Hey everyone and welcome back to another episode of the daily grind today We have an exciting episode lined up for you with Jeff do Dan Jeff is an entrepreneur an unbelievable entrepreneur with an unbelievable story So as always enjoy today's episode grab a piece of paper a pen sit back and dive deep in today's episode with Jeff do Dan enjoy Hey everyone just before we jump into today's episode as you would have heard a couple weeks ago in our last episode I was doing a podcast course I was giving away to 20 people for a discounted rate Which is gonna show you how to make money with your podcast? This is a super unique opportunity that I'm doing an exciting news. I'm actually turning this into an online course So the online course is in the makes if you want to get on the wait list to get the very first special rate of this online Course just visit my website and email me directly that is calling Morgan dot biz C O L I N M O R G A N dot Biz Really looking forward to seeing you on the inside Welcome back to the podcast as I mentioned today We're sitting down with Jeff who's an undercover boss season business builder and former college player who went to Florida to paint And awake Hurricane Andrew two years later then launched Advanta clean a national restoration franchise that has over States when Jeff exited the company back in 2019 if you've ever wondered why CEOs earned six figure salaries and how you can do the same Jeff do Dan has the answer is who was spoke to discernment as always everyone today's episode There are so many good nuggets involved make sure you have that pen piece of paper take something from today's episode But without further ado, please meet Jeff do Dan well, Jeff. Welcome to the Daily Grand my friend.
How are you? I'm great Colin. How are you? I'm fantastic.
You know what any day I get to speak with Jeff. There's a good day for me Absolutely, I promise not to disappoint you You won't you won't you know, let's let's take a step back I kind of shared in the intro before this kind of who you are what you do. Let's talk about like early days Jeff Where'd you grow up? Colin I grew up outside of Chicago in Schomburg, Illinois, which was a bedroom community to the city when we moved out there in 71 and middle child of two brothers and my dad was an engineer had his own business for a while and You know my mom worked back then as well and I grew up and was kind of an athlete Very mediocre a disinterested student So basketball player primarily growing up and then when I was a junior in high school I picked up some football and stuck with that for a while interesting what made you pick up the football?
Well, we got a new coach in the high school and I hadn't really played before but the guy came in and he wanted to throw the football and before then it had been Kind of a grounded pound game and where do you go recruit athletes who can catch something better than the basketball team? So he I was we were running a full court one day I looked up on the shelf above there and I saw the new basketball coach and he was just watching everybody play and then the next day He came to my science class and the teacher happened to be the offensive line coach So he came to the science class and pulled me out and said I'd like for you to come out for the football team We're gonna be throwing the football and we need some people who can catch it So that was really just that him taking that little bit of time to go out of his way and to come to the class and When somebody asks you to do something if you don't have a good reason not to you might as well say yes because half of life is showing up So that's what I did. Okay, and what's that what position did you start out in football? I started as a receiver and Fundamentally a horrible football player just didn't have the years that everybody did yeah, you know It takes a little while football scary.
It's loud first time you do it You don't have the blocking and the tackling down So you know I would run out there and catch some passes and fall down and whatnot But we ended up with a really good team and a quarterback that ended up playing in the NFL for a lot of years and they Paul Justin So you could you could run out and find a little spot? He could put it on you and we had a really good run and a couple of really good seasons there at the high school And then from there my grades I really didn't apply myself to my grades But I so I ended up walking on to a school university in northern Iowa in Cedar Falls, Iowa And continued with my lack of interest in school but school is a little bit harder So after that first year and kind of getting a baptism of fire into a college football program with roman when I hadn't really played for long and then coupled with a Substandard academic performance. I think there must have been a meeting somewhere where everybody agreed that I shouldn't come back So I went back home to a junior college outside of Chicago called Harper junior college It was kind of a football factory and really Honed my craft and got more serious about the grades and from there I was able to Get a football scholarship up to Appalachian State University in Boone, North Carolina Wow, what was the disinterest in school? I was kind of the same way to be honest I was kind of completely disinterested in that.
What was that? What was that for you? I don't it's interesting. I I think it was just no expectations were set and that I was very curious So that led to a lot of extracurricular activities.
I was a voracious reader I love to read as a matter of fact my my testing scores were quite high Really? Yeah, and so I remember getting called in by the guidance counselor And he had my grade transcripts in one hand and he had my test scores in the other They looked at me and he said these don't match. You know, what are you doing? And I don't know I was You know Two two I must have been an angry kid or something I was I think my dad just called me a rebel without a cause and so but it was just foolishness and trying to figure it out And especially good cool So you go to Appalachian State what what did you take there for the remainder of the two years?
Are you a junior when you arrived? I was but I ended up getting a four-year degree in five and a half years A lot of the stuff I took didn't early didn't didn't count didn't translate qualified So so I had a couple of years that I had two years left of football to play And I ended up in rolling in the business college And I just thought that seems like the thing and they had an accredited business school And I remember walking into and I had I had really worked hard to kind of try to figure out what productive life looked like And I remember walking into my first accounting 101 class as a Junior and taking the class and the teacher was giving me a hard time About being an athlete he would say you know that we're talking about the SEC and it's that Jeff That's the security exchange commission not the Southeast Conference Got a big bust in me and and all that but I actually got one of the highest grades in the class on the first test And he brought me out there. He said man you did really good on this and honestly I remember that was the first time in my life that I thought you know I might not be a complete idiot after all And if I apply myself I can study I had good reading and comprehension skills, but I just hadn't really applied it So so I did that and while I was there I decided that I wanted to stay out there It's a beautiful part of the country. I didn't want to go back home to Chicago But I didn't have the financial means to to really stay and food service or restaurant wasn't gonna get it for me So I started the painting business with my roommate In the first year we painted a few houses and at the end of that summer we met the property managers who managed the majority of the student housing And we painted a few apartments and the next summer we arranged to paint a lot of apartments So we stood up a business and we we recruited athletes who were there over the summer who wanted to stay and work out and we would paint 15 17 apartments in a day And I think over the summer I think the first summer we made $56,000 and then the next summer we made $79 and back in 1990 dollars And for really what mounted through six weeks of work It was pretty good money and for that was really my entrepreneurial bug and really excited about oh man This is fun.
I can I can build a business. I can I can recruit people to work in it and and that really So as I was finishing up my football career there my entrepreneurial career was just starting And how long did you do that painting business for? We did it for three years my brother my younger brother was washing cars at chambratoya And he you know he needed somewhere to go he's going to the same junior college So he came out got his North Carolina drivers license went back and finished school and and came out so he could get in state tuition And after living there a year right working the system a little bit If anyone wants to take issue with that it's he did it not me But so but anyway he came in he took over the painting business my partner's brother was there He took over the painting business and Mike ended up getting a degree work the painting business continued the work He got a degree in accounting and he ended up as this chief financial officer the Carolina Panthers Oh wow Yeah, so he took an opportunity and he he did great with it And my partner and I got a call in 92 after finishing up a painting season and hurricane Andrew had just Devastated south florida and uh somebody who used to work for us called and said we need we need all the hands We can down here to help these people recover So I told my girlfriend at the time And we'll be back in three weeks and we jumped in our little truck and headed down florida and three years later We cut our teeth in the restoration industry and we had moved to central florida And we had started a business in the restoration industry that would turn into what was the business I built for 25 years Advaniclean ending up with over 230 locations and 37 states Wow, you're uh your partner during all this was he uh, was he a teammate years? I was your roommate He was a teammate and a roommate and I think candidly He just he had a truck which qualified to be a business partner And he was a little tired of me wearing all of his sweaters So he I showed up at school with like five t-shirts and two of them had profanity on him So I was not I was a little unpolished.
I would say as a lad, but uh, so we but but he had some good skills and we got along well And uh we partnered in that business and then we we started the restoration business together as well Wow, so when you started the restoration business you're in florida you're supposed to go down there for a couple months What what sparked you obviously like something kept you there what kept you there and what kind of garnered your interest in that business idea? Well regardless of anything I was doing in my life I always had a passion to help people and what likes me up and it still likes me up to this day is taking anything that I've learned and Teaching it to other people and seeing them be successful with it and we did it with the painting business our our my brother So for example, I needed I needed five thousand dollars to buy in there was four of us that were going to start this restoration business I needed five grand didn't have it. So I took my four cylinder Toyota truck I took it to the bank we had been a good customer there at the local bank and they gave me a loan for five thousand dollars on the truck I took the payment book handed it to my brother and said this is your truck when you get paid off You know and I took the five thousand and I went back down to to florida and that was my stake money to get into the business So but I've always I've always enjoyed and that was really the first time I said, you know, I can create a business from nothing And I've learned that leaders the true leaders can stand on nothing and create something And so I learned that I could create a business and build a platform I could teach it to other people They could prosper with it and you know, I could get a little something out of it as well It's just kind of with franchising it as you you help people become successful and you get a residual or a royalty from it And for the ongoing things that you do to keep them healthy and happy and in business And so that was a big lesson for me. I it was I really learned how to create leverage inside of inside of a business and And yeah, so that's kind of what got me going down there And then I always I think that especially young people everybody needs an adventure in life And for me coming from Chicago Not a not an upbringing where I had a lot of vacations or I ever went anywhere The first time I flew on an airplane was when I was taking my college visits after oh wow Yeah, after my after my junior college, I mean I got on an airplane and I mean it was like, okay, what's that noise?
So you get on there, but so I you know, I hadn't gone anywhere and say to go out to the top to go from the the streets of Chicago to this beautiful place with cute girls that talked interesting and You're on top of a mountain and you're you're there's all this forest and streams and everything around and playing football I was just a real adventure And then to go down to florida and drive into the middle of a of a disaster zone and to be able to I just I really Got to where I liked showing up and figuring things out in a difficult situation and then helping people recover from that So so that's what I made my career doing How long into advantage clean did you make the decision or you and your partners make the decision to start franchising? We initially hired our first franchise attorney to tell us the ropes in 1997 and you had started it in what you're sorry? 94 got you Okay, but over really soon after we started the business one partner left in 97 My business partner left in 2000 and then I bought my last partner out in 2004 And part of it was is We started in 94.95. I came back to north yerelina to start our second location and get married And we were really the thought leader in the opinion leader I was dead set on doing something significant I believed in the space that franchising was a really good business model to expand There was precedent for it in other companies So I was really pushing hard to To come up with a model that was franchisable and understand what that looked like it would build a business that would be good for people that they could operate What we were doing was we were doing tens of millions of dollars of it, but it was complex We were government contracting and it's not the kind of thing that a new franchise owner really could do So we had to simplify the business and the thought leadership was really coming out of the carolinas And I think my last partner really wasn't interested in the risk or the change of Really morphing the business into this new model and then expanding it through franchising So, but what's interesting is that We were there and we had grown we had a really nice business going it was profitable I had taken over ownership of it.
We had offices in multiple states. We had opportunities and national accounts. It was really nice business But after I bought my partner out we responded to hurricane Katrina in 2005 and I'll never forget that I was driving home Overnight in a camper that in a RV that we had that we would deploy with and we ended up deploying into the Gulf Coast after Katrina for five years And I was driving home after being down there for three months and setting up the storm response to catch in the middle of that to catch my son's football game And I realized that that I was missing his first football season And what I've come to believe and I didn't fully internalize at the time is that our true values are what we will tolerate You know and what we must have like so for me growing up such as I did maybe a little bit untethered Per se I really wanted to be present and I wanted to be home for my family And that was just something that was super super important to me So I made a decision on that trip to and I some short time later I called I called a meeting and we had 44 people and you know hundreds of contractors working around and I brought our executive team And I said we're gonna sell all of our company stores under the franchise model Some of you might go with that some of you might stay but that's what we're gonna do and we're gonna commit to this Franchise and path because I felt like that would give me more control over my time And be able to replicate the business model. So in 2006 7 and 8 We sold all of our locations under a franchise model We did some really interesting things with call center and technology Because we would we already started centralizing things before it was cool or easy to do so in businesses like ours So we went to market with a pretty strong competitive advantage and in 2009 we went to the franchise market and from 2009 to 2018 we We placed 230 operating locations out there in 37 states and then January 1st 2019 home franchise concepts out of Irvine California bought the whole thing from us Wow, what was that process like of like did you have ever in your mind and vision that you were gonna sell it?
Was that was that an option for you? Not when you started not when I started it But as I became educated in the space and you know one of the one of the things that really good business leader that I respect a lot would say Jd Gibbs he would say that What is what is this the best decision we can make for the families that we're responsible for? and When we looked at where we were with advantage clean we were doing extremely well and the space was The space was rolling up services were rolling up and when you roll up into a into a bigger brand There's all kinds of things that your franchise owners theoretically are going to get in terms of support Contracts opportunities to customer acquisition So I felt like at the time It was it was a good time for me being still young enough to do something else And to figure out what that looked like and also a good opportunity for the brand and the franchisees and their families and employees To join a company that had big aspirations and a lot of resources very cool. So January 1st That's you it was January 1st right you and sold yeah 2019 Wow, so just over a year so January 1st January 2nd rolls around let's talk about that Okay, so it's a new it's a new age for Jeff What what did that look like for you?
I mean it doesn't seem like you're someone that kind of sits around and puts your feet up on the couch But what was that like it was it was fascinating and I And I had developed Of an appreciation for coaching and mentoring and I had some good People in my life to give me advice and the advice is you're not supposed to do anything for a little bit and kind of let things settle in and And figure out what's next because most people will want to try to do it bigger faster and do the same thing again And fall back into that trap and not give themselves time to really think about what their purpose You know to drive deeper into your life purpose and to really figure out what is the impact you want to make in the world You know, you've already been on the treadmill you've done one thing This is a chance for you know really investigate You know, is there a different purpose in your life with a different people out there that you can help or engage with or not Or is it a fishing pole? Who knows what what it is for people and so I took You know out of the respect for these people I took three hours off and started a bunch of businesses What was your vision like obviously like you started three hours, but what did you start? Yeah, I think you know, I just came up with another book title the uncouchable coach Just hit me just hit me. I'm a horrible horrible student No, so when I I had come to appreciate business building in the franchise space and and believe that The franchise development piece of it how to find great franchise owners and match them up with the right brands and So I think there was something around that I had learned late in my career that I wanted to do more of so I partnered with somebody to create a franchise sales organization I also wanted to work with CEOs and great founders and leaders So so I made some investments and some brands that I'm able to have influence and have impact in and hopefully do a good job Making those brands operate in a responsible quality manner and and then some intellectual property a road book Spent the year writing a book called discernment, which is the business athletes regimen for a great life You're better decisions where I tell some stories But I really fundamentally take a look at the intentional process of acquiring wisdom over time And what are the fundamental building blocks that if I'm a young person and I want to Improve improve my business making prowess because there are no absolutes in business Nothing is 100 and anything can go to zero and the quality of your decisions the batting average that you make over time in your life It determines the quality of your life and the success of your business So how do you I think Warren Buffet said, you know, look at your look at your investments as if you only get to make 20 your entire life I mean really yeah, well, I I hear he's quite bright.
Yeah, he does. All right. Yeah, you know, all right So I think that So so what I really tried to do in the book was to create what are the fundamentals that you're going to train on if you want to be a Better basketball player you're gonna work on your left hand dribble your cross over your footwork all of these things You're backswing your follow through if you're whatever it is involved So what are the fundamentals that you were if you're gonna apply that to your life and that you're gonna train on and what are the models of thought that you lay Opportunities against to make decisions and how do you assess the scenarios the potential outcomes that you've got from that? So is it you know, I talk about values I talk about having a personal balance sheet that includes things like relationship equity where you you know What are you doing to intentionally build equity in the relationships that matter in your life?
And how do you how do you measure that and what does that mean? So concepts like that I've always just made up or thought about or internalized just over 20 years in business and and it collected So I just I laid I laid those against examples and stories in my life that I try to keep the narrative going and then Really show how all of these different tools helped me to make hopefully better decisions over time Very cool. So coming from one experience to working with a lot of business owners CEOs leaders There a lot of people are listening who kind of want to get into that stage right there They're wanting to start that business. Maybe they're in it, but they're looking to grow What have you found in terms of fundamentals say in business?
What really helps someone say early stage entrepreneur? Which should someone be focused on like where should their attention be? Reading What type of books would you recommend? There's actually in the back of my book.
There's a list broken up like category, but you know principles look like principles by Ray Dalio Yeah, you know just you have to you have to build a toolkit of things that you constantly put and you have to control your inputs And track your outputs So we especially with social media how much stuff just goes right through our eyeballs and our ears and just impacts on our brain And distracts our brain from the kinds of things we should be talking about so controlling your inputs and making sure that That you have the right Percentage of things that you can collect and put in buckets that you can draw on over time to create your models of thought and your beliefs About how you execute on your business. Those are important things I think you have to you have to strike a balance in your life And maybe it's under the category of sacrifice or self sabotage, but what's your what's your balance between creation and consumption? What do you do when you're consuming? Do you know when you're when you're creating?
Do you know when you're on purpose and what are the types of things that lights you up? When do you know that that light switches on in your own purpose for me doing this show? Which I appreciate the opportunity is on purpose because it gives me the opportunity to Provide value for others and to encourage entrepreneurs and connect dots from what I've learned And that's really my purpose is encouraging entrepreneurs and connecting dots for people based on the experiences that I've had in my life And if I'm doing that whether that's in a company or an emerging franchise brand or any entrepreneur then I'm on purpose So but I've had to but I've collected through experience and then through through curiosity and reading this This large Inventory of things that I can draw upon that can help other people or help me make business decisions or assess opportunities So if somebody wants to continue to incrementally improve as an entrepreneur then it's it's that compound effect It's it's over time. You don't really have to be in a hurry.
Do you have to grind? Absolutely But you can be quick about it and not in a hurry So true and it's so funny right because entrepreneurship is one of those it's one of those spaces where I equated to or compare it to sports you'll kind of agree with this like you Entrepreneurship one day someone can just be like I'm gonna be an entrepreneur Like you can't do that with other things you can't I can't wake up tomorrow and be like you know what? NFL looks nice. I like those paychecks I'm gonna go and be an NFL athlete like it doesn't work that way Like you can have some physical attributes much like in sports You can have some attributes that help you in entrepreneurship But really it takes time and it takes learning and ultimately like I feel like you know speaking with you and other really really successful entrepreneurs Like they view themselves as lifelong learners like they're not they don't have all the answers You're looking to learn more than you're looking to share almost even in conversations Which is really interesting you find that as well?
I do and I look for people like me in that regard because those are the people that I really tend to enjoy If you wanted to extrapolate a little bit on something that Ray Dalio said You know he said that people think that their future is some small variation on the immediate past As opposed to looking far back into the you know It's a history to understand that the future is probably drastically different than what you think it might be And I've really come to believe That life is really an illusion that you create And we we we surround ourselves with things we surround ourselves with people And then we tie it all up and bundle it together with thoughts and beliefs and head trash And and now that's our life, right? We have to go here. We have to do this We have to do that But the reality of it's an illusion that we created by the actions that we took and the decisions that we made And if we wanted to make a different life tomorrow, you absolutely I could walk out of here And I could never drive my truck home. I could I could make it drastically different I could say I'm never gonna do another podcast Tomorrow can be drastically different.
All I have to do is decide and commit to it now I might still have bills to pay and things that I have to do so there's a there's a limit to uh, you know imagining up your future But nothing great happens in your life and so you make a bold declaration and the future informs the present what matters the most So when you when you understand that, you know, you you have to you can you can really envision a different powerful future for yourself And the path to get there may not be as long as you think That's super interesting and it even goes even building upon that too Like you had mentioned what you kind of read and it's important what you consume Because a lot of what you consume does impact your beliefs and your values and all of those things and especially now with What we have in our hands and what we're doing right now like it's they can drastically impact what you do and what you watch and why you do those things Absolutely. Yeah, Jeff. Um for people first of all, we want to grab a copy of your book discernment Where's the best place people can do that? Because I think it's super important that people you know read all of your knowledge And I mean it's amazing what you've done.
Where's the best place people grab a copy? Just straight up Amazon, you know feed the beast fan that they've got it. They can have it to you tomorrow Awesome. Well, I'll share that link and then if people want it to follow along with you learn more about you know Your journey what you're doing what's coming up.
Where's where can everyone do that? Go to jeffdoudon.com jeffdoudon.com And you can find there blogs and articles and a lot of content that's written there I have a podcast as well the jeffdoudon show that platform is all about entrepreneurial encouragement So you can find all that there you can reach out to me on linkedin or feel free to email me if you want to talk to me direct me at jeff at dudeon.me Amazing and jeff let's end the show off this way. I feel like you guys are good for me So let's let's end the show off at like a thought of the day something that our audience can go home with one thing or one thought 10 the show I will steal it from And everything's going to be okay And if it's not okay, that must mean it's not the end Oh love that. Keep trucking right keep on trucking Trucking jeff can't thank you enough for coming on here sharing your wisdom.
It's a pleasure for me I know it's a pleasure for everyone else listen, but I truly appreciate it. Oh, and it was great really enjoyed it Thank you and everyone hope you enjoyed today's episode if you did hit that like button share this out with one person who you feel like would truly Impact be impacted by listening to today's episode We'll be back next week with another one until then call and we're gonna signing off and always remember to keep on grinding