In this interview, Ken and Lisa Jordan share their unique journey of establishing Accent American Inc, a successful cleaning and disaster restoration business.

The couple initially started with a simple carpet cleaning service, gradually incorporating services such as upholstery cleaning, water damage restoration, mold remediation, and crime scene cleanup.

Ken and Lisa attribute their success to high-quality work, professional certifications, networking, and mentorship.

The couple also shares personal anecdotes of overcoming significant obstacles and fostering a close-knit family business environment.

Despite the challenges in their industry, Ken and Lisa's passion for their work and commitment to their clients set them apart.

Timestamps of key moments:

00:00 Introduction and Meeting the Jordans

00:26 Ken's Early Career and Life Before Cleaning Business

05:09 How Ken and Lisa Met

13:10 Starting Their Cleaning Business

14:42 Growing the Business and Gaining Certifications

21:38 The Challenges and Rewards of Working Together

23:37 The Challenges of Property Management

25:06 Reality TV Show Experiences

26:04 Dealing with Infestations and Unusual Situations

27:04 Overcoming Personal Challenges

36:18 The Power of Networking and Referrals

38:38 The Importance of Certification and Education

43:29 The Future of the Business

Ken and Lisa can be reached through their website at https://accentamerican.com/

Hi.

Today we're celebrating Ken and

Lisa Jordan of Accent American Inc.

Cleaning and Disaster Restoration.

Hi, Ken and Lisa.

How you doing?

How are you?

Wonderful.

How are you?

Good.

We're so excited you're joining us today.

This is, this is going to be fun.

We're excited to be here.

Thank you.

So, how did your business get started?

Uh, Disaster Restoration, that sounds

like a big, Well, first of all, I, I

started a carpet cleaning business.

I worked my way, I majored in business

and finance and I worked my way

through school and, uh, was a bouncer

and checked out a bunch of jobs

and nobody was paying decent money.

I mean, uh, Kmart offered me a job

out of college, 18, 000 a year to

start and 60 to 80 hours a week.

And I made more money working

part time in college just

being dressed like a Chippen...

I was a bodybuilder.

So I dressed like a Chippendale on

ladies night to serve drinks to the

ladies and, uh, that started in the

eighties and I was making eight to twelve

hundred dollars in tips in one night.

It was easy to do back then.

Yeah, I waited tables also.

It was easy to make 800 bucks a night.

I remember when the

Chippendales were popular.

Yeah, they try to get me to do that too.

And I'm like.

They wanted me to, uh, join up

a group in London, and they got

busted for a patent infringement,

and then the guy got arrested for

having relations with a 15 year old.

Well, because Chippendale, Chippendale

is a very famous old furniture company.

Right.

Right.

And they took the name and didn't

get permission to use the name

Chippendale, and it is patented.

They got busted when they went to

England, which is where Chippendale is.

I also could have got into pro wrestling.

Uh, everybody's seen the actor The Rock.

I knew his father.

I trained with his father.

And he wanted to promote me in

pro wrestling along with Paul

Wallering and a few others.

And I was in college at the

time, so I couldn't do that.

But they were switching over.

to, from the Dusty Rhodes type look

to the bodybuilders, and I knew Hulk

Hogan, trained with him, and he had

just, uh, bodyguarded Cyndi Lauper,

and on stage he got noticed and he made

Rocky III, and after that wrestling went

crazy, but the main reason I couldn't

do it, they wanted me to fly to Japan,

I could do, you know, wrestling is

all fake, alright, and the Mount Sulu

wrestling school is a stunt school.

Like I would go to and I'd have to go to

that and that cost 10 grand, so I'm not

going to make it, but kind of wonder,

well, what would have happened if it did?

So did all of that physicality, uh,

play well into, you know, lead in well

into your, your business, your, your.

It didn't lead into the business, but

it definitely helped having all that

muscle and all that strength when

you're moving furniture and carrying

around big pieces of equipment.

Oh, sure.

I've seen him pick up a sofa and

carry it out the house on his back.

Yeah, won't do that now, but, not

at 64, but, um, yeah, it just.

I just saw an ad somewhere and it says,

you know, make a thousand dollars a week

and I'm sitting there How can you do that?

I was used to making that in a day

when nobody wanted to pay the kind

of money I made and Long story short.

I went to work for a company and it was

a bait and switch $595 or $495 a room

you go in And I'd watch what they did

and I'm like, you know, I don't agree

with this I didn't know what I was doing.

So I said, yeah, I can you

know do this better So now

granted this was the 80s, right?

So I'm walking in, I'm working in

biker shorts with a portable, a

tank top, just about making money.

And he was massively huge back then.

He's small now compared to what he

was and you know, he had a 12 pack

of you know, most of his clients were

women and some of them were having

their carpets cleaned once a month.

Aunt Lisa said, I met Lisa, she was

working at Roboconnie's And at Century

Finance, and at Cardi's Jewelry.

And I knew Jim Robiconti.

He was a legend in Tampa for nightclubs.

He's a big promoter in South America

now, and I knew him real well.

And I used to bounce for him.

And in the 80s, they had,

uh, best, 80s Bar contests.

Bar contests for, like, bodybuilders.

Best chest, best legs.

Well, they had them for women, too.

But I would go enter these,

and I'd win 500 bucks a week in

addition to making those tips.

Wow.

Because I'd go in and I'd win

bar tabs, I'd give away, but

I'd win about 500 bucks a week.

Go in there and I'd go in all

dressed, lousy and take off and

get on stage and pose and win.

So Jim calls me up and I'm

like, no, I don't wanna do that.

I, I'm too old to do that.

He said, now bring your best

friend, your but your buddies

and we'll give you free drinks.

And was cocktail waitress in there?

I was one of the waitresses, and Jim told

me to go recruit guys for this contest.

And he walked in with, Him and

five of his big massive buddies.

So of course I go right up and

try to recruit them So I didn't

tell her I was in the contest.

So i'm like, hey, you know Would you like

to get together sometime have a coffee?

Here's my card.

Nope.

Nope.

Don't have time I'm busy.

I work three jobs and I would come

in there Big story, long story short,

that, that contest that night, a big

fight broke out, some guy jumped on

stage and who shouldn't have been

there and he was severely overweight

and everybody's laughing and then he

cold cocked the bouncer busted his nose

open and I used to bounce with this guy

and had to rush him to the hospital.

So, get him all stitched up.

So after that I kept coming back.

Mm hmm.

And she's...

Yeah, I kept saying no.

I'm tipping her 5 a drink for 1.

75 beer.

And she's, no, no, no, no.

So...

Legitimately, I'm busy.

I was working two full time

jobs and a part time job.

I worked Monday through Friday

at the finance company, 8

to 5, with my two roommates.

And then I worked at the bar full time.

My only night off was Monday, because

on Saturday and Sunday during the day...

I worked for the jewelry store.

So when I asked her out, my buddies

there, now this sounds very egotistical,

but let's understand, in the 80s, the

way I was built, the women asked me out.

They'd come to the club, they'd want to

go out, just like the eye candy thing.

He was also a male model.

Yeah, I did some modeling too.

This was during the John

Travolta days, right?

Pretty much.

Yeah.

Well, I really kicked it off

after you had John Travolta.

Then you had the country

Western thing kicked off.

And right after that flash dance came out.

Yes.

I remember that when flash dance

came out, all the women, which the

gym became the new meat market.

And I was at a gym that was hardcore.

I mean, I dumbbell started at 50 pounds.

Oh, I'm playing with 180 pound dumbbells.

So the women would come in there,

you know, instead of going to

the happy hour to meet guys.

And we're like, what the heck?

Leg warmers and everything,

you know, and it stood out.

So then after that, all these

other clubs started coming.

Uh, and they were meat markets.

Ballys are, are, are all of that stuff.

Mm hmm.

So, pretty much.

Well, so what happened with that,

he kept coming in and talking to me.

And, you know, it was like six weeks

of him coming in every night and just

standing there, waiting for me to walk

by so he could talk to me a little bit.

And would ask me out all the

time, and I kept saying no.

And I thought, I only have one night

off, that's when I do my laundry.

And my buddies are laughing

and rolling on the floor.

She said no.

And I'm like, I know.

She said no.

I'm like, what's that?

At the finance company, my two roommates

worked at the finance company with me.

I was the only one with a car,

so I drove both of them to work

and drove them home every day.

Um, our boss was really cool

because most of the people who were

working there did collection work.

I got bumped up where I was

doing the actual posting onto

the account, so I didn't have to

make those phone calls anymore.

Nice.

But the one roommate, James, did off

site collection, so he would use my

card during the day to run and pick

up payments from people and bring it

back so they could post on the account.

Well, our boss would let us take

breaks with the radio contest.

Whenever they'd have dial in and win,

he'd go, Okay, everybody take five

minutes, dial in, see what you can win.

So we won a lot of stuff

because we're constant.

We had multiple lines, so we

could have five lines going at

the same time to the same number.

So on this particular day in July, I won

two tickets to a movie premiere party.

It's a Monday.

I'm off that night.

Asked both my roommates, which

one of you wants to go with me?

Oh, no, it's too late.

We'll get home too late, and I

gotta go to work in the morning.

I'm like, really?

I take you home, take a nap, get

dressed, and go back out to work

and get home at four o'clock in the

morning, then sleep for two hours

and wake you up to come to work.

You can't go out one night.

They're like, no, no, no.

So, my male roommate, James,

why don't you call that guy at

the club that keeps talking to

y'all and giving the guy a break?

Okay, thank you.

So, I am, um, getting

ready to go out the door.

I had another thing, I'm already

dressed and the answering machine rings.

And back to, so I stopped to

listen to the answering machine.

And it's like, hey, it's

Lisa from Robiconte's.

And she told me that story.

Can you be here in 30 minutes?

And I'm like, boom, called her up.

Where do you live?

She lived next to King High School.

I lived on the other side of Tampa.

I lived in apartments close to,

um, Town and Country, Hillsborough

and Memorial and it's five o'clock.

Alright?

So I'm like, oh my God.

So yeah, I'll be there.

So man, I drove like a ba.

I drove so fast, I hit a pothole,

busted my passenger door.

It started flopping open.

So I had to bungee cord.

You driving in the van, I

had a bungee cord that shut.

So I finally get to her apartment and

I start walking out the car and then

her roommate goes, My male roommate,

James, who was kind of built, nothing

like him, looks out the window and

he says, This guy, is he kind of big?

And I'm like, yeah.

He goes, Is that him?

And I'm like, yeah.

We lived on the second floor.

And he goes, Okay, see ya!

And ducks in his bedroom.

So, so she comes out, and Lisa,

Lisa had million dollar legs.

That's what attracted me to her.

Yes, and those five inch heels and a

miniskirt and I'm like, oh my god, you

know many so anyway I'm like you're

gonna have to get in on the driver's

door I just broke that door and she's

like, yeah, right So she goes in I make

sure I turn and I look the other way I

may I look at it and make sure he was

polite He would look at the other way

because I literally had to crawl over

the driver's seat in a micro miniskirt

Cross your legs before you sit down Yeah.

So, we get to Harbor Island, and it was

a, a club, what was the name of that club?

Blueberry Hill.

Blueberry Hill.

And she won a movie premiere, it

was a movie with Cindy Lauper,

Jeff Goldblum, about psychics.

We finally saw that movie

about two years ago.

Two years ago, this was thirty five years

ago that we were supposed to see it.

So we're talking and drinking,

and she, oh my god, can she drink?

I spent 280 on the bar tab and

she drank in the 80s and the 80s.

So, we end up back at Robiconte's

at about 2 in the morning and

everybody's cheering and clapping.

They're going, finally!

Yes!

So, anyway, after that,

that was our first date.

Prior to that, working in the club,

our boss, Jim, would have meetings with

The staff, the staff is mainly female.

He liked female bartenders,

female waitstaff, we had one

male bartender, and the bouncers

were the only other male crew.

So he would always tell us, ladies,

don't go out with the guys who come in

here, they're all crap, they're all, you

know, assholes, and that kind of thing.

And then one day he looked at me and

he says, except Kenny, he's a nice guy.

I said, what are you talking about?

I'm not seeing Kenny.

Why is everybody talking

to me about this Kenny guy?

So when we finally walked in, everyone

was like, yay, you finally got together.

That was our first date we've

been together ever since.

Wow.

We knew we were getting

married on the first date.

Yeah.

The things we talked about, having that

big house, a lot of land, Bunch of dogs.

Bunch of dogs, raising our own

crops, and that's where we are.

That's where we are.

We bought this in 99.

And so, naturally, um, I got

to tell her I had a business.

I had a carpet cleaning

business, upholstery cleaning.

And, uh, so.

She came on and she would help me with

the business and she would work, uh,

the bar and I told her you don't have,

you know, it's up to you, but you

don't need to work three jobs anymore.

We'll move in together,

put our bills together.

Uh, I'll have the business lease the car.

And we can use it and

write off the payments.

All right, and you put all your tips in

a jar Which turned out to put that all

that coins We had one of those big five

gallon zephyr health bottles and I would

bring home the change for my tips Which

is quarters always we filled up that jar.

It was over six thousand dollars helped

us put a down payment on our first house

Yes Because we needed to come up with

like uh, ten thousand or something.

We bought the first house in 89 So, I

met her in 88, and then, not, uh, yeah,

towards, yeah, 89, we got in there.

89, we bought the house,

we got married in 90.

Then we bought this place in 99, and

so she would help me with the business.

I'd drag her out in the field.

Well, I would, I would come home in the

evening and help him with paperwork,

which he's horrible at paperwork.

So we bought a computer and I started

putting things into, you know,

the computer bookkeeping program

for him and that kind of stuff and

making sure that all the bills got

paid so he didn't have to do that.

And I also made him

start wearing a uniform.

Yeah, we found out about

certifications back then.

It was called the IICUC.

ICRC now, and I became a certified

triple master in the industry.

So, uh, in terms of what that means,

they teach at Purdue university now

as a 10 year course, and there's

less than 500, 550 people worldwide

who have his level of certification.

So that question,

what sets you apart in the industry?

He's a ICRC certified triple master.

Um, you ever look at his list of

actual certifications, it fills up

a full page and we figured it was

over 10, on the sleeve, over 10,

000 hours of classroom training.

Plus Q Gon, plus testing, plus for certain

ones you have to get the certification and

then be a journeyman for two to four years

and show actual proficiency in the field.

And he was also what they

call a performance assessor,

where they would take.

Say, you were a carpet cleaner, you would

come to the assessment and we would help

on the side, run you through certain

tasks, like, how do you measure chemicals

properly and people don't know how to

measure pH and how do you measure pH?

How do you pull back the carpet?

Clean and replace the pad when there's

pet urine and then reinstall the carpet,

different things like that, and you'd

get a grade, pass or fail, and it's a

way for companies to say, okay, so John

does great here, but he needs help here,

so this is what we need to work on him

for, and he was one of the assessors.

I got dragged in behind

him to kind of help.

Yeah.

Okay.

So it's sort of an

external quality control.

Yeah.

It's done by third party people

who've been trained and assess

themselves to be experts.

Now, moving ahead.

Naturally, when you had a water

loss, we didn't have water

damage restoration back then.

We had to invent it.

So what happened, who would you call?

You'd call a guy that sucked water out.

And then you'd say, well,

can you dry this or that?

So we'd put fans down.

Lo and behold, we think

we're drying, but we're not.

The walls started molding and all

of this, so mold became a big issue.

I don't know if you remember the

Melinda Ballard case in Texas, where

their family got sick from mold.

They had to sue Farmer's Insurance.

And, uh, they wanted, they had to,

you know, tear the house down, so

that's when Aaron Brockovich came in.

Took over and basically, you know,

after she made that movie, she became

the lawyer and she took that ball case.

So now they came up with

a certification for mold.

We came up with a certification for

water damage, how to do it and dry

it properly so you wouldn't get mold.

We've served on committees that

help establish these standards.

He just recently did a committee

to rewrite which one was it?

Deodorization.

And they dragged me in for

some reason, even though I

don't have the certification.

Yeah, so what happened is, so

naturally, one thing led to another.

So carpet led to upholstery, which

led to tile and grout, which led to

this, which led to floor, which led

to water damage, rug, cleaning, all

different certifications, drying a

building out, crime scene cleanup.

Uh, biohazard remediation.

COVID cleanups.

All of that.

So that's where we grew to.

Okay, so you didn't start with

the crime scene part of it.

That was much later.

It was simple carpet cleaning and

they each built on each other.

Okay.

And I once had someone ask me

how they kind of correlate with

carpet and upholstery cleaning

and disaster restoration.

Well, if you clean carpet, you

usually have some kind of equipment.

We have the big truck that sucks.

Some people use portables.

We have a bigger truck.

If you have water damage,

you suck up the water first.

So you need the big truck that sucks.

And the last thing you do on a

water damage restoration job is

you clean the floors as you go out.

Fire.

If you have a fire, what do

they use to put out the fire?

Water.

So again, you need the

big truck that sucks.

Plus we use the big truck

to clean everything.

And again, we clean the

floors on the way out.

So again, you're dealing with the

water situation, and you use the

drying equipment, and you still use

the big truck that sucks, because

we tear out the drywall, and then we

wash down the sides and the floor,

and again, we clean the floor.

It's the last thing we do.

That separates us from our

competition in this way.

Think of a national franchise,

any of them, that do what we do.

They do not want to dry anything.

They want to rip it all out.

In our industry, in order to

learn drying, they had to build

homes and flood them and dry them.

And we successfully dried carpet

padding and drywall from clean water

losses without ripping anything out.

Over 400 times.

In this house that they use.

Yeah, and drying of drywall

makes it stronger and harder.

You don't have to cut it out.

But if it takes you three, let's

say, uh, 2, 000 square foot house

flooded completely, it might

take us $5,000 to dry that out.

But my competitor wants to come in and

take out 2 to 4 feet of drywall, put

everything in storage, rip out all the

carpet, pad, floor, rip out all the

cabinets, hit you for a hundred grand..

I'm dry in 3 to 5 days.

Your house is tied up

for six to eight months.

And they have to...

any cleaning from a fire, they sub

out They don't know how to do it.

Yeah, we do it ourselves.

So why?

Now from a business model It's easy

to invest a half a million dollars in

equipment to make less They would rather

hire three guys with a razor knife go in

And i'm sorry, i'd rather do it ethically

in the right way Yeah, plus I can do

ten jobs for five thousand dollars each

while they're I've been stuck on this one

for eight months and I'm only in a month

and I still got the other seven months

to do those and three to five thousand.

Now, think about it.

Alright, your house, a pipe breaks.

Alright.

And um, you got a company that can

dry everything out and guarantee it.

No odor, no mold, no nothing.

Alright, your, your insurance.

So, we had to argue with

the insurance a lot.

Oh, carpet and pad molds.

No, it doesn't.

It's plastic.

Alright.

Tupperware, you don't throw

Tupperware away when the food molds.

Hey, there's so much, there's so

much crap wrong about mold, and I

could talk three hours just on mold.

All right.

And, uh, so it naturally, you know, came

to, for, you know, to fruition that way.

Okay.

Now you've got to tell me what

do you guys love most about

working together as family?

We are together.

We get along great.

We love working together.

We don't have to have time apart.

We spend all our time together

and we, I, I, I've trained her.

And honestly, when it comes to cleaning,

especially crime scene, women are better.

Men are lousy.

Men make lousy cleaners.

They are not, when I got to do

detail cleaning, be it fire or

be it mold or trauma, women.

But for the level that we clean at, it's

way beyond your housekeeper type cleaning.

Right.

Because we are looking for blood borne

pathogens and, you know, viruses and

bacteria where they're just looking

for skin polished surface cleaners.

Sometimes when we go through and clean

to disinfect, it doesn't look pretty.

That comes later.

You got water stains on your mirror.

Okay, this is about getting it to pass

a test saying you are healthy clean.

We clean carpets and

the floors the same way.

Like if you mop your floor,

you're not cleaning anything.

What happens as soon as you

squeeze the mop in the wringer

and dip it back in the water?

Well, one of the things we really

enjoy is every day is different for us.

We don't have like this set schedule.

It's not just a job, it's an adventure.

We don't know what's

going to happen tomorrow.

We work with a lot of property managers.

We had one, we're still waiting for

them to pull the trigger on, that

their tenant was getting evicted.

Um, before they could

get him out, he died.

Um, he was there for ten

days before they found him.

And his poor little dog got hungry.

It wasn't a little dog.

He was about...

His poor dog got hungry.

So, the situation...

He's dead.

So now they have to find his family.

And they can't do anything with

the unit even though they were

in the process of eviction.

He hadn't been legally evicted yet.

They can't do anything with the unit

until the family is notified, and

it has gone through probate, and the

family has the ability to come and

take whatever possessions they want.

It was flea infested?

Well, and in the meantime, we go over

there to do just some basic cleanup, and

they had the power turned off because he

didn't pay his bill because he's dead.

And now they're trying to get the

power turned back on, but because

of the probate situation, the power

company is going no way to do anything.

So they're, they're stuck and they've got

this unit that they can do nothing with.

There's no rent coming in and

no hope of any rent coming in

until probate goes through.

We ran equipment to knock down most

of the odor so they can at least get

in and, and to get the contents out.

Yeah, well, this is the same property

manager who during Ian had one of his

houses that was rented to a family

and three huge oak trees fell on it.

Boom.

Boom.

Boom.

Went through the roof.

Came through the roof.

Came through the ceiling into the

living room while the family was

having a birthday party in the room.

Luckily, they were in the

dining room and nobody got hurt.

Broke the trusses and everything.

And.

We went in and just cleaned

up all the mess up and dry it.

Yeah So you could actually walk through

the building without flipping and falling

And then the tree crew came in and

pulled the tree out and made a huge mess

again, so we had to go and clean it.

Sounds like you guys could have a second

division selling insurance because with

all your stories We've been contacted

for reality shows, um twice Discovery

channel and the problem was they want

drama They want you to make up stuff.

Yeah What the hell's

wrong with you or this?

The first time, they said take some video.

So I'm out in the field and we

had, we were working with a general

contractor and his crew on a mold job.

And we're in there in the old suits and

everything and ripping out drywall and

I'm taking video and I send it to them and

they go, Well, where, where's the drama?

You know, we need you guys like

fighting and bickering at the same time.

It doesn't work like that with us.

We don't we don't have that kind of stuff.

And then the 2nd, 1 dirty,

rotten, dirty, rotten cleaners.

We're supposed to and they interviewed

us and they were just getting ready to

start filming when something happened

in the background and we got cut.

Well, right after that happened, we had

a, um, a major hoarder house with spiders.

We had a house that was infested

with spiders and German roaches.

Plus, he was a 40 year

smoker, so there was nicotine.

Plus, he had a couple of cats

that were using his dirty clothes

laying on the floor as their potty.

So that would have been a

huge one for their show.

Then we had another crime scene.

We had the one where the guy had the

aneurysm and then bled out in his

chair in the 8, 000 square foot house.

We had all these interesting stuff.

So I emailed him.

I said you're missing out on all of

it Because people see episodes of

their show and they're like there's

nothing there, but they're bickering

at each other They're not really

doing anything interesting like you.

When they interviewed the first interview.

I said, what do you want to talk about?

Blood, mold or crap?

Oh yeah, he's our guy.

Okay, ask a question.

What a shame.

I was I was playing basketball on a

carpeted court for wheelchair patients.

My.

My thighs look like Earl

Campbell, if you've ever watched

Earl Campbell running back.

Huge.

Alright, I was about 260,

you know, really big.

So I ran down the court to make a

fast break and the carpet gave loose

and I blew both patella tendons.

At the same time.

That's the one that's...

from your kneecap going down.

Oh, yeah.

So they rushed me to Brandon Hospital.

They didn't know what to do.

His kneecap flew up into his thigh.

So they had to.

I finally got to Florida Orthopedic.

Met, uh, Thomas Bernassi.

Well, first we went to Brandon Regional

and they kept you on a stretcher in the

ER with monitors on you for 24 hours

and the doctor never came to see him.

Did nothing.

He did nothing.

We didn't have health insurance.

We'd just gotten married a year before.

Not even a year before, so

brought him home and then someone

said, go to temple general.

So we had a friend who

had a van in a wheelchair.

So we loaded him up in the back of

the van in the wheelchair and hauled

him off the temple general and Dr.

Thomas Burnett.

They happened to be on duty that night

and we told him we don't have insurance.

It's not don't worry about it.

Dr.

Burnett picked him up and didn't

know if he'd ever walk again.

So this is.

Than a year after we got

married and then shortly after

that, found out I'm pregnant.

He was the main, how soon after that?

Uh, it was just a couple months later

that we found out I was pregnant.

And, and you still didn't know

if he was ever gonna walk?

Mm-hmm.

I had no idea.

Mm-hmm.

He was still laying on

the sofa, unable to walk.

When I came in and told him that I

was pregnant, I sat in a ccpm machine

that gets a thing that would work.

Work your legs for two months.

Mm-hmm.

, go, go to the bathroom.

And I have buddies after a while.

I said, pick me up, take me to the

gym so I can at least work upper body.

It got so bad, I finally said, I got to

go to work, wires are not, they had to

put a screw through my kneecap and a screw

through my bone and, and the lower bone

and wrap it with wire to hold it together.

Well, timing, both my trucks blew

up and, um, didn't have the money to

rebuild my engine, so I borrowed a used,

bought a used truck, it was stick shift,

Ford, so as I'm driving down the road,

I'm pushing the clutch, wire breaks.

I hired another kid.

He had fetal alcohol syndrome,

but he could, he could work, to

do what I needed and pay him.

Well, we also had my brother in law, one

of his friends, uh, came and took our

truck and did some of the cleaning jobs

for us, so we would have some income.

Because I'm working part time, and my

story on that, I was working, I left

the nightclub, I was working in a

hotel, in the bar, just serving drinks

a couple nights a week for extra money.

I went to my boss and told

him what happened and he

goes, what can we do to help?

I said, I need more

money and I need it now.

Yeah.

So he said, okay, I've got like paperwork

and stuff in the office that you can

do for me and we'll pay you for it.

So I went back and started doing

all of his reports and all of

the paperwork for the food and

beverage operation in this hotel.

Well, the corporate office saw

that the reports were coming

on in time and accurate.

And they said, well, what's going on?

And he told them, well, you know,

Lisa's working in there part time.

doing all of this for me.

Well, they created a full time position

for me for 30, 30 grand a year,

which in 1990, pretty decent money,

plus full health insurance benefit.

And I found out later that I

was pregnant, so it was covered,

but that created a position.

From there, I went to become,

in less than eight months,

assistant to the general manager.

At nine months pregnant, they promoted me.

To assistance to the general manager

and human resources director.

And then after she left, when the

hotel got taken over, which they do

frequently every four years, I moved

to a different hotel and was assistant

to the regional vice president.

So that incident is part

of the career for me.

They got a computer and she

figured out how to work it and

programmed it and created computer

software to run their programs.

So really, it was simple stuff,

but I'll say she got an IQ of 169.

And I'm a natural one.

She got me beat.

I'm 1

41.

Yeah, absolutely.

Don't ever play scrabble

words with friends.

That's so you guys,

you guys overcame that.

Apparently you heal because I healed.

I had to teach myself to walk and

uh, and I had and every time I push

that clutch to stab me in the 10.

Well, the minute I told him I'm pregnant

is that that was the spark that got

him up and I've got to do something.

I've got a child to support now.

I've got to, I've got to go.

He'd run upstairs carrying a floor

shampoo weren't affordable because

I didn't have a truck mount yet.

And when it came to a truck mount, I

found one in a junkyard and built it

when I got well and put it in a truck.

So my first couple I built

because back then good truck

mounts were running 40 grand.

All right.

Now there are hundreds.

So, I built the system.

If you ever see our big red truck,

we drive around, we work on it.

It's about 250 grand to

outfit that truck today.

We got lucky with it.

We, we bought the truck used the

truck mount unit that's in it.

It's a funny story.

We got lots of stories..

We get, we go to our annual

conference every year usually

either in Vegas or another city.

It was just in Fort Lauderdale.

Yeah.

And they would have these raffle

prizes where you buy a dollar

ticket and you stick it in the

cup for the prize you want to win.

And I always win some stuff.

I still do.

They don't do raffle tickets anymore.

They do it different, but

I always win something.

So, we go in and they're drawing for the

prizes and I win a machine called a CRB.

It's a counter rotating brush machine.

You use it to clean floors

and it helps get up.

It pulls the nap up.

It pulls the nap up on the carpet.

Well, Ken has been talking

to a guy named Troy.

Troy had a truck mount cleaning

unit that was down here in Tampa

at the shop around the corner.

No, he shipped it to the shop.

Or he shopped it.

There was something wrong with it.

Needed rebuilt.

Needed to be rebuilt.

And they had been negotiating talking

about can he maybe buying it from him.

Well, Troy comes running over to me

and he goes, hey, I'll trade you that

truck mount unit for that CRB machine.

So the joke is, I got the

truck mount for a dollar.

Because I paid one dollar, I won

the truck mount and traded it.

It's about a...

The other machines were about two

grand, so I had a buddy rebuild it.

To buy that machine today...

It's ridiculous.

So it's very powerful.

I mean, probably one of the most

powerful machines you can buy.

So we got into that.

Yeah, we got into that for a dollar.

Wow, that's quite a story.

Yeah.

I won another machine too.

I won another machine that's what, 6, 000?

Yeah, that portable we use for high rises.

They would draw your name

and I kept joking around.

I'm going to win that grand prize.

I'm going to win that grand prize.

And we're at a pool party in Vegas.

And Ken's sitting at the table with my

mother, and they're drawing prizes, so

I get up and walk around to the opposite

side of the pool, where the podium

and the stage is, and I'm just kind of

standing there, next to a tree, waiting,

and all of a sudden, Larry, the guy

who runs the show, who knows us very

well, pulls out the name for the grand

prize, and he looks around, and he goes,

I've never seen her run so

fast in those stilettos, man.

My mom's like, what's going on?

And Ken's like, she just won something.

She's up on the stage.

And then he sees me standing next

to this big portable machine.

He's like, oh, she just

won the grand prize.

Keep going on some interesting stories.

Oh yeah.

We've got 30, I think

you guys have a book.

I think you got an absolutely

natural book of, of stories that

you could probably Oh, I could write

a book based on a lot of things.

Oh yeah, absolutely.

If nothing else, your, your beginning

years and, and subsequently, yeah.

I knew very famous people.

I knew Dr.

Martin Luther King Jr.

As a kid.

I sat on his lap.

Uh, my Jesse Jackson's, uh,

stepmother read us Bible stories.

Um, we had the same birthday.

And, uh, that's where I got my,

uh, conservative values from.

And, um, my mother was best

friends with Anne Frank.

She's from Holland.

Holland, The Diary of Anne Frank.

Yeah.

So my mom lived, was in Holland

under occupation by the Nazis.

Yeah, she unfortunately died

at the age of 84 in Frankfurt.

Oh, I'm sorry.

Her family was in the Dutch underground.

Um, I mean, yeah, you've got to start,

you've got a publishing, uh, career again.

Yeah.

Is there anything about being in a family

business that you know now that you wish

you had known when you started this.

I wish we had known more about

the Small Business Administration.

Because we didn't know any of that in

the small business development council.

We didn't know that and well, I try

to get an SBA loan and I couldn't.

Okay, so I had to I had to basically

my vehicles I had to pay for

where we, we pay for everything.

We got, we didn't get any loans.

The only time we got a loan

was when my dad was working for

General Motors and I could buy a

vehicle with option a and get like.

A discount and you can finance the truck

mount with the truck at five percent and

I did that twice with two trucks Okay

Minimizing debt in your business

Yeah, use your money wisely.

I mean, you know, we're practically

debt free Yeah, our goal is to pay

the house and the one credit card we

took out to buy the generators, right?

We're paying Payments

are 70 bucks a month.

We're paying 500.

So knock it out of the way.

Yeah.

Well, so if somebody's listening

to this, um, in the future, what

service area is within reach?

Do you go across the country or?

No, we don't go across the country.

It's just two of us.

We do mainly Hillsborough,

Pinellas, Polk and Pasco.

We do a lot of work down in

the Sarasota- Bradenton area.

We work with Neal Communities,

which is a huge builder up there.

So, if there's any builders up there,

we do some amazing things with floor

cleaning, like removing paint, drywall

dust, uh, wood glue, that kind of

stuff, we can get all of that off.

Post- construction cleaning?.

Shaw Mills referred me to them.

I had to develop the system,

because I couldn't get it out, so

I developed a system that works.

Yeah.

So, for somebody to reach you, I

know your website is Accent American.

Accent, like, accent on a...

Right.

And American, there's an N on the end.

American.

Yeah.

With an N.

American.

Yeah.

And I'll make sure I put

that in the show notes.

Um, it's phone number there

or through the website better.

Um, you can phone us if people want to

contact us by phone at 813 621 6015.

That's what you call when

you want it really clean.

All right.

If I could give advice to mostly

to consumers, um, You got to be

careful of national franchises

because they're not certified.

The only certification,

you can't create your own.

The only certification is the

Institute of Inspection, Cleaning

and Restoration Certification.

So anyone going in, anyone

can get in this business.

They get an occupational

license to do business.

They say I'm licensed.

They get insurance and bonding, but

they don't know what they're doing Go to

school and learn learn the science first.

Yeah Definitely learn this way to get

into this kind of business definitely

go to the IICRC Then get in some of the

the facebook groups that are out there

Um truck mount forums is an amazing

one Rob is great about supporting other

people and he doesn't allow any crap.

He doesn't allow people to bash each other

Or someone to try and steer someone wrong

deliberately cleaners connect cleaners

connect is another There's a lot of people

out there who are willing and able to help

you if you want to get into this Yeah,

someone can run any business look for

those look for those chamber of commerce

is great for that Give me an example

Let's say you bought a brand new carpet

and you have the new warranty required.

You got to clean it every 12 to

18 months whether it looks dirty

or not because of soil and sand.

You got to have an

IICRC certified cleaner.

If you hire just anybody and they

come in and they spray a pH about 10.

6 You just fried your stain protection.

You never even knew it.

It's gone.

Yeah, one of the one of the biggest

Things I tell business people all the

time is network get out there meet

people We don't spend any money on

advertising or marketing None at all.

Zero.

She, we track every call.

We it for years because of networking.

It's referral.

We started networking heavily

back in oh seven and made lots of

great contacts and we foster those

relationships with those people.

We make sure we stay in front of 'em.

We make sure we keep in touch.

That's where our business comes from,

is from that small circle is where

we're getting all of our business.

Beginning when you in a new company,

you're going to be, you got to create

a customer base problem with people who

call you see SEOs and stuff like that.

They don't work for us

because let's be honest.

If you're at the, if you're in house

floods and you're at the computer,

you're not going to go online to

look for a water damage company.

You probably go call your insurance or

call someone, you know, you're going to

call your neighbor or your mom or somebody

and go, Hey, this is what happened.

What do I do?

Because people don't know what to do.

Now, if you want to clean a carpet

or a floor and you don't know

what to ask, we've educated, but.

People how to market us and referral.

You don't know what to ask.

So you go, you see an advertisement

or you see something on Google and

you call and your first question is

how much I don't have time for how

much I don't have time to explain.

I don't need 1000 calls a day.

To spend 10 minutes trying to book someone

I'm going to book someone that hey you

so and so used you and I want to do

boom Right, they're ready to hire us and

pay so how much callers are the leads?

We don't want leads.

No, we want referrals.

And that's the hardest

thing to explain To an SEO.

We can get you the phone rings I don't

want the phone to ring with someone I

have to sell to And getting back to that

you're asking how how to communicate

with us I communicate with my clients

the way they want to communicate.

If they want to go on to Facebook and

get to us through Facebook Messenger,

I will respond, text message, LinkedIn,

Instagram, however they feel most

comfortable with how I deal with them.

She said clients, not customers.

There's a big difference in our industry.

A client values you.

Customer values price and they just keep

moving to the next price And a lot of

these guys get caught up and they go

out of business and guys like us buy up

their equipment Because they they pay

for all this stuff and point for click

and this and they got no work coming

in So they end up going really really

cheap to get volume and they're stuck and

they work themselves to death They can't

afford an oil change change the tire.

They can't afford the right

insurance It all compounds.

Because you're selling a service.

If Coke or Pepsi, if

you're like Coke or Pepsi.

Either one.

Yeah, you're going to

buy it, which is cheaper.

You can measure it, you can

touch it, you can feel it.

But you can't with a service.

Sounds like you've got a

consulting business there.

You could also start . Oh, I, yeah.

And that's the hardest

thing to explain to people.

Well, there, there's several

companies in this area that we

have mentored in this business.

Yeah.

I've helped our competitors because

the more of us they are, the more who?

The tide rise.

The boats rise.

Yes.

Yes.

Exactly.

That's the crap floating in the water.

And you can clean it up.

So what we do right now, other

than a damage, we probably

don't work most 20 hours.

Two, three days a week.

That's it, but we're higher end.

And we built our lifestyle, we got our

stuff paid off, you know, because at some

point we're going to walk away from this.

Not yet, we still love it.

Now I'm going to die here

on this property, sorry.

Well, if someone, I mean.

Well, it's about a million.

We have eight acres and we've got

our cows and we've got our chickens.

We've had our pigs in the

past, got our crop, got our

garden and that kind of stuff.

And it's peaceful and it's quiet and.

We have great neighbors, so, and

our daughter is a block away.

We turned down a wonderful...

So, you brought that up.

A lot of family businesses, you know, the

concern in a family business is, is that

succession of what, what happens to the

business when I'm no longer able to work.

You don't want it.

She doesn't want it.

She has no interest, so we get to the

point where we're going to retire.

We would just say, hey, you know,

come buy the equipment here.

Okay, so you're basically just,

your plan is to liquidate and

just shut the business down.

Unless somebody wants to take

that name, then, I mean, if they

want to buy the business as a

whole, then we would sell it.

Now, we turned down a 1.

6 million dollar offer in 2009

from a builder, but we said,

if someone comes along with 3,

4 million, I will consider it.

Yeah, you know, because 1, 000, 000, 1.

6, you go buy a house for 600, 000.

You can't live on 1,

000, 000 for 30 years.

I, I, I couldn't.

Well, our financial planner said if we

had 750, 000 to invest, we could retire.

Well, that's that.

Yeah.

But, but so a million.

Well, it sounds like with, you know,

the ability to sell insurance to

create a publishing empire with all

your stories and to consult with

other cleaners, you know, that you

could do basically over the Internet.

Multiple options.

Yeah, this has been such a pleasure.

Thank you so much for joining us on our

podcast I see another interview coming.

We will see you soon.