In this episode, host Jennifer Sutton interviews Nick Berry, the CEO, entrepreneur, author, and founder of many businesses. Nick shares his entrepreneurial journey, starting from being a personal trainer to becoming a consultant, business coach, and founder of multiple companies. He emphasizes the importance of finding support as a founder, including being part of a peer group and having a one-on-one coach. Nick also discusses the challenges of managing people and the misconceptions about running a business. In this conversation, Nick shares his insights on coaching and mentorship, the importance of trust and vetting, and the challenges of being a business owner. He also discusses his journey as a founder and his plans for the future. The conversation ends with a discussion on how to connect with Nick and his resources.
Nick emphasized the importance of seeking support as an entrepreneur. He highlighted the value of being part of a community, having a peer group, and working with a one-on-one coach or advisor. By surrounding yourself with the right people, you can gain valuable insights, accountability, and guidance to help you navigate the challenges of entrepreneurship.
Nick shared a pivotal moment in his journey where he realized the need for a clear strategy and direction for his businesses. By embracing change and making tough decisions, he was able to streamline operations, cut back on certain aspects, and focus on growth. This highlights the importance of being adaptable and willing to make bold moves to drive success.
From growing up on a dairy farm to navigating the complexities of entrepreneurship, Nick's journey is a testament to resilience and perseverance. Despite facing obstacles and tough decisions, he remained focused on his goals and continued to push forward. His story serves as a reminder that challenges are opportunities for growth and learning.
02:11 Nick Berry's Entrepreneurial Journey
07:45 Transitioning from CEO to Podcaster and Author
12:34 The Challenge of Working with Staff
14:25 The Myth of Running a Business
23:40 Aha Moments in Nick Berry's Journey
25:21 The Importance of Support as a Business Owner
27:19 The Three Levels of Support: Big Community, Peer Group, and One-on-One Coach
28:50 The Strategic Impact of Marketing
29:52 The Value of a Dedicated Set of Eyes on Your Business
30:05 Finding the Right Coach or Mentor
31:50 Building Trust and Accountability
36:36 The Challenges and Rewards of Being a Business Owner
42:59 The Journey from Dairy Farm to Entrepreneurship
47:12 Exploring New Directions and Partnerships
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (00:00)
Welcome to Hello Chaos. This is a weekly podcast exploring the messy and chaotic minds and lives of founders, entrepreneurs, and innovators. Every week we talk to founders from different industries, different company levels and stages, all shapes and sizes. We hear the real, the raw, the unbiased founder stories. It's why our motto is, where aha meets shit. We drop new episodes every single Sunday.
Founders tune in to us to listen in for tips, insights, strategies on not just growing their business, but on ways to be a better leader, a better founder, a better people manager. HelloCast is one of the many resources brought to you by OrangeWIP. That is OrangeWIP, W -I -P for work in progress. OrangeWIP is a multimedia company dedicated to serving founders and entrepreneurs in affiliate cities.
We've designed hyper local media platforms to inform, inspire and create connections to help founders succeed. Our innovative digital zines are an all -in -one content hub with fresh and engaging stories, curated local calendars and local dynamic roadmaps to help founders navigate their local entrepreneurial ecosystems. We've done all the hard work for founders. They only need to go to one trusted source to find the local information they need.
So if you want to find out what city we're in, go to OrangeWIP .com to go find if we're in your city. If we're not in your city, send a request. We need to be in your city. Every city needs to have an OrangeWIP. So my name is Jennifer Sutton. I am your host of Hello Chaos. I am the founder of OrangeWIP and Bright Marketing. people also call me JJ as my nickname, so you can do that too.
And today we have Nick Berry, the CEO, entrepreneur, author, founder of many businesses. Welcome to Hello Chaos, Nick.
Nick (02:05)
Thank you very much. I appreciate it.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (02:08)
And I should have said, podcast, podcaster. Wiley, you're the multi hyphenate, right? Is that?
Nick (02:10)
And in podcaster. Why leave anything out, right?
I'm like the personal trainer who has all of the initials after their name. That's what I wanted to do.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (02:21)
That's right, that's right. Well, thank you for being a guest and I appreciate you taking the time and wanting to have a conversation with us. Why don't you just start out and tell us about your entrepreneurial journey. How in the world did you get involved in this mess?
Nick (02:36)
Yeah. that's so that was, it was kind of a long time ago. but like a lot of entrepreneurs do. So I wasn't, I'm not one of the entrepreneurs who grew up knowing this was my calling. So you get it. It's like, it really is like, how did I get here? I got out of college. I still had no direction.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (02:49)
Yeah. I didn't either. Yes.
Nick (03:02)
I took a job as a personal trainer in a gym for like six months and it was about five months too long. I was, I was not good at that at all. And, and really the worst part of it was I was, that's when I realized I'm a bad employee. I got, I just was not cut out for it. So that's when it hit me like, okay, I'm going to have to find my own way. That was kind of my first like major light bulb.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (03:23)
sure.
That's your...
Nick (03:31)
moment. Yeah. So then I ended up buying the pro shop in another gym and then doing that again. And, you know, they're like this little small smoothie bar retail things. And then opened up a personal training company in another gym and that took off. And so this is probably a couple of years later.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (03:48)
They're okay.
Nick (04:01)
had some kind of innovative practices going that were nobody else was doing at the time. Went to some conferences, told other people about it. They said, I'll give you money to tell me how to do that. So then I became a consultant. And then another, you know, this is probably another year, two years later, we were flipping that into information products, business coaching, mastermind programs that became a certification that became a franchise system.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (04:23)
Okay.
Huh. Whoa.
Nick (04:30)
Yeah. So like we, it just, it was a flurry of like getting in there, figuring out like, how the hell are we supposed to do this? And then realizing we could package that and sell the advice. Like we were, we were building content businesses in 2006, seven, eight, like before anybody else was doing it.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (04:49)
gosh.
Right. You're like, here's our content pack, also like just in the end, you were just doing the fitness in the that arena, like in that segment. Okay.
Nick (05:00)
At that time, yes. And it was like, it was not fitness advice. It was how to run your business, how to make more money doing what you're doing. Like we were teaching the practitioners how to operate. Yeah. Which it seems like there are billions of people doing that now. Everybody's got that advice, but they were like,
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (05:07)
Okay. Great.
how to operate, yeah. And, and.
Go online. Would you like a mastermind class? you like it? Yeah, right. Nobody. Yeah. All right, so what's been the most rewarding part then of your journey of doing all that, learning from that? And you said that you've like exited or you're transitioning from kind of
Nick (05:26)
Yeah, who doesn't have one, but we were doing that when. No, I don't know. Anybody else is doing.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (05:50)
and going into a new phase of your journey.
Nick (05:53)
Yeah. So, the, so the, would say like the most rewarding part is like, I had to figure out all those things the hard way and being able to turn around and say to other people who are in the place where I was and say, Hey, like you, can save you all this time, all this money, all these sleepless nights. Like it's still gonna be hard. There's still things you're going to have to figure out, but you don't have to make all these mistakes. did. So here, like skip the line.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (06:04)
Yeah.
Right.
That's right.
Nick (06:23)
I just like doing that. I like, I like to go figure stuff out. like to solve the problems, and then kind of hand it off. So that part I love. And then the second part you ask about kind of my current stage. So, through that whole story, like I've had several dozen companies either founded or acquired and then got that, divested and exited through most of them.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (06:25)
Yeah.
Nick (06:53)
other than three up until the last few years. So now I still have three of those businesses operating, but they're being run by operators. I'm not having, I'm not involved in the day to day.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (07:08)
my, how relaxed and that's like dream city for lot of founders of like, how can I just step away and just run, like sit up here and be a visionary and not be in the business. You have achieved the freedom.
Nick (07:16)
On the surface it is.
So on the surface, that's, that may be what it looks like, but you, probably know better. It's like, so I stepped away from fitness revolution, which was our, our big coaching business, at the beginning of this year. And, and the guy that that's been running the show there has been doing a great job, but that's when I was like, well now what I, it's been a long time since I didn't have something to
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (07:53)
What else?
Nick (07:57)
Like when I wake up, focus on, so, you know, that's how podcasts get started. So I did that, you know, just, go to work on the book. you meet a lot of people, you update your LinkedIn profile, team times, but it's, you know, it's, I'm not trying to escape, right? It's more like.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (07:59)
Yeah.
You write a book?
Nick (08:25)
catch my breath and clear my head and figure out how to reapply the things that I'm good at and that I enjoy doing and make sure that it's not just inertia from what I have been doing. I don't want to just get back up and do the things that I'd been doing out of habit.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (08:41)
Yeah.
Right. I mean, I feel like a lot of founders, lot of entrepreneurs kind of have this innate ability is that when we get a moment of downtime, our brains are wired to problem solve, create. I mean, my favorite quote, I don't know who said it, but it's creativity is just intelligence having fun. And I find that we are wired in a way of like, you put us in just
Give us some downtime. We're gonna come up with something, because we can't help it. We will find a solution to some problem that we hear. We see something out there, we're like, let me go ruminate on that for a minute.
Nick (09:20)
That's right. Yep.
And if we're not careful, we'll create a problem to solve. Like that's, mean, we've worked with a lot of business owners over a long time. And one of the things that we talked to them about is like, you get to this stage, if you start to feel idle and you get fidgety, you, you maybe need to like distance yourself a little bit more so you don't break something even unintentionally.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (09:55)
Right, right, or disrupt a team that is starting to get their gel on, right? So I always say, I'm gonna ask this question, ask every founder, you know, hundreds of interviews, and it's my favorite question. But if you had to sum up your entrepreneurial journey in one word, what would that word be and why?
Nick (10:01)
Yep, that's it.
That is a good question. So I'm afraid that my answer is going to be, this is going to be kind of boring. So I would say fun. also was thinking, chaos came to mind, but I think it's because you said chaos at the beginning of the conversation. So, but I could see chaos being applicable. But I guess I would say fun. Okay. If it, one word. Yeah.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (10:28)
Okay.
Yeah.
chaotic fun. There we go.
Nick (10:50)
I'm trying to stay within the rules, but you know that's not going to work either.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (10:53)
What did you have three words or a phrase?
Nick (11:03)
I mean, probably like the exciting chaos thing is because it has been chaotic, right? It was not planned, but it was not so chaotic that it was like excruciating. was more like just enough that it was exciting.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (11:09)
Hmm.
It's the thrill. Yeah.
thrilling. Yeah. I love that. I don't think we've had that word yet. People even though our show is Hello Chaos, which is kind of our world, right? Well, we welcome chaos. We live in chaos. We we organize and structure chaos. But I think you're the first that it's like it's a it's fun chaos. It's thrilling chaos. It's exciting chaos. I love it.
Nick (11:43)
Mm -hmm.
Yeah. I mean, I use the words like complexity, uncertainty, and chaos all of the time. When we're talking about, you know, my podcast is the name of it is the business owner's journey, right? And that journey is complexity, uncertainty, and chaos. So.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (12:08)
that's right. And that's, know, I've talked a lot of foul words. We're trying to desensitize words. We're trying to normalize some of the challenges or the barriers. think either people think it's this sexy entrepreneurialism or running a business. Ooh, it's freedom. And it's like, no, no.
It's hard work. It easy. It is not. What do you think is, think of not easy, and you're talking about the uncertainty, the, what'd you say, the uncertainty, the complexity, and the chaos. What has been, for you, I mean, know you work with a lot of businesses, and you coach, you've kinda given people kinda scale up kits.
Nick (12:39)
Yeah. Freedom and riches and easy.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (13:07)
But for you developing all that and kind of creating a business and multiple business around it, what has been your, what have you found to be the most challenging aspect of being a founder and a CEO entrepreneur? What has been the most challenging aspect?
Nick (13:26)
For me, probably just working with staff. I don't think that necessarily has to be the, is like everybody's biggest challenge, but for me, was hardest to pick. But I think there's a lot of power in being aware of that, right? If you don't, if you're not aware of it, then you can just be like reckless and make it even worse.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (13:40)
Yeah, wait, it's mine.
Yeah.
Right. Right.
Nick (13:55)
But for me, was probably managing, it's probably been the biggest challenge, like the skill to develop. know, like leadership strategy and some of those things came to me more naturally, but like getting in the day to day and managing, I've just had to work really hard. I like to go fast and...
be pretty, you know, decisive, but flexible. And, so I've had to do a lot of work on learning about communication styles and ways to, put people in a position where everybody gets an opportunity to process and contribute. And it's just taken me, you a long time and it's still, I'm like everything. It's a work in progress.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (14:29)
Right?
Yeah.
Yeah.
That's right, I think that's our theme. We're always a work in progress. I am, I'm a walking work in progress. Chandler, our producer, is like, yeah, you are.
Nick (14:56)
Yeah.
Not the time to - not the time
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (15:06)
I'm not afraid to say it. Not afraid to say it. What do you think is, I mean, and you work with a lot of owners, entrepreneurs and founders. So speaking for yourself, but also what do you see out there? What do you think is the biggest myth about being a founder, about running a business that you think needs to be busted as a, what's that misperception that we can go,
Nick (15:22)
Thank
Well, you know, I think there's...
a bit of a gap among business owners as to what running a business really entails. I'm a big fan of the creator economy. I think it's been a great thing and gigs and all this stuff. That's part of what brought me along my journey. But I also think that it kind of blurred the lines between
levels of expertise and skills and quality and.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (16:14)
Yes. talk about that. Please, please, please. I feel it. I feel that, like, that's been a part of our journey too. But talk, expand on those things.
Nick (16:23)
Yeah.
Yeah, well, it just kind of blurred the lines, right? Like it lowered the barrier to entry to a lot of things, which, you know, it's great. gives everybody, people an opportunity. However, that, you know, there's not, it comes at a cost. There is a trade off for that, right? And so, you know, now more than ever we see, you have to really be skeptical with what information you.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (16:44)
Mm
Nick (16:56)
follow who you give your money to, whose advice you take, because anybody can say anything. And I'm not really just talking about the obvious scam artist. There are people with really good intentions who maybe are over -promising without realizing it. I know in my career somewhere along the way, in 2008 or nine or 10 somewhere,
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (17:13)
But yeah.
Okay.
Nick (17:25)
I'll guarantee I was one of those people, probably. It's almost a certainty because I knew I didn't know what I didn't know, but there was a lot of it. I think that's okay, but you have to be constantly in pursuit of closing out those blind spots so you can be true to your message.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (17:34)
That's right.
Yeah, yeah.
Nick (17:55)
with your audience, right? So you need to be able to speak to your level, your acumen, your capabilities, your skill, the outcomes you can produce, like within a pretty good reason, so you're not over -promising, even if it's unintentional.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (17:55)
Yeah. Yeah.
Friday.
Right, or probably to help, you probably help business owners to help discern that not everybody that comes to you with this certification or whatever can do what they need to do. Because we see that in the marketing industry. I've been in it for 30 years, but to see in the last probably five years, 10 years we started seeing Trump, but.
I thought it was just inexperience and now we're just seeing just pure scam artists, art, know, bad, what we call bad actors of, you know, anybody can just grab a computer, say I'm an SEO specialist, put some black hat tech on a website and falsify people's traffic and just collect, you know, $500 a month from companies and the companies have no idea that they're like, what?
Nick (19:09)
And then they can go on Twitter and tell people they're doing that and try to build an audience as like the Black Hat SEO guy.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (19:17)
Right, right. And so it's, you know, we've just seen this like explosion and I have to meet with business owners and CEOs and CMOs and stuff on, you know, the marketing. They're like, I don't like marketing agency. They have this distrust of like, well, we don't operate that way or, you know, we're, we've been doing this a long time. You've, you've just hired inexperience. And like I said, for a long time, I just, never thought they were about.
you know, bad actors out there. I just thought it was inexperienced people that never worked in agencies or really were trained in the environments that we were. you're, you know, you're just, you're hiring for that inexperience. But we feel that even when we, because our business model on the bright, you know, the bright side of the agency, you know, we were,
had a different business model, a more hybrid from the beginning before it was cool, know, before COVID, we were 100 % client, you know, our virtual office, we had people all over, we had 1099. I didn't want employees after being, you know, a manager of people for 25 years and having staffs of 50 people, 100 people at an agency. I was like, I don't wanna do anymore. I have to do a performance review. don't wanna like.
Let's just do 1099s. I can hire really experienced people. I vet them. I know their quality. But then as we started to grow, it was like, you're getting bumper. I'm like, I'll give you a chance. Whoops. That was a mistake. And even not like then resumes got padded. it was just the last 10 years have been learning of that gray area that you were talking about is.
Nick (20:57)
Yeah.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (21:13)
is very real to me.
Nick (21:15)
Yeah. Well, I make this joke to friends a lot, like, cause I have friends who are in marketing and it's like marketing agencies are the new business coaches because like you're, I'm watching it happen to agencies. Just like we went through it as business coaches where it's like, well, you don't even, you gotta be careful telling somebody or introducing yourself as a business coach because they've probably have been scorned.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (21:39)
Right.
Right, right. And it's like, people don't know the difference between branding, marketing, and advertising. They mix those frameworks up. And yeah, it is, it's a mess out there in our industry. We don't do any, you know, our industry is worse. Like, someone's like, don't even know the difference. So if you say full service agency, I don't even know what that means. And I'm like, that's a problem. 10, 15 years ago, people knew there was,
You knew exactly what that was. And it is not the same. It is a different landscape, but you're right. It is that skepticism.
Nick (22:22)
I think it'll correct itself too, to good degree. The economics are going to force some things to separate. Also, and I think that there's already data out there on this, buyers are becoming better buyers. They're approaching things for the most part with a healthier level of skepticism. Some of it may be a little beyond healthy level, but that's okay. The pendulum is going to swing back, hopefully.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (22:26)
I hope so.
Yeah.
Yeah.
It'll swing. I just want people to ask more questions, right? I mean, it's be smarter. I mean, as a business owner, what, and you, don't know if you hear this a lot, but I feel like there's this sentiment among small business owners, but even scaling. Like if you're, you know, of significant size, there's this mindset of either marketing is considered an admin support, like support to sales, and is not really a,
seen as a strategic lever in somebody's business or they consider it completely overhead of I'm like my god that's a revenue driver like that should never be like you should be seeing return and no matter what you're in marketing branding or every now your run your runways might be longer but don't consider it overhead like that's
Nick (23:47)
Yeah, yeah, that's probably kind of goes hand in hand with like what that had the way that that would manifest in a lot of the clients that we worked with is when you talk about marketing, they're like, well, it's basically just going to be social media busy work. Like do my social media posts. We're not really expecting anything out of it, but we got to do it.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (24:01)
Right, right. It's admin work, right? That's right, it's like no, no, If you do it right with intention and strategic and put creativity to it, you should see a return. It might take six months or a year or whatever, but you should still, there should be an objective behind it. Right, yeah, that's, I'm so glad you said that, yeah. Because we see that, we're like, re -edgy, it's like.
Nick (24:15)
Mm -hmm, right.
Exactly. Yeah.
process.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (24:31)
No, no, need, that's not a, that's not a, it's time, money, and energy that you're spending. So, it's gotta have a return.
Nick (24:41)
But it's probably helping you guys up your game a little bit in knowing now like, well, I'm gonna have to educate the prospects and clients a little more. So I've got to learn how to explain this in their terms a little bit more. like, I really don't know a different way to approach it.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (24:46)
yeah.
That's right.
There's no other way. It's just education. is. So what is the biggest, mean, other than you were like, aha, I gotta start becoming an entrepreneur, because I'm unhireable. Just kidding.
Nick (25:03)
Mm
So that's exactly what I thought and still think it.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (25:21)
But were there any other aha moments in your journey, like as you were going through the ups and downs of your business, was there a aha moment you were like, whoa, this changes the way I think about things?
Nick (25:33)
Yes. And I think mine were looking back, like they were pretty clear. so there was that one. And then not too long after that, I had the realization like, I, I can't do this alone. I've got to go out and I need to find, I wasn't sure exactly what I was looking for at the time. In hindsight, I was looking for coaching and peers. I needed to be around other people. Like, you know, I need to be in a peer group.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (25:47)
Yeah.
Nick (26:03)
and I needed some type of guidance in my corner. like even now, like one of my things that I just like rail on all the time is every business owner, should have these three levels of support. You need to be a part of a big community. You need to be a part of a smaller, more intimate peer group and you need to have a one -on -one coach. Those are my rules.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (26:03)
Right.
Yep.
That is fantastic advice. I don't think I've heard that before, honestly. Yeah.
Nick (26:32)
Really? Yeah, I mean, but that's where it came from. It's me staggering around. Like I've got to find some help and I stumbled my way into Vistage. And so then I started to figure out like, okay, this is what the successful business owners, the people that I'm aspiring to be more alike, this is what they do. This is how they put together a support system themselves.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (26:35)
But I didn't eat.
Okay, yeah, yeah.
Right.
Okay.
Nick (27:01)
These are the things that they think about. This is what they spend their time on.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (27:05)
So Nick, for our listeners that don't know what a Vistage Group is, because I've talked to lot of founder, I'm like, have you heard of a Vistage? And a lot of people don't know what that is. Describe what a Vistage Group is, what it does, why it's important to be in something like that.
Nick (27:22)
Okay. And this will actually be a good example of the difference in like that gray area we're talking about, like something done professionally versus the bro version. Yeah. So Vistage, everybody's probably heard of a mastermind group. And if you've been a part of one and walked away scratching your head, it probably wasn't a great one. It was just a group of people who got together and like talked over each other and maybe bragged about some things that they'd done. That's a bad example.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (27:29)
Yeah, yeah.
Unstructured.
Yeah.
Right. Okay.
Nick (27:52)
A good example is one that has some structure. There are maybe some criteria that you make sure that the group members are similar enough, like -minded enough that it's facilitated. There is an agenda and maybe some curriculum. So it's not just a show up and free for all. It's more, it's like small group, eight, 10, 15 people, similar businesses, but not competitive and a facilitator who runs the meetings.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (28:08)
Okay.
Nick (28:22)
So you're able to like come together and help learn from each other's lessons, solve problems together. You it's like you're buying speed in those situations. So it's like, it's what a mastermind group should be.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (28:39)
Right, almost like a very, almost like an accelerator type of a community that you're, I mean you guys are working together to accelerate your business, like hey, help me scale or help me unlock or I'm unstuck or is it like that? Okay.
Nick (28:46)
So, yeah.
It's similar in an accelerator from my experience is there's a little more burden on the leadership. Like it's more like a one to several or small group, training or coaching and in this edge, like the facilitator is responsible for kind of keeping things on the rails, but you're really trying to source the experience and knowledge from the other peers more than you would maybe in an accelerator.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (29:10)
Okay.
Okay.
Gotcha.
Gotcha, okay. And then so that's one level. Everyone needs to be in something like that if you're an owner, founder. And then what was the other?
Nick (29:32)
Mm -hmm.
So you need to have a one -on -one coach or advisor, guide, and somebody in your corner who like knows your business in depth, knows you really well, knows what you're about. Somebody who can kind of hold up the mirror to you every once in a while and say, like, you need to be accountable. You're not doing what you said you would do, or you're not, the behaviors are not aligning with the commitments.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (29:39)
Okay.
Okay.
Okay, is a one -on -one better to be, like how would you find that? Is it somebody that is more of a leadership coach of like how do we develop your people management skills, your leadership skills, or is it someone that is helping more from a, hey I know this business and this is the way you should be running and operating a business. What's...
Nick (30:30)
That's a good question. So I think it will change over time. So for me, like I've been through different versions of each of those things at different times. You kind of, you know, it's not like a revolving door. There was overlapping some, but you know, like if you hear, so that we just had the Olympics, right? And you hear these athletes talking and they're like, well, I've got a coach for this and a coach for that and a coach for that and a coach for this. they, sometimes you may have several things that need to be worked on.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (30:33)
Okay.
You
Right.
Nick (31:00)
But what's important is that you have someone dedicated to like putting their attention on that thing. I kind of, so I like to keep the list at least in general to leadership strategy and then having an operational system in place. It doesn't mean that you like, we have worked on all three at the same time with people.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (31:00)
Okay.
Gotcha.
Okay.
Nick (31:25)
Don't have to do it like that. if leadership is kind of the thing that's your bottleneck at the moment, find the best resource to help you with that. If you need work with strategy, like if that's the big pain point at the moment, then find a good resource to work with strategy. But you need someone who, like a dedicated set of eyes on you and what you're doing.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (31:34)
Okay.
then fine. Gotcha. Gotcha.
Yeah. That you're meeting with on a regular.
Nick (31:50)
to be accountable, to keep to like challenge you, somebody who is willing and capable of telling you the things or seeing things that other people can't or won't. But that, that's, you have to have that as a business owner.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (32:03)
Do you?
Yeah, do you think it's important to have that person in your backyard like, you know, locally or is that somebody that you that you could have virtually? Does it need to be in person or can it be a zoom or a phone call?
Nick (32:20)
Yeah, it can be, I think the difference in those things generally is going to come down to like communication style, like preferences, but I don't think that it is necessarily a factor that should eliminate someone from being able to do that effectively.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (32:33)
Okay. Okay. All right. Have you had some bad coaches?
versus good, like have you ever, you've had good coaches and good mentors?
Nick (32:48)
let's see. I've, I wouldn't say that I've had worked with anyone who was bad at their job. I've had some, best coach that I, that I ever worked with had a couple of bad moments. but like, you know, he's human. that's, that's okay. Like it didn't, that definitely didn't define him, but that's.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (33:10)
Yeah.
Nick (33:17)
probably the way like what you should expect. The people that I worked with were vetted and expensive. it's not like the conversation we were just talking about, the inexperienced person, like I didn't just go to somebody that they had no resume or I talk to people who refer, yeah.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (33:36)
Sorry.
You were like, they had a good resume. Yeah.
Nick (33:47)
They were referred to me by people that I trusted. So in those cases, I would be very surprised for them to have been bad at what they were doing. But bad ones do exist.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (33:59)
Okay, okay. Yes, so you need to vet them. And get comfortable with them, because you gotta build that trust, right? I mean, because you're gonna be sharing a lot of stuff. So you need to, you should be. Don't hold back. People can't help you if they don't know what the problem
Nick (34:05)
Yes.
Yeah.
You should be.
Right. I mean, it's not, it's one of those relationships like you're, this is why one of the things that makes it so hard being a business owner is that there are not that many people who can relate to the things that keep you up at night. And the better you do, the more successful you are, the closer you get to your goals, the fewer people there are going to be who can fill that role. And you have to take responsibility for going and finding people who can fill it. Because if you don't,
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (34:33)
Right?
Here, that's right.
That's right.
Nick (34:49)
your behaviors, your mindset will change, not necessarily for the better. So you need to go find those people. And when you do, have to set, you have to create an environment. You kind of have to give into it, right? Like if I'm going to hire you to hold me accountable and call me on my shit, then I'm going to have to be vulnerable and honest about some stuff with you. It's not, not a contest like
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (34:55)
Right, right.
Yeah, well you.
That's right.
Nick (35:17)
If I try to show up like I've got all the answers and appear perfect, you can't do anything.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (35:21)
Right, no posturing, like come on, we've gotta be real, we gotta be transparent. How can you help me if I don't know what's going on? The real stuff, you know, and I think you're right, for founders and owners, there's a very small group that can understand those barriers, the shoes that we have to fill.
Nick (35:26)
You've got to be real.
That's right.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (35:51)
the day that, and I always say that like as you scale your business, you jump two different circles, right? And sometimes those circles as you get bigger, but then those circles shrink and then you're like, I wanna be in that circle. But it's like, that circle doesn't want me yet until I can grow. So yeah, I'm always like, I'm learning, I'm relearning.
I'm stop, you know, and then I gotta, I gotta stop learning things and then I gotta relearn again. It is.
Nick (36:23)
Yeah. And you have to have a certain mindset to do that, right? To subject yourself to it and to stick to it.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (36:27)
to do that, yeah.
Yep, ugh. The discipline, I'm working. I'm trying to get better. I'm trying to get better on that. And resilience, yeah, yeah.
Nick (36:35)
And resilience. mean, if you've been doing this for what you said, like 30 years.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (36:42)
Well, I've been in marketing and worked at agencies for about 30 years. I started my own company in 2013. yeah.
Nick (36:49)
Okay. I mean, yeah, you've got a pretty healthy dose of it.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (36:55)
I've got, I've done this. Woop, now I'm back on the right going. My one word is serendipitous. So I never thought I'd start my own company. I mean, that was kind of my, never thought about it, didn't want it. I hit a glass ceiling, or I would say a glass ceiling was crashed upon me at an agency I worked for and I was like, you know what, I'm gonna take an opportunity.
Nick (37:00)
What's your one word?
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (37:25)
I took a contract thinking, yeah, I'll work this while I'll interview and see what else I, you know, what else I want to do. But my phone rang off the hook from past clients, the clients I was working with at that agency who were like, you're the reason I took my business there. Are you going to start your own agency? I was like, no, I don't think so.
They're like, need to start your own agency. But my phone really, what it blew up on was all the people, like the creative directors I had worked with, the media people I'd worked with, the account people, the video people, the events people, the research folks of all the peers I'd worked with in the agency world who were like, I'm not gonna date myself, because you were in about the same age as me, but 2008.
to 2010 when the recession hit, it killed our industry. mean, 40 % of ad agencies closed their doors between 2008 and 2010. And ones that survived probably cut their staff by 50%. So you had a lot of really good talent that hit the streets after that. And so,
you know, here I am 2013 and you had all these great creative directors who had said, all right, well I'll just create gigs, I'll just be a creative director for hire. Or you had a media person that was like, I'll be a media buyer for hire. Or you had a account planner that was like, I'll be a strategist for hire. But here they're working with all these clients who need full service or need more of a holistic.
approach so they were like or you know and these people needed also they wanted a scale so it was so that's how bright was born of like hey we're all working to grow these clients together but the client really wants a holistic team you know and so i'm like well maybe bright can be that connective tissue maybe bright can be the the best and brightest and all these different disciplines i can build the operations i can build the systems the infrastructure
Nick (39:32)
Mm
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (39:46)
but then bring all of these different communities of creators, of producers and thought leaders in the different disciplines of marketing. But they don't, because these were folks that had 20 plus years experience who were like, I will never go work for an agency again. I'm independent and I will never go back. So it's like, but how do we tap into that expertise in that mindset? So that's how.
Nick (40:13)
Mm
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (40:15)
where it was born was under that kind of idea of, okay, we can serve the business community in a much better way, in a much more nimble way, but still solving their full service kind of holistic strategic problems, but bring the best and brightest of those teams where they're not paying for all the overhead that a large agency has to charge. But it was very serendipitous. Like it just kind of all fell
together because I was being brought in to work on this project and then another person was like, I need you for this project and then I was like, well, hey, we need this person to come to this project. So it was just like this web. That's right. that's right. Just all just fell into place. But it's not anything that I really, like I said, was very serendipitous or, you know, I've heard, you know,
Nick (40:59)
And that's the thing that you could do and you like the opportunity was there. That's.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (41:15)
I don't know if it was accidental, but it was more serendipitous. just, saw the opportunity and made the connections and it's worked out. Yeah. Well, thank you. Yeah. We've made it 10 year mark. Like who knew? That was hard. Didn't think we'd get there, but yeah. So, okay, so the.
Nick (41:23)
Yeah, I mean, that's fascinating. And congratulations.
That's not an accident.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (41:42)
your biggest crap moment, the big shit where you're like, I've hit a wall, hit a barrier, what have been the biggest shit moments?
Nick (41:51)
Hmm, let's see. think
So a couple of things. had a, going kind of through my journey and kind of things are clicking. I get into Vistage, like I figured out I need, I can't do this part alone. I need some help figuring out like what I'm supposed to be figuring out. And then the next thing was realizing like we didn't have, we were.
at this point, we probably had seven or eight operating brands. And I probably had a staff of 40 people. and, and remember, I'm not good at as a manager. So you can kind of see where this is going. But I realized like we're missing a strategy. there's, there's something like we've got all these people who are capable.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (42:38)
Well.
Yeah.
Nick (42:58)
and interested and willing, but for some reason it's just nonstop firefighting. And then I realized like, okay, we're missing the, like the strategy to give the guidance. Right. And so, and that was, we found EOS. Like this is when Gina Wickman was the person who took us through a workshop. Like there were like two EOS implementers at the time. Like it was the beginning, beginning.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (43:08)
Yeah.
yeah.
wow, and that's like, that is the very beginning, cause it's what? Thousands and like, it's a cult.
Nick (43:28)
Yeah, it is. It really is. But so so that happened. And then we get through it. OK, you know that now we can kind of see everybody march now. You you ask you this framework that you can kind of hold things up against and see like what's missing or maybe out of place. So then I had a 5050 business partner in all in all of this. And then we realized, you know,
We don't want to do the same things. You want to do this and I want to do that. So we go through all this learning and we figured out all this stuff and like our business was probably at its peak then. And then we realized like we just did all that and now we're going to cut it in half. But it like we did that and and we're still able to continue growing like since then, you know, I've had.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (43:59)
Yeah.
yeah.
Nick (44:28)
the most profitable years had the several exits. He's done very well. so, you know, it may be seem a little bit counterintuitive at, at, at the time we wouldn't have expected that necessarily, but because we got these other things in place, you know, they had that much of an effect. We were able to, basically cut it in half almost exactly in half and
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (44:45)
Pray.
But for those things to grow. Yeah.
Nick (44:56)
and it still grew, it was almost like pruning something. And I don't think that we would have been able to exceed that growth staying together and trying to make a concession, one or the other of us. So you hear a lot of bad stories about partnerships and especially 50 -50s, and ours did not end like poorly like that.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (45:11)
Well, that took a... Yeah.
Yeah. Well, it sounded like you had two personalities that had a lot of empathy for each other and for the process and being transparent and just like doing it very respectfully. Because you're right, the contention, the confrontation, in the egos, it sounds like all that stuff was kind of, nope, let's put that aside.
Nick (45:36)
Yeah.
Well, it was difficult. I can't lie about that part, but I think we were both new definitively, like we know what the worst case scenario is here. And that is we're gonna avoid that no matter what. So we will find a solution that other than that one and just doing that exercise I think is what kind of made sure that the empathy stayed.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (45:52)
Hehehehe
Okay.
Okay.
Yeah.
Nick (46:14)
close enough to the surface that we're no matter how conversation went like we could always zoom back out and remind ourselves like, all right, remember we're kind of still on the same team here.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (46:22)
Where?
Right, right, We're still friends, right? Yeah. All right, a little change of direction, but what do you think our listeners would be most surprised to find out about you that's not on LinkedIn or is not on a website or anything? What would be something that would be surprised to learn about you?
Nick (46:27)
Yeah.
Well, so I grew up on a dairy farm. That's one thing. In Kentucky, Hodginville.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (46:51)
Okay. In Kentucky, is that right? What part of Kentucky, by the way? I forgot to ask you that. My family, Hodgenville, where is that? Lisbetown, so my family is, have family, Lisbetown, but my grandfather, and he was one of nine, they had farms, tobacco farmers.
Nick (47:03)
Elizabeth town is like. Yeah.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (47:19)
all up and down from Nicholasville, so between Louisville and Lexington, but all the little small towns in between. But then a lot of moved to Elizabetown, but yeah, there's that. So I feel like, yeah, I told you I'm from Indiana originally, but I've got a lot of Kentucky, Kentuckiana in me.
Nick (47:26)
Yeah.
I knew we clicked. Yeah, so that's where my family, they're all from that kind of central Kentucky region.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (47:48)
So dairy farmer, yeah, okay. All right. I love it. Did you like being on the dairy farm? The dairy farm? Was it like a high producing, a, know, massive amount of cows on the farm or was it more of like a hobbyist dairy farmer? No, was like a true, yeah.
Nick (48:05)
No, it was not a hobby. Yeah. Yeah. had, we were one of the bigger farms in the country. Yeah. In the county, not the country, in the county. Yeah. No, we had several hundred cows, several hundred acres. So, you know, I don't, I like hard work. I like being on the farm. I like.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (48:14)
the larger ones okay my gosh okay I was like whoa how many acres was that
Yeah.
Nick (48:35)
field work. Didn't love the animals so much, but
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (48:36)
Yeah. They have they it was that the tobacco farming was in track because they didn't need much. It was like 40 acres as a big is a big tobacco farm. But then they did black. One of my great uncles did a black steer cattle was like an Angus black Angus that he whatever what he produce, generate.
Nick (48:48)
Mm -hmm.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (49:06)
It was all very technical. Like they would have like one or two female cows and then they had to be, yeah, hang on, speak. And they would have like one or two bulls that would then generate, but they would put them in those like dairy, the metal containers. You would walk into like a small barn. There's like 50 of those things. I'm like, is that milk? And they're like, no, that is.
That's the essence to breed. The steer, the cow, we're like, okay, good to know. That's not dairy. Not dairy. Always good to life on the farm. Always stories, that's right. So how do you deal with like, okay, so.
Nick (49:35)
And...
Gotcha. Yeah. Right. Not dairy.
That's right. There's always stories, right?
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (50:05)
You you've had a really good spectrum on your journey of going from zero to 100. Now you're kind of like, okay, what's next? What would you be doing if you had no fear?
Nick (50:24)
hush. I need to think about things like this one. Don't I? I mean, I don't know. I mean, I kind of want to say that I don't that I'm not
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (50:27)
I I like catching people off
Do you have fear?
Like if you weren't doing that, like if there was no barriers to entry, like, well, what do you feel like you'd be doing or what would you love to do?
Nick (50:50)
Man, what a good question.
I'm not, I don't know. Like it's kind of what I'm trying to figure out now. Yeah. You know, there's just not been anything that is calling me.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (51:00)
Yeah, you're trying to figure out what you want to do.
Well then.
Nick (51:15)
That's like just been captivating, you know, a few, a few years ago, it, a few seven or eight years ago, it probably would have been something, in tech, like, you know, go back and, and either I would even need to find, I would need it to, learn some degree of, of like the skill or knowledge, but, find a good technical co -founder.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (51:17)
Yeah.
Like learn to code?
Nick (51:45)
but you know, a few years ago, I just felt like there was so much, mean, there's still is so much opportunity, but like, it's probably not for me. It wouldn't be as seamless for me to jump into it as it would have been then. Hmm.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (51:51)
Yeah, yeah.
No, like professional soccer player. Swim, dive, no, I'm like...
Nick (52:06)
You know, the only thing that comes to mind, I kind of get stuck on this stuff is like, would just like come up with more stuff to do with my daughter. I mean, she's, she's two, two years and two months. So like she's yeah. And, I get to spend a lot of time with her and it's awesome. I'm yeah. If anytime I think about.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (52:15)
yeah.
The best age.
Yeah.
Maybe a write a children's book.
a game.
Nick (52:34)
Kelly said she's going to write one this year. Yeah. So I don't know, maybe she'll let me draw in it or something.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (52:37)
I love it.
That's right. Sky's the limit. I always like that. Because someone asked me that once and I'm like, if I had no flight, if I didn't have to worry about leaving this, the business, I could just do whatever. would, I was like, I would totally finish. Like I have a movie concept and I would do that. I would produce it and it would be a hit. Would be blockbuster. But to do something like that, I don't know. That would be my thing. So.
Nick (52:53)
Mm
Yeah.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (53:13)
If you had to rewind on anything, is there anything that you would do differently?
that you were like, ugh, I didn't like how that worked out.
Nick (53:24)
Well, there, there are definitely things that I think that I don't like how they worked out. but there, but you know, sometimes that's how it goes, right? Like that's how, that's why, when I talk about like the uncertainty, this whole, the whole game for a business owner is who can make the best decisions with less than complete information, the most often, right? It's poker.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (53:52)
Yeah, yeah.
Nick (53:53)
You're just trying to place the best bets you can with what you've got. And you're never going to have all the information you want. So, you know, I'm big on the thought process. Did I think about things the way that I wanted to? Did I act the way that I wanted to? And then if I do those things, and even if I still don't get the ideal outcome, like, you know, I have to, I'll live with that. And I think I'd do a pretty good job of being
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (53:56)
Great.
Right, right.
Nick (54:22)
thoughtful about the decisions that I make and treating decision -making as if it's the most important part of my job. And I'm okay with things not always going my way. So I don't have regrets in that way, but I definitely have, I've said my share of stupid thing, like put my foot in my mouth or try to be funny to somebody.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (54:33)
Yeah.
Yeah, yeah.
They didn't get the humor.
Nick (54:52)
wasn't funny. things like that, but.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (54:56)
If we met a year from now, what would we be sitting down to celebrate?
Nick (55:08)
the screening of your movie.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (55:12)
Yeah, I'll take it.
Nick (55:20)
Well, by then, I definitely need to have more clarity on the direction of what I want to do other than podcast. So I started a podcast because I had more extra attention and time, but I also have no intention of being a professional podcaster.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (55:35)
Yeah.
Yeah, neither do I, but I still do it. Like I forgot to preface that. like, I am not a professional.
Nick (55:47)
You do great. I mean, I want to get back into some, some partnerships and, and build a portfolio of businesses again. And, and this time what I'm thinking about is more of a, like a platform type strategy where I've got, you know, a portfolio of, of services that most businesses can utilize. So, you know, bookkeeping, accounting,
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (56:13)
Yeah.
Nick (56:16)
know, websites, VAs, marketing. So put together like a suite of companies that can all kind of share on the client pool. So I'm not exactly sure what the milestone will be that we are going to celebrate in a year, but it'll probably be something in the. Yeah, it will be somewhere there.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (56:21)
Right.
Right?
Let's hope it's the launch of that business, because that's a gap. That's a gap in the especially small business. We need it. We see it. Yep. That everyone can kind of talk. The accountant and financial advisor is sitting with the agent, know, marketing agency, sitting with you know, web tail, like everybody, surround that business, that business leader with the right, almost like an EOS, right?
Nick (56:49)
Yeah.
Mm -hmm.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (57:12)
What do they call it? The E11? Is it E10? What is the weekly meeting in it called? Elton, yeah. Like creating an off branch of EOS but around the companies that need to be sitting around that seat.
Nick (57:21)
the L10. Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, yeah. Yep, the wheels are turning now.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (57:39)
Here we go, we're workshopping it. We're workshopping this. We're gonna, call it the L10 and be a branch of EOS for all of their businesses. I don't know if that's allowed. You'll workshop it, you'll workshop it. Well, what advice, I mean you've given a lot of good advice.
Nick (57:57)
Yeah, the wheel is definitely turning.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (58:07)
some new stuff that we haven't heard from a lot of founders, but what is the best advice that you received as a founder and an owner that really stuck to you?
Nick (58:19)
well, it was the, don't know what you don't know. You've got to make sure that you get out there and try to find it. and then the other piece is, someone telling me that not to confuse someone's willingness to do something for their ability to do something. And which is kind of like going back to the root of my managerial.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (58:47)
Yeah.
Nick (58:49)
struggles was getting those two intertwined. Yeah. Cause you know, then you're just putting people in a situation that they're, may be willing to do it, but they can't succeed. Yep.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (58:52)
to align.
They can't succeed, right? And that's the worst to do. As we say, you know, manage with candor and kindness. Don't give feedback. Everybody wants to be able to help, but not everybody has the capacity to do it.
Nick (59:18)
Yep. And you're not doing them a favor by running them, letting them run themselves into the ground.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (59:23)
Right, Nor are you, you're helping your own business by allowing that to happen. Well, this was fantastic. Okay, so before we go, how do you want people to connect with you? Is there anything you also want to talk about or that I've missed? I know you have a, you got a podcast. Remind me of the, it's called The Business Owner Journey. And then you said that you're an author. What is your book?
Nick (59:28)
Right.
The business owner's journey.
so I've co -authored a few books, but I haven't co -authored a book in 10 years, but they're on my website. If you go to nickberry .info and you can find the books and the podcasts on there, like the podcast is at nickberry .info backslash podcast. So, but it's the business owner's journey. That's the way to...
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (59:55)
Okay.
well then, so how do want people to connect with you, Nick?
Okay.
Nick (1:00:21)
to get in touch with me would be to go to the website. It's got all my social handles there. You can find everything that you would possibly want to know about me or the businesses there. You can subscribe to the newsletter where I share the podcast and stories from my guests every week. that's Command Central is nickberry .info.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (1:00:36)
Okay.
I love it. I love it. Well, thanks for coming on. I appreciate it. Always fun. Yeah. I'm gonna have to check out your podcast. I'm sure I can relate. Business owner that I am.
Nick (1:00:46)
Thank you. was fun.
Yeah, we had a great conversation. So we may have to circle back and do this again.
Jennifer "JJ" Sutton (1:00:58)
Yeah. Yes. that would be fun. That would be fantastic. So thanks for hanging out for all of our listeners or watching anybody that's watching us. Thank you for joining us. This podcast episode will be available on your favorite podcast platform. So subscribe to Hello Chaos. Give us a like comment. Share this great content. Help us build and grow a more connected entrepreneurial community.
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