Tyler from Business in the Borough interviews Pat Lordi about his entrepreneurial journey. Pat describes his initial experiences growing up in a hardware store and then taking over the business at a young age after his father's passing. He explains the struggles he faced and the decisions he made that helped him grow the business, including his shift from retail to wholesale. He talks about the importance of hard work, customer relations and understanding the industry. Pat also shares the story of how a soft pretzel at a trade show led him to land a major customer. Finally, he discusses selling his business with his family and the importance of adaptability in entrepreneurship.

00:11 Introduction and Background

00:25 The Start of an Entrepreneurial Journey

00:40 Taking Over the Family Business

01:24 Lessons from Father and the Decision to Become a Businessman

02:06 The Impact of Early Business Experiences

03:04 Transitioning from Retail to Wholesale

04:17 Breaking into the Property Management Industry

06:05 Scaling the Business and Overcoming Challenges

07:07 Reaching the Million Dollar Milestone

07:59 Strategies for Continued Growth

11:41 The Importance of Personal Relationships in Business

12:45 Leveraging Trade Shows for Business Growth

16:28 Advice for Aspiring Entrepreneurs

19:46 The Journey to Becoming a Self-Made Millionaire

20:04 Reflections and Future Plans

22:04 Conclusion and Preview of Next Episode

Hey, Murfreesboro, this is Tyler with Business in the Borough.

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where every business has a story and

every story deserves to be heard.

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Now, throughout this podcast, we're

going to be interviewing local businesses

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throughout Murfreesboro, but today

I've got a special treat for you guys.

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All the way from Pennsylvania to

you he's Pat Lordi, to me, it's

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dad, the one that inspired me to

start my entrepreneurial journey.

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Pat Lordi: I grew up in the, in a

retail hardware store with my father

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who was in the business for many years.

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Back in 1985, , unfortunately he

passed away and left the business.

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Pat Lordi: I decided to

take the business over.

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Based on my experiences with him

learning through him as a young child

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growing up in the store, starting

off as a floor sweeper and inventory

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clerk learning the books, et cetera.

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It inspired me to really do my own thing.

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And yeah, it was quite a journey.

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It started with when he passed

away, running the hardware store.

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Unfortunately, after a year, my mother

ended up selling the business and it

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left me with a crossroads of a decision

to make do I go to work for somebody or

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do I take what I learned from my father

and apply it to being an entrepreneur?

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And I decided to second.

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There we go.

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I decided to become a business man.

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And that's what it began.

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Tyler Lordi: So you could say really

being an entrepreneur is in our blood.

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Pat Lordi: It certainly was in mine and

I really didn't think, I thought I would

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have a longer journey with him, with my

father, but I never thought of myself

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doing anything different, to be honest.

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It's all I ever knew as a kid growing up,

listening to his business stories watching

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him conduct business as a professional and

similar to your childhood, it was a win.

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It was better than any

college course I ever took.

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For sure.

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Tyler Lordi: Definitely.

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That college was pretty expensive.

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It was an expensive hobby.

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You could say,

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Pat Lordi: yeah, I felt

that a couple of times.

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Tyler Lordi: Talking about, your dad, what

was one of the best stories that, he told

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you that kind of impacted, your decision.

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Pat Lordi: Some of the life

lessons are really important.

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So what you go through in

your life lessons as a child.

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Through character moments, through

teachings, oftentimes apply to business.

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So I remember my father always telling

me when I was that 13 year old doing his

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general ledgers and I knew what to do when

I was giving him advice at 13 years old.

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He used to tell me to be quiet.

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Open my eyes and listen.

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And, a lot of times we speak first

and we don't really hear what people

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have to say or what their needs

or concerns are before we speak.

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So I thought that was valuable.

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And obviously learning how to talk to

people and the importance of customer

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relations and how my father really dealt

with his customers as the most important

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aspect of his business is really where

I learned and applied it on my own.

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Tyler Lordi: Yeah, and you can

take that a long way for sure.

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Mom sold the business.

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What did you do next?

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Pat Lordi: Here we go.

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What do I do?

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Obviously you go from a little

bit of security to zero.

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And a lot of people that start a business

oftentimes don't have guarantees.

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There's no recipe for 100 percent success.

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It's a crapshoot sometimes.

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And it certainly was for me as

a 18 year old, what do I do?

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So I decided to go out and hustle.

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And part of what I could do the

best is to go out and hustle.

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I started a company in the little

bit different than a brick and mortar

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that my father had as a retail store.

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I decided to start a wholesale company

selling to contractors, hardware

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supplies, construction supplies.

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Et cetera.

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And I was running around in my own

vehicle, just going to job sites and going

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to customers and selling for a living.

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And it worked out well, the

construction industry is a little bit

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unstable, it's unstable, especially

on the financial side, because

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unfortunately you might have somebody.

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doing contracting work in one town

and then the next day they're gone.

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So it was a little bit

of a eye opener, right?

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But it really enabled me to get my start.

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And after a couple of years, I thought

that there would be more for me.

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I decided to dive into a little

bit of a different industry.

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That's when I went to rep for a company

out of Maryland who was breaking into

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the New Jersey, Pennsylvania market

selling to apartment buildings to

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property management and within two

months I became their top salesperson,

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came off of salary, went to draw and

decided to do that for the next year.

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Tyler Lordi: That's awesome.

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Now talk to us about how you

got to that level so quickly.

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A lot of people take forever, especially

they're they're young and they're

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trying to ramp up their sales skills.

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What kind of stood apart with

you versus everyone else?

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How did you get to that level so quickly?

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Pat Lordi: Hard work, customer relations.

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I really didn't have, they didn't have a

clientele base in the Pennsylvania market.

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So it was up to me to knock on

doors and to use a high level of

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persistence to establish clients.

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There's obviously, they had a reputation

in the Maryland market that kind of

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carried them, up into the Pennsylvania.

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New Jersey market.

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But that's when I really finalized

that, when you're still repping

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for somebody you have, you're

not a full entrepreneur, right?

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You're not, you're working for

somebody versus working for yourself.

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And that's what I

realized after 12 months.

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of being their top salesperson

that I wanted much more.

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So I advanced my sales rep

mentality and started picking up

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different product lines at the time.

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I still had my company, but I

wasn't fully engulfed into the

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property management industry.

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After I left that company within a year,

that's when I decided to go full scale

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on my own into the apartment industry

with my connections, with very little

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resource, very little finance, but decided

to start the beginning process of growth.

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So when you do that, the

risk obviously is dramatic.

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It's pretty, pretty high intense.

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But at the end of the day, I

felt confidence in myself that

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I could go out and I could sell.

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And I could build customer relationships.

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It was just a question of now I'm building

my own part numbers and I'm starting

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to establish the beginning phases of my

company with a little bit of experience

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that I had certainly as a child growing

up in the hardware business, but certainly

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into that property management industry.

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So as we started climbing $400k, $500k,

$600, we started reinvesting into new

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Inventory, we started to look at the

way we were buying material tried to buy

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things a little bit less expensive based

on volume, looking at alternative product

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categories that may have been an option.

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So if you didn't want the best

product in a certain category,

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we had a secondary option that

was a little bit less expensive

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and a little bit less in quality.

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So not everybody wants the best, not

everybody wants the worst, right?

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So that certainly helped

us get to that next tier.

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And we started to approach

a million dollars.

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And then I said to myself,

Jeez, this is doable.

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We had the recipe, we

had the customer base.

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We had really pushed to grow each customer

to gain an all exclusive relationship

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with customers where they can rely on

us for just about everything they need

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to purchase because of our dependability

and our product, best product offering.

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That they didn't really need to shop

with two or three different vendors.

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So that started to really increase

our numbers and get to that, that

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first million dollar plateau.

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Once we hit it, I remember

sitting in the office going, I

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can't believe I just did that.

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What a great thrill.

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The problem is now you get to a million.

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Now you're wondering how to get to 1.

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5.

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Tyler Lordi: More money,

more problems, right?

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Yeah, no, definitely.

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I'm sure that was an amazing

feeling, but I don't obviously

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know it didn't end there.

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So what do you, what did you do?

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What did you decide to be like,

okay, this is what we're gonna do

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next to get to that next level.

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Pat Lordi: Push a little harder.

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Obviously we had our

established relationships.

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We had our reputation.

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The foundation was built.

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The dependability and the

industry reputation was there.

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Where I thought it was time to really amp

up a little bit and so we added a person.

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We had an additional employee.

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Again, we reinvested into

additional inventory.

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We bought a second truck, we hired

a second driver, and that could

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really elevate our distribution,

which certainly affects our numbers.

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So it was really a situation

where we were ready to launch.

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And our goal was not the 1.

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5, but it was to get to 2 million.

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The other thing that happened

was we started concentrating.

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On companies that had maybe

six, eight, 10, 12 properties.

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So we wanted to try and

add at least one portfolio.

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We did that probably about maybe

15 years in 12 to 15 years in,

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we added another portfolio.

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We were ready.

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We certainly would have been ready.

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The first eight years, seven years, but

we were ready and we added, and that

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certainly allowed us to jump over that 1.

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5 into that 1.

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8, almost 2 million range.

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And now all of a sudden we had to

ask ourselves, okay, part of what

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we need to do as entrepreneurs is

assess our daily situation and what

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it is that we're looking to do.

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Are we accomplishing our goals?

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Are we still staying within our

principles that we establish?

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And the foundation that we established.

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And are we able to fulfill

our customer needs?

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To their expectations and if we're not

able to do that, do we continue to push

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forward or do we take a step backwards

and fortunately I was able to, again,

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ramp up, get ourselves in a situation

where we're now handling 2 million and

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then the question now becomes, okay,

what's the next, what's the next step

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and eventually what's going to happen is

you're going to put people in positions

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to allow you to help you do that, right?

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Can you rely on other people more

than yourselves as an entrepreneur?

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My answer is no, but it's like very

hard at the end of the day, if you can

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get mind like people and you can get

people that understand the importance

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of what the company's trying to do

and how it's important to take care of

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clientele, then I think you're fine.

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So we had gotten over that 2 million hump.

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We went to a different, a little bit

larger facility and really tried to

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kind of balance all the challenges.

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Now, again, there's financial challenges.

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I've never used commercial credit.

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Certainly didn't use it

throughout this time.

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All of our inventory was always paid for.

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And one of the other factors

too, is evaluating your finances.

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When entrepreneurs have a business,

they oftentimes wear different hats,

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they're the salesperson, they're

the inventory control expert,

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they're the warehouse manager.

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They're the accountant, right?

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And so you have to really know what your

company is tolerating on a daily basis and

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whether it's time to take that next step.

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And I felt it was time.

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Really the difference between us going

from 2 million to 3 million was adding

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another portfolio, which we were able

to do, which literally took us about

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a million dollars up in an uptick.

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Now all of a sudden we got a different

set of problems this is when you

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started to come into the picture after

graduating with honors from college.

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Now you come in and all of a sudden.

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Now the company is going to continue

to go upward because the foundation

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and the core principles didn't have

to readjust, didn't have to be sold.

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They were only there when you came in and

you just took the ball and ran with it.

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So it became a little bit easier to

get over to that 3 million fees and

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sustain it, which is oftentimes the

challenge where we can get there, but

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how do you sustain it to a level of

satisfaction, both from the client.

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So having that situation where you

have a lot of different options

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today in regards to marketing.

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Hiring a company like yours to create

a website, which you did a great job

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doing for my company, , other ways

that you can innovate, and create,

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opportunities to get in front of customers

is a positive, but in my personal

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opinion, I don't think anything beats

that personal one on one relationship

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with a customer, knowing personally

what they want, when they want to have

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it, how they want to have it, having

the ability to be able to negotiate.

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Tyler Lordi: Definitely.

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At the day, people buy from people.

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Right.

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People buy from people and having

that connection allows you to

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give them exactly what they need,

allows you to upsell your products

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And services, it just allows you to build that relationship.

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So that's, what's awesome about having,

a local community business, but I

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knew you had a lot of insight on that

with the way you built your business.

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So that's awesome.

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Let's talk about some other ways to,

I know trade shows were really big in

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the apartment industry and, we went

all the time to these trade shows.

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So let's talk about, the different unique

strategies that we did, the different,

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nuances and then some relationships

built along the way through that.

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Pat Lordi: Yeah.

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So that it's a great opportunity

to, certainly get in front of the

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industry, present, uh, brand new

relationships or new opportunities.

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A lot of times what we would

do is we'd create a promotional

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flyer for that particular show.

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Create maybe some new product

Indo introductory opportunities.

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One of my reps would be able to display

a brand new drain cleaning machine

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that may just come into the industry.

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But one of the greatest things that

happened to me at a trade show, happened

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in my early years of, being a business.

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And that was one of my long lasting,

biggest customers had a portfolio.

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We sold about 15 of their properties.

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We used to give out soft pretzels to

everybody and we see the person that got

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one and the person would take 10, right?

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Tyler Lordi: Listen,

these guys were hungry.

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Pat Lordi: Right, and that's okay because

you never know those 10 pretzels could be

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worth, you know, 50, 000 sales someday.

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Right.

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But, um, one of the owners of, of this

particular company who I knew back when

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I was a rep, he came to the show with

his daughter and a lot of times the

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owners, the big boys of these, companies

would come later on in the afternoon.

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So when everybody was packing

up to go home or to get to the.

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The, after trade show party, I stayed

till the very last second and I happened

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to run into this owner who was with

his daughter and I asked his daughter

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if she would like a soft pretzel.

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And, uh, she, she said, yes.

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Uh, so I gave her a soft pretzel

and I asked her, she liked

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mustard on the pretzel, which kind?

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So we'd have yellow, we'd

have honey mustard, we've had

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golden, hot spicy mustard.

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And so she said, I'll

take a honey mustard.

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So I put it on the pretzel for her.

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Well, the owner Was extremely

impressed with that time that I was

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able to spend or offered to spend

with his daughter We ended up being

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a 35 year Relationship customer.

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I'm not sure if it was just

because of the soft pretzel, but

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at the end of the day I think that

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Tyler Lordi: I'd like to think so.

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Pat Lordi: It'll be the the best

pretzel I ever bought, right?

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Right, but um, it just shows you that

if you're genuine if you show Um,

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the human side of this instead of the

financial side, that that goes a long way.

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Tyler Lordi: Definitely.

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Definitely.

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Yeah.

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Talk about ROI,

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Pat Lordi: I always felt that if I could.

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Reach out certainly one the trade show

was to keep the core clientele attached.

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So you're representing Your

ability to show face that

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you're a legitimate company.

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You're in it.

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You're in the game with everybody else

But more importantly I always wanted to

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come away with a handful of perspective,

what I thought were serious, inquiries

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and maybe gain a customer or two, right?

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It's the percentages, if you

can drum up a hundred people,

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you might get, you know, 1%, 2%.

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It has a lot to do with relationships

and your ability to have fun and show

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a personal side that a lot of people

fail at when they own a business.

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People think that they form a business

and people are just going to buy from

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the product or from the brick and mortar.

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That's not who runs a

business successfully.

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It's the people inside.

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It's the ownership.

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It's Rest of the people, right?

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So yeah, there's certainly

some opportunities.

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Tyler Lordi: I love that.

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Yeah.

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So a lot, a lot of organic growth, a lot

of boots on the ground, a lot of just,

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you know, old school methods and some of

them are, if not all of them are still

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very valid today and really shouldn't be

forgotten about, they should be in mix

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with, a digital strategy, so to speak.

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Now, anyone listening out here, whether

they're starting out or maybe they're

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struggling to scale, what's like

the best advice you have for them?

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Pat Lordi: I think the, again,

first and foremost, you have to know

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your industry and know your core

values within your business, right?

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Believe what it is that you're doing

and the service that you're providing is

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of extreme value, whatever that product

or service might be, that you do it

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to the fullest extent of your ability.

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if you do that, certainly that's

how we can lay our head on the

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pillow and go to sleep at night.

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If you can't do that or need to do it

in different facets, then you need to

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obviously look at personnel to do that.

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Being an expert in your industry is

probably the biggest thing because there's

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always somebody that knows something more

than you or know something different.

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Tyler Lordi: That's huge.

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That's definitely huge.

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And I think, uh, a lot of

people can learn from that.

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They want, they want

the, the fast returns.

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They want the big businesses quickly,

but there's a lot of sweat equity.

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You gotta, you gotta put in.

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Pat Lordi: And you could get lucky.

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You know, there, there are situations

where, you know, you never know

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you could buy a stock and it could

split tomorrow and all of a sudden

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you're twice as wealthy, right?

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But at the end of the day, most businesses

fail in the first 7 years, right?

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And that's not because it could

be today, but it's not because of

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maybe it's not because of finance.

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Maybe it's not because of lack of trying,

but, um, if you know your industry

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and you try to do things better than

everybody else, especially in a local

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situation where there is maybe a couple

different businesses that are about

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the same in an offering, just be better

than them, make it a conscious effort

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that you're going to be the first one in

the building and the last one to leave.

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That's what I did for, for 35, 40 years.

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I was always the first

in and the last out.

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Um, Michael Jordan was always

the first in the gym, last one to

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leave when everybody was home, he

was shooting free throws, right?

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There's a reason why he was one of

the greatest players in the world.

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So I, that's probably the biggest thing.

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That being said, if you work hard.

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Nothing says that you can't reap

the benefits and be a little bit

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different later on in your career.

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I chose to be a hard worker all the time.

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And that's the way I was patterned.

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That's the way I was taught.

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I don't know that I could have changed

even if I wanted to, because I just

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knew head down and grind it out.

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But you know that there might be some

different ways to do it for different

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businesses and my industry, I needed to

be there all the time for my customers.

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Not because I had to,

but because I wanted to.

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Tyler Lordi: A lot to learn and.

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And to think about when, you know,

someone's starting a business

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or maybe that they're stuck,

like, why are we not growing?

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Like we should go back to

more traditional methods.

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Maybe, maybe you got to work harder.

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Maybe I'll stay later.

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Pat Lordi: And that could too

be economical reasons, right?

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If your industry's in a.

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In an economic turn, maybe it's in

an educational turn, maybe it's in a

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innovation turn, whatever the situation

is, adaptability and flexibility

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is important because I know one

way of having a customer relation.

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If that kind of shifts a little bit and

I don't shift with it and adapt with

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it, then I could pay the price for that.

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So having the flexibility

to say, okay, I know this.

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But I can also consider this where

there's something different if

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that comes to, to be in the play.

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And that's important too.

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Tyler Lordi: Yeah, definitely.

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Started a business as when

were you like 19, 20 years old,

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Pat Lordi: almost 18 years old,

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Tyler Lordi: 18 years old.

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Um, we won't tell everyone how old

you are now, but, we'll just say

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maybe like mid fifties or so where

you were able to sell the business.

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What's next for you?

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Pat Lordi: Trying to enjoy some of the

fruits of the labor, um, I, when I sold

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the company, uh, we sold May 1st, um, I

never thought I'd ever be in a situation

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where I'd have the opportunity to do it.

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Um, I decided that it was

time, it was a family decision.

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It wasn't just my decision.

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It was, um, it was a

family decision as well.

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And once we made that decision, I said,

I'm going to take a year to figure out

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what I want to do, fortunately, I was

able to become a self made millionaire

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from the sale, uh, through the hard work.

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But, at the end of the day, I don't

need to go to work for somebody else.

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If I choose to do it, I will.

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If I choose not to do it, I won't.

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I can pretty much do what I want to do

when I want to do it, how I want to do it.

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Which is pretty unique.

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Tyler Lordi: That's the dream, right?

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Pat Lordi: Right.

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Unless I'm living in my

mom's basement, right?

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It's pretty, pretty unique

to be able to do that.

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Because of everything that you did prior,

and that's the whole thing, I never

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borrowed a penny from anybody, I never

had help from anybody, I started from

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zero, and I ended up different than that.

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At the end of the day, from an

ego perspective, if I threw this

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into an ego conversation, what

much more could you ask for?

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Right, you accomplished, and

a good friend of mine said it,

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he goes, you went from A to Z.

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And you're reaping all

the benefits from it.

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And, there, there's some truth to that.

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There's parts of it

there's vacancy, right?

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So when you're used to doing all

this, and then you're no longer

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doing it, there's some challenges.

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There's some, some roller

coasters, some ebbs and flows.

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For sure.

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But, um, I'm fortunate.

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I've got a great family.

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I've got a great supporting.

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Uh, wife and I, as much as I miss

it, sometimes, uh, I'm able to,

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to know that I finished on top,

which again is a nice situation.

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Tyler Lordi: Absolutely.

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Well, I'm so happy you were able to

fly down here and tell your story.

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I'm so glad you guys got to listen

and hear the ins and outs and,

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the journey behind it all.

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So thanks for coming out.

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Pat Lordi: Appreciate it.

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Best of luck.

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Tyler Lordi: Thank you.

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Thank you.

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Again, this is a very special episode.

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Next time we'll be talking

about businesses all

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throughout the local community.

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See you soon.