The Power of Perseverance: Overcoming Hurdles to Success in Business feat. Johnathan Price with Down4Sound

Yo, what's up everybody welcome back to another episode of Small business Origins. You're tuned into our nationwide search. We're looking for entrepreneurs that have a story to tell and as always, I'm your host, john kelly a K A john the marketer on instagram and Tiktok and let me tell you if you're not following me on Tiktok, you're making a mistake because we've been working on getting these Tiktok lives together so that we can go live and share these stories and give you a sneak peek into what's going on behind the scenes here in the studio. So make sure you head over there, john the marketer official on Tiktok and follow that account so that you can catch up with all the stuff we have going on over here because it's interesting to see us. But most importantly, let's get to it again, this is our nationwide search and I've got an entrepreneur that wants to tell his story, Jonathan Price with Down for sound, Jonathan. Welcome to the show. I appreciate it. Thank you for having me. 

It's a pleasure to be on here. Heck yeah man, it's always interesting and we've not had somebody from Las Vegas Nevada yet, so I am excited to get you in. I know you're not from there, but that's where you're at right now. So I'm sure Las Vegas is gonna come up and maybe you can share with us as much as you can about the place, even though I know the old saying of what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas. So you know, I'm sure it's more than just a stereotypical thing that everybody says, but before we hop into all of that stuff, your origin story, everything else we have to start out with our icebreaker question, we do every single episode and today's question is what is your go to tv show to watch at night? Go to tv show man. 

To be honest, I don't watch a lot of tv, like it's probably a typical response from entrepreneurs because we're so focused on our business and stuff. Um but I do every now and then get into a netflix series and I liked Ozark. Um I liked Yellowstone, those couple like me and my fiance, we, we divulged and those like them a lot so that if I had to pick some type of tv show that would be the two that pop up in my head first. Yeah, I was a big Ozark fan man, I honestly uh I worked for the fire department full time. 

A lot of my listeners know that and me and my driver, we were both huge fans of it. So every episode that we could, you know watch, we'd watch it at the station and that is definitely a conversation we had was bro, we should put a podcast on and just talk about like all these conspiracy theories about Ozark and then like ways that we think the story could have gone or you know like what if there was an alternate ending and that kind of thing, fan of that show, we kind of do the same thing. I don't watch like tv tv, if that makes sense to you, You know, I don't have like, you know the normal little channels, local tv type stuff, but we do stream netflix, Disney plus hulu, like I've got an account for all that stuff so I'm paying more than I ever was for cable really, it makes my kids happy. And at night my wife and I just kind of have our routine of either playing super smash on the Nintendo. I've talked about that before on the show. Um or like right now we're really into Kaleidoscope, which is a netflix series. 

We just started, me and my fiance, we've watched like two episodes of that, so we just got into that one that's our, but for some reason it didn't pop up into my head, but yeah, it's cool so far. Yeah man, the and I know you can watch the episodes in any format or any way that you want to, you know you can watch whatever episode you want, you don't have to watch it chronologically. We started from the beginning and at first it was kind of annoying just because it was so slow, but after the build up I'm really liking the way that the story is going and for our listeners if you have not watched that show yet um I would recommend it, it's slow so it's gonna take some time if you're one that wants something action packed, I would say it's probably not for you, there's some action moments but um I love the premise behind it of just coming up with like that ultimate bank heist type thing where you're just working on, you know busting into this safe and then just kind of all of the, the way the storyline ties into it and it's like there's a backstory for every character, every character is connected and then how are they gonna pull off this one big job? So definitely interested in seeing the way it ends you're right though as an entrepreneur man, um an entrepreneur with basically two full time jobs over here and it takes up a lot of my time. So at night I I usually wind up working before and after dinner and then I try to spend some time with my kids and my wife after dinner and then usually we'll watch an episode or 2 30 minutes to a hour, hour and a half. And then after that she goes to bed and I'm back on the Macbook and I'm sitting there working from bed, you know trying to figure out how to get everything squared away. So I'm definitely with you but I think it's important to take those times to wind down and spend time with family. Yes sir. Alright, well we're here to talk about you and where you came from and kind of how you got into what you're doing. So let's just start with that origin story man. Where'd you come from? So I come from a small town in Mississippi called Greenville. 

It's in the article a miss area. So there's a place where Arkansas Louisiana and Mississippi touch, it's called the Mississippi Delta as well. But small town, 20,000 people um primarily farming. There's fields everywhere with different crops and stuff and that's where I grew up at. And um I love going back there. 

I go back and visit my parents all the time now that I'm able to and uh starting my childhood was I would say a pretty typical one. Uh my dad was the sole provider of our family's home and my mom worked here and there, but she was always in and out of having issues, so she was more of a stay at home mom, which we know that that can be a full time job in itself, taking care of, um, I have three sisters. So taking care of four kids going through school while my dad's off at work. 

So, um anyway, the one of the things that my dad taught me at a young age was, you know, he has a saying, you can have anything you want in this life, as long as you're willing to work your ass off for it and don't give up. And that stuck with me my entire life. And he also taught me a unwavering work ethic that he has himself and he instilled this into me as a very young boy when I was not even old enough to mo yard by myself, I was probably like three years old and uh, I post this picture on my social media every now and then, but it's some people don't even know what this style of line more looks like, but it's just your typical push mower like you have, and it usually has a bar in the middle. So my mom was pushing the push mower from the top and I was so small, I was standing down and barely able to reach the bar in the middle, but I was pushing the mower like with her through the yard and somebody took a picture a long time ago. So every time I see it pop up in my memories, it just takes me back to where that's when I was, I didn't obviously, I didn't know I was just a little baby. But I was getting that work ethic instilled into me at that young of an age that's when it was starting. So he always taught me that hard work and being consistent and also if he taught me the value of a dollar by, if you, if you want something as a kid or whatever, like say I wanted a new bike, no problem, but you have to pay for half of it. I'm like, how am I going to pay for half of it? 

I'm just a kid. I don't, I don't know. Um so he's like, well go ask the neighbor if you can cut their yard and I'm like, oh, I do know how to cut grass now because you told me since, ever since I was little. So before you knew it, I was cutting all the yards. 

Uh, pretty much every yard on my street for like 10 or 15 bucks. And so I'm like over here rolling bankrolling when I was like, just so such a young age, but I was able to get my half of the money for the new bikes or if I wanted new shoes or whatever, he was making me pay for a half. So that taught me the value of a dollar and that's something that obviously I'm super grateful for. Yeah, I I actually have a very similar story man for, for one thing I've got about a half acre property. So we have a riding mower and there's still those portions right around the house and stuff that, you know, the riding mower can't get up into and then the front yard is just too small for a riding mower, so gotta push more eggs. 

The design is, you're talking about little bar right there in the middle. My 13 year old doesn't understand why the riding mowers for dad and the push mowers for him, but I'm like, hey, I'm too old to be doing that, sh it anymore, that's your job now. Uh and you know, you're right, like, I don't care if you're three or four years old man, you gotta pay for your keep around here. And my kids, we've had some of those come to jesus meetings where we're like, hey, you know, they'll say I really wanted this, I want that are like, so and so gets this and my, my other friend gets that and y'all don't give me anything. I'm like, let me try this light switch over here. Light switch works. So you have electricity in your bedroom on the bed and yeah, and it feels nice and cool in here on these hot texas summer days and you know, all this different stuff. 

I'm like, that's weird. It seems like you have a lot to pay for, you know, and uh I think it stems from, I had to work for so much of my life because I grew up middle class, we were fine, Everything was great vacation all the time going through divorces and stuff. We turned into poor folk man that was you know, eating ramen and rice in different ways just to try and have something in your stomach type stuff. And so I worked because I needed to help pay some bills and I think coming from that I was like I don't want my kids to have to do that, but at the same time I love this, you've got to pay for half, you have to do something, you have to earn it Because it is so easy for kids to not understand the value of a dollar. And my dad was the same way like I'd shoot pool at 13 years old in the ice house, hanging out with my dad and play beer for beer and then my dad would cut me the money at the end of the night for whatever he got out of that and that's how you know. 

Just one way I earned my keep and help. The guy, his name was woody, we do uh DJ and and karaoke shows and stuff out there and he couldn't lift the equipment because of a medical disability. And so he paid me 30 bucks a night just to load the equipment or unload the equipment depending on what his needs were and then there's some extra money, you know, and then pops put me to work doing flooring stuff because he owned the flooring business and uh actually got paid really well in that one. I had to tear up a lot of floors, but I'd get to 300 bucks a weekend and half of it had to go to his savings the other half I could do whatever I wanted to with it And you know, nine out of 10 times I wanted to save a little bit more money because at the end of it, when I was 16, the goal was, we're gonna get your first car for you and whatever money you save up in that savings account, I'll match it 100% to go toward buying you a car. So I love these stories man, I love and maybe it's a southern thing. 

I don't know, I don't know if it extends up north or not, but I love here and stuff like that because it really does put you in an entrepreneur mindset. Oh definitely. I mean I have tons and tons of stories that I was on a two podcast yesterday. 

I've been, I feel like on a roll here like podcast podcast, but they were asking me some of the similar questions and um yeah, just knowing the value of a dollar and getting that work ethic instilled into you is things that you, you, people can, I've heard people say this and I believe it as well, people can take, you can lose everything like at any given time, but what you do not lose is your knowledge that you've gained and if it happened, and also your unwavering work ethic, your consistency always showing up and and the knowledge that you have, so a lot of entrepreneurs say that they're like, you take everything for me, I'll do it again because you have it up upstairs, so you know, you'll be able to, what took you 10, 15, 20 years to do, you might be able to do it in two or three because you know all the shortcuts, all the things that you learn the hard way over the years, like now, you know the answer to them and how to skip step one through five and end up at six, like, so, but when you're first learning and um you don't have a mentor or something like that, you have to take the licks and and go broke sometimes and find out the hard way, but that's another thing, like having a mentor is a huge uh asset, if you can get a mentor highly recommended and the bit, and I understand now the problem with a lot of people not wanting to do one, not wanting to do mentor ships when they get super successful and to why they don't want to do it for free because one, it's like when people win the lottery, what happens to them a year later, 95% of them are broke because they don't have anything invested into it. Same thing when they get a mentor, they could be $100 million person worth like a billion dollars or whatever and if they get put in the room with this person and they're asking all these questions and it doesn't cost them anything, a lot of them waste it, they don't they don't go and apply it or they so you wasted this guy's time and sometimes multiple times. So now it may be also understand why people charge for these mentorships or these master classes or whatever because you don't want a lot of people in there that are just wasting your space and time and not going to apply it. So more than likely if you have something usually money invested into bettering yourself, you're more than you're more likely to use it because you know you had to give up a lot of hours of your life to purchase this course or purchase this mastermind to be in the same room as this super successful person to get these secrets and you're like okay I need to use this because I paid a lot of money for it, I had to trade 200 hours of my life working for what, like however I earned it to get into this room so I need to make sure I apply it and get your return on investment just like that person did. So definitely yeah, so changing from you know, learning how to do stuff around the house, mow yards and all that man, did you have a full time job at one point one or four? One or four, yeah. Where'd you go after that? 

You know, I mean, because I hear so many of these stories where it's kind of like, it's one or the other, you know, sometimes they say I went straight into entrepreneurship and it was just, I knew what I wanted to do and I did it from the beginning, you know, and then, um, I feel like a lot of those people are kind of lucky in the fact that they have a really good setup, you know, mom or dad is super successful um in the business, it doesn't fall into their lap because we've heard the stories right here on the show where some of them have worked their ass off to get what they have, even though they could be in s it's considered like a trust fund baby, but then at the same time, there are some people like me where it's like, hey, I'm growing a full time job and a part time job that's kind of a full time job, as well as my entrepreneurship journey and then trying to transition into full time entrepreneur eventually. So, my story looks a little different, so I'm just wondering like, did you go straight into it, or from, kind of what you were saying? It sounds like maybe you bounce around a little bit at first. Like my, well like I said I was cutting grass on my, my street when I was a young boy and I continued to cut grass as a side hustle my entire life until I moved out here to Vegas. Obviously the grass cutting business out here isn't that great, Right? So um but I use that as like a side hustle too because it's just cash also. So you're getting like a what, a 30%, it's under the table, so you're getting a 30% bonus on all your money, not having to get a text. 

Yeah, exactly, yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm a kid or whatever, but I mean I did it up until I moved here. So um anyway, so my sisters and family, they were always like, he's a little entrepreneur, like he's like he's gonna figure something out one day and but I never did any type of technically a business. Uh so as I continue to grow up, I had different jobs. My first job on paper was actually chopping cotton in the fields of Mississippi. Um This was something that definitely shaped me and makes me super grateful. 

I've had a lot of jobs that makes me even more grateful and gives me that perspective of what else is out there because I've done them, I've chopped cotton, I've waited tables, I've worked in insanely hot, like, I mean chopping cotton in the fields of Mississippi with the humidity, like it's no joke anyway. And I mean you're, you're literally using a hoe. So my, I'm getting done at the end of the day. I got blisters, my hands are bleeding, my ears are appealing because they're got burnt by the sun, just all these things. But doing all these different jobs definitely shaped me into the person that I am today and also makes me even more grateful for being able to be here. 

So, um, after I graduated high school and went to college, I actually made a post about my thoughts on college this morning on my social media. Uh it's probably similar for a lot of entrepreneurs, but anyway, um my two cents on that real quick is I think we need to quit telling kids that the only way that you can be successful is if you go to college, this is not true. I mean, and I could go on a whole another tangent about that, but I'm just gonna leave it at that. Um I do think there is a necessity for certain things for college. Like if you want, for example a doctor, of course, you can't go on the internet and learn how to be a doctor. Like you have to go to school for that. So, but I think for the vast majority of people that are going to be blue collar workers, tradesmen say for example a plumber or a carpenter or something like that, my two cents is go work for a person and even if you have to work for them for free for months, you're gonna be in a, but you're learning the trade like show up on time, like ask questions, do anything they want you to do, learn how to do that and after you work for them for months, more than likely if you ask them like, hey, like do you think I could get a job here? Like I know how to do all this stuff, The best guy taught me how to do all this stuff, so I have a good skill set, you're not hiring this some random person off the street and they'll know what type of person you are. So more than likely they're gonna give you a job and you don't have $30,000 in student loan debt over your head trying to get started in life and that I did that, I got, I mean I did the wrong way, I went to college uh, national Auto diesel college because I thought I wanted to be an auto collision repair tech and I got this monstrous amount of debt, I finished second in my class and they were promising me the whole time, oh yeah man when you get out, we're gonna get you a job. We got good relationships with Bentley Maserati, like naming off all these high end car manufacturers and I'm like awesome, like I thought I had it made, you know, graduate and the weeks keep going by, we keep going by, nobody's calling, I'm like, let me call the, the college and asked them like what's going on? 

I call them All, the market's flooded, like we can't really find anything for you. Like we used to, I'm like, man, I just spent $30,000 to go to college and this was back when I graduated, so that's a no to there's a massive amount of money. I mean it still is, but even way more massive at that point, so they're like, but we'll we'll keep looking for you, we'll try our best to find you something like, okay, cool. The only call that I ever got was six months later, you know who it was, It was Sallie Mae, she was wanting her money back for the student loans and I had no job, I was living with my parents and they were my dad because he had raised me to be this hard working individual and I got kind of in a slump and I was, I was becoming a bum basically, I was, I was living with my parents, I was playing video games all night long, sleeping till lunchtime, like this, this whole thing repetitive and uh when they called and said I need my, we need our money basically and my dad's like because he goes down on the loan for the um the tuition and so there if I don't pay it, they're gonna take it from him. So that made him super upset. 

He gave me an ultimatum, you can either go find a job or you're getting out of my house and I'm like, oh crap. So he ends up finding me a job at a place that he previously worked out many, many years before and it was totally unrelated to anything that I went to school for. And this is a another reminder. Uh and why my thoughts of college are what they are and I know my story isn't abnormal. 

I know so many people now that experienced the same exact thing. They go pay an absurd amount of money to become whatever it is and they get out and they think they're gonna be making six figures a year if they do happen to get a job and the thing that they went to college for, it's usually a quarter or half of what they thought they were going to be getting paid and a majority of them can't even get a job and what they got this piece of paper for like this degree and I was the same person like that devastated me and I was like, I was so upset furious for so long because I'm like, I'm having to pay these people this money and I'm not even using it man, it. So that's why I tell people if you're gonna do a trade like Auto Body or whatever, go to a body shop. Say like go to the body man. Hey, can I be an apprentice to you for however long you can learn exactly what a school was going to teach you from a person and not and they'll get value from you because you're helping them, you're running to get tools or do all the little stuff that they don't want to do, but they're gonna be teaching you and then after three or six months you're gonna get a job there more than likely. If not you can go somewhere else. Like, hey, I worked under Jonathan price for six months. 

He taught me everything. He knows pretty much exactly how to do this. Um, do you think I could come up with you? Oh yeah, I know him. Like he's a great body man or whatever. So anyway, that's my two cents on college going. So after I graduated college I got back home and I was doing, I was working these um, odd jobs, but I started cutting grass again And I worked at the place my dad got me a job at, for a little while. But um, I found myself over at an airport working, um, pumping gas into airplanes like for the private airplanes. 

So, uh, at one time I was working seven days a week at the airport minimum of 60 hours a week there. But I'm like, the only way I knew how to make money is if I was trading hours of my life for dollars basically, it's a common thing when you're getting started. So I'm like, okay, I have some extra time when I get off because I think I was working five a.m. To three p.m. Or something like that. So I was a majority of my time was taken up in the morning time. So I had my afternoons were kind of free and I'm like, okay, I need to get some more yards to cut. So I ended up getting, I would average around 6 to 10 yards weekly to cut after I got off from there. 

Uh, so I was doing that because I knew how to cut grass and these people that were flying in and out of there in their private jets. Like, man, I wonder if I could, I learned how to wash cars. Really good when I was in the auto collision school because this thing before you get the cars back to the, uh, the owners, you want them to be clean. So I'm like, I wonder if I could wash these people's cars when they're gone on their trips or whatever. So I started detailing cars for these people when they were going on their trip. So I would detail their cars and then they come back. Like, I wonder if I could detail detail an airplane and I would ask him like, hey, when's your next trip? And like two weeks and like, do you want me to clean up your airplane for you? So I started detailing airplanes and I still found that I had a few hours like late at night that I wasn't really doing anything productive. 

I was besides playing well. It's not productive. But I was playing video games like what else could I do? I love this place in my small town, there's a restaurant called Sherman's. 

I ate there pretty frequently and I'm like, I wonder if I could wait tables. So at one time I was working at the airport seven days a week, pumping gas and airplanes. I mean I would do anything. I was really do anything person. 

I was pumping gas into them. I was doing some maintenance, I was vacuuming the floors. I was cleaning the toilets. 

I didn't care like I would do. And I loved it because I love aviation. But while I was doing that I was cutting my yards, I was detailing cars and airplanes and I was waiting tables at one time. So I had those four things going on at my height of multiple hats being squared of or worn weird. Um Warren, I was doing all those things. 

Oh yeah, my vocabulary is not the best for sure. But anyway, so I was doing those four things. Um, just trying to, I think my ultimate mindset at that time was if I work all the time, I won't have time to spend money. So I will eventually start saving money and making money and then uh my dad always taught me to save, save for a rainy day, but a lot of times I saved for a long time to just go buy something that was more expensive. Um so it didn't really start sinking in for me to start investing like investing Until I was probably in my late 20's, I started somewhat making sense. But even though like he taught me safe, safe, safe, I would, but then I would go blow it on something stupid like but anyway live and learn right? 

I mean and that's the whole point of this is to see where people learn their lessons and how and then how that relates to what they're doing now. So what is that transition, when did you figure out that sound? Inside of vehicles was something you had an interest in? Uh the initial thing that got me hooked on car audio was um so in the, so I don't know if it was just Mississippi or what, but back in my day, I feel like I'm 90 years old telling these stories but they had a thing that was called a hardship license so you could get an actual uh license at 14. So my, when I was chopping cotton, my first job I got this hardship license where I could just go back and forth to work. So um but you can only drive between the hours of like six a.m. And six p.m. Just basically to go to work or go to lunch or whatever. So um I was I was coming back from work and I met my mom for dinner or something and I had to take the vehicle that I had at the time to was my dad's truck to get something done to it. So I was riding with my mom back to the house and we pull up at this red light and I'm like what is that sound? 

I'm looking around and like I don't know, I mean I'm just 14 so I don't know anything about this and it wasn't, I don't think that popular back then. And uh and I feel my mom's van vibrating and stuff. I'm like mom is something wrong with your van and she's like oh no that's that's this uh loud music and I'm like music and the guy pulls up beside us and like he has the windows down and his mirror shaking and like this going all crazy and it's shaking my mom's mirrors and I'm over here thinking this is the coolest thing ever. 

My mom is like has this most disgusted look on her face like dang hoodlum is like uh disturbing the peace or whatever. Anyway the light turns green and he pulls off and we're headed home and I'm just thinking to myself, I'm like man that was so cool. Like I thought that was the coolest thing ever, but what was it like? I didn't know what was actually causing these waves of sound. So anyway, fast forward. 

A few months after that I was on my way home from work from chopping cotton and I pull up at a red light and the guy pulls up beside me again, like I hadn't seen him since then. It was like a few months later and uh he pulls up beside me, has this music playing like holy crap, this dude's there again. Light turns green. I'm following this guy, like I'm definitely following him wherever he's going. So he's driving around for miles and I'm just like creeping behind him, like, like I don't know where he's going, but like I'm gonna talk to him. So he ends up pulling up at this gas station and I pull in behind him and I'm like, hey man, I'm not trying to be creepy or whatever, but like I hear your vehicle like what is that? And he's like, oh, it's subwoofers. And I'm like, what's the subwoofer? 

I don't know what that is. And he's like, oh, it makes the bass sound that you, that you're hearing. And I'm like, man, that's the coolest thing ever. And he's like, oh, I can show it to you, I work at a local shop and uh okay, so he opens up, he has an awesome install, It's really clean and I'm like, I was just blown away, I was hooked and I'm like, this is so cool. So that's what got me hooked on car audio and ever since that day I've always had like a thing for sound and sounding good and, and pushing the envelope of sound as well. Like, I mean now fast forward to this day. 

I have a vehicle, a Chevy Tahoe with 9 18 inch subwoofers in it. It's got 72 8 inch mid ranges and all the doors over 100 and 50,000 watts of power. Like I had to put a place polycarbonate windshield in there with bolts too because I kept blowing the windshield out. So anyway, that him and I'm like, do I owe me being in the sound the way that I am now to this guy point, It was at the moment that paved this in like this whole journey for me to be where I am today because I remember it like it was yesterday. It gives me goose bumps talking about it because I'm like that, that was when I found out about car audio and it got, yeah, so I always had a thing for it and when I got out of college, I was always tinkering with trying to have a bigger and better system and stuff and it just kind of grew from there man. 

I uh, going back to sound the same thing. I mean, I own an event services company and um, one of my favorite things is going to buy sound equipment for that type of, you know, particular use and, and just trying to figure out how we can be loud, but how we can be more compact. Now that technology has advanced to where, you know, I can play enough sound for 2, 300 people outdoors where it's, it's loud enough that I mean we had 1000 people in the crowd, they can still hear you clearly. 

That's the big thing is, it's good sound and you know, this is a system that one DJ can show up and look around in his car, put up by himself in less than an hour and have that ready to go for all those people, you know, and, and so sound has always interested me because like I said, I was deejaying and running karaoke shows in the bar at 13 years old. So I'm with you there of just sound has always been kind of ingrained into me and my sister was a little bit older than me. So all her boyfriends, you know, growing up in the nineties, that's, that's everything was all about how loud your vehicle was and not the mufflers, but you know what kind of speakers you have in the back, what kind of empty, I've pushing it and how much can you vibrate everything and everyone that's around you. And so man, I've, I've been there since that day. Um, I couldn't afford it as I was kind of becoming an adult, it just wasn't in the cards for me to be able to afford it. And then now with my jeep Wrangler, much to my wife's dismay, I am the hoodlum. 

She looks at me like I'm crazy because I've got 15 inch kicker comp ours. Um, I used to have a really nice kicker amp, but the fuse actually melted because it just wasn't a big enough fuse even though the sound guy told me it was. Um, and so it luckily my vehicle did not catch on fire or anything cause I mean it was completely melted and it blew my amp out. 

I had a kicker like 1600.1, whatever specifications that are way above my knowledge of car audio. I just know that it was loud enough that I had a carpeted box that it came with and it blew the sides off of the box. And so because I'm the same way, like it's gonna be all the way up or nothing. Those 22 ways. I want my brain to rattle around in my school a little bit as I'm driving down the road. And so I actually swapped into a rhino lined box after that. 

I thought I blew a speaker and I went into a sound shop and I was like, hey, just need to know how much if I can get another kicker comp. I like this one or you know, just get new speakers or what And as soon as I reached in to touch the box to show him, I was like, never mind figured it out. So I got a real nice rhino lined box in the back of my jeep. 

That's, you know, way too big and takes up way too much space, but it's totally worth it. Um, and then, yeah, I just, I've always had that same interest as you man. I grew up around it and everybody was always just, you know, the time 12 were just big. My brother in law loved his tins that were like super compact but still had a really good sound to him and I'm with you like 9 18, that'd be great. 

I would love to have that in the back of something, but I just don't have the room for it in my jeep. So you gotta have a compact system in those jeeps. And then if, if you can go marine or outdoor friendly, it's even better that, but I love sound. That's why whenever your email came across my desk, I was like, man, this is gonna be a good conversation because I love the car, audio space. Um, you know, and then again marine, outdoors boats, all that kind of stuff and sound systems are amazing no matter what vehicle you're putting them on. So what is it exactly that down for sound is doing. It looks like are y'all building your own manufacturing your own speakers and amps and all of those things or, you know, kinda, what's your idea of client? Yeah. So, I mean, are 99% of our clients are do it yourself type people that are going to be installing their own stuff. That's all I'll say 95%. 

Uh, some of them purchase it and they try to take it somewhere and have somebody else install it. There's a kind of a gray awkward area there because most of the shops that you go to, they want you to purchase the stuff from them if they're going to install it, which I get it. But anyway, um, that's our, our typical client is somebody that's usually doing it themselves. 

Uh, the way that I know you're gonna ask me like how down for sound came about and what made me think like, oh, I need to, I need to do this as a business. So, the way that that happened was I was growing my social media following on Youtube primarily initially and I was getting a good following and I was going to these shows, my system was like, the bigger my system, I've made my system, the more, um, crowd that it drew when I went to these shows. So I was gaining popularity there and I started recording the videos and sharing them on Youtube and people want to love seeing themselves on the youtube videos and obviously that's like a snowball effect every time I go to the next show. Like I want to hear your stuff. I saw it on Youtube. 

Like, so it started making me a little bit the famous at the time. And um, but every time that I would give people these demos, they would ask me the same quote. Most of them would ask me the same question. Where do you get your equipment from? This kept happening? And I wasn't really thinking it wasn't clicking. And then one day somebody asked me that after they got a demo from me and they're like, where do you get your equipment from? It was like the light bulb just snapped in my head. 

I could be selling these people this stuff. Wait, how do you sell people stuff? How like, how do you start a business? So then all those questions came after it. But that's how like the idea of down for sound started and obviously it wasn't an easy road getting started. 

And, but I went from in the matter of seven years, I ended up getting fired from the airport, got forced to trying to condense the timeline, but got fired from the airport, I was moving to las Vegas. Uh, was forced to figure stuff out. I thought when I moved out here to Vegas that I would get a job at another airport cause I had 10 years of experience. I'll get hired. No problem. Um, never got a call again. Just like college. Like never got a call, but that ended up being the best thing that ever happened to me was nobody ever called me and it forced me, my back was against the wall. 

I was out here living with my girlfriend now Fiancee, I was living with her, I was being a bum, like I didn't, I had no source of income, so I'm like, I gotta figure this out, ended up figuring it out. It went from basically jobless to the past two years. I've done over $17 million a year in revenue and going from being fired jobless where I was making $30,000 a year, so you can figure it out as, but at that time I also made a Youtube video, I was like so devastated because you lose your prime source of income and so many people become so dependent on that it's normal, but when that happens in your, it's basically like your life lee hood is sucked from you, you're like, oh crap like what do I do now, but as long as you don't give up, you remain consistent and like you can achieve, I mean, my level of success, like I know people that are way more successful, I know people are equally as successful and there's different people, Success is different for every person. Like, and to me it's about having freedom, like having choices and um anyway, so I've been able to do this in a relatively short amount of time just by figuring things out and again when I, when the idea first popped in my head, I knew nothing about business or selling stuff for a warehouse, the 30,000 ft, like stocking all this product like, but he's able to be figured out and having a mentor, I didn't always have a mentor, but in the past few or four years I've had one kind of at my um at my beck and call, I don't try to bother him that much, but if it's uh thing that's coming up that I haven't experienced before, hit him up for his, his expertise, his, he has the knowledge or whatever and he's helped me um become what I am today a lot faster than I maybe would have been able to figure it out, So mentors are huge, but um it's been a heck of a journey so far, so what is it then, you know, you go from figuring out, you need to sell something because you gotta make money, which I love that story too because so many great businesses are built out of that hardship, you know, with me, I'm trying to transition from one thing to another and so many entrepreneurs have that story where it was like yeah, my main source of income got shut off and that was it, I had to sink or swim and so I guess let's start with what you started doing and then kind of progress into what it is that you do now? Same company, you know? But just, what did you start selling? And then what do you sell now? 

Okay, well, initially I started selling some like t shirts and like little knickknacks, apparel type things to kind of really cover my expenses to go to the shows and stuff. Like recoup some of my gas money hotel. Um, sometimes I couldn't even afford a hotel, so either slept in my vehicle or slept under my vehicle. 

My fiance would be laughing right now. She knew this. Um, there's so many stories inside of my journey, like trying to pick the ones that people can really relate to, but uh, that's definitely one of them when I was going to these shows and trying, I was working at the airport and going to the shows when I wasn't making that much money then, but I just like going to the shows initially, but um, like I need to start selling something, uh, just t shirts and apparel because people would ask me if I had anything to represent me and that didn't make sense to me either. I'm like, why do you want to represent me? 

Like, I'm just this dude. Um anyway, so that was the first couple of things because obviously it's a lower cost item. Um, and my fear at that time was people like these t shirt manufacturers are like, oh, you gotta buy a minimum of 50 shirts or whatever, like 50 shirts, I just have three people that are wanting t shirts and how do I know what size the next person is going to be? I don't know that am I gonna be able to sell them? 

I'm gonna have to give them away to my family or whatever, so that was like a big hurdle for me. My initial hurdle was trying to figure out what size t shirts I was going to buy, and it didn't make sense to me because I didn't know what size the next person was going to be. Um so after I got fired and you talk about people that are in the transition, sometimes they're stuck with the comfort of and and this, I don't, this may be kind of where you're at, you're like working here as comfortable, I got good retirement, I got like insurance, like all these things, so all these things are in their head, that comfort is, that's all it is, is just that comfort and it was the same way with me, I'm like, I have this job, I'm not really, and it made me not really push down for sound or start selling sound because I'm like, oh I can, I'll just get to it whenever. Um but now I know like I've been to tons of wealth building seminars and like all kind of business strategy, um masterminds, all these things and most of the people say when your side hustle starts exceeding your primary source of income or even getting close, you need to step away from it because it's going to push you like your back is still gonna be against the wall, like I gotta do this, I don't, I don't have a choice and not that you have to burn the bridge so to speak, but most of the time when you make that decision it's gonna push you to um go and do better and make what you're doing your your your full time, obviously your thing because that's what you have to do. So after I got fired and I moved to Vegas, nobody called me to hire me on at the airport, I'm feeling like a bum sitting in my girlfriend's townhouse with the little bit of stock that I had. Um I just had some speakers, couple of subs, I didn't have a much because I was broke, like I just, but I knew that I needed to invest some money into some product to be able to sell it at that time, I was lucky if I was getting one order a week for something, I mean it could be a small $50 speaker, so I was still broke, like I wasn't like you're not making that much money off of these things, so you're not bringing in that much money and she's paying for like the rent, the everything, so I'm just, again I'm kind of in this feeling of helpless, like I'm, I'm not good, I'm not, I'm not even good enough to be with her because I'm not providing anything to her besides, like I love you, like you're, you're beautiful, but I'm not providing any sort of thing that us as men, we, we want to be the, the rock, the shoulder to cry on the providers, you know, so, and I'm doing none of this. So it was affecting me mentally for that reason. So I decided, and this is kind of my secret sauce. 

I decided to, because I had my following, I was building my online presence via youtube and facebook, It was just cross pollinating uh, facebook Snapchat, instagram, twitter, all these things, they just started like slowly building. Um and I'm like, how do I let people know that I have this? I mean I have a website but do okay, I know what I'm gonna do. 

I'm gonna every single day or every time that I get an order, I'm going to take the invoice, I'm going to personally sign a thank you. Uh thank you john and then sign my autograph on there, like, so I'm giving them a personal thank you and I'm also gonna take a picture of their product me with their product or do a little video and I did that every time I got in order and if I'm like, if I don't get an order, I'm gonna go pick some random product that I have and take a little picture of it or talk about it or whatever. I did that every single day and I still do it to this day, not not every single day because I have a ton of other stuff going on. 

We come out with new products, I go live on facebook, I'm letting people know because you, if you're out of sight you're out of mind. So that's what I did over and over and over and eventually it started to get a little bit of traction where I'm like, okay, I'm not a complete bum now, like I'm I'm able to bring in a little bit. Um and we, so every time I made some money, I invested everything, all the money that I had back into getting more product cause I'm like, if I keep flipping this time and time again it's gonna, it's gonna continue to grow. And so I kept doing that. So I was, I was broke because I was uh inventory poor, like I had a lot of inventory, but I had cash poor, I had a lot of inventory on, I say a lot at the time, I thought I had a lot of inventory, but I had no cash because I just kept dumping everything back in. So as that grew, it was and I was operating out of her town home, so it was filling up the garage, it was filling up the kitchen and living room area. 

I had taken over one of the spare bedrooms made in my office and I was lugging stuff all through the house. The house was filthy with my foot like the traffic um my foot traffic going in and out there with my shoes on, it was blackening up the carpet that was like a white color. So she wasn't that happy about that, but it made me realize okay I need to actually get a place that I can store my product at. So I went down the road uh and found a storage unit, a 10 by 15 storage unit. 

I'm like okay I need to get this to get all the product there to get it out of the house. So I'm not like destroying our house so much and making it look like a business because this is her house. Um So anyway I go down there and they're like okay we need three months of rent, like down payment. 400 I think it's 450 bucks or whatever. I'm like crap, I don't even have $450. How am I gonna come up with this? So scratch up the change to get the uh the storage unit and take all the product down there. So I'm operating it like that for a little while running like again I might get an order once at that time, like after that was about a few months later that time I was getting an order maybe every other day or something, it was starting to pick up the volume and sometimes I get two orders in a day, but anytime I get an order I would run down there and grab the product to drive back to the house and print the label like do all that and then and I would take it over to the Fedex and a few hours later, five hours later sometimes I'd get another order like okay, I'm gonna run back down there again and so I'm running back and forth and doing that for a few months. 

I'm like man this this doesn't really make a lot of sense. Like I'm running all over the place all day long but I'm not productive at all because you're doing so much running so that's when the thought came to, I need to have an actual location, like a small warehouse that I can have a little office, have the little product that I have and get it going as more of an official business instead of running it out of a garage. But you hear the stories that so many people start their things out of garages, out of addicts and all this and a mind very similar to that. Um But so I ended up looking around and I'm like man 1000 square foot, that'd be plenty to do what I need to do, okay, I'm looking and looking and mentor. Um now I didn't really know him that well at that point but some of the other business owners that I was selling their product for, I would talk to them and I would message them on facebook and stuff and I'm like yeah I think I'm gonna look for a little warehouse 1000 square foot. And they're like what, 1000 square feet, what are you gonna do with that? 

I'm like I can't even afford 1000 square feet. So how am I gonna look for something bigger than that because usually warehouse spaces around a dollar a square foot out here. So um I'm like I'm looking at 1000 bucks a month and I could just barely pay for the storage unit that's 100 and 50 bucks a month. 

They're like man basically they told me we see how fast you're growing and uh just just do it like look for something bigger. So I ended up going and getting like a 25 100 square foot warehouse and they're wanting two or three months in advance and like how do I do this like so every time it happens like it's that big hurdle that you're having to overcome. But um so I got the 2500 square foot warehouse did that for, I think I signed a two or three year lease on that and within a year and a half I was outgrowing that space and I started looking for my second warehouse, which is gonna be 7500 square foot. So I'm going from 100 $50 a month to $2500 a month in rent to $7500 a month in rent. I'm like, this is crazy, like, how am I going to afford this? Because at the time, like, I was still cash poor, like I was just putting everything into the inventory and um I was looking for the second place, which is 7500 square feet and this was probably one of my dad, like I told you always told me to save save for a rainy day and because you never know what day was going to rain, like and you're gonna need it. So when I was moving into my second warehouse or trying to move into there, I found this place and I called the guy and I'm like, hey, can I come look at your place? Like I really like the outside and everything is like, sure. So he meets up with me And I probably get him to let me see the place like 10 times before. 

Like, I'm, I pulled the trigger because I'm like, I'm going for $2500 a month to $7500 a month. That's a major difference in my head. And of course I'm still terrified that I'm gonna fail because I'm just in those early stages. So anyway, I finally making the decision to get into this or that I want to get into this place. And uh, I mentioned like, I'll take it like, let me know what I need to do next. 

He's like, we'll send you over the paperwork and fill it out and get us your financials and stuff. So I sent it all over to my accountant and uh, I got it back, got it sent back over there and I don't, I don't get a call back from him and I'm like, man, am I having deja vu again? Like what's going on? So I text him no response. 

Try to call him a bunch like for weeks, no response. I'm like, what, what the hell is going on? And I'm like, okay, he won't answer. 

I'll go back to the sign that I saw and uh, find the company. So I found the company. I called to the main headquarters, downtown Las Vegas. 

I'm like, hey, and I can remember this dude's name. Like I met him that one time and his name is Jake Higgins and I can remember it. Like it was yesterday because it was a turning point in my entire life that this happened to me. So I called them and I'm like, hey, I've been trying to get in touch with J Higgins, Is he still with the company? 

He's not giving me a call back. He was hitting me back left and right, when I was looking for this building and she's like, I believe so let me check, but it puts me on hold, comes back. Yeah, he's still with the company, uh what do you need? And I'm like, well, I mean I was trying to get this new building at 9 50 pilot road and I can't get a response from him, and she's like, okay, put me on hold again, and she comes back. She's like, I was sorry sir. Like you basically told me you can't afford this. Like when they saw my because I wasn't making a ton of money at that time, or bringing in a ton of revenue to be able to afford, I don't know, close to $100,000 in rent at the time with they have cam fees and stuff. 

I don't know if that's a thing around you also you like you have all this stuff tacked on top of it, so um you can't afford um this rent out of like the revenue that you're making, and I'm like, I'm devastated, I just knew that that was going to be the place that I was gonna move into. I loved it. You know? Sometimes in life something happens, you see something you like that's the one that's the one right there. I know that's the one, this was that building. And uh I told her, I'm like, are you sure there's nothing that can be done? Like can you check? 

She's like okay, I'll go talk to my manager higher up or whatever. She comes back and she's like, I'm sorry to tell you this, but it's pretty much I'm probably not not gonna happen. And I'm like, well what they say, and they said the only way that we can make this happen for you is if you pay a year's rent in advance, I was like, Wow. And she told me it was close to $100,000 and I'm like, It took about 30 seconds. Like it was dead silent on the phone. I'm like, do you want any cash or a check? And she she's dead silent on the response as well. And I'm like, hello. And she's like, did you, did you just ask me if I wanted cash for a check? 

I was like, yeah, you wanted to cash or a check. I think I had 100 and $2000 in my account or whatever it was. So if I had to think I'm like, do I really wanna take because I'm going all in. Like, I'm like, if I really believe in this, I got to go all in and it gives, man, I got I'm covered in Goosebumps right now because it was one of those moments in my life that I'm just like, I got to make this decision, I'm going to do this. 

This is gonna be a she's like a cashier's check is finally like, what do you want me to bring it to you at lunch time is that's fine. Now I go to the bank, I get this check for a cashier's check for $100,000 whatever it was. I drive down there, this massive building like downtown Las Vegas like skyscraper type building, go up to the 50th floor, get out and there's a receptionist there, like I'm here to speak to whoever it was and she's like oh yeah she's in the conference room in there and I walk in there's like this huge conference table 50 seats at it, she's sitting at the end and like you can see all the downtown Las Vegas, the strip down there and everything. I'm just like is this a movie? Like what, what is happening right now? 

I felt like I was in the Matrix or something like but anyway, go on there and I put the check down the thing and she picks it up and looks at it. She's like In my 30 years of doing this, I have never had this situation happen before and I'm blown away that this is happening right now. I was like you and me both but I kind of get those keys, it's just like right here so I signed and I was like now I was walking out of there so happy but that was like again, you know, I tell these stories just getting slapped in the face over and over and over and you're like why me? Like why does this keep happening to me? But now I know why it's made me stronger and it's made me more weathered to these situations that happened. So when I started looking for my warehouse that I have now, so uh almost it's been about 2.5 years ago, I moved into my current warehouse that has 30,000 square feet and we have higher ceilings, we have more racking and everything like that. So that's over the course of six years, kind of going from operating out of a garage and attic and then a little storage unit to 30,000 square foot warehouse. Um over 15 people on my team. Uh so it's been quite the journey, but so grateful that um I'm grateful for the things that have happened to me, especially those hard times, because again, every time you learn something new like you learn to, I got to expect this right hook that's gonna be coming at me when I'm looking my next building, that is 100,000 square foot or 250,000 square foot, whatever it ends up being the next step, I'm I'm gonna be ready for it. So anyway, that's kind of the transition of how down for sound got started and like the little steps along the way that made it what it is today. So we're now considering too, we sell to people all over the world, we distribute car audio products worldwide every day. Uh Now we average over 100 orders a day and if you think about it just six years ago, I was wishing I could get one order a week. 

That was my goal is to get one order a week and now it's over 100 a day sometimes on black friday and stuff like that, we'll push 7 800 orders in a single day. So um that's, it's just not giving up though. Like I could have easily uh I have a story about all my, when I closed the store one time because I got scammed out of, somebody did a chargeback and I'm like how can a person, like it was one of my biggest first orders, it was like for five big amplifiers, like $5000 I'm like man, this is awesome, I'm gonna be rich. And so I shift out the amplifiers um to the person and it ended up being international and everything like that, I'm like I don't care, I'm gonna make it happen so I ship it and then um one day I'm I'm actually boarding a plane in Vegas to go back to um Mississippi and I get a notification on my phone, it says your account's been deducted five grand, I'm like what? I don't even have five grand overdraft my account, I'm like what is going on? So anyway, the planes taking off, there's no uh internet, so I land, I'm calling the bank and I'm like, why did you take money out of my account? 

They're like, oh, the person did a chargeback. It was a fraudulent charge. I'm like, what do you mean I don't have any protection? And I know it's the person that had, the card information is protected, but you have to give the money back. I'm like, what? Okay, I'm not doing this anymore. Like this. If somebody can just steal from you like that and and not then and just get away scot free, no strings attached. I'm like, why would I have an online business? 

Is basically somebody walking in there taking the product and thanks or maybe not even saying thanks. So like, I'm closing this down, like I'm not doing this anymore. So I closed the store down for I think a few weeks and time's going by. And and my dad's asking me like, what's going on? And he's like, I didn't basically, I didn't raise no quitter. Like, why why are you gonna shut this thing down? And what if I did decide to leave the store shut down? Like and and went back to work doing something else, whether it's cutting grass or pumping gas, I definitely wouldn't have done 17 million in the past two years. That's for sure. So anyway, that's another story that uh, I knew that was also a big thing that impacted my life and if I would have gave up, it wouldn't have been the best decision for me. So I had to keep going because we definitely wouldn't be servicing um Wherever we're approaching 200,000 orders now like on the store. So that's a ton of people that want to take a chance with purchasing from down for sound. And the only reason why they're going to do business with you is if they trust you you have to provide provide a good uh product, you have to get it out to them fast, fair pricing. Uh if anything happens like have good customer service and take care of them but so we're shipping products worldwide and um dealing with people that have, they want to customize their whether there's their vehicles, their golf carts, their boats, their uh side by sides a T. V. S jet skis like we're into all these things were offering stuff to all these people and we're constantly expanding it. And as time has went on people have asked for your asking if we do our own manufacturing and stuff. Um as time went on people were asking us if we were going to do like our own like household name brand. So we started looking into that and over the past 2 to 3 years we've been heavily coming out with new products but we we vet them as best as possibly do as much research and development on each one of them as possible. And uh we've constantly expanded our own product offering and uh we were able to Launch an amplifier line and do over $1 million dollars in sales, I think it was right at six months, which probably hasn't been done before in the history of car audio for a new car audio company. 

Um, and anyway, that's where it kind of started and we just kept adding and adding and adding to the product line. So now we have tons of amps, tons of speakers, tweeters, sound deadening material, batteries, wire, like cables, like all this stuff. So we're just constantly also listening to our customers and our, uh, fans like, what do y'all want to see next? So, or how can we make our last products even better? So we're constantly listening to them on feedback on what we should come out with next. So that's kind of how we also make our old, our version one or two products, the version two or three and then also come out with the next product that the people are demanding. 

So, um anyway, sorry to be so long winded, but that's kind of the story on how it transitioned now. What's amazing to me about this entire story? I, I wasn't asking, I didn't get dates, I didn't get times. 

I didn't get, you know, any type of like actual timeline on this. So this entire time that we're talking, I'm thinking in terms of, you know, when you were growing up. So I'm thinking like nineties two thousands, you know, when, when we talk about the company starting, I'm just kind of thinking in my head early two thousands, you know, maybe early 20 tens, but it's like, no, This company is six years old. So this was what, 2016 or 2017 when you started uh the so I actually came up with the name down for Sound some years prior, but the reason why I came with the name down for Sound was because back in, back in these days, my space, there was a transition happening from Myspace to facebook and there was like a kind of a gray area, there may be another awkward area and people were spending a lot of time on online forums. So basically stuff that people post on facebook now, they would post them on car audio forums. Um but the problem with the forums back then was there was so much, so many trolls, like people that belittle people and stuff, like, say you have a beginner that comes into this car audio group and they're asking a simple question, how do I wire my speaker up and they would come in there, You're an idiot, You don't know how to do this and like, just I'm like, but God, he's just clearly trying to learn, like, why not just answer his question instead of making him feel bad or trolling him or whatever. So I'm like, I'm gonna come up with a place where people, I'm gonna start my own for him, so people can come there and when you sign up, you have to um, abide by these couple of rules. 

The first one was absolutely no trolling if you're controlling or belittling somebody your band instantly. So that was the first thing, like, don't sign up here, if you're gonna ever do that. So anyway, that's how the name down for sound got started and it was initially started for a place for people to come and talk about car audio and not have to fear being belittled or bullied or whatever. So I had that name for a while, but I didn't, again, I wasn't trying to sell anything, I didn't know anything about selling anything, but I loved car audio. So, uh, that's why I had the name uh, down for a sound for the forum. And as the time kept going, more people started transitioning to facebook and it was taking over and Myspace was going away and people were creating facebook groups, Car Audio facebook groups and everybody started uh moving away from the forums to the facebook groups and posting all their stuff there. So I'm like, well there's not really any reason to have a forum anymore. 

People just post their stuff on facebook. So, um, but that's kind of when the idea happened, like, oh, I need to start selling these people, this stuff, Oh, I could make down for sound, the landing page for this, oh, this, this will be awesome. So yeah, this is the actual store ish, probably 67 years. But again, like the very start of the store was like, you know, you have these people, I've got a website but ain't nobody going to the website, like nobody knows about it or whatever. It was kind of like that. 

I wasn't doing like really any sales or whatever. So, um but anyway, obviously snowballed and uh turned into what it is and there's, I've created a lot of supporters, a lot of fans, but man, there's some people that are very disgruntled about like what I've been able to do in a short amount of time. And uh and a lot of them, I looked up to them like I thought these, like, I knew they had been in car audio, they had shops for a long time and I looked up to them and I'm like, man, these these guys are awesome. They're killing it. They're like, they're either a brick and mortar store or whatever. Um and as I continued to grow the thing that I had that they didn't ever have was my social media following huge, huge shot in the arm to somebody that's wanting to do something because you have this, this amount of people, whatever it is that you, that's trusting you, they're listening to you, they're watching you because they have this connection with you. So um anyway, these people, not all of them obviously, but there's some people that I really looked up to that I caught up to what they were doing and I destroyed like their revenue that they've ever done and they got really upset about it like they slandered me, they said I had to be taking advantage of people like all these things that you hear about entrepreneurs and stuff that um it kinda, it kinda hurt my feelings because for you to hold somebody at a high regard for you to look up to people and then for them to slander you like and you even give them kudos, you even talk about them highly and then them talk to you or belittle you or slander you because you pass them like it's that saying everybody wants you to do well until you still start doing better than them and then they get upset about it or they start they act totally different. So that started happening. But anyway um that was a, it was crazy for me to experience that but I mean I would rather be where I am today than experiencing, oh I didn't I didn't quite beat them, I didn't quite reach that level. 

You know I wanna my goal with down for sound is too with the downward sound products and we have a saying that's the down for sound difference and the downward sound differences, guaranteed lowest prices fastest shipping, best customer service. Uh we we really hold this to a high regard and people hold us to it as well. Like if we're slipping and like oh you didn't get my order shipped out fast or like I didn't have the best um dealings with customer service. It makes it where we need to go back to the drawing board, we need to see what's going on so we can become better and uh yeah, we've just been able to grow it um through treating people right and also expanding our product lineup and um just, I don't know, kind of, there's a book called blitz scaling as well. 

I read that about a year ago and I've been kind of supercharged my thought processes on, okay, we need to really come out with more products and and just flood the market with them because it's gonna help us grow even more so anyway. Yeah, I mean the whole point is that it is such a short time to have such large gains, you know? Um So I was sitting here thinking of this like long term thing and then at the end of it, you're like, you know, 67 years of actually selling, you know, of of having, you said a functional, I'm getting orders. Yeah, it's so fast and I don't know honestly, it's just blow, it blows me away and then to like you said, scale up so fast continually of making your own products and then having those kind of blow up and do great too. I just, I think that most audio companies no matter what type of, of sound there into your hearing about the super successful known name brand ones are, you know, years and years in the making, where it's like we've been making sound equipment since the sixties, seventies, eighties, you know, it's kind of a low and slow process, but I do think it's probably attributed kind of to the fact that so many people can do it yourself now where it's like, it's the technology is getting so much more compact and so much easier. 

It's, it's like having a computer in the sixties compared to having a computer now. It's like, well when computers used to take up an entire room, you know, and they were 50 $60,000 that's too much and now that exactly. Well, so then let's talk about, you know, how we can find you where we can find you. 

Just a general overview of, I know we've talked about some of the products that you have and stuff like that. But um, just a general overview overview of like that elevator pitch. If you could just convince someone to be your client, what would you say? 

Yeah, I mean people, a lot of the people that come to downward sound are supporters of mine already. They're either following my youtube channel, I've tried to provide a ton of value on their answering the most common questions that people have about car audio. I go to a ton of shows, car audio shows and different um, shows all over the world now. Like I travel like I've been to Russia europe, um, a bunch of different places just in the name of car audio. 

I love being out there with people and obviously when I take my vehicle to these shows and people get to hear it now with the, this form that it's at now, it's just this mind blowing experience. So, um, they get this connection with me either through my social media post or they actually get to meet me in person. So that's the connection as well. So people come to me for most of the time, that reason, but if they come to me, if they just stumble across down for sound on the internet and they're like, oh, I'm searching for whatever product it is and I pop up and like, I'll check this out. Okay. No, guaranteed lowest prices. So okay, I'm probably not going to find it cheaper than here, but I'll research anyway. 

I'll look at some other places. Okay. He actually does have the cheapest or the same price as some of these other places, but we also throw in like a lot of what we call freebies on some of these orders that are a certain dollar amount or above. So if you're gonna buy a, an item, say it's 500 bucks. 

You can get the item at, um, store one or store to being down for sound. So why would you buy from one if you don't know the people, if you don't have this connection with them, why would you buy from down first sound? Well we throw in what's called freebies. 

We have these, so the items listed there and then right up under it, there's uh T shirt size sticker, color volt meter, color lanyard. Like all these things that people get in addition. So we're adding even more value on top of the product because most of the products that we sell in car audio there, the pricing is controlled by the manufacturer. So you, it's called minimum pricing. So we have our products listed at minimum pricing. So everybody else that sells the same product online, it's all supposed to match. So you have to convince or look more appealing to people for them to buy from you instead of the other person. So this is one of the things that we do, not just all the social media posts and being out there like that. But when a person sees like okay I can just get this $500 item from store one or I can get the $500 item and all this swag to go along with it for free. 

Okay I'm gonna get it from them and they have so is guaranteed lowest prices, fastest shipping best customer service. So they know that we're gonna get it out as fast as possible and if something happens or they need to talk to us our phone numbers, they're like we're open from six am to nine PM monday through friday and even on Saturdays from eight am to four PM. So um that's what we're doing. We're trying, I mean I'm a firm believer and treat people how you want to be treated. So I'm always trying to treat people as good as possible, talk to them like um like they're my buddies and like I say I go live all the time on facebook and chat with people and answer all types of different questions. 

Sometimes it's business, sometimes they're asking about speakers, sometimes it's relationship advice or whatever. So I just, I've always been a totally open book for that. Um but that's our website down for sound shop dot com. 

You want to find me online, you can do. So um we have facebook pages instagram pages under the down for sound name. I also have my Youtube channel which is my biggest um I guess area it's got over I think we just went through half a million subscribers on Youtube. So um that's it's called the life of Price because it's just me sharing my life basically and then we have the life of price on facebook, I'm on Snapchat under J. P. D. Four S. Um what else do I have? 

I have a twitter but it's not really a popular thing for uh car audio so I don't spend too much time there. A lot of people follow me on my personal facebook page which is just Jonathan price. Um I just share a lot of my, I have all my poster public on my personal facebook page so you don't have to be my friend to um to see my stuff but a lot of people follow my personal page. 

I think I have almost 30,000 people following my personal facebook page just for my daily whatever it might be like for me doing ice baths in the morning to working out to red light therapy and all these crazy things that I do. Um But anyway so those are the areas that you can hit me up on perfect. Yeah man I mean I was going to uh kind of end the show there and say thanks for coming on but ice baths jesus. 

That has been a trending thing that I've seen, it's really kind of it's exploding. You know a lot of people are talking about the health benefits of it and uh I know it doesn't look like it because you know my weight is like a roller coaster. I go through these times where I'm like eating super healthy, getting super trim, working out all the time and then life gets busy you know and you start just eating double cheeseburgers again and you know doing that whole thing and so now we're back on top of it trying to eat a little bit better trying to get into the gym at least every we try every day, but at least every other day or so. Um you know, only skipping maybe once or twice a week basically. But ice baths is something I've seen kind of hitting every single day where they're like yeah man you gotta just, you have to I guess nut up and just get in there And submerge your temperature for a while. 

I think they say like 10-15 minutes, something like that. It doesn't have to be that long, it's uh most of the time you can get a ton of benefits in like two minutes, I stand there for 3 to 5. Um But usually after the one minute mark, like you you get way more accustomed to it like this that you just have to control your breathing initially and get that under control and after that like you'll be fun. Like I mean I I was the same way, I don't like cold, I don't like getting in there, but if it's like it's probably, I know if I go in there and do that, that's gonna be more than likely the hardest thing I'm going to do that day, so I go in there and I'm like the rest of the day is gonna be a breeze uh turned into a block of ice this morning and I'm perfectly fine so but I've been doing it for a couple of years now, so I have a whole morning routine of what I go through now and like you said, one of the things with entrepreneurship, um I don't, I don't know if we have a couple more minutes or whatever, I can tell you this because it was okay, it was really important to me um as, As the business continued to grow, and I think a lot of people that are entrepreneurs are, they went through the same thing, as the business continues to grow... So does your waistline. 

Mine was, I had gotten, um, and there was things that were, there was other things that were suffering not just my health, but my relationship with my daughter and my fiance. These things were like, I was so focused on the business, I had like blinders on, I couldn't see what me working at the business 100 hours a week was causing to my family, or my health and then before I know it, um, I had reached my heaviest weight, which isn't super heavy to a lot of people, but when you've never been there before, um it was heavy for me, so I'd reached 210 pounds. I was eating, I was eating so much junk food, like in the mornings I would go to, if I did go to the gym, I would reward myself on the way home with a box of Krispy Kreme doughnuts, a dozen Krispy Kreme donuts and one of the, like, chocolate frappuccinos or whatever, wash it all down with that. Like, I earned that, I went to the gym, I probably burned 100 calories at the gym and consumed 5000 on the way to the house. Uh So, you know, these things, uh they don't happen overnight, just like if you're trying to go the other way, it doesn't happen overnight, but I wake up one morning and like, I am £210 like, I haven't ever been this heavy um like I noticed when I'm bending over to tie my shoes, like, like there's a big bulge there, like my belly's getting big and everything, like, I gotta, I gotta start doing something about that is, it wasn't that, it was right around that time as well, my dad had a stroke and um he almost didn't make it and it, it opened my eyes even more to if I keep doing, I was basically doing the same exact thing, even though I was working out here and there, he never worked out. Um but he always ate and drank whatever he wanted to his entire life, and I'm like, it like, popped in my head if I keep doing the same thing I'm doing, I'm gonna end up just like him, I'm going to have a stroke because I'm not taking care of myself. So that was also a big motivator for me to turn my life around and um and just become a lot healthier and um and ever since that day I've made my health um again, I'm not perfect either, like you talk about you, you're on a roller coaster, you go through, I eat a jalapeno cheeseburger and fries for lunch today, like I go through, but I go through some of the most, I'm more concerned, I'm about being better a majority of the time. So. And now I've gotten to a place where I can kind of maintain uh um I try to maintain 1 80 or under uh as my goal weight. So if I ever like get on the scale and I'm a little bit above it, I'm like okay I need to tighten up a little bit so I don't uh end up being back at £210 because I like to have some good food when I go back to visit my parents in Mississippi. 

I mean there's soul food, there's all this good cooking. I'm like I'm not missing out on that stuff, you know, it's experiences. So um But anyway, yeah, getting my health back under control. Um I got my blood work done um just take it way more seriously now because I wanna what's the use in earning a ton of money if you end up being on your deathbed and you're like, you're not gonna say I wish I would have worked more, or I wish I would have made more money, you're gonna say, I wish I would have spent more time with my family, you're gonna say, I wish I would have taken care of myself better, so I'm not having a heart attack at 40 years old or something to this extent, so, um as these realizations that I had, that made me want to do better a majority of the time and you lose your health, you, you lose everything, so um all the wealth in the world isn't worth your health, so that's something I've been um really actively trying to do better at for that reason. Well you never know what you're gonna get on the small business Origins podcast, A little bit of motivation, A little bit of Origin story, a little bit of business advice there, I think it's been a great episode, had an amazing conversation and I just can't thank you enough for coming on the show today and sharing all your stuff with us. 

I appreciate it, man, thank you for having me on, it was a great conversation and maybe I'll come back in the future and chat it up again. Heck yeah, and listeners, thank you for tuning in to another episode and helping out these businesses by just casting a light on them, sharing their content, following them on all the social media channel channels that they share and of course buying their products, if you like, good, sound like me then head down to the website, get you a good product like you said, you're gonna get a cheap price and you're gonna get a ship to you quick. So please check out the website. If you do nothing else, just share that content with your friends and family and keep coming back here every single week for a new episode, a new entrepreneur in a new business. But as always, that's it for us. We'll see you on the next episode and stay beefy.