417 $35 to Visit a Doctor When Your Have No Insurance w/ Dr. Timothy Wong (iHealth Clinic)2/24/2020 
What’s a doctor to do when they become disenchanted with the healthcare system? Dr. Timothy Wong decided the answer was to start his own micro-practice.
In his office in the East Liberty neighborhood of Pittsburgh, Dr. Wong sees ~20 patients per day and only charges $35 for a visit. This allow people without health insurance to get the care they desperately need. Dr. Wong believes that healthcare needs to be simple, needs to be about the patient & the doctor, and needs to be accessible. His business model allows that to happen. In this conversation, Dr. Wong and Aaron discuss how he got the idea for iHealth Clinic, how care gets delivered at his practice, and the way this model can spread & inspire change. Pittsburgh’s best conference to Expand your Mind & Fill your Heart happens once a year. Dr. Timothy Wong’s Challenge; Let other healthcare providers know about direct-access primary care. Connect with Dr. Timothy Wong iHealht Clinic website directaccessprimary.com If you liked this interview, check out episode 399 with Hayden Cardiff where we discuss spinning a software company out of another firm, raising a $9 million Series A, and hiring in a high-growth startup.
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Watson: Dr. Wong, thank you for coming on the podcast.
Wong: Thank you for having me. Watson: So I read first about what you're doing here at the clinic through a Bloomberg article. And then before I could even write the email, trying to get you to come on the show, a friend of mine sent me the article saying, dude, this gotta be perfect for the podcast. And I think the reason that he sent that to me is because this is. It's simultaneously innovative, but then deeply simple, what you're trying to do here at the clinic and taking kind of a new business model, a new approach to healthcare. So to start things off, can you just explain how this clinic works and the business model underneath it? Wong: Sure. So I'm pretty sure I didn't, or I wasn't the first one to invent this model. It actually is a lot of people, the model resonates with them because it was how we did medicine many decades ago. So I call this model direct access primary care. It's a little similar to direct primary care where physicians don't take any insurance, but in that model they take a membership. So even if you don't go to the doctor, you're paying that membership. But, on the flip side, your visits are generally free and you get some perks like generic medications may also be free or discounted. So I didn't really like the membership model. So I kind of took part of direct primary care, but also paired it with something called the micropractice, where I was, I am the only kind of employee. And that way I can actually decrease my costs so that I can have a price point where I don't need memberships, but most visits are actually $35 and we don't bill insurance. So it's for everyone. So if I have patients who have Medicare, I have some patients who have Medicaid. Most of my patients have no insurance and some patients, the other majority would have commercial insurance, but high copays and deductibles. Watson: Yeah. So this is about anyone can walk on the street. Like, you know, the clinic's got open here after we complete the interview. Anyone can walk in off the street for $35, get to speak with a doctor, get taken care of, gets to see some sort of assessment of their health. Wong: Yes. Yep. Exactly. So for example, we do primary care, urgent care. So I do simple suturing. We do, you know, this week just alone, we had kind of two corneal abrasions, but we do a lot of primary care too. So we generally treat a lot of anxiety, depression, just because it's so prevalent, some diabetes. This week I actually saw a patient with, uncontrolled diabetes who wasn't getting treated for a year. And it was interesting because he didn't actually have insurance. So he was actually foregoing healthcare. And he kind of made enough money where he couldn't get medical assistance or medical assistance for workers with disabilities, but he was making this mental decision to forego healthcare because of the price of commercial insurance or the full price of seeing a doctor, which can be $150, $200. So I saw him in, I think he was a week or two away from landing in the ICU because of his sugars and I charged him $35. Watson: Wow. So. The reason that this model is possible, use the term micro-practice direct access healthcare. The layman's version of someone not in healthcare understanding of this is we've got a little space here that you're renting in the East end, got three rooms, one room for providing care to patients. And there's no other administrators. There's no people who have to interface with the insurance companies, which has its own kind of inherent cost in order to be able to translate that. So that's really what's making this business model possible that $35 can sustain you and this space and the gear that we have here. And then otherwise, if someone needs to see someone in a specialty environment, you can kind of make that referral. Wong: Yes, exactly. So you alluded to the space, it's about 700 square feet. I only need one exam room because I don't have staff to prep a patient in another room. So, I also have a self check-in, so I don't need a front desk staff. So it's actually still pretty efficient because if I see a patient I'm done, they walk out of the room and someone else walks in. If there's someone there, I can prep a chart in maybe 30 seconds and get that ready. I have no billing, pretty much people pay at the end of the visit. So I don't need to hire billing departments. I don't need to get collections. My collection rate's probably 99%. So it's pretty good. Actually, you also alluded to working with insurances and there's some studies that show actually just working with insurance can cost a hundred thousand dollars per year hiring staff that interface with that insurance. So helping to fill out forms, but also calling the insurance and doing other things. So we not only decrease the, or take away the second highest cost of a medical office, which is additional staff, but we also reduce the cost of working with insurance companies. So it's quite a bit of savings for the patient. Watson: So where did you go to learn about this model? Learn about this idea? Because almost always when I interface or when I talk with someone who is playing by a different playbook or kind of chasing a different model than the status quo or the standard way of doing things. They're getting their information from some other source. So where did you go to kind of start to conceive that this was possible? Wong: That is a very difficult question. And I would say it's difficult because it was not just one source. Watson: Right. Wong: So my wife is from the Philippines and she's a doctor and her parents are doctors and she would tell me kind of. You know, it was cash based there, but it wasn't very expensive. And because of the cost of living was low, it was definitely easy to have a means to live, even charging a low price point. I would have my college advisor would tell me his doctor, his father was a doctor in New York city and he wouldn't actually charge very much or sometimes not charge patients at all. But what patients would do would be to tell them, 'Hey, come to the restaurant.' You know, because the patient was a waiter or was an actor and say, 'Hey, come to my show.' You know? And that was a form of payment. So my college advisor had actually had a very colorful and rich childhood, even though he wasn't very monetarily rich. Watson: Yeah. Wong: But he, he had all these cultured experiences. I also was interested in kind of the micro-practice model cause they kind of liked working independently. I kind of liked working, you know, if something needed to be done, just do it, don't go through a committee. Watson: Did you spend some time in a large healthcare system to see that alternative? Wong: Yes. So I, I worked, not exactly, well in, in residency, I was part of one of the large healthcare systems here, but it was kind of a training environment. So we didn't see too much of, you know, the kind of the bureaucracy. But also, working with insurance companies that much, we were just trying to learn how to provide care. So we're kind of, it's kind of like an extended apprenticeship. But when I did about four and a half years in Indiana, Pennsylvania, which is kind of a small health system in itself, it was with an independent hospital, Indiana regional medical center. And there, I kind of, I also did quality. So I was director of quality on the outpatient side. So I would work with insurance companies, the major insurance companies on quality metrics, making sure our quality metrics were high. Making sure, you know, diabetics had good sugar control. They were on the appropriate medications, for example. Starting new endeavors to try to get our colon cancer screening rates up. But also with that, I saw kind of the insanity of the system, because you know, I would see insurance companies making these cost cutting decisions that made no sense, would actually hurt patient care, and I would even have employees from the insurance company who would come to our meeting and be like, 'yeah, I don't agree with this.' But, you know, and I'm like, so, you know, the insanity is so prevalent that you yourself as a professional, don't agree with the insanity that you see. Watson: Yeah. Wong: And so I was thinking one day with all kinds of these, these pieces together, you know, I was part of the problem because I was in the system because I was taking insurance. They were part of my master when I was seeing patients. And so I was like, you know what? I got to cut that tie off. And so what would be my alternatives? So there was direct primary care. And so that's usually a pretty big movement now, but I really didn't like the membership model. I didn't feel that we should charge a premium for access. Access to primary care is actually already pretty hard. That's why there's urgent care and retail clinics, and we don't have enough access. So limiting that access even further and charging extra for that didn't feel right to me. I also didn't like the idea of me getting paid when I wasn't doing a service. So just being able to come see me, I shouldn't get paid for that ability. The other really big thing I had against direct primary care, and this is, you know, my own personal view is that they limit their population to maybe 400 and 800. When, average PCP might see close to 2000 patients, maybe 1800. So by decreasing your patient panel to maybe a third or a quarter, or even, you know, even half, you're really making access harder for everyone else. And you're making your colleagues in primary care work harder to fit acute and chronic care. So while it's good for your patients and you can argue that you provide great care. There's also a spectrum that we have to realize between high volume, poor care and low volume high care. We have to find a happy medium between those two. And it can't be just low volume high care because while you're providing high care for some, you're also neglecting many others that you never even see. Watson: So what is abundantly apparent in, you know, this is our first time meeting in person, is the degree to which you are driven by mission driven by, you know, the Hippocratic oath that, that a doctor takes upon the completion of their education to find the way to help people. And what's fascinating to me is you're simultaneously using your skills to help someone, whether it's with, you know, diabetes or depression or some of these other elements to actually get treatment, but also thinking at a systems level about how to do that for the greatest good and the, in the highest utilitarian sets. I think that's really, it's really fascinating that that seems what's driving you. Wong: Yeah, I'm actually doing kind of some leadership roles, but also looking at our primary care group in my previous position. Really thought pushed to me, looking at systems. I actually went to college as a freshmen in engineering, but I soon dropped out and went into English and pre-med, but that also showed me, you know, You know, in medicine, it's great because you can help people. But what I realized was if you could make the system better, you can help a population. So helping one person is awesome. You can see direct effects, but helping a system, you can help thousands of people at once. Watson: Yeah. So the other thing that's always fascinating and, and across the spectrum of interviews we do on this show, there's so many through lines of, well, now, when you introduce digital, when you introduce these kinds of modern tools. It allows for in all these different, whether it's, you know, technology or politics, or we can go run across the spectrum, all these different ground up solutions, as opposed to something being top-down in a capacity. And, you know, having the iPad where someone can sign in on the way in and manage probably a lot of, you know, other elements of your business processes digitally helps something like this exist in some capacity. So the other element of that is you, the individual, being able to make this work. So frankly, the basic math here, you need to get enough patients in the door to pay the bills. But the other element that I was curious about as we were coming in here is, you know, with Hannah and I starting our own business, one of the big keys was that I had paid off my student loans. And she didn't have any. So we, we came in with no debt, which allows us to, you know, run that very tight margin then revenues at the early stages of a business. Medicine is the profession notorious for accumulating debt as a part of your schooling. So how does that factor into your being able to get this off the ground? Wong: So I, I of pretty much did the same thing you did. I didn't have a lot of student debts. Luckily, thanks to help from my parents. My wife, as I said is a physician. So we had one stable income as I kind of did this. But what you also did was you didn't take a small business loan. And if you did have a student debt or you were the only person having an income in your family you would probably have to do a small business loan and pay yourself. But because I was in my position with little debt, you know, I had mortgages and car payments, but those were helped by my wife who had a steady income. I was also debt free. So we have no debt in, in the company so far. I, for a few months, I didn't pay myself anything. I put, you know, maybe $60,000 to start up, get everything ready. But we didn't take a small business loan because I could take that personal financial hit. But if I couldn't, that's pretty much what a small business loan is for. So I would be forced to do that. And then you would have to pay that off and you couldn't, you know, it would slow down your business growth because you would have to pay that debt off. It would also be riskier because you are now in debt, but it's definitely still doable. It's just one of those kind of barriers to entry that that exists for any small business, let alone kind of this model. Watson: So what does sustainability look like for you in this model? Like how many patients need to see, what, what does the volume need to look like to make that work? Wong: Sure. So. It's not an easy question because you have to figure out what's the norm for a primary care doctor. So a primary care doctor in general, according to Medscape's annual surveys. I think, I haven't looked at the numbers for awhile, but most primary care doctors work about 50 hours. So it's more than 40. They spend 10 about 10 to 12 hours on paperwork. So that includes reviewing a ton of paperwork from insurance companies. So say if you negate that since I don't work with insurance companies, and I would say that's the worst part of being a primary care doctor, at least when I was doing the traditional model, you remove about eight hours. So if you reinvest that time into just patient care and being in the clinic available, you can still work maybe 50 hours. If you see about 20 patients a day, your salary would probably be 60% of what a traditional PCP would make at about $215/ $220,000. Okay. In PA we're in the mid Atlantic region, we actually get paid, I think the second lowest in the country. So I would say traditional PCPs, maybe get 180, 190. And then if you see 20 patients a day, that's probably about a salary of 120 if you can keep your costs low. So you do have a salary reduction at the cost of being fully independent, being your own boss, getting joy back into your job because you are, you know, taking care of patients. I see patients all the time who are like, 'Oh, I admire what you're doing.' And I tell them, well, I went to medical school to take care of people, not insurance companies. I didn't go to medical school to fill out forms. And so you get that joy back and that does come with a financial cost. But if you are efficient enough and you can see 30 patients a day, you have thrown some telemedicine, you know, you could make a very similar income than a traditional PCP. And you could say, well, 30 is quite a bit, but if you're efficient enough and with self check-ins, it's actually not terrible. Watson: Yeah. And the other thing that's so fascinating to me about doing something like this is you're, you're still in the early stages, right? And there's still a degree to which number one, you're learning how to do this. You're learning how to actually build this system itself and make it more efficient and get people in the door more efficiently, all these other things. But as you prove a model like this, part of bottom up changes is, well, some people will see what you're doing and maybe go do it for themselves on the other side of town or in a different town somewhere. And that creates the opportunity for whether it is a software developer or some other service provider, another sector to figure out how to build something for you that isn't necessarily right for the large health care system isn't necessarily right for the other parts of the industry. But would it make sense to help you do this more effectively? Wong: Sure. So that is something I've actually been thinking about quite a bit. Um, I I'm actually lucky enough to be working currently with two people who are in software. And we're actually trying to create this kind of platform that decreases that barrier to entry. Watson: Yeah. Wong: So eventually what if we created almost a Shopify platform where we could help other providers really just plug in and decrease those barriers of entry, like, hello, how do I figure out how to do self check-in while I've already been doing it? This is how you can do it for a very affordable price. Well, how do I have a queuing system? Well, actually a few weeks ago I started a queuing system using Google sheets. And it's HIPAA compliant here. You could do that. Oh, how about adding telemedicine in? Well, we got this crate telemedicine platform that we've already developed and it has all these features that no other platform does, here use this. And so by doing that, not only can we, you know, at least get a return on investments, but we can also make it easier for other people to do. And part of this model as you alluded to is it's a proof of concept. Watson: Yeah. Wong: So that's why I didn't want to take grants or outside funding or a lot of small business loans because I wanted to show it can be done. It can be done in Iowa. It can be done in Hawaii. It can be done in California. You know, your price point in certain details might be different. One example is maybe if you're a female provider, I would recommend at least you have an additional staff just for safety reasons. Watson: Yeah. Wong: And you might want to, even as a male provider have a, an extra staff and you might have to charge a bit more because of that, but making this model really kind of an option for providers and an option for patients is one of our stretch goals, and decreasing those barriers to do it is one of our stretch goals as well. So creating a software platform, but eventually even having a fund where we can provide the small business loan to make it easier for you to do. Or even having a malpractice contract with a national carrier. So it's easier for you to do. Watson: And could be shared with all the others. Wong: Exactly. So you kind of leverage kind of the lessons I learned, but also kind of group purchasing. Watson: So the software thing is like, I'm tingling a little bit at hearing this idea because the whole. Magic of AWS within Amazon was that Amazon was the first client of AWS. They built their own clouds infrastructure, and then they figured out how to turn that into a product that they could offer other people, but they got to incubate it internally. Same thing happened with another company. Idelic, that does safety software for truck drivers, started within Pitt Ohio for themselves, and then spun out to be a product for other people. So, being able to build that solution for your own internal pain points where you're right up next to it every single day, and then spinning that off as something to help other people is a great idea. Wong: Yeah. And I think it can, you know, like I said, it, the hardest thing to do this is just getting into it. Yeah. Cause you have to figure out and do things you probably aren't normally comfortable with, but making that easier. And making, you know, this model more accessible to providers is definitely what we want to do. And even at our first meeting with these other kind of developers, we all agreed unanimously and easily. You know, we were saying, you know, if it comes to the pushing the model or making, you know, a return on our hard work financially, we're going to push the model. And everyone agreed because we believe in the model, and we really think this needs to be an alternative in American healthcare. And you can ask any of our patients, a lot of our patients, you know, what they think, and you'll, you'll hear a lot of good. Feedback. Watson: Yeah. So, I'd be remiss here if I didn't ask some, probably super low level, but basic questions that you get all the time. So in terms of writing prescriptions, you're able to do that. Is there any sort of like difference or drastic change in what people be used to? Wong: So that, that is a question where I do ask patients, do you have insurance? And then sometimes they get a story of how they lost their insurance. I'm like, That's okay. You know, there's almost a stigma not to have health insurance. And for me, it's, you know, it's more of a financial decision. It's not a stigma point, but, the reason I ask is because if they don't have health insurance, I give them good RX coupons. Or for chronic issues, we can think of patient assistance with the drug manufacturer and try to get them, you know, a year supply of a pretty nice brand drug that can decrease the risk of dying potentially, with patient assistance. And if you have prescription coverage, what I do is just send the prescription to any pharmacy. If you don't have prescription coverage, I send the prescription to any pharmacy, but I print out a good RX or I text you a good RX coupon, so that at least you have some price transparency and you should have almost guaranteed price. Watson: Gotcha. And then what about like different testing? Say someone needs blood testing, I don't even know all the tests. You would probably tell them better than me. Wong: So part of this too, is kind of creating those, that knowledge base to do this model actually also involves kind of contracts with, so I have a contract with quest so that I can get client-based prices. So for example, a patient with insurance paid $230, like a few years ago for her lab work when she had insurance because of deductibles and copays. Watson: Okay. Wong: When she didn't have insurance and she saw me a few months ago, she paid $30 and she had no insurance at all. Watson: Wow. That basically breaks my brain. That that happens. Wong: Yeah, it's counterintuitive and unfortunate. So, you know, getting these contracts makes the APC direct access, primary care easier, but also, you know, finding local resources too. For example, there's a, a nearby radiology place that's independent. And I send them a lot of business because they have price transparency. They do a good job, but they also, you know, do cash pricing. That's cheaper than anyone else. So. You know, yeah. I'm going to send them my patients right on price transparency. Watson: There's an economics podcasts that I've listened to where they've had a couple of really good discussions about basically amongst the issues with the healthcare system is this notion of like, okay, I'm getting shoulder surgery, I'm buying shoulder surgery. I have no idea what that actually costs. It's obfuscated behind the wall of insurance and all this other administration. So. The notion that having that transparency right at front, where someone has to bring their prices as a part of it, there are other kind of second order considerations of what, you know, just going bargain, hunting for healthcare could potentially imply. But the fact that there isn't any sort of transparency in pricing across most of the system is a real issue for people people's accessibility across the board, whether or not they're making a lot, a little or somewhere in between. Wong: Sure. Yeah. Price transparency makes the market more efficient because if you don't have price, transparency, how are you going to be make educated, inefficient decisions? I think that's part of the reason why people forego healthcare and basic healthcare that can make their daily life better if they don't have insurance because of that price opacity. But also that very high costs that they don't even see until it happens. So they, they they're just averse to even getting that hit of, 'Oh, that bill.' But it's also with price transparency issues you also have, I think it's called information asymmetry in economics, where, you know, insurance companies have more information than the consumer. And that is an advantage, a vast advantage for the insurance company. So say you want a shoulder surgery and you get the bill, you had it done and you're recovering, which is great. But then you get a bill. How are you going to argue that bill? Or how are you going to know that bill is okay. Watson: No frame of reference. Wong: Yeah. You have no frame of reference. They're going to use medical jargon and insurance jargon. Like I signed up for open enrollment in July with my previous employer. There was this complicated chart. As a medical provider I couldn't even understand a hundred percent of it. And I was like, I don't know what this means. And it's ridiculous because I think insurance companies actually play upon that because it's very hard for consumers to make good decisions. And so, you know, it's, it's like leading blind sheep. Unfortunately, consumers get manipulated in healthcare all the time. It's not just price transparency, but it's also information asymmetry. Watson: Totally. Last question, kind of in this vein here, before we aim towards wrapping up. When it is a more severe case. So our understanding is their primary care helps me be diagnosed or direct the issue. And in a system it's like, okay, you need to go to this specialist, that specialist, what have you. But when you do come across those cases that supersede your capacity to treat, what does the next steps look like for you there? Wong: So it's pretty much the same as any other primary care I would refer. I usually say, you know, if you're a good primary care doc, you shouldn't be referring too much. So out of, you know, we just hit, I think over 1200 patients, unique patients, yesterday and out of all the referrals, I probably made 30, 40. And most of them were a sleep medicine because of sleep apnea, possible sleep apnea, which I can literally do nothing besides refer them, or fractures. Or I think there was a few cases of sending to endocrinology for hyperthyroid, which I'm not great at, but everything else, mostly, you know, I do myself. So that's still, you know, probably 99 or 95%, you know, not having to refer. Now, there are patients I've sent to the ER, just because, you know, it was unsafe for me to just treat by myself and risk it. So one patients ate an entire bottle of anti-histamine, and I was like, ah, I think you have anticholinergic poisoning. And you know, so I called the ER and sent them, got a friend to drive him to avoid, you know, an $800 ambulance bill and made sure he was safe. And I gave report to the ER and he got to the ER. Watson: Great. Well, Dr. Wong, I am so inspired by what you're doing here. Like, like I said, at the very beginning of this, I read the thing a friend of immediately said that this is somewhat a story that we had to share and tell, and I'm really excited to see this movement continue to grow in addition to your own business. Before we hit our last two questions that I talked about before we turned the mics on anything else you were hoping to share today that I just didn't give you a chance to? Wong: No, not really. I think, I think this model really can work because even if you look at our Google reviews, you know, at six, six months we've hits, we're lucky enough to get five stars across the board. And I think we hit 43 reviews. And so it has social value in this model. So I really want one of our goals is really to show that this can be done, you know, in other parts of the country and really. I even before I started, I told my wife, you know, if I even have 1% chance of changing the healthcare system, it has to be worth it. And I'm lucky enough to think that this model can work with, you know, different kind of flavors. But I think it can work still. And it does have such social value because, you know, 8.5% of Americans in 2018, it's estimated had no healthcare insurance. And I didn't even realize how bad that was until I started doing this. It's almost like when you're a traditional provider, it's almost like a silent population that you never see, but need help. And it's almost tragic to me to have patients who are hardworking. We have patients who, you know, worked three jobs and are maybe even single parents and working really hard and great, great additions to society, but society is failing them in that, giving them basic healthcare options. Their only option right now is either paying full price, which we talked about might not make financial sense, or they have, you know, they're averse to just getting surprised with all the price opacity. Or a free clinic, which are difficult to do, you know, in all of Pittsburgh, I think there might be two. And you know, there's the enrollment thing and then they have certain hours and then only certain hours are walk-in. So it can be pretty difficult. But also what I realized too, is that 8.5% includes a lot of patients who are actually very vulnerable. Like new immigrants, travelers or family members who just traveled to help take care of, you know, newborns. So you have grandma or your mother coming in who have no access to healthcare pretty much. But also children, which I never realized. There's actually a decent proportion of patients who are minors without insurance, because, for whatever reason, they can't get chip or another insurance. And having a resource and being able to provide a service to them is vastly much more rewarding than only seeing patients with insurance. And, you know, doing medicine in pretty much the same way, but the value that I feel I'm doing every day is vast superior to a traditional model. And I think a lot of providers have to experience that. Watson: Yeah. I want to make sure that all of our listeners can experience it in some capacity. What coordinates can we provide for people that want to learn more both here and in the digital world? Wong: Sure. So we have a Facebook page, I think it's 'iHealth Clinic,' but our main website is www.ihealth.clinic no.com or anything. And I'm actually trying to promote the direct access primary care model www.Directaccessprimarycare.com. And those are kind of the main places we have Instagram, but I am not a great Instagrammer. Watson: No worries. We're going to link that all in the show notes for this episode, you can find it in the podcast app where people are probably listening right now, and also goingdeepwithaaron.com/podcast. Before I let you go and start treating some patients here, I want to give you the mic. One final time, Dr. Wong to issue an actionable personal challenge for the audience. Wong: Well, I think especially if you're outside of Pittsburgh, if you think this model as a patient could work for, you know, your friend, yourself, your family, tell this to your medical provider. Because I think we need to get the word out that this is a model. And I think in the next few months, we're going to show that this is completely financially sustainable. We're growing pretty quickly. I've already been able to pay myself a salary after a few months. Traditionally it takes two years for practiced and mature. And we've gotten really far in just six months. But I think I need help getting this model out there. And if you're a patient who thinks that your community can benefit, spread the word. Tell your friends, share it on Facebook, share it on social media. And hopefully a medical provider who has the ability to get into this model can see it and be like, wow, people are talking about this. You know, this could work for me. You know, I might be in a position where this could work and we can spread this model, you know, across the country and provide care in a better way, and for a lot of people who don't have insurance or have high copays, or just have problems with access who, who can't even see a PCP for four weeks. So if you are a patient spread the word so that, you know, we can spread this model and get more providers knowledgeable that this is a model that could work for them. Watson: Right on. Dr. Wong. Thank you so much for coming on the podcast. Wong: Oh, thank you for having me. Watson: We just went deep with Dr. Timothy Wong. Hope Everyone out there has a fantastic day.
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Jack Welsh is the co-owner of LumberjAxes and Sliders Curling. He has successfully transitioned from a union job and bartending gig into running a business that delivers genuinely unique experiences.
He and his co-founders first came across axe throwing in Philadelphia and decided to bring the concept to Pittsburgh. It’s been a winner and has grown to multiple locations. To keep the momentum going, he has now opened Sliders Curling in the adjacent lot to offer competitive, bar-style curling to their customers. In this conversation, you’ll hear Jack and Aaron discuss the origins of the company, how Jack transitioned out of his day job, and the capital required to get the company off the ground. Pittsburgh’s best conference to Expand your Mind & Fill your Heart happens once a year. Jack Welsh’s Challenge; Go out of town to find some new entertainment options. Connect with Lumberjaxes Axe Throwing Axethrowingpgh.com Connect with Sliders Curling Slidersbarandgames.com If you liked this interview, check out episode 184 with Ed Bailey & Day Bracey where we discuss comedy, drinking partners podcast, and creative partnership.
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Bill Sarris has been in the candy business for more than 40 years. Upon graduating from college, Bill joined his father’s business and has overseen significant growth while building a Sarris Candies into a regional leader in chocolates.
Sarris Candies was started by his father Frank in the family’s basement. Behind Bill’s efforts, the company grew to include more than 350 employees and $16 million in annual sales. Today, the Sarris Chocolate Factory and Ice Cream Parlour fill an area the size of a football field with over 100 yards of chocolate, penny candy, ice cream, and plush toys. In this conversation, Bill and Aaron discuss flying to Europe to buy equipment in the 70s, Sarris’ five channels of revenue, and the strategic acquisition of Gardeners Candies. Pittsburgh’s best conference to Expand your Mind & Fill your Heart happens once a year. Bill Sarris’s Challenge; If you find something you like, go after it. Connect with Bill Sarris Sarris Candies Website If you liked this interview, check out episode 306 with Bryan Salesky where we discuss Argo Ai, self-driving cars, and what he learned from the DARPA challenge.
Underwritten by Piper Creative
Piper Creative creates podcasts, vlogs, and videos for companies. Our clients become better storytellers. How? Click here and Learn more. We work with Fortune 500s, medium-sized companies, and entrepreneurs. Follow Piper as we grow YouTube TikTok Subscribe on iTunes | Stitcher | Overcast | Spotify
Watson: “Bill, thank you for coming on down here and being on the podcast.”
Bill Sarris: “Hey, you're welcome!” Watson: ”I want to start off. The name Sarris to any listener who has spent any extended period of time in Pittsburgh.. he's gonna be familiar because the candies are/have been all over the place. The Hallmark store may be a school fundraiser here and there, but I want to actually go back and take it. Upon graduating, you entered the family business. You were probably around the family business.” Bill Sarris: “Well before that, yes I was.” Watson: “But where did you start when you transitioned into kind of full-time work from being a student or a youth?” Bill Sarris: “I graduated from W&J College in Washington, PA. I always stayed close so that I could come home and work. My dad wanted me.. he needed help. He was the one-man show. I came back after college my plan was just like.. every dad wants their kid to be a doctor or a lawyer, so I went to W & J, planned on going to medical school, and then came back, and I just said I'd rather come into the business. If I don't, it's gonna ruin my golf game. It was just something that I wanted to do. We wanted to grow. There was a lot of potential at that time. I said, hey, there were just three: my dad, my grandfather, a couple of my dad's sisters, who worked there. So, when I was coming in, you know, it definitely was just a small family business.” Watson: “Yeah, that's the definition of family business. So, in terms of the vision that you saw, the potential that you saw, for what did you see to be done or that could be done that wasn't being done at that point in time because it was 1975, right?” Bill Sarris: “It was 1975. Prior to that, my dad was just working in the wintertime when the school season was going. In the summer, timely delivery closed the candy store. It was closed in the summers, so me coming into the business, the idea was originally to start fundraising when I was a senior in high school, when we needed to raise money. So, I said, ‘hey, let's put a little worksheet together and our school will sell some candy.’ We didn't know what was gonna happen, you know? The school needed at that time three thousand dollars. They bought, you know, four hundred kids their yearbooks, our cap and gowns, paid for their prom, and that type of stuff. So, have that come, and say, you know what? There's something here. We need to do fundraising. My dad says, ‘well you can't sell what you don't have.’ I said, ‘I'll take care of that. I said I'm going to Europe. I'm gonna go buy equipment.’ He said, ‘you're crazy, I’m sorry.’ I called the bank, got the money, no problem. So, I went to Europe, bought some equipment, and came back. So, we needed the equipment. If we sold candy, we had to be able to produce it, so that was a gamble.Yeah. But that was the thing that, coming into family business, that the opportunity I had, that my dad didn't. My opportunity was he had some money. When he started the business, he had nothing.” Watson: “He started it out of his basement.” Bill Sarris: “He started in his basement. I mean, literally playing around because he saw other candy guys and what they were doing. That really.. the catch was he knew a local candy guy in Cannonsburg that said, ‘hey, can you deliver me a truckload of candy up to Erie?’ So, he jumps in the truck. He said it was snowing, and he drove to Erie. He comes back. The guy gave him a hundred-dollar bill. Now that was way back when. He says ‘a hundred-dollar bill.. I'm warning the candy business.’ That's kind of, you know, one of the reasons why he went into the business. But that made all the opportunities for me.” Watson: “So you would say that in terms of him having some money? In habit, some options there was a little bit of..he came from a place of ‘let us scrounge to get by. Let's keep this thing alive. Save, save, save.. nested away for a rainy day.’ You saw it partially as an opportunity to say like ‘we can make some investment here. We can kind of our trajectory of growth through making some strategic moves.’” Bill Sarris: “The difference between that generation and my generation was his investment. He wanted to make money because he grew up and didn't have any. So, he busted his tail to sit there and grow a small business and to make some money, you know? I came in with the opportunity that we could really grow this thing in different directions, as opposed to just literally making candy yourself and then selling it in your candy store. Yes, he sold to groups or local groups like the VFW and their Christmas parties and things like that. You know, there was an ‘ooh’ there's a big order. It's funny as we go back and we have records. At Easter time, my dad had a little sheet, and it said ‘could have sold three more eggs.’ Well, he only made 24, okay? So, he goes, ‘sold 27.’ I mean, those records are in there. So when I came in, again, I'm jumping ahead, but years later, I had to ask him and my mom one day. I said, ‘hey, do you know you know many eggs we’re making today?’ My dad says, ‘I don't know how many, maybe a thousand-five thousand?’ I said, ‘no 30,’ and his response was ‘you're crazy.’ Don't make that many. You're never gonna sell them. I said, they're sold, but that was the difference in the numbers.” We the generation changed, you know? It just became a bigger business, you know, and stretched out into other areas.” Watson: “So, let's go back to the first story you said that you go to Europe to go buy some equipment. What has to be more of that conversation as opposed to like, okay, hopping a plane I'm coming back with some equipment? Bill Sarris: “What did I look like? Well, I had called the bank and said, ‘hey I'm gonna go buy some equipment’ and there was a special company that made candy equipment. That's who I wanted to go see.” Watson: “Gotcha.” Bill Sarris: “Well one of their reps.. Well not reps, one of their partners broke off and went off on his own. I talked to him and he started a company making candy chocolate coding lines, you know? That's basically what? You run a piece of candy down there. It covers it and goes down. It gets cold and you put it in a box. So he had said, ‘hey I'll build machines for you and we have to make a deal.’ Now these machines at the time were about $300,000 each. My plan was to buy one when he came back and said ‘I'll make you a deal. I need to get my equipment in America.’ He says, ‘I'll give you three machines that you can put in your place. Three.’ He says, ‘I want $75,000, but I want it in cash.’ I said ‘I'll be back.’” Watson: “Gotta make some calls.” Bill Sarris: “I flew home, went back to my dad, and he said, there's some famous words, ‘you're crazy’ and I went back, went to the bank, and got a document that said it was okay to carry that cash. I carried that cash back to Germany and handed it over, and three months later they ship three pieces of equipment over.” Watson: “Wow.” Bill Sarris: “Yeah, so that was pretty strange carrying that on the plane and, you know, you have a little bag. You know, with a note in there from the bank. You have to go through customs, and everybody wants to look in the bag. It wasn't an issue. Now we had equipment that we had to go sell so that we could hire employees to run the equipment.” Watson: So, what you're saying is you kept one of the pieces?” Bill Sarris: “No, we kept them all.” Watson: “You kept them all. You had to sell the candy, right, to validate the cost of production?” Bill Sarris: “Yes. Those machines.. and it was, you know, surprisingly it didn't take long.” Watson: “Well, I would imagine that if your dad was making a note saying like ‘we could have sold more I didn't have the supplies,’ there's a degree to which, in that kind of time period, late seventies and in the 80s, your capacity to just produce a that scale was a differentiator relative to the market. If every kind of neighborhood had a candy store of sorts you were hitting a capacity that those other stores couldn't necessarily get to?” Bill Sarris: “Yes, and what we could do was that if somebody needed chocolates or needed candies, whether it was another candy company, in a sense to sit there and say ‘Hey. You know, I need this. I'm selling stuff to this group of stores, and boy I need these items.” You know, my question was ‘when do you need them?’ We could do that quickly. That really helped in our growth. People said yeah word-of-mouth in your vendors and other people said, ‘you know what, if you want something, you're stuck, call him. Call him. He'll get it done for you.’” Watson: “That's a great reputation to have.” Bill Sarris: “‘Oh you know what.. we still do it.’ That has not stopped. That's it. That's really one of our key things that we do for other people. It’s that we're able to do something very quickly.” Watson: “Gotcha, cool. So, moving forward a little bit, I guess, not even moving forward. You even alluded to it already. The sales in schools and a portion of the proceeds associated with those sales from you know kids listening to their neighbors or the aunt or the uncle or whoever for the school funding.. can you talk a little bit more about how that model works and how you grew that?” Bill Sarris: “What started to be again a local school Cannon Macmillan, where I graduated from, kind of was the key. They started selling candy.They take a sheet they get 35% of the profits, and with the same prices in our store and all that. It was an opportunity for people to buy candy and not come right to our door. That way all the kids would deliver it. The kids would do that and would distribute it, but the key was when either let's say the band. One high school band was selling candy, and the band directors talk.” They go, ‘man, you got brand new uniforms? You got this? Where'd you get that?’ ‘Man we got this program here. We sell candy during the holidays.’ ‘Wow, you do? ‘Okay, there's the guy go see.’ So, it was more word-of-mouth.” Then I was going out with a sales guy and, you know, knocking on the door. It was word-of-mouth. You get one, then the next one, then the next one, and the next two. It became, you know, a pyramid. That really grew quite fast. That became a big part of our business.” Watson: “So if you were having so many referrals and inbound, does that mean that in terms of scaling up the team, you were investing in operations and the actual production of the candy? Where was the investment coming from outside of that machinery?” Bill Sarris: “The investment was just coming in people. It was about finding employees okay that could come in quickly and do the work. At that time, it was done right, having family and friends in there and doing that. But eventually, you were able to make more, and my goal was to make full-time jobs. That was really a key because before that our candy was seasonal. I always said, ‘Whenever school starts, that's your season. When school is in, that's kind of the candy season.’ We call it that cuz summertime is not a candy season. The less clothes people wear, the less candy they eat.” Watson: “That makes a lot of sense.” Bill Sarris: “Very simple. Very simple. As soon as you start putting a lot of clothes on, you can eat more candy. So, fundraising was a big key in our growth. That got us to expand quickly, and the only place you could get candy at that time was in our store or through a fundraising group, and that was a good sale both ways until later on. That was how we did it for a while.” Watson: “Gotcha. Well, you said for a while and then later on that change. Can you explain that?” Bill Sarris: “Later on, there was an opportunity for a friend of ours. Candy people were very friendly back then. They worked together. They helped each other out. They went on vacations together. I mean, it was a very close community. So, a person in Pittsburgh who was dealing with Giant Eagle, they had three spots in Giant Eagle, and the father passed away. Well, the daughter came to us and said, ‘hey, it's November. I gotta get out of Giant Eagle. They need a supplier.’ Of course, my dad says no, man. Well, fundraising in our store, we don't want to do that. I said, ‘we don't have a choice. We got to help this girl out.’ So we did, and we had said, ‘well, how much candy are they selling?’ She says, ‘well, they do about $5,000 per store for Christmas.’ Well, we went in there, those three Giant Eagles, and it was fifty thousand each store.” Watson: “That’s a bit of a misestimation.” Bill Sarris: “Well one thing was, we were able to supply them. That's one thing we were able to do. So, they were thrilled. That's how we expanded. What started as going into Giant Eagle was the first grocery chain that we were dealing with. Again, 3 stores, then we did 5, then we did 7, and we did 10. You know, it wasn't like a boom all at one time.” That was how we stepped into another area of business, when we were host selling and that expanded.” Watson: “Gotcha. Now does the wholesaling represent a majority of the business that Sarris is doing now?” Bill Sarris: “It's a part of the business. What we do is, I was using my hands, you know, because we have corporate sales. We have our retail store, we have fundraising, we have private labels. I'm probably missing something, but there's the big four. So I always said it. We try to keep them relatively important. Because if you lose a finger you know you can still golf. Okay.. you can still go so you don't put all your eggs in one basket. The hotel end is a big, growing part. We're out in a lot of stores, you know? Let’s expand again. It's word-of-mouth where you have Hallmarks and you have, you know, Giant Eagle, then you know the grocery Shopping and Saves. You have just everyday self owners that own stores and that one premium chocolate. So, we've got probably thirteen hundred stores, okay? 800 stores that we actually service. We do the servicing in every one of those eight hundred stores.” Watson: “What does that entail? I'm not particularly familiar with retail.” Bill Sarris: “When we go into a store like Giant Eagle, we say all we want is a location, that's it. We want to pick the location with you. We need the square footage that we ask for, and our people will place your orders. We will restock everything, keep everything going, and you don't have to do a thing. They don't do anything and we have 100% guarantee of the stock. So, you know, it’s phenomenal. They don't have to do anything, and we manage it all. That's really the key to it's worth, so service-oriented, and every part of the business that we do. That's a big key that I have, you know competitors, in a sense can't do that. Again, we're local. Now you know I say local. We go about 150 miles that we service, and do this in these stores, so, you know, outside of that is a different story.” Watson: “Gotcha. Yeah, that was one of my notes, it's kind of mid-atlantic region Ohio, West Virginia, and Western PA.. being able to serve that area. What's fascinating there is the brand name. I even kind of thought about how you know the names of the last names that would be familiar to someone who grew up in Pittsburgh, like I did. Sarris is one of those names where I can picture the exact square footage. that You probably know the like dimensions down, but if I walked by it in the Shop and Save right where I grew up, I can picture exactly that kind of area that you can see the brand.” Bill Sarris: “It's a key that we want to be very consistent on. It’s building the brand and keeping that brand.” Watson: “If you think about the decision that those retailers are making, you're not a headache because you're servicing it yourself. There is a brand. There's a demand, particularly, in the one half of the year when people are wearing more clothes to have that candy. So, it becomes a very easy decision for them to keep you in stock and to keep you in that position, because there they've got 18 other things that they're trying to deal with, and Sarris is there selling.” Bill Sarris: “Correct. They don't have to put any labor into it or anything. There's no cost other than space. Space is valuable, you know? Every little space is valuable in those stores, so to let us operate the way we do is really important.” Watson: “So when you think about the brand, you eluded the brand in the last answer. You know, every single part of packaging is distinct. The coloring is distinct. It's got to be good candy. When you brought in some of these pretzels here, we're probably gonna devour these as soon as or maybe even before you leave the building. That's a huge part of the brand. It being, you know, tasty and delicious and people wanting to continue to consume it. What were the other considerations beyond that as you thought about building the Sarris brand? How else have you thought about that as the company has grown?” Bill Sarris: “We're starting to stretch a little bit in areas that our brand is not familiar. So, we're going out there. We're recently working with some brokers. I know when I say recently, I'm saying in the last four months. There's two brokers that we’ve hired. There's one in Kansas City, and there's one up in the Buffalo area. The Buffalo area is doing a piece and going into some chains with specific products. Now they don't know our brand, so we have to go in there and make sure we try to get people to taste it. So, we do tastings. Hopefully they like that taste and they're gonna go buy that, cuz candy is very regional, okay? Everybody grew up okay with a certain candy. It's like I'm spaghetti. No matter how bad it is, it's my it's mom spaghetti, and that's what everything is compared to. So is candy. Candy is regional for us. To go in an area and not have a brand and know people don't know our brand makes it very difficult to build that territory. Unless you go into, and what we're doing, you go into places like you know, Century 21/C 21s in New York. We're working with them. They're gonna do some stuff for Easter specific products. Now what we forced them to do is that we have to make an impact. You can't just throw a couple boxes of pretzels or a couple eggs on a shelf. There has to be a reasonable amount so that our brand statement is there, and that's the key again. It's the, you know, the color, the packaging, the things that people are going to remember and hopefully go back and say, ‘man that was good.’ You have to go try that, and that's, you know, the-word-of-mouth is a huge key when you're not in our own little area.” Watson: “As a retailer, they're, you know, they maybe have their certain areas that are mainstays that they're selling in a certain square footage. Then with another part of their square footage, they're always testing to find the other thing that will sell better than the other things that they're trying in their space.” Bill Sarris: “They are any place you go. Any retailer that you go to, we look at it. Do you go to Target and you see a wall of chocolates from everywhere? You know, from Europe, you know, you ask everything. The things you never heard of but they're key to selling is that they sell more afterwards on sale than they do during the holiday. Well, I don't want to deal like that. I don't want to stick my product in the center with that other stuff. I need to stand out. I want the candies over there. I want to be over there on my own little hole. I need that niche. Otherwise, we don't do it. We have to keep our brand. The word brand is just so important, and it's difficult sometimes to get salespeople today convinced that you know what, I don't care about them selling. I care about the brand. The brand will sell eventually, okay.” Watson: “Well that's the challenge with incentives. You know a salesperson that's on a you know a quarterly sales goal or some sort of yearly quota is strongly incentivized to kind of see things through a short term lens. Beyond just having your name on the actual packaging, there's a degree to which when it's a family business, when you've been in it for a while, and you intend to maybe not just bring it yourself to pass it onto the next generation. You are gonna over-optimize an over- index on that long-term reputation and brand. Perhaps even at the sacrifice of some short-term revenue.” Bill Sarris: “But their long-term revenue is so much better. Yeah, okay, it's like an investment over long-term. You're gonna make much more than you would in one short little bang, and yes, does it happen? Sure. Do okay in other things, but you know on the brand end, to build that brand we have to keep certain standards.” Watson: “Yeah, so another question that I wanted to ask you about while I had you was that you mentioned the grocery stores. I've seen it in both Giant Eagle and Shop and Save. I remember seeing it in Hallmark, but Hallmark has had some hard times, and in general across retail there, it's a slightly overblown media fabrication. The retail apocalypse and these stores and malls and not being what they once were, with the advent of the internet, and the explosion of direct to consumer brands that are kind of built as e-commerce being kind of the initial or the first assumption of a channel, and then, you know, Warby Parker has a store now. I sense a trend. They have physical retail locations, but they're starting internet first, and what's fascinating to me is they have to invest. I was just looking at the Casper Mattress IPO they have to invest boatloads into marketing to try to build a brand out of nothing, whereas a company like Sarris that might not have the same like starting DNA of selling things online has that brand equity that's been built up over 50 years that can be tapped into. and My question to you, and all that is navigating this transition, maintaining relationships with retailers, I'm already having the relationship with a lot of schools as part of their fundraisers as you think about the digital side and the e-commerce side of a chocolate business how have you been thinking about that?” Bill Sarris: “We've done quite a bit with online sales, and it goes back of course when there were people that you had to get on the internet. It was called ‘internet in a box guy,’ and it was thin on boxes and stuff to plug in. There was an advertising agency that we were using at the time. The guy's name was John Juno. He passed away. He said, ‘hey, you need to have a website.’ What? I didn't even know what he was talking about, okay? ‘You need a website. You need email addresses. We're gonna do this. They're gonna do direct mail, but you're gonna get people. I'm gonna put an order form in this mailer and you're gonna put a phone number, and you're gonna put this website thing on.’ Their ‘website thing’ I called it. They're gonna be able to go on there, and they're gonna place an order, and you're gonna get the order. You're gonna send it up. I said, ‘alright let's try it.’ So, that time it was way ahead of our time. Everybody didn’t have the internet okay, we called it mail order. It was something because the brochure we sent out was a candy store in your mailbox, so you got a catalog, and then you could call and you do that. So, on the digital end, we've been doing it for years. It's a big part of our business that we sit and do that. Especially because you got a lot of transients that leave Pittsburgh. Okay, they're gone. They're out. You know them to sit there and go ‘oh my God, you got a website. That's great! Let me order some candy.’ The only problem with sending candy online is Florida/Arizona. The heat, that's of course packaging, and that's ice packs, and things like that. That was the other finger on the business. It was the digital end, which we just been doing and that continues to grow.” Watson: “Yeah, I would imagine so, and the craziest thing about that is that's where brand becomes even more significant because maybe I come in the grocery store. I'm just looking for candy, and it catches my eye, and I go over there. I don't necessarily know what it is that I'm picking up. For someone to come to the website and for someone to make that online order, it really has to effectively be the brand that brought them there. They remember that candy they had as a kid.” Bill Sarris: “Correct. It's the only way, you know, you're not gonna get people/strangers that are calling them. Facebook's big for us in communicating with, what do we want to call them, fans. On Facebook, we do a lot of email stuff and a lot of promos and stuff, and that's the art, basically. That's our customer Instagram. We do stuff on there that’s small. You don't sell there or even on LinkedIn. It's more of a connection than it is a place where you're gonna go. Somebody's gonna buy something, yeah, but you're out there, and that's really what it is. You are out there and somebody's gonna see something, okay, and you might get lucky and get a new person that says ‘hey, let me try that.’ That's something that we do on our end, to sit there and say ‘you know, what we're 100% guaranteed. You try it, you don't like it, give me your money back.’ So does it happen, yeah. Occasionally, somebody will say, ‘oh you know what, I'm used to dark chocolate. I don't like milk chocolate.’ No problem, you know? It's not a problem, but you can't mean that that type of thing is going to grow continuously. You're not gonna get away from the digital stuff. That's where you know, that's the Amazon.” Watson: “What about experimenting with products, so like,what you brought in here that the pretzels, I don't even know how many of these have eaten in my life, but this is an old reliable. This has been a staple of the Sarris product line for a long time as you may be you're looking at reports, maybe it's through testing, what do you think about new product lines that you could introduce versus just timeless classics of the chocolate business that you know the eggs that are just going to continue to deliver for every Easter?” Bill Sarris: “We always look and see what new products may be taking chocolate and presenting it in a different way. The fad stuff never works for us. That doesn't work for us. Our customers are people that know us have a favorite.” Don't screw with their favorite piece of candy, you don't. That's what they're gonna go to, okay? With everybody watching their calories, and this health thing, and all that kind of stuff, they're enjoying their candy. They're not gonna take that gamble. They go say ‘oh I'm not trying that new thing I just want what I like.’ So we kind of stick with the basics, okay? Then we make every type of candy that you can think of. But not the fad stuff that comes. I can't even think of a fad thing that's been in and out. I can't even think of one.” Watson: “Yeah, it makes sense. I have a good friend, and he talks about Cinnabon. They experimented for a while with like a low carb, low fat cinnamon roll that somebody gets it like the mall or the airport and it's like.. that's not the job of Cinnabon. Cinnabon’s job is ‘I'm having a terrible time, you know, transporting from one place to another, or you know, in the mall I want my indulgence, and I don't need half of my indulgences. I want my indulgences.’ That's the job that you have as a role to play, and these feel like that type of role.” Bill Sarris: “That's exactly it. This is what you're selling right here. I can't take sugar out of that chocolate because it's not gonna be the same. Okay, I can't use soy instead of milk. I can't. I can't do that. There's beans, there's milk, and there's sugar, and some cocoa butter, okay? I mean there's not that much to it, you know? That's what people want. You can't change that. I can't do it. I can't do that. It is what it is.” And that's the brand. It's reliable and it's trusted and that's why so many people love it. You know what you're gonna get when you're sitting there doing that. You've traveled a little bit, where you're driving down the road and you're hungry and you see these little restaurants along the way but you don't stop, and you see Wendy's or McDonald's and ‘you know what? I'm gonna go there.’ You really don't want to go there, but you do there cuz you know what you're gonna get. You have the other place, you might not get one. So this one ,here, I'll take that. Okay, and again that's their brand. You know their brand. You know exactly what you're gonna get when you go there. It might not be exactly what you want, but you know what you're gonna get.” Watson: “Yeah. That's a powerful note to end on, Bill. We've got our standard last two questions that we always ask but before we end. Is anything else you were hoping to share today before we ask any more questions?” Bill Sarris: “You can come and see us. Our biggest thing here is that we want people to come to our store, and we do things all the time to get people in there from murals, to things, and now we're building a whole wall that's gonna be a chocolate waterfall. Come see us, online visit us on all the digital sites from Instagram to LinkedIn, and join me on LinkedIn. I always post a lot of stuff on LinkedIn.” Watson: “I was impressed by how much you're posting.” Bill Sarris: “Yeah I got it. That's the only digital thing that I do myself. For everything else, we have our own team that does it. For that one, there's mine, and I just like to have fun with it.” Watson: “I was gonna make an acknowledgement of that. I do like the way you use LinkedIn.” Bill Sarris: “Now I think if I don't do something, I'm thinking like they're gonna go ‘oh why isn't he doing something? Is Bill okay? So what's going on?’” Watson: “Right on. We're gonna link that all in the show notes. We'll have the website, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and all that good stuff for people in the Podcast app. We're probably listing this right now or in the show notes at goingdeepwithaaron.com. Before we give you a chance to issue the actionable challenge for the audience though, I want to ask one other question that I almost forgot about. In 1997, you acquired Gardener’s Candies, which was kind of more of a Central PA based candy company. Can you talk a little bit just about the acquisition that happened but also what you learned from acquiring a business like that?” Bill Sarris: “When we first found out that they were not doing well ,we needed production because our facilities were landlocked. They had a facility there with the equipment and things, so there was an opportunity there to go in and buy it. When we did, of course, there was a decision. They had stores. Do we change it to Sarris? That gave us an opportunity just to have Gardeners. They had a decent name. A good name, and one of the top online products was their Peanut Butter Melt Away, which was trademarked. Gardner's original Peanut Butter Melt Away which still is a great product that sells, so I mean, that was the key. We went in there, and we kept it. We said, you know what, ‘we're gonna clone it like ours, so if you go there and you see Gardener’s, you'll see our boxes are the same.’ A few pieces inside may be slightly different, but if you'd walk in the Gardener’s right now they may be making Sarris Pretzels. If you come to our place and we're making cherries, we're using Gardener’s boxes, and they're doing cherries, where we are two companies under one umbrella.” Watson: “Yeah, and you've become integrated- all your systems and processes.” Bill Sarris: “Yes.” Watson: “What's curious to me is that Gardener’s, when they were under some rough times, made a choice to come to you versus go to some private equity firm or some other potential avenue for capital.” Bill Sarris: “They were already sold to somebody else, and then a salesman had come to me and said, ‘hey, did you hear about Gardener’s?’ I said, ‘no, what's going on?’ He says, ‘they sold to I don't know who they were, but they sold to somebody.’ A week later he called. Well, a week later, he calls me and says that sale went through. I looked at my dad, and I said, ‘hey, we're buying a place.’ He said ‘you're crazy.’ I am like ‘we're buying it. We need it. It's perfect for us and it's not that far.’ We went in literally the next day. Him and I went up there and we wrote a check. I said to borrow the money. He said, ‘no, we're writing a check. Let's just get it out of our hands. I don't like to borrow money.’ I'm gonna bar on anything, so that was his thing. We did that, and I mean, we went in and I lived there for two years. I went back and forth all week long. I just stayed there. There were people who thought I was crazy, but I've been in from scrubbing the floors, to cooking in the kitchen, to running the lines cuz I wanted it done my way. It was a surprise when they'd see me crawling under a machine and fixing something and doing that stuff, and they said that you know he's crazy. Well, no that's what I do. People don't realize I've done all that. Okay, because I grew up making little bundles of 12 bunnies before I went to bed at night, so you know, it was interesting for people to see that down and dirty, I was in there. I could run the equipment. I could cook everything. I could do that, and scrub the floors. I want somebody who has never scrubbed the floor before and say I'll teach you how to scrub a floor. I don't want somebody coming in and saying ‘oh I've been a janitor for years.’ ‘I'll teach you. I want to teach somebody, and that's how you build a great team. It’s your being able to speak from experience, and they become your family, and they love you. They don't like you, they love you. They have a great job. They do well. I told the kid that was 20 years old, I said, ‘you know you're gonna have a 401k. You're gonna get this. You got your health insurance.’ I said, ‘you realize if you're here.. you're 20 years old, by the time you're 65, you're gonna be a millionaire.’ It's very difficult for somebody that's making $10 an hour to understand that. I'm matching some numbers for him. He's gonna put 20 bucks in, I'm gonna put 20 bucks in. ‘So by the time you retire, I'll still be working’, he's gonna be retired. You know, so it's interesting to go in and buy a business like that and walk in the door, teaching people that you are exactly like them, and that you're working with them. Even though you know you're the boss, you know I'm the guy.” Watson: “Yeah, it's powerful. This has been fantastic talking with you, Bill. It was great. I really enjoyed it. I want to give you the opportunity to take the mic one more time and issue an actionable challenge directly to the audience.” Bill Sarris: “What's an actionable challenge?” Watson: “An actionable challenge means that sometimes people will say ‘go consider all of the options, and do what's right for you.’ It’s very fluffy and superfluous. We're talking about things.. that maybe something you've done yourself or that you recommend other aspiring ambitious people could do in the next day, week, or month that's tangible, you know?” Bill Sarris: “The message to anybody really is to.. yeah like my kids.. my kids are 40. Now that generation, but the next generation, my grandkids- there's so much going on, so many things, so many opportunities, I don't know which direction anybody wants to go. I did go find something. Do something you're gonna really enjoy doing- you can't wait to go do it. I don't care what it is. I don't care what it is! You've done it. , I went to school for this, and you went another direction- same thing that I did. So you know, is school important? Sure. It's important, but if you find something you like, and that's just an old saying, you find something you like, go do it. Go after it. Opportunities are just there, out there, there's so much to do especially now.” Watson: “Yeah, that's a beautiful note to wrap up on. Thank you so much for coming on the podcast.” Bill Sarris: “It was great I loved it.” 
Glen Meakem is the founder & CEO of a permanent cloud photo storage and sharing company called Forever. He previously took his first technology startup, FreeMarkets, public in late-1999.
FreeMarkets grew up during the height of the Dotcom Bubble and reached a peak valuation of over $10 billion. While the spectacular highs of the bubble could not last, underneath the market Glen was tripling revenues each year and operating. After selling FreeMarkets to Ariba in 2004, Glen started angel and venture investing. Some of his most successful investments include Kiva Systems (sold to Amazon), HotPads (sold to Zillow), and Niche.com. After wrapping up a successful venture career, Glen returned to being an entrepreneurial operator. Forever was built because Glen was frustrated by the short-term business models and incentives offered from other cloud storage providers. In this podcast interview, you’ll hear Glen and Aaron discuss timeless leadership principles, how to recognize a business opportunity, and stories from the tech bubble. Glen Meakem’s Challenge; Don’t sit on the sidelines. Get in the game and take action. Walk through the door. Be ethical. Be kind. Pittsburgh’s best conference to Expand your Mind & Fill your Heart happens once a year. 
Connect with Glen MeakemConnect with Glen Meakem Forever.com If you liked this interview, check out episode 303 with Luke Skurman where we discuss founding Niche, recruiting engineering talent, and why follow-through is so important.
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