Success After… - Creating Awareness To Promote Growth – with Tim Retic – [Ep. 157]

Linda J. Hansen: Welcome. Thank you for tuning in to this episode of the Prosperity 101 Breakroom Economics Podcast. My name is Linda J. Hansen, your host and the author of Prosperity 101- Job Security Through Business Prosperity: The Essential Guide to Understanding How Policy Affects Your Paycheck, and the creator of the Breakroom Economics Online course, the book, the course and the entire podcast library can be found on Prosperity101.Com. I seek to connect boardroom to break room and policy to paycheck by empowering and encouraging employers to educate employees about the public policy issues that affect their jobs. My goal is to help people understand the foundations of prosperity, the policies of prosperity, and how to protect their prosperity by becoming informed, involved, and impactful. I believe this will lead to greater employee loyalty, engagement and retention, and an increased awareness of the blessings and responsibilities of living in a free society. Listen each week to hear from exciting guests and be sure to visit Prosperity 101.Com.

Thank you for joining me today. My guest is Tim Retic, Tim is the Founder and Owner of Forever Faded Barber Shop in Waukesha, Wisconsin, soon to be opening another one in Wisconsin. And he is an educator, master barber, and he is also a podcast host. We met through a podcasting Master class with Elzie Flenard at Podcast Town and just a great group of people connecting together, collaborating together and through our conversation, he had several questions about how policy affects his business. I'm sure there's other business owners who wonder, how does this even affect me? And I've never interviewed a barbershop owner before. And so I just really am thankful for you, Tim, saying that you'd like to learn, and I hope that people will also go to your course and podcast and learn from you. But today we're here to learn together. And thank you for joining me TIM RETIC.

Tim Retic: Thank you very much for having me. I appreciate you so much and all the work that you do in our community and personally at the level of government and policy creation. So kudos to you for being who you are.

Linda J. Hansen: Well, thank you so much. I just love your story, too. Tell me how you started Forever Faded Barbershop.

Tim Retic: Okay, so here's the short version of it. I've been cutting hair since I was 13. Fast forward through high school, through college, through military servitude, I found myself addicted to marijuana. A lot of people that have real other addictions to harder substances will say that's not an addiction. It was for me. I had a substance abuse problem, right? So I couldn't kick it, through prayer I did eventually, but before I got to that and everything, what happened was I ended up being kicked out of college because the marijuana was more important. I ended up being kicked out of the military because of the marijuana was more important. Worked my way through American TV distribution back in the day in their warehouse, went from there to selling cars. 911 happened, the industry slowed down, had a child.

That child led to me growing up a little bit. And to answer your question, my then,  soon to be, right, because I had just got married, like in had my child 2000 and got married in 2003. And my mother-in-law that summer, right after, right before marriage, looked at me and goes, well, you do a pretty good haircut. Why don't you look into going to school for it? I hadn't thought about going to school and making it a career. So I looked into Cost Cutters, started an apprenticeship, got my license through WCTC, 2003 to 2005 with schooling, 2003 to 2008 with Cost Cutters. Worked my way up from apprenticeship all the way to management. Stepped down from management because I didn't want to be the corporate dictator that Cost Cutters in the Regis Corporation needed me to be, right, because it is a business, so that happened.

Found myself being an employee again, right? And then that I had a boss all of a sudden after being the boss, well, I knew what was right and what was wrong. She pulled a no call, no show, forced me to walk away from twelve clients that I was scheduled with, and to do a perm for an older lady, an elderly lady who was in a senior care facility. So I couldn't turn her away. I didn't have the heart to do so as much as I hated doing perms. So I did the perm, right? Needless to say, I picked up the phone and I read my boss the riot act. And then I called her boss and read her the riot act. I didn't have a job anymore, God just so happens to have a plan that's bigger than our foresight. So I didn't realize, like, this was God's plan, looking back, it was God's planning. A friend of mine wanted to start a barber shop, the barber he needed had literally just fell through two days before I got fired. So I'm telling him through a smoke session what just happened and everything, and he goes, well, I need a barber. I go, OK, well, let's talk to my mother-in-law and see if she'll help us out. She decided to help us out and everything. Two weeks after being fired, February 1, 2008, we started the shop. 2009 I bought him out, becoming a sole proprietor, 2010 I moved and rebranded in 2011, creating Forever Faded. So that's the short two minute story there.

Linda J. Hansen: Well, that's a great story. And I'm sure anyone who is listening and has been through the entrepreneur roller-coaster or who has ever gone through some hard times in life, and I can guarantee you that's pretty much everybody. And if you haven't, you probably haven't lived long enough yet. There will always be ups and downs and roller coasters and challenges in life, and they vary from person to person. But I loved your story because you overcame a challenge and an addiction, and you went forward into an open door. You walked through the door that God gave you, and you made something of this, and it's pretty exciting. So what made you decide to then not only just have the barber shop and the growing barber shop, but to open another, but also to have an online course and a podcast that is called Success After Barber School? So tell me about that.

Tim Retic: Well, thank you for asking again. And what made me decide to do a podcast and online course, Success After Barber School, it's all in the name. I wanted to help those people that were just getting out of school, right, become more successful, quicker and earning a six figure income. So pause. I lost several barbers due to bad choices they made. And in that happening, God sent me female barbers. I had the thought somewhere before the male barbers left and everything that I would like to work with females. I forgot what it was like to work with females in the barbershop setting and everything. So I got one female barber named Megan. She kind of came all around before all the guys left, right? And she was right out of school. I got to pouring her, and it made me realize that, wow, I can teach.

I really like teaching, then I had another barber come over from another chain, and I got to teach some more. She brought a friend over, and then before I knew it, I looked up, and it was just me and these three amazing women that are barbers and everything with me and it's like, hold on. This is kind of cool, you know, I want to start a podcast because I can teach, and I have all this information to share. So that's what Elzie was like, I want to say, was probably his idea. He looked at me, goes, well, you know, Tim, you should start a podcast because he was building Podcast Town. So being that serial entrepreneur that he is, he kind of played at that seed, nurtured the seed, allowed it to grow and everything and before you know it, Success After Barber schools was born. Then after that, it was the online course and even though I haven't sold a course yet, I know we're on the road to prosperity, because this is God's plan. I'm just the vehicle he's using to implement it.

Linda J. Hansen: Well, I love that viewpoint as well and the thing about it is, you are pouring into people, and this is just another example for everybody listening. All of the listening audience, they have a skill. Like everybody listening. You have a skill. You have a passion. You have something that you're good at that you could help others with, either teaching them or serving them or something. And this is just a perfect example of taking what you have and making the most of it. And that's just so inspirational. And the fact that you brought in people and you're pouring into them, and your goal is to help them become entrepreneurs as well, so they're not just employees. There's nothing wrong with being employed, so I want to make sure people know there's nothing wrong with being an employee. We all have different seasons and paths in our life, and all businesses need employees, usually, but some people have a bent towards entrepreneurism, and you're helping them do that, and you're taking what you have learned and pouring it into others. So thank you for doing that, and what is the website? I will say it again at the end, but what is your website? So if people are interested in learning from you, how would they do so?

Tim Retic: It's foreverfadedmke.com. That's foreverfadedmke.com.

Linda J. Hansen: Okay. And is that how will they get access to your course and to your podcast as well from there?

Tim Retic: Yes, I believe everything is accessible from there. But if you just Google Timothy Reddick that's my first name, timothy my last name Retic, R-E-T-I-C, eventually you'll get to one of my social media pages. Click the link in the bio right there. Everything is listed. The podcast, the online course, it's all there for your beck and call. And if you're local, book a haircut, come have a conversation.

Linda J. Hansen: There's quite a variety of services available at his barber shop, so if you are in a local area Waukesha, Wisconsin, you can obviously make an appointment, and that would be great too. But you were talking to me earlier today about questions you had regarding policies and how it affects your business. And I thought to myself, like, what a great take on a podcast interview? So often I'm interviewing people who are sharing how policy affects their business. They're already talking about it, they’re trying to help government leaders understand, they’re trying to help their employees understand. But for you, you are kind of on the other side of that, and you have questions about how things affect your business and one question that came up, one topic that came up right away too, was I asked you what some of your pain points were, and you did mention mandated wages. So can you tell me a little bit about what that looks like, the mandated minimum wage in your business?

Tim Retic: Well, it really applies to apprentices. So there's two ways to be educated as a barber. You can go straight through school, that's ten months straight through. Take the state board, you get your license, you're good to booth rental or commission. Right. The other way is to do an apprenticeship, which is the longer route. You're in school one day a week for two years approximately, and then 1800 hours on the barbershop floor. If you go that route, then there's this mandated minimum wage. And I'm pretty sure in their mind they're thinking, but we want to make sure they get paid for their time. It really hinders and puts a crutch on the business owner though because now I have not just their minimum wage but I have these other several fees that go along with that. One being unemployment insurance, the other one being the tools that it costs to get them started and everything as well versus them being able to make a commission right away, which generally is more money than the minimum wage anyway. So I don't like that minimum mandate, the minimum wage mandate. And I wish there was a way we could, you know, effect policies to change that in the state of Wisconsin and who knows, maybe even across the US.

Linda J. Hansen: Well that's a good point because that mandated minimum wage as you and I were talking about is really like an unfunded mandate. Like they mandate, they tell you, you have to pay for this but they don't necessarily provide the money for doing that. You probably wouldn't want the government to provide that money either. But all you want to do and so many business owners want to do is to be able to actually flourish. They want to be able to grow their business, hire more people, and pay the people higher wages, increased benefits. They want to be able to do that. But when there's so many fees, so many mandates from the government, it limits growth. It's like putting a cap on something that's bubbling over and you can't, I think so often of like when your kids pour baking soda and vinegar together and it makes a volcano and it's exciting. Well sometimes when businesses are growing it's so exciting, It's like this bubbling over, but then the government comes in and says, well you have to do this, you have to do that. You have this fee, that fee, this license, this mandate and it's like putting a cap right on it and pretty soon when the bubbles dry out because the business just can't absorb all that.

And we also were speaking a little bit too about energy and energy costs for business owners are astronomical at times. And as we're looking at what's happening in our nation and around the world regarding energy and we see this push towards the green energy, all of that, which actually is not as efficient, it is actually at times more damaging to our environment if people really look at it and it can be more expensive. So that creates a problem for a business owner too. You've come up with some good ways to combat higher prices and increased energy costs. And for some people, I mean most business owners would probably keep a steady temperature or whatever and things but the increase in energy costs and energy fees, sometimes we're paying for new types of energy research we're paying for. I know that some states will impose fees for say, closing down old power plants or things or increasing wind things. So it's really interesting how it affects a business and that's another thing that absolutely impacts your bottom line. What about taxes? This is something that we talked before, but you were mentioning the employment taxes, all these different things that you have to pay health insurance.

You said most of your people are independent contractors in a sense that at first, once they get past that apprenticeship time, then they are independent contractors. And now you had questions when we first were talking, you had questions that came to mind when you realized we could talk about policy and how it affects your business. What were some of those questions? We did talk about the minimum wage and that type of thing, how we could impact that. So we'll get back to that. But you had a couple of other questions. What were they?

Tim Retic: Well, really as a small business owner, small minority business owner specifically, I know there are money set aside by the government and everything to help small businesses grow. And if I have access to some of those grants, then taking on more apprentices and paying that minimum wage will probably be absorbed by those grant dollars for business growth and expansion. But it seems like you're blindfolded in a maze trying to figure out where those dollars are located and what you actually have to do to apply. And then even then, there's no guarantee after you apply that you're going to be chosen and given access to the funds. So I guess the real question is, are there policies that exist that say a certain amount of those numbers have to be given to small businesses under a certain employment mark as far as like the number of employees goes and stuff? And if so, where's that information located?

Linda J. Hansen: So you would tell policymakers, make it more accessible. And it's interesting because you have a different flow in the sense of most of your employees because they're 1099 employees for the most part, right? So they have their own LLC. They're like self-employed, but you still oversee so much of how they earn their income in a sense. Right. But as you navigate that, that helps them, as you research this and learn more, that will also help your employees. And as you've talked about the unfunded mandate of a higher minimum wage, as you've talked about energy costs that are actually forcing you to really think, I mean, we all need to be responsible. Don't get me wrong, we all need to be responsible, but it's something that is really going to affect your business.

If by chance your energy cost doubles again, then that's going to affect your employees, your contractors. You may be able to give them less commission, you may not be able to keep the shop as warm. It's going to affect your customers. I mean, there's only so much money in a pot and so you have to cut back where you can. And when you're trying to get promised help from the government, navigating a sea of red tape, there again, we have that bureaucracy we have the total incompetency of government. Typically when government gets its hand on something, it makes it worse, not better, because it's just so bureaucratic. And the way to solve problems is usually to go to the people closest to the problem, and that's usually not the federal government. So if you could say something about improving that process for people such as yourself, what would you say to a legislator about how to improve that?

Tim Retic: I would say, dear Mr./Mrs. Legislator, it would be great if you could make in plain writing where to go to apply for grants and make dollars accessible to the small, the little guy of the small business world for business expansion and growth. Because we do want to grow, everybody wants to build an empire, and I'm no different. I have a dream of doing 100 shops, creating a product line, creating tools and everything, and having some access to some monies to do that, so that eventually, right when I'm sitting on high, I can find the new person that looks like me, that needs some help and everything. I have a giving heart, I want to give back, but I can only give what I have access to give. So again, I would say, please make those funds available and make it easy to get, so that those people are going to be responsible for it. Not saying give it away, but have it streamlined so people like myself know, go here, do this, apply, and then we'll get back to you. You know, instead of it being me after the five, someone who's great at writing grants and making a request and all that, making a simple process that doesn't have to be, you know, foreign language.

Linda J. Hansen: Yeah, that's a good point. And I liked what you said about you want to grow so you can give back. And that's one of the beautiful things about our system in America, is that people can grow and we are able to work hard and create wealth. Sometimes we have helped through a grant, sometimes we have helped through loans from people, whatever. But we are able to rise and so often when people do, they do turn around and give back or maybe some of them just give back by giving jobs to people. Because as their business grows, it's job. I tell people, have you ever had a job from a poor person? Never. Right? And so we want to help everyone lift. We want to raise the sea so all the boats can sail and that's exactly what I hope to do. What you want to do with your ministry/work that you do through your barbershop is really helping to elevate others, help them to accomplish their dreams. And that's what I feel we should be looking for in terms of our government too, that it needs to get out of the way, Government needs to get out of the way so we can grow, we can accomplish things, we can move freely.

It doesn't put the cap on that enterprising money making enterprise that is bubbling up in the entrepreneurship. It doesn't spoil that by sucking all the air out and discouraging employers but it really allows for prosperity. I always tell people government cannot provide prosperity, it can only allow for prosperity. It can only allow for that type of growth and development and it can also squash it, It can also harm the opportunity to create and grow and be entrepreneurial and successful. So it's really great that you have these ideas, and I hope that you'll take some of these things you've learned and maybe even talk about them to your employees, share with them how these issues affect what you are able to pay them, what you are able to do in terms of the prices that your customers need to pay. Because your increased energy costs are really paid by your customer, your increased wages costs are paid by your customer. So it isn't like this greedy business owner who's trying to keep all his money, everybody hurts when these policies are inhibiting growth.

Tim Retic: Facts. I'm glad you said it that way because at the end of the day, that's what it is. We cannot stand by idle and allow for any one entity to not allow growth, because the American dream, the American way of life, is built on the growth of being able to pull yourself up by your own bootstraps. And if I were to paraphrase, I would say view success like a ladder, right? The reason America is the land of milk and honey, the reason so many foreigners are able to come here and immigrants are able to come here and be successful in everything, because their idea of success is not necessarily the same as my idea of success. You can choose where you get off the ladder at for success because not everybody wants to be on the top, right? Some people are okay at the middle. So figure out what level of success it is you want and go after it. Because the only thing that's standing in between you and success is your own idea of the work that needs to be done.

Linda J. Hansen: Well, that's a great place to pause. And so, one, I congratulate you on your successful business and what you're doing with it and I just applaud the fact that you want to give back. And I love it that you want to learn how all these policies affect you more and more. Thank you for listening to my podcast, and telling me before we close, if you could just tell the listeners something you learned from my last episode, you had told me before we were recording.

Tim Retic: Yeah, that green energy isn't necessarily the best form of energy because of the disposal cost that's associated with the end of the life cycle of solar panels, or the big wind turbines and stuff. So that's something that I found very interesting because as I drive through the country, especially here in Wisconsin, from the city more towards Door County, which is one of our family's favorite places to kind of vacation in the summer and everything. You can see where there's big wind turbines and stuff and it's like there's fields of them now where there used to be none, I think you mentioned they call them farms. They're like wind turbine farms and stuff and solar panel farms, you see fields of them and stuff and it's like, well, where is all that stuff going to go when it's all said and done, when it's at the end of its life cycle? Does it just go back to the Earth where it's not going to break down and stuff? And if so, who's responsible for cleaning up that earth when it needs to be retailed and reused for a different purpose?

Linda J. Hansen: Well, thank you for sharing what you learned and that it just awakened new things for you and kind of put you on a quest of learning for energy resources and things. So that was a blessing to me. Thank you for telling me that. But for everyone again, could you give your website, please?

Tim Retic: It is foreverfadedmke.com

Linda J. Hansen: Okay, foreverfadedmke.com and you can get in touch with TIM RETIC, and if you're local, you can definitely book time at the barbershop. You can book a haircut, but if you're not local, you can still do business with Tim and get acquainted with him through his website and for everyone, you want to check out his podcast and his online course, Success After Barber School. So thank you so much, Tim, for joining with us today and we look forward to continuing to hear about your success and how you're growing your barber shop entities around the state of Wisconsin and around the country. And just please keep in touch. So with that, we know.

Tim Retic: Thank you, Linda, I appreciate you. Have a great day and be blessed.

Linda J. Hansen: You too. Thank you.

Linda J. Hansen: Thank you again for listening to the Prosperity 101 Podcast. If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe, share, and leave a great review. Don't forget to visit Prosperity101.com to access the entire podcast library to order my newest book, Job Security Through Business Prosperity: The Essential Guide to Understanding How Policy Affects Your Paycheck or to enroll you or your employees in the Breakroom Economics online course. You can also receive the free e-book, 10 Tips for Helping Employees Understand How Public Policy Affects Their Paychecks. Freedom is never free. Understanding the foundations of prosperity and the policies of prosperity will help you to protect prosperity as you become informed, involved, and impactful. I give special thanks to our sponsors Matthews Archery, Inc. and Wisconsin Stamping & Manufacturing. Please contact us today at Prosperity101.com to let us know how we can serve you. Thank you.