Lighting for Profits - Episode 180

This week we welcome Jake Sittner, a proud Lincoln, NE native with a Horticulture Degree in Landscape Design from the University of Nebraska who has spent the past 12 years manufacturing and installing bollards. With his wife of 16 years and their three boys, they enjoy family time at their sports events. Leveraging his extensive expertise in residential and commercial bollard applications, Jake is focused on empowering contractors nationwide to enhance their projects and create remarkable spaces.

Tailored Lights is giving away a 20" Full Circle Bollard. Go to https://landscapelightingsecrets.com/podcast-giveaway to sign up for giveaway - drawing will be on January 28th.

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Episode Transcript

We discussed everything you need to know to start and grow a successful landscape lighting business

Welcome to Lighting for Profits.

All light. All light. All Light powered by Emory Allen. Get rid of your excuses.

Your number one source for all things landscape lighting.

That's where the magic can happen. You can really scale a business.

We really had to show up for each other from lighting design, install sales and marketing. You're a scaredy cat sales maker. We discussed everything you need to know to start and grow a successful landscape lighting business. What do you think a hippo has.

To do with your business, Ryan? Usually it's some weird childhood thing. Bully kicks your butt.

I think the key factor here is trust. Here is your host, Ryan Lee.

All, light. All light. All light.

If you're looking to start or grow a landscape lighting business, this show is for you

Welcome, welcome, welcome to the number one landscape lighting show in Lincoln, Nebraska. I'm Ryan Lee, your host of Lighting for Profits powered by Emory Allen. And, listen, if you're looking to start or grow a landscape lighting business, you're definitely in the right place. We're here to educate and motivate to help you dominate. So who doesn't want to dominate? It's 2025. We are off to a hot start of the year. I think everyone's excited about the economy and, it's gonna be a great year. we've got, an awesome guest today. We've got Jake Sitner with tailored lights. And, we're gonna have an awesome discussion about business. We're gonna have a discussion about products. he's got an awesome product that can help enhance your designs, enhance your projects, create some upsell opportunities. So excited, to talk to him. listen, guys, we've got a couple of, a couple of things before we have Jake on number one, we got Light It Up Expo coming up soon. It's coming up next month. It's not too late to get your ticket. It's in Orlando, Florida. I could think of worse places to be the end of February. But get your tickets at lightedup Expo. Com. Guys, we've got a ton of vendors coming, okay? And these guys have all pretty much donated product, or gifts, gift, cards, money, a lot of different things. So when you buy a ticket, you're automatically entered into that raffle. And, it's pretty cool because, like, we're donating. Jake's actually, he's gonna be donating something later today. And actually special episode today. Not only will you be entered to win the raffle if you buy, a ticket to Light It Up Expo, but he's giving away another product for all. Listen, not all listeners, but you'll be, you'll be. You can enter to win later today in this episode, by going to, a landing page that we have, to win some of some more free product. Okay. So you don't have to buy anything to win from Jake. He's that nice of a guy. so I'm excited to have him on in a few. But if you're looking to bolt on permanent lighting, landscape lighting or holiday lighting, you gotta be at Light It Up Expo. It's the end of February, in Orlando. And we're gonna have breakout sessions, speakers, networking, mills. I mean, it's all there. We want to see you guys there. It's going to be an awesome show. The, the vendors are super excited. They're all bringing their, bringing the heat. We've got some amazing speakers lined up. We're going to be releasing their name soon. but I cannot wait. It is going to be the place to be. If you're in the outdoor lighting industry or want to be, this is the place to be. okay, so again, we're gonna have Jake on in just a few minutes.

You need 2,000 people to tell you no to your offering

But, before we have Jake on, what if I told you. What if I told you that we were 36 months away from earning $10 million? You just have to wait 36 months? How excited would you be to wake up every day, Right? Because you're just one day closer. Now, there is some requirements. One of the things you have to do is you have to get 2,000 people to tell you no to your offering. Okay, 2,000 people to tell you no. And you only need about 200 people to tell you yes. How excited would you be to get your first no? Like, honestly, if you're like, man, you're just a couple thousand no's away and three years away from earning $10 million. How excited would you be to get your first no? Okay, you're really, honestly only so many no's away from achieving what you really want. And a lot of people are afraid to hear no and they're afraid to fail and they're afraid of rejection. So they don't start. See, I'm not afraid of that. I'm like, I'm going to go, go, go, and if I know I just need to get 97 no's to get three yeses to make a million dollars. Well, I'm going to try to get 97 no's as fast as possible. A couple of weeks ago, I attended, Door to Door Con. Okay. This is Door to Door conference. And, this was crazy. This was Here in Utah at the Salt Palace. These are expert door knockers, okay? They understand this is a. Historically, they've sold like roofing, pest control, home security, alarms, stuff like that. But they're. They're selling everything now, guys, and they're going to start selling permanent lighting and landscape lighting and holiday lighting, okay? They understand diligence and hard work and psychology. They know what it takes. There are people knocking doors, making hundreds of thousands of dollars in a short period of time, like a few months, okay? There's salespeople that are willing to do that. and they're not just selling roofing and pest control, okay? And here's what they understand. They understand that sales is just a numbers game. And so when I learned sales, I was taught this, I learned it was a numbers game. And, whoever is willing to keep going without quitting is always going to win. That's how this game is played, okay? Like, everyone can win. It doesn't matter about your competition. It doesn't matter about someone else. It only matters about what you are willing to do. So it's kind of like, succeeding in business. As long as you don't quit, you're going to win. As long as you don't quit, you're going to win.

So how bad do you really want what you say you want

So how bad do you really want what you say you want? So be careful when you establish your goals and your resolutions and stuff like that, because it's easy to just state what you want. But how bad do you really want it? What are you willing to give up in order to achieve what you want? Are you willing to get 97 no's to get three yeses? I am. it's time to wake up. It's time to get excited for your future. how much money do you want? How much freedom do you want? Like, what are you. What does your dream life look like? no matter what, no matter what is going to require a lot of people telling you no. And you can get depressed about it, you can get upset about it, you can take it personal, or your answer can be good because you're one step closer. Okay? When you do the math, do the numbers to figure out what you need to do to get there and make it happen. And of course, there's skills that you need to learn along the way, right? But, it'd be nice, right, if you only had to get 96 no's instead of 97, or maybe 89 no's. But if you're willing to get 97 no's to get those three yeses. That's the mindset it takes. And then eventually you can get skills to get one more yes and one less no. Okay. but the key is to not quit. And the key is to start.

Don't be afraid of the no. Embrace the no

Some of you are, I talk to business owners every week, every day. Some, like, what's your strategy? What are you doing for marketing? What are you doing for this? It's like bragging to me about word of mouth and how awesome you are. It's like, but what are you going to do to grow? What are you going to do to scale? Well, I don't know if I have to scale. Well, what are you going to do if someone gets sick? What are you. What are you going to do if you get sick? What if someone gets hurt? Like, does your business have redundancy built into it? Is it. If someone gets sick or hurt or needs to go on vacation, are you filling in? Right. When you stay disciplined and get your reps in, you win. Think about what would happen if you decided today to call 10 referral partners, 10 new potential referral partners, every single day, five days a week, 52 weeks of the year. Don't you think that you're gonna have a handful of them? Say yes. Like a certain percentage, even if it's a, 1%, 2%, 3% of them start referring you. That's better than last year. Right? So when are you going to go get your first snow? And when it happens. Good, you're one step closer. When the first 10 people that you call because you're like, you know what? He's right. I'm going to do 10 cold calls. And the first 10 people don't even answer your phone call. Good, you're one step closer. And when the first handful of people tell you no, they're not interested. They already do lighting. They know everything. Good. Because you're one step closer. That's what I want to share with you guys today, is don't be afraid of the no. In fact, celebrate the no's. Try to find opportunities to get no's. Because that just means you're one step closer. And by the way, this isn't just some random hypothetical. You want $10 million in the next three years, you need 200 people to give you 50k. 200 people to give you 50k in the next three years. If you could do that. Someone fact check me on that. Someone fact check me. If you can do that, you're going to end up with $10 million. Okay, just make sure I'm good at math. I think I meant to do it on the calculator before I hit the live button. but seriously, guys, like, don't be afraid of the no. Encourage, the no. Embrace the no. Go find it. Because that just means you're one step closer. And when that conflict hits you, you hit that wall and, and you feel like, oh, man, I feel resistance. The answer is good because now I'm one step closer. You know, you're on the right track. Hey, quick shout out to Emory Allen. Listen, what sets Emory Allen apart? Well, bulbs aside, they believe customer satisfaction should be the top priority. Always. Emory Allen goes out of their way to ensure lighting professionals have access to the best light sources built with the highest quality components suited specifically for the landscape lighting industry. So listen, at the end of the day, it's what's on the inside that counts. Take advantage of Emory Allen's world class customer service. Get 10% off your first order. Here's what you need to do, guys. Email tom g@emryallen. com. mention Ryan Lee mentioned Lighting for Profits, mentioned you heard about him here. He will connect you with the lowest possible pricing, which is better than their website. Don't go to their website. Email Tom gmeryallen. com and he will hook you up with that discounted contractor pricing and experience, that single source led.

M. G. welcomes Jake Sitner to the show

All right, guys, well, I think that's enough for me. I'm ready to get to our guest. I hope you guys are too. remember, stick around because I'm going to introduce Jake here in a second and then we're going to be doing a, giveaway on the show where everyone has a chance to win, some product. So if you want, the link to that, we'll put it in the show notes and we'll, I'll say it here in just a few minutes, so stick around for that. And, what do you guys say? It's time to get Jake on or what? Welcome. M. Welcome to the show, Mr. Jake Sitner. What's up, buddy?

Thanks for having me. M. Yeah. How are you?

Heck yeah, man. I'm excited for our conversation. I'm doing great. Thanks for asking.

Good. I enjoyed listening to what you've already said and made notes. And I can, It reminded me of Elon Musk, interview I saw a minute ago. And yes, you're 2,000 no's. And there was a guy, I don't even know what network he was interviewing from, but he, he said to Elon, arguably the most powerful guy in the world, what's your source of strength? And, Elon's borderline on the spectrum. And, he, he's, he said simply, if there's something important to, to get done, we should keep doing it or die trying. And I think that's the way a lot of us operate our, our companies. You know, if you, if you trip over yourself, you got to get back up. I think a lot of us entrepreneurs, we just have that bone in our body where quitting is not, in our nature. And that's what he said. And then, he kind of just rambled and said, optimism, pessimism, whatever, F that if we're going to get it done, we're going to get it done.

Yeah. So I love that.

If, if he can put something on Mars potentially, I think we can, operate, local companies and do them successfully.

Yeah. Land a rocket ship on some chopsticks or whatever.

I think, yeah, pretty much the thing.

That impressed me when I was at this conference, these door knockers and I, and I actually used to knock doors. We're going to do a whole episode on knocking doors. but the thing that impressed me is, yeah, we aren't as business owners, like, quit is not in us. But there's so many people waiting around for something to happen where, like these guys, they're like, no, no, I'm not going to wait around for a lead. I'm not going to wait around for a customer. I'm going to go knock all these doors right here. And, I know someone in here is going to say, yes, I don't know which one. So I'm just going to go get it done. And they're going to accelerate the failure. They're going to accelerate getting the nose. Instead of waiting for 97 nos over a year, they'll just go knock it out in a day. So that's, that's what's impressive is like, you know, what is your mentality? Like, are you like, do you really want it? Because if you did, you'd go knock those doors. You go knock 100 doors a day, it's easy to say you want it, but then you make excuses. Well, it's cold outside, it's dark. No one wants lighting right now. They're probably not going to. There's, there's no soliciting. it's just, it's easier to talk yourself out of your dreams and go make it happen. And that's kind of the point is like, no, like, stop dicking around. Let's. Let's go. Let's get intentional. Like success is intentional. Let's make 20, 25 our year. Instead of just say we have a goal, let's make it happen. And the way to make it happen is to get 97 no's and three yeses, you know?

Yeah. Well, if no is the worst thing that happens, it's really not that bad. It's pretty easy to recover from and.

Yeah, good. Gotta put yourself out there, one step closer.

Jake Sitner started his landscape installation company when he was 21

well, Jake, dude, thanks for being here. M. just do a quick introduction, you know, you know, about you and I have had several conversations, so I've gotten to know you a little bit. But introduce yourself to, our listeners and tell them who Jake Sitner is.

Yeah. And, I mean, I'll start by saying thank you. I mean you've got a incredible platform to be on and I feel lucky to be here and can't wait to eventually go to Utah and get. See the, the. Get the tour of, wherever in Utah and branch out a little bit. But no, from Nebraska. My whole life kind, of. Kind of stuck around Lincoln. Went away for college for a little bit, but started my landscape, installation company when I was 21 in college. And, it went well enough to where graduated, with a horticulture degree and met my wife along the way in college. she's also got a horticulture degree. But I did the kind of. I always get confused on left brain, right brain, but I'm the creative type. still numbers driven, but she was the biochem and thought she wanted to be a lab person. and then she had an internship one summer in a lab and realized she didn't want to do that anymore. So, you know, we just had our. We were actually a December, wedding, which you don't hear about much in the Midwest, but, you know, when our. It was like 14 degrees today and on our wedding day, December 13, it was like 55 degrees and then like negative 4 the next day. So. Funny. Funny how stuff works out. But no, she's got a. She's got a shop in a small town outside of Bennett now where it's We feature some of our lighting so people can feel them and see how big they are in real life. and then we do the landscape installation. We don't focus all in on hardscaping or planting. We kind of do, an approach to people's yards where, you know, we're going to design the best of everything. And that includes a lot of, the lighting that we make and a lot of accent lighting and, you know, me and the team can't wait to do eventually get more involved in the AOLP and Illy and that, you know, I've got three kids, 13, eight and four, about to be five. And, you know, kind of my reasoning is get a good foundation. And, you know, we've been making our own bollards for over 10 years now, but we're just starting to market them now because we just have a foothold in our landscape installation company. And I didn't want to over promise and under deliver, and we've learned a lot along the way. but now it's just kind of a comfortable time to transition and branch out. I don't know.

Love it.

We'll be branching out at the same time Nebraska football gets relevant again.

Well, thanks for the intro.

You mentioned your wife thought she wanted to be a lab person

And, you know, one thing. You. You mentioned your wife thought she wanted to be a lab person, or however you worded that, and then she did it and then realized she didn't. I actually love that you shared that because so many people are so, unwilling to make decisions. I mean, in anything. Well, I don't know, do I want to try that product or, I don't know, do I want to start this business or do I want to start offering that, or should I do maintenance plans or, you know, should I join Landscape Lighting Secrets or should I go to Light It Up Expo or, all these decisions. Most people just procrastinate and don't make the decision. So they never learn. They never learn. Was it a good choice or a bad choice? The fact that she did that was like, cool. I don't want to do that. So, like, you have to make decisions to learn if it's right or wrong. And I. I used to be the worst at making decisions. Like, that was like, one of my biggest weaknesses. And I've turned it to, like, one of my biggest strengths now. Dude. I mean, you might think I'm reckless. It's like, I'll talk. I've hired my last two coaches, and these are like $50,000 a year guys with like, no, no. Like, well, let me talk to my wife or let me get, you know, talk about it for a few days. It's like, I get the price. All right, cool. How do we get started? And. And my. My old. Former self would be like, dude, that's reckless. But it's like, I've learned, like, you just make the decision and I'll know if it was the wrong decision. And I'll figure out how to rectify the bad decision. But like they're usually good decisions. Like you know, even if you decide not to do it that way forever the rest of your life, you know that it's not for you. So that was cool.

Tailored Lights is giving away free bollards at Light It Up Expo

well, let's talk about your. I want to talk about a couple things. One, we're going to be doing a giveaway. Tailored Lights is giving away a free bollard. And this is like a 500 Ballard. these are, these are nice lights, you guys. We're going to talk about that in a minute. Before we do that, and Tailored Lights has stepped up. You're one of our vendors and sponsors of Light It Up Expo, our gold sponsor. and so you're gonna be at Light It Up Expo. You're also donating another bollard to the raffle there, which is really, really cool. but before we get into the actual like Tailored Lights and the bollards and stuff like that, which I think are amazing, I think it's gonna offer so many people an opportunity to upsell and enhance their projects.

I wanna ask you about your business experience. Um, I love getting in the minds of entrepreneurs

I wanna ask you about your business experience. I love getting in the minds of entrepreneurs and what worked and what didn't and why you did certain things. what's the name of your landscape installation business?

So it's Tailored Landscape. So we have, we actually have three companies each with the same logo which you can see right there. So each one is tl. So Tailored Lights, Tailored Landscapes and Tailored Life. because the life is a basically living. You know, I don't even know how to describe it. If, if a garden center and a, if a garden center in a Hobby lobby had a baby. That's what that is.

But nice.

No, it's, it's been a journey just like for a lot of people. And I have to kind of start my conversation with. We're in Lincoln, Nebraska. It's a, a big small town is what everybody calls it. It's 300, 000 people. very conservative and ah, a lot of what I'll talk about for like why I'm going to the Light It Up Expos to show people bollards. But like, yeah, I'm going to learn from other people too. But like if stuff can work in small rural parts of Nebraska, I mean east coast, west coast, south, like it's going to work there. But no. Started the landscape portion when I was 21 and about 10 years into that married, my wife and then she joined and that's about the same time that we started the lighting. we just saw a need for it. But, you know, I'm kind of like most people. You. You learn the hard way on some things. And then, like, you. You were talking about your decision making gets better over time. But yeah, like, rewind, seven, eight years ago, I wouldn't have ever done it. But right before, the end of the new year or the end of the year, last year, I bought a brand new transit van and a new stand behind Bobcat MT100. Because you get that experience, like, and kind of what goes into making decisions is like, what's the worst thing that can happen? oh, I have to sell a brand new van back, and I have to sell a brand new Bobcat. Like, you're trying for growth and you're playing the odds a little bit every day. So, But I kind of eat, breathe, sleep, whatever. Landscaping, it's fun. You know, you're into it. When you have dreams about landscaping or landscape lighting or whatever, and you go out to dinner with your wife and you talk about landscaping and landscape lighting, you. You fight. We did have a fight over how the magnolia was trimmed. It's a very prominent magnolia.

That's. That's worth fighting. Yeah, some things are worth fighting over, you know?

Yeah, yeah. Sleep. Sleep on the couch because of pruning.

That's worth it.

Decision for sure. Grow back.

Yeah, yeah.

A lot of people think buying a van is a $48,000 decision

So, like, yeah, like your van and Bobcat example, how much. How much was a van? How much did you spend on the van?

it was. So what we're getting into is like, we had one that we had had for a year or two, and we had never put a wrap on it. And Lincoln's a small enough town, and you can boil your big city, like a small part of the community into a version of Lincoln, but people notice stuff like that. And I was like, if I'm gonna put $5,000 into wrapping it, I don't want to do it on something with 88, 000 miles. So it was like 48, 000.

So a lot of. A lot of people think, well, that's a $48,000 decision. Well, it's not. It's actually not a $48,000 decision. Because if it's wrong, let's say you're like, you know what? That was a mistake. You're not going to zero on that thing. You right. If you're like, you know what? That was a bad choice. I'm going to resell it you're going to lose some money. But it's not 48,000, you know.

Well, and I don't. Yeah. And I don't know exactly what the depreciation schedule is like, right now, but I mean, the whole thing is you drive it off the lot and it depreciates. Well, yeah, but also with the amount that I'm saving on, taxes, you know, I could probably sell it next year and kind of. Kind of break even.

Yeah.

Ryan Lee started lighting business after landscaping

So. And what's cool and getting to know you a little bit. I've never been to Lincoln, but it sounds like you live in the middle of a cornfield. And I'm like, accurate. How is this guy. Wait, how this guy is providing for his family? What? How. You know, like. And I think people blame their market a lot. You know, it's like, well, I'm sure you can do that in Florida or California or Texas, but I'm in Lincoln, Nebraska. How have you overcome that? How have you excelled in your businesses and kind of push that out of your mindset?

I think from. I think, I think just the way that I am. I. I don't really. Like, I'm not an anti everything. I'm not. If you go black, I'm going white. But I always like to put my own spin on stuff. So when people are planting this tree all the time because it works and like, I've gotten into trouble where, like, maybe that plant was marginal. I shouldn't have. I've lost money on it. But like, people should go to the Ryan Lee's of the world or the, you know, the really good installers because they do their stuff their own way. And when people are planting stuff or lighting stuff, like, I don't know. I'm huge on continued education. It. It wasn't always in the, budget the last 15 years or whatever, but now it's become a regular thing. but just pushing it and knowing trends and when you can tell the customer that you, you know, this is why we're doing this. And if you can back it up and. And then at the end of the project, they're like, yeah, he was fantastic. Then it just goes from there and in a small community. And I talked to a guy in Florida today and over of like Venice to Sarasota and that whole area, like, he did one. One job, did a solid job for these people, and now he's on like his seventh house in the neighborhood and just treat that like a. Just take over the community pretty much. But, I Don't know, it's just kind of interesting how, how one door opens after you do do a good job.

I like that. what about lighting? so, you know, you got the horticulture culture background. Makes sense. You start a landscaping business. When did you discover lighting? When did that become a passion of yours?

I mean, it came out of necessity. You know, you don't. A Lincoln really doesn't have a, or didn't have at the time, a subcontractor that I could hire to do the lighting after I did the landscaping. and when you get to get the bigger, job or bigger client and they're saying, well, they're kind of saying yeah to whatever because they trust you. we just kind of figured it out. And I was back in the Kitchler 8 1/2 watt days. And, it was a Kitchler transformer, Kitchler Path light and all that stuff. And then you just kind of work through that and see what kind of product you like along the way with lighting. But, I didn't pioneer the bollard style, but we're definitely putting our own, our own spin on it. you know, I'm not going to say that Nebraska is the only place with kind, of a really heavy duty value set of like, oh, yeah, if we're going to do something, we're going to do it like really heavy duty and all that stuff. But, that's definitely something from our families and from our community. And like you said, like, right out that window, on the other side of those trees, I've got a cornfield. And on the other side I've got a cornfield. so we're, we're an ag country. I mean, everybody welds. And that's probably why I do well selling the product, because I, I believe in it. You know, there's some messed up driveways in the world. And I've seen our light at the end of the driveway either keep somebody from driving off of it or they hit our light. And our light is stout enough where the, the light bends before the back corner tire goes off the driveway. So, like, that's awesome. and just by you know, being kind of a creative brain person, like, I like the idea that, that our lights have one footprint. Even though we've done, we basically go from 2 inch by 2 inch all the way up to. I did a custom project, it was 10 inch by 10 inch. And you're always thinking like, okay, these people are into palm trees or they've been to the Eiffel Tower. Like, how can I make that cool for them? and then they put it somewhere special in their yard. Like, I, I can only suffer through so many more, rocks with an address engraved out in somebody's landscape, which are very popular in rural Nebraska. but when we show our light with an address going vertically, you know, it's just a different, a different option. And I'm always trying to kind of push, but be tasteful with what we do.

Yeah. Well, thanks for confirming my, the stereotype I have in my head about Nebraska with the cornfields. And then you said everyone welds. I just, I just imagine everyone just being so tough there. So it's like, just walk like, oh, what are you doing? Oh, I was just welding over here. You know, just close my eyes for a second. Actually, I kept open this time and I'm in shorts and it's negative 12, but I just welded a fence.

I'll tell you what it. You will have people walking to the hardware store in 12 degree weather or negative 10 and they'll have shorts on, they'll have a coat on. Probably shorts and, and like what are the, the little molded rubber shoes that everybody wears? Crocs.

That's awesome. Yeah, that surprises me. Yeah, I was expecting more of a work boot in my, my, my vision of stereotype, but, yeah, no, that's good. So that's. Yeah, I guess.

Talk about tailored lights. I like the customization. But accent lighting is accent lighting and I appreciate it

Talk about tailored lights. You said like the, the custom addresses. I like the customization. And this is where I think, you know, I never, I don't want to say never, but I pretty much, pretty much sure I never did a bollard like these decorative bollards on any projects. And once you see it, like in an application, installed in an application, it's kind of hard to unsee it where you're like, oh, I could see me putting a couple of these on every project and possibly more. But it's just a good way to differentiate your design, I think, and show something, someone unique and cool and, and then it's like you mentioned like, you know, hey, you guys said, you know, you guys just got back from Paris or you guys, you know, I asked you earlier about your favorite destination. You guys go always go to Hawaii or you like to go visit the cornfields in Nebraska. Whatever it is. did you know that we could customize this with a piece of corn on it? You know, right there, their college, like you can, you can see stuff on people's license plates. The Things that they're proud of and in, in their house, in their office, maybe they played college ball. I mean there's just so many things, so many ways to like speak to the client and that one thing could mean the difference between you even winning the project or not. And now, we're not talking about just buying a bollard or two and making an extra few hundred bucks. This could be the thing that helps you earn the entire $20,000 project if you're, even though you're only using a couple bollards, you know.

Well, and I'll go back to, I, I still need to work, learn a lot from the people that put on programs like illy and stuff like that. Like accent lighting is accent lighting and I appreciate it. And I've, I've listened to the the people at like I went to the Sterling Summit and you have the lighting purists where they don't really always like the shadow pattern. But if, if there's, I don't even know how many new lighting companies starting every, every year, every month or whatever. But to an extent homeowners have seen up lighting and down lighting. How are you going to get their attention and say, hey, we're not bidding apples to apples, we're bidding something that they can't get. And from my point of view, if I have a relationship with somebody in Florida, I mean we're small enough to where we're happy with who we're working with and we're happy with it growing organically. we're doing the Light it Up Expo to grow it, but we still have room for growth. But at a certain point I'm going to be like, well, the competitor of the guy I've been selling to for like 10 years. I mean there's loyalty with that, but I mean you won't, you won't get more kind of wows and likes and whatever. you know, just kind of the, I don't want to say shock because that's kind of a bad word. But if you put a social media post out there with bollards and people haven't seen it before, it's, that's kind of the excitement behind them right now. And if you went into high, school or whatever, there isn't a kid in the high school is going to know what a bollard is. I mean it's just not a, not a, not a term. So there's a little education. But I mean as far as setting yourself apart, I think it's a good tool to do it.

Yeah, well, I think it gives you the wow factor. You know, when I used to do and I think a lot of like when you do down lighting from trees and you do it right where you see that the dappled, you know, shadows on the ground, that's what's, what a BALLARD can give you. Without even having like some properties, you, maybe you're like, well I don't need the ballard. I can just do the downlights from the trees. But a lot of places they, they don't even have that opportunity. So the BALLARD allows you to do that. We were, we were actually on a call earlier inside Landscape Lighting Secrets and someone had a question on a project and there was, there was no trees around. It was really, really complicated. Like what would you do here to light these steps? And honestly I sent them the link. I said I would go, go, go right here, get a couple of these bollards. It's perfect. It's going to give you some nice area lighting, some really cool like artistic look on the ground and solve the problem. So yeah, it's, it's definitely different. It's the wow factor. It's something especially on a, on a marketing campaign. It's going to catch people's attention, more than just the generic landscape lighting photos that you see for sure.

Right. And I'll tell you, like, they're, we, we install locally around Lincoln and we don't even use them on every project. So I don't want to beat it into everybody's head. Like you have to switch everything that you've done for 5, 10, 15, 20 years and, and start, you know, using our product. But it is a it's a game changer in the, in the right the right use and you know like I had a guy that I met over the summer, kind of a colleague and he's down in Kansas City and Kansas City just got dumped on with snow and they've got like, I don't know, some, some places got 13 inches and he took a picture just to show customers what a 30 inch ballard of ours looked like right next to like a, you know, typical, I don't know, 20, 22 inch maybe, maybe it was only 18 inch path, light. And you know we have more light spread. You know, you can, mowers can run into them, snowblowers can blow stuff into them. Like they're, they're a lot more. And this comes into sales stuff but they're a Lot more robust. So they're not going to break over time. we're doing a lot of testing right now. We, we have a bollard at a acreage right on the corner of a driveway where it kind of does a T and that thing is putting out a 40 foot diameter spread of light. And when you don't have the trees like you're talking about, there is another landscape group that I was talking to a guy like he was trying to he had a lot of constraints against what they wanted to do or what they didn't want to do. but if you can put a tall Ballard at the start and the end of a path and then you can do kind of ground marker lighting along the way, I mean just kind of takes away a lot of points of failure and less busy approach to designing it.

Yeah, I agree.

Landscape Lighting Secrets. com is giving away a 20 inch winding vine

So still got a lot of stuff I want to ask you but we are doing a giveaway. You, you decided to do this. Tell it, tell about what you're going to give away. What I'm going to post here, the, the landing page that people can go to. You don't have to buy anything to enter. You're just going to put in your name, email, whatever, and we're going to do a random drawing on January 28th and then we'll reach out to the winner via email, or phone call. What are we giving away?

So it's a 20 inch winding vine. we wanted to pick something that was easy to take to meetings and kind of set up and show people that way they're holding it, they, they feel how heavy duty it is and stuff like that. But then you can actually install it and they can get an idea of the shadow patterns and from there then you can hand them a brochure. We can give you pictures to use. But it's a 20 inch winding vine. The vine is, it's an organic design and it goes with a bunch of styles of architecture. So it'll be rust finish. you're going to be able to throw it in the back of your truck or whatever you take to, to do meetings. But it's just going to be another thing where you know, I don't care if you put it in your backyard, if you enjoy it that much. But I, I do think it'll be a, a good tool for you. And they're not, they're not cheap. There's a, a lot of design into them. but it'll just help ah, you with kind of setting yourself apart.

Yeah, no, dude, it. I think it's awesome. I appreciate you doing this. you know, we're just always trying to get people engaged and, you know, reward our listeners for being loyal and stuff like that. It's awesome. So if you guys want to enter, we'll put the link in the show notes as well. If you're listening or watching this later on, it's Landscape Lighting Secrets. com podcast-giveaway. Good luck typing that incorrectly. Landscape Lighting Secrets. com podcast dash giveaway if you can type that incorrectly without looking more than once, we'll throw in an extra bollard. Just kidding. Landscape, lightingseers. com podcast giveaway. And again, we'll put that in the show notes and stuff like that. It's on the screen as well. that's cool, Jake. I appreciate you doing that. I mean, that's a 500, value there, baller. These are, these are heavy duty guys. I'm, I'm gonna put some. I don't know how many yet. I think Jake's gonna come out and help me figure out how many, but I want to do at least like, one in the front. I don't have a huge front yard. I don't have a huge backyard either, but I want to put a couple in the backyard. I just like, I like the, the, the shadow pattern it puts on the ground, so I'm excited about those.

Yep, they're fun.

What's the material made out of? How do you guys make them

Let's talk about forever.

Yeah. What and what. What's the material made out of? How do you guys make them?

it's steel tubing, so it's actually, structural tubing. we're not bending, sheet metal or anything. so it's 12 gauge. It's extremely heavy duty. I, I don't have the weights off the top of my head. Like what the 20 inch that you're gonna. If you do win. I mean, it's, it's about £25 all in or somewhere around there. but they're laser cut and we have kind of all the flexibility to kind of put almost anything in. You know, whether you have a customer with a cool corporate logo or, you know, you want to do something like numerical like we were talking about. We've done stuff that just says welcome. I mean, people have secondary homes where you could kind of propose anything to them and they would do it like we did. We sold 50 at one time to, ah, kind, of a corporate group that had kind of a retreat. And it was A rustic retreat. And they're like, we just want something that'll work and that we can beat the hell out of with a weed whacker and not have to worry about it. And I was like, well, the good news is for rust, and rust is kind of weird thing to, to push on people. But like, it's kind of cool not taking something out of the box and having it too shiny in the landscape because, like, when people do have natural, like rustic landscapes, like, okay, that's got a cool glossy finish on it. How long is that going to last? And, and you know, even if they don't mention it or if they don't know it, their internal clock's gonna be like, well, I might have to replace that 10, 15 years from now. where rust, I mean, it's just kind of. And like, I probably know more and think more about rust than a lot of people, but it gets, it goes from sandblasted perfect metal to a very orangey color where the rust has got dripping off with the solution that we put on it and then it eventually settles into like a brown color. And I can tell you there's one that, I installed 13 years ago maybe, and it was on a column cap and it was a natural stone column cap, so I didn't really worry about it, leaching onto there, but it's barely marked it at all. So nice to have something that, that people can even rely on the finish like, that they don't have to fuss over for a long time is kind of a, a cool aspect of them too.

Light It Up Expo is coming to Orlando next month

Very cool. Well, I'm, I'm super excited to hang, out with you in Orlando next month. We're going to be at Light It Up Expo again. You're a gold sponsor. We're very grateful of that. what, what, what's what, what allowed you to jump on to light out of Expo? What are you most excited about?

I think I'm pretty quick to know my deficiencies and my deficiency right now is the cri, and just all the all the stuff that I don't even know what to talk about right now as far as going out and getting customers and like all these people from the Service Pro and stuff like that, they're going to be like, oh, well, what's your customer, acquisition cost? And I'm going to say I've got no idea. so it's going to be really cool because it is a, ah, it's going to be kind of a complex group of people that are all similar minded in some fashion. Like you're going to have a little overlap with everybody there, no matter if they do power washing and whatever. So I think it'll be, you know, I've been to the shows before where you talk about one thing and then you think about lunch and then you're tired after lunch. And I think this is going to keep people engaged for, for quite a while and you're always going to be meeting somebody new and talking to about something that you really hadn't planned on. So yeah, kind of it's, it's going.

To be a diverse group. I mean no one's ever done this where we brought together the permanent lighting with the landscape lighting with the holiday lighting. even in the permanent lighting is the newest thing. Of course it's like, you know, a lot of people talking about that, but yeah, they're just not that opportunity. So people are going to come to this. Some people have, you know, less than 12 months experience, other people have 30 years plus experience. Different backgrounds, different parts of the country. I'm it's, it's going to be so awesome. we've got the support of a lot of vendors, a lot of different, you know, you go to an event like this and just talking with people and networking, one conversation could, could change the trajectory of your life and business. I mean it's literally that powerful. And I would tell anyone listening, like be intentional, don't just show up and like go through the motions of the agenda that we have outlined, which is epic. It's going to be awesome. But like go, go sit by someone at lunch that you normally wouldn't. Go sit by, introduce yourself. Go sit by someone at dinner that you normally wouldn't sit by. Like get uncomfortable. Make, make these things happen. And, and if you see someone, you're like, oh yeah, I saw them on the podcast or whatever and all they're, I don't dare go introduce myself. Like go introduce yourself. There's no, there's no ego like that. Like people want to help, people want to share the things that they've learned. just like you and your business, like when you, you, you learn certain things, there's this natural desire to reach back into your past and help people that you're like, if someone would have just told me this one thing that would have been super helpful. So I'm going to go do that. And that like kind of scratch, scratches the itch. So get uncomfortable guys. Just get out there, be, be sociable. I Personally, I don't know if you guys know this News alert. I don't want to go and talk to everybody. I just want to go hide in my hotel room. And I know people don't believe me. They're like, but you have your own podcast and you do all this. I'm like, no, I just want to go hide in my hotel room. But I want to get uncomfortable, too. It helps me learn. It helps me grow. So go out there and get uncomfortable for it. For sure.

I'll say that I'm not completely a believer in the permanent lighting yet. it's here. It's penetrated the corn fields. But, I. If. If I do it, I want to talk to the people that say, this is the best one you can do, and here's why. So then I can bring that home to Lincoln and say, I talked to a guy off in fancy Florida, and he said, you know, I'm joking, but, here's. Here's what I want to use, and here's what I, you know, would back with my company.

Yeah, and I totally hear you. I have. It's funny because I have clients now that when it first came out, they were like, I'm never using that. And then now this. Last year, they sold, like, a few hundred thousand, so.

Right.

I. You know, we did a training at my house. I think it's. I actually think it's cool for holidays and stuff like that. This year was the first year that I didn't have to get up on my own house and do my temporary lights. And I'm not gonna lie, it was freaking awesome, Mike.

Well, with budgets and people, like, if they can cut out the labor every year, I think it's gonna force people to put up permanent lighting.

Yeah, I. I'm not one. My neighborhood, when you come to my house, you'll see, like, my. My neighbors have that stuff on, and it's dancing, it's moving. I'm like, what's the date? Like, is there a holiday? Like, it's. There's no. There's no holiday going on. What's going on? It's like a circus every night. That stuff drives me crazy. my. My permanent lights, they're not on right now. My architectural landscape lighting is like my go to. But I'll turn it on. You know, I turn it on for Christmas. I turn it on for Halloween.

I like it for the holidays. It's fun for that. But I'm not, uh, it's not permanently on

we'll turn it on for whatever, you know, Valentine's Day. It's. It's. It's fun for that. But I'm not, it's not permanently on. Let's call it that. You know, I, I like it for the holidays.

Yeah. And I can see people, like everybody does everything while people that have kids, a lot of them do everything for their kids. And if you, if your kids are like, oh my gosh, that house is cool, then it's going to plant that seed and mom and dad are gonna talk and say, well, maybe we'll do that for our house. And you know, then you can, like if you have a birthday party, or if you have a team event, like our kids play select baseball or basketball or whatever, you know, then you can have fun and have the team, color is going on while you're having an event or something like that. and I, you know, I'd like to even not as you wouldn't have to do them on a house. Like you could do them on a hardscape project and just kind of do a little bit of that. So I don't know, I think there's a lot of applications for them that people could use.

Yeah, it's fun. So, you know, at the end of the day there's some people, you know, it's interesting conversation actually.

50% of my clients stop doing landscape lighting because they focus on holiday lighting

I mentioned, just briefly at the beginning of the show, intentional success. Sometimes the low hanging fruit is not the right answer. Just because, you know, permanent lighting is the easy thing to sell right now doesn't mean you should do it. And same with holiday lighting. Just because it's easy to get leads doesn't mean you should do it sometimes. I've got, I don't know what percentage, but maybe 50% of my clients, they stop doing landscape lighting because they have to focus so much on holiday lighting. And I'm like, no, you're like cutting one of your legs off. like, why are you not focused on landscape lighting? You know, and so my point is like everybody should have their version of intentional success. If you want to be the permanent lighting guy, the landscape lighting, the guy, the holiday lighting guy, then that you should totally do that, like embrace it and have all three options because it's, it's easy to cross sell. And there's a lot of, there's makes a lot of sense. But if you're just doing it to do it because you see other people doing it and you're not making any money, then maybe you shouldn't do it. Maybe you should focus on the thing that's best for you. That's what intentional success means to me is like defining what works best for you. Revenue doesn't matter. Profitability does. So if you're just doing permanent lighting and you're only charging 20 bucks a foot and you're like, yeah, but you know, I don't make that much money. But I get a lot of people asking about it. It's like, what's the point if there's a plan there? And it's like, well, I'm going to break even because I know I'm going to sell them a $50,000 landscape lighting job. That makes me, you know, 50% or something. Okay, maybe that, maybe that's your plan. I don't, I'm not saying that is. But you have to have a plan. That's the point. so most of your bollards are four by four, but now you're also making a little bit smaller ones, right?

Yeah. we've had requests to make a two by two. it's going to be 24 inches tall, but it's going to be the kind of crossover more to people's comfort zone with a path light and more into a dollar amount where you can use them more often. but we're going to be rolling those out here in the next week or two. and they're going to be powder coated, rust finish, of course. And then one thing that we do that a lot of, well, I wouldn't say a lot. some people don't have access to is galvanizing. but pretty much every, irrigation pivot system is galvanized and we have one of the biggest facilities in the country not very far from us. So, galvanizing is another form of powder coating. I think it's a little bit more hardcore. you think it's going to sound weird to have silver lights in your landscape, but I've done it and I've done it around some softer landscape, you know, perennials and whatnot. And it actually looks really cool. So we're excited about it and you know, any, anything to get out of shipping a 80 pound light or whatever. kind of, kind of just spread our, our offerings a little bit.

Nice. Well, it'll be cool to see you guys grow and you know, experiment and stuff like that. I think what, it's cool. You'll, you're going to get a lot of people, you know, you mentioned, like, to keep the price down. I used to always be price conscious, like, okay, if I need to make more money, I need to save costs. And I think everyone should. I mean, just as a business owner, you should know your Costs and you should do that, but at the same time, like sell on value. And the customer, you could tell them this bollard is $2,000. I mean, it doesn't really matter. Like if you sell on value and you show them how it's going to transform that space, that, that's what it's about. It's not about trying to cut corners, cut costs. And I'm again, I don't want to sound hypocritical here. Like, you should manage your costs and not just blindly buy something without caring what it costs. but that being said, a lot of people do that and they learn five, ten years later after they've already got all this failing product in the ground, that maybe they should have invested in a higher quality product. You know what I mean?

Right. But I think ours compared to other stuff, our price per fixture for our 6 inch, like our original series, like if you do a 30 or 42 is kind of already up there. So it's just a way to keep the same family of light. Like maybe you have a garbage can area that you need light on that it's impossible to light with anything other than that where you just want to, I'll say, stick something in. that's kind of what we're going for just so they can give the customer a breather. But I totally get where you're coming from. I, we're in the office and we're kind of cooped up in the winter here and there and showed my guys a video and the guys talking about, you guys pay your Facebook subscription today and kind of gets on a rant on like how everything goes and if it's too expensive, you've got the wrong customer. But, I've been seeing a lot of good videos on that and, you know, establishing value and, you know, value, you know, how do you want to pitch it to the customer? Like, do they value stuff lasting over 10 years, over 20 years? I mean, what's the value of having another contractor come out or you come back out and repairing, replacing something like that down the road?

Yep.

Two ways to get free product from Tailored lights. com podcast giveaway

All right, well guys, just remember two ways to get free product from Tailored lights. These are 20 inch bollards. Really? nice product here. So number one is if you're coming to landscape or you're coming to Light It Up Expo, get, your ticket now. At, some point, I don't know, I, I pushed the date back because I took two weeks off for Christmas. but we're gonna end our, our deadline for our Our low ticket pricing and stuff, early bird pricing and stuff. But no matter what, get your ticket. Landscape lighting, or light it up expo. com. i'm confusing the giveaway. Light it up expo. com. you buy a ticket, you'll be automatically entered into the raffle to win. And, you can actually win twice because the second way is. And I'll put it on the screen, we'll put it in the show notes landscape lightingsecrets. com podcast-giveaway and no purchase necessary there. All you need to do is enter your information in that form. You'll be automatically entered to win the free 20 inch. Ballard. We're going to do that drawing on the, January 28th.

Light It Up Expo is scheduled for February in Orlando, Florida

So Jake, did we leave out anything? Do we need to talk about anything else?

Not really.

Okay, man.

Well, I think, we're excited to be in Florida in February and not Nebraska. Hopefully some of the people that come can, you know, bring their families and kind of have a fun time down in Florida and, you know, write it off and everything and just have it kick start the year for them. So I think everybody's probably pumped to get 2025 going and, you know, learn from, learn and build from last year.

That's right. Yep. It's a great time of year. Typically, slower in a lot of markets. It's good weather down in Orlando. So get, your tickets, guys. Light it up expo. com. we'll see in Orlando. Jake's going to be there, I'm going to be there. We're going to have tons of speakers, vendors, breakouts, networking, all the good stuff. So thanks for coming on here, Jake. Appreciate you, man.

Yep, absolutely. Anytime.

All right, guys, go get your ticket to Light It Up Expo and don't forget to enter the free giveaway here. Landscape lighting, secrets. com podcast giveaway. Guys, have an awesome week.