“A Fabulous Conversation About Marketing"

[Music] hello everyone welcome to the 21 hats podcast I'm your host Lauren Feldman this week we introduce Stephanie Stucky a new regular on the podcast who tells Dana White and Laura Xander about the iconic roadstop business her grandfather founded when it peaked what went wrong why she bought it back and how she plans to rejuvenate it along the way we discuss whether small businesses should Outsource their marketing how hard it is to find an agency that really listens and what it should cost to hire a marketing firm plus Stephanie offers a tutorial on how to engage followers and get free Consulting on LinkedIn even in Good Times owning and running a business can be a lonely Pursuit our hope is that these weekly conversations will if nothing else let owners know they are not alone in facing these challenges same thing with our daily newsletter the 21 hats Morning Report which you can subscribe to at 21h hats.com where you can also find transcripts of our podcast episodes this week's lineup features Dana White who is CEO of paral Boyd a chain of hair salons based in Detroit Laura Xander who is CEO of Jimmy Bean wool a digital yarn store that is based in Reno Nevada and also owns a wholesale supplier meline TSH in Fort Worth Texas and Stephanie Stucky who is CEO of Stuy the snack and Road stop business famous for its pcan logs the episode is titled a fabulous conversation about marketing [Music] welcome Dana and Laura and our newest Regular on the 21 hats podcast team Stephanie Stucky great to have you here Stephanie thanks for having me our pleasure uh let's start with you Stephanie uh you're the granddaughter of the founder of the Stucky roadstop business uh a brand in a business that is remembered fondly by uh by so many people uh even though it fell on hard times after your family sold it but you bought the business back in 2019 why don't you start by telling us uh what kind of shape was it in when you bought it not good tell us more yes duckies had been losing money consistently since 2016 when I purchased the company and we were in the red and what I bought was something that you could not see on the books and I think that is what took a family member to appreciate and understand the value of the brand I bought a brand I I didn't buy an asset that was really worth a lot people think of the road stop locations what were the assets that you did in fact buy yeah and just some background because I think uh there's a certain era that really remers duckies and it would would have been people who maybe in the 1950s 60s 70s early 80s would road trip and pull over and see our stores so that's what we were best known for is we had roadside locations at our Peak we had 368 stores in almost 40 States and we were known for our products and specifically we started as a pean stand on the side of the road so to this day we continue to be known for pecan based products so that was can I can I just interrupt real quick and say you are now my new best friend for pronouncing that word correctly yeah right everybody is like pean pean I'm like it's pean we even ask Google and Google thinks it's pean so I am so stoked that you are here you are on my side and I used to go to all the time and that's probably where I learned how to say it the right way so true sorry just my grandfather would say peans when you pick them pecans when you sell them so it was however the seller would want to pronounce them and he sold pecans to the Northerners a lot you would say Yankees and you would say peans yep so yeah so what what assets were there we have 67 locations none of them are company-owned they're all independent franchised operations only 20 of those are Standalone stores the remainder will be what we call Stucky Express or store within a store so you'll see a branded a co-branded Stucky section in for example we're in a few pilot locations just like you would see a Duncan or a Subway you might see a Stucky mini section so we had 20 Standalone stores 47 stores within a store so 67 franchise locations that we're paying a a monthly franchise fee we have a distribution center in Eastman Georgia we have three sales reps uh we have a we had a skeleton crew that had been running the company for a decade since my dad's retirement uh so the main team was a vice president and a CFO and three sales reps so that's those are sort of the assets that I purchased that's like five employees you're talking about so we have two people run the warehouse and we have three Pickers Warehouse Pickers and a couple seasonal workers so really round number 10 small you sell lots of snacks um pecan snacks did I get that right yes and we've we've been Outsourcing our product for decades that's something I think a lot of companies don't talk about but many well-known Brands they don't actually manufacture their product in house they Outsource that that doesn't mean it's not a quality product and it's not made to their specifications using their recipes Etc living up to their standards but that is kind of a a secret of many products that they don't self-produce having said that uh very soon we're in the process of acquiring our own manufacturing capacity so we're going to change that around but I didn't acquire any manufacturing at the time what I'm curious when was the peak when was it doing the best that it was doing and when did it really start to I mean that's a huge drop right good question so a c quite a few things happened the peak would I would say is the mid 1970s my grandfather sold the company in 1964 right before I was born and he remained involved with the company and was head of Stucky division of the company that bought stues for about 10 years and then the CEO that brought my grandfather on on died unexpectedly of a heart attack my grandfather was pushed out then that company got bought out by another company and then people were driving the roads less because there was an Arab Oil Embargo and then the airline deregulation Act passed and people were flying more because flying was affordable so it's external and internal factors that all combined that had us on this rapid trajectory of going downhill that's 80 years history I've like condensed in a few minutes right Stephanie you you don't really have a background doing this kind of thing you have you've had an interesting career tell tell us quickly about your background and um and how this feels to you taking over a business as CEO had I not been given this opportunity to buy the company from my dad's former partners who were actively selling I would never have stepped up to the plate and been a c I would have never thought I had the capacity to do that but when you look back on your life's experiences and think about the skills that you gain throughout the different careers you may have had or the different position positions that can help inform a new career even if it's a doing something different they're similar skill sets and the number one skill set I would stress is what Warren Buffett always talks about which is emotional intelligence and that only comes with maturity and being able to handle very stressful situations in a way that's even keeled and so much of being a successful entrepreneur or a business leader or leader in life is being able to effectively manage interpersonal relationships I'd say that's easily half of what I do every day is making sure that the team is working together well and we're maximizing each other's skill sets so for my background I'm a lawyer by training I practiced law for many years I was a litigator I was a criminal defense trial lawyer I was in the Georgia state legislature I had a career in public service for 14 years and I headed up an environmental nonprofit for three years and then I got tapped as head of sustainability for the City of Atlanta by mayor cine Reed I was doing that and then I left was heading up uh sustainability for a nonprofit based in Atlanta and teaching as an adjunct at the University of Georgia school of law when I had this career move to take over my family's business and you think that your resume is not like impressive enough are you kidding me I didn't think I could be a CEO I mean I was I was in the nonprofit space right yeah but just three letters you can put those you can put any three letters behind your name you want to if you own the company right if you own a company by the way you can make yourself CEO that's exactly CEO exact CEO yeah exactly I change my title to Chief candy maker soon perfect I love itle I want pean pean maker for me I was you know a Labor Relations Specialist mhm I'm not a hairstylist yeah um and I think I I think you're spot on when you say a lot of it has to do with your emotional maturity I worked in the Middle East I I worked in New York City um in the skill set to be able to talk to people to be able to work with workers understanding what they need and and how to support them you can translate that to anything I too had a brief sent in politics um oh really I was um in the presidential campaign years and years and years ago um but that rallying the troops that getting everybody on the same page that um you know being consistent with your message that all translates in business to culture Vision processes order I don't have an engineering background so the fact that I've drawn to this lean manufactured business is new but I have experience even my experience being a waitress has helped me develop um this brand my question for you Stephanie is you said the 70s was the Peak at what point did stues not involve what happened in stues that didn't keep up with the changes they lost their Visionary founder and I know I'm biased about that because he was my grandfather but it plays out looking at the history and talking to non-family members about what happened he was involved with the company even after he sold it like I said as head of the stues division a company that bought stues it's based out of St Louis and part of their portfolio at the time was Whitman's Chocolate Samplers so definitely had an aligned brand in their portfolio and it really was a good fit the new CEO was in finance and did not understand a brand he didn't understand marketing and he certainly didn't get what was special about stues is that we were a road trip experience we weren't just selling a product and we weren't just numbers on a book so my grandfather was Ed and then that company got bought out by a Chicago railroad conglomerate and at that point it just became a rapid down downward yeah I think that's important especially for our listeners when you know business owners are always trying to keep their head above water um and a lot of us right now just barely have our noses above water I'm fortunate my my you know my mouth is above water my chin is a little under the surface and so yes it's a money-making opportunity but you really need something somebody who's in line with the vision our largest competitor um just sold and announced it two days ago so they just got a buyer and the buyer was like the second largest competitor which is um a VC funded you know they've raised I don't know 50 60 million bucks and there's no heart and soul to the VC funded company you know so you know we're just waiting for them to exit you know they've been acquiring all these kind of assets and small businesses within the yarn industry over the last two years or three years you know my little tribe I guess of local yarn shop owners um have all been you know discussing like what does this mean that the business that our competitor sold and it was a second generation business um and it's been around for 45 years and we're like well there it goes there goes the heart and soul you know I mean they'll stick around probably for a year that's proba is what I'm assuming the contract is and then all of those sales are going to end up being distributed across the rest of us um so for us it's actually a really good thing because we're assuming that it's going to follow that same kind of trajectory that you just explained and that you just experienced because there's no heart and soul you know there's no Drive do you know why they sold um I don't know specifically I'm going to assume you know they're a little bit older uh they're probably 10 15 years older than than Doug and I are um and probably just tired you know and ready to retire and be done sure um and it goes back to like what do you do succession planning you know I mean it's really making us look or me look inward um you know can I do this until I'm 60 70 you know not all of us are J Golds uh and not all of us necessarily want to do this for the rest of our lives so what do you do how do you not lose the soul or do you care do you just end up shutting it down like where does it where does it go you know that's a good question because I think so often people feel this stress of especially if you're in a family business like me I'm I'm a 3G or third generation or there's this pressure it has to go to the fourth generation but and I'm not suggesting this for stues but sometimes I think it's okay just to say it ends here it's it's been a great business we had a great run we're we're shutting it down and how much better would it be to close in a very decisive way instead of having it die the slow and pathetic death where you drive by and see these shuttered Stucky stores that are now porn shops which is the reality of some of our old stores if it hadn't gotten back in the family business that's how it would have di I mean oh my God talk about the polar opposite Stephanie are are you comfortable telling us uh what this investment in stues means to you um I mean if you're comfortable sharing what you paid for it we'd be interested to hear that but but what I'm really interested in is um just are you putting your heart and soul into this what does it mean to you to turn this business around it's very personal to me so it's it's my name up there on those Billboards and on those stores and on the candy label so I do have a really strong emotional connection to this brand and it it's more than just my personal experiences with it it's what I know it's capable of and that whole experience of taking to the open road which I think is such an American Experience because we have this country that is huge with highways that connect us and there's this Wanderlust in all of us and stues is part of something so much bigger than just me getting excited about making pan log rolls it's getting in your car it's exploring back roads it's going to the alligator petting zoos or maybe not a petting yes no I took H to one you know but it's it's Goofy Golf and South of the Border and Y Wall Drug that is so uniquely American you don't see places like that anywhere else in the world and it's everyone's vacation you don't have to have a lot of money to get in your car and experience these things and stues is part of that so we fill a unique Niche and Stu has gotten away from offering that we've lost that magic because we were out of family hands and I'm trying to get it back to that and my father he did a great job he saved the brand it had he not taken it on it would have gone under but he was also running five other companies at that point and he he made Stucky part of his portfolio to keep it going but he didn't really have the he doesn't have the same vision I do for the company having said that he's still very much alive and supports what I'm doing and the direction I'm going my vision for the company is getting it back to this unique experience I'm working right now on getting photo booths in the stores that would be branded Stucky so the old timey photo booth where the little reels come out but you can also get a a digital version of your photo too I'm working on bringing back that sense of having a fun experience when you pull over and it's not just getting gas and using the restroom and getting a bag of Cheetos it's having a unique experience that relates to the place where you are and I'm not telling how much I bought it for sorry that's I uh I uh I think people might be shocked it it it was pretty I don't know they might think it was too low or they might think it was too high negotiated down I'll say that I have i' have to say like I know a little bit about stues um and one of the things it's sad but true um stues had no segregated bathrooms that's right on the road yeah in a time where in the South bathrooms are segregated so you guys were in the green book we were in the green book yep you're in the green book we could go to a Stucky so you know I'm excited for you um and and I I hear that you get it obviously um as as a girl who you know has a personal connection to the brand you know you just don't want anybody to take it over and you were called to to take it over grow it and and especially that wonderless factor especially now right people aren't getting on planes and who knows when those get back on planes the way they used to I I was listening to you I'm like wow such Rich marketing material oh my God know and even with the you know even I don't know how your marketing team would feel about it but even in touching on you know Mar it could be you it could be you know it could I'm you know I just hired a marketing team and we could talk about that in another episode but or we could talk about it this one I I would like to hear Stephanie talk about her marketing plans and and hear what you Dana and Laura think about it like I'm listening to her and there's such a wealth of ways to reach so many customers to reconnect them with stues you know having not segregating their bathrooms in a time like this showing who you are is who you've always been that's wow yes and that phrase was 29.95 you can have that no kidding that was a good Stephanie one of the things that uh caught my eye is that your your website uh unlike most uh websites has a has a guest book where people can uh leave their memories uh what they've experienced with with your brand Through The Years how do you build on that do you have a a marketing plan I do have a marketing plan I wrote it myself and I have had the benefit of a lot of Freelancers that support me but on a very limited basis and I've had it vetted with others to get their feedback but I have a marketing plan and I have a very small team I guess I can say I have a marketing team then I have two graphic designers that I use freelance and I have a wonderful guy who helps me draft some of the narrative in my eblast and then I have a young man who helps me post on Instagram especially and uh I'm very challenged with video content I'm interested in uh Dana Lauren if y'all Laura if y'all use uh video because that's more of aen for me I'm trying to I'm trying to figure that out but but the marketing team is just me coordinating um Freelancers on an hourly basis I just hired someone to help me uh structure a Pinterest site and get that up and running as well I will offer as much advice as you would like in exchange for pean rolls so I'm just throwing it out there I'll be on your board and I'll drive um as long as there's food there during the day I I'd be stoked and maybe a t-shirt excellent so I just I've been open eight years and I've been I've done so with doing very little marketing and so this year I've decided to make an investment into marketing so I literally just had a meeting with the firm that I'm going to bring on to do all the marketing outside of graphic design I too freelance for graphic design somebody I've been working with starting in 2020 and I'm I'm I'm a nervous wreck I'm a nervous wreck because you know I'm feeling like the investment is trying even though with the little marketing I've done we have some idea of what works but um this is a huge investment for me and I want to make sure that the money I put in I get back and I've I've talked to some of their other clients um I've talked to a friend of mine who's a soon to be client and a friend of mine who's already a client of theirs they came highly recommended um and you know my challenge with finding a marketing a marketing team through the far through an agency of record is you know I'm a different kind of business and people want to box me and the second you do that I I'm I'm losing what do you mean Dana that you're a different kind of business what about your business are you referring to most marketing firms that I interviewed want to make me a salon and I'm having I'm getting ready to cut a check and you're still talking about appointments and it's so obvious that you know it's I'm walking only you know I was in a meeting so Dana if uh I come and make an appointment I'm like you can't make an appointment oh right it's Sunday You're closed today no we're seven days a week so they don't listen they're not listening they're not getting and so then a lot of their marketing ideas for me were appointment based and if you'd even done any homework which I know they had but if you paid attention to the website if you had done any homework you'd realize that you have to approach perly Boyd a little differently and listen to the owner when she tells you how to mark it to the people she wants to be her customers and they're like well no maybe we should Mark it to these people how do you respond to that Dana do do you correct them or do you head for the exit I correct and head like I I correct them and I leave I'm a little nervous and I think they're they're beyond qualified they're going to do a great job um but you know we the proof is in the pudding and when do I pivot when do I say okay I've put in enough money it's not coming back I like I like their ideas thus far we've done a little bit of marketing that's data driven so I've giving them the results so we kind of see what works um but I'm nervous as I'm getting ready to cut this check every month oh my goodness it's it's ban how big is the that I can totally relate to that the check is 50,000 yeah that I that's consistent with quotes I've gotten and the quotes I've gotten is I well what if I just hired you to do several months worth of work and really help put a good structure in place for us and the quotes I've been getting for that have been 40,000 I've gotten quotes for 100,000 I've well that's what you you will see charges like that and I think quite often maybe they think we have more money than we do or we're willing to spend money we don't have or maybe large corporations I know pay a lot of money and so they're used to that there's really not a lot of marketing firms out there that cater to small businesses and it's sh I'm so excited that you said that that was part of my selection criteria don't and and I said this in our very first meeting with every marketing person don't give me a proposal based on who you think I am give me a proposal based on what I need give me a proposal that says I want to be in a relationship with and Dana White and in five years I want to be her agency of record if you give me a quote that says x amount of dollars then I'm saying you don't want to be in a relationship with me and I finally found a marketing firm that gets it that's comfortable marketing to my market that gets apply boyed um and I'm excited to see but it's still it's still $50,000 for the year it's still a lot of money what did they promise you for that $50,000 I've spoken with a you know a customer of theirs whove said these are the Returns on the investment that I've gotten and this is what I've reinvested in them and I and I don't look back um they have promised me a lot in their statements of work something that they've already started to do Dana this is what we're going to do and they're smart they shouldn't promise me an Roi of such and such and such and such no what they' promised me is to deliver and work hard and that's all I can ask for to an extent 6 months in at $24,000 and nobody's coming in the door okay let's talk but do you even have metrics for like number of Impressions number of products okay you do y can I ask um at 50 grand for the year obviously you thought about I could just hire one person right right and they that would do this fulltime for me that was inh house and that like lives and breeds the brand and isn't doing anything else what was the thought process behind why choose an agency as opposed to having a full-time employee their Network who they could call and negotiate a rate with at a radio station the individuals that I had looked at wanted to work with perly Boyd they over promised there were question that I was asking that they hadn't had the answers to it was obvious that I had thought more about this than than they had I'm at a point especially because of this show I'm at a point where I'm done handholding I've been open for eight years I'm not happy with the growth you know Co aside it's time to to bite the bullet invest the money that's why I hired the operations manager and that's why I chose a firm the challenge also with hiring in house is obviously all the expenses associated with that a 50,000 salary is not just $50,000 you have to provide health insurance you have to pay social security you have to pay taxes it gets very expensive very fast so the actual cost of the company would be more than 50,000 and most people coming out of college I'm amazed at the salaries that they expect I wish that there were more more firms that would cater to a smaller startup and provide really Boutique services but this the firms I found even the smaller ones that I thought would offer more reasonable rates are quoting me six figures no and that's when I come in saying I can't afford six figures exctly I can't I'm nowhere near there there is such need out there for marketing with smaller firms where if you could pick up a 10K a 20K client and you could pick up 10 of those those clients and provide good quality work and have somewhat of a gig economy model where you're you utilizing some Workforce that you can coordinate their services I think there's a model there it's beyond my capacity because I'm not a marketing Guru what I do know is the Stuy brand yep and so I know how to message the Stuy brand which is what I'm doing but there's a need out there the other thing with the firm is all the software right yes and lot of software and equipment and yep I also chose a firm to answer your question because of where intend to go and I didn't want to outgrow someone who can't market for me in Atlanta Chicago New York and do product as well Laura Stephanie had asked about video and and you asked about um kind of doing this work in house you kind of built Jimmy Bean Wool by doing your own marketing a lot of it was video uh creating video showing uh your customers what they could do with your yarn that was some time back do do you think that model still works is that still possible I think it's probably more possible and more relevant now than it's ever been um in fact that's what our focus is going to be for 2021 is doing inhouse again low production value especially in our industry and I would I would venture that in um the Stuy brand is a little similar and that their C how so you're talking about a kind of working class road trip Americana I would assume and Stephanie please correct me if you're wrong people are put off by Corporate America they're put off by shiny objects I mean you want it to be um you want it to be real and a little down and dirty and a little flawed because otherwise you just look at it and you feel like crap about yourself um so anyway that makes sense I get the capacity thing and I that makes sense to me Dana in terms of if you're doing ad buys um and that's a big part of your strategy that totally makes sense you know to have somebody you know outside it also so happens that like I really enjoy the marketing um and that is an area of learning that I am digging into that I have um just you know that just excites me but it sounds Stephanie to me like you're the same way and that you want to build a you've got a brand and that's what we have always focused on so we're not as focused on creating non-appointment walk-ins um you know where you know or foot traffic we're we have been focused on less Roi direct Roi stuff and more brand building getting the word out there causing Some Noise creating some noise and and in some ways kind of just saturating the market so that people in our industry if they're like in your example if they're going to go on a road trip there's no way they can't know about stues because you just pop up everywhere aren't I doing the same thing though like that when I'm listening to you I'm like no Laura I want to do that too right I want women to say to themselves you know what if I have to get my hair done today I'm going to peral boid yeah I I'm going to venture I would think that hair is just slightly different and that you do want your hair to be perfect it's not touching everybody I have a niche market I think I hear you do have a niche and I mean yes want the peacan roll to be perfect and I don't want to get salmonella or get sick because of something you know right so there's that on the food and yes I want my yarn to be good but there seems to I mean when it comes to beauty Beauty needs to be clean you know it needs to in my mind you know I don't want to see a down and dirty Salon ad um I want to know that the tools are clean I want to know that you know when I come out of there my hair is going I'm going to look like freaking I don't know somebody amazing Lady Gaga um so I would say that in your situation you might need it to be a little cleaner um and you might need it to be a little more professional and Slick than and for Stephanie and I um but again that's just my gut kind of intuition as a consumer okay um you know I I think I mean Stephanie good God like and I know you know this otherwise and you're obviously very intelligent and way more accomplished than ever be Stephanie you'll learn that Laura's always talking down her business despite having a very successful impressive business yeah yeah yeah if I was doing that well I wouldn't be so stressed out all the time um Stephanie if you need a succession plan and I'm serious like board of directors whatever like you have such a freaking gold mine and I know you know this and that's why you made this move she has a huge following on LinkedIn to that point my gosh like the Americana The Nostalgia the you know I'm reading Ready Player one with my son right now and you know it's all about like the 80s and going back and we're trying to capsure this innocence and you know um you've got my generation you know I'm 46 and I grew up going to stues you know that was the highlight of the trip um didn't matter where you went and to be able to capture that oh it's been fun and and it's a great Point Lauren about LinkedIn I when I first started I was posting on LinkedIn once a week and I was on Facebook da Twitter da Instagram da I quickly learned that LinkedIn is where I'm having the most interaction and for me interaction is not just a thumbs up that's so surprising you don't I don't think of LinkedIn that way how do you explain that oh no that's huge sorry if I can just interject my marketing team is all over LinkedIn just FYI Dana that's a huge market for you LinkedIn was the biggest surprise I get so much engagement on LinkedIn it's the comments and it's not just well done or Kudos I like that it's I really like this because like today for example I can't afford marketing research so I'm deciding between two billboard designs and I was really headset on one billboard design and the owner of the store wants another billboard design and I'm like all right I'm just going to put this up on LinkedIn I'm going to ask people for their feedback and everyone's going to agree with me and then I'm going to go show this to the store owner and say all right see I'm right well I posted it I said I want your feedback I've already gotten a lot of feedback and uh it's been mixed a lot of people like the way he likes the billboard so that's just one example but the feedback I'm getting is not just I like the top one it's I like the top one because the logo stands out more God what a great way to grow this brand by like having your community involved in all of these decision Mak get free Consulting I put up display Concepts oh this was my favorite I put up display Concepts and I'm been working on this display because we're so small and we have limited budget and we don't own our own stores part of my growth strategy is we get Retail Partners and that sell our product but they don't pay us a franchise like an Ace Hardware so I'm working on these displays that look like a mini Stucky store with a roof roof a blue roof and a little Stucky sign and so you get the experience of a road trip from the display even though you may be at your local Ace Hardware store so I got the inspiration for this display shamelessly from a Crispy Cream display that i' taken a photo of and I showed it to this guy who makes displays I was like this is my this is my inspiration can you mock up something and so I had a I had a prototype and I put the Prototype on LinkedIn I said can y'all give me feedback what do you think of this got tons of great comments and this one guy messaged me and said I really like this I have some valuable feedback I'd love to have a phone call with you it looks a lot like the the display that I created for Crispy Cream when I was their marketing director and he showed me a photo and I was like busted he's now helping me by the way that's great yeah at a very Reas rate because he said I love your brand he's no longer working for Crispy Cream he's doing he he just took time off for family reasons and he's like this is a fun project I'm interested in helping you and he's amazing and I found that through Linkedin through a LinkedIn comment I was I didn't even say I was hiring do you enjoy like building these displays and and kind of designing or helping design and lead the billboard is this fun for you well I'm doing it more out of necessity no I don't have the capacity to do all of this so our exec team meetings are for people we don't necessarily have those layers of processes and structure that a big firm has but that doesn't mean that we don't need more structure and more processes and so there's some learning that could really help inform how we run things at Stucky we were a really big Corporation at one point with a thousand employees so I've been pulling through our archives and finding materials and actually some of our paperwork is actually pretty helpful and how stues had been run and some of it I'm saving I'm like okay well when we really grow the brand some more I'm GNA pull this old document off and this is a good org chart for hundred people I see a Stucky Museum coming Stephanie oh that would be outstanding a Stucky Museum wow I have actually a mini so I collect a ton of Stuy archival materials I am the number one cuy buyer on eBay if you you know I shouldn't say what my eBay tag is I think I'm I'm outed they they definitely start raising the rates when I'm bidding but I've collected a ton of stuff and I live in a duplex and so half of my house I rent out on Airbnb and I've stucked it up and it's full of Stucky memorabilia and I actually advertise it as take a Stucky stop and every room has Stucky stuff on the wall Stucky pillows stucky's old candy boxes decorating the shelves you need a museum yeah yeah that that would be outstanding that it fills up a it fills up fills up a two-bedroom house right now two-bedroom two bath house with old Stucky signs and paintings filling the entire Place guys this has been great and I have a feeling we could talk all day but I got to let you go I have one last question will each of you commit to sharing this podcast when I publish it on Tuesday on LinkedIn Absolutely I'll be more than happy to share with myund followers exactly but that leads to more followers and the other thing is to I I try when I share things not to just hit the share button but to have a teaser yeah to say we had a fabulous discussion about marketing today or we talked about how important it is to network and look at these resources or what's a reasonable budget for a marketing firm and what should you take into account when you're looking to hire a marketing firm if you're a small business I'm writing it all down my thanks to Stephanie Stucky Dana White and Laura Xander uh as always thank you all for sharing this was great wait wait don't leave yet if you have a question or a comment that you'd like the 21 hatso owners to address send it to me by replying to your Morning Report or by email at Lauren 21h hats.com that's L ren at21 hats.com do it now before you forget and don't be afraid to tell Jay what you really think he can take it and if you got something out of this conversation help us reach more business owners tell a friend subscribe and review us wherever you get your podcasts follow us on Twitter subscribe to the morning report at 21h hats.com this episode was produced produced by Jess Theron founder of blank word Productions okay now you can leave thanks for listening everyone [Music]