Jack Tuszynski from Family Life Publications, Gemma Beylouny from Rejoice Maids, and Ricardo Berris from Purpusly

Speaker1: [00:00:07] Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX Studios in Woodstock, Georgia. It’s time for Cherokee Business Radio. Now here’s your host.

Speaker2: [00:00:23] Welcome to Cherokee Business RadioX Stone Payton here with you this morning, and today’s episode is brought to you, in part by Alma Coffey, sustainably grown, veteran owned and direct trade, which of course means from seed to cup, there are no middlemen. Please go check them out at my alma coffee dot com and go visit their Roastery Cafe at 34 48. Holly Springs Parkway in Canton. As for Harry or the brains of the outfit Letitia? And please tell them that St. sent you. You guys are in for such a treat this morning. We’ve got a studio full first up on Cherokee Business Radio this morning. Please join me in welcoming to the broadcast with Family Life Magazine’s Mr. Jack Tuszynski. How are you, man? Good, sir.

Speaker3: [00:01:13] Good to see you this morning.

Speaker2: [00:01:14] Well, I have really been looking forward to this conversation. I see you most Thursday mornings over at Woodstock Business Club. You always have a glint in your eye, a smile on your face. Life must be good and you must really enjoy your work.

Speaker3: [00:01:31] Well, I do. I do. I love this community. I grew up in Cherokee County, and I married a Cherokee County girl June before last. And I’ve always loved the community and we just look forward to giving up, giving back to that, learning about people, learning their stories.

Speaker2: [00:01:44] Sounds like a Hallmark Channel then, I guess. So tell us mission purpose. What are you and your team really out there trying to do for folks now?

Speaker3: [00:01:55] We just want to produce a fun family magazine. We want to, like, give people an idea of what’s going on in their community so they can go out there with their families and embrace community relationships. You know, just build, build community out there. We want to, you know, help businesses grow because stronger families are, you know, come from stronger businesses and strong communities. So it’s just one step at a time for us pebbles to pathways, so to speak.

Speaker2: [00:02:23] I like it. So it’s magazines. We intentionally I made sure that I use the plural of that. So you have you have more than one speak to that for a moment, the market you cover?

Speaker3: [00:02:34] We do. We are right now. We do have a magazine. We have three back in April and we had to do some restructuring. So now we have the two magazines that we’re concentrating fully on Cherokee County with our Canton and Woodstock publications. Mm-hmm. Those are their 30000 in print each month. Oh my. Every issue.

Speaker2: [00:02:54] Slightly fewer than that listening right now. To be candid, I think over time regarding those in our world and when we do digital radio, a lot of it is consumed on demand, right? Not so much. So a few. Not quite that many live listeners right now. So that’s impressive. Throw that. Wow.

Speaker3: [00:03:14] Well, I’m not going to say they’re are reading it. The first day they get in the mailbox either hits a monthly, so it’s it’s around for a little while, you know, just like you go recording and it stays, but you’re reaching

Speaker2: [00:03:23] A lot of

Speaker3: [00:03:23] Folks who on here. Yes, sir. Yeah, it’s direct mail. Twenty eight thousand six hundred and eleven of those in Woodstock go straight to homes and businesses straight to the address leads.

Speaker2: [00:03:32] So very

Speaker3: [00:03:32] Nice. It’s a lot of fun to get it out there.

Speaker2: [00:03:34] I’ll bet it is. So what do you find the most the most rewarding about the work at this point?

Speaker3: [00:03:42] Really, it is about getting the message out there. We’re a good news magazine. We we partner with a lot of organizations within the community, and we’re able to spread their word and spread their mission. So it’s really just nice to sit back and help people succeed at whatever their mission is is basically what our mission is.

Speaker2: [00:04:04] So what is the structure of the magazine? You’ve got some, you have some stories you have. There’s an opportunity to to sponsor or advertise. You can run ads, right? Tell us about the structure of the magazine.

Speaker3: [00:04:16] We are advertiser supported. Okay. Obviously, thanks to the Postal Service, they keep us on our toes. So what are those so we saw the ads, the money we make from the advertising sales people that we partner with, we call them workers. That goes to produce this publication, which we distribute out to the community.

Speaker2: [00:04:38] Yeah, because it lands in my mail. I’ve been living here since April. Good, and I love everything about it. As any listener of this series knows. I mean, I am just this is utopia for me. I love being here. I love everything about it. But yeah, we’re getting. We get it in our in our box.

Speaker3: [00:04:52] Great. Yeah, good. And you read it?

Speaker2: [00:04:54] Hope. Yes, absolutely, I do.

Speaker3: [00:04:57] But yeah, the community, our community calendar that helps gather people in there. We’ve got a great staff. I’ve got Stephanie Bolton, our Tiffany Tiffany, who’s been with me for year since the start. We’re going to be nine years old this coming July. Oh, wow.

Speaker2: [00:05:12] And you brought that to get this thing figured out. Yeah, eventually. Eventually, just this thing might work.

Speaker3: [00:05:19] So Tiffany Corn and we got Julie Singer, Julie Clifford, singer. Ah, Julie Singer, Clifford. Sorry, she’s a newlywed as well. She’s our editor. She’s kind of the brains she makes, you know, makes my work, puts my words together, makes me come out, you know, like, I know what I’m doing. And and then my wife, Vicki is joining the team as well. She helps with the books and keeps me working.

Speaker2: [00:05:40] It’s you guys can’t seem. Those of you are listed on the radio and not seen the video version of this. But Jack is is smiling, almost almost smirking.

Speaker3: [00:05:51] He gets me on my toes.

Speaker2: [00:05:53] All right. So if I’m a business and I am and I would like to to advertise, I want to become one of your partners. What does that process look like? Is it a is it a consultation? Is it? Fill out a form and check this box and send a tag or somewhere in between?

Speaker3: [00:06:09] There is an order to that. Yes. Initially, I like to sit down and speak with people and find out what they who they want to reach. I like to find out about them what they do. And if I’m if I’m a good fit for them, I have. I’ve told people on occasion that, you know, this is not your advertising medium and you probably want to look somewhere else, you know? Well, you know, I don’t want to sell, you know? I’m trying to think of a I’m typically pretty good with these, but I’m on the radio as I’m on the spot and I can’t figure it out.

Speaker2: [00:06:38] But if it’s not a good fit, you’re not. You’re not going to jump. And I’m sure people have come over time to really trust that level of integrity.

Speaker3: [00:06:45] There’s no good deal for bad advertising.

Speaker2: [00:06:48] I mean, somebody write that down. That’s going to be like this. That’s at the top of the notes for this session.

Speaker3: [00:06:54] There’s just not a good deal for bad advertising. I think everybody should advertise in one way or another, but it needs to fit you and your medium. You know, here’s what I’ve seen written down. This is not an original, but having a business without advertising is like blinking in the dark. You know you’re doing it with nobody else does. So we just want to be a good fit for our clients, and then we will have the consultation. We’ll find out, you know, do they want something quirky and fun? Do they want something kind of stoic and straight on clean lines and that kind of thing? I’m more of the quirky and fun kind of person. That’s why I never

Speaker2: [00:07:28] Would have guessed, would you guys? Right?

Speaker3: [00:07:33] That’s why I kind of like, you know, we have some bright colors. You know, we have a good color scheme. My art department gets that feeling across, well, right? So, you know, I’ve told them in the past, if it’s square curve it, because that’s because we kind of want to we want to meet everyone’s needs. But then again, we want to get the right message across for the advertisers, too. So, you know, we had some people say, Oh, I smile too big on that and I like, Well, you’re a dentist, you probably should smile on that. Yeah, really, you know, so we try to keep it obvious as to how we can best help them. Once those ads are designed, we get advertiser approval on that. Our team lays it out, you know, in the magazines, we we don’t just kind of throw everything together. We start early in the month. Right now we are already in October. We’re planning the act. Actually, we’ve been in October for a week now. Aha. So my calendar is kind of crazy. Doesn’t mean I get my Christmas shopping done early. It means my calendar is kind of crazy. So once our team gets all that laid out, we typically go to print about a week and a half before where we’re mailed out because it does take a while to print 60000 magazines.

Speaker2: [00:08:38] I’ll bet it does so. So what are without the benefit of your counsel in this in this consultation kind of phase? What are some of the mistakes or pre misconceptions that that a layperson like me in that field might have? What are there some things that we should just try to avoid and some traps that somebody like like me that doesn’t know that much about that advertising is mistakes.

Speaker3: [00:09:07] Well, some of the big mistakes people make when they’re starting a business is not having an advertising budget that needs to be online about their line item. And everyone’s marketing plan is it’s a cohesive advertising campaign planned out. And depending on what you want to do with your business or your service or your organization, you need to have that. You need a plan, the plan. Follow the plan, you plan the work, follow the work right. And because you can. There are some businesses that will benefit from, you know, just a big cover blast. Bam, you know, it’s a cover ad. You know, big spread. There are other businesses that need more of a drip campaign. It could be quarter page ads for a year or a half page ads for a year. If you’re in the service industry, you may consider a column package which would allow you to write for the publication as well, basically as like sponsored columns.

Speaker2: [00:09:58] Now see that I can get my arms wrapped around because I’ve seen through the benefit of this work the credibility that comes along with, like hosting a show. I bet it’s very similar. If you’re right, if you’re writing an article of it, that’s a real credibility builder because people get to see you really do know what you’re talking about, at least in this one little area, right?

Speaker3: [00:10:17] And they get to read it and write, and there is power in print.

Speaker2: [00:10:20] Yeah. Oh yeah, so. Absolutely. Ok, I got a note. Let’s back up a little bit. Tell us a little bit about the back story, man. How in the world did you? Did you land here?

Speaker3: [00:10:31] Well, I did grow up in Cherokee County my first few years. My my dad is to take me to school over in Dunwoody. And he dropped me off on his way into work for for, you know, my grandfather’s company. My grandmother would pick me up and take me back to their place, and I would sit around and read magazines because, you know, back then, there were three channels on TV. Not much going on. That’s right. And so I basically spent my afternoons waiting on my dad to get off work reading time life in National Geographic magazines. Oh, my grandparents traveled a lot, so they took me around a lot of different places, you know, cross-country trips on trains, you know, ski trips, you know, trips to out West Colorado and that type of thing. And I just always kind of fell in love with photography and the and the imagery around that. 14. I got a camera. I got on the yearbook. Staff got hired off of the yearbook staff by the yearbook company and was able to build a portfolio. Basically, here’s a couple dozen rolls of film. Go shoot it. I guess that would be the 80s equivalent of digital. And from there, I went to work for the Tribune. Turkey Tribune worked there for seven years, kind of doing community magazine photography, did a stint with television while we’re doing my own photography business. Photo Jack Dot net on the side and

Speaker2: [00:11:53] Got your brand or two you had. Photo Jack. I like it. Or did the way I figure that one out now.

Speaker3: [00:11:59] Photo Jack’s been around the tree wife. Ok? Yeah, that’s that’s 92 93. When photo Jack came came about. I’ll tell you that story later. But and then after the television stand and everything and building photography sign and doing the community magazines, it kind of got with digital kind of get in the slump on the photography end of things because as you know, and digital really kicked off in 2010, everybody was doing it and then everybody else phone in their pocket with a camera on it. Right? Yeah. So that kind of phased out and then really just some alone time with my dog on the couch trying to get my life together through it up to God and on a prayer said, You know, show me something I need, show me something. And a few weeks after that, one thing or a few months after that, one thing led to another and I was able to hire an unemployed magazine staff and we went to work and we started publishing what’s going to be the largest distributed magazines in Cherokee County.

Speaker2: [00:13:01] Now the process you just described, you really don’t take that lightly. You really are kind of fired up about your faith, faith. Your faith is a big part of your your life and I and I’m operating under the impression that it has a real impact on your business and the way you conduct your your business. Is that accurate? And if so, do you mind speaking to that? Absolutely.

Speaker3: [00:13:21] Yeah. Life’s not always been a bed of roses. I went to, you know, even though I went to school in Dunwoody, I grew up in a trailer on a farm and afternoon I rode in hickory flat. We didn’t. We didn’t have it easy. We grow vegetables and, you know, we we plucked our chickens and, you know, the whole nine yards. Right? You know, I had Ted Turner. Son was in my first and second grade class. And here, you know, I am going home to, you know, picking beans and cotton, okra. So but I did I didn’t enjoy, you know, growing up with a with a simple, simple country boy lifestyle, you know, has some challenges, you know, in my dumber years, which I think most of us may have run into some issues in our 20s and possibly 30s. And it was it was fate that, you know, kind of turned me around and kind of showed me the light, so to speak. And, you know, kind of get my life back together and on the right track.

Speaker2: [00:14:16] So I suspect your world, your business, the the business landscape for you has changed as much for you as they have for for anyone with the advent of all of these digital platforms and digital tools. Is that the case? And it’s so a little insight into how you’ve chosen to to adapt to it?

Speaker3: [00:14:38] Well, we started not the magazines. I mean, we were kind of the weirdos in 2013 and 2014, dropping dropping QR codes on our ads and then our in our publications and linking videos and things like that. It didn’t stick, you know, with what’s happened in the past two years. People are now, you know, looking back at keywords for a source of information because all you know, you have your restaurants at the menus and things like that, all the

Speaker2: [00:15:04] Hands sort of see me try to drink fish when it was at see me going into a bar more likely or a bar restaurant. And I have to ask for the menu like, please, I won’t hold you responsible. Just wipe off a menu and bring it to me.

Speaker3: [00:15:18] Yeah, my wife had to show me how to read a QR on my phone. I couldn’t. I didn’t know how to do it. So, yeah, so unfortunately, that’s kind of come back into it now. We do have digital subscribers of the publication. Oh, really? Yeah, OK. A little over 6000 we send out each month. Wow. And our digital magazines are linked. The The Advertiser Partner Ads display ads are linked directly to. So if you tap on their ad on our digital page, it takes you to their web site. Nice. So we’ve always wanted to incorporate it. We’re doing that more. So now we’ve got some software in line that does are, you know, services or subscriptions out for us because easy when you got a couple of dozen and you can just drop them out there, you know, we’ve put some things in play that kind of help everything work for everybody.

Speaker2: [00:16:06] So you’ve really embraced the the good of it and tried to incorporate it into your world and you’ve kind of taken a both end approach as opposed to either or

Speaker3: [00:16:16] If you can’t beat them, join them. So, so yeah, we’ve always gone hand in hand with that. We like that cohesive aspect of digital and print because it works. You know, we’ve had it. Several our customers have dropped out trying to do digital and then this work. If people are looking for it right and they’re seeing it, they don’t have to look for it, they turn a page, there’s the ad.. So that’s how we’re engaging people, you know, through just the mental aspect and the psychology of print and reading something that’s not not a, you know, fleeting, fleeting pixels on a screen. And there’s no timer within a within a magazine and saying, Oh no, you’ve been looking at the magazine for four hours like you get, you know, there’s screen time on your phone. It tells you how bad you’ve been, right? So just going that route, too.

Speaker2: [00:17:08] But there’s something to be said to. I think for an integrated approach, there doesn’t have to be one specific answer. And if you can blend the two and bring all of that to your clients, now, you’re in a position to give to provide genuine return on investment as opposed to

Speaker3: [00:17:24] Right because you want to hit everyone. I mean, some people, you know, younger folks, your 2020 35 40 crowd, they may lean more toward the, you know, the convenience of digital because they’re out there. They’re they’re still at their work in it, and they need something that they can, you know, I’m not going to say, sit at a traffic light and read, but the first thing like go over convenience, you know, when they’re, you know, at the doctor’s office waiting, they have their phone there. But they also have the opportunity to take a take a rest from that screen and look at something in print. Yeah. So it’s definitely something that can work together, and that’s what we try to do.

Speaker2: [00:17:56] Well, clearly not my arena, but my instincts are for Business RadioX, for Cherokee Business RadioX think I want, I want both. I like the idea of easy access and there’s a there’s a crowd that might access the digital version of what I might do with you, but I really like the idea of that red x popping on the page right and a picture of people in my studio enjoying themselves. I mean, I think that could work really well together,

Speaker3: [00:18:21] Well inside the magazine and stole my number and email. If you would like to reach out and get a media guide and I’ve got some contracts already printed out, we can talk after the show.

Speaker2: [00:18:30] Very nice. Actually, it is that time I could have this conversation forever because I one of the things that I enjoy about this work is we so often have bright, passionate, well-informed folks who have a great deal of domain specific expertize. And so to have a conversation with someone like you that really understands how to leverage print to produce. I mean, I could have this conversation all day long. However, we do have two other guests and I’m interested in visiting with them before we wrap. Please do share with us whatever you think is appropriate in terms of points of contact, email address, website, LinkedIn, whatever works.

Speaker3: [00:19:07] Ok, well, we’re family life publications is the company name. Our website is family life publications. Dot com. I’m Jack and my email is Jack at FamilyLife Publications dot com. You can reach out to me there, or you can give us a call on the phone. Seven seven zero two one three seven zero nine five if I’m not there. You know Vicki or someone will be the answer the phone. If not, please leave a message and I’ll get back to you.

Speaker2: [00:19:31] I believe it. Well, thanks so much for coming in and visiting with us now.

Speaker3: [00:19:34] Yes, sir. Stone, thanks for the invite. Appreciate it, sir.

Speaker2: [00:19:37] Can you hang out with us while we were there other guests?

Speaker3: [00:19:39] I’d love to want to find out about them, too.

Speaker2: [00:19:41] All right. Next up on Cherokee Business Radio, we have with us with rejoice made’s, miss general ballooning. How are you?

Speaker4: [00:19:51] I am absolutely

Speaker2: [00:19:53] Perfect. So did you learn anything in that last segment?

Speaker4: [00:19:56] Yes, I love what he said. Always advertise when you’re new in business. That is what I learned from the very beginning. Always advertise. And I do.

Speaker2: [00:20:09] So your business? Rejoice, maids, I could make a couple of guesses and maybe get close, but let’s don’t take the gamble. Tell us what you do and why.

Speaker4: [00:20:18] Well, I can say I clean houses, but not anymore. I have employees that do clean houses. We are here in Joki County. This is our home. Started here over 10 years ago. And what we do is to help not just homeowners, you know, with their single senior citizen, senior living people that needs a lot of help in their homes. We take care of a lot of home is that the homeowners have children like that. So pretty much helping anyone needs housecleaning.

Speaker2: [00:20:57] So why the house cleaning business? You strike me as someone who may be evaluated several opportunities and then chose this in lieu of something else. What drove you to this business?

Speaker4: [00:21:09] Well, it started us just for, let’s say, a side hustle so I can go to school. I was going to cancel, but then I saw the opportunity. I tried different other avenues. But this this is the road that is much more something that I can relate. I’m a woman, not just I’m not going to say, just being a woman. But it’s closer to me because I think know my family and I see there’s a needs in this community. So I chose this part and I love it. I still love it. I’m very excited. Each time my team would go to a home that, hey, the home order will send us a feedback and say, thank you so much. We we really, really love going home to a clean house. We love that we have somebody that when we wake up in the morning, we know they’re coming. Let’s get up because our home is going to smell good today. I love that.

Speaker2: [00:22:06] So when you first started, the business did some things surprise. You did some things that just hit you that you never expected?

Speaker4: [00:22:16] Yeah, there’s a lot of surprises. Actually, there’s plenty of surprises in this business. I came from the Philippines and not really in the background where where we have a maid or over there, when you are rich, you have maids. You know, in in-house maids that don’t go home, they take care of you 24 hours, some days all night. Yeah. Even for average middle class over here, middle class, or even while all people, they don’t have maids unless you have jet vessel, I guess, right? You have your own or Bill Gates, but no, here you must be limited, even if you’re a rich person. I guess unless you have unlimited amount of money, then you have an in-home

Speaker2: [00:23:00] Housekeeper, right?

Speaker4: [00:23:01] So here there’s an opportunity because, you know, and also in America, I point out that People Lab’s privacy

Speaker2: [00:23:11] Are

Speaker4: [00:23:11] Privacy. So two hours, four hours max is that’s what they want you to hang around their home schooling their home. Yeah, most of the people that want you out. Oh, it’s interesting. I love their privacy. So yeah, that’s one of the things that I learn. And it’s really, really I like. It’s really interesting.

Speaker2: [00:23:29] So now that you’ve grown the business to the point that you have, yeah, I’m operating under the impression that a big part of your job is to generate really continued good results. But but with and through other people. Right? So the the the recruiting, the training, the ongoing development, can you talk to that a little bit? What how how is that done?

Speaker4: [00:23:53] It’s like a roller coaster ride. Like any other business right now, we are experiencing not end having not enough employees. Mm-hmm. We’re in that stage, but because we’ve been around a long time. We actually have loyalists. I call them loyalists, my my teams that I’ve been around me since way back 10 years ago. They’re still with me. These are the one that you will see all the time, you know, familiar faces. We have a lot of homes that we serve where the senior people, seniors are living, and they want familiar people, familiar faces, familiarity. So we have those. And but since we are growing, I tell you what the fun. Then it really brought us dollar like 40 percent business and then boom, it went up skyrocketing. And we need like 10 20 people like 10 and days ago. We just can’t find them.

Speaker2: [00:24:46] I think I struck a chord here, guys. So you’ve got the business. You need the people.

Speaker4: [00:24:52] You know why? Because like Jack said, Advertise, advertise, it’s a power of marketing power, privatizing you. I always emphasized I’m a small, tiny business, but I always believe in, you know, marketing advertising.

Speaker2: [00:25:07] So you learned early on that’s just a discipline. You got to put that in there, just like the light bill. Absolute, that’s not a that’s not one of those things that you do one day when you have enough leftover money.

Speaker4: [00:25:17] I never pinch pennies when it comes to advertising. Nope, I’m always there. Top of mind. And I just I also, you know what? Also, I learned now over 10 years in business, I get excited when I do creative things for my business with digital social media now. Heck, I make my own videos. I’m having fun.

Speaker2: [00:25:42] Well, I can tell. And you make it fun for everyone, for everyone around you. So what are the if you don’t mind if we’re not trying too closely? What are the near-term plans in next 12 to 18 months? Are you looking to continue to scale to grow if you can, if you can fill those posts, if you can fill those positions?

Speaker4: [00:26:02] Yes. Yes, of course. Yes, absolutely. We would like to have our franchise at our office up north where you know they need us. There’s a need. There’s a lot of OK today I want to be a housecleaner. I’ll pick up a back here and I’ll pick up a rag. I’m a house cleaner now. There’s a lot of those youth beach. You’ll pay less money, you pay, you know, but but then you realize when something break in your home, they disappear. They are the dog got. Huh. They’re gone. You know, or want they get hurt, they or you’re in trouble because you have to pay for the hospitalization liability liability. Oh my gosh, if you’re hiring a professional like us, right, you’re covered.

Speaker2: [00:26:47] So. So you mentioned the word franchise, which makes me think of how important it is or or must be in a lot of businesses. And I think theirs is one of them to kind of bottle what you do to to have consistent processes, repeatable processes and transferable tools and so that it’s so it can be passed through the organization. Is that

Speaker4: [00:27:14] Literally? Yes, yes. We are building our system in the very beginning of the business. I, well, you don’t know anything right when you’re just starting and then you learn. You learn. I’m still learning. My thing that I learned is build your business as if you’re going to sell it tomorrow.

Speaker2: [00:27:32] Somebody write that down.

Speaker4: [00:27:35] You know, cause you never know. That’s great advice. I have a friend in the business. She her her business went all to two, two and a half million dollars and she died at 56. But she just bumped the dead, right? Guess what? Her business, the two and a half million dollar business, went under the drain out. So always, like I always tell my husband, my poor husband said, You know, I can die tomorrow. Better. Make sure we’ve got to get something before you announce to the public at Jebba billion is dead. Sell the business.

Speaker2: [00:28:06] There’s another pro tip. That’s right. First, it’s

Speaker4: [00:28:10] Funny. I build a business. I have a system. Do it, sell it.

Speaker2: [00:28:15] Oh my, gracious. So you are so enthusiastic and it is contagious. I mean, you just you bring a level of energy to the room. That’s that’s incredible. Where do if and when your batteries run low? Where do you find your inspiration? How do you recharge?

Speaker4: [00:28:36] I have a day where I would just sit all day and watch Eddie show all day, all day. My husband knows what I mean that would. I would just sit there all day. But then the next day I have this. I call myself, me, myself and I. I will say, Get your USB started to get it off. So I have this three person in my head, what? I don’t need somebody to come to me and talk to me because I have that already. And just just by having that, I’m blessed. I thank God every day that I always have this energy, that I always have this fighting mode in my gut. That’s different when you have that in your gut. You don’t need anyone. I mean, you need coach, of course, to help you sometimes, right? But then once you have that in your gut, it doesn’t matter how old you are. I’m 49 and I’m still excited. I have more to offer. I’m just learning. I’m just I’m just starting to grow.

Speaker2: [00:29:36] It’s cool. You are excited and you’re in your exciting. So before we wrap, let’s get a little real time consulting here for the benefit of everyone here in the room and for our listeners, some inputs and insight from you. If we’re looking at engaging a cleaning service, I think many people may be like me. I don’t even know what questions to ask if they show up, and they got a cool looking decals on the side of their car. I’m thinking, OK, I’m sure they could do it. There probably are some things to look for. Some questions to ask, some things to make sure are in place when you’re thinking about engaging a top notch cleaning service.

Speaker4: [00:30:13] Yes, sure. Yes, of course. First, you got to know their experience longevity in the community because like I said, anyone can pick up a vacuum, can pick up a broom and say, I’m a professional house cleaners. Second, you got to know that they’re there. Ok, everybody can say I have a liability insurance license that cost you 20 bucks. Do you have worker’s comp? Most of the most of the people out there, I’m not I’m not being mean or bad to anyone. That is something that’s going to wash your money. So if you ask them that, that is something they don’t provide because most advertising was a license and wondered which cost you 20 bucks? Well, that’s the big difference. When you are a professional housecleaner, you make sure your employees are covered. So when you go to everyone’s homes in your community, if anything happened to them inside your home, the homeowners cover.

Speaker2: [00:31:09] Wow, I’m glad I asked. Well, kind of. You’re scaring the hell out of me, OK? Between cleanings, because sometimes it might be every week, but sometimes it might be every couple of weeks or whatever. Are there some do’s and don’ts for the homeowner? Like between just some things that that we should do or not do in between cleans them, I help keep everything on track.

Speaker4: [00:31:35] Yeah. Like for if you’re a homeowner that that like to keep up with your house at least every other week. If even if, like the professional house cleaners like us goes through your house every other week, at least in between, you know, pick up things in your floor so that you don’t trip, you don’t get into an accident. You know, like like we sometimes our kids or my husband take all these socks and just leave it everywhere. Pick it up you to avoid accident or if their scrum and you have a little kids and eating it enough so you don’t have ants running around your house. Like if you’re if you’re trying to like, make sure that your home is maintained, you know, then have a regular cleanup professional cleaner that will help you so you can do your other things. It’s it’s it costs you money. But if you count how many times you go to Starbucks, multiply that as opposed to having someone come in and clean your home for you. It’s a big difference.

Speaker2: [00:32:36] Well, I know I’ve become a believer in wind possible. Stay in your lane. But my time is best spent recruiting people to run studios or hanging out with guys like you and having conversations like this on the air, then it would be spent. Now it does make all the sense in the world. To me, though, if if you, if you and if your team is coming tomorrow, let’s my wife, Holly and I, let’s get the dirty clothes off the floor because we don’t want your team doing stuff I can do. I even I can do that. And then they can spend the time staying in their lane

Speaker4: [00:33:09] As they’re doing. Absolutely. The thing is, a lot of people don’t realize that if you make us pick up things for you, then it will give you less time cleaning your home. So like I said in between in between before before the cleaning arrives, at least pick up things, especially if there’s something that’s going to embarrass you.

Speaker2: [00:33:31] Oh my gracious. Hmm. All right. If our listeners and I’m sure they do after listening to this, we’d like to reach out and have a conversation with you or someone on your team. What’s the best way for them to do that?

Speaker4: [00:33:45] While you can email us service at Rejoice Made’s or you can call us six seven eight nine zero five three four seven six. Tammy Mills Our Angelika will be happy to chat with you for any questions about cleaning. I’m Gemma, the house cleaning expert with Rejoice Maids.

Speaker2: [00:34:04] I feel like she’s answered that question before. Very nicely done. What a breath of fresh air to have you on the show. Thank you so much for joining us. You got to come back sometime. I didn’t even ask and when we will cover in another segment, any designs, or maybe you already do some commercial work as well, commercial cleaning work as well?

Speaker4: [00:34:25] Yes, we do. We do church, a lot of churches and people.

Speaker2: [00:34:31] Well, we talked about Jack’s faith. You know, there’s your inroad right there, God jack those people of faith. So you did commercial in the churches and that kind of thing. So don’t be a stranger. Come back in and keep us updated. Ok, maybe we’ll have like a reunion show, just the three of us. We’re having a good enough time, right? Ok, so this next gentleman, one of the things that a professional host would do before you ever go on airs, make sure that he properly pronounces everyone’s last name. I know just enough to know I’m probably would butcher this last name. I would. It’s easy enough on paper, but I would probably say it wrong, so I’ll let him do that part. But please join me in welcoming to the show with the purposely and a lot of other stuff and a lot of other irons in the fire too. And maybe we’ll learn about that. Please welcome Ricardo to the broadcast. How are you doing, man?

Speaker5: [00:35:20] It’s good to be here. Thank you. How are you?

Speaker2: [00:35:22] I’m doing well. I’m going to give you a chance to practice pronouncing your last name. Okay.

Speaker5: [00:35:27] Well, so it’s funny because some people say Barry’s right, because that’s the obvious thing to say. But but my last name actually has I. And I am so you say very

Speaker2: [00:35:39] How

Speaker5: [00:35:40] Because the eye changes how you pronounce it. And I have a Spanish background, so you usually roll the R’s, they say. Omar, nobody. So that’s usually the again.

Speaker2: [00:35:52] Welcome to the show, Ricardo. Very sorry. That’s my best shot at that. It’s good. Thank you. Ok, so purposely. Yeah, mission purpose. Walk us through that man.

Speaker5: [00:36:04] Well, thank you. Well, so purposely. Was born at about three a.m. on the morning of this, probably September 20 and 19 somewhere there. Oh, because we had a problem. So I’m a serial entrepreneur and so always after business opportunities and after a way to make a difference. And after ways to transform people’s lives. I believe I am an agent of transformation. And so when I was 20 years old, I started my first business and I had a problem. And the problem was, you know, I was labeled as a math god and did very well at math, and people even paid me to do math for them when I was in high school. But my brother had a very opposite problem, and that was what he hated the subject. And so that was for me a challenge. And, you know, everyone looked to me and say, Well, what can we do about it? And I said, Well, you know, it’s funny enough because he’s not the only one with the problem or hundreds of other boys and kids that suffer from just just struggle with mathematics. And so I said, Well, I’m going to do something. So I went to the first floor of a building that I was interning next door to. And you know, I remember the landlord said, Well, little kid, do you know what you’re actually doing because this is real? Like, I just need my lease every month.

Speaker5: [00:37:25] I said, Well, yeah, I’ll figure that part out. These people just need some help. Is it a place to help them? And so that was my entryway into the business of transformation that my brother is married now. He’s got his own business, and he was able to. We were able to help him lower that barrier challenges. He’s got an unknown hundreds of other kids who’s now whether it’s professional chef or they have their own business, whatever the case might be. And so that that’s really how I started my entrepreneurial career. And fast forward into around 2017, I’ve been traveling around the world and meeting a lot of different businesses, and people just know my background just knows that because I’m in software development and I also do digital marketing, I’m in business. And so people have always sort of asked me questions specific to those kinds of space. And one of the things I wanted to do as I was traveling, I remember, particularly in South America, people would ask, You know, how can you help me? I’ve got a physical product. How can you help me to broadcast it to the world? And so I wanted to do something about that.

Speaker5: [00:38:27] So I created this platform for products that were made in the Americas. I call it pulled out at the time. So just dedicated for products that were made in the Americas because a big part of the conversation I’d have with entrepreneurs is that, well, you know, these products that are coming from other parts of the world, they come to the Americas, and they’re either not, as you know, it’s not enough quality on them or whatever the case is. And there is a huge challenge that these small business faces. So I started to and we’re kind of working through building just sort of a cultural platform on the web that would appreciate, you know, products that came from different parts of the region. And so just went through testing it and realizing that people cared more about what impact and the purpose behind it product than they were where it came from. And so even if a product came from China or it came from Brazil, they cared more about, you know, what does this product do for a local family or what does this product do for the environment in which it came from? Is how is it giving back? And we see that we see those statistics sort of started climbing, you know, about 10 or so years ago, people were just very interested in ensuring that they’re spending their dollar towards something that’s impactful.

Speaker5: [00:39:51] And so I decided to stop the platform and started looking at how can we incorporate this because this is really meaningful. It was something that we wanted to do, but it wasn’t a priority. And so I got up at three a.m. the morning. It was thinking and purposely it was the thing that came to my mind, so purposely. So I went on. The internet was looking for purposely. As always, the first thing you do got an idea. You go, look for it. And so I couldn’t find it, and I said, Well, OK, there’s the shot. And so I incorrectly spell. I spelt purposely, incorrectly on purpose and so purposely as pupu SL. Why? And so I was able to take that was all that was the name that was. Available like no one else in the world, use that name, right? But, you know, purpose purposely like, you know, everyone spells it the common way the dictionary has its. And so hopefully we’ll probably get purposely in dictionaries sometime in the future. But that’s how that’s how it really got started.

Speaker2: [00:40:53] All right. So walk us through this kind of if I or my cousin or someone has a product or service that has the kind of impact that that is consistent with what you’re describing. Walk us through the process. Do we petitioned to be part of your platform? Yeah. Walk us through that.

Speaker5: [00:41:11] So, OK. So it’s purposely, so purposely is a multi-channel commerce platform. That’s the big word. And so it is a community which we normally sort of label as omni channel. So there are parts of it online there, parts of it offline. And so but it is dedicated for purpose to purpose driven products. So you may have heard the term, you know, digital nomads, digitally borne products, meaning products that are born in digital era, they only know digital and it’s kind of like that for purpose driven products. They’re intertwined in the mission, in their vision. These creators want to make an impact from day one. They want to make a difference in their environment, in the society and in the economy. So we talking about things, for example, like clean energy, like climate change. We’re talking about things like ocean energy or ocean protection, wildlife protection, woman empowerment, poverty. And there are a list of, you know, not worthy causes, as would go would call them that we all as a world where we’re heading towards healing. I love this. This documentary by David David Automat. I think his name is, am I not mistaken? But he does this call our planet? It’s a very popular Netflix. I spend a lot of my time watching that.

Speaker5: [00:42:38] I love the guy who’s got a beautiful, you know, way of just talking about the world, and he realized that our world, if we don’t change the way we live, if we don’t begin to ask ourselves and do that, introspection on a daily basis will be destroyed in the future. So we have to do something about it or environment is is getting destroyed and, you know, or society, cetera so purposely really wants to work with any brand that this is this a physical product now that you’re making a physical part as a creator, but you have inside your vision, your mission, want to make a difference, want to make an impact. So it’s not. It’s impact, it’s purpose over profit. And so we basically for invitation, you come into our community, we help you to showcase your products. We help you to get exposure for your product through or distribution channels, which is we’ve got a we’ve got an online marketplace ourselves, and the online marketplace essentially just displays you as a creator, showcase your work. Tell your story. We actually call it telling your story and showing your story doing because there is no such thing as story doing, which is the next level up of storytelling.

Speaker2: [00:43:56] Do you see the pearls that we pick up in this show? Exactly. There’s at least two, right? Sell your business before you said before you tell anybody that your spouse died and never do story. I love his story.

Speaker5: [00:44:10] A story doing an ad on purpose. We we’re hoping to capture stories of the creators because this is your idea. This is your your purpose. This is what you want to do to change the world. And we all have to chipping at some point to do that. And so we we will help to showcase those products for you, showcase you and your business on our platform. We also have a VIP box VIP boxes, essentially for the little tribe that comes from what we call a conscious consumption space. So as a conscious consumer who would be interested in that kind of product, that is purpose driven. The idea is that there is a small tribe of people who would be interested in discovering what is out there in the world. And so we do the traveling, we do the scouting, we go to Brazil, we go to Asia, we go all over the world and we’ll bring these to you in a box every month and introduce you to purpose, introduce you to people who are making a difference, a real difference in their own world. And so whether that’s locally or internationally, we believe that we have the ability to make an impact globally.

Speaker5: [00:45:22] And so that’s our focus. And the final channel that we use is the this is sort of the offline space, which is the pop up was, we call it, a pop up shop network. And pre-COVID we did test this and we realized that this actually does work. Because we go into communities. We invite folks to come on down physically, connect with the brands, physically meet the creators if they’re there, hear their stories, see their story in motion and engage and that spurs, you know, we have their samples, they’re sampling, you have the ability to purchase products. And there’s something about making a purchase with a difference in mind is something about spending your dollar and knowing that this is actually going to provide at least one lunch for the daughter of a farmer who works on a coffee farm, who has to then work on these coffee beans to then process it. Fair trade, cetera. Fair wage. Get it to your table. You enjoy the best part.

Speaker2: [00:46:26] You enjoy the best part, right?

Speaker5: [00:46:28] Which is, do you want a coffee? Let’s go brew a coffee in the morning. But as you’re spending your money here, you realizing we want you to, we want you to remember and reminisce on the fact that what you do with spending on that coffee. It impacts whether it’s five bucks lunches for a little girl somewhere out there who goes to school every day doesn’t miss a day because she misses a day, it becomes a challenge for her. And so that’s kind of the impact that we want to we want to create, but purposely is a big beast. And so the idea, you know, is to do that pop up shop. So we introduce real time in real time in physical, in-person, and we can’t do much of it now, but we still have it as part of our plan to introduce these products to you and allow you to meet these folks. And so we have something, though, for nonprofits, because nonprofits, we consider them as champions and they on a daily basis advocate for a lot of the things that we’re talking about now. You know, they want change and they want to make a difference in business.

Speaker2: [00:47:32] The Cherokee Business RadioX was a nonprofit in February. Oh, awesome. No, no. We didn’t make a profit in February. I don’t think that’s what you meant. Well, well,

Speaker5: [00:47:43] Yeah, you know,

Speaker2: [00:47:44] That’s not what you’re talking about, what I’m talking about,

Speaker5: [00:47:47] But I suppose it’s not for

Speaker2: [00:47:49] Profit,

Speaker5: [00:47:50] So you cannot make a profit on a given month, but that doesn’t make you a nonprofit. But it’s a not for profit charity organization, I suppose. And one of the things that you’ll see in the next couple of decades is that every company is going to now want to integrate this philanthropic component in their business model, and we see what some of the bigger guys are doing that they’re on purpose dedicating all of their wealth or more than half of it, you know, to give it away to charity. And it’s like, Oh, well, you spent all this time making all this money and then you’re going to give it back. And it’s not a bad idea, either. But the little guys like us, we can do the same thing and we can practice those sort of those sort of things. And so for nonprofits, we have what we call a causal and the causal showcases who you are as a nonprofit. What you have been working on and how we can sort of visualize your story as a nonprofit, the impact that you’ve been making.

Speaker2: [00:48:47] Oh, I love it.

Speaker5: [00:48:47] So if you’re in Cherokee County and you’re helping women, empowering women, you know, we will visualize that to just show because people love to see numbers in motion, you know, people love to see data and we’re using data to be able to sort of help to visualize that. So that’s really sort of what purposely is. I mean, there’s a lot of moving parts to purposely and we’re slow start. We’re just 20 months old, but what we’re building is amazing and I love it.

Speaker2: [00:49:16] Well, it’s certainly an inspiring story and clearly noble work I will share with you from my perspective, one tremendous value in the infrastructure that you continue to create. My wife and I really appreciate and from time to time will take great pride in buying that fair trade, coffee or anything along those lines. And it’s kind of like, I treat it a lot like my gym life, right? Like, I’ll go work out for a couple of weeks diligently and then I don’t for a couple of months. But with this, this instead of like swinging in and swinging out of that world, I think with infrastructure like this, it may help more people like me and Holly not just become engaged, but stay engaged. Are you seeing some of that happen?

Speaker5: [00:50:09] No, absolutely. I mean, you know, there are millions and millions of products that you can find today online. I mean, this is the world’s not short of products or ideas. It happens every single day, but there are very few weather platforms or online communities that fosters impact and purpose. I mean, this is this is our DNA. Like we, we gave birth to a purpose driven so infrastructure and environment. That we want to be able to build a community, so naturally, I believe that we’re all going to live our lives every day, naturally seeking for that impact, like what can I do to make a difference? I mean. And you know, the information is so widespread that everybody knows now that, you know, flood in Germany happened for the first time in this year, killing a couple, a couple of scores of people, I think fire burning 300000 acres in the West. Like, we share these stories, right? We just saw what happened with Hurricane Ida, this people coming on the air saying, I’ve been here for 20 years and it never happened and never seen this. So there’s so many extreme stuff that we’re seeing happening. And you ask, you know, why is this happening? You know, the truth is that it is a it’s the effect of things that we’ve done as a cause and effect kind of situation. So we’re seeing now where people are asking themselves internally, what can we do? What can I do to make a difference? And we’re saying, well, what you eat, what you consume, what you wear, let’s start asking about the impact that they’re making because I think that’s where it actually starts. And we can we can make this space a better place for you and for me by starting with me. You know,

Speaker2: [00:51:53] I wonder, would you ever get to the point where maybe my product could be purposely certified or something, you know, like, like get the stamp? Oh, absolutely. Hit the purple piece. Stand for what? I don’t know. Absolutely.

Speaker5: [00:52:05] I think it’s a beautiful idea where we’re basically, again, we’re building a community, so we want to be able to recognize those people, right? I mean, we think it should be a way of life and we think it would be a way of life. Right. And you see, what happens today is that there are over six to seven percent of consumers already asking their place. You know, like what? What was this going to do for my environment?

Speaker2: [00:52:29] So that’s my kid and her boyfriend. They are 24 seven. That’s that’s how they are. And Holly and I are that way when we hang out with them, right? And then we we drop off. But no, there is that tribe, Matt and Kelly. That’s them. I guarantee you. Yeah.

Speaker5: [00:52:44] And that’s a life. And you know, you can expect in the next 15, 20 years, this is just going to be a normal way of life. It’s just what we are going to do. And so this is is something that we want to make it easy for people who are caught because we call these guys conscious consumers. They’re consciously thinking about these different things and these different components, these impact. And we realize that it’s not all about, you know, just making money or spending money. It’s about like, what good can it do if I let it go, you know, because they always say money is a currency right and a currency is constantly moving. And if we can get it to move in certain places to make certain impact, it will make you. It will make you feel a lot much better and make your life feel like you’re living on purpose because we all are here for a reason. We all are here for a season. We all are here for a purpose, right? And that’s really what we’re trying to build in what we’re doing.

Speaker2: [00:53:43] Wow. Yes, that is inspiring. And we’re going to continue to follow your story, man. Please don’t be a stranger. You got to come back. You got to come back and talk about in my group. Oh yeah. And I understand you have your own, your own show. Is it is it centered around the purposely work or the in my group work or is a little bit overlap the show?

Speaker5: [00:54:01] No, not so. You know, as a serial entrepreneur, so am I group as pretty much sort of an umbrella organization that does a lot of other things right across software and and digital marketing. We’re out there in South America, in Colombia. We’ve got a Spanish speaking team out there and we’re also out in the Caribbean. We’re also out in India because we have a team out there as well. And we’ve got some guys out in Sweden, in Europe. So so we have a podcast. But the podcast is really about technology tools to really help small businesses to grow. So we, because we work on a daily basis with non-tech savvy entrepreneurs, say,

Speaker2: [00:54:37] Imagine where you might find some of those. Yeah, maybe in this room, it’s

Speaker5: [00:54:44] Like, it’s like, it’s like, maybe it’s like probably present day farmers. You know, they have a farm, but they’ve never been in the farm but reaps and it does all kinds of stuff for them. And so in today’s world, there are lots of tech non-tech savvy entrepreneurs who are just doing business and they don’t want to get their hands dirty in the weeds of tech and in the weeds of digital stuff, right? And so we do that for them. So our podcast is really helping those who want to be able to do certain things themselves whenever they can to identify tools and things that they can use to grow quickly. And if they knew that it existed and were willing to explore and try. So your world is what it is today because of our willingness to discover and or willingness, you know, they always say, you know, open mindedness is one of the greatest gift that we can actually have of mankind. And so, you know, Radio X. Business RadioX, it really was an idea. But imagine if that idea was not persisted, if it was not pursued, if it was not open to being discovered, we wouldn’t be here today. And as so many other examples. And so we on that podcast talk a lot about, you know, different tools that can help. And some of them are. I’ve never even heard of some of them myself and I’ve been in the space, but it’s always sort of, you know, always a learner and not a, you know, know-it-all.

Speaker2: [00:56:02] So, all right. So when you come back and you are going to come back, we’re going to talk about about that show we’re going to talk about in my group will probably get an update on purposely. And it just dawned on me. Couldn’t with your technology knowledge, couldn’t we do like a joint show where we’re broadcasting and publishing to your tribe or broadcasting and publishing to art? So, yeah, we got something to talk about that. Absolutely. In the meantime, though, let’s let folks with some coordinates. Both how they can access the show, I think will be incredibly valuable. I know I want to go listen and also how to connect and learn more about him. I agree purposely, whatever you think is appropriate.

Speaker5: [00:56:38] Yeah, absolutely. You know, these days, people go online and search for my name Ricard about and a ton of different things will show up. I mean, it’s not very not not a lot, but that’s kind of also where you can or how you can kind of see, see my stuff look for purposely. You can go to purposely dot com, turp you as El Wine.com, and it’s kind of the entryway to the environment if you’d like to reach out to me personally. You can just email me at Ricardos is a common spelling. Some people put h in the Ricardo. So we’re just saying no, Ricardo purposely pupu sl y dot com. And I mean, podcast is call more. So it’s it’s more it’s a big yellow, more yellow background with more on there. I think in this, it’s on Spotify. It’s on anywhere. You listen to podcasts, you can search for my name or you could search for and get more, which is that big Moe Ari and you’ll be able to find me there.

Speaker2: [00:57:36] Well, I am looking forward to more from everyone in this room. We will continue to follow all three stories. Thank you, Rukoro. Thank you, everyone. This is what a marvelous way to invest a Tuesday morning. I love it.

Speaker5: [00:57:50] Thank you. Thank you, Stone. You’re doing a beautiful work. Thank you for all of what you do to the community and for the community. I think this is purposeful and you are certainly on the way the mission to change the world through what you do. So thank you for that.

Speaker2: [00:58:03] Well, thank you for saying so. All right. This is Stone Payton for everyone here at the Business RadioX family. Sam, we’ll see you next time on Cherokee Business Radio.