How a Failed Franchise Launched a 30-Year Business Success Story
welcome to the Art of Succession podcast
with Barrett Young join us as we explore
the strategies stories and insights that
shape the journey of leadership
transitions and business success no
matter where you find yourself along the
journey this is the podcast where you'll
find the tools to make it happen i was
passionate and still am about my
business so if I'm in a sales situation
I'm very passionate about it cuz I
believe in it we just grew uh word of
mouth marketing efforts uh internally uh
externally my partner was not interested
in the payroll uh payroll is a very
complex field uh more so than people
realize take that and take the
responsibilities and and the liability
that goes with it and um have your own
firm my name is Barrett Young and this
is the Art of Succession podcast my
guest today is Charles Reid CEO of Get
Payroll in Dallas Texas charles bought
an accounting franchise in 1991 and has
since grown and refocused it into a
payroll company charles welcome to the
art of succession barrett thank you very
much for having me it's a pleasure to be
with you so uh I want to start off just
asking you know what brings you to talk
about succession planning here on the
art of succession what really interested
you in getting in front of my audience
well it's the same reason I wrote my
most recent book is providing
information to clients and potential
clients uh is something that I like to
do um anything that adds to their
education
uh is great anything that puts us in
front of potential clients is even
better awesome thank you Charles i
appreciate that so you are a CPA a
fellow CPA how long have you been a CPA
uh it's uh let's see this is 25
uh
47 years
okay
so about 10 to 15 years there working
for other companies then as about about
15 years in the corporate world gotcha
uh after I got my MBA I went to work for
Texas Instruments and then I spent 15
years basically in the corporate world
large companies small companies
turnaround startups lots of wonderful
experience but uh I knew I was never
going to get to the top of a major
corporation i don't have the political
skills uh I'm unwilling to stab people
in the back and toss them off the ladder
so if I was going to run a company I was
going to have to start my own okay uh
talk to me just about the the landscape
in 1991 um accounting franchises really
aren't known uh that much anymore uh in
the you know in the profession so talk
to me about what it was like in the late
80s and how you found an accounting
franchise and let's talk through that
success that uh acquisition a little bit
i have to say it was
serendipity i had finished my uh time at
JC Penney with a contract dispute
um they wanted to void my contract and
have me do other things and I wasn't
willing to do that and my lawyer who was
handling that uh had a
friend who had
uh Financial Express it was a mobile
accounting service okay okay like go to
somebody's house and prepare their tax
return kind of thing go to their
business we had a van that would vans
that would go to the business park in
the parking lot get the stuff do the
books go over the financials with the
owner and go on to the next one okay and
they needed a COO so I went in and was
working for Financial Express the board
was pushing the president to get rid of
the original office
uh and concentrate on franchising
so I said "Hey I'll buy it." And I did
uh now a year later the franchiseor went
belly up uh mismanagement
um some piccadillos some other things
going on that just weren't right and so
a year later uh the franchise or
disappeared we just changed the name and
kept on going and that was over a third
of a century ago
so you were working there in one of
these vans going you know doortodoor
business to business i had I had I had
two vans and uh another accountant and
was going to to door to door and uh
every time I'd uh go to a client I'd uh
that I hadn't been to before i'd pull
the doors on every side just to hand out
additional information try and find
clients and uh marketed and did all the
things my wife and I started it
together so uh it worked um work life
balance wasn't a problem because she was
there as much as I was u was she was she
the other accountant or was she on admin
kind of she was the admin and customerf
facing person uh she people liked her
she's a people person was uh I'm I'm I'm
an accountant i mean you know you
understand we're we're not people people
we're we're numbers people uh you know
we're professional nitpickers uh you
know naysayers and and excitement
dousers all that kind of stuff as as
long as Yeah you know I you've been to
CPA conventions 8 o'clock at night
they're all in bed they don't go out and
party
okay it's crazy at a CPA convention
there's There's no night life
that's funny like I said I haven't heard
of accounting franchises i mean you've
got like tax shops and stuff like that
like an H&R Block i don't really
consider those accounting franchises i
guess they are but was this unique at
the time this kind of Well American
Express was uh trying to franchise
accountants
uh basically buy up accounting uh
practices and and have them practice
under the American Express name they got
legally they got legally shut down
because of that in several states and
quit doing it uh but this was a
consolidation time the the big four was
well the big eight the big 10 was coming
down to the big four and there was a lot
of turmoil uh in the accounting industry
uh there were people trying to do
franchising uh there were people trying
to do uh bookkeeping franchises and act
as accountants and it was it was a
tumultuous time uh
and some succeeded some didn't obviously
uh Financial Express went out of
business um they turned out that they
their marketing program was based on one
individual and it wasn't repeatable
robert was a unique individual and could
sell his services and couldn't train
anybody else in his style mhm and so
that was the ultimate downfall of the
franchise was
marketing we tried all kinds of
different marketing we're fairly
successful over the years uh not as much
as I would have liked to have been uh
but I found out later
on 20 years later when I finally hired a
marketing person that I couldn't market
my way out of a paper
bag so I'm very pleased at what I was
able to accomplish because uh when I had
that marketing person I realized I
didn't know [ __ ] so it was it was
incredible
yeah marketing tends to be the downfall
for most firms especially in succession
planning because that is the thing that
a founder is really good at
relationships all that kind of stuff and
never really thought to train somebody
else to do that so I was passionate and
still am about my business mhm so if I'm
in a sales situation I'm very passionate
about it because I believe in it i think
we provide an excellent product
excellent service skill levels all these
things and it shows
uh but
salesman it's a little harder yeah yeah
and you have a little bit more freedom
as an owner to make deals and
concessions and double down on something
take a hard line too that it's it's hard
to train somebody else know yes so so
the board was encouraging this guy to
lean into the mobile business and you
wanted to buy the physical location is
that that was Well we we had a physical
office but we were still mobile oh okay
but it was we had I think three vans
there and I just I knocked it down to
two when I bought it uh but it was you
know you still have to have a physical
base for for for a mobile service at
that point in time uh this was long
before the internet okay and the email
and the internet basically put mobile
out of business because there's just no
need for it anymore they can they can
internet you know it's the the ability
to
communicate is so much greater than it
used to be before I started this I was
in the footwear business and we did a
lot of sourcing out of Taiwan
once fax machines came in we were able
to get designs literally back and forth
overnight we'd send them a design they'd
work on it at We'd send it to them on
our day which is their night they'd work
it on their day and fax it back to us
and we'd have it the next morning and
the turnaround went from four or five
days each way to 12 hours and then once
you put the internet in
uh wow i mean you know there's there's
just no need for on-site things like we
provided uh anymore there's just uh you
know we service payroll clients around
the country
um because it's all electronic now
there's just there's just no need for
paperwork physical paper i mean I've got
to get a wet signature for a 2848 but
that's about it good old IRS still stuck
in the fax machine days so
Yeah I I was talking to an agent the
other day they still they're they're I
swear they're the biggest user of fax
machines in the country
and paper checks still on many things so
yes
um so with the with the franchise you
know going under a couple months after
you came in what did that do to the
acquisition deal i mean did it get
renegotiated did it get wiped out talk
talk a little bit about that because
that sometimes happens so I had formed a
I had formed a corporation and we bought
the assets of the original
office and with that was a royalty
agreement okay but when the office
closed and they were providing no
support I quit paying royalties
we got a letter about a year later from
an
attorney and I hired a a franchise
attorney and we responded basically uh
to the extent since we're not receiving
any
services and no support you have
abregated the agreement we are not going
to pay any royalties and my attorney
said to the actual attorney that wrote
the letter since you know all of this
should you continue to pursue this we
will seek sanctions against you
personally
you never heard from him again
put that to bed real quick so
that that that was the end of it
cautionary tale about four months later
my attorney called me and said "Have you
heard anything?" I said "No I haven't
heard a thing." He said "Great let me
know if you do." He sent me a bill for
that phone call well of course yeah
absolutely
he thought I was done but he was
checking in so yep all right so you find
yourself now the owner of an accounting
company still doing the mobile thing
still you and one other accountant at
this point uh at that point he'd moved
on uh you know I was doing all the work
still doing books for companies on a on
a monthly basis then yes a lot of a lot
of monthly accounting uh obviously taxes
in in tax season um mostly corporate
taxes and the owner's taxes uh we
weren't a we weren't a retail tax shop i
had no interest in being a retail tax
shop and competing with you know H&R
Block and so on and so forth uh they
they can't do corporate taxes worth the
dam so it they weren't competition in
where I really wanted to be which was
businessto business gotcha yep so just
anybody listening this means he wasn't
just doing anybody off the street 1040
only tax returns sticking to the
business owners the the ones that really
needed t need tax planning too uh have
more complicated situations and m much
more uh higher bills and so on the only
simple ones I do would be the the
owner's kids
so you say "Can you can you take care of
Larry's?" Yeah fine w2 yeah 25 bucks and
and move on i mean you know just boom
yep that's not that's not the business I
wanted but you know when when when the
client's generating you know 6 or 800
bucks a month in fees and he wants a
little 1040 tax return done sure not a
problem Joe we'll be glad to take care
of it for you yep yep gotcha i don't I
don't want him to talk to another tax
guy or another CPA
yeah
so
um have you acquired any other companies
since then or is that the extent of your
own personal uh experience through
acquisition talk talk me through that a
little i know you've walked other
clients through this but was any of any
of your growth over the past 30 years
through acquisition no we looked at
several firms uh I had taken on a
partner in the accounting firm a few
years later okay and we looked at
another accounting firm or actually
several in town and got very close but
it just never came to never came to the
final uh we had one that we were all set
on we negotiated a uh lower price than
his initial ask and we were all set to
sign and somebody else came in and said
I'll buy it for what you're you're
asking for it so he said okay and uh um
it it did not go well because the guy
didn't know what he was doing but you
know it was too late at that point in
time uh and you know CPAs
are hard to deal with
so they they like secrecy and so on and
so forth so it's uh but no we didn't buy
anybody else we just grew uh word of
mouth marketing efforts uh internally uh
externally
um you know we're not as big as I would
have liked but it was a good living mhm
what was the purpose of bringing on
another partner a couple years later
just to double double the people signing
returns kind of thing too much business
i I had more business I could handle so
I had to expand the professional staff
so uh I brought on we tried a couple and
some worked some didn't
uh we had a very nice young man that I
hell he used to mow my lawn and he
became a CPA and I he worked for me for
a couple of years and then moved on to
another bigger position because we were
a small company mhm and so I looked for
a a partner and well I looked for a CPA
and I I liked Robert and so uh we made
an agreement and I sold him part of the
firm and then I made him a full partner
and it was an equal oper equal
partnership uh and then when uh the
money wasn't enough for him
uh and I was moving into the payroll I
sold him the rest of the accounting
practice here about 10 years ago and
kept all the payroll and moved solely
into the payroll business uh the only
taxes I do anymore are uh my own
companies multiple companies taxes my
personal taxes and you know a few
friends and I'm getting out of I'm
getting out of the friends i I'm getting
tired of that
um okay so you ran an accounting company
for the good majority of the history of
for about 20 years twothirds of the of
the lifetime so far of business so what
was it about payroll that because that's
a long time with a lot of established
clients i mean you've had clients for
probably all 20 of those years that
you're now like I'm not going to do your
taxes anymore you're going over to this
guy what was it that you started to see
shift in your interest or in the
business model or because mo just for
listeners context most CPA firms would
shut down the payroll or sell off the
payroll or move out of the payroll and
stick with the taxes
because payroll is tends to be a lower
profit center tends to be a higher
headache center um and so that's how
most people would look at it so you you
took the opposite tact with that why was
that
well my partner was not interested in
the payroll i actually was i enjoy that
it's it's really business to business uh
payroll is a very complex field uh more
so than people realize
uh and we were moved into multiple
states so we're now operating in in the
mid 90s with the internet we started to
pick up clients uh all over the country
uh and to me it was much more
fascinating i'd spent you know many many
years in the accounting field and and
the payroll field was was new to me and
much more interesting uh you know I was
a grass was greener and so it was more
fun so since we I needed to move income
to Robert I moved the accounting to him
and I kept the payroll and we split the
firm now all the clients were basically
familiar with Robert because I had been
starting to concentrate more on payroll
internally
so most of them knew who Robert was and
he was doing a lot of the taxes
already um Diana was working for us
part-time um she was an interesting hire
she'd been a full-time CPA at Brinker
International okay and had her first
baby and wanted to work part-time and
they wouldn't hire her part-time
so she came looking and I found her and
hired her immediately and a few months
later Brinker came and said "Well you
know we'd kind of like to have you
part-time now." And she said "No." And
she still works for us now uh
god 20 let's see Drew is 26 or 27 and
she came to us when he was 3 months old
so um she was there too
but so the transition of the accounting
over to Robert and and Diana went with
him uh went very smoothly we were doing
a lot of both accounting and payroll for
the same clients of course yeah
so we just split it up in the billing
we'd always we all we had always build
it separately
anyway so it wasn't a big change for
them to just call me for payroll and
them to call Robert for accounting and
tax it it was a now Robert lost three
clients because Robert is
as much as I am a CPA and not a a people
person
robert is more so
he's not a people person i mean Robert's
a great accountant and a great tax man
exir agent very knowledgeable very
experienced uh you know a nice guy
family guy uh I like Robert but it's
hard to hold a conversation with him uh
unless it's tax so yeah he lost a couple
of clients because he was you
know you remember uh Joe Friday and dry
debt just the facts ma'am just the facts
that's all he wanted to talk about
that's all he wanted he he didn't you
know that he's gotten better over the
years but you know the the fact that you
had kids and Lynham was sick and the
baby was ill just the facts ma'am just
the facts
so I imagine then you weren't you
weren't get payroll until this time
right so he took the name of the company
the m majority of the clients and you
took the ones that were payroll only or
you know had had payroll that you guys
were working on exactly what other we
continue we continue to if I get a have
a payroll client that needs accounting I
send them to him if he accounting client
that he's picked up that needs payroll
he sends them to me uh until we sold the
building here last November we still
office together okay because I'd built a
building 25 years ago and that's where
he officed and he's after we sold the
the firm he he just rented an office
from me and we talk on a daily basis
okay so still pretty closely tied then
on that one oh very much it was very
amicable how else did you structure I
mean what other approaches did you take
having had this experience buying a
franchise from somebody who was kind of
like a peer and a friend it seemed in
back in '91 what steps did you take in
this split to make a definitive line to
be clear about revenue and be clear
about you know cost sharing and things
like that
okay the cost sharing was was a specific
contract he would rent office space and
equipment and we would provide certain
services for a fee the one thing I
didn't put into it was the ability to
raise the fee
okay it was just a flat
fee and of course as our costs went up
over the next 10 years we should have
been able to raise it
we had no mechanism to do that and
frankly it wasn't that big of a deal so
I just never did
uh we came to a very con comprehensive
contract on what business went where and
what clients and so on um so it was uh
and again we'd worked together we were
partners it was a very amicable split i
mean this was not forced or or driven
uh I offered uh you know he'd come to me
and was talking about you know setting
up his own firm because he needed more
revenue and so on and uh he was a
little I was still taking revenue off of
what he was doing okay because I'd
really moved into payroll and he was
really doing almost all of the tax and
accounting and I was still taking a cut
and so I basically said "Here you can
keep my cut you can have the firm and
I'll take all the payroll and we'll just
move on on that basis." And that was all
he wanted so
um it just was just worked uh it was a
very I was ready i knew I wasn't doing
much work in the accounting side but
still getting income off of it that was
fine i didn't mind that but you know he
he was right he was doing the work he
should get the income so okay fine um
take that and take the responsibilities
and and the liability that goes with it
and um have your own firm so uh we had
set up Reed and Shahan at one point and
I just sold him the stock in it and he
became the uh uh sole stockholder in the
corporation
gotcha okay i mean that's that's great
that it was amicable and everything
worked out there that's definitely not
the case especially with um something so
closely tied together like that were
there any conflicts or were there any
warning signs that you would had you
been an adviser to this relationship you
would have told a client watch out for
this or you know be careful i mean you
you you can't keep taking money out of
the firm and not do any work in it okay
that that's that's not going to work
over time it's not like you've put up a
major asset that they're using or
something like that you're just taking a
cut of the revenue
uh and and not doing any of the work and
that's not going to work in a
professional uh operation where it's
professional skills and and effort
that's creating the money it's not like
you have capital invested that's that's
needed and so on and so forth so that
that was an obvious I was not surprised
at all when he brought it up mhm i knew
it was I knew it was coming i mean was
that defined for a term or was that a
dollar amount that earnout that that he
was basically paying you for uh I was
taking 25% of the revenue but for a
certain number of years or just into
that was just an ongoing thing okay that
was just that's how it was uh
[Music]
and you know he's
he got so he resented a little bit and
when he said something I said understand
not a problem uh pay pay he paid me
uh one times revenue uh plus uh
outstanding AR
to get out of the lifetime annuity
effectively to to buy to buy the the uh
book of business uh and I I'd sold him
half of it based on that that same uh
revenue that same formula earlier on
he'd bought in for 25% then 50% and then
we used the same terms to to go 100% uh
could I have insisted on something more
ownorous absolutely could I have said no
I'm g not going to sell it to you
goodbye uh I I could have done that too
but what what purpose
uh it was it was a time and place I was
ready he was ready uh he wanted to run
his own firm uh fully and not have to
put up with a partner and I understand
that and so how long into that split 10
years ago did that conversation happen
because you guys continued to work with
each other or next to each other for a
while sharing business yeah we we we
worked in the same same offices for
another 10 years so I mean but was that
within two years of that happening and
he said "This isn't working." I would I
would say that from when he brought it
up uh it was 90 days before it was done
sorry how long did it take him to bring
it up before that split
oh 6 eight years okay
partner it was quite a while he was he
was very happy being half you know half
but as I was working out of doing the
accounting and more into the payroll uh
I think he began to resent that a little
bit that I was still taking you know as
much of the revenue so the acquisition
kind of really happened in two phases
you're you're still a partner in that
one but you're doing over here and
you're making 25% off of him doing the
work and then finally a couple years ago
at some point he just said "No I want to
buy you out entirely." And we go our
separate ways his his point was that he
needed more revenue mhm okay and so he
was going to look for something that was
going to generate more revenue for his
family and I said "Hey just take it i'll
tell you the rest i'll tell you the rest
of the firm will that work?" And he said
"Yeah." And so we we negotiated we used
the same formula we had for him buying
in and it was it was a done deal in 90
days gotcha okay awesome
how did you now that payroll is your
100% focus i mean how did that shift how
you're selling to clients how you're
saying this is what we do over here my
my former partner can provide this i
mean and now that this how did you see
what did you see the vision the future
for get payroll from that point forward
oh we wanted to get as big as ADP but
you know we never did uh you know we we
concentrated we focused on payroll and
payroll services uh we didn't talk about
accounting services unless they brought
it up and then say "Yeah we we've got a
I've got my exartner whose office is
with me that that does accounting you
know let me have you talk to him." Yeah
and there were clients he wouldn't
take uh he didn't like nonprofits m
uh and uh you
know as as an accountant in
payroll it's much more straightforward
than taxes mhm uh and so we'd have
clients more regulated but also much
more straightforward right that would
they would pay payroll and and and do it
down the line mhm but over on the
accounting side they would wander across
the line you know on what's right and
what's maybe not and so on so he might
have problems with them there where as
long as they were paying
payroll correctly and legitimately
we didn't care what they did i mean from
the from the payroll company's point of
view they could be a crook
but if they're paying Joe Blow his
hourly rate and paying the taxes and our
fee we don't care for instance uh you
know we had some problems with the banks
uh as time went on because of cannabis
and other things that the the government
said you know you can't deal with these
people how it affects payroll just you
know boggles my it doesn't affect
payroll what do you care okay but uh
that did some things but uh you know we
didn't care if they
were not 100% up and up on on the per
side we didn't care as as long as they u
the the checks cashed and um our fees
were paid u you know we didn't get into
it we didn't care he did and properly so
had I been doing it I would have cared
too
yeah yeah complicated issues for sure
when Yes very complicated dealing with
the states state's regulations on it and
then the IRS's regulations on on things
like that so what was your target
audience or target uh client for the
payroll company was there a certain
sweet spot for you guys what' that look
like under 20 employees okay so super
small businesses as far as payroll is
concerned well yeah but what you have to
understand is 95% of all US businesses
have less than 20 employees
now when you get to a
100 uh our competition goes after them
vehemently very hard uh every company in
the US that has over 100 employees is
called on personally by an ADP rep at
least four times a year
okay
we don't have the marketing budget to go
after that and to compete with that in
addition to that in our industry uh
paychecks
ADP will do anything to get a client
when we copied the original paychecks
contract there was a
line
w whatever it takes what at WIT WIT
that's all it said was WIT and the
salesman could do whatever he needed to
close the deal the WIT meant whatever it
takes
so they're horse you know they they'll
do anything to get the job to get the
contract i'm I I have a hard time doing
that because I've seen paychecks
literally come in uh on a deal and raise
the price before the first payrolls run
and then raise it again before the
second one and raise it again before the
third one okay um I was listening in on
the
uh call that ADP has with their analysts
for their annual and Rodriguez who was
the president at the time said "Our goal
this year is to get everyone to book,"
which means list price or above
i I mean these these people are scum uh
on their business ethics as far as I'm
concerned um and I I won't operate that
way it's too much of a CPA enmy so uh we
we chose the the small businesses uh we
find them to be very long lived uh very
constant and once we've got them trained
in the system uh it's very profitable uh
the margins are good and the amount of
effort needed particularly as technology
is improved is minimal mhm so uh we are
doing much more payroll with fewer
people now than we were 20 years
ago so the the the systems and and
software and hardware and internet and
electronic banking and so on uh uh
direct deposit um electronic payrolls uh
has made this far less labor intensive
than it used to be uh and therefore more
profitable
what's your marketing look like because
I know for under 20 under 20 employees
that gets so undercut by the the big two
brands so what's your marketing look
like or is it almost I mean I know from
having a payroll wing of our company you
could basically just pick up all the
people that they screw up
we get a lot from ADP and paychecks
because your best advertisements they're
they're our best advertisers absolutely
but we're we're we're all over the web
now we have our own YouTube channel uh
we're on Instagram we're on Tik Tok uh
our biggest source of leads is Facebook
advertise
uh we've got uh we had two people and
now we're down to one at the moment who
does nothing but our social media okay
that's really where we're doing our all
of our advertising we don't
do
um door door too died years ago um
postcards any kind of local No the the c
we do a lot of email advertising but the
cost of snail mail
is for a dollar for a a piece of real
mail I can do 50,000 emails
yeah why why why would I send out a
piece of mail uh you know I get them in
my mailbox i just throw them away yeah i
don't look at the damn things uh they're
a waste of time and money coal calling
is dead uh you know Yeah glenn Forfeit
Fabolita with he does a whole uh thing
for payroll companies uh he believes in
um bulky mail you know where you stick
some chucka in there that that makes for
an uneven package and so you open it and
so on i think it's a waste of time and
money uh I get these things periodically
for various
things one of the things I loved is a
pen company used to send me uh free pen
samples wanting me to buy pens and sell
them and I'd just take them put them in
my pen rack and have a free pen uh you
know I don't believe in that stuff uh
email marketing works for us uh in our
business we've discovered that it's
never know
it's just not today mhm we get clients
that come we get potential clients that
after a year two years 5 years as long
as 12 years come back and say "Hey I
need payroll." Now one of my favorite
stories is I had done accounting work
for a gentleman
CPA and uh 12 years after I had ceased
doing business with him he retired and
so on his son called me and says Charles
you guys still do payroll and I said
yeah
sure well he brought us a whole chain of
restaurants is as a group it's our
biggest client now
mhm out of the blue 12 years later 12
years later yeah it's it's amazing my my
my sales guy has adopted that as his
phrase now you know what I always say
it's never it's you never know it's just
not today you because he believes it now
so everything we dump in the funnel we
continue to drip market to because
sooner or later particularly if they're
with ADP or paychecks
they're going to get pissed mhm and if
we're on the desk they're going to call
us
being a being a fellow CPA and you know
like you said we're the life of the
party everywhere we go how what did you
how did you shift your mindset to this
because I talked to CPAs in my
profession some my age some older than
me and they're just no chamber of
commerce go shake hands play golf all
that kind of stuff
what caused you to shift your mindset
and then like you said finally
acknowledge I'm not a marketer i need to
bring marketing inhouse i was trying to
do all of this mail pieces networking
and so on and it was getting
overwhelming with everything else was
going on so I hired a marketing person
just local or contact or
referral i I I put out an ad and and
this was you know 10 years ago whatever
eight years ago and hired a
lady
and she immediately started doing things
in the social media area mhm
that my personal view of
Facebook is it's a great place to send
grandma pictures of the babies other
than that I have no use for it that's
why my parents got started
using Exactly she started using that and
started getting clients from it and from
other social media and email marketing
and we
we she was she was she she made me
change my mind uh and it was just
serendipity that I finally hired
somebody because I'd gotten you know I
had other things going on my wife is
disabled and uh uh from a stroke and
just I didn't have time for everything
and so far far far better at it than I
was so yeah and I I I've been to CPA
conferences for years and you know
there'll be 100 people at the marketing
uh CPE course and maybe two of them will
ask questions and one of them will
implement something
uh yeah we we don't know how to market
cpas don't know how to market they just
don't and it's it's not it's not in our
DNA it was in hers and I I'm I'm I'm the
guy who would try something from the
conference okay i'm that guy but I
still can't mark my way out of a paper
bag compared to a professional at it so
if if you have a CPA firm and you don't
have a marketing person hire one at
least part-time
nice
i mean yeah just good on you for
recognizing the limitation there
recognizing and and you know getting
lucky with your first hire also a lot of
people have have know so little about
marketing that they can't tell if the
person that they've hired is doing a
good job or not because they're like I
guess something might be happening so
that's that's awesome to hear
um did you say you're down to one person
now for marketing or that's just one
person on the social media what's what's
payroll one person on the social media i
have two people in the marketing staff
i'd had three uh I'd had
um uh who did all my photo editing and
and all the social media videos and so
on
we now have systems in place where
somebody anos my marketing manager can
do a lot of that and the things we need
to we can outsource on Fiverr or
whatever for a fraction of the cost of a
full-time person that's right we needed
that full-time person to develop the
systems the hardware the concepts and
everything else that went went through
it and I don't begrudge uh at all uh the
cost of having him on board for uh four
or five years
uh he was just fabulous at it but he got
an offer from somebody and you know
uh moved on and I congratulations i mean
you know I I I never uh put somebody
down for for doing what they think is
best for themselves uh if somebody says
to me you know I found a better job i'm
leaving i stick my hand out and say
congratulations mhm uh good for you i'm
glad you found something you think is
better if it doesn't work out give me a
call yeah good and and I've had people
come back to me
yeah the grass wasn't greener over there
yep michael was was a superb
videographer and I I treasure everything
he's done and got our YouTube channel
set up and and helped us define how
we're doing things and so on and uh he's
he's a very very talented individual and
at some point we may replace him and
bring somebody else in but at the moment
we're just doing it on a little less
budget okay uh two to three people on a
marketing team what size is get payroll
now where you would justify something
like that where that makes sense like
staff-wise how how big are you guys a
dozen people oh wow okay so about a
quarter of your team almost is uh is
marketing wow that's awesome
um if you want to get into it here
towards the end of of the interview
what's talking about you know your
own acquisition what's what's the
succession plan for get payroll look
like and what's the timeline on that are
you in talks do you have a leadership
team within the company what's that look
like there are three people in in
leadership positions uh Deborah has been
with me for 25 years uh Chris has been
with me he's my ops manager for 10 and
an is my marketing manager he's been
with me about five years now uh and then
I have you know eight or 10 other people
uh under
them i'm basically semi-retired now i'm
doing very little work other than
podcasts and interviews uh we have a
monthly we have a weekly marketing
meeting where we go over things and I
still you know have to make some of the
decisions uh because I'm I'm the owner
though Deborah Deborah owns 10% of the
company i gave her 10% years ago
uh my plan is to move the business
ownership to all the
employees obviously the ones that have
been there longer and are in positions
of authority will probably end up with
bigger
shares we are in discussion on exactly
how that's going to happen i don't know
the best way yet to do that i'm talking
to an attorney about uh you know um
employee stock ownership whatever but it
is my desire by the end of next year to
have gotten myself completely out of the
business the only thing I'll doing is be
getting a small income stream from it uh
for the sale of it for the rest of my
life i mean I could I could I could call
ADP tomorrow mhm and sell this
for probably one and a half times
revenue
adp
uh paychecks paychoice whatever a paycom
they'd all buy me in a heartbeat
it's not enough money to matter
uh I would much rather give my employees
the chance
to have the ownership and produce the
kind of lifestyle that I've enjoyed from
that
well believe me the first 10 years were
tough okay it was handtomouth and and if
there wasn't a if somebody didn't get
paid it was me uh
but it got better over the
years uh and I think they should have a
chance to do it as they please and uh
I'll take up you know an income stream
for the rest of my life and when I die
it's theirs you know they don't have to
do that anymore i'm not going to try and
burn them with a
uh my youngest
uh I married when I married Ruth she had
five children they were she was older uh
my baby is 61 years old my oldest are
retired okay
they don't need the company they've
never worked in it uh the only one that
might have uh passed from cancer uh 30
some odd years ago
so there there's you know they don't
deserve the the fruits of my labor uh
they didn't work in the company if one
of them worked in the company for 30
years they'd probably get it
but
uh hell Deborah's been with me 25 years
that's Yeah that that's we we don't have
turnover to speak of i mean Michael left
and we didn't replace him uh we haven't
hired anybody since Michael and he's
been with me five years so we don't have
turnover um we pay well uh we don't play
politics uh we don't hire jerks um it's
you know now we're all virtual so
everybody's working from home quite
successfully and I had
my hesitation about that but when uh
Crystal who handles uh uh the the
banking and and reconciliations and
bunch of other things and HR uh came to
me last year and said "This is what
we're spending on having the building."
Made an easy decision and I looked at
that and I said "Jesus Christ really?"
And we went through it we actually added
a bit more to it
uh it was a no-brainer we'd all been
working off and on remotely since co
Yeah so to move it to remote
uh Christy who works in operations had
literally been working from Colleen
anyway you know uh 150 miles away she'd
come up one day a week then it was one
day every other two weeks
uh and unbeknownst to me because I you
know I let operations run itself now uh
she moved to Louisiana and was working
there so you know remote just wasn't a
big deal uh she got married again and
moved to
Louisiana so
uh it's all working it's all remote
uh life's good
and you know I do very little now and I
want to do less so yeah let them have a
chance at it i want to legally get shot
of it so if there's a problem it's not
me uh which is a very smart thing to to
make sure that if you're selling a
business that the potential liabilities
are not your responsibility uh that's
something that you really need to be
critical about um in in buying and
selling businesses it's why I recommend
in most cases to my clients that are
buying a business that they buy the
assets
they don't buy the existing business
form a new corporation buy the assets
move it into a pay cash or whatever
they're going to pay for it outside and
that way any potential liabilities that
exist right aren't your problem end with
that corporation end with that
corporation and I want to make sure the
same thing that I move the stock over to
them and I'm not even a stockholder i'm
just a
uh they owe me money i'm I I'm I'm just
you know you'll figure that out with the
attorney
great
awesome uh well Charles I mean this
conversation went fast i appreciate it
uh just the the wealth of your
experience and your knowledge and yeah
just the the care that you have for your
employees that's really great to hear um
uh they're they're lucky to work with
you and I know you you know you feel
lucky to have them so absolutely
anything that you wanted to add before
we jump into the lightning round no
we're good all right all right i
appreciate it uh so let's get started
with the lightning round uh coffee or
tea and how do you like it coffee black
all right uh pie or cake and do you have
a specific kind you like hot apple pie
with cheese on top okay that's a new one
for me i don't think I've even heard of
that before so Oh yeah slice of cheese
on top of hot apple pie oh gotcha apple
pie i I heard pineapple but no apple pie
i have a cold apple pie with a slice of
cheese is my favorite american cheese
cheddar cheese cheddar cheese is better
but American will will serve cheese and
apples go together if you've never had
it Yeah right try it sometime try a
slice of cheese on a piece of hot apple
pie you'll be amazed my mother-in-law is
going to freak out at Thanksgiving when
I try this awesome it's
interesting um what is a common belief
among entrepreneurs that you would want
to challenge they they they all expect
to be uh the next unicorn and it ain't
going to happen
you're you're not going to be the next
Jeff Bezos you're not going to be the
next uh Microsoft guy whatever uh it's
not going to happen but you can make a
nice living uh what's your favorite
holiday and why fourth of July
fireworks i love it works all right
awesome uh are you a morning person or a
night person night person i hate
mornings all right what's What's a
routine look like for you at night uh
well when I get up I exercise which is
probably why I hate mornings but I will
normally after after work and after
dinner I'll read until midnight i read a
a great deal and then hit the rack um
what is one thing that you would want
your successor to remember you for
Charles i don't care i don't want them
to remember me i wanted them to have
their own life i I had I had another
podcast asked me "What What do you want
your great ch grandchildren to think
about you?" I don't expect my great-g
grandandchildren to ever think about me
okay that's just ego and and I try to
park mine at the door awesome all right
interesting um where do you where are
you finding creativity right now in
technology as technology changes it
allows you to do
things look at us this conversation
right now electronically 10 years ago
never happened right
this is a marketing opportunity as well
so the changes in
technology the things you can do with
them are just
incredible i love it i love your
optimism uh I hope I can retain that for
the rest of my life so
um uh last question what do you have
coming up in the next year that's that's
got you really excited i'm going to sell
the house I have that Ruth and I built
and I'm going to buy land and build a
bachelor house i'm a widowerower uh
so I'm very excited about doing that i
built one custom home and I swore I'd
never do it again but building a custom
house is like pregnancy after a few
years the pain goes
away and you may have another child
you're like "It wasn't that bad was it?"
Yeah ask your wife she'll
understand so I'm very excited about
that change in my life and and and
moving on i I'm 75 but I live on a
20-year horizon i assume I'm going to
live 20 years from today and tomorrow I
assume I'm going to live 20 years from
tomorrow now I realize at some point I'm
gonna have to lower that horizon and I
tell people probably at 105 I'll have to
lower that to 15 years
i love it oh man uh Charles where can uh
where can people go and find out more
about you we're
getparel.com all over the web uh we have
our YouTube channel that has both fun
videos and educational videos there's
some really fun ones the the the
Halloween one with the IRS as the uh uh
living dead rising from the graves is a
blast okay uh so my email is cjr getp
payroll all right I'll make sure I link
that specific video in the description
of this show and uh Charles I just want
to thank you for being on the show and
it's been a pleasure talking to you and
just once again uh Simprify Brother and
thank you for your service simpify
brother been my pleasure you've been
listening to the Art of Succession
podcast with your host Barrett Young
twice a month we'll bring you interviews
sharing the successes and challenges
from business owners with their own
succession stories the Art of Succession
is sponsored by GWCPA and is provided
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