E1: Top M&A Entrepreneurs - Marty M. Fahncke "Chasing the Whale"

out and You're recording. So, uh, I wanna make this kind of informal, Marty, because you and I have talked before, we're friends and uh I just wanna find out how you're doing. I wanna talk, interview the top M&A entrepreneurs. So, This is Marty Fonke. Um, welcome to the show. Thank you. Excited to be one of your inaugural guests. You are the inaugural guest. You are the inaugural guest. Yes, I mean, I've got other people signed up, but you are the very first guest, you know what. Say about pioneers, right? They're the ones that wind up with the arrows in their back, and then everybody else just follows along behind them after they blaze the trail. So, yeah, like I, like, hey, honey, let's go, uh, build, you know, it's 1820 or something like that. Let's go build a house out in the west in Idaho or something. What do you think? It's, you know, property's free. Yeah, no thanks. Yeah. I'm so excited. So, you know, we met each other through Roland's Epic course, which is the M&A group. And I just kinda wanna find out, I'm gonna ask you some questions, uh, just how it's going for you. So everybody on the other side gets a sense of, you know, who you are, uh, what you do, how your success, and, you know, who your failures on that. So, let's just start with, what do you do now? I know you've got a great career. I've seen that, we've talked and I've seen you on video. Well, thank you, yeah, so easiest way to describe it is I create money out of thin air. So, whether that be through marketing strategies, or whether that be through investment strategies, uh, mergers and acquisitions, I find ways to put money into company owners' pockets. Yeah, and then, and so you're looking at a company, uh, what size of companies do you work with now? The range is pretty, uh pretty broad actually, uh, between 1 million and 175 million are the deals we've done in the last, you know, one of the deals we're working on completing in the last year, so it's a pretty broad range, but 175 million is the biggest one so far, and, uh, uh, of this, of this past year, the biggest ever I've done was about um 300 million. Yeah, that's amazing. Now you came on as Making money out of thin air as like a consultant or contractor with that one, or what, what was that? Yeah, so whether it's if I'm coming in approaching it from my my consulting and and management advisory, um, I can basically walk into any business and find where they are leaving money on the table, whether it's through increasing revenues, um, increasing profits, sometimes, sometimes, sometimes there's more money to be made in just efficiencies than there are in In increasing revenues, cause if you've got a bad system, then, you know, you're just exacerbating the problem with increasing revenues. And then from the investment side, helping business owners find ways of raising capital that aren't always the traditional ways that they would think of, and, you know, whether it's most business owners, if they need capital, they think of banks. Which is debt lending, right? They think of uh SBA loans, which is debt, they think of private equity, they think of VC and there are hundreds of other options out there for raising capital that I can help business owners find if they need if they need funds to grow. Yeah, when I, when you raise funds or use alternative methods to raise funds, now, what are you looking at as The, the best scenario or possible case. Uh, let me give you an example. I had this conversation with a guy earlier this morning that the business needs to raise capital. And I said, Well, what's it gonna be used for? Because a lot of the times I've seen people come, they want they raise money because it's gonna solve all their problems, right? Right. I said, no, the, where I've seen the best success is if they already know what their metrics are, cost of acquiring a customer is, and If it's $100 or $1000 then you ask like, well, what if I give you $100,000? Would you still have the same profit margin adding all those customers? And what if I give you $1000 or a million dollars? Am I gonna get the, you know, turn a dollar into $5? Right, yeah, yeah, and that's, and that's a question that always needs to be asked because quite frankly, I would guess, well, it's probably 80/20 rule, right? 80% of the time when you ask that question, you get an answer that's less than satisfactory, right? Like they're they're wanting, they're wanting to spend the money. They're usually trying to throw money at a problem that should just be fixed first. And then you can put money into capitalizing on, on, you know, fixing that problem. So definitely, I'm always asking the business owner, what is the problem you're trying to solve. And that's why it's, it's can be any number of things. It could be fixing something that's broken, it could be everything's right, they just need more customers, which is a marketing and sales problem. Or it could be that they have something that definitely needs capital, whether it's equipment or um inventory capital, etc. There are times when just truly cash is needed. And so, going in and understanding that and helping that business owner to, to really look at what is the money that they need and, and why do they need it is absolutely great advice. So you're, you're right on on that. Well, let's go back to the Epic courses. This is where we met you, and this is an epic course, uh, started by Roland Fraser. It's uh basically an M&A course which turns into kind of a mastermind because we're networking with everybody. So what did you think of the course? Uh, it was life changing for me. So I am not a take a course kind of guy. I have, I have taken a sum total in my 35 year career. I've taken a sum total of 4 courses in my, in my life. I limit myself to one per decade, apparently. And so I'm not one of those that, you know, jumps on every guru. I'm not a big guru guy, I'm not a big course guy, etc. but Uh, I do a lot of business, um, in and with China, and so I could see at the end of 2019, well before most people, what was coming to the United States with regard to the coronavirus. Already my factories were being shut down. Uh, I was seeing all sorts of issues, and I was starting to warn people like something's coming and it's, you know, it's gonna be a huge disrupter and you need to be ready. Well, I knew that I knew what was coming, and from a personal standpoint, there were things I could do to prepare. From a business standpoint, there were some things I could do to prepare, but I didn't know exactly what to do to fully prepare for what I knew was was coming. But I was, I was ready. So we are, we're recording this literally almost to the day, one year after the world started shutting down, and um I kind of sat there, uh, I basically, I got lucky because some of my businesses that I work with, uh, were able to take advantage of, or, let's use a different word. We're able to capitalize on the lockdown. So, one was a, a company that that produces calming sleep music. Well, everybody had such high anxiety that that that product was selling like gangbusters, uh, I mean record levels, um, but other products and, and businesses I had were suffering. Um, one of the, I do a lot of TV and radio advertising for a lot of my businesses, and so there was an opportunity that came along where, um, all national advertising for things like movie theaters, car, you know, car, uh, sales. Um, restaurants, etc. all stopped. They pulled their budgets overnight, and so, almost every single TV and radio network out there went from, you know, from cranking along in one of the best robust economies we had to every budget being cut overnight. So there were huge opportunities with media I was taking advantage of. But I was watching to see what, what's the long-term ramifications here? How do I, I knew that businesses were gonna be shutting down and going out of business. I knew that entrepreneurs were gonna be struggling. I knew that a lot of people in my circle of influence were gonna be hurt because they were in, you know, restaurants or other types of businesses that there was no way they were gonna survive in extended lockdown. And I knew it was gonna be extended lockdown. There were a lot of people who were like, Fell for the, you know, 2 weeks to flatten the curve line. I knew it wasn't gonna be 2 weeks. I knew it was gonna be months or years. So I quickly was looking for, how can I help people? How can I, how can I survive this? How can my businesses survive this, and how can I help others survive this? And it was less than 30 days later, I think it was only 3 weeks later, that uh that I got an email from Roland, and I had been um I was actually signed up to be in his at at trafficking conversion to go to the VIP dinner with Arnold Schwarzenegger and, and uh Marcus Limonas. And I think there were only 15 or 20 of us that were signed up for that. And so I was, you know, I was kind of upset that that had all gotten canceled cause I had a specific reason to want to meet, wanna meet Marcus Limonas and on a project I was doing. So I was on one of Roland's very first emails, and he said, hey, you know, I've got this course. Would you be interested? And I'm like, yeah. So it was the 5 day course, the epic challenge, and it was brand new for him. He was, I mean, he had, he had done one live version before, but he hadn't, he hadn't done it virtually. So I was on, on that. I was 3 days into that 5 day challenge, and I knew this was it. I knew this was the way I could help people. So you were epic number 11, yeah, OK, yeah. Um, I mean, I didn't hesitate at all. I just, the second I got the email from him, I was like, oh, I know where this is going. I, I could just see it. So I signed up, yeah, go ahead. You, uh, uh, knew Roland before or you were a part of digital marketer before, or, yeah, yeah. So I, I was, I had traffic and conversion was a very important conference for me. It was one of my most profitable conferences. I had a lot of, uh, business partners that I met out there. I went out there for networking. I went out there for, for education, etc. Um, I had met Roland. I wouldn't say I knew him, but I had met him. And then, like I said, there was a VIP dinner that was scheduled that I was signed up for with, with Arnold and, and Marcus. And so, um, and that, that got canceled. And so I was already kind of working with Roland and his team and Deanna and things like that. So I think that's why I got kind of the early bird sneak preview, like, hey, we're thinking about doing this. Would you wanna kind of, you know, we're in the beta group we're called cause we, you know, all the kinks weren't worked out yet. So 5 days into the the epic challenge or 3 days into the 5 day challenge, I already knew this was, you know, absolutely a game changer for me. And I went ahead and, and did the 8 week full, you know, full course. And um anytime I've ever done a course, like I said, I don't do very many, but anytime I've ever done it, I always tell myself, I want to see an ROI from that. In the time frame that the program is. So, um, you know, I put a couple $1000 into it and I said, OK, and, and it's an 8-week course. This is so in 8 weeks, I have to make back my $3000. And I always do that with anything I do, I always put an ROI to. By the way, it's, it's not $3000 anymore. Oh, I don't know how much it is now. I'm sure it was, is it a lot more now? Yeah, I don't care how much it is, it's worth everything. Um, yeah, it was probably cheaper for us cause it was beta, but, yeah, um. I made my money back by the 2nd week. Well, OK, so tell me about that. What, what did you acquire a company? Or what? Oh, well, what kind of company was it? So it was my bookkeeping company, so the company that I already used to uh that did all my bookkeeping for my other businesses, and uh we learned about a technique called the pipe wrench technique, which is basically Uh, you know, you go to a company you're already working with and, uh, well, backing up, so how do you, you know, how do you find businesses to acquire? And the, the starting, um, the starting place is, who do you already do business with? Who do you write checks to and who writes checks to you. Your whole supply chain is an opportunity for investment. So, The pipe edge technique is basically going to a business that you already do business with, and saying, hey, you know, I have a new, I have a new motto, and that is I only do business with companies that I own part of. And so you already have several of my accounts. I'm gonna be acquiring a bunch more companies. I will bring all those companies to you. As new business, your business is gonna grow, but I want to own a part of your company, and it was one phone call and 2 emails, and that deal was done. Oh my God, that's great. I was like, well, what are we talking about a bookkeeping service, or was it a CPA or it's a BPO, yeah, yeah. So they do all the quick books, they do, you know, taxes, and they're not a CPA, they they're a bookkeeping firm. So, um, I, it's funny, I literally an hour before, um, an hour before this call I just got my My, uh, February profit share from them. So, uh, yeah, so how did that work out? Now, how, how are you doing like the profit first, like, uh, Michael? Oh absolutely, yeah, absolutely. So I mean every deal I do is different. That particular one was um was structured, so I get paid. I get paid monthly. I get paid, um, annually, and I get paid. I only get paid if the if the company is ever liquidated, which I don't anticipate this one, you know, really exiting anytime soon. This is a, you know, it's a small business. There's there's 4 employees. It's it, you know, it's, it's one of those, uh, CPAs, I have a buddy in the M&A uh world for CPAs and 64 employees about $600 to a million dollars, so. Yeah. So they're, you know, they're, they're a nice business, but it, you know, that some of them that I do these kind of deals with, it's like, OK, you have a specific goal of exiting in 2 years or 3 years or 5 years, or this one's like, they have no goal of, they have no intention of ever exiting. I don't care however long they live and like or dislike doing taxes. Yes, exactly. So yeah, so my very first deal was within within the the 2nd week. And uh by the time the 8 weeks had, had, had completed it, I had completed another deal. Yeah that that one was um. Gosh, I'm gonna think about it. It's been a year I've done a dozen deals in a year, so I gotta think about which one that you've done a dozen deals. I've done a dozen deals in the last, oh, that was my beekeeping, uh, my beekeeping one, which I've told that story actually a couple times on, on some other interviews, but, uh, um, they, um. Yeah, that was the CBD honey deal. Oh yeah, yeah, I think I read, I, I saw that on your, uh, interview with somebody else. Yeah. Yeah, I did, I did tell that story. I don't wanna, I don't want to it's a great story though, because it's so perfectly frames how this all kind of can work, but yeah, that was my second deal. So that happened on like the 4th week, probably, and again, that was a very fast, that was another like two phone calls and an email kind of a deal. Um, and, and so I thought, you know, it made it look easy, right? So, um, obviously I have other deals. I just, I just closed one, yesterday that we started, I started last July. Yeah, not all of them are that quick. They, you know, obviously some of them take 689 months, and then we've got others that are, are I'm nurturing and, and what's this, uh, so what's this big, the one you just closed? So the, the big, the big one is not closed. Um, we've hit a, we've hit a bigger, a bit of a hiccup and and I'm actually not gonna get into too many details about it because of where it is. It's in a, it's in a really weird place. Basic, basically it was a $175 million asking price for a particular company. We raised the $175 million in about 6 weeks. We raised $150 million in the 1st 3 weeks, and it took us about 3 more weeks to raise the last $25 million. We had the full asking price for the seller. Um, we had a be for certain reasons, we had a non-exclusive LOI, um, because there were a couple of exceptions that were that were in play. And while we were trying to get everything finalized and we were that close, somebody came in and offered $65 million more than we did and took us out of the deal. No, it's not cash, and so, um. We firmly believe that deal is going to unravel and we're gonna get back in it, and that's why I'm not gonna get too far back in. Yeah, so you and I talked about this, and I, I'd be very discreet about this too is, uh, oddly enough, I, I, I, uh, know one of the guys that owns it, not the son of the guy that he went to NAU, I went to UA on the same fraternity. We knew each other. That's very odd, very small. Yeah, it's a it's a crazy situation. We are, they have 3 more weeks to, to close that deal and then and then uh and then we're back in. So I, I'm they're probably out trying to raise the funds. They're out trying to raise the funds, right, yeah. Yeah, and they're not doing it. Are so are you coming back with more funds to help them or are you staying with the same offer? Uh, we're gonna lower our offer if he comes back. OK, all right, interesting. So, and the guy, have you still had conversations with him? Is that we're in communication, so awesome, awesome. So what's the game of chess, man. Yeah, it's interesting, man. It's, uh, emotional, right? Oh God, when I, yeah, when I, when that got. Uh, taken out from underneath me. I, I, I literally was like sitting at my desk for about 20 or 30 minutes just speechless. Um, and then I shook it off and I, I was like, OK, there's gotta be, this can't be what just happened. And so I, I started doing some digging and some researching and made some calls and, and, and had some conversations with some Some smart people like you who, uh who gave me some things to think about and then that's when we realized we're not, this deal isn't, this deal isn't dead yet. There's, there's some extenuating circumstances, so, but yeah, it's odd that I called you within hours of that happening. Yeah, I think it was that afternoon, yeah. Yeah, and it's just like recalls, I, I, I want to bring this up. I, uh, I was reading something in Inc. magazine from back in 19 or 2012. It was, uh, Uh, Tony Robbins business, and he's talking about Peter Gruber. You know, Peter Gruber from, uh, Hollywood. He was at Sony, and he did it, he, and he said, I've had many cataclysmic and painful failures in my life, Gruber says, emphasizing Tony Robbins, but he helped me overcome and move through them faster and more efficiently. Uh, like the fact that the uncertainty doesn't threaten me anymore, doesn't threaten me. How, how did you get through that and say, you know, it's not dead, or I'm just gonna let it go, or there's just too, too many opportunities out there. Uh, like I said, I would, I, I I, I literally sat there for about 20 to 30 minutes just completely speechless, and then I, and then I got back to work and just said, you know what? Either, either this deal's still gonna come around and I'll, and I'll make it happen, which is great. Or I will learn a lot of things from the deal. So one of the things I learned is that, you know, if I need to scrape up $175 million in 6 weeks, I can do it. So you, you've got, since then, you've made those contacts to do that? Oh, absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. I've got, I've got the, I've got the uh intent letters and everything, so. So now I've learned, uh, I've learned where to go and how to do, how, how to, you know, put that kind of money together for the right deal, which is great. That's cause that's bigger than any kind of deal I've ever done by myself. I've done bigger deals as part of the team, but by myself, I've never raised that kind of money. So, um, you know, and the, and to do that in 2020 was was to me impressive. Now I know that that actually isn't that impressive cause there's a ton of dry powder out there with regard to investment, so. You know, it's, it's actually a great time to be, to be looking for cash to, to uh to buy companies or invest in companies. But, um, so I chalked it up to, look, if the deal never happens, uh, I learned some things that I would do different with the deal process to, uh, you know, to more guarantee surety of clothes. I've made some amazing connections. I've got tens of millions of dollars of investment capital in my back pocket for the next couple of deals that I'm working on, which I'm working on other deals. Um. And it's been, it's been a, it's been a fun ride. Now, do I still want to close that deal? Yeah, I'd love to have that EBID in my pocket cause it's the, you know, business is minting money. But if it never comes back, then it wasn't meant to be, and, and uh I've learned some great lessons from it, made some great contacts from it, and I'll go do another deal. Yeah, good, good for you. I, I do want to ask you about that process because You know, we go through Epic, we learn how to purchase companies with no money out of pocket or other people's money. But there's a big gap between some of these companies. As you grow larger, they're gonna say, I, I would, you know, I want some down payments, some deferred down payments, so you have to find it. Now, what did you do about going and finding that dry capital and say, You talking to an investment banker, hey, Marty, uh, you're purchasing this company. Let me know when you come to the next deal. Here's the letter of intent for 25 to $50 million. What what was that process? So we started with looking for actual equity investors, and we, and we, when I say we, I say I've got a, I've got a particular partner who, who he and I have worked together for several years. We've grown a couple of companies to 30 to $40 million together. And uh and so we worked on this project together. And so the first thing we do is reach out to people that were high net worth individuals in some family offices that we knew would have equity. So we, we raised the 1st $30 million that way. And that was, that was fairly quick. We kind of knew who to call and, you know, we've been working this, this network for years and, and so, um, and then from there it was a matter of um the the rest of it was gonna be debt and so it was a matter of talking to the right banks with the right, you know, the right mindset. And um we very quickly got uh 55 million committed right away, um, and then we had, we uh actually one of our earlier phone calls was uh was a a bank that um Uh, was, they were sitting on so much capital that hadn't been deployed. They were begging us to be in. The ceiling was at 30 million though, so they, they committed $30 million in one phone call and, and literally begged us, please take my money because we, you know, this is a deal we can make work and we got to get money out there, and please, you know, please put us in the deal. Um, so, oh, OK, you know, twist our arms. So, but we, you know, we pretty quickly had, you know, over 100 million and we just kinda kept stacking it up from there, so, um. Well, that's not, I mean, that's a lot of dry powder. Are you upping your level about who you're going for? This is because this is funny. I, I read a lot of books on, uh, Berkshire Hathaway and Warren Buffett, you know, and he starts at C candies at $26 million and now it's Like, uh, to move the needle, I need need to make a $40 billion acquisition. Yeah. Crazy. Yeah. Um, so I have different levels that I'm working at, so I have my own personal acquisitions that I'm doing, and those are on the smaller scale. I have two different partnerships. One is in the healthcare space, and we've got $30 million committed there, so we're looking for and and we're specifically looking for businesses in the Basically, the 2 to 3, maybe $2 to $4 million range, uh, in that because that's the, that's the sweet spot where we want to find them. We're gonna, we're doing a roll up on that. And then, um, with other partners, I've got, we are open to anything up to, you know, hundreds of millions if it's the right deal, so. And of course you leave that management in place. Uh, all of it, is it all of these companies you look at and say, hey, we leave man in place, keep doing what you're doing? No, so I, I, so I've had 3 different kind of deals that that have, that I've kind of done in the last year or tried to do in the last year. So, um, the first one of my first closings was uh a company that wanted, the owner wanted to retire and and uh and uh leave the business. But I had a an operator in mind who I've known for many years and I trusted, who, you know, when I saw the business for sale, I said, you know, um, I, I brought it to my friend. I said, you'd be perfect for running this company. He's like, yes, I would. So, um, that worked out great because I, you know, we were able to do the acquisition, put somebody else in a, in a great job, let the person who owned it retire, um, everybody wins. So that's, so I'm not always mandatory that the, uh, the existing operator has to stay or the existing manager has to stay. Yeah. On most deals I'm doing um less than full acquisitions. I'm doing anywhere from uh 20 to 49% acquisitions in those ones, obviously I'm keeping the management in place. We are looking to them to. Continue to run the business, run it efficient efficiently. We're bringing to the table a lot of resources whether it be uh partnerships, business development, um, doing business with all, you know, all the other businesses in our portfolio and our partnerships uh partnership portfolios, um, business development and I'm, I'm, you know, I consider myself the number one salesman for most of my, my portfolio. I like, I'm always out there selling how many is in your portfolio now right now, um. Uh, well, as of yesterday, 13. That's amazing. So, uh, since last year, when you started Epic, you've made 13 acquisitions. No, uh, I've made 12 acquisitions since I started Epic, but I had, I had a, I had 3 already before I started Epic, and then I, I, I've spun off 2 of those and I kept one, so total is 13, so. Yeah, that's amazing. I mean, I, can we say you're a star student of Epic? I, no, I, I am far from, there's plenty of people doing plenty more deals and plenty of big deals. I'm just enjoying life, man. Yeah, that's cool. Oh, I, I, I love to hear that. Um, go back to, is there any deals that you did? For you know, you're just like, I would love to own that company, you know, so when some people get very, very rich, he goes, I've got to own that sports club. Yeah, well, this, this big deal I'm working on, so I, I was kind of, I was working on, you know, the types of deals as far as like management and stuff. So there's, there's been mostly deals where I keep management in place. There's been two deals where I've management has left and I've replaced them with operators. And the big deal that I've been working on, I actually was gonna take that over. That was, I actually want to run that company because I have I clearly can see how that company can triple in revenue. And I know how to get it there. I've got the vision and everything. So I was actually gonna run that business for about 3 years. And, um, because I think I can, I can get that to be a billion dollar business without too much effort. So, um, obviously I'm not gonna go run a million dollar business, but I will run a $200 million dollar business if, if it makes sense for me. So those are the three, you know, kind of 3 models, whether it's, um, the owner operator stays, the owner operator leaves and I replace them with somebody I trust, or whether I become the. operator, which is gonna be a very specific deal. Uh, and, you know, if another one comes along that's, that's almost that perfect, I'll do that one. But, um, yeah, I'm not looking to run most any company. And, and so my involvement generally tends to be as a strategic advisor and as the chief, uh, salesman, you know, I'm always looking to, to grow, you know, any businesses I work with. And, um, but from a strategic advisor standpoint, is I'm, I'm the coach, I'm the one that's Uh, a lot of times the business owners that are currently there, if, you know, even, even though they maintain ownership, you know, there's a reason they, they, there's a reason they sold part of their company to me, right? They, they're in trouble or they plateaued, or they're doing good, but they want to grow faster. Whatever it is, there's some reason why they were open to uh an investment. So, um, So what I always do is look for opportunities where the company has some very specific issues that I know I can solve and help that company to, you know, unclog and and and and grow faster in scale. Yeah, so you're all of them or most of them are non-controlling interests. Do you have a put call agreement in place and The profit first kind of deal. Yeah, so, so some of them have, um, uh, I, I usually put an option. In there, so, uh, a buyout option down the road, um, which is, which is, um, usually tantalizingly, you know, tantalizingly high for the, the seller, and, um, and I, and I use that as leverage on the, on the front end. So, um, I, I kind of use it as a bargaining chip to get a better deal on the front end, so. Um, but, but, um, yeah, most of them, if there's several that are that are specifically gonna be growth, growth opportunities for the next 3 years, and then, and then they specifically want to exit, and they're really designed around doing that. And so, um, you know, I'm gonna, I'm gonna increase the value and my, my profit's gonna come from my ownership shares of that company, so. Yeah, you have any plans or uh To take any of these companies public? So, uh, yeah, there's a couple of them I think are are right for reggae plus and uh or uh or other things. Um, the healthcare business that we're working on that we've we've got the funding for is, is specifically, you know, is, is gonna be that that 30 million is just the initial seed. I mean, we, we, we definitely have a goal of taking that into a Um, a billion dollar evaluation and, and, you know, through, through a couple of different strategies. We're gonna focus on home healthcare companies. So you know, companies that are going around, there's, there's about 15, somewhere between 12 and 15,000 home healthcare businesses in the United States, and, uh, most of them were started by some sort of medical professional, usually a nurse who, you know, sick and tired and fed up with the medical system and, and, you know, a hospital system, and they, they wanna make a difference and be more personal and hands, hands-on. And so, uh, they start this home healthcare business so they can go into people's homes and take care of them. All great, right? But the reality is that's a brutally tough business and a lot of them have, uh, you know, they're great nurses, but they aren't great business people. And so I can't tell you how many deals, um, I've, I've had conversations, uh, pitches that I've conversations where the owner of the business, I mean, they got 25, 30 employees and um and they're literally driving down the road in between patients um with their entire business on the passenger seat of their car and in file folders and milk crates, trying to do paperwork in between calls and then, and then, you know, take calls from us and, and beg us, please help me figure out how to do this right. And so, so we've started with, you know, so there's a lot of Burnout in that space right now, the COVID thing has really been brutal on them. So, um, so that space is very interesting to us because it's, there's a lot of businesses, business owners who are thinking about selling. Um, it's a business that's critical today and will become more and more critical as the, the peak of the baby boomer generation, um, hits their critical mass with healthcare problems at 2 in 2030. So there's 9 more years before the, the healthcare system just completely, you know, is, is overwhelmed. And so, um, we're positioning that business to be, you know, on the forefront. What, what we want to do is build the Nordstrom of home healthcare, basically. Well, anytime you have a fragmented industry, what's his name? Uh, Wayne Huzinga from Blockbuster saw that fragmentation fragmentation opportunity, yeah, and there and when you know, if you are interested in home healthcare for yourself or for your parents or whatever, and I say, what's the brand? Yeah, there isn't, there is none. There's, there's brands in in managed care with facilities, so a place for mom, right? So, but that means you gotta holler to a a place, uh, but there is no national brand for home health care and uh so my partner and I are setting out to change that. Oh, that's awesome. Yeah, I like that. I, I wanna go back to your developing these relationships. With the family offices. Now, how very specifically, how did that look like you created a pitch deck or an offer deck or, or did you just, this is just kind of phone call and it's in the back pocket and say, hey, next deal I wanna do, what does that look like? It it's been a little bit of, um, so on the, on the front end of this, it's been a couple of personal relationships. So I know, I know some people who have some fairly, you know, good sized family offices. So it's been, uh, in the early days of kind of doing this in 2020, making phone calls, say, hey, I'm looking at doing this, I'm looking at doing acquisitions. If I need capital, you know, what are you interested in doing? And then they, they've kind of told me, and it's been in the early days of this last spring, you know, or mid, you know, spring, summer of 2020, it was a whole lot of, hey, we aren't putting any money into anything, we don't know what's going on. But very quickly by the fall, it was, they were calling me back going. OK, we've got to deploy funds, and we, you know, we're we're interested in what, what are you doing? And so, so the conversations definitely did not go great at the beginning because I was too early. I was too, too, you know, everybody was just hunkered down and nobody was deploying capital anywhere. But I stayed on them and so picked up a few, picked up a few of those, I guess some of them are some uh people that I've worked with before. I ironically, one of them is uh is one of my earliest acquisitions who went on to, um, I, I think that acquisition was $2 million this is 20 years ago, like $2 million and then he went on and did another, built another business and he and it was acquired for $700 million. And so, uh, this guy knows how to build businesses and sell them. I, I, I bought a $2 million business, but I didn't buy a $700 million business. He said, I gotta get out of here because I see bigger potential in some other stuff. Exactly, exactly. You can have my little $2 million business, so, um, but so I, so I have some connections with people who have connections and I've just been working them. So when that great big deal came along, um, it was, it obviously got much more aggressive and um. It was interesting because There was no pitch deck involved. There was no nothing. It was literally, um, call those people and then and nobody, nobody, no one family office or no one bank is gonna put in all that money. They all want to do, you know, some sort of syndication, right? And some of them were waiting for the first guy to, OK, I'll do it. Yeah, so we had, we had our first, we had our first group, and so from there it was like, hey, so and so's in and so and so's in are you good for, you know, 2 million or 5 million or whatever. Yeah, absolutely. And so, um. But it was interesting because people who normally wouldn't have probably taken our calls, um, basically it was a, it was a very, you know, back in the napkin kind of thing. Here's the business, here's the money, here's the EBA and, you know, this thing is just thrown off cash like nobody's business. And um OK. I mean, it was, it was crazy how, how quick that went. So, yeah, yeah, where did you uh how did you source that deal? Where did that come from? Another epic member. Oh awesome. So collaboration, collaboration, yeah, networking and, and, and working with Um, you know, other investors and other people who are in the M&A space, everybody's got something specific they're looking for, and everybody has something specific they are not interested in, and there are plenty of deals out there to go around. And so I've um got myself plugged in pretty well to several people who are are bringing me deals on a pretty regular basis. I've brought you 2 or 3, yeah. So, um, that was, you know, so that one came to me from somebody who, you know, was fairly fresh into the game, and, and so, you know, they, they picked up on it and they were out, they, they found it cold calling. Oh, that's awesome. Yeah, what what what is their split in the deal? Do they Um, I don't. If if it goes through, right? If it goes through, yeah, so it it was depending on how the deal closed. Now we were closing this one as independent sponsors and so our independent sponsor success fee was gonna be, you know, 2%, and so he would have gotten half of that, basically, so 11% of the 175 million. So yeah, so, yeah, I think everybody would take that. Yeah Not bad for a cold call. Yeah, yeah. Uh, I mean, 1% doesn't sound like much when you're talking numbers like that. 175 million. It's a lot. It's a lot of money. Yeah. So, um, yeah, so networking has, has been my number one source of, of, of deal flow without question. I have, um, Um, number 2 though has been podcasts just like this. I've I've been, um, having a, I've had a lot of people who've reached out to me and asked me to to do interviews, and every single interview I do, um, my, you know, I just watch the web traffic spike up and then the phone calls start coming in, and I, the last interview I just released about 2 weeks ago. Um, within 2 hours of the interview dropping, I had 3 really interesting deals, you know, contacting me. So that's been kind of cool. Yeah, and yeah, that's cool. I, I, I have to, have you watched, uh, the Jason Calcana and Chamath and Freeburg and Sachs, this Silicon Valley investors? Oh, it's awesome. I mean, Shaath is just wicked smart. I mean, he's wicked smart. I mean, the analysis he puts over situations just. Amazing. That is a great podcast if you I'll check it out. Thanks. Yeah, yeah, um, so that's that's really been my, my, my two primary sources of deals has been, you know, networking and word of mouth, and, um, you know, and, and doing interviews with really smart, cool people like you. And that's been. You know, I, the collaboration, I have to share this story. Um, we just partnered up with, uh, Adam Lyons. He's one of the other instructors, you know him, right? Yep. So we're partnering up with another business, but I was listening to one of the conference calls, and he said, we were, I was helping another Epic member try to do a $6 million deal, and we got stuck on it. Some snagged, right? And the guy wanted to see proof of funds for some amount. I don't, I don't remember what it was. So. Adam reached out to another guy who had lots of cash, took a screenshot, he said, he took a screenshot of his bank account, sent it to him, and Adam gave him 6% of the deal, and they closed with the LOI. So. Yeah. I mean, it's pretty cool. Just for that, it goes, uh, for 6% of a $6 million company, you just want a screenshot? Yeah, OK. Yep. Yeah, that's awesome. Wow. Yeah. So what's next for you? I mean, you'd like to get this company, but do you have any big deals coming in? You're going, oh, this is really exciting. I've got, I got a, I got the seal team deal team in place. I got grant, I got all my accountants. I got my own bookkeeping. Yeah. Um, I got funds ready to go. You're now on the Precipice of something big, huh? Yeah, I, you know, I, I don't know what's next, cause I, I haven't seen the, the next really big deal. I'm, I've got several kind of small to medium deals happening. I've got one, I've got a $22 million seller who, um, Literally won't leave me alone. She's begging me to buy her business and I'm just like, why is she begging me, um, this would be one where the owner well she will exit, she, you know, she needs to exit the business. She's burnt. She's been in the hospital twice with stress-related illnesses. I've already met 4 or 5 of those types like health, I gotta, I gotta get out. I mean, yeah, and so, which is, you know, so it's like, OK, now, um, you know, if the terms are right, we'll do it. But it's right in my sweet spot. It's a, it's a business category. I've already done, I don't know, $80 to $100 million in sales in personally. So, um, so that one might be interesting. Um, we just gotta work out the right price and the right terms, but that, that just came about recently and Um, and I've, I've had, I've had 3 people today call me and say she's, she keeps calling me, she wants you to call her and like close this deal, and I'm, yeah, we'll see. I, you know, wait till the price gets a little more realistic, so oh, so what's the uh the multiple evaluations too high? Um, so the issue there is that her books aren't very clean. OK, so we don't really know that that's, yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm willing to, I'm willing to take a gamble on fuzzy books, but I'm only gonna do that if, if the worst possible scenario is what we based the numbers on. So, and she's kind of wanting to base the numbers on the best possible scenario, and I'm basically saying let's just clean up the, clean up the books. So, um, so we'll see, you know, that's one of those that's not gonna happen overnight. Can you ask for the bank statements and just say, hey, let's, we're gonna go off the bank statements, not. But that would cost you a lot of money, then you're doing due diligence before you got a deal, you know, um, but we'll we'll get there. I'm, I'm confident in that one. we'll, we'll get there. Well, good. So what do you, let's do. This, I mean, I, I, I've probably taken up your hour, and I, I love this. I could probably talk for another hour. Yeah, you have 10 questions, and I think we're only at 2, like we're only at 32. So you wanted to try to do this in 15 minutes. I like I was crazy. OK, I overestimated that, all right? All right, sorry. And I think a patch, uh, Patch Baker said that too, and he goes. I'm not gonna do a 15 minute conversation with you. I go, yeah, it turned out really stupid to say, I want, you know, I'm gonna crossfire you with these questions you're gonna answer real fast. That didn't work out. It could have been fun. I mean, we could still try the format sometime. I, I was, I was kind of practice. I think like I think I could have nailed it. I don't know how much content or value the content would have to the list. But it could, it could still be done. I think it'd still be interesting to try that. I think it's so much by the way, rock stars, you know, M&A rock stars, I mean, Patch is crushing it. Holy moly. Yeah, yeah. Somebody told me I'm, I joined his 3 p.m. Thursday he's done 40. 4D acquisitions, I heard. Yeah, that I believe it. It's they're just, it's, if they, they steamroll though. Like once you start doing a couple, then all this they just, I mean, I got, I used to have to go out and find deals, and now they're coming to me faster than I can even keep track of them. And then so I can believe that. He's, he's really doing awesome. Yeah. And let me, let me ask you back to like personally, what has it done for your confidence or just who you are as a Yeah, like, like you walk in the door and doesn't matter. I mean, the prettiest girl on the planet would look at and you go, that guy's powerful, you know. I still drive a Toyota. Actually I drive two Toyotas. Um, I have a truck and a car, um. You know, what it's done for me, it's done two things. It has made me feel good about myself knowing I'm helping others. I mean, I have saved some businesses. I have literally saved some businesses and literally saved some jobs. Not as many as I had hoped. I had these really grand visions of, like, Doing a lot more saving, um, and, and, and a lot of my deals, I'm saving some jobs, but other ones, you know, they're just, um, they're making more efficient. I'm almost really, I'm almost losing jobs because I'm making the business more efficient. We don't even need as many people. So, I'm a little frustrated about that, but I, I am, I am helping people, and I know that, and that's, that's the most important thing to me cause that's really why I did this. Hm. Second is, I am having a ball. I'm having so much fun right now, and I'm, uh, you know, my mom called me this morning and she said, Do you realize that you haven't talked to me in 2 weeks? And I'm like, really? naughty boy. Didn't I just talk to you like 2 days ago? And she's like, no, it was this day and this is what happened and you were going to dinner and I was like, oh wow, I, I'm, I'm going a million miles an hour. And uh I, I, I, I'll have to slow down. I, I, I, but I play hard too. I take a lot of vacations and I get off the grid and, and, and fairly frequently to, to the point my partner's getting annoyed with me, but um. But I, um, I'm having so much fun. That a 14 hour day of Zoom calls. I'm exhausted, but I go to sleep with a smile on my face and wake up and go, hey, let's do it again. Let's do it again. It's it, is it 6 a.m. yet? Let's go. And, and so, um, that's the coolest thing I think is that is that this stuff can be so fun, and every deal is so unique. There are no two deals like that. You gotta be creative. You've gotta think outside the box and look at it from every angle and, and understand. The needs of the, I mean, I, this is the stuff I learned back as a as a salesman, you know, I, I think that's, let me, let me up to very because I think that's why you're so excited because it's new every day. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, if it was the same thing every day, you just grow boring of it. You, you're, I think it's because it's different. Yeah. Yeah, there's no question about it. I am not a person that could be on work on an assembly line and do the same thing every day, day in and day out. God love the people that are. Thank you very much. I, you know, uh, I'm a huge, huge fan of Mike Rowe and, and, and, you know, and, and, and the, the jobs out there that I could never do, the skilled labor jobs and whatnot. But for me, I just have to be creative and I have to be innovative. And um um this has given me the ability to do doing mergers and acquisitions and and and scaling businesses. Has given me so much opportunity to, um, yeah, just totally be, be an artist, but an artist with businesses. I can't draw a straight line to save my life, you know, I can't sing. I don't have any of those kind of artistic abilities, but my artistic ability is in business and growing them and scaling them and making more profitable. And that's my, that's my canvas, and I love it every single day. Oh, that's beautiful. And I'm gonna end on that because that's a beautiful note right there. So, I wanna appreciate your time, Marty. Let's, uh, I hope we can do this again. Yeah, awesome. Thanks, John. Well, for your first one, I hope that, you know, I hope that I set the bar at least reasonably high so that when uh when, when, when people like Patch or whatever show up, they know they don't you don't look back and go, oh man, that first one with Marty that was Mary. I got 100 views and Patch gets 5 4000. He goes like, no, no, no, no, this is, this is gonna be great. I really appreciate it. So I'm gonna stop recording.