And so my path has been more the corporate role where I've been in jobs and I have business degrees.

I've got a bachelor's degree and an MBA and have gone that route.

And I have a 20 year career in the banking industry and I found that I just don't like being a corporate person.

Welcome to Small Business bs, the podcast designed to ignite your entrepreneurial spirit through thought provoking ideas and actionable business strategies.

Each week, entrepreneurs Adam Witmer and Jeff Gargis dive into creative marketing hacks, proven sales methods and clever growth strategies.

Get ready to unlock the full potential of your business with insights that are both fun and impactful.

And now, here are your hosts, Jeff Gargas and Adam Witmer.

Hi.

Welcome to episode one of the Small Business BS podcast.

My name is Adam Whitmer and I'm here with my co host Jeff Gargas.

And we want to thank you for joining us for our very first episode.

Now today, our goal in this podcast is simple.

We want to share our personal stories of entrepreneurship and explain why we have created this podcast.

So, speaking of which, Jeff, would you be able to start us off by sharing your unique story that you have for your business and give us a background on why we're doing this podcast?

Yeah.

First off, Adam, this is pretty cool.

Episode one.

This is something that we thought about for a little while as we've known each other for a while.

And I'll talk about that I think here in a second, but pretty awesome to be here.

So thank you to anyone who is listening right now.

We really hope this is going to grow into something that's going to be really valuable for you and your business.

So boy, thinking back, we talked about, hey, we wanted to share a little bit of our entrepreneurial story and how we got here.

Mine's like it's a crazy road so I'm not going to go all the way.

Adam.

I think some of it'll be infused in a whole lot of episodes as we go.

But I was trying to think like, where did my, like where did it start?

Like what really got me into it?

And I think back, and this is funny because you and I would both come with from a music background playing in bands and stuff which I again I'm sure we'll share more into in throughout different episodes.

But thinking back to when I first was got into bands, started playing and actually ended up with the band that I was with for the longest period of time, you know, to get into bars and play certain clubs like you played cover Songs, Right.

You played other people's songs, your version, and that's usually why people got in.

And then hopefully they'd listen to your stuff.

Maybe you could pay.

Whatever.

I like struggled with this.

I don't know if you like this.

I.

I couldn't do it.

I hated it.

Now looking back, I'm like, oh, that was a stupid business decision because that's a good business strategy.

But I didn't like, dude, I wanted to create my own thing was.

I was very like.

And this was a little bit ego, a little bit pride, whatever.

I was very.

I'd rather not make it as my own thing than make it on the back of someone else.

Yeah.

And I don't.

I didn't realize too much later in life that I'm like, oh, that was a little bit of entrepreneurial, like little entrepreneur, like the biggest, the evil mind of an entrepreneur that like I wanted to create my own thing.

And I think as I kind of went through life and I had a lot of different jobs and this will also come up all the different jobs that I've had and different things I've done about.

And I always refer to them for so long as my side hustles, even like my full time jobs.

Because my side hustles.

Whatever I was trying to build in my world.

That was my full time thing.

And this other thing was just the thing I tried to make some money on.

So I think that's really where like this internal like need, I guess I'll say need, draw whatever drive to always create my own thing has led me to always want to go into business and always create business and stuff.

And I think my first sort of taste of it was really with my band having to figure out the business side of music, which I know you obviously have experience and too we've talked about it before and I think that kind of led to me taking over.

I was a little bit.

I was older, like three or four years older than other guys in my band.

So I was quote unquote mature.

So I was one who took on a lot of those roles and eventually actually started my own independent record label.

And that was like my real like, let's go after this thing, I'm actually starting something.

And then it's just been sort of what new idea do I have again and again and again from there.

Eventually landed me in a community and then in a mastermind with you that we've been in together for I don't know how many years now.

It's been.

I think it's Three.

Three years.

Right.

And that kind of led to this podcast because you and I have always.

We built different businesses, but in similar ways, but in also very different ways.

If.

And I don't know that that makes any sense when I say it, but I hope it comes through as we get in this podcast and get deeper into episodes, how that works.

And I think I really like that about you and I being able to agree and disagree almost at the same time with a lot of things.

Like, a lot of times we get to the same point, but we come from very different directions.

And you can actually see that in our background and stuff from the way we went to school or didn't go to school and how we started things or.

And everything like that.

So for me, I think the really hopeful.

My hope for this podcast is that the two of us can share all those different stories that we had and the different paths that we've taken and different angles and viewpoints we've had and all the good and bad, and then somehow maybe accidentally provide you, the listener, with some valuable tips and ideas that you can actually put into place and grow your business.

And then maybe, I don't know, maybe one day someone will reach out, Adam, and say, hey, you know, that podcast you did, it helped.

And then I'll just rest easy.

So.

So I don't know.

I.

Again, I don't know how well of a job it did, though, because usually when I go into this, Adam, I go way too long.

So I don't know if I went way too long or not, but I'm interested.

It's great.

It's great.

I've heard your story before, and like you said, we're gonna expand on this as we go through this podcast, but at the end of the day, I.

I view you more of the.

Of a serial entrepreneur.

Is that a correct assumption?

Yeah, I mean, I'm a huge Captain Crunch fan.

Lucky Charms, Cocoa Puffs.

Do you see the joke I'm going on here?

No, I do.

I don't know if I've ever used serial entrepreneur, but I.

I think I probably fall into that because I have, you know, my current business with Teach Better, that I've had for 10 years now, I think is, like number 12 or 13, I don't even actually know is the problem.

So, yeah, I think I probably fall into that.

That.

Yeah.

Group a little bit.

Yeah.

See, for me, I think I.

I take a little bit different approach, and I took a different path in my entrepreneurial journey because, like you, I started and found my Love of entrepreneurship and bands.

I actually started in high school, a couple of bands in college I started a band, we got on the radio, we got quite a few good gigs, we sold T shirts, we saved money, I made money gigs to create an album, made money from that, got my taste of it there.

And I actually got asked to be in a band years ago to play trombone, which was kind of my instrument, and I turned that down.

It was a national act, but I turned it down in order to pursue college as I thought that was the right thing to do.

And so my path has been more the corporate role where I've been in jobs and I have business degrees, I've got a bachelor's degree and an MBA and have gone that route.

And I have a 20 year career in the banking industry.

And I found that I just don't like being a corporate person.

And so I spent, you know, I was in, in the, in the career maybe five years before I realized I had to get out.

It took me about 15 years to go full time in my own businesses and I'm now full time self employed.

But you know, for me it did start with music, but it evolved over time.

Learning, you know, having these side hustles like you did, where I realized that I enjoyed photography.

So I tried to turn it into a business and saw the numbers didn't add up for me, it wasn't what I wanted to do.

I didn't enjoy photo editing, which would have been my job.

And so I tried something else and I've had a couple of side hustles till I've gotten to the point where I'm at today.

So for me that's kind of my background is I, I just, I love business and I've studied business and I've been on the corporate side, but I have this underlying passion for small businesses.

The mom and pop shops of America, those brick and mortar stores that are owned by people who are literally going in at 4 or 5am, working till 1011 at night, who are just doing their trade, who love their trade, love what they do, they're serving their community, but they have to compete against the big box stores.

And so for me, I've just had this passion to figure out ways to make things easier for those small businesses.

And I think on this podcast you and I are going to be able to explore all kinds of business ideas, strategies, best practices and be able to break them down and simple to understand layman's terms and be able to tell our audience how does this apply to them as a small business owner and make it simple for them and easy for them based on our experience, our observations and our expertise.

So that's, that's it for me.

That's why I think this podcast is so exciting and so going to be so much fun to do.

I speak, I agree with that.

If I can say words properly.

Don't worry, that's not getting edited out.

That's staying in out.

They need to know the real me.

But here's what I love and I, I alluded to this earlier, but what I love about you and I, and I want to make sure the audience knows right off the bat is like, so you, you're sitting over there lots of years in college, bachelor's degree and a MBA in business, and you're sitting across and you're like, hey, you know what's a good idea for my life is to go into a podcast with a co host who's a four time college dropout.

That makes a lot of sense.

This, this molds well.

But I actually, we were saying this before we actually hit record like, you know, actually multiple times when we've talked about this podcast.

I, I love that we've kind of found that in our, you know, we, we literally have been talking at least once a week for three years now in our mastermind.

And I've always enjoyed that because like we do have very different paths and different takes on things and I've always been a very build the airplane as I'm trying to fly it.

And you've usually probably got it all figured out to go to space before you take off and I think that's really great.

But I also love the fact that even with all of that and your, you're very calculated, very strategic and everything you do, you were also doing all these side hustles because you have that.

And I think it's really cool as you were talking about the music thing, which I've known that we both had the background in music, but like we have that it's the creative piece in us that like makes it so like I can't just do this thing that I.

Because I know you enjoyed your job in banking, you were good at it and you liked it and it took care of your family, but you were like, there's part of me just can't not do this other stuff.

And that's the part that I love the most.

And so I think, you know, people who are listening to this, if you, if you opened up that this podcast, most likely it's because you have that in you too.

So you.

You might come from a very strategic, planned, calculated approach, the way Adam usually does, or you might just figure it out as you run through the wall like I do.

And I think regardless of which one you come from over your little mix of both, which I think we probably both are actually like, this is.

I think this is gonna be a great show for you because I think you're gonna see that again and again as we talk about different topics that, again, we're gonna come at it from different angles.

We might even argue about it because of those different angles.

But 9 out of 10 or 9.5 10, we're in.

In the same spot, like, with the same sort of hopefully, takeaway for you listening that you can then put in your business.

So I'm excited, Adam.

Like, I was already excited, but now that we're actually recorded, I think I'm more excited now.

Hey, I'm excited, too.

And I.

You know, the thing with business is there's no right way to do it.

There's just doing it.

And so at the end of the day, you know, props to anybody who started a business, because it is hard work.

It is not for the weary.

It's not for the weak of heart.

It's lot of work.

But if you love it and you know you love it, it's.

It's so worth it and so, so fun to do.

So I think it's great.

I'm excited for this podcast, Jeff, to dive into more episodes.

Typically, our format's going to be a little bit different.

We're gonna, you know, we're gonna have at the end of each episode, a recap where we talk about what we've done for the episode, and we'll allow you, the audience, to formalize in a conclusion, you know, what we have talked about, and just kind of go back through it.

This episode, obviously, is more introduction to us and, you know, welcoming you to this podcast.

But if you stick with us for a couple more episodes, we're going to start diving into specific topics each week.

We've got a series coming up on websites.

We're going to talk about that.

We'll get into all kinds of specific strategies for.

For your small business that you could consider.

You may not implement all of them, but it's.

It's going to be thought provoking to say, hey, am I doing this?

And a lot of the things you probably are doing just naturally, but if we're strategic about it, we can make it better, make it work for us, make more money and Grow our business.

So that's really the idea behind this.

So we're going to have this recap at the end, and that's.

That's really going to sum up everything for us in our.

In our show each week.

Yeah.

And so kind of a recap of what that is and.

And then also sort of a question to.

To the two of us, of, okay, like, how do we take what we talked about in each episode and actually apply it to.

How does.

How do you, the listener, actually apply this to your business?

Right.

So I think, Adam, for this one, there's two ways that I can apply this to my business right now is one, I should hit subscribe so that I don't miss any of the other episodes.

Right.

This is.

This is investment of time into my business, into the growth.

But also, you know, something that we kind of did here was a little bit of, like, thinking back through your journey.

So if you listen right now, like, like you might be grinding.

Like Adam said, like, you know, we're here for the you that, you know, you're grinding.

You're up early, you're up late.

You're putting everything into it.

Like, have you thought about, like, and reflected on your journey and why you're here?

Right on the.

For the tough nights, the rough weekends, the long weeks and quarters and.

And years.

Takes.

Take some time between now and listen to the next episode.

Like, think through, like, what.

Like, remember your story.

Remember that why?

The reason that you got excited about your business, the reason you got into it.

And I think that's super important.

I think it comes off sometimes a little, I don't know, fluffy, corny, whatever.

But, like, remembering that I think is really important.

Like, we were sharing our stories back and forth.

Like, it got me pumped up for this, like, even more.

Just hearing your story a little bit again and seeing the connections again and me thinking back to stuff.

So, like, take the time after this episode to, like, think.

Go back and think about your story and think about the reasons you.

You got in here and to fun along the way.

And I think hopefully it gives you a little bit of energy into the rest of today or into tomorrow or into the rough weekend ahead or whatever it might be.

So I think that's a takeaway today.

No, that's a great takeaway, Jeff.

The why is our North Star.

That should be our driving factor.

Because if the why is not there, it's going to make owning a business, running a business very difficult.

So.

And like you said, you know, we're going to have more episodes.

This is a weekly podcast, so tune in next week.

We will have another podcast being released and we'll see you next week.

Thanks for tuning in to this week's episode of the Small Business BS Podcast.

If you enjoyed the show, be sure to subscribe and share it with fellow entrepreneurs.

Until next time, keep thinking big and taking action in your business one step at a time.