Everyone has problems. Especially business owners. Lee talks about how to handle problems that come up in this episode of Trash Talk. Check us out at https://www.junkra.com Subscribe to this channel for all the best junk removal industry info Like and follow us on Facebook at Junk Removal Authority
I want to show you something. This is our first truck right here. See this bar, this bar right here is the cross tube for the tie rod. We’ve got to running behind the driver’s tire back to the battery. Even if you all have any mechanical ability, know that that cross tube isn’t supposed to be right there. We’ve tied and wrapped it up so we can tow this truck back. This tube right here supposed to run between the driver’s side tire and the passenger side. There’s two ends. There’s tie rod ends on the end of this whole thing. The passenger tire rod in, it pulled out the threads. The threads on this bar. I’m not going to be able to show it right here but if you look inside this ball right here, the threads are gone and this is the second time this has occurred on one of our vehicles. We don’t know exactly why, but it’s like the tie rod in is just getting pulled out. The threads are just wearing out or something just from the force and stress. I don’t know if we have guys dry steering or bumping into curves or what but anyway we’re getting that fixed.
That right there is just an example of a problem. Any of you all that had been in business for any length of time are used to problems. They happen all the time and you just got to correct them. Don’t let it stress you out. Don’t let it ruin your relationship. You know, sometimes money gets a little tight on it. We have that problem at the start when we first started business. We’d really be scrambling because we just had one truck. Yeah, we’d be a little stressed, but you just got to solve it. So, if something like that happens with just one truck. Number one, that’s a fairly easy fix. So, the parts were in stock, Isuzu parts are in stock. I pretty much tell you, to tell you they have a pretty consistent problem with them because Isuzu, they aren’t very good on keeping parts in stock. But that’s fairly easy fix. So, I mean you get thing towed to mechanic. Find the mechanic that says they can fix it right then and there. You get it towed there. If you have to go get the parts yourself. You get the parts yourself. You do whatever, you need that truck back up and running. If you have another issue happened with the vehicle and it was going to be down a couple of days. What you got to do is you got to rent a truck. Go to U-haul, Budget, or Penske whatever gets your truck rented. You’re going to have to handle the load. To rent a dump trucks is too expensive but get your truck rented. Get your mechanic lined. Get the thing to the garage to get it fixed. You can’t worry about the money. You’ll have to put it on a credit card if you aren’t got the money. Stick it on the credit card. You got to have that truck run. So, don’t worry about it too much. Now you can take steps to try and prevent it from happening in the future. Like in this case, you know this being the second issue we’ve had on these tie rods coming off. These tire rod ends coming off. I’ve got my mechanic, he’s going to be over the next month. We’re just going to be rotating these trucks down to the mechanic and inspect those tie rod ends. Tie rod ends are coming off, he’s going to inspect them. If they look suspect at all then we’re replacing the tie rod end or the cross tube. I think the cross tube is a problem. I think the threads on the cross tube are getting worn out
So, that’s helping prevent problems in the future. So, you can’t get stressed out over problems. You just got to fix them, but that doesn’t mean that you don’t take steps to try and prevent it from happening again. Money issues, everybody from time to time should have a little bit stress, a little bit of problems regarding money. If you don’t, then that means you’re saving too much. You’re not growing enough, you’re not investing enough, you’re saving too much. You know, if you’re in your twenties, thirties or forties, then you shouldn’t have these huge amounts of savings. You should be investing that money in your business and assets that gets you income. So, but like recently we had a $51,000 workers comp bill. I was like, $51,000 you know we were putting it towards. We were investing in our business and make another investment. So, I had to call the company and say, “Listen, we can make it to $51,000” but we don’t have it right now. What kind of payment terms can we work out? Can we cut this bill? You know, make a lump sum payment of $20,000. Can we just put this out over six months? What can we do to make this right? So, we worked something out with them. Sometimes, you’ll have issues where you have a customer that’s late paying you. So, got to hold off paying some of your vendors and you always pay your car payment first. Anything that your business relies on. You got to make sure you get paid first or that’s going to have a huge effect on your credit. So, pay the car payment bill and pay your landfill bill because you require that. But your shirts, we have a staff shirt. We had a large order, few thousand dollars order of shirts, coats and hats. Just uniform stuff and that bill we got put off a little bit. Then we had a $6,100 website bill, that bill we got put off a little bit.
So, what you do is you just need to be upfront. Call these vendors and say, “Hey, I’m having an issue with cashflow right now.” You’ve got to get paid. Here’s what I think you’d get paid, but it’s going to be late. So, just be up front them. Let them know. Most of them had been in that situation before and they’re going to understand that.
So, problems you have is easy to let problems ruin and hurt a relationship. You know, calls hair to fall out and turn gray. I still have stress now, but I’ve gotten so good at handling stress. I got big problems and major problems but the thing is you’re going to work through it. So, that brings up another point when you’re doing something. Just think about what’s the worst-case scenario. So, if I’m going to do this investment, what’s the worst-case scenario? I’ll lose a few thousand dollars. Probably, not a big deal. You might not want to do it a lot, but it’s not that gives you a deal. I lose my house. Yeah, it’s a little bit bigger of a deal. That is going to cause a bit more stress. So, you might not want to put yourself in a situation where you lose your house, but you know that being said some of them might be “Alright yeah I lose my house. I go back to renting an apartment” What’s the big deal? So, make sure you’re comfortable with worst case scenarios when you have problems that come up.
Just find a solution, move on, try and prevent them from happening again if possible. Just be thankful if you have problems. If you don’t have problems, that means you don’t have business. You don’t have employees working for you. You don’t have equipment that you own. If you don’t have that stuff, you aren’t making money guys. So, problems are good thing. Always email me [email protected]. Visit junkremovalauthority.com or call us at the office +1 919-466-9322. Thanks guys!