Shirt Show Podcast ep 161 w/ Dan Frank, CEO of Silver Screen Printing in Reno, NV

shirt show all right let’s go [Music]

[Applause]

we’re talking with Dan from Silver Screen in Nevada

hey there hot stuff yo yo yo yo yo what’s happening you’re

just talking to your [ __ ] six minutes ago I know and I missed you so hard since

then yeah yeah I think what people don’t realize is that when we talk to each other during the week we want to like

any friend would be like hey what’s going on how’s your feelings or whatever and then as soon as we start we say no shut up

don’t say anything when I talk to you now it’s it’s real

yeah you start telling a story and I’m like shh h don’t tell me

strictly business on the phone right so you said it was like 900 Degrees there

yeah I like a good a solid maybe not 900 but I’m like 800 for sure right like a

mere 800 Degrees yeah how about there yeah I was saying surface of the Sun plus plus it’s on fire so the air is

just filled with smoke so what a week this has been um I’ll just I’ll just start this off on

for my what happened what like the [ __ ] that went down over here at Short dong

mm-hmm um Tuesday no internet which means no

phones also so that’s why we had to cancel or whatever reschedule this this episode

um and they said it was going to be out for days but it was on the next day so that’s good right things worked out

yeah so we were we were cool with it like it just worked out um I had gotten or an email

on over the weekend that said hey you’re we’re resurfacing the whole parking lot it’s shut down on Wednesday and Thursday

so that happened and um we emailed and asked this church that

was just like right down the street if we could park there they said yeah cool help yourself you can even come over here and use

internet you can we have offices what do you need they’re trying to [ __ ] lure you in dude they’re awesome they’re like

come on in we’ll do communion yeah it was really gracious of them uh and so we did like we used their a lot

then these guys show up on

uh Thursday yesterday to resurface this lot and just let me tell you these guys

were [ __ ] awesome like the badass [ __ ] on earth like the baddest

asses on Earth that they just showed up were they out there were they out there shirtless and [ __ ] cause [ __ ] and

just practically Rippling in other muscles no think opposite of that but they they just got

it done like I’ve never seen anything like this they just show up like they sped in here and er you know

like power slid in power slid in the parking lot yeah and then jumped out

and they were working within 30 seconds I would say 10 of them and they were like

that’s I’ll tell you what this is a nasty job resurfacing asphalt parking lots they had like

tar arms like probably that’s that I would

say that if you if one of them quit working there it would take a year to have not have that tar on their body you

know I can face because they’re out there spraying you know it’s like with hoses tar everywhere and stuff yeah and while he’s

doing it like the asphalt’s dumped and it’s smoking and he’s got a cigarette you know just hanging out in his mouth

and they’re just badasses yeah they die at 35. yeah and it was like 100

yesterday too on top of it all right um but they were really nice

a couple times one came like and just stood inside and said hey I’m gonna

cool off for just a minute you mind I’m like come on in yeah what do you need got stuck

um it was really cool like there so it’s done and then actually um we showed up this morning and the parking lot was striped and all the

concrete blocks were back there and Katie who um who was a shipping receiver manager

lives right down the street and she was driving by and she said at night at 10 o’clock at night they had lights on the

parking lot and they were striping it like at night they’re badasses badasses

I want like uh we should have just hired them all you know what I mean I like how we [ __ ] and moan and be like Oh our

t-shirts didn’t come in and these guys are like [ __ ] covered in tar and standing on

the hot asphalt it’s it was gnarly but they I was super

impressed it looks beautiful like it is it’s glorious uh somebody got here this morning and

when I pulled up they were skating it it was so smooth and they were just like looking up at the sky

smooth right the next thing that happens is someone comes in with like their piece of [ __ ]

jalopy and [ __ ] the oils dripping out of their car everywhere and they Park in your lot and then some other kids gonna

come in and graffiti all over like draw a big dick and white spray paint in the middle of your parking lot a semicoms

and like pulls a UE and then just all it all just like tears it all up yeah probably I’ll be tomorrow 11. yeah

so yeah that uh that happened how about you what’s going on up there uh they’re actually doing work out front

here too they’re putting in drainage but it’s not it’s not exciting it’s just you know whatever

but uh shots was great uh things are going good uh we’re getting that Fourth of July slowdown but other than that

things are things are nice we found a couple people taking vacations um

I’m playing a lot of basketball during lunch and a bill is going to give me a fresh haircut after this so okay yeah

the Clipper is like a number four or five six yeah I got mine uh eight what

are they [ __ ] my wall twenty dollar hair clippers that’s what I use every

time yep and he’s gonna give me a sick fade all the way around and uh trim my top and

director manager and barber so yeah we’re about your what about down there yeah definitely like a whole bat wing it

I hold it out and then he just shaves it down he goes like it’s like when um on Dumb

and Dumber Jim Carrey they’re like filing down his toenails and they but they put the wall down there and it goes

like it’s stuck yeah it’s just like that open up really bad bleeding experience

once so I’m ready for it yeah I thought I was gonna die you want to tell that story or maybe I

legit thought I was gonna die I nicked a ball once and uh I bled

everywhere like blood all over the bathroom like [ __ ] Massacre

and then I could not for the life of me get it to stop bleeding and I like tried all these Band-Aids they tried

everything and it would not stop so I finally just like somehow got it to stop bleeding enough

to put a Band-Aid on to get it to like secure and then uh I would the hard part was I

had to go to bed and I was terrified that the Band-Aid was going to fall off while I was in bed and then I was gonna bleed to death you should have just

tourniquet like tourniquet that [ __ ] just put a heavy rubber band on my balls and wake up in the morning they’re

they’re black and ready to fall off I think next time you do that next time it happens all right that sounds good

yeah um today we flip-flopped you know where

our stock was in the far corner I don’t know if you remember it was just far like far from

shipping and receiving shipping and receiving is right there well you can almost see it look at that yeah

yeah so DTF was there and it was crowded and there was way more space over there

and then we brought stock back over here which where it should be you know like that’s right next to it exactly like if

you’re if you’re ordering shirts or if you’re missing a shirt or whatever it is you need to pull from stock well there it is

it just makes sense and we thought like in my head I’m like man that’s a full days project there’s this is going to

take some time but we were it was just half day am I finished by lunch you know so this

is a good there’s a good team there yeah we got it done we got that camp thing we’re trying to

do we have a camp where where are we at with the vet

well in real time for us right now tickets go on sale tomorrow July 1st yep today’s

June 30th tomorrow is can you believe tomorrow’s July what the hell I know dude

dude tomorrow is my son’s birthday my I I officially have a teenager

tomorrow oh yeah well

well hey I um I’m sorry but it should be should be okay mine I remember with mine

I don’t know what teenager 13 is that seventh or sixth it’s gonna be in seventh grade

okay well so he’s already corrupt basically he’s been a junior high for a

year okay well then it’s not that big of a deal yeah yeah he uh yesterday was like the first time

and it’s funny because he’s turning uh 13. tomorrow but yesterday I took them

to the pool during lunch and it was like the first time I’ve ever seen him act like a teenager to the degree of

like being a [ __ ] like no one really has like teenageresque things of like the way he

talks to his friends and whatever he does but he’s not really too much of an [ __ ] yesterday he was just being a

bully he was sister and he was like doing stuff and then when I said get over here like I want to talk to you I

said something to him and he just turned and gave me a look and then like walked away and I straight up dad moved I was

like don’t you walk away from me and like got him back and he just gave

me this like stupid look or whatever and I was like dude I was so pissed and then yeah he just the [ __ ] he was doing was

just like oh God this is what life is going to be like now yeah so

yeah but you’re good dad you’ll uh he’ll get it figured out yeah I mean

you can only beat him so much right hand starts to hurt

it’s stretch time and you know that means our stretch is brought to you by oh yeah

I forgot we got a stretch now for Frank yeah that’s right

um oh wait I always I don’t know what order to do this in yet because I think we need to do the button and then say

that the stretch time so no I’m gonna stretch while I do it well you do stretching today well you do

the wipe this yes don’t touch it yet that’s what she said

let me know when you want me to touch it and now anytime as soon as you touch it

I’m on freak

you are almost a little premature yeah it happens it all starts with a screen and whether

it’s new stretches or re-stretches Frank and his team do it the best to find out more go to graphicscreenfashion.com FFF

reddit.com or greatfuckingscreens.com hell yeah the world’s best

somebody so do you remember that story I told you where uh that dude was on a shop tour and I

gave him a thin thread a 158 thin thread he messaged me yesterday

and I don’t know I’ve got to read it he said Andy

I just wanted to say thank you so much for Lending me that 156 thin thread screen I finally got to use it today and

oh my God I can’t wait to switch all of my screens over to thin thread the underbase was so

perfect and just like you said one stroke thank you again and that was Sasha and he has that that brand that

shirt I showed you you see that it’s awesome no is it blurry yeah I can

see it so yeah that was the print he did with it stoked don’t be a [ __ ] just go

get some Thin thread or if you don’t like thin thread whatever just get screens from Frankie but he has both

worst case scenario [ __ ] buy someone try it out you don’t have to buy 900 of them just

get a six pack cleaning screens is no fun but easy way

makes it way more funner their line of eco-friendly chemicals will make reclaiming screens a whole lot easier

check them out at easyway.com easy way it’s the easiest way um

next we have graphic source and if you or your art Department could use some love then you need to go to one

900hotstuff.com and get in touch with Nick or Lucas Nick lugers

at Graphics source and let them run your business and let them run your business yeah

that’s what they do they do no let them run your art department so you can focus

on running your business yep we’ve been going back and forth for the last couple days with Nick it’s been

really fun just to get that hot dog graphic the world’s ultimate hype man

she just that’s what his business cards should say is like Nick would hype man

it should just be [ __ ] like club music like as soon as you pull that card out it should just be like

it should just be like [ __ ] light show and [ __ ] um

it just makes you feel good and you know what I mean and that’s um that’s rare out there in the world so really truly

appreciate it Dylan choosing the writing motion for your shop is complicated and that’s why

we love chromaline go to chromalign.com to watch kev’s vids or contact him on Instagram at the

Emulsion Guru and get the answers you need yep

look if you’re not using DTF or screen print transfers in your shop then you

are a [ __ ] so we partnered with Howard custom

transfers to get you the transfers you need fast check them out at howardct.com I think that went well yeah

yeah I’ve ordered from Howard every day for the last couple days I feel like every day we have more and

more stuff that’s coming in that people want transfers for that is [ __ ] impressive

like seriously you’ve ordered Howard every day for the last two days

like if not three or more days okay because you said couple days you’ve like

I’ve ordered from them every day if I just like place an order I place an order thinking like okay that’s the order for the week or whatever and then

the next day someone comes in and it’s like hey this customer wants it’s toddler hoodies and baby onesies and

it’s like a five color and whatever and I’m like well transfers transfer that show order more transfers and the next

day it’s like oh so-and-so wants to get a thousand tags and whatever else it’s like well

let me email candy again I’m selling all my presses and just gonna transfer that’s it like in my house or something

like in my garage seriously it would be so much easier are you recording I forgot I don’t know

I don’t know are we like when you wear that white shirt see your pokies through it

yeah yeah today’s guest is from the great state of

Nevada ladies and Gentlemen please welcome Dan with

Silver Screen in secret silver

perfectly timed perfectly timed

what’s up dude how are you I’m good how about yourself oh wonderful

uh we were talking about how it’s about the surface or the temperature of the surface of the sun outside is that the

case there in Nevada or or what yeah it’s like 80. not too bad for summer it can get up to 100 plus here so

it’s pretty good we’ve got swamp coolers blowing everywhere and trying to keep cool right

do you feel when I did some traveling in the South um to a bunch of shops I feel like that

was a staple in every shop with a swamp coolers do you feel like they’re actually like working really well for you or is it

just something that’s kind of like take an edge off yeah we should obviously we could air condition this place but taking the edge

off I mean the you know the swamp the water really helps and then we have big fans that operate up top and then we

open the vents so you know try to get good airflow through the through the shop right yes we have five big dryers

and those things create a lot of heat I’m assuming though in Nevada that it’s

dry and you know it’s not very humid and so the swamp coolers don’t add to the

humidity it actually probably works better in an environment like yours or a climate like yours is my guess

good point yeah I definitely think so we’re in 4 300 feet and it’s pretty dry then down south in Houston I could only

imagine oh or down that way yeah I think the place I saw the most of them was in

uh when I was in Tennessee and I feel like every press had one like pointing

at the you know the loader and the puller so

um I don’t know I just always wondered I always thought about getting one here but I didn’t know if it would make much of a difference with my climate or not

but the water is the key right I mean the big fan is great but getting that

getting the water in there really cools the air coming through yeah

um so you kind of have a cool story you had a life and a career before you

acquired a print shop yes uh definitely I’m a logistics guy

most people don’t know what that is but you know Ocean Air Freight custom brokerage Global operations so worked my

way up after college I thought it was a pretty cool thing I worked for apple and Munich and I didn’t like computers that

much and I’m kind of a small town guy so uh you know I’ve found an industry it’s

basically Trucking warehousing those type of things so you know my crew is a good career for

sure I mean uh you know I end up being the CEO of some you know fairly large companies 100 million type no not not

super big like you know major corporations but uh 100 million seems like a pretty good size

company yeah yeah a thousand employees something like that but the the problem

with the industry for me was that uh the travel is 70 overseas so you know it’s

just a destroyer of the family life and live in big cities and I’m from a small town so

you know I just got it got kind of burned down um I was on the plane going to Dubai the owners were in the last I worked for private Equity the last

company and uh you know I don’t think private Equity is bad but it’s all about the money right employees and customers

are kind of second nature second fiddle to that so I had a little bit of struggle with that but most of the

travel um and uh I really wanted to get close to my hometown Reno is about an hour

outside of Colfax California which is 1900 people my mom’s 83 and I told my

wife I just really want to slow down a little bit and I really want to kind of get back to the entrepreneurial type of stuff and uh you know focus on the

employees and the customers and kind of have a little fun and I thought it wasn’t going to work as hard but this is not an easy industry to put back the

hours but at least at least I come home every night right and uh I was uh how was that life I mean I know you said you

were traveling everything else but like your day-to-day was it kind of like I don’t know what was that like compared

to what it is now um I think there’s a lot of misunderstandings about a CEO uh like

they’re the guy in charge of the truth is CEO works for owners and uh they could be pretty pretty aggressive and

then the CEO’s job is to you know make the employees feel cared for but make sure that this the the ownership is

being addressed in the way that they want to be addressed and so sometimes that’s just difficult

um you know I I definitely learned a lot about scaling per you know we supported production from manufacturers things

like that overseas so you know one of the things I was interested in this business is really getting into the production instead of supporting it but

uh you know I definitely learned a lot in the industry for sure it was it was good but again it’s I also like the

Multicultural thing I mean uh that was pretty cool my office was in Singapore the last company and you know developing

a team in Singapore dealing with the cultural aspects that region uh I had a European Partners as well so I really

loved that part when I was a kid you know in a small town I just thought I want to travel the world and I got to it

was great um and I think you know that is an added element of challenge for sure I mean there’s no

doubt but you know it’s very fulfilling if you ask me it was it was it was great it really was yeah

um coming from that world to this world you said that you had some things that you

kind of like brought from that and you really wanted to be more Hands-On what was what was the company like before you

took it on was it it was a lot smaller right it was small but it was it wasn’t as big

as it is now yeah so I bought it four years ago in June so you know it’s been four years uh

unfortunately you know seven eight months right after I bought it coveted hit we went we actually closed down and

we opened up with 12 people so you know somebody said would you have bought the company and if you would have known I

said no that’s a challenge uh but the good news is that you know I’m kind of a build it guy and you just rebuilt it’s

literally from scratch uh but what I what I liked about the industry and I you know I’ve been on a few podcasts

with you guys and also with print Hustlers and I think the industry uh I heard a guy say this is an art this is

production I thought that was a really good way to put I think it was a guy named from social imprints Kevin McCracken he was on print Hustlers and

um I think that’s where the industry struggles a little bit uh it is Art and it’s creative and all that but you know

at the end of the day you’ve got to push stuff out the door it’s it’s really a Sausage Factory and so that part of my

training was really good for I think the company um but you know when I bought the company about from a guy who started in

2003 um he wanted to re-prioritize his family and things like that but I saw some

things that uh that you know it wasn’t super profitable but it was good business for sure but no swing shifts

um kind of siled employees in in certain side of the printer was a printer and you know a lot of things that I thought

cross training and uh you know we do a lot of Labor sharing between departments obviously we’re we’re I think at 92

people something like that I I think there’s efficiencies you can gain I think speed is is the game right so uh I

really saw that the industry could be profitable I also saw the employees were underpaid I hear that a lot in the

industry that you know you don’t pay much in screen print but I think you know it really comes down to the

disciplines of the shop uh we implemented uh um you know full medical benefits and

Market what I call Market rates uh that was a little difficult because you got to kind of catch up to yourself right uh

but you know once we got there I I think uh you know once we got a really good uh yeah I think you guys understand that

we we call it a meritocracy here so meaning that a yearly review is a long ways away for for somebody on press so

what we try to do is we we our schedules judge their performance every single day

in regards to kills and up you know we have 100 is obviously Optimum but you

know for printers doing 80 as they’re learning they get paid a certain amount of money as as they grow in their their

performance they’re immediately rewarded with increases and you know I think that culture here really helps uh I

implemented that because I thought you know these guys are working hard and it’s not an easy business and uh in my

opinion somebody should be paid for what they’re worth not you know meaning if somebody increases their value to the

shop I think you gotta get with them really fast I agree um how did you

I guess how do you collect that data is it you that collects all that data and then

um did the does the team member know that if they hit a certain number then that means that you know their

compensation is bonus or something like that like how do you go about doing that did you write the software did you buy the software

like I said there was some you know buying this company was great because there was some really good processes in place uh you know I think some of the

reward versus scoring was was a little bit too slow in my opinion but they all

get their report card uh the next day so you know if they have a schedule uh that

schedule has got metrics built to it so you know how many screens uh how many pieces uh and we we have basically met

you know to be honest with you it’s Excel spreadsheets but it comes out of our our system and um we just write

those schedules we give them an amount of time per job um it’s a it’s a good process and and

you know again a new printer is not going to do 100 but we have some that are over a hundred and those those

printers are paid uh much higher than the ones below below that and they’re scored to answer your question they’re

scored every single day how did you come about getting the I guess the preferred time per job did

you guys just do that like an average over a period of time and say a Four Color front to color back this many

shirts should be this time or how did you come about those numbers yeah obviously setup is a big issue with

with a a run right so we we average about I think we’re 170 a job uh we do a

lot of promo uh Sports things like that we’re just strictly contract uh so what

we do is we look at how many screens just exactly what you said it comes up with a math for example I think I’m not

the guy doing that but I think it’s five minutes of screen I could be wrong but meaning there’s a metrics to every

single uh setup it’s around five minutes of screen I think so yeah it could be

quoted wrong but uh I mean there’s math to every single job right and it allows for that

um so yeah I mean uh you know obviously a large job is going to require a lot more

pieces than the small job our average setup each pilot is about seven jobs per

per day uh but if he’s running a two setup schedule then obviously he’s going

to be required to do more he or she’s going to be required to do more pieces um and then it just it obviously the

performance they we document everything that was performed and then we run metrics for them the next day

Dylan did you see that Excel spreadsheet from CustomInk that was being passed

around the other day so it was it it was sick like they it could all be done in

Excel like you just said it looked really nice I don’t know who built it out but it was built out Pro and it had a lot of this stuff that you

just described you know like each press or per day and it actually had even dollar amounts that they were they were

trying to hit like the goals for the day and everything like that and then everyone’s name like every single press

operator I guess press assistant’s name I think they were running a lot of manuals too because the list was like

seemed like 50 people long or something but it was really elaborate and it would be so cool to like track that and see

that every single day and like you said compensate or bonus based on all that stuff because I think

that that’s one of the things that we’re lacking here yeah you’re not rewarded for

like more output every day and so we’ve never really thought about that I don’t think your shop does that either Dylan

we kind of just come in and we’re chill and we have this is what’s due and we go through it and everybody understands

that hey we got to get this done but wouldn’t it be great to actually have

um that sort of thing in place I think it would be good I hope it doesn’t I hope it wouldn’t backfire and for some

reason there’s got to be some sort of downside to it but it seems like it would be great yeah I think

I’m really interested in hearing Dan your story and like how your mind is thinking about this from the CEO thing

coming into this because my approach to this whole thing since the beginning has been more

the art form side like I got into it because I was into

art and I was into music and all that stuff and that came together and it worked and then I’m not necessarily a

business guy I turned into a business guy because I have to be because I’m an owner of a business and so on and so

forth but the more and more we grow the more and more I see like I need to meet Both Worlds at some like together at

some point I can’t just do the art thing forever like I have to do I have to learn some [ __ ] when it comes

to business and the Sausage Factory and so on um so it I think that’s where this stuff

comes into play and that’s where I’ve been taught people listen to show know that for me over the last year or two has been a lot of like

grown-up stuff like we’ve been in business for like 15 years but like I’m getting to the point where I’m like

all right I need more like legit like HR and like you know all this other stuff

and recording you know the times of jobs and this other stuff so that we can figure things out more clearly and make

it the business side of things more the cohesive and everything else so do

you feel like recording this info and having the presses uh The Operators

write all this down and figure this out daily is like good for competition for them or is it

like creating resentment where someone’s slower than somebody and they’re like well I’m never gonna make what this guy

makes because I just can’t print as fast as that person or whatever yeah I think the it doesn’t create some

competition the answer is yes hopefully that’s healthy right but uh we also have captains on the floor that are there to

help them and groom them so our captains we coached his managers or coaches here

and uh supervisors or captains just kind of a neat language that I stayed with I thought it was pretty cool

um probably from the sports sports side of the things but you know uh I think

you know there’s certain people that learn really really fast and they get rewarded quickly some people learn slow

but they they get there does that make sense and so they should be discouraged for for being slow what I always say is

that it’s better to slow start out slow and learn your discipline than go real fast and burn it you know kill a bunch

of shirts right so I think it just has to be a positive environment I think looking to say Hey you know this printer

is making X dollars and I can get there and I have support to get there uh is the key you got to keep it positive for

sure how does that scale work like what what do they is it just you you review it after uh x amount a month period and

say okay you’re worth this much more now or is it like a gradual thing yeah it’s been a journey by the way all

this stuff if you ask me for even for me if you say some background in it I still you know it’s still a different industry

and you have to kind of learn your your DNA I don’t think there’s one solution for all shops but I do think uh in my

opinion we struggled with saying okay let’s do bonuses but I find that getting their pay up is is the most important

thing for them I mean how do you do a bonus and then you’re doing a lot of scoring so we really focused on the meritocracy idea and and and rewarding

them quickly so if I’m answering your question it’s it’s kind of radical almost that uh I have a two guys that we

call the exact team right um but I didn’t mention as well and I always want to mention these guys when I came here we have four people that have

been here almost 15 years in the management team so when I say a great purchase for me I mean you know you

mentioned the art it is Art and I you know and it’s really really important to do your craft well but I have that

that’s a real blessing for uh to have those guys however I think for me sitting down every single week and we I

I think one week we did six increases one week so you know is it is it two

bucks an hour no but is it 25 or 50 cents an hour the answer is yes and fast so you know recognizing them you know

this the screen print is 62 percent of our business so you know our coach and screen print is breaking a lot of those

but I I love to see them I think that you know the idea that we want to reward for for progress is important and I

think that uh not putting a timeline remember I just mentioned the guy that learns fast I mean you know we have a

young gal she’s probably five two she probably weighs I don’t know 90 pounds and 100 pounds and I wouldn’t have

thought she she would be as good as she is but less than a year from now she’s one of our best printers and she’s one

of our highest paid printers as well uh so you know I think we’ve managed the

the morale suspect through the coaches and the encouragement that we want to pay more we really want them to step up

but you have to you have to have you know key metrics to that you can’t just say well we like you right or you know

you you always show up on time which is great but can you perform your job as well and I think also you know

disciplines do they call you know then this business what I’ve learned is is that you know if people are not on time

and they’re not really trustworthy and they do a lot of call outs you know that’s going to be tough for us so we

really try to tell them hey your disciplines are part of the process as well

that was going to be my other part of this question is what do you do when you get somebody in the beginning who’s

eager and wants to prove themself and does awesome and gets our numbers up and they get their pay up does it come down

as well if their productivity starts to slack because there’s definitely I’ve

seen that throughout the years as I get people that are here one two three years then by year four we call it the

printer’s curse here where they start to get like you know over their head or busy or

whatever and then they think they’re better than other people and they just kind of like well I’m not good you know this person is getting favoritism so I’m

just gonna work slow and blah blah and it’s like do you cut it down then or is that like a meeting between your

coaches or your captains or whatever yeah of course it’s screen print again

the most challenging so you know uh we do a point system through a payroll company called Paylocity if they’re late

or they do what we call no call no show or you know two hours before the shift they get uh points for that and uh those

points can add up to a termination I know it’s not something you want to talk about but this really really important

for us we haven’t had what you just said we that’s probably a good good thing to bring up and a fear that I would have

but so far so far so good so far it’s working out yeah I would say that what’s

important for a shop like you know yours Dylan or mine is that as we

let’s call it mature into having some of these things like tracking data and doing doing that sort of stuff

um compensating you know for bonuses and good you know I guess performance is how you put it is that we don’t lose the

culture we have or the vibe that we have because I don’t want it to be like you said earlier Dan where

it’s you were working for a private Equity company and it’s all about like the numbers and profits and less about

the team and I think that that whatever we do if we’re going to add any of this stuff we don’t want to lose the fact

that it’s not always it’s not for us anyway it’s not profit over team or profit over customers you know it’s it’s

the opposite of that and so I think that’s the balance that you would have to we’d have to maintain somehow and probably would be the challenge you

know if that makes sense yeah um so I have a question about your just

purchasing the business I have a few actually did you um know anything about screen printing

before you decided to buy this shop that’s my first question nothing no

I’ve got a buddy of mine said what were you thinking and I thought well you know but again the leadership team that was

here I felt comfortable they knew their disciplines pretty well uh but I did not know anything though how did you find it

I was gonna say if you didn’t know anything about it like how do you come about a screen printing shop and be like

yeah I’ll buy this well Reno’s is uh is perfect by the way

for screen print Regional we had talked about that but you know in San Martin Esther right here and uh I looked at I

looked at that as a positive I looked at uh Reno obviously being close to my hometown and I didn’t want to live in

California if you guys know taxes when cost of living are real high so Nevada is a great business pro state so I kind

of focused on Reno and I said okay and then I then I looked at this shop and I looked at and my guesses were right uh

with the Garment manufacturer wholesalers here and with California having so much trouble I I think

sometimes my theory about California is they really they’re not too excited about screen printers or manufacturing

or Trucking or anything else so I just thought to myself you know I want to get close to home uh this seems to be

something that I can add value to seems like a good industry and I thought you know it’s a it’s a it was a local shop

at the time we’ve tripled in size uh but I I just looked at the outside of California and I said hey I really want

to become a regional uh provider we also did things promo items buttons and glass

and things and I chase that right out of the building and said all things garment and then we Diversified into retailers

we did we’re doing sports promo and then some big uniform companies as well so uh

you know I just kind of looked at the whole thing and dove in and thought I think I can make this work uh and again

I I found that I love the industry which is funny because I didn’t pick this industry it kind of picked me if that

makes sense so how long was the time frame from you

were interested in purchasing the shop and you put in I guess a letter of intent or something to actually closing

and having it be yours what was that how long did that take about three months okay and

did you then afterwards let’s say you closed and it’s now all of a sudden yours did you go in front of the entire

team there with the previous owner and say okay hey by the way I’m Dan and I

just bought this shop or did they have any idea that it was going to be sold or you know how did that kind of play out

I’m curious to how that worked yeah the seller I would have done it different but you know everybody makes their choices he’s a great guy and he’s

still on board as a consultant so you know fantastic seller one thing for sure is I really judged him first as as far

as integrity and what he’d accomplished I think he did a great job I always celebrate him for sure because he’s half

My Success if not more right uh but uh he was very private about the cell I didn’t like that part um so they kind of

all of a sudden in in early July they had me sitting in a room with him and you know and that’s the first time that

they knew about it it was very difficult for sure because the business had been for so long with him owning it since

2003. if you rewind that I told him right before when we were negotiating I

kind of get your people involved but he he felt hesitant to do that which is what I mean I guess you have to think

about it though you know if you’re a team is involved and they know that you’re

actively marketing or trying to sell your company how does that make them feel like because they’re probably like oh is my

job secure what’s going on and I know there there are things you can do like

um let’s say within the contract the sales contract you can say like you can’t terminate anyone for six months or

you can’t terminate anyone for a year or whatever that is you know just to protect everyone’s job and so that you

can maybe build into something that would be interesting or would that way I guess you could tell your team look

we’re going to sell this company but your jobs are secure do you know what I mean to get get rid of that fear does that something that you considered or

did he well I did ask if he would make sure that he bonus the key players pretty

well I did review that with them because I just thought I want to make sure these guys have a check in their pocket when they meet me and uh that was a

negotiating part for me but uh you know I I kind of bear the brunt of

you know it’s talking about why I’m here what I want to accomplish and you know spend a lot of time with the team it was

pretty Rocky for the first six months for sure and then covert hit right um so uh but you know so you know that

was a whole different uh piece as well but at least I had those six six months to really get to know everybody

what did you do when that happened I mean you I’m guessing you had to spend a sweet chunk of money to get this company

in to get everything going and then kovit comes what what runs through your mind

yeah it was really tough in Nevada the the governor at the time was uh uh pretty aligned with Gavin Newsom and so

he decided uh he called it the central essential basically workers or companies could operate we were not in that bucket

so we closed down for for one day and I brought the you know some key players in

and we sat down and and then we went to a couple key customers that we do uniforms for for you know road work and

things like that and we just defined ourselves as essential unfortunately there’s just there was no business so

you know basically 12 of us uh got together and you know I learned how to do a lot of things that’s for sure which

was It was kind of fun also you know when you buy a company there’s there’s going to be some people that uh would

don’t like the change there’s nothing you could do about it you guys would run a company different than me and and it’s just part of the part of that and I I

was in merger acquisition so I was aware of that it really did give us opportunity we furloughed everybody and

then we made sure that they had their insurance and all that and then we brought fact the players that we thought

you know over time were the best fit for the business um I think that was a benefit and one of

the things that was great about covid for them was they got unemployment if you remember they also got 300 a week

yeah I thought we made sure everybody got their unemployment we did you know coaching you know we brought him in the

conference room individually and we made sure we helped them sign up for employment some people didn’t get it so

we brought them back right away um you know we we overstaffed and lost a lot of money and like you said it was a

pretty scary time uh some of the government programs just fell into our lab thank God I mean uh without those it

would have been extremely difficult to survive for sure

and then post that how how are you feeling now I mean you’re four years in do you feel like I mean you’re happy

with your decision and you you love being part of this industry now yeah yeah I do I really do

yes one of the things actually the reason I’m on the uh podcast with you guys is that I feel like you know I’m in

the industry I like it I’d really like to you know get to know some more folks and you know kind of we’ve been a little

lonely in Reno as you know it’s a small town and uh you know a lot of y’all are in the Midwest and the East Coast but uh

you know I kind of want to get deeper into the industry as far as kind of just networking and getting to know some folks Nick Wood at Graphics was bugging

me he’s like Dan you got to do this I said oh okay I’ll do it uh but uh but yeah I think I think for us you know

really trying to figure out where the industry is going and and networking and sharing ideas is good I know some people

try to keep everything secret in this industry but you know I think I think it’s better to share and I like what you guys are doing it’s great because you

know you’re really helping the discipline and the industry grow uh I don’t think it’s competitive in nature

really I mean we’re all doing our own thing there’s enough uniqueness to each company right what would you think what would you

think is something that you could offer that you would want to share that’s not already being shared

I would say the labor Management’s the biggest thing that I we talk about meritocracy increases but I see a lot of

silos here where there was a lot of them and and you know again sometimes when I

speak my staff look at me like I’m got three heads because to me there’s not such thing as a

a discipline that you should learn and then just be stuck with my opinion uh

our job is to move people around teaching more skills we do reward them for that as well so you know it was like

well we don’t want to lose our best printer on red right and he does Sports and so he’s the best make sure he sticks

there but I think uh and we encourage uh what we call you know cross-training and

then uh uh labor sharing that’s just a word we use but labor sharing means you move from one Department to another so

you can create a lot of efficiencies there um and also there’s a lot of slow time in this industry and I see you know do

you we we guarantee 40 hours here we’ve got full benefits and uh you know it’s

just our DNA but then that’s real scary because what happens when screening gets busy well the good news is embroidery

goes nuts we have 44 and brighter heads so we cross-train those and those people are paid higher as well so if you’re a

quote cross-trained employee um then you’re going to be more valuable to the company uh you’re obviously going

to help the profitability and we definitely reward for that as well um but I think

again by the way it’s just my feeling I don’t know even if I’m correct in the

statement but at least here I I saw a lot of protection in other regards to a skill and that person in my opinion was

stuck I understand the reason for them being stuck but uh I I I think that learning new things

is great for the company and it’s great for the employee as well and it really helps profitability I mean our head

counts we we judge every single day uh how much we built so it’s two days behind but we and we really focus on

that as a management team we look at our building every single uh morning which we did this morning and we celebrate a

good day and we don’t celebrate a bad day we also look at at the end of the month we look at how much we’re producing per head uh that’s a corporate

term it doesn’t sound very nice but per employee um so right now we’re trying to gun at 7

200 per head um and and what are the and then go backwards and say okay how do we get

building up how do we become more productive with those with those employees and and then you kind of navigate your way through that process

of what I told you we’re really working hard on that it’s it’s had great great results you know again a Strictly

Business mind to production right

wow um yeah I think that I need to spend more time on that sort of stuff you

Dylan I mean do you feel the same way I mean you know I said you said earlier that you’re trying to

get more business stuff but I I just you you’re like listening to you it’s really

impressive because it’s coming from an angle that I just don’t have a whole lot of training I’m not you’re used to yeah

yeah so I think it’s great to hear that that’s the interesting part is that it’s just like

it there’s there’s many ways to do this industry there’s many ways for printers to to

just survive like there’s the entrepreneur who is happy just doing what he’s doing and you know they could

be like yeah this is just what I want to do forever I just want to print my local stuff in my garage and make money and go

home and whatever and then it goes all the way up to the people that have you know 20 30 autos and their their print

shirts too it’s just on a lot bigger scale but there’s also shops like mine that it’s just like you know I built the

shop it’s doing really well it’s got a really good name it’s got a good brand it’s got whatever I need I stay busy to

you know employ my you know 12 15 people and I’m happy like

everyone here goes home with five and we do our thing and I want to stay at my three Autos or whatever

um but still there’s it’s so interesting to hear everybody’s point of view and

then pull in the stuff that makes sense for you that could just improve yourself

um but I think your mind Dan is very like like you said like the not to say it in

a shitty way but like the Sausage Factory it’s like it is manufacturing it is trying to get

times better and get more productivity and all this other stuff and it’s like that’s just something I haven’t really

super thought too much about but when we have a meeting with a manager or

something that’s the first thing that always comes up is like oh so-and-so’s Dragon ass or someone still always calls

in or like all this other stuff and it’s like what can I what would you use as advice

to me to be like the first stepping stone or the second stepping stone to be

like all right let’s start to think about this more like manufacturing and if I if you were to

come into my shop I’d say I hired you as a consultant and I said help me get this place [ __ ] whipped into shape when it comes to that kind of thing what would

be the first thing you would want to look at you’d be like I can’t help you this thing is a [ __ ] yeah

well the first thing you said is I think everybody’s got their goals and and there’s nothing wrong with you know

being happy with where you’re at right so you know everybody does their own thing obviously I had a background and I

felt uh that this company could take an important step forward I think the first thing you have to do is get buy-in

um you know you could talk the first thing they’re going to think is Dan’s here to make a whole lot of money and and uh you know he doesn’t care about us

well it’s actually the inverse I mean I care about the employees very much and uh but I couldn’t see how I could get

their wages up and I could really get them the benefits they needed to some sort unless we increase productivity uh

I hear a lot in the industry the mortgages are slim and I think they are uh the question is is that you know how

do you how do you I think first you want to start measuring things and the good thing is a lot of disciplines here that I really liked and then we just added

some more and then really make sure the employees get you get their buy-in by saying hey this is what we want to do

and this is why it’s good for you right okay so say say tomorrow I say hey I want to start measuring things am I

looking at setup times time it takes to print and then what do I tell my employees as far as that because I think

the first thing they’re going to think from going from casual printing just doing their thing every day to hey Dylan

wants to start uh like timing everything and seeing what it actually takes to do I think how

I think it’s what he just said that you’re you’re in it they’re buying in too because then they’re going to get compensated better you know it’s not

just you trying to go faster and make more money they’re they’re also going to make more money you know like it’s the

whole company wide and you know it’s that leap of faith that Indiana Jones leap of faith I mean you have to say it

then you have to back it up so it’s a little scary right I mean I was scared to hear because I’m thinking I’m not from this industry but I just kept

working and looking I said no this will work this you know this but you have to make sure that the employee understands

that I’m I’m here for you and I’m here for a stronger company you know we’ll be more healthy be able to survive

downturns not lay you off in December because I’m scared for January so on the store uh I think you know those are the

things that you you have to do and I think also you have to put up where you put your mouth right I mean if they say

well if I get my productivity up I’m gonna get rewarded for that and the answer has to be yes of course right right

um but uh it’s really a partnership right how do you go about that as a company though saying especially like we

all know the down times and stuff to say oh guaranteed 40 hours you have X benefits you’re this whatever like how

do you go about that like do you have a way to be like well I know I’m gonna get x amount of work in before you say

something like that or are you just saying that to be like well I guess it’s it’s what I want to stand behind

and we’ll see how it goes yeah I mean uh you know we we say we you

know we we don’t do the layoffs as a company we we promise 40 hours a week uh there are a couple of ways to navigate

that of course is not hiring in you know late October and a little bit Administration take care of itself so uh

but uh you know try I think you know it’s kind of again like I said more and

more of a leap of faith uh but you could suffer some anybody could suffer some

losses with those statements um you know I think you know it’s it’s one of those things

that you can’t say it and then and then all of a sudden backfire and say well not this year right that’s what I’m

saying is I could be like all day long be like yeah I want to offer the you know full health and this and this and this and then you get going into it and

you realize like damn this is a lot and I don’t know if I should have offered as much as I did yeah but I think even now more than ever

employee retention is important and it’s super challenging and you know them

knowing that they have a secure job like a 40-hour a week paycheck that is never going to be below that is one of the

things that you can do besides the other stuff like all the benefits that you talked about and all the benefits that

we have now and so I think that’s really important can we change the subject to customer service for a minute because I

have a question something happened here today good sure so um say you have a top customer you know

they give you lots of orders every month and an order goes wrong so that happened

here it wasn’t a very big order this was maybe 100 pieces but they don’t complain often but something uh it didn’t turn

out the way they wanted it to turn out they chose the Pantone colors we mix the Pantone colors but the end result

wasn’t really anything we did it’s just in like they received the shirts and they didn’t really like them

um what I decided to do was just say uh you know we apologized

and we said how we thought we could fix that in the future but we said we’re avoiding the invoice no worries and no

questions asked you know what I mean like that that’s just I that was my first thing I went to I didn’t even think about it and so is that something that

you do I hated to do it because it’s money you know like it’s a chunk of money on a actually a very slow week you

know but it is what it is and so is that how you go about things too even if I know

because I know your heavy contract printer is that the same sort of thing you would do and also Dylan is that what you would do

Dan um well we have a two percent spoilage policy and I would tell you we very

rarely rarely exercise it only on thousands of pieces so uh we pretty much

stand behind all our work uh the discipline we have maybe a little bit different I’ve voided in invoices as

well but what I really like is just to take in the what if out of it is I want I want the garments back so what we do

is we send them UPS labels uh we tell them hey let’s go ahead and let you know let us go ahead and pay to get those

garments back and we’re going to inspect those garments we’re going to align with you we’re going to make sure we learn from our mistakes and we’re going to

make it right uh so we purchased the garments we reprint so you know your method was good if the customer was

happy we we really try to go that extra mile to say we want to make it right it

does avoid some you know all shirts are bad but maybe only a few right so you

know it’s just a really good validation I’ve I’ve had clients that say look I just want this uh uh you know replaced

and I still want the garments back I mean I want to avoid the invoice uh so which is a tricky area for sure it’s

it’s funny because I learned that when I was in Georgia that that’s what they did is they said uh you know I’ll pay the

whatever fee to get the garments back because I feel like it’s over 50 it’s

probably like I don’t know I would say 60 to 70 percent of the time when a customer complains about something with

the order and they say I want my money back or I want a discount or whatever with it

or I want these redone if you say hey here’s the shipping labels I’ll get these back once I get these back I’ll

give you the refund I feel like stole many times that they just either

stop talking or whatever because I feel like they’re just trying to get free [ __ ] like well I think I mean they’re like

they’re like oh something’s wrong with this and then we’re supposed to reprint and then they’re like cool now I have a double order

or whatever because we’ve had that before where people are like you know oh I these are unsellable

that’s always what they say they’re like there’s no possible way I could sell these the color is not right it doesn’t

match this and we’re like all right well we’re gonna send labels get them back and they’re like well uh we can’t do that because we already sold like 30 of

them or whatever I’m like you just [ __ ] told me these were all unsellable okay but still here’s where I here’s how

I my thinking on this was is that one uh it’s a customer that places 10 orders

a week at least and they rarely reject or complain this just happened uh the

order was specific to June and it had to happen this month it’s for uh this month only

and this month’s today is the last day they already had sold some just like you said but I think it was that they

somebody who was somebody in the management was traveling didn’t see until they got back and said hey this

didn’t turn out as good as they thought what it was was it was an ombre effect that didn’t contrast enough and so

um I think that I just said look you don’t worry about it we’ll just get it next time and so that was one of those

where you were 100 writing that and I think that was a special circumstance I’m just saying like an average customer

that maybe orders once or twice a year or just their first order or whatever oh

we’ll complain about it thousand percent 100 I’m like yeah I want them back so what you’re talking about is the DNA

of the customer so you know when we got busy when covid uh obviously was over we

all got really really busy we actually sat in a room and we offboarded probably about 40 of our customers because we

really want to trust relationship and and the ones that we felt weren’t a good fit or uh we there wasn’t that trust

built so on sort so uh Andy I would do the same thing on that circumstance for sure uh but I would assume that’s a good

client I I could tell by the way you talked about them they’re a good client you you trust them in a sense that you

know you don’t feel uh that there’s any games going on and you just want to keep them happy I would do the same I think

the important thing is is that you have to even though we didn’t do a whole lot wrong you know because we mixed pantones

that we were supposed to it just didn’t turn out the way they wanted it to and I want them to be happy

and I just every once in a while you just gotta say forget it like don’t worry about it for the invoice we’ll just let’s print the stuff next week you

know what I mean and so I just think that that’s an important and it’s hard because you’re like wait this is this

sucks because I have to avoid this invoice I don’t want to you know like I had I’m losing money but are you really

because I think you gain it because the reply actually once we told them what we were doing was very positive yeah it’s

very positive you know and so you’re right though they got to keep those other shirts I didn’t ask for them back in this case I’m just like whatever

don’t worry about it and you know we’ll get them next time and so um it’ll be a

win on the next order that’s kind of how I looked at it and I thought it would be a fun or like an important thing to talk

about because I I get caught up in sometimes like wait a second you know we shouldn’t have to avoid this or

whatever and that’s the I guess that’s a Nuance or that’s the difference between um some of your top customers to some

something like you were talking about Dylan the person’s ordering once a year or whatever where that happens then yeah you ask for the shirts back it’s

complicated isn’t I mean and if I’m not making like if I’m not in here let’s say I was gone and somebody else

has to make those decisions like do you have somebody that you can trust to make the right decision because if you make

the wrong decision there you’re going to lose potentially lose an account in fact I saw yesterday on

Instagram one of our one of my favorite customers is not our largest or anything but just one of our customers that I

liked printing their stuff I saw that they went on Instagram and said hey two new shirts and they were wearing them

and we didn’t print them and I’m like that hurts like what did we do wrong and so I was like honestly it sucks and so I

thought to myself okay wait I could ignore it we you know maybe we did something wrong maybe they have a person

that isn’t uh you know sometimes there’s a there’s a change in who orders the shirts and all of a sudden somebody else is in charge and they’re going to their

cousin or whatever and so I don’t know the real reason why we’re not printing that order or why we didn’t print those

two orders but I want to ask and I want to email not email I want to message or whatever and say hey did we just want to know

like did we do something wrong and if it if so like what was it so that I can fix that you know next time like so that

won’t happen again because I want to print your [ __ ] you know every time that happens I feel like it’s something it’s

I feel like it’s like a girlfriend thing where you’re like you feel betrayed but you also like feel

shitty emailing them like you’re whining you’re like oh why not me you know what I mean like

I don’t know it’s just it’s weird I wouldn’t word it like why not me well

obviously not I’m just saying like I’m just saying that it’s it stings like you see that and you especially when it’s a

customer that you’re kind of like buddy with you know what I mean like you feel like you had a good relationship like I’ve had that recently where you know

there was this customer we dealt with for years and then they just kind of like stopped getting orders for a while

and I emailed them and they’re like oh we just got to the point where we really had to focus on price and then they started Price shopping and

like we just weren’t the best price or whatever which you don’t really want to race to the bottom but you’re also kind

of like Ugh like I thought we were I thought we were [ __ ] Bloods you know like I thought we were ride or die and then they’re

just like oh well I’ll go to someone else because I have to think about the bottom line or whatever yeah like

that sucks let’s get a question for you guys and it’s just been you know my you know

talking obviously I was thinking this would be a good question to ask you guys I find that that the word screen print

is used for almost everything meaning that we’re screen printers right uh but

we try I’ve told my team and said we’re garment decorators and the reason I did

that wasn’t because I don’t like screen printing it doesn’t pay the bills uh but I really feel like the industry tends to

want to hang on to uh what they’re comfortable with or what they like uh

nowadays everybody’s saying digital is going to take over I I disagree uh but I

think being open to different techniques we do DTF Digi we do uh DTG we have

woven labels now with our uh we bought sewing machines and I feel like the industry sometimes is comfortable or

maybe maybe profitable I I more of a question to you guys but I pushed the

team to say we’ve got to be Innovative we’ve got to think about it don’t don’t think it’s the next thing to take over think of it it’s another option for your

customer right now foreign nuts for us and I think it’s really good for screen print because if it’s nine

colors it’s not I just had a client say it’s nine colors nine pieces I was like oh we’ll DTF that it’s better for them

on price keeps it off the big breasts uh so do you guys you know obviously you

guys are really you know explorers of the industry and see from my perspective I guess and I’m looking for yours is is

that the industry struggles with the change in Innovation and fear and some things like that

I just feel like a lot of people get stuck in their ways of this is the only way to do this this is

what I’m known for this is whatever but I think here I’ve always said I don’t really ever say like a screen print shop

I usually just say we’re like a print shop or a custom merchandising shop or whatever yeah

um because I do feel like all those things are tools and that’s the that goes back again to even like the small

part of it is the debate between water-based and Plastics all it’s like we do both because it’s not about what I

want necessarily it’s not that I’m like we’re 100 a water-based shop or we’re 100 plus so it’s like it’s what the

customer wants like yeah before any of the other things it’s like how I look at

it as every job comes in is how could I best produce this job for the customer to get the result that they’re looking for yeah and the truth of it is is like

nowadays if you go to the mall or you go anywhere like half of the shirts you see in in there are a digital print or a DTF

or whatever it’s like go look outside your shop and see like what’s actually

selling right now and like what’s happening and the norm is that nowadays

I feel like so many people are used to the fact that whatever graphic they want they want it on a shirt they don’t necessarily care

if it’s a screen print or a water base or a you know a digital or whatever they just want the graphic on the shirt and

they want to not fall off so like we should look at it as like what tool works the best for that client and what

they’re trying to achieve so I think that’s what people should look at going forward is just like

I want to be knowledgeable on all the tools so that my shop can do whatever it is that my client coming through the

door wants agreed 100 agreed I but you know I’ve seen that through the industry a lot of

debate and a lot of concern and kind of going back and forth but like DTF just you know we don’t we don’t have a DTF

machine we we get we do gang sheets every single day and there’s we get a big role and they come in every single

day but we sure have heat presses we know how to locate it I mean you know they still need us right does that make

sense if if we decide to get a DTF machine I think the technology is new and it’s still but I think diving into

it like you said before the customer’s benefit and then really Consulting them on what the best way to go is I think

those things my opinion that’s the key to success I think a lot of the people that like to [ __ ] and moan about it are

the people who just are scared to learn a new thing you know what I mean they’re like oh I’ve screamed printed in for 25 years

and blah blah it’s like okay well have you looked into anything else like have you tried have you tested anything have

you whatever like we got into ddtf but we didn’t get into it lightly we didn’t just pick one place we didn’t just be

like oh super caller and we’re just gonna order transfers or you know any of these places like I researched like 10

different places and we did tests with all of them and we did prints we ordered DTF and digital stuff and everything

like all these hybrid prints of actual prints that we were Screen Printing and then we did them side by side and tested

them and like you know had the customer look at them and all these other things and pick what worked for us so I think

that’s the thing is you just need to educate yourself of like this isn’t as bad as you think it is like there’s a

stigma out there of oh it’s just like transfer or digital thing it’s like well have you washed it 10 times have you

stretched it have you held it have you tried I don’t know ways to post press like I think um I think that maybe being

scared isn’t the right uh word maybe some are that’s probably true but I

think that there are probably shops out there that are in overtime with their printing presses I mean I started as a

screen printer in my garage and that’s what I did there wasn’t DTF I didn’t have an embroidery machine I was a 3D printer and I think that if I had a

business that was built around that and that was my Niche let’s say and I was really good at it and I charged a premium

and that’s what I liked and I was busy then I think I could just be a screen printer I don’t have to be an apparel

decorator I don’t have to have embroidery or anything like that like we do but I thought that it was a nice like

it just it went well together and so we added it a while back and and I don’t regret that decision or anything I don’t

really know embroidery very well but um so I would probably describe myself as more of a screen printer just

because I just don’t know I’m not really an embroider I don’t know how to run the machine I can but not like very well and

I agree but I’m also saying that if you get to that point you need to realize that if you decide to just stick with

screen printing and you’re not looking at the trends in the industry and what’s happening then you can’t [ __ ] when like

you go under because you didn’t stay with the times like yeah that’s the truth of it is you can’t keep up with

the other people because you can’t offer the [ __ ] but yeah but like Dan said he doesn’t think screen printing is going

to go away ever you know maybe it maybe it loses market share let’s say to DTF and other things which it’s probably

will that makes sense maybe I saw this thing what was it um

print Tavo I think they posted something like the biggest press in the world it had like

65 stations and it had like a 100 pallets or whatever or I mean a bunch of

colors and I thought to myself stupid because why would you ever want like especially

when things are like if I have a color that needs or a shirt I should say that needs 65 colors I’m just it doesn’t even

make any sense because wouldn’t you just shift that to some other process like a digital squeegee wouldn’t you have just bought a digital squeegee because you’re

taking up way less space in your shop way less of a press it just doesn’t it didn’t make sense to me I saw that it

was kind of cool it’s sort of like that thing like oh my God I blew my mind you know like 65 station that’s crazy but

like why would you buy that press it just doesn’t make sense to me not not now like I would I would buy a 14 color

or 16 color and put a digital squeegee on and buy a Polaris or a digital squeegee ears yeah I just wouldn’t buy that press but I think that I don’t know

I think that if you I think it’s okay to know your Niche and then if that’s what

you’re good don’t deserve why why diversify it doesn’t even matter like if you just go all in on what you’re great

at because then you’re gonna be maximizing your profits but you could get stuck one day if it like you said

flips to not that like oh by the way nobody’s ever screen printing ever again but that seems like pretty far down the

road if that ever happens I think I think my thing is my preferred method is obviously screen printing like there’s more art to it there’s more life to it

and all this other stuff but I think what I would rather do is I would rather be a printer for

like I’m more interested in the niches that we’re in like the markets that we’re in like if I wanted to print for

ex-comedian who’s going to go on tour and he wants this certain print I’m gonna do whatever I can do to make

it what he wants because I want to do that print or if it’s a comic book thing and it’s this whole crazy whatever like

if they’re like oh I want to do this with embroidery added and puff and this and this like I don’t care how I’m printing it I just

want to print it to where it looks cool so like whatever process I can do if that’s hybrid if that’s whatever

so I I think that’s that’s where I’m at is I just want to I want to own a print

shop that can just do rad [ __ ] like I don’t really care yeah necessarily the method I mean I prefer screen printing

but I just want to make cool stuff and I think that’s where you know we’re trying to keep our heads just being

Innovative look at what’s there and focus on what what the customer is looking for right

um but uh yeah the other thing that I find in the industry is diversification I mean we got into retail because I had

a call from a big retailer and uh they said you do inner tag Brands and I said no but we can so I bought a bunch of

asps and I’m we’re doing those that now is almost it’s almost the gorilla it’s 30 40 of our business is retail we had

no retail businesses at all I I just did it because I really felt like uh you

know you don’t know sports sports stopped for a year and a half can you imagine we’ll have this shop and we had no business because we were 40 sports

right so I felt like I learned my lesson but also it’s like you said do cool stuff for different types of Industries

so we try to you know really look at the percentages between uniforms promo uh

Sports and Retail honestly retail is a little scary because it’s growing so much uh so we’re really working the

other disciplines if that makes sense but you know know we now do blank uh inventory for retailers so they ship

their containers directly to us we put them in the rack of course I’m a logistics guy so we pick them then we

build the order and then we ship them directly to the retail stores that was something we didn’t do um I just think it’s important to always

be open to something new does that make sense from a technique to a different type of customer and you know if they if

they feel like you’re open to Innovation or trying something new I feel like the customers are willing to to to you know

go with it right so is this business mindset and what you’ve done and you’re happy with the uh

industry and obviously things have picked up what uh what do you want to implement next what do you feel like is

next in uh your space yeah we made an agreement that we’re not

going to do anything new for a couple years uh new as far as like expansion or anything like that

um because we really want to get good at our disciplines so really our Focus right now is we got the four legs the

four you know different verticals if you would uh we’re really trying to be Innovative for those customers

um but we really we just want to be profitable we really want to run a good shot we want to train up our people so

kind of the Focus right now is I told the team let’s not think about anything new as far as what’s going to the

company’s Next Step uh for two years it’s been really good because I think you know as you guys get to know me I

mean they were fairly scared of me I’m sure like oh God this guy you know a lot of enchances I think people also want to

you know feel that they’re in a place that you know not too much change does

that make sense yeah so you just want to focus on systems and processes and processes yeah to get everything dialed

in yeah is there one in particular you you want to focus on Labor Management labor over and over and

over building up our team and again like I said in the spirit of building them up uh I we we have now very low turnover we

were at 100 turnover uh when I came on board uh it was seen as kind of a job an

hourly job but we were a little bit under market and I don’t think anybody felt connected to the industry or the

company uh in the shop I’m not talking about the front office of course but you

know I I think in my opinion the people in the shop are the most important employees you got me you got to really

take care of them I’ll share some of that we just did yesterday we had a captain on swing and uh she her mother

had a stroke and she was gone for two weeks very hard on the shop because key employee and three team member students

stepped up and they just you know they really owned it and they of course really didn’t want her to worry about things and of course Supreme Ventures

working late nights and all that but when she got back we met with the three employees and her and we gave them gift

cards in the letter and just you know really congratulated them on on really owning things right and these are these

are line employees and you you know I I left the meeting to think of myself those three employees got blessed right

they really felt rewarded for that I would like to see them continue to grow you know not not just in the shop but

professionally if that makes sense yeah that’s awesome yeah that’s some things

that I need to work on too I think I think my next steps are to basically do some of that time tracking but also do

rewards with that as too I just I I think I just need to figure out what those rewards are I think that’s my

biggest thing I don’t want to do too much too fast and then kick myself in the ass so this is just my opinion

because I was in big companies I think a monthly employee of the month is is becomes a remote very very quick I think

it needs to be tactical if you find something that somebody overachieved and they reward them or recognize them for

that I don’t know we don’t do it public either we just it was just me and the screenper manager and the captain and

those three employees so they feel like it’s very personal that makes sense I like that

nobody else in the shop knows about it except maybe now a few people right so [Music]

Amy do you want to do overrenders over unders yeah so I’m going to say I

have nine things over here and you either say that it’s overrated

underrated or properly rated so the first one is popcorn

underrated are you a popcorn Guy where you add like all kinds of seasonings and stuff are

you just like uh extra butter popcorn guy extra butter salt popcorn

guy for sure I remember growing up uh my dad would always go buy

uh the powdered mac and cheese like a craft or something and he would buy like a bowl

package of them I don’t know what it is like 50 boxes per case or whatever I remember well he he always loved to open

one of those and steal the cheese packet out and then he would pour that on the popcorn and then eventually you would go

try to have mac and cheese because you were starving and you would realize there was no cheese packet

like you’d make the noodles and be like what the hell like there’s no there’s no cheese I don’t know it just reminded me of that

yeah I Love Popcorn it can be almost any like kettle corn white cheddar

lots of butter now I know what to get you for Christmas it’s one of those like tins with like the three different

and they’re okay I mean like I like it fresh I should say sometimes those tins you get during the

holidays and you’re like gross and all right um next we have air conditioning

well we kind of talked about that in the beginning yeah the underrated for sure out here

I’m a thick guy underrated I know I was we were on a walk the other night and it was still I don’t know

almost 90 degrees and humid and I’m like what did they do 100 years ago you know

how could you I would move like I would literally move from here I couldn’t do it it’s how did you sleep if it were

like that at night you know like it was miserable so air conditioning one of the best inventions of all time

yeah probably um Auto reclaim

uh under underrated we just bought Lotus love it

um felt really sorry for the guys in the car wash it looked like right so uh I think we could have bought a larger unit

spend a little bit more money and I would say it’s definitely underrated for sure so you guys just got to Auto

reclaim with that many autos and that many people uh a year ago I think it’s about a year now

and you’re how are you liking it you’re saying now you should have got another one like are you keeping up with screens

uh we are but just barely we do three to four hundred a day probably closer to four so

should have bought a faster one a little bit more bells and whistles I was feeling a little cheap about it we

hadn’t done it before um I don’t think it’s a bad machine I think it’s great depends on your budget right so we’re happy with it but wait

underrated for sure uh we know a guy Mr Mimosa so I can hook you up if you want

something that needs some serious output I would say Auto reclaim is one of the

most underrated pieces of equipment in your shop and I have whenever I hear

somebody like the first week that they get one and it’s installed and they’re running it owners even owners say hey I’m

running screens through because they like it you know the quality of life just changes and you and it blows your

mind that you’re like wait a second I just ran 100 screens through this thing and they’re clean and it was actually okay like it wasn’t such a brutal awful

job and so yeah I think um massively underrated next we have Tesla

mm-hmm oh that’s interesting I mean Elon Musk fan so uh underrated for sure I love the

car I have a Tesla it’s uh it’s awesome for sure for me I want to see that fight did you

see that George St Pierre is on the on Elon side now it’s a trainer I did

not but I I love all the memes first of all like I like the like have you heard

about this how elon’s gonna fight uh Mark Zuckerberg oh you’re kidding no it’s real yeah oh

that’s awesome yeah so gdsp like you know Hall of Fame UFC fighter is gonna

help train Elon for fighting in this event the thing is is there’s such a thing as as weight class and so I don’t

know how that’s going to work because that’s real you know elon’s gonna destroy him

should do that that would be a bad thing for him I thought this I thought that if Zuckerberg loses then that’s okay

because people kind of think that he may already um but if Elon loses like he’s not cool

anymore like he’s definitely gonna go have to go to SpaceX and fly the [ __ ] out of this like Earth because you know

like everybody’s gonna be like oh you guys you got your ass kicked by [ __ ] Zuckerberg like you’re not cool all

right next week he has to win I know he has to win he has more to lose in other words I

think than Mark next we have a personal assistant oh underrated million percent

and I can’t use one so let’s say for me overrated uh I have an admin team here

of three people and we just work as a team and they help me um I I went to a company where there was

two personal assistants sitting outside my door I didn’t know what to do with them uh the owner told me to I let one

go but I still struggled with the the other employee um I don’t know uh I would rather work

with the team and have an admin that’s available um when I need it and as long as as long

as that’s the case I feel like you know I’m not the king or anything here uh I want to be part of this team if that

makes sense I I agree with that but not it I don’t know I guess it’s how you Define personal assistant like I feel like it

my team I don’t know I feel like the first time I considered someone a personal

assistant was when I basically handed them my emails and said you know I need help with this I need

someone to tackle these for me to me that was a personal assistant but now they’re like a full-on customer service person that I just

say hey you’re for me it’s kind of like low man on the totem pole does like the running around but

um I don’t know I that’s what it is to me like I don’t have someone who’s just sitting here being like here’s your coffee Mr Gilligan but maybe that’s what

I was saying when you said personal that that is kind of like you know what do you need Dan you know in the morning yeah I don’t need that at all I think I

mean that yeah I think that’s where the question was like that’s what Andy wants he wants someone to be like here’s your

lotion and well wait a second I mean I think that I think that they’re

underrated and I think that you know there’s there’s such thing also now as a virtual

personal assistant which could probably be really helpful um but I’ve really considered it I don’t

know so I I’ve never had one so I don’t know what it would feel like or be like and so it could be terrible but I I like

I guess not having one I think that they’re underrated because I think I really want one or possibly even need one next I have travel

underrated underrated underrated what was the favorite place you went you

said you did a ton of traveling favorite country is Vietnam for sure

why just the scenery and the the culture or I probably got connected with the culture

um I went in in 1988 when it wasn’t very popular to open a first office for a

company and uh you know I got way too many stories about that but you just become really connected with the people

I really like the culture they’ve been through a whole lot it’s a beautiful country

um you know the people are just great and uh I have a lot of personal friends there as well good food too

incredible food yeah next we have credit card rewards

I’m interested in Dan’s reaction to this I’m not sure how to even categorize this

but I love them so uh that’s the one perk that I keep my back pocket and

everybody knows about but you know we do purchases on my uh my business card and I I like to you know I get some off-road

hobbies and stuff like that and it’s nice to pay for rebuild I was gonna say because we brought this

up in our personal chat together but what do you do with the reward is it go

back into the business does it go in your pocket does it go what does it go to so it is a personal perk of mine I don’t

know if that’s right or wrong probably feel embarrassed to say but I just feel like that’s what I do yeah I’ll I’ll say

it it’s like free money for me yeah I figured there’s got to be some perks ownership right so I just I take that

one right next is spinach

um flat line this is what it is it’s just yeah

I don’t know I eat it every day I love it underrated come over I’ll make you some spinach

you’ll be it’ll it’ll like change your life I love it baby um and last we have humility

underrated underrated yeah why and so I ask for that you know

not in a prayer sense but just you know I always remind myself you know it’s just important to be humble I mean um

you know you it it can happen to all of us right we think we’re pretty bitching and uh usually trouble happens right

afterwards I’ve actually personally been struggling with a lot of that lately and just the

things in my life with that and uh I’m just gonna leave it at that I’ll say underrated

agreed I’m with you guys underrated so Dylan do you have there were some listeners there were quite a few

listener questions for you Dan so let me try to navigate these a little bit

Mark sportswear says how do you offer commission to any outside Salesforce how

large is your sales force yeah that’s the beauty of contract by the way contract isn’t the best or worse

it’s just who we are but our sales force is our customers so uh you know we deal

with a lot of promo companies uh you know I say that sometimes to some of my best customers I said hey you’re our sales force and that is really a

partnership so we choose not to go out and sell garments and and art and all that but we want to we want to provide

the best backup for them and be able to deliver the product so they are our sales force do you not have sales people

to try to get more contract customers I am I’m it so uh you know we really try

to be picky uh and I don’t mean that in a negative way I try to work with every I just got a contact from SanMar and

they come you know SanMar is great with us they recommend us a lot because Reno’s right here with their warehouse and uh but I want to make sure it’s a

fit I I you know I don’t go at it from a sales I really go at it from you know is this a fit how can we help you and uh uh

you know we work it from there that was something you said earlier that I had in my mind to go back to and I never did was you had mentioned at one point post

covid that you got rid of like what 40 percent of customers that you had were they just

[ __ ] customers time suck customers what was it yeah but it wasn’t just

price or size because you think that’s you know we’re making money or are they too small but those are factors but I

think really the fit and and we really you know we we had some customers that over the years just wasn’t a fit we

weren’t able to I think we talked about damages I mean you know how many damages you know there’s some customers that

everything’s a damage and the question is is that you know how is that sold to the customer what were the expectations

those type of things so when there are sales force you know let’s be honest there’s good sales people and there’s

people that you know maybe struggle we also try to educate our customers but some were just not open to that so you

know I guess the main thing is there’s a relationship uh there’s there’s there’s trust built

um and we have some you know very small customers we kept because we felt that was there okay

uh Market another good question to you uh how long and involved is your training for new hires

nah we could do a lot better at that um we we do an orientation we do the OSHA thing uh uh I go in with the executives

we introduce ourselves and we tell our story um and then we and then we probably

don’t do so great from there um we we could get them into the department and we train them on the the uh the

functions they’re going to be doing and they they get a shadow for for a week or weeks

um but I’ve always thought that you know working them through I we just don’t have the time or the resources maybe

that’s an excuse but I’d love to see him move around the shop and really learn uh multiple disciplines what does art do

and how does this and we’ve talked about it we just never implemented that uh I don’t know if we really got into

this too much but Matt Relentless says uh what’s your Niche uh what’s your

ideal client so maybe I misunderstand you didn’t ask

a question but Niche meaning that uh like what do you are you going after sports teams are you going after the

schools are you going after bands what what is your ideal contract customer giving you as far as like

apparel types so the the uh the owner that I bought from his name was Dave Olson and he he

felt that it’s really important to have verticals balanced so for example we could take on 50 of the shop in sports

tomorrow uh but it would it would disrupt If Sports is its own DNA right so what we’re trying to do is try to

limit those four we we look at them and we we push certain uh growth areas that

we think we have capacity um so we yeah I think I repeat myself but you know retail Sports promo and

uniforms uh we we right now are pretty heavy reach out so we’re really trying

to work on in fact you know we’ve just landed uh a sports uh account and that starts on Monday and that was of course

was down to like 16 percent East Bay got bought out by BSN and when that happened we were the East Bay’s West Coast

solution so right now we really we’ve got all these poly dryers and you know the auto numbering systems and all sorts

of stuff and we’re light there and so uh but you know if you said to do I want to

grow Sports the answer is well why we just want to be Diversified in our product offerings if that makes sense

so I’ve been pushing Sports uh Midwest shirt company says what about

the business keeps you up at night uh finances it’s a very expensive

business Capital intensive um you know making sure I think I’ve come to a comfort level where where we I

think being financially disciplined will allow me to sleep at night and it’s very easy to get kind of uber excited about

something new or doing but just really tempering that with the plan and not over over capitalizing the business

uh Elite Inc says this kind of ties into that a total gross revenue up or down from last year and uh by how much and

that the reason why the only reason why I asked that like I definitely don’t want specifics um but I feel like for me and for a

bunch of people I know like people don’t necessarily like to be vocal about this but like it’s been a really weird year like two

years I feel like it’s like and I’ve said this a bunch of times like it’s really busy one week and then it’s crickets the next week it’s really busy

the next week and it’s like it’s this weird up and down like have you seen that as well

yeah that’s people talk about it we’ll grow about 50 this year so that that’s no I’m sorry we’re going to grow we grew

50 last year we’re going to grow about 35 this year sorry uh uh so but we we

thought we were going to grow more the first four months uh you know I think we’re in a recession nobody wants to

talk about it but for example it just is what it is right especially promotional items we were doing a lot of

stuff for Google and Facebook and those things through Distributors of course we don’t not directly but that business is

way off so uh it was pretty scary I mean we we lost a good chunk of money if the

other decorators have as well it’s uh the first three months I was you know not sleeping super well at night because

I was thinking hey but uh we we started coming back in mid-may and we’re really rolling pretty good right now

um but uh you know that that slow period in the first of the year scared me quite a bit but we’re we’re we’ll do fine

overall um and again we expanded I’m not sure brought it up but in November we went from 25 square feet to 50. and we bought

a bunch of equipment and did those things so we had more capacity uh we also didn’t really think it would take us that long to kind of get up to

capacity it’s not as much as the machines it’s really training The Operators uh you know getting you know obviously you you have more capacity you

need more customers so but we’re we feel like we’re kind of caught up with ourselves now thanks

all right Andy Rick takes the first question is what do you miss the most

about childhood and today I would tell you for me it is um no back pain I’m just gonna go with

that because my back’s hurting today even more than usual but yeah that’s what I miss how about you

miss about childhood wow that’s a that’s an interesting question I uh I’m not I mean I’m 59 so I guess I’m

I’m I miss a little bit the idea that there’s a whole lot of runway in front of me

um because it gives you more flexibility as you get older you know you can’t I always you can’t pivot like you used to

be able to do so I can’t take chances I guess like I used to be able to you feel like you took a good chance

going from the life you had before to the screen bring industry yeah my wife would tell you a huge sugar I thought

she was going to have our deck for sure because there’s a lot of comfort but that’s my last one uh I always tell the

team I mean this is don’t worry I mean uh you know our intent just you know is not to sell the business but to try to

uh you know uh in some form or fashion which I’m still struggling with is you know turn the company over to the place

so you know but this is my last hurray as far as that goes for sure hell yeah

um let’s see something random that brings you Joy

for off-road riding motorcycles so I still race uh desert race and it’s you

know so everybody in the shop thinks I’m nuts and I will break another bone for sure but uh it’s just the adrenaline

it’s just the thing I love to do so you know it’s probably not super rational but I just do it anyways are you just

doing like dunes and stuff or are you doing like hill climbs or what are you doing uh in the I’ve done Enduros in Texas I

lived in Texas for a long time and also in Northern California but here is desert racing which is worse because

it’s high speed right so it’s 100 miles takes you five or six hours you’re with about 500 Riders and it’s dusty as can

be and Rocky and it’s it’s a it’s a little irrational but uh every time I’ve done racing I think I think I’m too old

for this and then I sign up for the next race so oh hell yeah you know all right

if you could change out one piece of equipment at your shop what would it be

well I don’t know change out I’m disappointed with the DTG machines I’ve got two brothers

um it’s very limited as far as 100 cotton and so on and so are them I’m not sure if the change out is the right

thing but uh you know I’ve done I learned my lesson and trying to focus on one thing that’s why I asked you the

digital thing is I think you just need to be open to change and options and not be you know too focused on one Silver

Bullet so but those underperformed for sure my expectations so you would just

kill off that department or just get to do something else I’m hoping the DTG and

you know we do digital vinyl and things like that I hope over time that that probably goes away maybe in two honest

but you know it’s just it’s too too segmented I hear a lot of people say that’s not my thing I think I know why

they say that it’s uh I think that people’s biggest headache with all of that is pre-treat right of course yeah I

should have brought that up I hate the you know how to pre-treat it not get that square and you know it’s just it’s

just a big pain in the butt they got they got uh pampered a little bit with DTF not having to pre-treat or anything

I love DTF it just you know no weeding with the vinyl you gotta weed we’d weed

I don’t like that when I saw the DTF it’s you know there’s definitely we’re not selling the dtgs to your question

but you know I I tend to steer customers a little bit away from it now

is there anything that you’re watching reading or listening to right now that you really like

um no I’ve been I’ve been I was interested in the digital squeegee and kind of I like that concept uh uh so I

keep an up on it but uh again I like I I like that idea I just uh scared of a 250

000 unit to plug onto a press but I keep watching it

Andy all right Dan what is for dinner tonight

um I don’t know uh the wife always surprises me but she’s great she cooks every evening so I wouldn’t know

what do you think it is what do you want what do you want it to be manifested Dan

come on uh my favorite is beef ribs she does them really good she she bakes them and

uh you know big chunky meaty beef ribs are great with a little salad and I’m

happy I’m hoping you get beef ribs tonight yeah hey thanks well thanks for coming on with us man we

super appreciate it uh you you seem to have a really awesome thing going and I’m glad that you decided that after

everything you went through in life that screen printing was where you wanted to land yeah definitely hopefully I see you guys

uh but I’m also committed to kind of going to some of the trade shows you know definitely kind of want to network

uh if you don’t mind I’ll ship you those uh I I’m not a big secret guy so we you know I’ll send you both of you those uh

scheduling tools that we have in regards I would love that oh yeah thank you man it’s you know I would say your Shop’s

gonna be different in regards to how you do things and so on so but I think you know being able to have something that has metrics you can play with but you

can adjust those so I would love that yeah I’ll ship them for sure see you thanks dude

um thank you nice meeting you and uh this was fun and

um we’ll see you later I guess we’ll see you at the next trade show Long Beach Long Beach yeah for sure we’ll be there

right sweet thanks dude we’ll see you later all right see ya foreign foreign