Introduction:

So here was Muhammad Abdul-Hadi’s idea for a pizza joint: First, buy a building in one of the most troubled neighborhoods in one of the poorest big cities in the country. Open a restaurant despite having no experience in the food industry and do it during the pandemic when many restaurants are failing. And hire only people who, like Abdul-Hadi, are convicted felons. If that business plan sounds a little dicey to you, rest assured you would not be the first to suggest that to Abdul-Hadi. But he did it anyway. He built out the restaurant, and it opened in 2020 to lines that required people to wait as long as three hours for their pizza—thanks in part to a marketing plan that created excitement and scarcity by “dropping” pizzas the way some people “drop” special-edition sneakers. And now, Down North Pizza, which has been featured on best-of lists in national publications like Bon Appetit and The New York Times, is looking to expand. A special, year-end bonus episode.

— Loren Feldman

Introduction:

This week, Shawn Busse, Liz Picarazzi, and Jaci Russo discuss what they learned in 2023 and what they expect from 2024. After a tough year, Shawn is optimistic that his clients, having survived the turbulence of the past few years, are ready to spend money and try something different. Liz explains why she’s been willing to discount her products as much as 40 percent on Cyber Mondays and tells us about some new products she has in the works. Early in the year, Jaci, thinking she was going to have to staff up to handle two big new clients, dove into remodeling her offices—but those big clients have yet to sign on. “I might have jumped the gun a little bit,” says Jaci. Plus: Liz talks about her Midwestern mom, who can’t understand how Liz can charge so much for her trash enclosures. And Shawn raises the issue of how much money business owners should spend on marketing.

— Loren Feldman

Introduction:

This week, Paul Downs tells Jay Goltz and Jaci Russo about the latest developments in his year-long campaign to stop relying so heavily on Google AdWords. At a specially arranged, two-day marketing event, Paul got to sit down with a series of architects and designers who had already been vetted and who he hopes will become repeat customers. So far, Paul says, the results look promising. Plus, we also discuss: Do you write your website copy to please Google or to please people? Is there any way around skyrocketing property insurance rates? Why has Jay decided he no longer needs a chief financial officer? How big a disadvantage to owners are the new laws forbidding employers from asking job candidates about their salary histories? And would you reject a candidate simply for trying to negotiate a starting salary? I know someone who would.

— Loren Feldman

Introduction:

It used to be that best practices in sales were pretty standard across the board. But since the pandemic and with the advent of artificial intelligence, says Lance Tyson, founder of the Tyson Group sales consultancy, it’s like the Wild West out there. Suddenly, everyone’s playing by different rules, and the best sales approach can vary, depending on the seller, the target, the industry, the region of the country. The keys, Tyson says in this week’s bonus episode, are to pay attention and stay flexible. Along the way, he also addresses a host of hot topics: How important is it to see a prospect face-to-face? Is cold-calling dead? Will A.I. replace sales trainers? What’s the right balance between base and commission? How do you handle the salesperson who can’t or won’t be a team player? How do you get salespeople to take maintaining their CRM seriously?

— Loren Feldman

Introduction:

This week, Jaci Russo explains how she put an end to her eight-month drought of new clients. Jennifer Kerhin takes us through the bureaucratic nightmare of managing remote workers based out of state (“That is a headache that I don’t wish on my worst enemy,” says Jaci, who has found a way to sidestep the problem). And Liz Picarazzi brings us up to date on her ongoing struggle to get her trash enclosures certified as bear-resistant. The common thread to these challenges may lie in these two questions: When is continuing to fight the good fight the definition of entrepreneurship? And when is it the definition of insanity? Plus: Why does it cost so much to exhibit at a trade show? And did you know that as recently as 35 years ago, there were still laws on the books requiring women to have a male relative cosign on a business loan? Those laws are now gone, thankfully, but Jaci, Jennifer, and Liz can all attest that that kind of paternalism is very much alive and well.

— Loren Feldman

Introduction:

This week, Dana White drops a few surprises. When we began this podcast in 2020, Dana had two promising hair salons in Detroit that she’d named after her grandmother, Paralee Boyd. She had an innovative business model designed specifically for women with thick and curly hair. And she was on her way to winning a prestigious business plan competition. All of which presented her with a wide array of opportunities to consider. Would she continue to bootstrap? Would she franchise? Would she take on an investor? Would she open salons on military bases? But the pandemic hit her hard. Struggling to find both employees and customers, she eventually decided to close her Detroit locations and open a new one in Dallas, Texas, where she hoped the greater population density would help her make a fresh start. But in this episode, Dana tells Jay Goltz and Laura Zander that she’s come to a painful realization: “Paralee Boyd is not working.”

— Loren Feldman

Introduction:

This week, Shawn Busse tells Jay Goltz and Mel Gravely why he doesn’t want his firm, Kinesis, to be known as a marketing agency. Part of it is his sense that people just don’t trust marketers. But Shawn also believes that what Kinesis offers its clients is much more than just marketing. Hearing that prompts Mel to take us through his recent decision to spend a lot of money rebranding his construction business, which he says created alignment throughout the business and would have been worth twice what he paid. Plus: Mel explains how he manages to generate new business without employing salespeople. Jay asks if it’s still possible in this tight labor market to enforce attendance policies. And, for the first time in the almost four-year history of this podcast, Jay goes extremely quiet in this episode. What exactly was that about?

— Loren Feldman

Introduction:

This week, Liz Picarazzi tells Jay Goltz and Sarah Segal that her trip to a bear sanctuary in Montana to get her trash enclosures certified as bear-resistant did not go precisely as planned. Because of a logistical snafu, she has not yet obtained either the certification or her real goal: a marketing video of the grizzlies attempting to crack open her baited enclosure. Fortunately, things went better for Liz in a more traditional marketing venue, a trade show in Chicago where she promoted her rat-resistant enclosures. Meanwhile, Sarah follows up on how things are going since losing two big clients and having to lay off three employees, and Jay explains his new catch phrase, “Let me not sleep on it.” Plus: we discuss the owner of a two-year-old construction business who wonders how long he should keep going if he doesn’t start to make a profit. He also asks why no one ever talks about how hard it is to run a business. While we can’t know for sure what’s happening inside his company, we can be pretty confident that he’s not listening to the right podcast.

— Loren Feldman

Introduction:

This week, we meet Jaci Russo, the co-founder and CEO of BrandRusso and the latest addition to the 21 Hats Podcast team. Jaci tells Jay Goltz and Laura Zander how she went from working for Barry Diller to starting her marketing agency. Jaci also explains why she recently decided to introduce a four-day workweek and why she thinks her agency has now gone eight months and counting without signing up a new client—the longest such stretch in more than 20 years in business. “I find it interesting,” responds Jay. “You just said this is the first time you’ve ever had such a long period without new business. And, ‘Oh, we went to a four-day workweek.’ Hmm, how interesting.” Plus: Laura talks about what happened when venture-backed competitors came for the knitting industry and how stressful it is to buy and operate another business in another state.

Introduction:

This week, Jay Goltz tells Shawn Busse about the latest stop on his journey to figuring out whether an employee stock ownership plan is right for his business. Jay’s latest adventure includes waking up at 4:30 in the morning in Minneapolis too anxious to sleep—“Oh my God, what am I getting myself into here?”—and deciding to leave the seminar and drive back to Chicago. But on that six-hour return trip, Jay says his anxiety turned into clarity. In fact, he thinks he’s pretty sure he knows now what he wants to do. Of course, he has said that before. And we continue to learn more about ESOPs, this week hitting upon an interesting issue: ESOP enthusiasts love to tout the benefits of turning employees into owners. But are they really owners? And is that the right message to send them? “If you bought 10 shares of General Motors stock,” Jay asks, “would you tell your neighbors that you’re an owner of General Motors?” Plus: We also talk about when business owners should ignore their accountants and whether Shawn and Jay expect their employees to come forward and tell them if they see another employee doing something they shouldn’t be doing.

— Loren Feldman