The Big Dog Podcast
Episode 100: "The New Yellowstone"
When the stakes are high and the fields are wide, you can bet Steven McBee and his family are there, thriving against the odds. Their leap from hunting enthusiasts to first-generation farmers is a story of grit and growth that's nothing short of inspiring. On the Big Dog Podcast, I sit down with Steven to unearth the roots of the McBee family's agricultural empire, which spans everything from corn to exotic meats, and how they've cultivated success while others are scaling back. Listen in for a candid conversation that reveals the resilience required to sow seeds of prosperity in today's farming landscape.
Running a family business is no picnic, and when your portfolio includes not just a farm but a car wash and a meat processing plant, the challenges multiply. Our latest episode delves into the McBees' tale of diversifying revenue streams, the relentless hustle of entrepreneurship, and the strategic moves that keep their ventures flourishing. Steven and I examine the delicate balance of stress management and decision-making that's essential when your income is at the mercy of Mother Nature. This is a hearty discussion for anyone intrigued by the intersection of tradition and innovation on the modern farm.
As reality TV finds its way onto the ranch, the McBees face a whole new world of exposure and opportunity. We peel back the curtain on the family's foray into the limelight, discussing the pros and cons of life under the camera's unblinking eye. Steven shares the behind-the-scenes drama and the business savvy that comes from turning real-life into reel-life. The episode wraps with a heartfelt reflection on leadership, the nuances of family dynamics in the public eye, and how authenticity can be your strongest asset in business and beyond. If you're a fan of true entrepreneurial spirit with a side of reality TV, this is one conversation you don't want to miss.
When the stakes are high and the fields are wide, you can bet Steven McBee and his family are there, thriving against the odds. Their leap from hunting enthusiasts to first-generation farmers is a story of grit and growth that's nothing short of inspiring. On the Big Dog Podcast, I sit down with Steven to unearth the roots of the McBee family's agricultural empire, which spans everything from corn to exotic meats, and how they've cultivated success while others are scaling back. Listen in for a candid conversation that reveals the resilience required to sow seeds of prosperity in today's farming landscape.
Running a family business is no picnic, and when your portfolio includes not just a farm but a car wash and a meat processing plant, the challenges multiply. Our latest episode delves into the McBees' tale of diversifying revenue streams, the relentless hustle of entrepreneurship, and the strategic moves that keep their ventures flourishing. Steven and I examine the delicate balance of stress management and decision-making that's essential when your income is at the mercy of Mother Nature. This is a hearty discussion for anyone intrigued by the intersection of tradition and innovation on the modern farm.
As reality TV finds its way onto the ranch, the McBees face a whole new world of exposure and opportunity. We peel back the curtain on the family's foray into the limelight, discussing the pros and cons of life under the camera's unblinking eye. Steven shares the behind-the-scenes drama and the business savvy that comes from turning real-life into reel-life. The episode wraps with a heartfelt reflection on leadership, the nuances of family dynamics in the public eye, and how authenticity can be your strongest asset in business and beyond. If you're a fan of true entrepreneurial spirit with a side of reality TV, this is one conversation you don't want to miss.
The vision I have now. I'm not behind on it's just that's that next phase and what we've built in the last five to 10 years still support it. But the goals have to serve your purpose. Your goals have to serve your vision. If they don't serve your vision, they don't serve your purpose, there's no sense in pursuing them. You know, because if your goals do serve you and the vision, it's easy to make those adjustments when you're like, hey, I was 80% right on it.
Speaker 1:What's going on everybody? Welcome back to the Big Dog Podcast. I guess I'm still the big dog. It's Josh. Got the little dog in the background.
Speaker 1:Logan, what's going on? Logan, you doing all right, he hates it when I do this because he's got to mute, unmute. That's why I do it to you. And then he pops in and he disappears. But no, everything is going great here at the Big Dog Podcast. It's a beautiful day out in Virginia and guys pops in and he disappears, uh. But no, everything is going great here at the big dog podcast. A beautiful day out in virginia and guys, I got a really fun guest for us today. Uh, steven mcbee. If you don't know about mcbees or the mcbees right now, you're under a rock. The mcbee dynasty debuted on the 11th I believe, on peacock and I'm already done with the season. It was a ton of fun to watch and steven and I met about a year ago through a group called Apex, mutual friend of Ryan Steumann, and we just got connected talking about different stuff, business and things, and when this hit off I was like, oh man, we got to get him on the show and have a convo. So, steven McBee, welcome to the Big Dog Podcast.
Speaker 2:Yeah, thank you guys for having me on. I really appreciate it.
Speaker 1:How's everything out in your world Crazy?
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's been a whirlwind, especially over the last couple weeks. Been traveling all across the country, been trying to keep the businesses afloat while we're out here doing press and just pushing the show as much as we can.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's awesome. That's awesome. Talk a little bit, if you will, for those who are just learning about the show or the family. You guys are about an hour north. Of Kansas City is where the farm is.
Speaker 2:That's correct. Yeah, we've got a big farming and ranching operation about an hour north of Kansas City.
Speaker 1:Okay, and what are the primary things you guys have going on out there?
Speaker 2:Yeah. So on the row crop side, corn, soybeans, conventional row crop, and then on the protein side we run beef, bison pork and then just starting to venture into some of the exotics.
Speaker 1:So, uh, you know, usda inspected deer and elk as well. Nice, that's awesome. And you and the brother, you guys grew up on the farm so funny story actually.
Speaker 2:Um, we're first generation farmers. My uh, I've got three younger brothers. We all all grew up in Independence, missouri, which is about 30 minutes, 20 minutes outside Kansas City, just to the east, and we grew up there. We had the farm since 1998. My dad bought his first small track to land up there. We just loved being up there at the farm on weekends, so hunting, things like that. But I did not move up to the farm and really be on the farm full time until after I got out of high school and that's a little bit of a secret. A lot of people were like oh, it's a multi-generation farm. They grew up on the farm, it was handed down from granddaddy to his dad boys, and that's just not the case. We're first-generation farmers, trying to figure things out as we go and obviously we've grown really, really quickly. But yeah, we're learning as we go.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that was one thing I thought was super interesting Cause I didn't know that until the first episode of the show and it was talking about how your dad had bought that first parcel late nineties and I was like, oh shit, like this is legit figuring it out. Oh yeah, you know. And then the exponential growth over that time where you see a lot of these generational ranches and farms over the last 20, 30 years have gotten smaller because of development and things like that. You see the McBee set up expanding by leaps and bounds and the fact that it was just a recent piece, you know, for the family to start into and go down that path, what you know what initially got your dad like wanting to do that.
Speaker 2:It's a funny story. I mean, we bought that first small tract just for hunting and fishing. We love the outdoors, grew up hunting and fishing, so that was what we bought it for. We leased it out to a local farmer who would farm the tillable acreage on it and we'd go up there on the weekends and there'd be people fishing in the ponds ponds. There'd be beer cans all around the ponds and we're like what are you doing? This is our land. And they're like well, the farmer gave us permission and so that was what we're like all right, screw that, enough of that, kick the farmer off, we're just going to do it ourselves. And that was in 2005.
Speaker 2:So we farmed a hundred acres in 2005, bought an old John Deere and just tried to do it ourselves. And we were horrible. I mean, if you don't have experience in farming, it is a learning curve that I cannot begin to describe. You would think it's as easy as just putting a seed in the ground, and it's not. There is so much to it and so many nuances. And so we learned very quickly that farming is not an ease of entry business. And so 2005 was our first year going at it. I'd have been 11 or 12 years old, but I was still working on the farm. I was going up there running tractors at 11, 12 years old, didn't know what I was doing and obviously too young to be considered like a full-time worker, but I was still just kind of easing into what farming is and how to do it.
Speaker 2:And my dad had a telecom company telecommunications down in Kansas City. That's where he generated a lot of his income most of his income to buy the farm and then, with the real estate crash in 2008, started investing into residential real estate in Kansas City. We were buying properties for no money down At that time. Banks were like please take this property. Like no one wanted property, and so he was buying these properties.
Speaker 2:He didn't have the cash. If he was trying to go out in today's market and buy these properties, he wouldn't have had a chance but no money down at the time and so they were basically just handing over these properties. So he was scooping them up because he understood there's a once in a lifetime buying opportunity and that paid off leaps and bounds within 10 years because 2008, he started buying In 2018, these properties that he bought for $20,000 and $30,000 a door we were flipping for $100,000 to $120,000 a door, absolutely so. That was the big catalyst for how the farm blew up, because then, once we sold off these properties in Kansas City, we 1031 them into farm ground and that's how the farm shot up so fast Now the farm.
Speaker 1:How much fast now the farm, how much acreage.
Speaker 2:I guess you guys operate now yeah, so personally, between my dad, my brother, jesse and I, we own 18 000 acres of ground um, and then we lease the rest.
Speaker 1:We're farming 40 000 acres wow, okay, and then that's not all contiguous, is it?
Speaker 2:no, no, our biggest chunk is about 8 500 acres that we own and for missouri. That's a pretty good size continuous piece of land. You know it's not like the Western ranches where you get 50,000 acres continuous out here and where you guys are at I'm sure it's hard to gather 500 acres you know 300, 350 acres here in virginia.
Speaker 1:You're like what, yeah, where? And then you see the commas next to it and you understand exactly what's going on. So someone's been sitting on that literally since the boats landed. You know if they still have. You know those pieces. It was like lords of england, you know signing over. You know this land, land grants back in the day, um, with those big, big tracks and the prop. The homes on those big tracks are also out here, something really special to see because they were built in like 1600s and they're these huge manors. It's insanity. But no, most of the farms out here, I mean you're talking about 100 acre smaller tracks. If someone does have a larger operation, they're piecing them together but they're not ran up cont know contiguous together.
Speaker 2:So that's interesting. Thousand acre spans, I would say 130 miles circumference.
Speaker 1:Okay is our farming circumference yeah, that's awesome, and so what talk about? Kind of through the show. I I told you know you, I've already watched the whole freaking season Super entertaining, totally wild. I'm like what is going on right here your brothers are a trip, your dad's nuts, I'm like the whole thing. Every time I turn around I'm like what in the hell is Steve doing? Like what?
Speaker 2:The man's wild. It's unfortunate because just out of obviously creating a reality show, there's a drum up the drama. My dad has skill sets and talent that I like. It's so crazy how talented he is in certain aspects. Yeah, replace that. So you're looking at him and you're like man, this is a train wreck. What is he doing in the companies? Well, the companies didn't grow to be the size they were for no reason. Like he's a genius when it comes to tense negotiations, when it comes to deal cutting, when it comes to construction, like that things that no one else can do. And then, um he in dealing with stress too. He can deal with stress. Which business is all about stress? He can deal with that like no other. And I think the way he offsets that is by his personal life.
Speaker 1:Well, no, he has a great time. I was like man, this is, this is fun. This is fun. Now talk about like all. All the brothers are involved in the farm and operation as well.
Speaker 2:Correct. Yeah. So my brother Jesse. He's mostly overhead of construction on the car wash side. Ok Needs if we need him during planting or harvest he's sort of a fill-in guy. So we cross-utilize labor across our companies where necessary. My brother Cole, full-time on the farm, loves the farm and ranch. He actually moved up to Gallatin Missouri to go to high school there. He's the only one that graduated high school in that little town because he loved it so much. And then my youngest brother, brayden, works on the car wash side too. We all kind of have our specialty skill sets where we focus in across our portfolio of companies. But the farm and ranch is our passion and heart and where we want to be. It's just it's hard to make a farm and ranch profitable.
Speaker 1:No, I mean, that's what I have. I've heard that so many times and so many of the aspects of the business you really don't have any control over. You know you don't necessarily get to control cost, depending on what it is that you're selling. You can't control the weather. You know you spend all this money to put, you know, seed in the ground If there's no rain. There's no rain which is going to limit what grows, which limits what you sell. I don't even think a lot of that stuff on the agriculture side. You necessarily get to set price points.
Speaker 2:No, there's none of that. It's commodity-based pricing. My corn is worth the exact same value as my neighbors. It doesn't matter how we farmed it or whatever we did to it.
Speaker 1:That's right and so no, I mean that's got to be to the point you made about your dad, like the stress management piece, and to be able to see through that, still be successful through that when you have such little control over it, it's really remarkable. And so you guys do have these other venues, these other revenue chains. I know that you know you've got the meat company right and you guys just recently have brought processing on site, correct.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So I had direct-to-consumer like ready-to-eat meat snacks, so snack sticks, beef jerky, summer sausage. And then last year, while we were filming the show, there was a local slaughter plant that had just been built by these guys. I mean it's a five-star build-out and they only operated it for a year and they went under. And I mean it's a five-star build-out and they only operated it for a year and they went under and I was able to take advantage of them going under and getting it at a discounted price. I wasn't necessarily ready to run a full-scale slaughter plant by any means, but the deal was so good Buying a brand-new facility for $0.30 on the dollar I couldn't pass.
Speaker 1:That's awesome. And then the car washes. You got the coffee and car wash.
Speaker 2:Talk a little bit about that. Yeah, so I graduated from college with an MBA and an emphasis on accounting and finance, and so I jump into the world of farming and I'm looking at the business model of farming and, just like you said, we have our big three in farming is what we call it and out of the big three, only one of those we have any sort of control over whatsoever. Mother nature we have zero control over. That's one of the big three. Number two is global commodity price. What's my grain worth? No control over? So two out of the big three like just flip a coin. We have no control over them. The only one we can slightly control is our input cost, and even then those vary to the the point where you don't really control your input cost. I mean, you can try your best, you can control labor and some of times out of 10, it's on the latter side, so it's on the lower side of what you project. You don't collect your money, so you do all this work up front and you don't sell your grain until the following year. So it's almost a 365 day cash flow cycle and I'm getting out of college looking at this and I'm going how do we make this work Right? And so I started exploring other industries, like, ok, we've got to find a way to supplement the revenue and get more consistent revenue to help make this farm survive.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and you look at a car wash business, especially like the express car washes you have recurring revenue through the monthly memberships. You have no, basically your cash flow cycle is non-existing. Memberships. You have no, basically your cashflow cycle is non-existing. You don't have to have an accounts receivable department because they have to pay for their service on the upfront side and if they don't pay for it, they get to go through the exit lane. So it's got all of these and it's low labor. I mean, it's basically the equipment in the tunnel does 90% of the work. You have a couple of attendants out there making sure that the customer is satisfied. So it's such a better business model. And I was like, ok, we're going to make this farm survive and be able to feed all these mouths we have here at the farm, we've got to supplement it with some solid business models.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, I thought it was interesting because I really wasn't expecting the car wash piece to be as heavy a part of the show. Um, but you guys were really like you know, waist deep and a lot of dealings and stuff you know with the car wash and, um, you know, say that for people to watch, you know on the show and stuff to learn more about it. But it was. I really did appreciate how, in the show and capturing the family and what you guys were doing, you really were moving and showing in a day-to-day life that hey, you can be in the field working on tractor burning fields. The next thing, you know, you're shooting across to Kansas City to go meet up with bankers for car wash business or over here on houses that are being built. I guess the hustle factor was it was cool to see that part on display.
Speaker 2:Uh, for me if there was anything we could contribute our success to, because we sure as hell are not the smartest in the room and I wish we were, I wish I was smarter, but we're not. So the only thing that's even contributed to our success thus far is just out hustle, um, yeah, and I'm hoping to change that to where we can focus a little more more on the intelligence side and and set ourselves up for success, rather than just having to out hustle and work, out, work everyone. But that's all we've been able to do and and find success in. And and you're right, we.
Speaker 2:There's no conventional day for us. We aren't, uh, focused on any business, like there's not a day where I go into the office and I say, okay, I'm solely focusing on the farms today, because I'll get calls for the car washes. I never know where my day is going to end up. And it's just a true entrepreneur mindset of hey, we're opportunists, we're going to try and figure out how to make this work and, come hell or high water, we're going to work hard enough to figure it out.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's great. Talk to me a little bit about who had the idea for the show, who kind of pressed that to the family, presented it to the family. So I know you've done shows before this. You know another another show featured on and so kind of how did that process flow?
Speaker 2:So you know I hate to take all the credit for it, but branding and marketing is what I love, like that is my specialty to a T. So the whole reason I went on a dating show, which was Joe Millionaire, was because I realized how similar we were to Yellowstone. I'm looking at my brother, jesse. He's a spitting image of Casey Dutton. Obviously I fly a helicopter. Like we have this large farm and ranch that we're struggling to keep and my family dynamics are just so large farm and ranch that we're struggling to keep. My family dynamics are just so interesting we're a mess. You can see the show and see that. I was like, hey, if we're going to have to deal with this stress and the drama that we deal with, let's at least make it profitable. I was like, all right, let's get some eyeballs on this.
Speaker 2:The whole reason I went on the dating show was to try and introduce, uh, the production companies from LA to my family in the farm and ranch side. I knew that there was going to be a hometown where they were going to fly to the hometown see the farm and ranch. We brought the top six girls from the show up to the farm and ranch. Um, and it was all just getting eyeballs on our farm. Um and once we did that literally since the minute that show ended, we had been getting hit up from production companies about doing this real life Yellowstone and that was the end goal for it. So it all from there. It just came to what production company do we want to go with? We had six different production companies that were reaching out to me that wanted to shoot a pilot episode to bid it out to the networks, and I felt really good about Jeff Jenkins Productions who did our production. They had done the Simple Life with Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie.
Speaker 2:They had done the first 10 seasons of Keeping Up with the Kardashians. They had done all of Bling Empire. Like they have a track record of these. So, I felt really good about them. I sat down and talked to him. I said, hey, I don't want any manipulation, um, for our lives, Like I don't want you guys to create the story of who we are. I know who we are and I can tell you right now we have enough drama going on to fill up multiple seasons of reality TV, so I want to keep it real.
Speaker 1:Sure Sure.
Speaker 2:And so they.
Speaker 1:They did that and we feel really good about jeff jenkins productions and what they were able to do with the show that's so cool and I imagine, with it being the second time you kind of been through this process of the reality show, what was the adjustment for the rest of the family? You know, kind of how is that with the camera crews being around? I mean, because it seems like they're there all damn day, like like all day, all the time, capturing everything all day.
Speaker 2:So this show was way more comfortable than Joe Millionaire because we were in our environment, our homes, our businesses and going into shooting. We had several discussions with the production company and they said the reason why the Kardashians were so successful is because they showed 99% of their life the good and the bad to the audience. That's what makes it relatable. If you try to act like your life is perfect and there's no issues, or you parade around with this facade on, the audience can sense that fakeness.
Speaker 2:And so they're like you just have to lay it all out there, both the good and the bad. Everyone's flawed, everyone's got a dysfunctional family. If you showcase that to the audience, they relate way more. And so we said, going into it, hey, we are going to show them, we're going to try and one-up the kardashians as far as what we showcase and just let them into everything we've got going on, the good and the bad. And, um man, my, my dad and cole Cole really followed through on that promise.
Speaker 1:Man Cole had me in tears so many times. That dude had me in tears and the similarities between him and your dad. It actually was really funny to me watching it. Like there's so many similarities between all of you guys and your dad and like the strengths and traits and personality type you know, characteristics, um, that was a really cool thing for for me to see. I love that story. I love how genuinely close you guys are to your dad. I love how genuinely he cares for, for you guys and and loves y'all and that's such a neat thing.
Speaker 1:I don't I have a brother, um, who I don't talk to having in a long, long time for various reasons, my dad, but I would talk to him in years.
Speaker 1:You know it's it's the total opposite kind of dynamic.
Speaker 1:And you know my thing was like man I, I always wanted to create a family where there that was not gonna be the case with my son and I'm fortunate my son has decided like, like he wants to work for us and build within our business and be a part of the family business, what we're doing, and like that honors me, like I'm so honored that he wants to do that.
Speaker 1:And when I see the big family dynamic and everyone together. It's the good, the bad, the shit show, the, the laughs, the. It's just very genuine and I would say if you guys wanted to keep it real and genuine, it very much felt that way. If it wasn't, you did a great job of making it feel that way, but it definitely seemed that that was the case and nobody was kind of putting on it's like nope, this is, this is how we, we roll and you know for for good or for bad, and I just thought that was a pretty tremendous thing, uh, with the show and the aspects of it. So this was all shot last summer and fall was that right.
Speaker 2:We shot mid-april of last year through late july, and then we had some pickup scenes in august and september. Out the show.
Speaker 1:Okay, cool, Cool and then. So how long does the world have to wait until they find out if there's a season two?
Speaker 2:Well, we were 85% greenlit in a little bit of behind the scenes stuff. At the very end of the season it pops up and it says to be continued. That is the first time in NBC universal history they've allowed a season one show to say to be continued at the end of the season. That's how much they believe in the show, wow. So usually they let the ratings come out before they you know, they see how it does before they say, okay, yeah, season two. The fact that they were willing to do that is a pretty telltale sign that they're they're pretty damn positive. There's going to be a season two here. So we are 85 to 90 percent greenlit and we've already had discussions about shooting a season two here mid-summer, starting it in july. Just haven't gotten official confirmation yet yeah, was it kind of nice.
Speaker 1:Nice when the cameras dipped out and everything kind of settled down on the farm and it was just focused on a normal back to normal stuff.
Speaker 2:It is. Yeah, it absolutely is. I mean those cameras were there, like you said, 24-7. And it's a job in and of itself. I mean they were flies on the wall. Don't get me wrong. But whenever you're having to do the one-on-one interviews that happen between the scenes, like that all takes work and it's just it's a job Like that's what people don't understand is like it's so much work. And that's why, at the beginning, we were like all right, let's weigh the risk and reward of what this show could potentially bring. Risk is we tarnish our reputation. Obviously, there's a bunch of drama and it's a shit show. Our bankers are watching this show, our business associates are watching. There's a lot of risk here. But what is the potential reward? If we were to run this thing for 10 years, 10 seasons of exposure, with all the direct to consumer brands that we have, what could that potentially do to our business? In pouring rocket fuel on the growth? Like, well, that's a risk reward that we're worth. It's worth chasing after to see what could happen.
Speaker 1:What's next for the McBees? What are y'all working on?
Speaker 2:So just running these businesses day to day, really the car washes have done so well here in the last four to five months Like they've completely done a 180, to be completely candid with you. Uh, we opened those things up and and, honestly, we put so much time and investment into the building themselves, the business model, what we had going on, um, and then with the show, I really didn't have time to market them like I should have.
Speaker 2:And uh for anyone that's out there running a business, marketing's got to come Sales. You can fix a lot of mistakes if you have the sales, but you got to have the sales first. So I mean that's what I put all this time into the build out, like running the perfect car wash, like all of the tech side of things. And then we opened up and it was like what happened. I thought if you build it, they will come.
Speaker 1:No.
Speaker 2:You have to go out there and market the hell out of yourself and tell everyone about yourself.
Speaker 2:And after the show ended, man, we were in a tough spot there with the car washes. Obviously, the private equity deal didn't come through. The show, you know, dramatizes that a little more than it was in reality. We didn't want to cut a deal that soon before the car washes were up and stabilized, but as soon as the show ended it was like all right, we didn't want to cut a deal that soon before the car washes were up and stabilized, but as soon as the show ended it was like all right, we got to get boots on the ground and we got to spread the word about what we've got going on with these washes. And that's what we did and it's really paid off here in the last few months. So right now, you know, farms not on cruise control, but it's basically on cruise control and I want to work on building up the meat company that we're about to start shipping nationwide and then these car washes that we're continuing to grow and build out.
Speaker 1:That's great, man, and that's really, really exciting. And you are right. You know everyone's like, okay, I'm going to focus on this product. Product's going to be so great, everyone's just going to want it. And we don't have to tell too many people. No one gives a crap about anything that you have or you're selling until you make them give a crap about it. And that's where, like with my businesses, I'm probably always going to be on the revenue generation side of it active, because that's the fun part to me and with us, nothing that we do like.
Speaker 1:My primary business is the dog training and that's not a recurring revenue model Like we train your dog. It's trained until you get another dog. You don't have a need for me. I'm not the $10 an hour guy where you need lessons your entire dog's life. No, we're going to train that joker and it's going to be awesome and we're out moved on to the next one.
Speaker 1:So every day you know there has to be new clients found and what's the best way to reach people who need our service? Is it Google pay-per-click? Is it Facebook? Is it, you know, other meta type style platforms? Is it face-to-face? And trying all those things and figuring out what works for your niche in it and then going all in but also still paying attention to when things start to change and the market shifts a little bit. It's like, all right, we're going to pull resources from here. Now we're dialing in and focusing on this because this is the shift in what's happening, so you can still generate that new stuff. I love the recurring revenue model of the car washes. I think that's great, and the same thing with the meat plant pickup huge, and you guys do that. I mean a lot of that, I imagine will turn into recurring revenue as well. You acquire that client and now you're able to use them multiple times.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I've spent the last eight months and whenever we bought it it was straight up for custom slaughter. So basically, a local farmer brings in their own beef, we slaughter it, cut it up for them, send it back to them. Yeah, the past eight months have been about logistically figuring out shipping beef nationwide and then getting out of that custom slaughter because it's just not very, it's not a good revenue model, and getting it more into the subscription based like a. It's a butcher box, except we own every single facet. So it's our beef, our pork that we're sending out to you. The animal. Like when we say farm to table, the animal never leaves our farm until it's in a package to come to you. That's the difference between us and, like a butcher box or an Omaha steaks, they're using all these different slaughter plants across the country. Everything is right there on our farm. So when you want to talk about farm to table, I can show you the pasture that your freaking steak grew up in and where it was born.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's awesome, cause that was the question I was going to ask. You is, with that is all the meat being sourced from the farm itself, and that's a huge leg up for you guys.
Speaker 2:It is. That's the big marketing ploy, because everyone's like, why are you doing what ButcherBox is doing? And I'm like, yes, it's the same model. But as we get into more of this transparent customer knowledge center and knowledge market, they want to know down to a field level where their meat's coming from, how it was raised. Was it humanely and ethically raised? What was it? I can, like I said, I could show you the pasture where your steak comes from, because we own every single facet of the supply chain.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's incredible. That's, that's really really incredible. It's neat. Well, now that the apex piece, the apex um, like the beef sticks and all that, that was kind of your first venture into the, the shipping of the protein.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I wanted to do it in phases. I didn't want to take it all on at once and try and do raw beef shipping and like that was just, you can only eat an elephant one bite at a time. So I was like phase one, I'll make meat sticks and beef jerky and try shipping that. Phase two, which obviously happened a little sooner than I expected I thought that was going to be three to five year plan was to build out a slaughter plant and start slaughtering. And then that one fell in my lap and I was like, ok, I'm not ready for it, but damn it, it's a good deal and I'm not going to pass it up. So ended up buying that.
Speaker 2:And now the past eight months I've been like, all right, we've got to get the fulfillment center set up. We're building out a fulfillment center to be able to ship all this out, getting the shipping metrics set up for how we're going to ship it, where we're going to ship it to. It's been a lot to take place, but it's going to be launching next week, so it's all coming to fruition here. Oh wow, so it's time. It's time, yeah, I was trying to time it out with the show.
Speaker 2:The show was originally supposed to air March 25th and so I had all this geared up. I was like, all right, march 25th is our drop dead date. And then in February the network called us and was like, hey, moving it up to March 11th? And I was like, oh shit, I had the fulfillment center. That was going to be done. I had our apparel side, our merch side.
Speaker 2:I had the meet co. It was all set for March 25th and then I'm scrambling to try and get it done faster. And you know we didn't hit the exact March 11th date that the show dropped on. But we're going to be pretty close.
Speaker 1:Sure, yeah, that's cool. We'll have to. Logan, we're going to have to jump on there and put some orders in, get some stuff sent out. Appreciate it.
Speaker 2:Well, there was one point there that I think I do want to just point out if anyone's listening and I do want to just point out if anyone's listening and I know with how big you guys are on on personal development and continually investing in yourself. You know Alex Ramosi or Lisa. Yeah, that is one point. I love Alex Ramosi, love everything he has to say. The one thing I will disagree with him on day in and day out is he says spend two years building your product, making the perfect product, and let it market for you. I completely disagree with that because you're going to be wrong with the product or model that you come up with. So you spend two years building it and then you launch it and you lost two years' worth of time and it's the wrong model. People like this little niche of that product, not the product itself. I would rather go to market and figure it out by what the customers are telling me.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you're a hundred percent right, man, I, that's one of the things. We were talking about the podcast before we. We started the show and you know we're coming up on a hundred episodes. And I look at this and, man, I should be at 300 episodes, but I took so long to start it because it wasn't exactly how I thought it should be. So, rather than and then we were talking about that exponential effect of once you hit a certain mark and how you know, the algorithm starts supporting you and putting you in front of more people I'd be so much further ahead had I just started putting content out rather than what I thought was perfect content, just content.
Speaker 1:But it's hard. It's hard to wrap your head around that. And when people have these ideas or concepts and you truly do see it as your baby, well, I'm not trying to put an ugly baby out, right, I don't want people telling me my baby's ugly, but the reality is people are going to tell you your baby's ugly, whether you want to hear it or not, and you might think it's perfect, but there's going to be parts of it that pick up and get ran with and that's when you adjust right, because there's no original idea correct there's. There's our original take on an idea. There's what makes you, steven mcbee, unique and special in your situation with the farm to say, hey, we could take that general idea and we could really put a big process improvement, quality improvement of the product itself, you know a better process and experience for the customer and go that route. And that's not something someone else can do, because they don't have certain things in alignment. And if they did, they might be able to see it from the angle that you see it from, but only you can see it from your angle, because that's your situation and that's what I try to tell people all the time.
Speaker 1:It's like you know you have your vision for what you want to accomplish and where you want to be. You create goals that are kind of your benchmarks if you're tracking towards that vision or not. But, guys, visions change. The vision I had five, 10 years ago, for today is very different. I'm sitting in a very small segment of that vision I had and what businesses allowed us to create and family and different things have played into it, have matured, priorities have changed a little bit and the vision I have now I'm not behind on it's just that's that next phase and what we've built in the last five to 10 years still support it.
Speaker 1:But the goals have to serve your purpose. Your goals have to serve your vision. If they don't serve your vision, they don't serve your purpose, there's no sense in pursuing them. Correct, you know? Because if your goals do serve you and the vision, it's easy to make those adjustments when you're like, hey, I was 80% right on that, now let's get better and let's get a hundred percent right by making this adjustment. And now, what are these new goals? And so I think that's a really great point that you bring up. It's like get it out there and let the market tell you.
Speaker 2:Yes, yeah, Imagine if you spent two years working on your business model before listening to any customer feedback and you think you create this perfect business model and you go out there and it flops. You could have had it a perfect business model by launching in month two and then spending the next what 22 months revising it.
Speaker 1:Man, that is so right and it's so right, but but well, and that's again. You know what we're talking about. Number of podcasts that get past like eight episodes or three episodes. How many businesses make it past that first year mark? How many businesses make it past that first year mark? How many businesses make it past the first two? And it's hard, and what I've told people is like, look, okay, your business failed, the business failed. That doesn't mean you failed. What did you learn? What did you extract from that situation? And now, what is it that you want to do? And how are you going to apply those things to the next thing? Like what happened to you? You're not unique in it not working out.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's the majority. It's like nine times out of 10, it's not going to work out.
Speaker 1:Right, you know you, you want to go in this entrepreneurial path or you better have some grit and thick skin, because that is most likely what's going to happen. And if, because it didn't work, that hemmed you up and man, you got to see past that extract and move forward and get it going and get it done. Um, look, my favorite personality in the entire show. All right, you ready for this? My favorite personality out of the entire season of the show is your dog, sitka. Oh, one, just a great-looking shepherd, great-looking dog. And oh there, yeah, hi, buddy, hi bud, yeah, great-looking dog. And the producers did such a great job of building the dog's personality into the episodes, like some chaos would be going on and they just pan over to the dog just sitting there looking yeah, no, it was funny, we were.
Speaker 2:We were laughing watching the dogs. And then there's the one scene where sicka brings in a dead deer head into the house.
Speaker 1:Oh God, I was in tears. I was in tears man Cause. That just makes so much sense and that's such a funny, normal thing. So what? So with the family itself. I know that I don't want to ruin stuff on people to watch it, but there was some cool stuff happened with Jesse and his girlfriend towards the end of the season, which is cool. That's exciting, you know. It seems like you know they did a nice job of kind of giving backstory and setting up relationship stuff and things of that nature, good and bad, yeah, on who they're chasing. What did you and the family feel like you wish would have been caught more, or maybe shared more, if anything, or did you feel like it was damn near spot on to how you guys would have wanted to be portrayed?
Speaker 2:First and foremost, the production company in the network did an incredible job. I cannot imagine how much footage they took compared to compressing that down into 10 one hour episodes. Like they did an incredible job. The only thing that we wish would have been conveyed more is you go back to your talking about how close my family is and just how much my dad loves us and how much he puts on the line for us, how much my dad loves us and how much he puts on the line for us. You know he's made out to be.
Speaker 2:His personal life is showcased and put in a spotlight for reality TV show reasons. It's drama filled and it's a mess and everyone can see that. But to me I'm glad you were able to see the genuine love he has for us, because for us, watching it back, we're like man. You only see the bad sides of my dad. You don't get to see the good sides Like that dude works seven days a week like 12 hours a day. The other four are spent. You know partying or drama, but he works 12 hours a day and he's done that for 30 years, busting his ass to run these businesses Like. He is the hardest worker I've ever met. And if you're his friend, he will take care of you like to the end. I wouldn't ever want to be his girlfriend, but if you're his friend, he is the best friend you will ever have in your life.
Speaker 1:Right yeah, and he's best dad.
Speaker 2:I mean, he's such a good dad to us. You know we take his relationship advice with a grain of salt, but everything else, man, he wants the best for us and he loves us boys like no other. And that was the only thing. I'm like man, that isn't really seen and I'm catching a lot of hate on social media saying don't listen to your dad at all and your dad's a horrible person and whatever. Yeah, he's got his flaws in relationships. He's very jaded in relationships I'll be the first to admit that. But man in every other facet, that dude is a rock star and works his ass off and he loves us boys like no other.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I do. I do feel like that came across very clearly, like, if I mean, I feel like if you're a I mean I don't know if I'm the typical consumer of the show or not, you know, but for me it was easy to see and like your dad, you know, shoot, I'm probably. How old are you, steven? I'm 29. 29, yeah, so I'm closer to your dad's age than you, right? So I'm in kind of this fun zone where I'm like my kids are grown. Well, my daughter will graduate next year, logan graduated a year ago and my wife and I just be her and I. We're probably going to move from Virginia to Dallas and I'm ready to go Like, hey, I feel energized, I'm ready with the businesses, I got a new energy about myself and I like to go out and like when I'm in Dallas and do things. It was so funny.
Speaker 1:Your dad made a comment when he was in when he's in Nashville, he can just cut loose and like, do whatever and kind of do my thing. When I'm at home, it's work, it's work, it's work. But when I get here, it's kind of like, hey, I'm not necessarily known by everybody and I can just kind of be this alternate personality. That's exactly how I felt for the longest time when I would go out to Dallas and people like, man, there's like this different side of you that we don't ever see back home and I'm like, well, back home is boring, like this is new and no one really knows me out here. Now for like four and a half years I'm out there a couple times a month. We got a condo out there now and stuff, and so now I am starting to meet more people and stuff, so I gotta dial it back a little bit just a little bit.
Speaker 1:But um, you know, I could totally see that piece and, like you know, with your dad the part he's a young dude. He's 50, 55 years old, somewhere around there I think.
Speaker 1:They said right, he's turned 52 yeah, I mean he's young, yeah, he's young and he's working his ass off. He's going to blow off some steam. Blow off some steam and the thing is, to your point, right or wrong, it's his choice. I mean, it's his choice to make right and to do his thing. But I don't think anybody who missed the fact, with the care, investment, genuine love that Steve has for the family and sending shit on social, I mean they're going to find something shit to send about anyway. Right, those people, they just they'll never see it because they don't want to see things like that, they don't open their mind to see things like that. Cause, I think that's a pretty tough piece to miss when, like 70% of the time when he was talking, it's about you guys, the boys, correct, you know. Time when he was talking, it's about you guys, the boys, correct, you know. And the other 30 percent is the farm yes, so that's exactly right.
Speaker 2:Well, and you know that get some comments. They're like oh he just drinks non-stop, he's an alcoholic. That dude I. There was not in a single cup or bottle of alcohol in our house from the time I was born. Until every single one of us boys were at least 20 years old. There was no alcohol anywhere. He worked, he coached us boys in every single sport we played, and that was his life. There was no drinking, no alcohol, until we were 20 years old. It's not like he grew up partying like this when he was actually in the decisive years of shaping who we are as people. He was a strict dad that focused on work and sports and that was it.
Speaker 2:So it was like all this partying and stuff that's him cutting loose, because he spent 28, 30 years like just streamlined on business and making sure the boys were being raised the right way.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no good on y'all. I mean, I, I always have a lot of respect when a family opens up like this, because the thing that you feel like in general, society worries about most is what will people think? What will people say? Right, they got to put all their perfect shit on instagram and facebook and tiktok. Everything's got to be. Oh, you take a picture of your friends. You got to redo it five times, like my coo. If we take a selfie together, I just hand to the phone. I'm like, let me know, we got to do it again. Right, you know, I can't just take it and it'd be done. She's going to want to fix her hair, stand to the left of me instead, or whatever. My wife's kind of the same way with it. And it's cool, like okay, but everyone's so worried about it. And then when I see like a family, family, the same thing with the kardashians, I'm like shit, like they just open it all up and it's like to hell with it. It, it's, it.
Speaker 2:It's pretty impressive to me well, that's how us boys, all of us boys on the show, to be completely candid, like when I say, if you aren't paying my bills or you're not making my life better in some way, I don't give a shit about your opinion. Like I don't and I hate to be crude like that, but it's the truth. And even my mom is watching this show and she's texting us boys. Like you boys, what is everyone going to think Like? What is the people we grew up with going to think of you boys? Or I can't believe.
Speaker 2:You cussed on TV and a lot of the girls from the show, a lot of our girlfriends, say the same thing Like I can't believe you made yourself out to be an idiot like that. And us boys are like, look, we'd rather not put on this facade Again. It goes back to what I was saying earlier. Every family is dysfunctional as hell. Every single person is flawed. Like I'd rather be real about who we are, knowing that you know we've got some, some warts on us or some bad sides to us. Everyone does then try to like parade around like we're some perfect human living this perfect life.
Speaker 2:That's not real for anyone no, no, the the unreality of reality tv yes, exactly there's probably plenty of that too there is, and I think that's why this show even though, yeah, we're catching some hate and, you know, catching some bad comments it's hitting so hard because we just literally laid it all out there and said, hey, here's who we are, look up our skirt, we don't care right.
Speaker 1:No, that's cool, that's. That's good on you. So, right now, focusing on the farm, getting things efficient, getting numbers, focusing on these car washes You're about to launch the meat plant, you know and then that shipping and stuff, so you got it all. I mean, you got hands in a little bit of all of it. I do.
Speaker 2:Yeah, Trying to run it all. I wouldn't recommend that to anyone. If I could go back in time, I would focus on one really good business model and just ride that out until I can hire CEOs to run each of the different ones. I'm running pretty ragged right now, to be honest, but I got myself into a hole of like hey, I've already got all these companies.
Speaker 1:I got to figure out how to make them run now no, I mean, we did something very similar and I will tell you like, for your own sake, um, the sooner you can get those solid leaders right, because the math won't math in the beginning, no matter how you cut it, you're like, well, I can't afford to put a position in that role.
Speaker 1:I can't, you can't, you truly can't, but you can't afford not to either as soon as you find that right person, because it's going to be that individual who's 100% of their energy and focus and expertise is focused on the car washes, for instance, right, whereas it's getting 25% of you at best when you can allow for it to have a good 25% of you. The same thing with the meat side, the farm itself in general, and just having been in that position before, where I was the guy for all of them, we did fine, we did well. But I compare it to how we did when I got the right person in place, who I'm just feeding into those five, six, seven, eight leaders, rather than having to feed into everybody for everything and I let them take over and take that control piece. Eight leaders, rather than have to feed into everybody for everything and I let them take over and take that control piece man it it. It lights out when we made that adjustment. But it's a part of the process and finding those people isn't easy.
Speaker 2:It's that's. That is like my one fatal character flaw is I want control because I'm so. I'm so leery of extending trust because when it backfires you feel like an idiot. But I will tell you the carwash in the farms we found those people. So the carwash, the carwash.
Speaker 2:I extended that trust to our uh, a position that was basically running the company and right at the end of the show I come back after we got done filming Cause I wasn't involved. It was so hard to be involved in the carwash when we were filming. Come back. Carwash is an absolute shit show Like we're like it's in dire straits, to be completely honest. So fire that position. Because that was the guy that I had extended trust to horrible. He had a wreck of a personal life. It was extending over into the business we promoted from within to a guy that had just been a GM but was a I mean, he's younger than I am, he's 27 years old Like no one you would ever think would be like a true executive style leader. But we he was just even keeled emotionally, like nothing phased him and he knew what he was doing and he knew how to lead people.
Speaker 2:Since that day of firing that previous guy. We've hit a sales record every single week since and I have not gotten. I used to get six calls a day that were like personal crisis, like hey, so-and-so is about to fist fight, so-and-so like stupid crap. That was what I was dealing with while I was trying to run everything. I haven't heard of any major crises since that day. Yeah, it's wild. Like, like you said, the math doesn't math and it's so hard for me to say we can afford this guy right now because we can't. We're a startup Like there's, how am I going to afford this guy? And it's like, all of a sudden, you find the right person and it just is like the lights start shining down from heaven and you're like this is how people make it in business. Like this is wild.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I don't have to do it all, I don't got to do all of it. And man, at least for my personality, morale got better when I stopped dealing with everybody. Culture is so much better, oh God, culture is so much better when I stopped dealing with everybody is so much better.
Speaker 2:Oh God, like I, I'm an emotional rollercoaster because when we're running around trying to run all these companies, we're dealing with multiple crises every day. There's no way we can be at our best If we're trying to juggle all these different high priority deals, yep and so when I got, when I pulled myself out of the carwash, the carwash culture improved drastically.
Speaker 2:Sales records were hit each week. The farm is the same way Now. I just got to figure out the meat facility is really the big one that I'm working on next. That's the number one. I got to figure out a way to pull myself out of that.
Speaker 1:Good for you, man. Good for you. Well, look, I want to honor your time, man, I can't thank you enough for coming on the show and you know talking about, you know the adventures with, with Peacock and the family and just what you guys got going on, and it's a lot of fun to see and it's a lot of fun to hear you know about, you know plans for the future for y'all and what you're working on, and you know I wish you guys the very, very best. You know, truly we do. I I pray the weather is right, you know, and the prices are right and everything flows great.
Speaker 1:Um, and you know, I know a lot of people feedback I've seen from you know about the show and not people I've talked to personally about the show. A lot of people out there really, really are enjoying it and, you know, having a great time with it. So, um, I just wanted to thank you for for coming on and if there's ever anything I can do for you, you know how to get ahold of me. Um, you ever need a vent or anything, just give me a holler man and happy to to be an ear for you.
Speaker 2:Well, thank you so much for having me on. It's always I enjoy the podcast where I'm talking with people about business or I'm talking with people that I had relationships before the show ever came about. It's not just about why would so-and-so say this or this Talking show drama. I don't like those podcasts and I have to do a bunch of them, unfortunately. Oh, I'm sure, I sincerely, sincerely enjoy these talks and these podcasts where we get to talk about the more important matters?
Speaker 1:Absolutely Well, steven, take it easy. Man, I know you got a lot to get to Guys if you enjoyed this show or you got any questions for Stephen. Well, let me ask this, stephen how can people follow y'all and learn more about the show?
Speaker 2:Yeah, my Instagram and our farm's Instagram page are the best sources to go to. From there you can branch out and find out about all of our companies. My Instagram is at Steven McBee um, steven with a V and then at McBee farms is the two Instagram pages to follow, and then from there we're reposting content from the washes, the meat company. You'll be able to find everything we've got going on.
Speaker 1:Awesome, we'll make sure to plug that. Thanks everybody. We appreciate you listening and we'll catch you next time on the big dog podcast. You.