The Most Profitable Business Everyone Overlooks Transcript, AI Summary & Key Points

How did you go from traditional Amish horse and  buggy to multi-million dollar business owner? When I was about 16 and a half, 17 years old,  I was like, I am not driving a horse and buggy to work. I am not like dressing that way. But my  mom and dad didn't want me to not be Amish. So, it was rough on them to know that they're one  child is not going to live that lifestyle.

Dude, I made $132,000 in 24 days running my spray drum. We just did uh another job that I ended up  profiting $65,000 in 8 days. Oh my gosh. Is that a typical ticket price? Like tens to  hundreds of thousands of dollars? Oh yeah. Oh yeah. My first 10 weeks I made $50,000 in  10 weeks. It's 600xed since then. Is any of the piloting automated or are you having to do it  yourself the whole time?

It's all automated. Oh, it just gets better and better. I'm telling  you, it's all automated. So cool. Literally, you can spray a whole field. You can spray a whole  field and never once touch the remote controller sticks. I can tell you that. I don't care  where I would go in this country, in any state, I could do it. This industry, it's barely even  getting started.

94 to 97% that is still untapped. Literally, you created an entire industry. If  somebody has just a little ounce of motivation, you can make this work. Don't underestimate.  I call them testosterone businesses. Guys, this is one of the best episodes I've ever  recorded. One of the best conversations I've ever had. And I'm not just saying that. About four  years ago, I fell in love with this YouTube channel called Drone Deer Recovery, where these  business owners in Ohio would be paid about 500 bucks a pop to go

recover deer that hunters shot  but didn't recover. I thought that's incredible. I interviewed that guy. I found him and it turns out  he's making a lot a lot a lot more than 500 bucks. He's been on over a 100 podcast episodes  before, but he's never revealed his revenue or his profit until today. And the thing is,  drone deer recovery, that's a cool business, right?

You can make good money at it. But there's  something else that you can do with drones that I've never talked about before. It's not roof  inspections. like you will not see this coming. That is so freaking profitable and unique  and brand new. I have not been this hyped about an episode for a very long time. Oh, and  did I mention he grew up Amish as in horse and buggy Amish?

And he only started this business  4 years ago. And today, well, you're about to hear how much he's making today. You're going  to love Mike. We became fast friends. We swap phone numbers at the end of this. He's got amazing  energy and you're going to learn some really cool ways of making a lot of money. So, please enjoy.  when I came up with this business idea, it was part of the the whole thing.

It was like, okay,  this is my idea. I'm going to do it as a service, but I also want to create a YouTube channel. And  so that was right off the rip. Did you think that the channel or the service would be bigger  or more profitable than the other? I thought originally my thought was I will make more money  on YouTube ad revenue than I would on service.

And I quickly figured out that that's not the case  in my content. I just don't pull enough views to pay. I mean, my first my first 10 weeks uh doing  deer recovery just here in the state of Ohio, I made $50,000 in 10 weeks. So, in your  first like deer season in Ohio, first Yeah, correct. First deer season I ever went public  with him. You were at break even within a couple weeks and then it was mostly profit after  that point.

So, basically the my goal was when I bought the drone, I was like, I just want to make  enough to pay the drone off and then I'm good. But I quickly found out I was like, "Holy  smokes, I think we got something here." Yeah. Yeah. We need a bigger boat. What? So, you  just bought that drone for this YouTube channel idea, for this business idea. You didn't  already have it.

That's correct. Yep. So, if we back up, how it actually started is I bought  a cheaper drone. It was called the DJI Duel. DJI Dual. It was um it had thermal and a zoom camera,  but it was not good at all. I made some video, one video about it, flying over my hunting lane  and just looking at deer. Then I took that video to an outdoor show, a local outdoor show, and  I just had uh a table with a cloth over it and an old iMac that I had.

And then I had this video  playing on there and my booth was the talked about booth at the show. It was crazy. And it was  like the most plain jane booth ever. 100%. It It had like just this white sign behind me and it  said like like Yodar drone service or something and then you had this screen that was playing this  thermal then it would go from thermal.

So you see this heat signature and then you zoom in and it's  a deer and the people were like what the world like how do you see that? And so it just it people  just stopped in the aisle. It was so bad that the show coordinator said I have to move my booth.  Like it was so people wouldn't stop. They just pay for a booth this good. I'm telling you it was  crazy.

I dude that this I'm not kidding. I ran out of business card. I called my wife. I was like,  "Run to Staples. I'm about out of cards." And I took a picture of that when I was running out of  cards. There was one card left. My wife shows up and gave me another box of 250 cards cuz you could  get them at Staples for like super cheap ones. Your like foray into the whole industry was to  just take a low stakes video of your own property of some deer.

That's it. Go to an expo with your  target audience right there and just show a video of the drone video that you took. That's it.  Right. You got it. That is That's how you launch. That is exactly how I launch. And at that at  that show, right? So that was the at the end of the season. So deer hunting season was over and  the guys coming up to me and they're like, "What are you going to charge for the service?"

And I  was like, "I don't know. I think I'll probably be between I was like $250 to $350." And they're  like, "That's not going to be enough." I was like, "Oh, okay. Well, thanks for the info." And so  I took all that info that they were giving me that I was like, "Geez, maybe I start high,  right? I can always come down." And so then when the season kicked off in September,  so that show was in January.

In September, the season kicked off and I was like, I'm going  550 bucks. So yeah, it's $550 if I find your deer. If I don't find your deer, it's 450 bucks. Now  that's interesting. Like why do you think they said that's not enough? Because they were looking  at the cost of getting a tracking dog out. So like at that time you could hire in a tracking the  alternative.

Yeah. Yep. You could you could get in a tracking dog for like $350 and I just thought  I would fit in there. In the beginning I didn't realize that my product was actually better than  a tracking dog because they never had to go in and blow out all the rest of the deer that are  on their property. So they would pay a premium to just come look, find the deer, and then figure out  how to go in and take, you know, get the deer out.

So I love getting feedback for businesses, but  usually it's bad, right? Like your mom tells you, "Yeah, I'd buy it." Like, "Okay, what is that  worth?" But this feedback you got is so valuable because often when you're asking a prospective  customer, "What would you pay?" They're super biased because they want to pay less. But in  this case, you had this weird circumstance where statistically speaking, the people giving you  the feedback are probably never going to be your customers because it has to be this

one-off  scenario where they shoot a deer but don't kill it and can't find it. Right. That's exactly  right. And so they're giving you very honest, real feedback. They probably know that they  probably won't use you because they could probably count on two fingers the amount of times in their  entire life they've hired a dog service for this. Right.

Exactly. Exactly. It's like that pricing  feedback is insanely accurate. Whereas if it were a service where everyone giving you feedback could  be a potential customer, they might be like, "Oh, I wouldn't pay 350. That's 150." You know, so it's  like what good feedback that is. Basically, right? Because I was the first guy in Ohio that was  doing it.

Once they seen that option, they weren't wanting to get the dog. Even though the dog was  cheaper, they were $350 and I was $550 when I found your deer because it was like 98% chance I'm  gonna find your deer. They were okay with spending an extra $200 on top of what it would have cost  them for a dog just because they don't have to go in there and potentially blow out all the other  deer.

And the biggest benefit of using a drone was yes, we hope that the deer has expired by the time  we find it with the drone, but if it's not, right, if it's not quite expired and you walk up on  it with a tracking dog, they get up and they they're gone. Like sometimes you don't find them  after that. Yeah. Okay. So, did you take like phone numbers, email addresses from these people  giving feedback or were you just kind of passing out business cards?

Nope. Yep. Just passing out  business cards. I did have uh for the show for a little bit because I didn't order nearly enough  uh those little magnets that you would like throw on your refrigerator or something like that. I had  quite a few of those but ran out very quickly. So yeah, it was it was strictly business cards and u  the magnets. What was the name of the expo again?

It was called Northeast Ohio Sportsman Show. Okay.  Now, worst case scenario, that show does not go well. You have no takers, no interest. What were  you going to do? Were you going to try to market a different way or were you going to check your  return policy? I I was marketing in other ways as well. Like as soon as I got my um my drone in,  I I printed off these brochures, like a a flyer, and I went to the local bow shops, uh  local rifle ranges, that type of thing.

Just asked them if I could hang up a flyer. And  on that flyer, I had like a picture of the drone. I had a picture of a thermal and then I had a zoom  or or an RGB image of what, you know, here's a hot spot. And then here is what I'm looking at. I just  had that I had that on on the flyer. Real quick, please subscribe to my channel. I know it's  kind of lame to ask, but it means a lot.

Thanks. I was just sticking some flyers out there, but got  but again, this industry, the hunting industry, they do a lot of chatting, right? And so  once you got some people talking about it, they were just talking to their next people that  they knew because yeah, word of mouth. I mean, I'm I'm thankful. I was one of the guys that decided  I'm going to go for it.

The biggest thing is like people didn't know, is it legal? Is it not? And I  was like, let's just figure it out. Let's go. And was it it was not black and white in the state of  Ohio that you could do it. But I did talk to the the Ohio Department of Natural Resources head  guy and told him what I planned on doing and no formal, right? I wish I would have got a  formal email or something.

It was no formal thing. He just said he doesn't see a problem  with it as long as you're not using it to literally go find the deer and then go shoot the  deer. And so I was like, well, I'm going to be a professional in this. This is strictly to try to  help the hunter uh recover a dead deer. And so I took his word for it. When it was at that  show, the Dea Department of Natural Resources also had a booth at that show and a couple of  the game wardens walked by and they were like, they looked at the video and they're

like, "I  don't know that that's legal." And I said, "Well, I kind of talked to your boss already and he said  that he doesn't have an issue with it." And so they weren't sure how they feel about it, but I  said, "Hey guys, I would love to meet you out in the field and show you the equipment and show you  how it works and introduce you who I am and that I'm not out here trying to help people cheat."

Yeah. So I did. I met the g the local game wardens in my area. It was three of them, maybe four.  And we met them out at the rental property, my hunting rental property. And I showed them  and they're like, "This is cool." But they said, "We just hope people don't use it for bad."  And that's how we got going. And then and then the state obviously updated their rules  of what you can and can't do with the drones.

And now it clearly tells you in the hunting  regulations that you may use a a drone to recover for that specific purpose. Yes. Yep. Okay. Yeah.  It's funny. I'm picturing the game wardens walk up and uh he like looks at the video and and  he like slowly reaches for his gun. like he doesn't trust you at all. They were trying  to figure out if that's using an aircraft uh to hunt because there's a there's a law that you  cannot use an aircraft to hunt.

Well, in Texas, that's how you shoot pigs. It's from a helicopter.  Yeah. I actually had a YouTuber reach out to me in Texas that they wanted um me to come down  there and shoot some content doing eradication on pigs cuz he helps farmers. They come in and  they destroy their um corn and beans. So, yeah. He said that you guys are allowed to actually  use a thermal drone, see where they're at, and go in and Oh, interesting.

They're invasive.  Yep. Now, you said you were the first in Ohio to do drone deer recovery. Was there anyone else in  the world that you knew of at the time doing this? Yes. Yes. So, I bought my drone from a guy in  Wisconsin. He was doing it, but he was keeping it on the down low. So, I was not the very first  one to do it. I was the very first one to make it mainstream.

Yeah. To put it on YouTube. If you  brought him a bunch of competition, you probably brought him a ton of customers, too, because you  like you blew up the industry. Yes, I did do that. You raised the tide, right, which raises all  ships. Yep. Yep, I did. So, does this work anywhere there's deer hunting? Like, what I'm  thinking in Texas is a everything's so far out.

Like, Ohio has a decently sized population  and it's not nearly as big as Texas. So, and it's a big hunting state, right? It has  a pretty long season. Is that right? Yeah. Obviously, in certain states, it's going to be  better than others. How many trophy deer are there that people are willing to pay to have recovered  in Texas? I don't know that specific number for Texas, but what I can tell you is the Midwest  states like Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Missouri, Tennessee, you know, that main mecca hub  there.

It produces some big deer and there are a ton of people that pay a lot of money to try to  find their buck that they, you know, shot. Yeah. I want to get to the agricultural stuff, but  has your has the drone deer recovery side of your business shrunk since then? service calls are  less than than I had in years past because people have more options of calling other people and I  built a pilot locator map and they just go there to try to find their pilot that's closest to them.

So you're monetizing in a different way like you kind of popularize this so now you're like the  lead genen source for your own competitors. That is correct. And what are the unit  economics on that? Do you sell them those leads? We sell them a subscription. So they they buy  a subscription to be listed on the website super cheap, 500 bucks a year, they can be  listed on the pilot locator map.

And people that search for deer recovery people in their  area. If they're on the drone do recovery website, they put in their zip code. It sucks them into an  area. It gives you a drop down of who's close by and then they just click on contact pilot and then  it'll text them the phone number so we can track exactly how many people go to the website and we  drive a ton of traffic to these people.

I mean, you built the Yelp for drone deer recovery. That's  right. Nothing I always say on this podcast, nothing is too niche. And you're proving that.  You're proving me right here. Yeah. Yeah. It's I I don't know. I I feel blessed. You're able  to see all the numbers on your competitors, right? Like at least stuff that goes through your  website. Yeah.

Yep. So, how many What has that taught you? Yeah. What has that taught you about  the industry or about your competitors? Man, a lot of people can't shoot. Well, there's so many  wounded deer. There's so many wounded deer. So, I feel bad in that way, right? And and I do get  crap about it a little bit online is like, Mike, look what you're doing. Like, you're there's, you  know, hundreds of thousands of people watching you because hunters have put bad shots on these deer.

And I'm like, yeah, but this has been happening for many, many years. It was just never public.  And so what it's taught me is, yeah, there's definitely a lot of deer that get wounded. I think  you what you're doing has the opposite effect. It educates everyone how like you need to get a  clean shot like because there are so many like you need to hunt ethically because look  at these people that aren't like that's I don't think people would see your content or  your videos and think I'm going to shoot worse now

because other people you know what I'm  saying? Well, there's definitely guys there that uh that say like okay well I'm going to  take this marginal shot because I know I'll just be able to hire in a drone and you know find it.  Oh, okay. All right. Well, and you know, there's maybe that's something to it cuz I'm telling you,  if somebody has a trophy buck in front of them and they don't have the exact perfect shot, it  doesn't matter.

He can probably drone drone will be able to come in and find it. Yep. I could  see that argument side of it. What numbers are you willing to share about like traffic to  your website or leads or revenue or all that? Yeah. So, I should have had my website guy  get me those numbers for the 2025 season, but 2024, we were doing about 400,000 people going  to the website in the busy season a month during the deer season in your area.

400,000. Yeah.  Well, that's that's for one month about 400,000, right? But you have to, you know, we're getting  anywhere from 2.5 to 3 million views on YouTube, Tik Tok, Instagram. So maybe some of those weren't  literally looking for a a pilot. They were looking to buy a drone. They're just like, but  like we the website clicks. I'm just like I had no clue like that there's this many people  around.

I just Yeah. I never gave social media the respect that that it deserves in business. Like  I I had a residential tree removal business and that business was just as big as I could make  it here in the three counties. All of a sudden overnight I have a business that stretches from  the west coast to the east coast. Like huge. And it's slightly international too.

Like people  in Mexico and Canada uh and even in Europe have started watching our content and doing the same  thing in those countries. Oh my gosh. I mean, my thesis for what makes a business strong, like  incredibly strong. What gives a business a moat, one of those things is uh network effects,  right? And for those listening or watching, a network effect is is a business where it gets  stronger the more the people use it, right?

Every person that creates a new Facebook account  makes Facebook stronger because of the network effects, right? And so you have those network  effects like you have a moat. If someone were to go try to launch a competitor to your directory  website, good luck. Like how do you overcome all your backlinks, all your YouTube videos, like  y it is so difficult.

That's beautiful. And one thing that I I struggled, I don't know if it  it fits in for the audience, but it's like as I I screwed up when I when I did some of this stuff,  um right, I didn't know what I had to start with. I had something that is a Kleenex, right? So,  a tissue when somebody says, "Hey, could you give me a Kleenex?" It it might be a puffs or  a whatever.

Um, I have drone deer recovery. And yeah, I did not by the time I figured out  that I needed to trademark the three words, the attorney said, "Okay, I'll try to file  this for you." But by the time I got it in, it was just like a normal language at that point.  And genu, that's what it is. you know, and so but then it caused market confusion because it was bad  for people.

Okay, so imagine this company started. It's called Drone Deer Recovery. Drone Deer  Recovery is anywhere. It doesn't matter. You don't have to be in Ohio. Um, you can be everywhere.  FYI, if you know anyone in the military, please share this episode with them because at  the end of this, you're going to hear Mike say that either of these businesses that he's talking  about are perfect for current or former military members.

All right. Sorry to interrupt, but then  a guy starts a business in Tennessee and calls it Drone Deer Recovery Tennessee and people have been  watching this content and watching this guy. Hey, I'm Mike with Drone Deer Recovery. All of a  sudden, they're finding maybe Drone Deer Recovery Tennessee and they think it's Mike, but it's not  Mike. So, it just it caused some market confusion in the beginning and a lot of people were doing  doing it, but then they kind of they kind of quit that because of the SEO that we had

and it  didn't really matter what they were trying to use the name for. But yeah, if there's something that  I wish I would have done sooner was trademark that prior to like blowing it up. Interesting. The same  thing happened with uh Spikeball. You know that game? Yeah. Yeah. Yep. They had an issue with the  generic trademark where they had to like rename it, rename it to roundn net and actually trademark  that because they were having so many competitors like basically clone their product and call it  spikeball and

they couldn't do anything about it. Y that's really interesting. Now how many op do  you call them operators? Drone operators. Yeah. So they'd be independent operators. They name their  business whatever they want and they they just list. It's I'd like to call it almost like a home  advisor. um before Angie's list bought bought them and they can list on the website.

And how many  do you have listed? Gosh, you should just pull it up at go to drone deer recovery.com and then  look at the pilot there. Okay. Wow. Yeah. So, hardly any out west? No. No. Out west has some  uh Yeah, we got to work on the out west laws. Okay. So, that map will fill up as we get closer  to season. So, we're out of season right now. And so, people they lapse.

Yep. They'll they'll get on  in the busy season, but we're anywhere from 200 to 300 pilots on there. Wow. So, a little back of the  napkin math, we're talking six figures a year in in memberships. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Do  you have like affiliate links for these drones that you sell? Do you monetize this side of  your business in any other ways?

Oh, gosh. I'm a distributor for DJI drones. I am now the number two or number three largest retailer  of thermal drones in the United States. What is your total revenue across all product lines  and services? We have never told anybody that I'm going to guess eight figures. That's  what I'm guessing. So, let's imagine that I made $50,000 my first season like in 10 weeks.

It's 600xed since then. So yeah, we did. You're going to figure it out. Anyhow, it last year we  did gosh darn Yeah, your business is this. So we did we did this Yeah, we did over  $32 million last year. Oh my gosh. And I don't I want people to know I'm not saying this  to boast whatsoever. No. And you're not saying results are typical like this is anyone.

You're  not saying that. You're just telling your story. Uhhuh. I just know how it's going to go  because like in the industry that I'm in like and I'm sure they're they watch your content.  We're quickly becoming one of the biggest ones. Yeah. I had a business where we sold products that  were cost 5 to $20,000 and we did 10 million our first 90 days.

And if you do the numbers on that,  that's like we sold low hundreds of units, you know? So these are high ticket items. You don't  have to sell millions of them to make millions, right? Yep. It just feels like we're just getting  started. I'm sure. I mean, it's so interesting how they all play together. Like, you don't want to  get rid of the the directory side of the business.

You don't want to get rid of actually doing drone  route. Like, it all plays together. You don't want to get rid of the YouTube. They all even though  cuz like you might look at like, oh, 8020 rule, like cut out all that other crap. Cut. It's like  no, like they all work together. You know, you got it exactly what you're saying. If people could  just listen exactly what you're saying and build a business like that, it's like you just add keep  adding things to it.

Yeah. Well, I mean, I have a like this podcast I talk about a lot of bluecollar  business ideas and I own a tree trimming business and it's not huge. It's not super profitable. We  founded it three years ago, but like I want to speak with authority about bluecollar businesses,  you know? So, it it plays a role in this content, you know? Yeah. Yeah. That's that's what we did.

I just I've literally never shared it. I've done I've done probably a hundred I'd say right  between 120 and about 175 podcasts and I always get asked like how much money are you making?  It's not a podcast like your podcast. It's uh it's like deer hunting podcast and then they  want to figure out well if you do this many deer recoveries you could make this much money but it's  never asking me as a business how we went from doing a service making $50,000 to making tens of  millions.

So this is different. I should have come in into it a little bit differently. I'm also like  I I just am I try to not I I want to be humble, right? There's not a lot of people that make tens  of millions of dollars and right and that's not profit either, right? People don't understand how  much go to the IRS and your employees and I mean ecom businesses are hard.

Like they're very hard.  Fulfillment businesses are hard. You've got like multiple hard businesses in one here. Yep. Yep.  So I I recognize that. Well, thank you for sharing that. That's awesome. And I don't think anyone  thinks you're boasting like you're supporting entrepreneurship. You're providing jobs. How many  employees do you have? We have uh 28 people on payroll.

That's awesome. Yeah. What about if if I  wanted to do drone j recovery as an entrepreneur? Is there anything I can learn by like going to  your map and like trying to reverse engineer? Like there's one in DFW. Obviously local laws play  a factor, but could some could someone go look and say, you know what, there's there's a hole in the  market here.

There's a how to get started in this business. We've just put together um like a a  small little booklet that will help you try to research, you know, how many tags might get sold  in your area to the ratio of how how many calls we get in Ohio. So, we usually don't put this on  front and center. This is like something that we use uh we run Instagram ads or something.

So,  you're running paid ads to this for the training. Oh, yeah. Yeah. We we spend a lot and lot a lot  in marketing now. You know, in the beginning I was just doing all organic stuff. Now we push a lot  of dollars into marketing. Yep. Lot of dollars. I mean, you you created an entire industry.  People that create an industry usually aren't the first to launch a business in that industry.

It's usually the first person to shed light on it, put eyeballs on it, and and that's what you've  done. How does that feel? I feel lucky. I feel blessed. I just pinch myself that I get to do what  I get to do and make money at it. It's just Yeah. I mean, I This is how crazy it is. I'm a pilot.  I fly myself. I was in Georgia this morning on a multi-million dollar farm down there and I flew  myself back because of making YouTube content.

Yeah. What were you doing down there? I was down  there with an onion farmer that bought a new a rig from us. He bought two spray drones and um a  spray trailer and we were filming content of him using this technology to spray onions and to show  how he's adopting that new technology to increase his production of onions is yield. Okay, this  yield. Now let's say I'm a 20 to 50year-old entrepreneur or entrepreneur and I want to  do something in this space.

Do they go drone deer recovery or do they go agricultural? Oh my  gosh. Agricultural. Agricultural by a long shot. But then they go hand in hand, right? Oh,  so do both. But but agriculture first. Yeah, I would probably do that. The the industry is just  it's a multi-billion dollar industry. Like Yeah, it's so huge. It's not limited to specific states.

There's agricultural everywhere. There's egg from Michigan to Florida to California to Maine.  There's literally things grown all over the country in the United States and they get sprayed.  They either get sprayed with organic material or they get sprayed with pesticides, insecticides.  Can you finance these machines? Yes. Yes, we have. What does financing look like?

the payment's  going to range based on your credit score and stuff like that, but I do think that most people  are probably in the 15% um for interest. What are the unit economics on this business? What does  the opportunity look like for an entrepreneur? Oh my gosh, it is it is unbelievable. So, it's  outside work and it can get warm long hours and you got to work for it.

But if you weren't, Dude,  I made $132,000 in 24 days running my spray drive. We just did another job that I ended up  profiting. Yeah, let me roll back because I got these numbers. $65,000 in eight days and  I put in the bank. I think it was at $50,000. So like 80 70% net profit margins.  Yeah, it it's really good. And I told people I was going to make this public.

And  then the spray drone industry is like, "Don't do that. You're going to piss off the farmers  and you're they're not going to want to." Yeah, it's good. It's really good. Let me ask you  something. How many leads have you lost because nobody picked up the phone? An 8:00 p.m. call  comes in, you're at dinner, and you let it go to voicemail, and by the time you call back the  next morning, they've already hired someone else.

And that's reality. Leads come in after hours when  emergencies strike. And when you miss the call, you miss the job. And it's not about quality, it's  about speed. Highlevel built an AI employee to fix just this. It answers real phone calls, talks  to leads, qualifies them, and books appointments directly on your calendar 24/7. Also, it'll handle  text, DMs, and web chat, so you can stop missing revenue just because you couldn't grab the phone.

Oh, and you can also white label the entire thing and resell it to your clients as your software.  Charge them monthly and that is recurring revenue that you didn't have yesterday. So, check out  gohighlevel.com/tkopod and they will give you a 30-day free trial to see what I mean. Oh my  gosh. So, is that a typical ticket price? Like tens to hundreds of thousands of dollars?

Oh,  yeah. And that's typical profit margin, 70%. Oh yeah. Yeah. So, um, operating cost is  going to be anywhere from $3 to $3.74 an acre. And you charge depending on your acres, right?  If it's flat acres or rolling acres, you charge, you know, according to that. But it can be $10 to  $20 per acre is what you're charging. Hence the 70% margin. So profits could be 85 90% if if it's  rolling.

Again, it it is a it is kind of a short season. So, that's why you make haywall sunshines,  like you work long hours, uh short season and you put the money in the bank. What are some typical  crops that you're spraying for? Is it anything? Yeah. So, in Ohio, we're spraying mostly corn and  beans and pasture land, but I sell to people all over the country.

um spraying, you know, peacon  trees, almond trees, blueberries, cranberries, you name the crap, it's probably getting sprayed.  Yeah, literally anything. What does customer acquisition look like? How can an operator go out  there and find a farmer to to buy this from? So, the way that I would tell people to get a customer  is you you have to go to the customer or get the customer come to you to do a demonstration.

You  have to physically fly the drones and like spray, you know, be water or something. Spray it over  his corn or his beans. Show them the magic of it. Yeah. Show him. Show up at his farm. Like  you actually have to show up with his equip or with your equip equipment and show it because  just to hand him a business card and say, "Hey, I do drone spraying."

He might not  even know what a drone is. Yep. Yeah. So again, I Dude, I've seen guys do this that were  just cameramen. Like that's what they were. They were camera entrepreneurs. They knew nothing about  farming. Zero. They knew that drones existed. They bought a rig. They educated themselves. Went  to the farmers, did exactly what I'm telling you, and now they have a successful spray drone  business.

Now, there's other people that are just hoping that a farmer, you know, Google spray drone  business near me knee and they don't do anything. Yeah. And so it can be a little frustrating  because I'll see my new a rigs listed on Facebook for cheap because they it didn't work for him.  But it's like I can tell you that I don't care where I would go in this country.

If I want to be  a professional spray drone business in any state, I could do it. And the way I get that customer  is I take my rig, I go to his farm, I introduce myself, and I say, "Hey, can I just show you how  this works?" and you spray and you get down um to the crop and you show them the droplets. Like  that's what we were literally doing yesterday on the onions is the farmer has been doing this for  40ome years and he's like I never even knew that you get get the product on the plant where it's at  and the only

way it would have got there is using a drone and so they have to see it. Oh man, I have  like my mind is buzzing with questions right now. I'm like about to go buy a drone right now  and start flying it. Let's do it. Let's do it. What's like an average farm size? 5,000 acres.  No, not in my area. Yeah, not in my area. My area, you know, they're maybe a 100 acres.

I'll give you  some data. This is DJI's data. This is wild. So, there's 99 million corn acres in the  United States. 99 million. Okay. There's 82 there's 82 million soybean acres. And most of  these acres are going to get sprayed at some point by something by something. Either a ground rig,  an airplane, a helicopter. There's 46 million weed acres, 52 million pasture acres.

There's 11  million cotton acres. This industry tapped wise is barely even getting started. Like we we're at like  2.5% of what we could be doing. market potential is like there's another 94 to 97% that is still  untapped literally. All right. So the alternatives before drones were ground, airplane, helicopter,  right? If if you go to a farmer and you agree to pay 10 bucks an acre.

Okay. What is he going to  pay for any of those three alternatives? Ground, airplane, and helicopter. Yeah. So right now,  so let's take the exact same field in Kansas. That's what most people think about when they  think farming. Flat square Kansas fields. The airplane might charge you $8 to the $8 per uh  acre to spray. I can I would I would spray it for $8 with my drone, but I have way less overhead  than he does.

Plus, I'm going to do a better application for the farmer than the airplane will.  And I can prove it because the airplane gets to the end of the field and there's a power line and  he pulls up and his spray is, you know, 100 ft up in the air and he missed the the, you know, 75.  That's why all this corn's dying in this corner. Well, it could be. Yeah, it could be.

I'm serious.  So, the drones are going to go right to the power line, turn around, and come right back. And  it's low. It's always the same altitude. So, some guys some guys, right, they're good  salesmen. They charge more per acre than an airplane does because they can show why  it's worth it for the farmer to pay that. For me, I get a lot of acres cover.

I'm pretty  efficient with my rig, my setup. I still make a good bit of money charging the same as an  airplane. Um, so I would say for the most part, wherever you're at, you're probably going to  be in the same range as an airplane. Okay. Now, now there's some acres there's some acres like  here in Ohio Airplane won't show up. He can't get in. So those acres I'm charging anywhere from $20  to $25 per acre because there's no other option.

There's trees in the way. It's hard to reach. It's  rugged. It's it's just gnarly stuff. The farmer's willing to pay for it because they he literally  has no other option. Yeah. Now, what do farmers pay for ground or for helicopter? If an airplane  is eight bucks. Yeah. So, a ground rig out there is probably in the $6 to $8 range. They're all  going to kind of be the in the same range.

Okay. Y Okay. And now the the actual pesticide or  the fertilizer, whatever that you're spraying, that's not you, right? The farmer's paying for  that separately. Correct. Yep. Correct. Okay. So, that's included in your fee. It's strictly just  you applying whatever he wants onto those acres at the volume. So when I throw those numbers out,  that's normally doing like two gallon work.

So he gets two gallons of product per acre applied.  Okay? Now if a farmer says I want five gallons to the acre, then you know it might be a buck or  two bucks more to do five gallon work. But for the most part, just to keep it simple, talking two  gallons, you know, per acre. Okay. And he's buying that product from Monsano or whatever. Yeah. Yep.  Exactly.

Yeah. So, he's getting his chemical, whatever he wants to put on his corn or beans.  He'll get it in. I show up at the farm. I mix it up in my tanks, pump it into the drone,  spray it onto his crops. And he's probably very opinionated about what he sprays. You don't  want to get involved there at all, right? Like, yeah. Yeah. So, at some point, the more you do  this, the more you'll see what products work to maybe for this farmer and then maybe you can give  a suggestion.

But I did not want to be involved with that because I didn't want to recommend  him a product and then that product not do well, right? So then he's like, well, the drone didn't  work and the product didn't work, so I'm not going to get both of it. And so it's like, I'll  just do what you you want me to spray. So, I'm over here thinking like I'm an internet  marketer and if I wanted to find customers, I would go find any number of websites where you  can scrape property data, right?

I would scrape owner data of farmland over x number of acres,  maybe under y number of acres, and I would take my rig. I would, you know, at 10:00 a.m. or whatever  it is, I would drive to that gentleman's house, and I don't know if this is legal. I don't know  all the regulations, but I would literally start flying that thing in front of his house where  it's like when I knock on the door, it's behind me and he's just like, "What?"

It's like, "What  is this like men in black?" Like, you know, Independence Day and say, "Hey, I want to show you  my toy. It's got water in it. Do you mind?" Like, that's my hook. What do you think? What do  you think? Everything was good until you got to the point where you're flying your drone  uh at his property without his permission. So, these these drones are they're heavy lift  drones.

And so there's rules and regs that you can't just pull it out like you would  your little Mavic drone to take a video. Okay. You have to have permission from  the landowner to be flying over his land. But I could put it on his doorstep or behind me  right in his front yard without flying it. Oh, 100%. Yeah. Okay. That's what I'm saying.  Like show up with your rig.

Like Yeah. when you have 12 foot drones exposed on a trailer  like you can't help but look like and it's like it's like oh okay y'all like you really do do  spraying and I'm telling you it works. I went to co-ops like where the farmers buy their seed  and chemical from. So I showed up there with my drones and my trailer doing exactly what you said.  They're exposed to the elements.

They're like, "Oh, you really do mean you do spray with drones."  I'm like, "Yeah, I show them up. I show up. Am I here to get work done?" Like, "I'm not showing  up in my van." I usually say, "I'm not staying in a van or nicking a Crown Vic." Like, I'm  here to get the spray chucking a truck. Yeah. I'm telling you, like, and it worked.  It's worked.

I have to think that like once they it clicks, your close rate is just  stupid. Oh yeah. Is that true? Because they're already paying for this. You're not convincing  them to pay for a new service. It's like, no, give that money to me because it's better  and it's cooler and it might be cheaper. You got it. Yeah. Like once they once they see  it, they're going to do it.

Yeah. Like it's just the way it is. And sometimes they have no other  option. Like right now it's raining a lot in Ohio. You are not spraying your fields any other  way. Like, yeah, you can't take a five ton truck or tractor or sprayer in there. You can't do  it. You're stuck. But the stuff is still growing, so it needs spray. All right, everyone watching  this on YouTube, please know I have an audio podcast as well.

It's called the Ker Office. It's  the same thing except for a handful of episodes. I publish a lot of stuff on Spotify, Apple, and  any podcast platform that you might not see here on YouTube. So, if you're ever driving, mowing the  lawn, commuting, check out my audio podcast, The Kerner Office, same name. You're going to love it.  If somebody has just a little ounce of motivation and dedication and go-getter attitude,  you can make this work.

I'm telling you, there there's it's just so big, dude. Don't  underestimate I call them testosterone businesses. So, when I'm picking businesses to profile on  this podcast, it took me a while to learn that, but you know, generally speaking, I cover things  that are approachable, affordable, yada yada, they don't cost a lot of money to start. They,  you know, high payoff, you know, predictability in the first X months or whatever, but there's  a testosterone factor that I can't replace.

And that means the idea just has to be cool to men,  period. And so how that applies to you is like, you know what, my airplane guy is six cuz we went  to high school together. He's six bucks an acre. My ground guy's six bucks an acre. You're  charging me 11, but this is freaking cool. Uh, so we're in. You know what I'm saying? Like I  I'm not saying they would tell you all of their reasoning in their head, but they just they  want to see a drone flying around their property.

You've never seen this, and dude, you nailed  it on head. I am telling you, this happens. We are flying at a farmer's field and there's an  airplane next to us like ripping over his corn and he walks over and he's like, "That's  cool. You're spraying my corn next year." It happens. I I was in Kentucky. We were down  there and we were doing u doing the acres and then a farmer had us come clean up some acres and then  his buddy showed up to watch it.

Right. So he had already had his sprayed by the airplane and so he  showed up to watch the drones fly his buddy's farm and he's like I am definitely going to have drones  spray my core next year because he was watching how the drone went right to the tree edge turned  around and came right back and just the it's the the wow factor. Yeah. It's like okay.

Is any of  the the piloting automated or are you having to do it yourself the whole time? It's all automated.  Oh, dude. It just gets better and better. I'm telling you, it's all automated. All you are,  imagine that you are ATC, air traffic control, right? So, you have these drones. They're on  auto missions. They're out flying in the field and then they're coming back.

You just have  to like know, okay, this one is this high. This one's at this altitude. You're going to  make this one land here and this one land here. But literally, you can spray a whole field. You  can spray a whole field and never once touch the like the remote controller sticks. You can  literally just go swoop and the drone will take off. It'll go into the field.

It'll  lower itself. It'll spray. It'll it'll run out of fluid or the battery is dead. It'll  come back. You fill it up. You swap a battery and away it goes. So, excuse my ignorance. You you  led with talking about how hard this business is, and I'm sure it is. and how our heart is relative,  right? But I got a Cybert truck. Like I could just picture myself broing down in my Cybert truck 64  degrees watching the screen, you know, drinking drinking my DPZ right here.

What? Like on a hot  day? Like what what am I missing here? You have to sit outside. Like is that a regulation?  And you just you have to sweat? Well, yeah. Technically it is a regulation. You're supposed to  watch your drone with your own eyes. Can I watch it in my truck with my air conditioning on and  maybe YouTube in the background? I don't know.

Yeah. Yeah, you could. As long as you can uh see  your drone, you can sit in the You have to watch the camera and like have the actual drone be  within eyesot of you. Yeah, that's that's what the rules are. Yeah. But watch the content  and you'll see if people are following it. Well, okay. Again, here I'm just going to jump  into it. It probably won't go on the podcast, but it's like the FAA doesn't fly drones.

They don't They don't even know how it works. They make rules that we have to follow that you  don't even know that. Okay. For they say you have to watch your drone so you don't hit an airplane.  I'm 12 feet off the ground next to a tree. If an airplane's going to hit my drone, he  is inside the trees. Yeah. Like for real. Like the idiot. They just don't even They're just  It's just dumb.

Yeah. It's the government. It's the government. Yep. Now, we haven't even  touched on the recurring aspect of this. If if I have a thousand acres of corn in Kansas and  I'm paying you 10 grand a year, let's say eight grand a year to spray my corn, is it yearly or  what? Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Or or like quarterly or are there different types of applications or is  it like once a year?

So, it all it depends, but um Okay. So, some farmers might have you come in and  spray a herbicide. a herbicide kills all the weeds and then he plants the corn. So you've one  application there, then the corn starts growing. Then he might want you to come in and plant or um  spray a fungicide. A fungicide helps so there's not fungus growing on the corn.

So you might  do two maybe three applications. That's rare. Most of the time you will for sure do one every  year. Almost always one every year. that is in corn specifically pasture land like range land.  You might spray that twice. So in the springtime and then maybe in the summertime. That is probably  a three-year program and then it'll go to a two or four year program.

So it's more of a maintenance  type thing. So first you have a bunch of invasive you spray them you get them knocked out and then  it's you just come back you know maybe every two three years to come in and spray it again just  so to keep uh control of it. So different crops different applications the onion grower that I  talked about earlier that guy spraying once a week for uh the six six or eight weeks straight once  a week.

So, if you would get a client like that, you're going to go back to those fields every  week and spray something on the on those onions. I talked to him. I was like, "Okay, you're  a farmer. You're doing it every week, but do all farmers do this like that grow onions?"  He's like, "Yes." I was like, "Is there a business for somebody to come spray like if you were a  bigger farmer, come spray as a custom applicator?"

Right? Cuz we're talking about entrepreneurs. And  he's like, "Absolutely." Like, because there's some farmers that won't buy the equipment. They  don't want to learn the new technology. They just want to pay somebody to come and spray it when  they want it done. They don't want the overhead buying the equipment, running the equipment,  servicing it, keeping up on it.

And so, there's definitely there's those opportunities  out there. Cotton, for instance, like there's a lot of cotton grown. There's like 11 million  acres. I told you earlier, cotton gets sprayed once a week till it's ready to harvest. Oh my  gosh. Is that So, is it most farmers don't want to own and operate the equipment or some farmers?  Some farmers.

Yeah, some farmers. So, are most of your customers farmers like buying these expensive  drones for themselves and flying it themselves? Do they have to get trained in all that or  what? Yeah. So, no. Right now, the industry, how we see it going is it's entrepreneurs that  are wanting to do their own business because the farmers haven't completely switched and believe  that the technology does what it does.

So, they would much rather hire a guy to just spray  it. What about batteries? Like, how many gallons do they hold? Because that's what, nine pounds  per gallon just in weight. Are you having to swap out batteries every few acres? Yep. Yep. So,  you're swapping batteries all the time. Right now, the drone that we really like is called a DJI  T-100. That one carries 26 gallons of fluid.

And um it depends how many gallons an acre you're  doing, right? So, if you're doing two gallon work, you're almost getting like 12 or 13 uh acres  covered in um in one load. Now, there is a lot of management stuff. Once you get trained, you'll  learn, okay, I can't fill the tank completely full if the drone's only doing short rows because  it uses a lot of energy to make turns.

But if you're doing long runs, like I can get  away with putting a full load in. So, there is some common sense that's that goes into operating  the equipment. The equipment will know, okay, my battery's getting low. I need  to go home. It will know that. But just because you can carry 26 gallons doesn't  mean you're going to put 26 gallons in every time.

But it has the capability of doing it. Uh you need  three batteries usually uh three um three three batteries to fly. So it's always rotation. Drone  goes out, comes back, fills the tank, swap the battery. Usually about every four to six minutes.  Oh jeez. You're swapping batteries every four to six minutes. Yep. Yep. That's crazy. And how long  do they t take to charge?

about 8 to nine minutes. Okay. So, you're able to keep it going. Three.  Yep. Guys, tkowners.com. That's my community where people are building businesses. I do AMAs  Q&As's every week live. You can ask me anything you want. You can have accountability partners.  It's about a thousand people in there building, starting, growing businesses. Check out TKO as  in the Kerner office.

tkowners.com. What else is awesome about this business that I neglected  to ask about that we may have missed? For me, it's just like being able to be outside and watch the  sunrise and sunset on top of a trailer watching super futuristic drones spray over corn or  wherever you're at. It's just so cool. I literally and then I I look at my, you know, co-pilot or  whoever's flying on the trailer and I'm like, we get paid to do this.

Yeah. Like I'm not really  doing anything other than swapping the battery and filling the tank and the drone's doing the rest.  Like you're saying, it's a it's a wow cool factor. Have you been doing this long enough to know  like what the churn is to an entrepreneur that has a farmer customer that's paying him every  year? Like a yearly churn? Like how often do do farmers quit their you know their sprayer and  switch to someone else or something else?

You know what I'm saying? Are you saying adopting this new  technology? No. Like if I get a customer, how long am I going to have him before he fires me in this  industry? I don't think they I I've not done it long enough to get fired. You're like, "What is  churn? What is the C? What fired? Quit." No, the money just comes forever, Chris. Well, it does.

The only reason that I've lost uh my customers is I've sold rigs to entrepreneurs right down  the road. Like I literally have sold rigs to I I'm showing on so all my fields are on my phone. I  can tell people or show people what I've sprayed. And the guy's looking at the field boundary and  he's like, "You were spraying behind my house." I was like, "Oh, didn't know."

And now he has a rig.  Who do you think's going to spray those fields? He is. He's right there. So that's the only  reason that I've been lo like lost acres is I also equipped entrepreneurs to go do this. And it's  like, could I be a huge custom spray applicator? I could totally, but that's not my business. Could  you could an entrepreneur that wants to go cover, you know, 50,000 acres?

Absolutely. There's  guys doing it right now running 10 trailers. They manage. They send guys out to spray this  stuff. All they all they do is manage them now. All they do is, you know, carry cash to uh to the  bank in Home Depot wheelbarrows. It's wild. What does a business with 10 trailers do in revenue,  give or take? I know it can vary, but I would just take my numbers, what I've done, because I  don't have 10 trailers, but I sold drones to a guy that does, and I've not personally asked him how  much he's doing.

But we can quickly do the number like if he's covering, you know, 60,000 acres  and he's doing 10 gall or $10 to the acre. I mean, there you go. That's $600,000. Oh, man.  A season like not even a year, but a season. Yeah. Yep. Yep. So, is 600,000 I know that's an  estimated number, but would that be a 10 a 10 trailer business or a what's like the acreage  to trailer kind of ratio?

I'm giving you that number because I know that that's what the  guy's running in Kansas. He has 10 trailers, but he's like he has military buddies, this is a  great business for guys coming out of the military that they they just want to be, you know, out  in in farmland by themselves flying drones. And so what this guy did in Kansas is he had  military buddies and he has a bunch of acres and he doesn't want to cover it all himself.

So he helped his buddies get into it and so they get to spray those acres for him. And I  know he said they're going on 60,000 acres. I just don't want to tell you exactly what he's  making because I don't truly know. Yeah. Yeah. But I can tell you what I'm what I've done. So in the  case of this one guy in Kansas, it's about 60,000 acres to 10 trailers.

Yeah, that's kind of the  ratio. Is the ratio similar for you personally? So if I would have his acres, I would not need 10  trailers. Yeah. Uh but I work differently. So if I have 60,000 Kansas acres, I think I could get that  60,000 Kansas acres covered with four trailers. Okay. Wow. What's the biggest business that you  know of doing this today? I've sold to guys in Minnesota.

They're just slowly getting into it.  So, they I think they do a quarter million acres, like 250,000 acres um that they spray, but they  didn't do it all with drones because they're they don't think it's capable of it yet. They  haven't done it like we've done it. And so I don't know who is the largest custom spray  drone business as of now, but it's probably in the Midwest, like Iowa, Kansas, Nebraska, somewhere  like that.

I feel like someone's someone's going to do this on a smaller scale, fall in love with  it, be sophisticated, go raise a bunch of money, and they're going to be doing tens of millions  of dollars a year of spraying with drones. Like, that's an inevitability. It is totally possible.  Yeah. There's so many acres that are going to get sprayed. It's It's crazy.

like that  they say that there's like over a billion acre treatments. So meaning not necessarily that  there's a billion acres to spray that that if you would spray a field twice or whatever in a season,  it will add up to a billion acres needing treated. But that could be anything, right? Corn, beans,  blueberries, raspberries, on and on and on and on.

Totally. If somebody has if that's their goal  that they want to be the largest spray drone, you know, operation, the acres are there. The  co-ops are spread across. There's there's a reason that there's these huge co-ops across the country.  They have a large customer base. Their customers need custom applications done. If you can connect  with those people that already have the acres, you're probably going to have way more acres  than you can get done.

And that the truth is most people are like that their first year  when they get started. So they're like, "Okay, I'm just going to make enough to pay my, you know,  equipment." Soon there's more farmers coming. Hey, I got 300 acres here, 500 acres there. And you're  like, yeah, well, I still got 3,000 to do. I don't know how I get to there. And it's like they only  do what they can instead of quickly expanding.

That's most business like most business owners  don't have any employees, right? It's chucking a truck because it's hard to scale, right? So  someone at those numbers a billion acres per year. Like someone could own 10% of this market  and be a billion dollar a year revenue business at $10 an acre. Yeah. I actually think that  a big company that's already doing like say selling the chemical, I cannot understand why  they don't have hundreds of trailers right now.

I don't I do not get it unless it's just because  it's so new, right? It's so new. They're like, they have all the customers already already  trusting them enough to buy product from them. Yep. Yeah, it might be that. It's just like  you literally could add to your business doing the application. They're selling  the product. They're selling the product.

They could literally just spray it. And that's  the hard part, the customer acquisition. They've already checked that box. Yep. Yep. Oh my gosh.  Mike, I have a headache. This has been so good. This has been very stimulating for me. Anything I  missed that I should have covered? I know this was pretty exhaustive, but Oh, no. No. This was good.  I feel like I should have come with like specific numbers.

No, this is great. This is great. This  is great. How much like licensing or training does one need to have to to do this for agricultural  purposes? There's two main licenses that they have to get on their own that we can't really help  them with. One is called a remote pilot's license or part 107 pilots's license. Not that difficult.  I say if you study hard for three days, go take it on day four.

You're going to pass it. Okay,  that's one to allow you to fly remote drones. Two is get your commercial pesticide applicators  license in your state. Not that difficult either. If you're in Kentucky, you can do it online. Uh  you can study the course and in 3 hours you could take your test. It's not that difficult. Those are  the two two main things you need to get started.

Then my team will help you with everything else.  A lot of paperwork after that. So, in order for you to fly a drone over 55 pounds as a remote  pilot's license, you have to petition the FAA and be granted an exemption to fly over 55 lbs.  It's difficult to do. I tried it on my own, hire an attorney, didn't know how the process  works, and it's a pain in the neck, but So, just avoid that.

Yeah, just avoid it. Have  Yeah. Have Have us do it is it's just So, under 55 is the way to go. under 55 is is easy, but  don't No, no, you can't do that in agricultural because they're all over 55. Oh, okay. What I'm  saying is is get your remote pilot's license and get your commercial applicator's license  and then call my team. Once you have that, then we know, okay, you have those, no problem.

We will help you get the rest of your paperwork. And it's just paperwork. It literally is just  paperwork. And then you can fly heavy lift drones. Okay. How long does this whole process take? Like  let's say today I want to get paid money to spray crops with drones. How soon can I get my first  dollar in the bank if I just work my butt off? Well, that's where we made another program.

So,  we started a program that's called a it's called 137 Fastpass. So, you need what's called the 137  certificate from the FAA to dispense poisons from the air. The FAA is ferociously slow. It's the US  government. They don't do anything fast. And so, we start your paperwork for you. All right? So, we  start your paperwork for you on day one when you buy your equipment.

It's going to take to get your  own paperwork. It's going to take you anywhere from three to maybe four months to receive yours  back. But while you wait, we now have a program that usually in 10 days you can be flying your  drones that you bought from us because we're going to allow you to operate under our licensing  so you can get out there and get your equipment paid off.

Oh, okay. Okay. So, operate under your  licensing while they wait for the FAA stuff. Yep. Yep. All right. I've never done this before, but  after I hit record, we kept talking. He came from the Amish community and I found that fascinating.  So I hit record again. We talked for a little bit some about business, some about personal life,  church stuff.

So this is kind of a behind the scenes. If you're interested in that, his Amish  background and upbringing and how that shaped who he is today, keep listening. Otherwise,  we're mostly done with the business stuff, but he does talk about how much profit he makes  in there. So enjoy. I got to hit record again. How did you go from traditional Amish horse and  buggy to multi-million dollar business owner?

Did you have to like leave the community? Not really,  but my mom and dad didn't want me to not be Amish. So, it was rough on them to to know that their  one child is not going to live that lifestyle. So, my parents, the the Amish that they are, they  don't shun you like some of the TV shows. Yeah. But it was still hard on them. Sure. I now  live on the home farm that my dad had.

And so, we're cool, but it's different. Was there like  a triggering moment or event that made you decide to kind of forge your own path? Yeah. When I uh  started dating my now wife, she was not Amish. And I learned that I don't have to be Amish to get to  heaven. I was told that if I leave the Amish, then I'm not obeying my parents and I'm going  to hell.

Yeah. And so I figured out that that's not the case. and I decided not to  live that lifestyle. Yeah. Well, I mean, I'm I'm a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of  Latter-day Saints, LDS, and there's there's a lot of similarities there and like I just I get it,  you know? It's not like binary. It's not clear. It's not simple. There's complexities, nuances,  family dynamics, cultural dynamics.

Like, and also I can stop recording. I don't need to record.  No. I'm personally just curious. Record it. I'm telling you like I'm doing a podcast where  it's like I'm talking about this like people exactly like you said like going from a Amish  guy to making millions. It's like oh my gosh like why is this? It's because I chose to not live that  lifestyle and then and they're still cool with it.

And it's been four years since you started drone  deer recovery. Yes. Yep. That's a lot of change in four years. 2022 is when we would have started  the first brand of drone deer recovery. What were you doing before drone deer recovery? I had a tree  care business. It was called Any Bear Tree Care and um I was climbing trees, rigging them down,  using big cranes to get them down, you know.

Were you still in your community when you had  that business or you'd already left by then? No, I don't really left. So when I was about 16  and a half, 17 years old, uh something like that, I I was like, I am not driving a horse and  buggy to work. I am not like dressing that way. So, I'm in right standing with the Lord. I read an  article years ago about a you probably know about this, but it was a an Amish family on a horse and  buggy that got rear ended by a car going like 80 miles hour and everyone died and the

community  just like completely forgave the driver. Oh, yeah. Like immediately. Yep. That's pretty common.  I remember being very touched by that story. Yeah. It's interesting because like I've  in my church like I'm the I'm kind of the reverse in a sense like LDS is not like Amish  like we you know we use all the technology and everything but I'm the reverse of you and that  my whole family has left the faith and I haven't you know so it's a similar kind of feeling but on  the other side of it.

So anytime like I see I've never even watched those dumb TV shows but I've  seen like the trailers and the previews and like I just have a lot of empathy for people on both  sides of that equation. people that left that, you know, they feel like everyone  feels like they're going to hell and then people that haven't left. Like I have I  just have empathy for both parties because it's it's not simple.

Life is complex, you know.  No. Yeah, it it definitely is not simple. It's You bring up that um that story about  Amish forgiving that driver. My wife's uncle was just hit by a truck on a bicycle. He  was Amish. Their whole family is Amish. And the the guy that hit him was at the funeral. Like  they were not they were not upset. Oh my gosh, that's crazy.

Yeah. I just wish like if  everybody would just show more love. It doesn't matter where you come from, right? 100%.  It's like as as cliche as it is, like it is the answer. Like love is the answer. All the cliches  are true. That's why you hear them all the time. And why is it so hard? I don't get it. I  don't get it. Yeah. So, what what's your family think of everything you've built?

They're awesome. Like, I'm cool with them, you know? It's just different. I served a  mission for my church for two years and hungry. And my family members, they were kind of  like on the edge of the church. Some were in, some were out. But when I came home and I met them  at the airport, they were basically all out. And oftentimes you hear like motivational stories  of the opposite happening, right?

Where like I was blessed for serving my mission and so  these members of my family who left the church, they came back and people have their agency and  I don't think that's like a sign of I don't think that that sends a negative signal or anything  but like I had the opposite experience and it was pretty depressing, you know, coming back to  that. But like I just felt like the black sheep, like the reverse black sheep of my family.

And I  I felt like, you know, almost like they weren't judging me, but it kind of felt like they were  for not leaving, you know? But like I love them, they love me, we're cool. That's awesome. Yeah.  Yeah. That's where we're at with my family. Um it was definitely hard for many years. And uh but  they just they're cool with it now. I mean, dad sold me half of the farm for pennies.

Yeah. and  the other half is to his other son that isn't or that is Amish. I'm not and the other one is. And  so yeah, they don't they don't look at us treat us any differently. I have just like a mental model  that I I run everything through. Whether it's this sounds like probably ignorant, silly, but like  sunscreen and like foods and like I just kind of think like however people were doing it 200  years ago, we should probably get back to that, you know?

Like my wife's like, "You need to put  lotion on, moisturizer." And I'm like, "No." Like, "No one was doing that 200 years ago." Like, like  Exactly. Exactly. with food and like behaviors. Like I just kind of like were we doing it then?  I don't know. Yeah. That's a big lifestyle change in two years. What were you making per year like  before drone deer recovery?

Uh I think I took home maybe with my business 100 grand probably  around that with Anywhere Tree Care. Yep. That's a big change in four years. Mhm. I've  never It's just crazy. It almost feel like you you've won the lottery. I mean, yeah. I  don't have the millions, but I mean, we have We could if we wanted to, but we just reinvest  reinvest reinvest.

Yeah. So, it's tied up in the business. Mhm. Yeah. And then having like we  we've literally had what is that called? uh when companies with millions reach out. Private equity.  Private. Yeah. Yep. Yeah. Like I was like I didn't even know that this is a thing. Yeah. Like we're  not you're going to sell this for hundreds of millions one day. Like for sure.

Yeah. We we talk  about it, but then it's like what would we do? Something you just start something else. I mean I'm not saying you should sell. That's  not what I'm like hinting at. Like there's there's strong arguments for doing this  forever or for selling because if you sell like another thing I truly believe is like we need to  work like humans need to be building.

We got to build something. Even if it's software like we  have to create with our hands or we will not be happy or fulfilled or content, right? So sell your  business, you're super rich, cool. You're still going to build something. You might as well keep  building this. Yep. You know. Yeah. Yeah. We've talked about it, right? There's always when you're  an entrepreneur, there's times when things suck.

Then there's times when things are great. Then  we're like when it's bad, we're like, "Oh gosh, wonder if we should just sell this." But then  next we're like up here is like I'd never sell. Yeah. Yeah. No, I know. Who knows? I We talk  about it. Would we? I don't know. Maybe. Depends on the number. Yeah. But right now, it's  doing pretty well. Yeah, man.

That's incredible. It's inspiring. So, you have all these businesses.  The biggest thing that I have an issue with right now is having enough time and like being around my  family. It's like I'm always gone. Yeah. I mean, it's like the You familiar with the analogy of  like the rocks and the pebbles and the sand? Not sure. So, it's like if you if you take a  jar, picture a glass jar, and then you've got like rocks, you got pebbles, you got sand, and  they all fit in the jar.

You have to put them in the right way. You got to put the rocks  in first, then the pebbles, then the sand, and then you kind of shake it and they'll all  kind of settle in. If you do it the opposite way, the sand in first, it won't it won't work. So,  like you just have to make non-negotiables. Like it's you should read the book Profit First. Have  you heard of that book?

You should you should read that book. It's really good. And it just basically  talks about like screw the mindset that like you, you know, I'll take home money after the  business get like no like pay yourself first. Pull out the profit first. And then everything  else has to fall into place, right? Wow. So that's kind of how I look at family. Like I just have  some non-negotiables.

And there are exceptions. Like I guess non-negotiable and exception,  those are contradictory, but like I don't work during dinner hours, like during the evening,  like I'm with my family. Like I will travel, but like it needs to be pretty necessary travel.  Um and then like Sundays I'm just with the family. Saturdays I'm mostly like working outside  with the family.

I'll get on the computer for a couple hours sometimes to do things here  or there, but like But could you do that? Like you've now established um your businesses and  you you've got your you know your income streams. I feel like I'm still working to get that. Yes, we  do tens of millions. So it's like I don't actually have a million in the bank like me personally  business does, right?

So, like I I I feel like if I'm not at my phone and somebody texts or they  have an issue with a drone or they want this, it's like yes, I have a team, but I also feel bad  that I I see it come in and I'm like, just wait on that guy. Yeah. I mean, I have my phone on do not  disturb 24/7. 24/7. Like, no one's going to die, you know? They're just not.

Like, will your  net worth be 3% different otherwise? Like, maybe. But like what difference does that make  in the grand scheme of things? Wow. You know, but I'll also say, let me say offset it is like there  are seasons for everything. I have not done this for the 18 years that I've been self-employed.  I've had busy seasons. I went to China myself, you know, 10 days in a row to source suppliers  for my iPhone parts business.

Like that, you know, I was away from my family, two young toddlers for  10 days. Like there are seasons for everything. But you just have to know, you have to put an  expiration date on it. Like this is my season and I'm going to have we're going to take a month  off and go travel as a family for that season, you know? That's good. That's how I look at  it.

I definitely haven't been doing that. My my business partner, like he does really good.  I feel like he does really good. Like I try to text him. He won't text back. Not that it's an  issue, but like he'll get to it tomorrow morning. It's like I wish I'd do that a little bit more.  Okay, you should try. Mhm. You should try it. It took me a long time.

I'm still like,  don't don't get me wrong, dude. Like, I'm on looking at Instagram. My kids are  around. Like, it's a work in progress, you know? I'm not trying to act like I'm perfect, but I've  gotten a lot better. And my phone is in do not disturb. Like, I just answer emails and texts  in batches. I have no unread emails or texts, or I have a bunch, but I like relentlessly  unsubscribe from everything.

any spam, any I just get all that out of my head and I'll  just I'll clear out all my texts in 30 minutes and all my emails in two hours and I'll do that  like a few times a week. Yeah, I got to figure out how to do that because I'm just always busy.  But I got to do what you're saying. I hear you. Yeah. Oftenimes in a business like you you get  to the point where it's like you can afford to outsource and delegate more.

All I'm saying  like business owners usually late to do that. they just look at their fin like, "Oh my gosh,  I could hire a producer that could do all that, you know, creative stuff for me." Of course, you  like it depends on how much quality you want to stay there because there's always a trade-off.  There are no solutions, only trade-offs. So, sure, you could free up your time, but  then the quality is probably going to drop.

Are you okay with that? Maybe yes, maybe no.  You know, that's just the trade-off. Yeah. Gosh, this has been good. I appreciate your time, Chris.  Yeah, dude. This was awesome. Where can people find you or your businesses if they want to learn  more? All on uh social platforms. So Instagram, Tik Tok, Facebook, YouTube. So HL drones. No, no.  The names that people can search are drone deer recovery.

That's the obviously the thermal side of  it. And then the other one is Newway A spelled NU W A Y A G. So new way and drone do recovery on  all social platforms. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. All right. What' you think? Please share it with  a friend and we'll see you next time on the Kerner