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Episode #16 - Introducing the South East Gutter Monkeys

• American Gutter Monkeys, LLC

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In this episode of Monkey Business Radio, we sit down with Scott Wellington—longtime customer turned proud owner of Southeast Gutter Monkeys, the newest franchise in the American Gutter Monkeys network.

Scott opens up about why he and his family made the leap into business ownership and what stood out most wasn’t the startup kit, the tools, or the branding—it was the culture. From day one, what mattered most to Scott was how people were treated. The respect for employees, the trust built with customers, and the tight-knit, family-driven approach made AGM feel less like a franchise and more like a team.

We also explore what it means when team members stick around for a decade or more—and how that kind of loyalty reflects deeper values. Scott shares how the systems and training helped him avoid the usual startup stumbles, and why having a clear roadmap allowed him to focus on growing his business with confidence.

If you’ve ever wondered what it’s like to build something meaningful with your family, work with purpose, and launch with real support behind you—this episode is for you.

Speaker 1:

Ever thought about starting a new career, one where you call the shots, work with your family and build something that's truly your own. Today's episode is a special one. We're sitting down with Scott Wellington, the newest franchisee in the Gutter Monkey family and owner of Southeast Gutter Monkeys. This one's personal Scott was a longtime customer. Now he's running his own franchise with his wife Myra and son Marcus by his side. In this episode we dig into what made Scott take the leap from a 20-year career in the state system to starting a home-based family business. We talk about how he found the Gutter Monkeys and what stood out in the franchise model and why, after years and a tough job, he saw this as a path to build something real. From ladder safety to box trucks, radio ads and customer connection, scott shares what it's really like to launch a small business with big support.

Speaker 1:

If you're someone thinking about a second career or wondering what it takes to build wealth and legacy through business ownership, this one is for you. We have a great show for you, so grab a cup of coffee, sit back, relax and welcome to Monkey Business Radio. And welcome to Monkey Business Radio, hello everyone. Welcome to episode 16, where we're welcoming the newest franchise in the American gutter monkey family, the Southeast Gutter Monkeys. As always, I'm here with my good friend Dennis Siggins of the Cape Cod Gutter Monkeys. Chris, how are you doing Good?

Speaker 2:

Good, how are you, dennis? Doing well, chris, we have kind of an old friend, customer and our newest franchisee, scotty Wellington, on board today. Scott, how are you doing?

Speaker 3:

I'm doing fantastic, dennis. Chris, how are you?

Speaker 1:

Good, I'm doing good, all right, great Scott, glad to have you on the show, glad to be here, me, and to get you here for a bit. We're all interested in your story. Very interesting story actually. Oh, story actually, oh, it's a story, it's a story. So you're a couple of weeks in. How are you doing?

Speaker 3:

I'm doing fantastic. We got some spring weather coming in. Today was gorgeous. We were working out in Middleborough cleaning gutters, making it happen, and just the weather was cooperating and it was just nice to be out.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, you had a tough start. The weather's been pretty tough last two months, Sure Four months actually.

Speaker 2:

January February was the coldest winter in 10 years.

Speaker 3:

Yep.

Speaker 2:

And we turned right into March and the first two weeks of April was just constant rain. So Scotty did a lot of his training during a difficult time. But Scotty, your son, marcus, has been an employee here at the Cape Cod Gutter Monkeys for a year. Yes, true, and he's your business partner. He's got a wealth of experience under his belt.

Speaker 1:

At this point, it's kind of your origin story, right. That's kind of how you found the Gutter Monkeys, right. You know what?

Speaker 3:

Chris, it's absolutely true. In a way, that's exactly how that happened. Back the truck up.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, back the truck up. Yeah, back the truck up. Back the truck up Go back about seven years. How do we all meet?

Speaker 3:

Well, initially we were in need of gutters and I know it was hearing the advertisements on the radio gutter monkeys right down the road and we actually had a crew come out to give us the quote and we took up the business.

Speaker 2:

And we got the commercial version of the gutters on our house and they look beautiful. And we got the commercial version more jobs on your street. I remember diagonally across, the street.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, that's Mike and Mary.

Speaker 2:

Great people and we did so much work on your street over the next couple of months. It seemed like once a month. We were on your street throughout that whole summer, but that's how we first met Yep.

Speaker 1:

And fast forward seven or eight years, and here we are. Yeah, it's a big leap from cleaning your gutters to actually, uh, becoming a. I don't know. So what happened in that interim then? Or what was the?

Speaker 3:

uh, impetus for well, yeah, sure. Well, you know, my son is a graduate of upper cape tech. He studied the trades as a carpenter and he had a couple of years out. He worked on some cruise general contracting, you know, kind of cutting his teeth, and he reached a point that he wanted to try something different. And my wife and I were thinking of options. You know where would we go? And Gutter Monkeys came to mind. Right down the road had done work for us already, very pleased, and we're like, well, why don't you give the Gutter Monkeys a call? And he did, and somehow we got into the car.

Speaker 3:

Oh, my wife was on the gutter monkey website and saw that there were franchise opportunities and it really piqued her interest. I was coming up to retirement within a year and it was an opportunity and we bit. We wanted to have a conversation with that and we actually had the chance to sit down with Dennis, andy and Bruce, the principals of Cape Cod gutter monkeys and American gundermonkeys. And the actually had the chance to sit down with Dennis, andy and Bruce, the principals of Cape Cod Gutter Monkeys and American Gunder Monkeys, and the rest is history.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I'm kind of curious the first meeting, or first meeting or two, what was the thing that actually made you walk away and say, hey, we can do this?

Speaker 3:

You know, I'll tell you what. Marcus had started working and we were in the talks of possibly becoming a franchisee and two things struck us. One that really struck my wife was the culture here at the Gutter Monkeys. It's a family. Marcus really liked it and that was a big sell Like working here he loved working here. He still misses.

Speaker 2:

He would love to go out.

Speaker 3:

He's a good egg. He would love to go out for a last hurrah with Mo or T-Dog or something like that T-Bone, I should say and have a final cleaning. But he really liked the culture here and we loved hearing the feedback from our son, obviously looking to make a career for himself, so yeah.

Speaker 2:

You're going to start doing installs very soon and you're going to have a lot of jobs that are just too big for your brand new small crew to do alone. Yep, so Marcus is definitely going to have the opportunity to work with a lot of his former coworkers here. That's absolutely going to happen. Yeah, yep, did they give him a nickname yet? Gosh, I thought Marcus is a nickname.

Speaker 3:

As far as we go, he does like Marcus. Sometimes I call him Marky, you know, but we haven't got a nickname for him.

Speaker 1:

yet You're going to have to work on that.

Speaker 3:

Nicknames are important, you know. Sometimes it's a nickname that's not so good because you're a knucklehead, but sometimes it's a nickname because you know it's in respect.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, yeah, yeah, sometimes you have to earn that nickname.

Speaker 3:

Sometimes you need to earn that nickname True, true, very true.

Speaker 1:

So there's a couple other things that you were probably looking at. Right, I think one of the things that we hear about often is you know, what do I need to get into this business Was that? You know, how did you look at that, because we have sort of a home-based model. How did what are you starting with, then? You know what's your current status.

Speaker 3:

Well, I'll say this I wasn't a carpenter by trade and certainly never hung gutters. And in fact, before being introduced to tools and systems on how to put gutters up, you know what's a chop saw. I mean, I know what it is to ever handle one Nah, not really. But now I can tell you. I know what a chop saw is. I can bring it from one point to the other, I can set it up on a field stand, I know how to zero it and you know I've got that stuff down to a point that I'm comfortable. So if I'm in a situation to need a chop saw, I know how to make a cut, I know how to measure it and I know how to make it come out right. But service trucks you know there's some other items that you need. Going into the franchise, of course, you're going to have to have a truck for service. You're going to need a box truck.

Speaker 1:

You have a beautiful one sitting out in the parking lot there, brand spanking new Just yeah, nick did a good job.

Speaker 3:

He just got those graphics on and I'm very excited. It looks sharp. But that's an expenditure, right. I mean right off the rip. You know you're looking at a service truck. You need at least a box truck and if it's not cash on hand, you know you're financing it. So you've already got a little bit of overhead. You've got to make sure of things. So, yeah, in that respect, yeah, and the tools, hand tools and other things like that, just to make the jobs work, you know.

Speaker 1:

And of course you had a lot of help with you know, dennis, and those guys kind of oh, this guy's brilliant, that's a great story. Dennis always told me I never would have realized it was just ladders. You know, the first time I think you went you bought all the heavy-duty, massive ladders and stuff like that.

Speaker 2:

Well, I was a roofer Before I was a gutter monkey. I was a roofer for 30, 35 years and when Andy and I first started the Cape Cod Gutter Monkeys, I went out and purchased a bunch of ladders off of Craigslist and what we learned over that first year was roofing ladders have a different purpose. They need to hold a man and a bundle of shingles climbing up and down. A man weighs 200 pounds and a bundle of shingles weighs 92 pounds. That's a 300-pound payload. If you throw a couple of ladder brackets and a 24-foot plank two men and six bundles you know you got a thousand pounds plus on those ladders. Gutter monkey ladders are different. You want lightweight, nimble ladders because you're going to be moving them many, many times on a single home to clean those gutters. Installing gutters is not that much different. You're moving ladders all the time, so it's a different shape, size and weight of ladders. It's something that is so obvious. I didn't see it when I first came into the business and I had hung some gutters in my when I used to build houses and I used to primarily be a roofing contractor, so I was no stranger to gutters. But since we focus solely on gutters in these last 11 years, our gutter knowledge. My gutter knowledge has skyrocketed, you know, because we do specialize One of the things, scott, about.

Speaker 2:

Let's say that 16-foot box truck that you recently had lettered in. Scotty mentioned Nick. It's Nick Turkelson is our guy. He does all of our signage, wraps our trucks. He built the sign out in the front of our building here. Nick Turkelson, he's a great guy if you need that type of work done. He does all of our trucks. He did a couple of Scotty's trucks very recently, but that box truck is a moving billboard.

Speaker 2:

Absolutely. If you look on, you know, go to so many of the like the radio stations. We're on the iHearts, we're on the Codcoms and the CCB medias, we're on a lot of different radio stations and even over the bridge, atd, plm, cat Country these are big radio stations, many of them, and they also provide digital platforms and other marketing tools that we can all use. And what is the value of an impression? So if you're online, there's pop-up ads, there's all kinds of different ads that you can purchase, and my study has me believing that a well-logoed truck, especially a large box truck that's logoed left, right and back and even the front does have the Gutter Monkey logo on it, can garner upwards in a bedroom community, like we all live here on Cape Cod. 5,000 views per day, that's a big piece of marketing. That box truck pays for itself in marketing alone and that's something that can't be overlooked is the value of the marketing presence of your trucks.

Speaker 1:

It's huge, that's the thing about all these things like the ladders, the marketing, the branding and things like that. That's stuff that kind of AGM brings to the table that you don't have to. You know that, scott, you didn't have to worry about I learned from mistakes. I mean, all these things are learned by doing so. You know it's something you don't have to worry about. That came to you as part of the deal. You know you learned all these things as being part of AGM.

Speaker 2:

We made all, we've already made them and we only make it once. Then you fix it and we move forward.

Speaker 1:

So kind of de-risk your launch, you know you don't have to worry about making all those sort of mistakes.

Speaker 3:

You know, I'll tell you what, chris. That's a fantastic point Because when I was exploring opening a franchise, obviously the other option would be starting from scratch. You know, and I would have people ask me why would you do a franchise that's going to cost you money, why wouldn't you just do it from the get-go? And my response would be take a look at the business model. If you're considering a franchise I don't know if it's Gutter Monkeys or if it's a mattress moving company or whatever it might be what do they bring to the table? And I can tell you, the folks here at Cape Cod Gutter Monkeys had a business plan. They had a marketing plan. They, as Dennis just said, made the mistakes, learned from them and now you have best practices in place. One of the first things I learned ladders lightweight green tip Werner ladder, and I'm going to need it in a 20, 24, 32, and what was the last?

Speaker 2:

28. Yeah, we also keep forties, a handful of forties.

Speaker 3:

Those are tall ladders.

Speaker 2:

We don't use them every day, but we have three or four of them in the shop that get used pretty regularly, yeah.

Speaker 3:

But if you were starting from scratch, how would you know that you'd be ended up getting a fiberglass ladder and trying to lug that thing around, and it's five times the weight.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, it doesn't sound fun.

Speaker 3:

It, yeah, it doesn't sound fun. It doesn't sound fun.

Speaker 1:

So you're starting out now. You've got a home-based model right. You're at home right now. You're working on your basement and stuff like that. I was talking to you this morning. Sounds like the phone is ringing.

Speaker 3:

Phones are ringing, yeah.

Speaker 1:

We're busy this morning.

Speaker 3:

The discussion was how do we set up our week? I mean, obviously you have a territory you need to work. You don't want to spread yourself out one day or one job in Foxborough and then have your next job in Middleborough and then have your next job in Whitman or things like that. There's so much travel time that's involved. You're chewing up your day just getting from one point to the other. So that was one of the first considerations, I guess how to structure your week no-transcript cleaning set up on Monday and Tuesday, right, and then be able to have your installs as they start coming online on Wednesday and Thursday and then keep Friday as your office day. And I think that worked well and that's how we're trying to get our jobs set up for success. Make sure that you go from your furthest point out, work your way back and then you're back at home. Yeah, and you added a few people we did.

Speaker 3:

It was originally myself, my wife Myra, my son Marcus. We have Myra's sister-in-law, barbara. She's our office girl. She works Mondays and Tuesdays right now, and that just happens to be our cleaning days where we should be out of the office cleaning, so she has the ability to man the phones at this point, on those days. We also have my nephew, trevor, who's working with us. It's slow bringing him in and he is a great worker. I'm really blessed. Anyone who owns a business, your employees if you find yourself a good employee, someone who doesn't bang in sick, comes to work on time and has good effort and a good, you know good place in his mind for what he's doing and keep them, do what you do to keep them. So yeah, I mean it's, it's a small crew, but you know what it's our crew.

Speaker 1:

It's something I can actually say.

Speaker 3:

It's our crew, right.

Speaker 1:

It's a family. Yeah, it really is a family. That's the impression you get, at least I get coming in here. Of course, the podcast here is done in Cape Cod Gutter Monkeys headquarters AGM has a little office here, but it's Cape Cod Gutter Monkeys and it really is a family. Here you come in all these guys Well, you've known these guys for so long. Yeah, we've had a lot of them Been with you for a while, some of the guys from the start right, I'll tell you.

Speaker 3:

You know, just to jump back to a question you had, have, you know, not just one, but you have several employees that have been here for since the beginning, 10 years ago, maybe eight years ago. I mean that's a testimony, for you know how you run your business. For someone to stay for the long haul, like that, I mean, I think that's phenomenal.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, we have good retention of our co-workers. Cape Cod Gutter Monkeys we're in our 11th year. Chris has been here 10 and a half years. Adam's been with us 10 years. Then it's James Mo Trev. They've been here nine years give or take. Charlie and Bobby have been here seven years. John yeah, we have a really solid, solid group of core coworkers here that are just fantastic and it is like family it's part of your model.

Speaker 1:

I mean, you've kind of built in that family that togetherness. That was part of the business plan.

Speaker 2:

Way back in the beginning, when we started, andy and I started forming the business model long before we ever cleaned a gutter. There were a lot of things that we were focusing on, and one of them was the culture of the company. One of my last company before this one was on-time construction and the sub company was Blazing Guns Roofing. We used to build houses and re-roof houses. That was our world. We had just a great culture. We had a pool tournament every Friday night.

Speaker 2:

We had a great pool table back in the shop and you know we had Christmas parties and we. It was just like family. It was really great, a lot like what we have here. This company obviously has grown significantly larger than that company but, yeah, a lot of it is about the people that you work with every day your coworkers, but also then your customers. They're more important than the ladders and the trucks, because without your coworkers and without your customers, you don't have any need for ladders and trucks.

Speaker 2:

And sometimes we forget this young lady that came in earlier today. She was a young lady popped in, she was just visiting. She was a small business owner and she gave us a knock at the door and she walked in and she looked and she said, oh my gosh, you're doing a podcast. I said, yeah, actually we're going live here in about half an hour and she was so intrigued and she would look at the pool table over there and the dartboards. This is amazing. Sometimes we forget, like we get spoiled. But Scotty did mention that.

Speaker 2:

Scotty, you've mentioned that to me many times over the past year, longer, even Whenever Marcus started here a little over a year ago. You've commented on that how much he likes it here. It's true, we try to keep a fun atmosphere, a fun environment. I think it's very important. And as you're building a team, I mean back in the beginning it was Andy and me and an old truck. We had a 10-year-old truck and that's how we started and within a year or two we probably had four or five guys and my wife, babs. She was our office manager right out of the gate, and then Nancy, andy's wife, came on and Babs and Nancy pretty much ran the office. We didn't need anybody else at the time. But even our office staff now is very solid.

Speaker 2:

Yes, it's fun. I enjoy coming to work every day and that's huge. I want to point out one thing that, scotty, this came about many months six, eight, 10 months ago when you I believe Myra was there, bruce, a bunch of us were sitting in Bruce's office just talking and several items came up and I remember walking over and I shook your hand and went back and sat down because you have a very high level of financial literacy. It's not that common to meet somebody that says the things you do and understands the things that you do, and I know you have, prior to your work for the state over at the prison which you were at 20 plus years. How many years 20 years, 20 years in the jail, not?

Speaker 1:

convicted by the way. Oh, you were innocent the whole time.

Speaker 3:

All hearsay and allegation. There's no guilty people here.

Speaker 2:

You had a little bit of background in the financial services I did.

Speaker 1:

Did you not? Yeah, I didn't know that.

Speaker 2:

It was very apparent. In this one conversation you said two or three things that were eye-opening. I really felt like I was talking to somebody that has a high level of financial knowledge and I walked up. I stood up, I walked over shook your hand and I sat back down again. That's huge. Having a good financial background in anything you do is so beneficial.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, we talk about that all the time on this podcast. How important it is.

Speaker 2:

We do.

Speaker 1:

And I know I talk to a lot of potential franchisees out there, kind of shaking the bushes looking for them, and one of the biggest kind of the saddest things I find is that we find a lot of guys who have a lot of potential, make great gutter monkeys but they don't have their financial house in order or they don't understand the model and it's very hard to talk to them about some of the benefits of the gutter monkeys and having a franchise that you probably picked up on pretty quickly because of your background.

Speaker 3:

Well, and my wife, she also works as a yep she's a project manager, so she sees a lot of the finances as well. Just something as basic as a profit and loss statement what are your numbers at any given point during your month or quarter or year? And I know people that have small businesses and you'll ask them what's your? You know what's your profit and loss. It's like I don't know. It was like you need you kind of need to know that you really kind of do.

Speaker 2:

And it all goes together Marketing sales, the number of employees, monthly P&Ls and how many trucks am I going to need by the end of 2025? I always do my forecast at the end of the year, and January 4th of each year is when I do my balance sheets and all that kind of good stuff. But I also I basically present my forecast for the coming year on or about January 4th and I always look at where I want to be in 12 months and do we have enough trucks to get us there? Do we have enough coworkers in-house right now or do I need to look at two or three more? And these are some of the things that having a good high level of financial literacy can really help you. It can help you forecast, it can help you see things before they get here, and there's absolutely a huge benefit to that.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, and I've seen your list basically forecast of how many people you need to get this sort of revenue how many trucks? How much. Even you've got it down to even how much parking space you need to have a crew of 15 people.

Speaker 3:

You just opened up some new parking.

Speaker 1:

We did. You know, it's really down to that level. If you want to hit X number of dollars in revenue being a gutter monkey, you're going to need this much space, this many people, these many parking spots. You know, right down to that level.

Speaker 2:

That's the business growth chart that we talk about.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, and I'm sure Scott, you've seen that probably and a lot of people again with problems with their financial literacy, they'll look at that and it doesn't make a lot of sense when we talk about in this business, about building real wealth through business ownership, that's kind of what we mean. You know you're building real wealth as you start adding on those things and start building out your business. That was one of the things that impressed me. I wish again too old, but I wish I had actually found out about this myself a few years back, because I would have jumped into it. And those are some of the things that really made it attractive to me is that level of planning and stuff that's been done Well.

Speaker 3:

I think there might be an adage back in the finance days, and even if you have a business, you know hope is a bad strategy when it comes to investments. Hope is a bad strategy. When you're creating a business, hope is great and you want that to fall on your side. But to enter into something and say, well, I hope this works out this way, or I really really hope things will work out that way, that's a tough way to go at it. It's a very tough way to go at it. It's good. Very tough way to go at it.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, it's good to have a partner where you got an idea.

Speaker 3:

Absolutely.

Speaker 1:

So let's. One of the questions I had for you is we were the other day. We went down and we recorded a radio ad, one of the gutter monkey radio ads that you're well known for. Dennis is well known for his Bobby Don spot on the Cape Cod. Cape Cod. Gutter monkeys got the radio ad, I guess, on. And how did it sound your voice on the radio?

Speaker 3:

I'm kind of curious. Well, I have heard my voice on the radio.

Speaker 1:

And it's a little weird because I know when we started the podcast, one of the biggest issues I had with this podcast is I hate the way my voice sounds on the podcast and everyone else is like it sounds fine. It sounds fine Like Dennis's voice is so much better than mine After a while. After a while oh gosh, it sounds normal.

Speaker 2:

But right, it takes a while but how did it go?

Speaker 1:

how was your uh first radio ad?

Speaker 3:

oh well, I'll tell you what. I had a blast recording that we were um at plm, right, uh, we did. It probably was plm, but getting into the studio and getting past, like the shock, you know there's your microphone right there and you know we're going live. And you know there's your microphone right there and you know we're going live.

Speaker 3:

And you know, as soon as that comes up and you're starting to speak, yeah, it's just like oh okay, this is very different from anything I've ever done before, but to be honest with you, it was. It was a blast. I had a good time, you did really well.

Speaker 2:

I mean, I remember we did a take on your lines, you did a second take and then it went very smoothly after that. I think you just got the bugs out and you did a really, really solid job.

Speaker 2:

I know we've done I lose track of things, but we've done several right. We've been in different radio studios. I know we were up to PLM. I was up to ATD a couple of weeks ago. Those guys it was. They're a fun group up there. Atd is in Marshfield and I was on the morning business show about two weeks ago and just fun Radio people. They have magical voices. They're not like ours. I'm a gutter monkey first and foremost, but they have their regular voice and as soon as they OK, we've got got to go live, we got to do traffic on the threes or weather on the eights or whatever, and they turn into that radio voice. Larry over at a PLM, yeah, he's got a great radio voice and he's funny. He's a comedian, he's got some good stuff and it can be a little intimidating because you're in his office, this is his studio, this is his world and we're just walking in off the streets but we did.

Speaker 3:

We've done many ads, yeah. Yeah, I mean right there when you say I mean, what is someone's context? You're in a studio, you're saying you are in a studio. How many people are in a studio ever?

Speaker 1:

yeah I know especially for a new franchise.

Speaker 2:

I mean, you're a new franchisee and a week later you're back.

Speaker 1:

You're in a studio doing ads. How long would that without the help of a I'd probably still be shopping it around.

Speaker 3:

I mean it's and I'll tell you another thing that's great about radio and really it's really good Over the time that the gutter monkey's been building up over the decade. I mean there's some catchphrases that are out there that are just absolute gold. I mean, when you think about it, we clean gutters so you don't have to, we clean gutters so you don't have to. No monkeys were harmed in the making of this commercial. I mean people, I mean they love it, or even if it annoys them, there's like I can't believe that's such a hokey commercial. Well, we're in your head because you're just telling us our two biggest taglines, so it must be working.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, we go out to dinner after these podcasts and always like walking into restaurants with these guys, because the first thing you walk through the door and they're like oh the gutter monkey's here. Oh yeah, I'm a gutter monkey, have you had that experience yet?

Speaker 3:

Well, I'll tell you what. I did have a customer call in. It was a new customer and she was in the territory and needed the cleaning done. Really basic, the house wasn't formidable, it was all lower. I'm going to talk some gutter lingo right now. It was all lowers. It was a one story. I mean, it was a ranch, pretty straightforward. And she got to talking about what she needed done and she's like hey, have I heard your voice before? Hey, you sound familiar. I mean she just stopped me and just asked this question. I was like, ah, it's a little sheepish. I'm like, oh, you know, it's like. Ah. I said well, if you have to know, I've done a couple of commercials and I positioned it. I was saying I'm Bobby Downspout's sidekick and, yeah, you might've heard me on a couple of commercials. She's like I knew it. I said I heard you on Cat Country. Yeah, I heard us on Cat Country.

Speaker 3:

Big radio station, you know try and get my head back to normal size, it's like, and she was a sweetheart too. It was a fantastic job that we did, very appreciative. We did a couple of minor repairs in the cleaning and it's funny, it does happen.

Speaker 2:

We were in Turks and Caicos Two years ago, march. You always have a t-shirt or a ball cap that has gutter monkeys on it when you're on vacation and this family saw us and actually, chris, they're from Worcester and they know us from the radio stations out in Worcester. The other day, sunday, we were a group of us, took a little company break and we went up to the Sox game four of us and we were out on the four corners outside fenway just hanging out and bruce was picking up some peanuts in the shells big bag of them. You get them outside for 10 bucks and the peanut vendor, he saw bruce's ball cap and he said are you the cape cod gutter monkeys? He said yeah, I am. He goes. Actually I'm not, I'm the guy in the office. I sit in a seat, you know, and shining with my fanny all day. But he goes those guys and guys and he points to Trevor and Charlie and myself. He goes, those guys are actually the real gutter monkeys out in the field and he says you do my gutters. This guy was from Yarmouth. He's a guy, semi-retired, and this is sort of his retirement gig. He goes up to the Sox game on the weekends and he has a peanut, he's a vendor's license and he's out in front. And then one of the Boston cops came over and he started talking with us and he said you guys are the gutter monkeys. And we said, yeah, because you can see the ball caps. He goes. You do my gutters, he goes house.

Speaker 2:

But marketing is a wonderful thing. It's absolutely branding. It's a wonderful thing. It really is flattering when you're 75 miles from home and you meet a couple of guys that are customers of yours. It really is, because it's not a regular occurrence, but it's nice when it does happen. And, as you said, chris, if I have a hoodie on and I'm going into the market basket, you know, here and on the bridge here in the Cape, yes, two or three people always say oh, I can see the sweatshirt. Oh, you're the gutter monkeys, yeah, you do my gutters. It happens a lot, but and that's just branding, that's one-on-one.

Speaker 1:

Right and there's very consistent across all our gutter monkey franchisees. I mean we all refer to it as the gutter monkeys. We all have the same truck. Your truck looks just like the other ones other than Southeast gutter monkeys on it and whatnot.

Speaker 1:

It looks nice. Especially when they're all lined up and stuff like that. It's pretty impressive. But yeah, bobby, but downspout stories. So yeah, I had the same experience in Worcester going through Home Depot. Yeah, it's kind of cool. Even my mother listens to it and she's up that direction. So I heard the gutter monkeys today. I always ask which one wasn't.

Speaker 1:

Oh, I don't remember, but I heard it we're all better monkeys she also hears the competitors too, and she'll tell me when a competitor comes on. They weren't you. I heard them on the radio what was that? About your number one fan up there in ashland mass. She saw that still in ashland, same house as when we were in high school. We used to go up there and we used to run up that hill.

Speaker 2:

Remember that hill, Ramblewood right.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, remember that hill Magunko.

Speaker 2:

Hill. We used to have to run up there. I remember it very well. It was awful it was a long way from school too.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, so let's get into a little bit more about you know so, you're training, you're comfortable on ladders now.

Speaker 3:

I guess you haven. You know you start getting up to the heights, you think about it. You got to be careful. You need to know your ladder safety, which is one of the first things they the gutter monkeys, you know taught us ladder safety. I mean just the basics. If you're carrying a ladder from point A to B, you know there's a couple of ways you can do it. One way is three points of contact. I didn't know that. What are you talking about? It's a big ladder. Should I have two people? I mean, there's ways to safely and efficiently move a ladder and that's your business, because you're using ladders to get up to the gutters to do your cleanings.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, and so some of your office stuff is getting set up now, your back office tools and things like that yeah, you know scheduling. I'm sure scheduling is a major part of this whole thing. So, and of course, gutter monkeys have a scheduling system and stuff that you're using. Yep, there's a lot of back office things to keep in mind.

Speaker 3:

You know the accounting, the QuickBooks, those items ledgers. I'll tell you, even just having the daily schedule, when we first went live, I had the daily schedule. It was on our laptop, but I wasn't using the laptop. I had notes, sticky notes, and only after three customers I was totally confused. I'm like I got three people to schedule. Well, who did I talk to? What's the phone number? I know I'm supposed to get the email address, but yeah, there are processes in place. That makes your life a lot easier as you follow it. And again, that's another thing to keep in mind with franchises, if you have the marketing as you were just talking about marketing gold and the processes in place and you know the right equipment for the job, it makes your life a heck of a lot easier.

Speaker 1:

Right, especially being in a startup. You got so many things going on. Oh my gosh, it's just one less thing you had to worry about. Yep, very true, very true. So, going forward, looking down the road a little bit, you have sort of a three-month, six-month year growth plan. What's your near-term thoughts on what you're hoping for this summer and towards the end of the year, I guess?

Speaker 3:

Sure, you know I do have some ideas. You know milestones, some places that I would like to see the Southeast gutter monkeys be at certain time points, I mean right now. Initially we're just happy that the phones are ringing, right, you know. So that's step one. You know I'd like to see, in a year's time, for example, having a shop within our territory. Right now we're traveling from Ashby Our territory is off Cape, which will present some challenges when you start thinking about the summer months getting on and off the Cape on the bridges.

Speaker 3:

Right sure, and that's even before they decide to remake one of the bridges coming up. We'll see how that works out. So yeah, I see myself in a year. I'd like to see southeast gutter monkeys, at the very least leasing out a bay somewhere within our territory. Maybe it's in the Middleborough, taunton areas, rainham or somewhere around there. But I'll tell you what I clipped out. I think some people might call it a vision board. I mean, there's different names and there's different ways of thinking about it, but you know, trying to envision where your goal is, and I have a dry erase board in my office and in the left, lower, left-hand corner I actually have a clip out of a shop like an actual. Is it metal? What is your shop? Is it called a metal building? What is?

Speaker 2:

this building. Yeah, it's called a steel building. We are in a Morton building. I've built a few of these. It's a post and beam frame, but exterior is steel. Okay, gotcha Steel building, yeah.

Speaker 3:

And I actually clipped out a picture of. You know, it's not a four bay establishment shop like what the Cape Cod gutter monkeys have, but I've got a vision that I'd like to have this shop. It's got two bays, it's got an office. You can see, on one side there is an entrance. I can envision a sign Southeast gutter monkeys out front and I have that tape right on my dry erase board. So yeah, you know, knock on wood, we got a good team. We've got good employees where we know the trade. We're always going to be learning more about the trade, but I think it's a phenomenal start and yeah, you know, three years down the road, I think that might be something that can be accomplished.

Speaker 1:

That's interesting. So, you got your family all in, and so you're on your way now.

Speaker 3:

We're on our way.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, we're on our way, exciting. Yeah, well, glad to have you here. I'm sure it's been great. You know the little time we've been able to spend to each other. You know kind of paths been crossing, but glad we could get you in today to talk about this stuff. Yeah, glad to be here.

Speaker 1:

So what do you think about Any sort of advice you would have for other people that are thinking about not just maybe being a gutter monkey, or certainly we'd hope that people would be considering that. What is your advice? First off, I kind of want to go back to that one point you made because it kind of struck me as very interesting. It's like the first part that you made when you were talking about this franchise opportunity was the culture, which kind of shocked me, because the first points most people you think about is can I make money doing it? All those other sort of more not mundane but more technical issues. But you started right away on the culture. You seem to think that that was really an important part of it which I agree with I did.

Speaker 3:

I think, going into any type of venture with dollar signs in your eyes and that's the only thing that you have in your eyes, I think that you're going to miss some of the more finer points of owning a business how you treat your customers, the product that you're presenting, how you do your work, the image you are showing the public. We have uniforms, right, we have uniforms, and you're not going in. You know hobbling out of a beat up truck. You know, with cans falling out of it, you're dressed in ripped jeans and you know that all packages itself into the culture, which is great. And again, it was already there. I didn't have to guess, I didn't have to think about it, I didn't have to come up with it. So, yeah, that's what I would say about that.

Speaker 1:

Dennis, how do you feel about the new Southeast Guadalmonkeys?

Speaker 2:

Oh, I'm very excited. Great location. It's been a it's a big piece of real estate in between South shore gutter monkeys and South coast gutter monkeys and we're really looking forward to having Scotty and his team a well-established business in that area. It cuts down on the travel that the South shore gutter monkeys has to do they?

Speaker 2:

don't have to go over over into those other towns and we willingly do it, it's no problem. But now we can become a little bit more efficient, a little bit more streamlined, and, yeah, I'm looking forward to it. Scotty and Myra, they're very smart people. This was very apparent right out of the gate, and the skill set can be taught. You know, scotty mentioned that one of the first things he noticed about our business model was we have a great culture. Very interesting, because a lot of people don't look for that. They look at the dollars and cents right away.

Speaker 2:

Dollars and cents are important, but sometimes, seeing things from a different view, like, for example, the culture we have in our company. Another thing, for example, the culture we have in our company, another thing. For example, when I'm hiring somebody, I generally don't look at their skill set first. Skill set's good, but I look at personality first. Yeah, it goes back to our money ball. Yeah, yeah, so many times Great movie, great book, great movie.

Speaker 2:

So many times I see small business owners looking for the obvious. So many times I see small business owners looking for the obvious oh, I need a new carpenter. I'm looking for a carpenter, you know, just for the season. Well, if you're looking for a seasonal carpenter, that's a tough find. So look long term. You know you're looking long term for a skill set to fill a slot. I look for the personality for it. Now, yeah, when I want a skilled carpenter, sure, I'm going to interview and look to hire a skilled carpenter.

Speaker 2:

But in general, in all the companies I've ever owned, I try to look for the personality first. We can teach carpentry. If I bring a guy on and he's a middle of the road carpenter, he's not going to be a lead carpenter. I'm going to put him on a crew that has two other good carpenters and he's going to step in line. And that's how we develop skill sets by putting people around, surrounding them with other people of similar and maybe even greater skill sets of personality. First and foremost is look for that and in the case of what Scotty mentioned before, the first thing he noticed, or one of the first things that he mentioned to me, was this company here the gutter has a bit of a different culture than he's ever seen and he came out of a harsh culture. I've met some of his co-workers. I mean you have yes, I have, I know, and we're up to the registry of motor vehicles.

Speaker 3:

You sure did.

Speaker 2:

Oh my gosh, that's a hardcore job that you guys do, yep, managing inmates in a prison environment, that's a tough culture. That's a tough, tough job and we don't have to do that. We just hang gutters. Gutters don't argue back, gutters don't have issues. We're not dealing with the human element, we're dealing with aluminum and yeah. So you came out of an environment that I just have a gentleman's exterior view of it all. That's a pretty tough culture you came out of, and now you're coming into something where you can build the culture in your own office however you want.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, it's kind of the great thing about the gutter monkeys too is it's sort of a business you don't need to start at 22 years old. It's all been kind of ramped up for you. It's all been kind of laid out. The model has been laid out. You can come into this job as a second career, like you're doing like a school teacher or a firefighter, you know and kind of get into this business not knowing a lot Like you said you didn't know a chop saw from a you know what, a carrot grater or something.

Speaker 1:

but you know you're about right, so you know you could kind of get into it. You can get into as a second career. And again, another thing that I kind of wish I was a few years younger because I would have jumped at the chance, because it would have been perfect for a second career for me.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, doing what I did for 20 years, I had its ups and downs and it's like any place that you might work. There's ups and downs. The biggest difference for me I knew I was coming up to retirement. It would be something totally different, as it turns out, than what I had been doing the previous 20 years, but it's almost like how you approach the day, the work I did. It was tough but it was also shift work so you knew you were going to be in at a certain time and you would know. Going in you'd sit down and roll call and the next shift needed 26 people and you took a round, did a head count and it was like four people in roll call. Well, your eight day shift is now going to turn into a 16 day shift and that happens a lot and that wears down on you.

Speaker 3:

If you're someone who's single man, woman, because there's a lot of women that work corrections as well If you're single and you want to make some money, you can make a ton of money. You want to work 80 hours a week, then come in on your days off and work a couple doubles and add another 40 hours or whatever it might be. I mean you can, but if you're with a family it's very difficult. You know I miss. You know I miss a lot of things with my kids and that's one of the things I appreciate now with the gutter monkeys is, you know, just today, just goofing off with my son. I mean, we're in the truck, it takes 45 minutes to get to our first job, and I'm actually talking to this kid. He's a good kid, yeah, you know, and it's stuff that you missed over a 20 year period.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, yeah, you don't hear that a lot from people running franchises.

Speaker 3:

No.

Speaker 1:

Oh, I'm working there because I get to spend time with my family. It's usually tough opposite.

Speaker 3:

It's tough and I was telling Marcus today, and I was like you know what I like about this. I'll tell you what this is, what I like about this. It's different than what I was doing in my previous job. I wake up in the morning and I see it's an opportunity. I don't know what's going to happen, but there's an opportunity to talk to someone. There's an opportunity to prove your worth with what you're doing installing gutters. It's an ability to talk to people and just be friendly, talk, to just talk to them like we're normal people right Every day. You know, I was like Marcus. I'm telling you right now that it's an opportunity. Every day is an opportunity. What's that opportunity, you know, going to present?

Speaker 2:

itself. That's a great outlook.

Speaker 3:

And how do you latch onto that and it's so different than what I had done.

Speaker 1:

Kind of like what we talk about, you know, building real wealth through business ownership. That's what you're really doing.

Speaker 2:

So yeah, chris, that's part of the package. Yeah, I mean, if I could pick my top 10 most important components, that's in there.

Speaker 1:

Right, that's in there and that's kind of what you're describing getting up every day. That's what you're doing, yeah.

Speaker 3:

You know, I'm actually waking up earlier than I ever had before just because of the way my shifts work, but it is, get a couple cups of coffee, get the cobwebs out of your head and it's like you know what's my day going to be like today. You know what I'm going to be able to talk to. You know Joan, I got a cleaning with her. She sounded great on the phone. She needed something done at the house, or cleaning, or whatever it might be, and now I'm going to have a chance to talk to her in person. You know, and you present yourself, and I think that's the. When you talk about building a company, you know, are you seeing the dollar signs first? Are you actually thinking about establishing a company? Cause this is, let's say this, you can start off and you know, pay for all the marketing in the world that you want, and if you don't know how to speak to a customer, then what do you got? You want to be able to set up a relationship that we did a cleaning and a small repair out in Canton recently and I got in touch with her and the woman was.

Speaker 3:

She was distraught, she had some leaks in her gutters and she can't seem to find anyone to come up. And she explained her story and I did some probing and I knew, going in, that she had another company that was helping her out. At the very least she had them for two cleanings one's a spring cleaning and a fall cleaning. So we got up there, marcus and I. We were able to quickly discover what the issue was. We were able to take care of it right off. We satisfied her needs and as we were coming up to settle up, she's like well, the next time you come, when you come here for your next cleaning, I want you to take a look at all those seams. And I was like well, you did tell me that you had another company coming in.

Speaker 3:

She's like no, no, no. And I says you're doing all my work now. So the next time you come in, I'd like you to take a look at this and this. And then she's like hey, by any chance, do you happen to work in Sharon? I was like well, you know what? That's part of our territory. And she's like you know what? Give me a bunch of your business cards, because I'm going to make sure that all my friends and my family knows who you are and you'll take care of their business as well. So that's your difference. I mean, you know you're going to take some pride in your work and you're going to be able. I need 140 social media posts. You know? What's more rewarding? I think the latter, I think being, you know, talking to your customers and making relationships, knowing that it's not a one and done type of thing, but you're actually going to be able to work with them twice, maybe three times a year and if there's an issue with your gutters, bang, that's who you're going to call.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, we touch on this all the time. You know this. We bang that's who you're going to call. Yeah, we touch on this all the time. You know this. We talk about innovation all the time. You know, being part of this podcast is a lot about innovation of the small business. But a lot of these innovations are these old school things you know communications with your customers talking to them, meeting them in fantastic answering the phone when people call.

Speaker 1:

I called your number today and you answered the phone. I was like I'm going to call him. Oh, this is their work number. He's probably not going to be in it on the phone. There you were on the phone. Yep, southeast gutter monkeys. All right, so it's been really interesting having you here, scott. I hope to have you back.

Speaker 1:

We should have you back like in six months or nine months and you can tell us about how things are going and what's happening in your area. I know we're all excited about you great gutter monkey already, and it's going to be a lot of fun having you on the team.

Speaker 2:

I tell you, looking forward to it yeah, great, all right, bobby downspout of the gutter. Monkeys saying no monkeys were harmed in the making of this podcast.

Speaker 1:

Yep, as always. All right, we'll see you guys next time. All right, enjoy, all right, bye-bye. Thank you for tuning in to monkey business radio. If you enjoyed today's episode, please make sure to subscribe, like and follow us wherever you get your podcasts. It really helps us reach more aspiring entrepreneurs like you. And if you've got a question or topic you'd like us to cover, leave a comment or reach out to us on social media. We'd love to hear your thoughts and keep the conversation going. Don't forget to leave us a five-star review if you found the episode valuable, and make sure to share it with anyone who might benefit from our tips and stories. We'll see you next time. This podcast is produced by American Gutter Monkeys LLC. Build real wealth through business ownership. For details, visit us at AmericanGutterMonkeyscom.