Contractor Freedom: Turning your Contractor Business into passive income with Jason Paris

Jason: [00:00:00] Welcome to the Contractor Freedom Podcast. I'm your host, Jason Phillips. This show exists to help small business owners like you escape the tyranny of Contractor Freedom and enter the bliss of Contractor Freedom so you can have the Time, Money, and Freedom to Live Your Life With Purpose Beyond Your Business.

As a certified human behavior consultant in DISC personality styles and motivators, I'll be sharing with you skills for life, love, leadership, and business. I'll also be connecting you with experts that can help you scale your business and your life. So if you want to build the business and life of your dreams, then you are in the right place.

Let's go.

Jason Phillips: Hello, contractors, Jason Phillips here, and I actually have another Jason with us, none other than the one and only Jason Paris from Paris Painting and Aleph Holdings. And, I think you're going to really enjoy what, enjoy Jason today and the, and the chat we're going to have. So [00:01:00] Jason, welcome. And for, for those that, uh, man, for those that don't know who you are, Uh, which would be surprising, you know.

Hey, give us, give us the lowdown. Who's Jason? Paris.

Jason Paris: Yeah, so it's pretty cool. Both of our names are Jason. Both of our last names start with P. So we're both jps. We're both Jason. Uh, so I'm a humble painter from flyover country, man. I'm in Minnesota, as we like to call it. also known as a Silicon Valley of painting. We have quite a few major HQs in the painting world up here.

Titan Graco three M. Uh, a handful of others, but yeah. Humble painter from flyover country. Just, uh, you know, slinging one gallon at a time.

Jason Phillips: So, uh, now, now Jason, a humble painter.

Jason Paris: Yeah. Very humble. Most humble. Number one.

hum. The, the humble part.

one, humble.

Let's talk about the painter part. Um, , have you actually ever actually painted?

I did. I painted for a summer in college

Jason Phillips: No [00:02:00] way. You've, man, you've got one up on me. Oh, I did

know 

Jason Paris: how to hold a brush. You hold a brush like a pencil, not like an ice cream cone. And, uh, yeah, I, I know how to work the viscous visic nature of paint and cut a nice line. And, and, uh, I, I mean, I know enough to be dangerous.

Jason Phillips: You know, if you handed me a paintbrush, uh, it would probably be like watching Forrest Gump when he was a kid run down, run down the dirt road from those kids on the bikes when he had those braces on his legs, I'd probably be watching

Jason Paris: would hurt your, you'd find a way to hurt yourself,

Jason Phillips: yeah, exactly, exactly. Wow. I did not, man, I did not, did not know that you had actually done painting before.

Super cool. 

Jason Paris: Super

sunburns and I mean, a lot of exterior painting and so yeah, scraping houses and did caulking wood, and yeah, did all of it.

Jason Phillips: You know, I, my first week in the business, I actually worked as a helper, uh, And we, and we painted a fairly large exterior, had [00:03:00] all kinds of French doors, uh, stained garage doors, and I, I learned a lot, and it took us a week to do that house. I learned a lot about how much time it takes to do certain things.

Jason Paris: Yeah.

Jason Phillips: And I'm a huge fan of, of sending people, uh, out on the job. To do what I call the, the real work initially, uh, so they'll have an, have an appreciation for it, especially if they're going to be in like a sales role or something like that. But so what, what are things, man, what are things today look like for, know, Paris painting?

Where are you guys at today?

Jason Paris: yeah. So Paris painting is an eight figure. Business and residential repaint. We dabble a little bit here and there in commercial, uh, but it's more stuff that we trip over. So somebody's uncle owns a building and they want us to give a a quote, but for the most part, our bread and butter is working with homeowners, working with clients.

We are in Minnesota, so we kinda have April through October to really hammer out exteriors. . [00:04:00] We are majority subcontractor base for our labor pool. We have a good size team that's in-house, so that's about 12 employees that does in-house painting, but the vast majority is subcontractor base. Um, the amount of exterior to interior spread has gotten more and more, uh, even over the last five years.

So that's been a continual push to try and, uh, not decrease our exterior volume, but to increase the interior volume. Uh, but, but still by and large it's probably a 60 40 split at this point of exterior to interior,

Jason Phillips: So, uh, do you guys do anything else other than painting?

Jason Paris: we have a little division called Paris Roofing, where we'll do the roofing of houses. Uh, we kind of dabbled in whole on remodels through a branch called Haven Builders for a while. Uh, we started that with an operating partner. And ended up selling that to him, uh, earlier this year in January. So we no longer do remodels.

We do remodels, we do new construction [00:05:00] builds through our all of capital arm, but that is to build multi-family housing that we own. And so we're the clients and the builders and the investors and that endeavor.

Jason Phillips: Wow, that's pretty awesome. You know, we should, uh, circle back on that here in a few minutes. You know, you said, you said eight figure for, for Paris painting. That's, uh, quite rare in the painting world,

Jason Paris: It is rare, 

Jason Phillips: especially. 

Jason Paris: Yeah, I was gonna say in residential especially, um, you know, it's the wild west of an industry. Uh, it's going through, its maturation. It also is just fundamentally different than a lot of other trades industries. So it's not like HVAC and plumbing, which we call the license or, or electrical.

Right. The licensed trades, um, . And I think it will professionalize over time, but it's always gonna be just fundamentally different from those two things. Uh, from those three trades. it's a, it's a trade that the gap between a chuck and a truck and a professionalized company is large, but it's much larger in other industries.[00:06:00] 

And I think that's gonna continue to drive, um, you know, what the aggregate average is in, in painting.

Jason Phillips: and the barrier to entry is so small

barrier 

Jason Paris: entry is small. The um, emergency levels are low. There's no pain emergencies, there are plumbing emergencies, there are electrical emergencies, there are HVAC emergencies, and then the consequences for improper installations. Are pretty low as well, right? The consequence for an improper installation for a plumbing company is very high.

prop, the consequence for an improper installation for a painting company is relatively low, especially compared to those other licensed trades. So those are some of the fundamental underlying, uh, elements of our trade that will always keep us a little bit different, a little bit separate, but um, for sure right now it is the Wild West and you don't have, uh, you have a lot of self-employment out there, but not many entrepreneurs, not many business owners.

Jason Phillips: So what do you, what do you think Jason is the, uh, and of, and of course. I know you're speaking more than just for your company, [00:07:00] because you've, you know, been a part of the PCA for, uh, in a leadership role there for several years. Um, I'm sure you had, you were privy to a lot of other insider information, right?

What do you, what's, you know, the key to you guys becoming eight figure? And, uh, kind of the part two of that is, what do you think is limiting, what do you see as limiting most painting companies from, from really taking off and growing?

Jason Paris: Yeah, the number one limiter for painting companies is who's the owner? , who's the founder? And that is often their output that's gonna determine how, how high that that company flies, what's even more rare. So that, that's the, the number one limiter, the governor, you would say. Beyond that, it, it's pretty rare to architect a system that scales beyond yourself.

Right. So for most founders it's how well can they execute their business model. So what is their execution ability? That's a combination of bandwidth and skill. So what is their bandwidth? What is their skill? The second element [00:08:00] would be what is the model that they're trying to execute? Is it a model that is very easy to execute, it's very complex to execute?

How well does it leverage their talents of both bandwidth and skill? Then you start to architect a organization or a company that inherently requires quite a bit of humility, which is pretty counter, um, Counter to anyone who starts a painting company. A lot of egos involved. So scaling yourself beyond yourself.

That's been the key to us achieving eight figures. It's not like I work harder. I, I don't, there's nothing that I do day to day, week to week or month to month in Paris painting what you would call an active board member. Uh, so it's not my bandwidth and it's definitely not my skill. Right. That was probably one of my, um, saving graces in building a team is it was very easy for me to find people that were better than me at pretty much everything.

'cause I'm not very good at anything. So I think that's . That's what helped us grow. That's what's challenging PE for people to grow, is architecting a system that can grow beyond themselves, which requires humility. Uh, and it also requires, you know, a system that is executable by other people, which is taking [00:09:00] everything that's in intuition, turning it into a process, everything that's in recall, and transforming it into reference.

Jason Phillips: You know, so much, so much of what tends to get many companies started, uh, is also the same thing, kind of what you're saying, that, that becomes their limiting factor. I can do it myself, I don't need anybody to teach me, I'm, I'm smart, I'm strong.

Jason Paris: mm-hmm.

Jason Phillips: I can do it. And then you end up in this place where, yeah, you're doing it and you have to do it and you're the linchpin in your business.

You're the smartest guy there. And you have been in, you know, it does take humility to hire people that are smarter than you. And honestly, you know, it can be, it can be, uh, scary. To, you think as the business owner, the tendency. Is to think as the business owner, wow, I've got to be the smartest guy on this team.

They're all looking to me, man, I better, better know what I'm talking about. Right? And what you're saying is, [00:10:00] honestly, just the opposite of that, right? So how do how do you, you how do you lead people that are, quote, you know, smarter than you and that doesn't mean they're smarter than you in everything, but in what you've hired them to do, you're hiring someone that has a skill level above yours.

How do you lead those people?

Jason Paris: Yeah, I don't wanna lose that. So we'll come back to what is leadership. You hit on something that was really impactful, which is you talked about the origin of why people are getting into painting in the first place. And it's almost a chicken and egg scenario. It's a cyclical problem, which is we have a lot of people that are starting paint painting companies.

Why? Why are they starting painting companies? They're starting painting companies because they are proficient at painting and they have abilities that are not being realized, right? So oftentimes those abilities are, I have the ability to paint and I have some sales skill, or I have some project management skill, or maybe I could be a VP of sales, or maybe I could be, uh, uh, an operations director.

What does that person do? How many Phillips painting companies are there in the us? How many pairs of paintings are there in the [00:11:00] us? There are not many places for people who have painting competencies and mid-level management potential for that potential to be realized. They're almost forced to start their own painting company.

To get a taste of realizing their potential of any kind of leadership, uh, above and beyond the baseline of hard work, uh, leveraging some of their, their management abilities. So they're forced to start with their own companies. They're really good mid-level managers for a painting company, but they're aren't not entrepreneurs, and they're certainly not business owners.

And then you have this counter, then they create companies that aren't able to provide roles because that's where they originate from, and then those people leave. And so it's a cyclical issue. What makes you a good leader is not, uh, being highly skilled. It, it had certainly helps to have enough domain expertise to call somebody out on their, their BSS to help them problem solve, uh, and to know when to push back, right?

So if you are, you know, a leader of operations and you have a subcontracting crew and they're telling you, I can't solve this problem. It's too hard to do, it's good If you know how to solve problems in that [00:12:00] domain of expertise and you can help them and you're gonna, you're teach them what to do.

Otherwise you'd say, oh, I guess we don't know what to do. Let's just . Close the company. I don't know. Right. Let's just give 'em more money. It's, it's irrational leadership. I think a lot of who, what makes you a good leader is who you are. And so this is something I've come to realize over the last couple years is anytime I hire a high level leader in our organization, the number one thing we're hiring is the person who is that person.

And then secondarily, what can they do? What is their domain expertise, what's their background? Because leadership, first and foremost, it's contagious. Right? And I would, I would, I would guess that the company that you've built, . It, it, it is, it is a, a little bit of your d n a, right? So who Jason Phillips is is almost ossified by those around him, right?

Because your leadership is contagious. If you have high energy positivity, uh, can do attitude, shoot for the stars. That is contagious amongst the people that report to you. Similar if you're anxious, uh, self-conscious, concerned, fearful. Uh, aggressive. That is also contagious. So [00:13:00] leadership is about who you are first and foremost.

That's contagious amongst your team, and that's can help drive the culture and the success of your company.

Jason Phillips: Love it. Wow. Could not, could not agree more. So, you know, if you've got these guys that, most everybody that starts their painting company, like you said, came in through one of those doors. They were a tradesperson, a salesperson, or a project manager, something like that, right? And, and they get to this point, and, and to me, I liken it to the, to the Peter Principle, where, you know, in organizations, you get promoted, uh, to the point of, of your, uh, Inability, your incompetence

Mm-hmm. . 

Jason Paris: Yep.

Jason Phillips: and therefore you, you know, the idea there is you end up with a company of people that have been promoted to their level of incompetence and they're no longer competent to do their job. But the correlation I see is that, you know, we build our companies with what we had and we [00:14:00] get to this level of incompetence and we can't take it to the next level.

Because we don't know how. We don't know what that looks like.

Jason Paris: Mm-hmm.

Jason Phillips: And so we don't know how to do it. Maybe we want to, but we, we, we haven't, we didn't go get an MBA. We, you know, we don't know what, what it takes to do that. And so I think that's, I think there's an answer to that. And I think that, you know, I think the answer is, uh, well, I, we'll talk about my answers later.

I want, you know, I want to hear what are, what are your answers? How's, how's the guy that's been in business for a few years and he's stuck. At this, at this ceiling, this plateau, where he can't, uh, he can't either take his company to the next level. And not in, in, you don't always want to take your company to the next level.

Sometimes you just want your time back. You want freedom. Sometimes you want more money. Sometimes you want time. And, and really the combination of those, uh, you know, is, is part of what it takes to get freedom. But what, what would you say to the guy who's, who's stuck at, say, I don't know, a [00:15:00] million dollars in revenue? What does he need to do? He's already in business. He may be doubting himself. Am I even cut out to be a business owner? You know, what would you say to those guys?

Jason Paris: So we kinda get to the issue of what is the, starting with the end in mind, why did you get into business? A lot of times they got into business to be their own boss, to realize their potential beyond what they could find in any other painting organization, and they quickly achieved that, right? That's quickly achieved through being an owner operator, a lifestyle business.

And there's nothing wrong with that, and you just have to decide if that's the path you want. Or if you want something different, it's not a right or wrong, they're just different paths in life. I would also say that when you hit a, a dead zone or you, you hit your ceiling against the wall, against your head, against the ceiling, what got you to that point may be what is actually limiting you from getting to the next point.

So oftentimes a founder is extremely gritty. They have a very, very high tolerance for pain. They have to be good at everything. 'cause if they have a blind spot, it's gonna drag them down and and crush them, which means [00:16:00] that they're not quite a specialist in anything. Um, and they also typically have like a decent level of charisma and leadership.

Otherwise, they wouldn't be able to build the foundations of a team. But the individual that's gonna scale your company, you either have to transform into, or you have to recruit in place because that person probably needs a very low tolerance for pain, right? So when you started, you need a high tolerance for pain.

Now you need someone with a low tolerance for pain, right? They're gonna say, Ooh, I don't like this. I gotta just fix that until it's perfect. When you start, you have to be able to deal with everything. You're not no longer hiring generalists who are good enough at everything that the ship isn't gonna sink.

They're highly specialized in one thing, and they can take that one thing to the next level. So those are some of the things that oftentimes that you can find that you are just not the right person. You may be able to transform 'em to that person. , but oftentimes you have to recruit and change your org chart overall.

And that can be traumatic to the ego, that can be traumatic, uh, to your brain and to the architecture of what the company looks like. Uh, but there,...