Latest / The Inspired Stories Podcast / Ultimate Work Flexibility: Hunter Sebresos' Mission to Transform Temp Staffing

Transcript

Ultimate Work Flexibility: Hunter Sebresos' Mission to Transform Temp Staffing · The Inspired Stories Podcast

0:04
Welcome to another edition of the Inspired Stories podcast,
0:08
where leaders share their experiences so we can learn from
0:11
their successes and be inspired by how they've overcome
0:14
adversity. My name is Anthony Kodaspodi and
0:17
today's guest is Hunter Sabresos, CEO of Bacon Work, Inc
0:22
based in Provo, UT. They have developed a
0:25
groundbreaking gig work app that connects businesses with local
0:29
workers through shared ratings, reviews and performance metrics.
0:34
Under Hunter's leadership, the platform has been featured in
0:37
Forbes and KSL News, gaining recognition for its innovative
0:41
approach to on demand staffing. He previously served as Senior
0:46
Vice President of Product at Cambio and founded Concept
0:50
Hunter Design. Drawing on a strong background
0:53
in design and product development, Hunter also spent
0:56
time at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory focusing on public
1:00
exhibition design. With a passion for empowering
1:04
people to find flexible opportunities, he believes in
1:07
creating a fair and transparent gig economy that benefits both
1:11
employers and workers. By eliminating rigid staffing
1:15
contracts, Bacon offers a simpler way for companies to
1:18
post shifts and for workers to build their own schedules.
1:22
Now before we get into all that good stuff, today's episode is
1:25
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1:55
All right, back to our guest today, CEO and Founder of Bacon
1:57
Work, Hunter Sabresos. Thanks for making the time to
2:00
Share your story today. Thanks for having me, Anthony.
2:02
It's great to be here. Now, one thing we didn't mention
2:06
in the intro, and I want to stop and thank you for is your
2:08
service eight years in the Marine Corps.
2:12
That's right. Yeah.
2:13
And this is the 250th anniversary of the Marine Corps.
2:15
Actually. It's a special year.
2:17
I've decided to sort of honor that by running my first
2:21
marathon in the marathon I've picked is the Marine Corps
2:24
Marathon out in Virginia. So I've been training for that,
2:26
getting ready for it. Obviously in my military career,
2:30
I did a lot of running, but I've never done as much running as
2:32
I've been doing to prepare for this race.
2:35
But that's been a lot of fun, a lot of really enlivening and a
2:39
good way for me to, you know, remember and honor that that
2:43
service of that wonderful institution.
2:46
Oh, that's really cool. What's the farthest that you've
2:48
run so far in your training? And Miles, I did that last
2:52
Saturday, yeah. OK.
2:54
And do you have a target time that you're shooting for or just
2:57
hitting the finish line is the goal?
2:59
My goal is to be able to run the marathon in a way that makes me
3:03
not want to hate doing it and never want to do it again.
3:06
So I want to, I want to be able to, I'm, I'm, I'm running very
3:10
slow. It's all about endurance.
3:12
It's all about just enjoying the experience.
3:15
I run this great beautiful nature path for my runs and I
3:20
love doing that because it makes it kind of a serene thing,
3:23
actually good chance to kind of ponder things and, you know,
3:28
also grit it out, but also, you know, feel feel like I'm
3:33
getting, you know, some restoration from it as well.
3:36
So. When you pace yourself, it's not
3:38
all punishment. That's right.
3:40
That's The funny thing about it is in the in the military, I was
3:43
always having to go push myself, push myself.
3:46
And I've learned just how much pacing at a nice easy pace can
3:50
make it much more enjoyable. So as you think about your time
3:54
in the Marine Corps and you were Sergeant there, what what
3:59
aspects of that experience do you think have directly
4:02
influenced the culture that you're building at Bacon Work?
4:07
I mean, before that it directly influenced me as a person.
4:11
You know, I grew up in a single, single parent family, was
4:16
looking for guidance and direction as I got through those
4:18
teenage years and I ran into some struggles here and there
4:21
and thought I could use this experience.
4:24
So I went into it, you know, not maybe for this.
4:29
I'm sure there's a lot of people out there For these reasons, but
4:31
for me it was I need to build myself.
4:34
And so I learned, you know, things like discipline.
4:37
I tried to get as much leadership opportunity out of it
4:40
as I could. I also learned that there's some
4:43
difficult things about being military and the institutional
4:46
portion and things like that. All of that then fed into sort
4:49
of the culture and other experiences that I've had.
4:53
I've let it in the culture that I've tried to build here at
4:55
Bacon. One of the key things that I
4:58
remember in the Marine Corps was they would always say improvise,
5:03
adapt and overcome. Whenever we came to an obstacle,
5:06
whenever we, you know, we're in the obstacle course and came up
5:10
to a wall and we had to get our whole group over it or whatever,
5:13
they they'd use that improvise, adapt and overcome Marines.
5:16
That's really stuck with me. I feel like one of my kind of
5:20
superpowers is creativity and ingenuity that when we run into
5:24
a challenge, I don't back down. In fact, it gets me fired up and
5:28
like it's how do we get around this?
5:30
How do we overcome it and how can we find a way through this
5:36
challenge? And I think that that's part of
5:38
our culture as this company as well.
5:41
Yeah, you mentioned creativity and I'm looking at a very
5:45
creative work background and very diverse.
5:48
You know, we've got Crisper Crispin Porter, you know, a top
5:52
creative agency, NASA Marines, you know, and a number of other
5:58
creative roles were were you kind of just trying on a bunch
6:02
of different hats to kind of see what fits like what was what was
6:05
sort of the the long term thinking there?
6:08
My belief has been to make the best of whatever situation
6:12
you're in, take advantage of whatever opportunity you have.
6:16
And as you nourish opportunities more, come and then let sort of
6:20
life guide you, God guide you, whatever it is your belief is
6:23
like, let the steps come as they come.
6:25
And that's what I've done. I, I never thought of
6:28
entrepreneurship when I was young as a path for me, but it
6:32
ended up becoming a path for me after I went through some of
6:35
these experiences and just saw the various, various ways that
6:41
business was run both creatively and, you know, maybe more
6:48
administratively in certain settings.
6:51
And I started to say, think to myself, you know, maybe I could
6:56
help create something that could create a great organization and,
7:01
you know, do it myself and, you know, eventually had some
7:06
opportunities to do so a couple of times before and then build
7:10
this one. And I think all those
7:13
experiences have been stepping stones for that growth that I've
7:17
had to help learn how to do entrepreneurship the right way.
7:22
I'm getting the sense very early in our conversation here that
7:26
you are a person, that you're obviously driven, you've got,
7:32
you know, big ideas, but more of a, rather than like a hard
7:37
charge, like grinded out. It's more of a I'm going to kind
7:41
of flow with the river and as I'm going down the river, I'm
7:45
going to see where the opportunities are and kind of
7:47
float towards them. Is does this sound like I'm
7:50
painting an accurate picture? I think you are.
7:52
I mean, I think that that's probably my macro approach is
7:58
letting things, you know, sniffing out opportunities as
8:02
they come and taking advantage of those.
8:04
And I would say that once I see something though, I like to kind
8:08
of hard charge toward it, take advantage of it and and go as
8:13
quickly to a result as possible. I think that that's kind of
8:16
evident in the founding of this business.
8:18
You know, we went from, I think it was four months before we had
8:24
our first revenue. And you know, I remember our,
8:30
our initial investors came back and when I told them I had some
8:32
revenue in the door, they were their jaws dropped like four
8:36
months. What are you doing?
8:37
You know, not that they were upset, but that they were
8:40
surprised. Like how did you get there so
8:42
fast? And.
8:44
Because they thought you were going to be working on sort of
8:46
the tech platform for quite a while.
8:47
Right, that's right. And I believe First off the the
8:51
approaches, I believe all tech is built best first manually.
8:55
So you build it manually first you learn, you know, what are
8:59
the pain points and things that you have and that's the new
9:02
build solutions for that. And that's why we had some
9:05
manual revenue that came in from just manual shifts that we were
9:08
running. And then shortly after that
9:11
launched the platform and ran shifts through that as well for
9:15
the Utah Valley Convention Center.
9:17
That was our first client, still a client today.
9:20
And, and then that was, you know, that was our start.
9:24
And I, I like to get started fast once we see the opportunity
9:29
and that it has some viable, you know, legs for growth.
9:34
How is it that somebody with your background hunter came up
9:37
with the idea to start this platform?
9:39
I don't because I'm sort of scanning through your LinkedIn
9:42
profile here. I don't see a background in sort
9:44
of the staffing space. Right, Well, I sometimes
9:49
there's, there's two types of entrepreneurs, right?
9:50
There's those that are experts in that space and they know what
9:53
the problems are and all the, you know, flaws with the vendors
9:57
in the industry and they build a solution.
10:00
And then there's those that are the outsiders that come in and
10:02
try something new. And that new approach is what
10:04
gives them an edge. And I'm definitely that as it
10:06
pertaining to the staffing space.
10:07
But I will say this, the founding of this company started
10:10
long ago when I was a kid. And as I mentioned, my mom was
10:14
raising 5 kids, going to school in the evenings, trying to work
10:18
a full time job in the daytime. And what I observed from that
10:23
was that she needed flexibility. You know, she actually went
10:27
through this situation where she kind of worked herself into
10:30
exhaustion as a young kid. I was worried about her.
10:34
You know, I remember being called into the school office
10:36
and said, hey, your mom's in the hospital.
10:38
And, you know, I thought, oh, like, what's going to happen?
10:42
Flexibility is critical for someone in that type of
10:45
situation. And so that kind of stuck with
10:47
me. And then later on had a
10:49
conversation with her after she had raised us all.
10:52
And, you know, we all went to college and she had retired and
10:56
she was saying, you know, I've, I've been busy my whole life.
10:59
I'd like to stay busy, but I don't want to have a full time
11:02
job now. I just want to work sometimes.
11:05
But at that time I was working with a company as a product
11:09
leader or, you know, companies like the ones we serve now.
11:14
And they were all mentioning how difficult it was to find good
11:18
talent. And I thought, you know, any one
11:22
of these companies would take my mom for a day or two.
11:25
And she's experienced, she's educated, She has you.
11:31
Know but how would they refined her?
11:33
And how would they refined someone like that?
11:35
And I just thought, let's create a marketplace that would allow
11:38
someone like that to find a job or as short as a single shift.
11:42
That's what Bacon's all about is ultimate flexibility of work.
11:46
And that's both sides. You know, hey, I want to bring
11:49
this person in for a day. I don't want to have to go
11:51
through long onboarding. I just need to get some stuff
11:54
done. And that's how we first started
11:56
off. Interesting.
11:58
And so were there any members of your founding team or sort of
12:01
like the first couple of employees that had a background
12:04
in staffing or you guys were coming at this completely as
12:07
outsiders? The closest thing I would say is
12:10
the company we were working for before was this tech company and
12:13
it was doing employee engagement software.
12:17
And so we were familiar with some of the, you know, HR
12:20
related challenges that I would say, but we were obviously not
12:24
providing any staffing. So staffing directly, no working
12:28
with people as the primary, you know, service that we are
12:33
providing, we were familiar with that.
12:35
So we had a little bit of experience with that, but we
12:38
were pretty much outsiders. And you know that that's calls
12:43
back that improvise, adapt and overcome type thing.
12:45
You know, you just got to find a creative way to solve that
12:48
problem when there's a market to solve.
12:51
And so tell us how you got that very first customer, the Utah
12:55
Valley Convention Center. Yeah, they're a great customer.
12:59
Turned out that one of their directors actually just lives in
13:03
my neighborhood and I didn't know until years later.
13:05
And so that was a fun thing to find out.
13:07
Later on, one of the members of our team was going out to
13:14
clients and visiting them and showing them the platform that
13:17
we had built to that point and trying to get an idea if this is
13:22
something they would be interested in using.
13:25
And the person said, not only am I interested, but I think I'd
13:28
like to use it for an upcoming event.
13:31
And we had, we only had it in beta at that time, so it wasn't
13:35
live and what I thought. Was you didn't have any workers
13:39
employees like so. Well, actually or you did?
13:42
We did, we did. I did a little bit of growth
13:44
hack stuff in the beginning. We actually had 6000 people on
13:47
the platform before we were launched.
13:49
Oh, how did that happen? Yeah, I mean, we, so we did a
13:53
variety of, you know, social media, e-mail to friends and
13:56
family and then please pass this on.
13:58
We did actually a little bit of paid advertising through some,
14:03
you know, some more low end cost type opportunities.
14:08
I mean, we did everything. We, I don't know if I would
14:11
promote this as a thing to do, but when you're out there in the
14:14
beginning entrepreneur, you just got to hustle.
14:16
So this same employee's name's Matt, one of our founding team
14:20
members. We wanted to go to a career fair
14:23
where people going in to try to find work, but we didn't want to
14:27
pay for the booth. So we just put a bunch of Flyers
14:29
on the cars in the parking lot and saw if anyone, you know,
14:34
picked up a flyer. And we obviously knew there was
14:37
a target audience there. And then by the time he even got
14:40
back to the office, someone had responded, signed it up and
14:43
said, hey, yeah, when are you guys going to have things
14:45
posted? And we said we're in the pre
14:47
launch phase, we expect to have things, you know some
14:50
opportunities in the next month or so.
14:52
And by that period of time, all that work, we had built up 6000
14:56
workers. And so by the time you're having
14:59
the conversation with the Convention Center and they're
15:02
saying, yeah, we're we're interested, you had a stable of
15:05
folks that and they were all local that growth.
15:09
Was all, yeah, it was all just local, all pushing it local and
15:12
trying to build it local. And you know, a lot of people
15:15
say chicken or the egg when it comes to A2 size 2 sided
15:18
marketplace. I actually don't think that's
15:20
the way to think about it. And maybe it is actually I think
15:24
more a way to think about it. When you get your marketplace
15:26
built in the future and you have to start gauging between
15:31
hundreds of thousands of you know, supply and maybe 10s of
15:35
thousands of demand. And they got larger, larger
15:38
volume of units that you have to really start to balance.
15:41
But I think in the beginning side, which you have to find out
15:44
is what is the most important side of the marketplace.
15:48
And usually that's the paying side of the marketplace.
15:51
And so you find out what that piece is and you find out what
15:54
they want and what they're willing to do.
15:56
And you know what, how much they're going to pay.
15:58
And you know what is what is sort of a expectation that they
16:01
that side might have and you go and get it.
16:05
And I think people think of two sided marketplaces and software
16:09
as this mysterious, you know, not the same thing as a SAS
16:14
company or something like that. And I'm like, every business is
16:17
a marketplace of some type. Actually, if you think about it,
16:21
we got to figure out how many shoes to put on the shelf in the
16:24
shoe store. And you got to figure out that
16:27
by gauging your demand. And you got to figure out, you
16:30
know, how much food to put on the grocery store and you got to
16:34
figure out that by what's the population in the area.
16:36
So it's all just kind of a math equation.
16:39
And in the beginning stages, I think it's important to know
16:42
which variables are the easy ones to get and which ones are
16:46
the hard ones to get and which ones are going to be the paying
16:50
ones and which ones are not going to be the paying ones,
16:51
they're going to be the ones providing the service.
16:54
So. And so in your platform, it's
16:56
the companies that are paying. Companies paying.
17:00
OK. So from the time that the
17:03
Convention Center said yes, we're interested, how long was
17:06
it until you had your first worker showing up at site?
17:12
Even more fun than that was the day that we went to go do the
17:16
final set up in the demo to get them on board.
17:20
Our employee, Matt, his wife had a baby that day.
17:22
So he's like, Hunter, can you pick up this meeting?
17:25
I'm like, certainly I can, let's go do it.
17:28
I went to the meeting, walked in and she's like, I'm ready to
17:31
post, just show me how to do it. And that was for an event that
17:34
weekend. I think it was Wednesday or
17:36
something. And so it was Wednesday to
17:38
Friday or something like that. And I think the post initially
17:42
was for like 10 people. And for that first shift, to be
17:46
honest, it was 50% of it was like members of our friends and
17:49
family or members, you know, people from us, our team.
17:54
That signed up for this ship just so that you could fill the
17:58
space and show them that it worked and.
18:00
Yes and the other 5 though were others that were part of that
18:03
initial 6000. But by the end of the the, you
18:06
know, however many days they had run, majority of it was people
18:09
from the pre signups. So you know that's how you get
18:15
something off the ground. It's like when you're trying to
18:17
start a fire, you got to get the kindling and you got to blow on
18:21
it. You got to be really gentle and
18:24
well, once it gets going, they then, you know, you just add,
18:27
add fuel to it and it keeps growing so.
18:30
Was there a part of you that was shocked that it actually worked?
18:33
I mean, you're building this to do this thing, but there has to
18:38
be a part of you that's like on the edge of your seat, like
18:40
holding your breath. Like is anybody actually going
18:43
to like commit and sign up? I don't know if I was shocked as
18:48
much as I was like, OK, now we got work to do.
18:52
OK. Because something now that now
18:54
that the pipes are fit together and the water's running through
18:57
it now we got work to do. OK.
18:58
So because we had people that signed up before and, and we had
19:02
run some manual shifts before. So we knew kind of the, the
19:06
right steps to get a, a, a job staffed, right?
19:11
We did it all with spreadsheets and things initially phone
19:14
calls. So we knew it would work.
19:18
We just didn't know if it worked through our platform.
19:20
And then once it worked through our platform, well, there's a
19:22
kind of funny learning, this is a maybe a lesson for those that,
19:27
you know, are doing lean startup type stuff.
19:33
But we launched it and it was originally sort of like an Uber
19:36
approach where it's like 1 driver and essentially one
19:39
rider, right? Like one person to work a, a
19:41
single shift. So this first user went in and
19:45
she needed ten people over three days.
19:49
So 30 people, 30 total shifts and she went and made each one
19:53
of those one at a time, 3030 shifts do the same process 30
19:59
times. And I told that to my engineer.
20:03
She went and did that 30 times. And he sat right there in our he
20:08
didn't even leave the conference room and he rebuilt it so that
20:12
she could mass post right then and there first day, right?
20:16
So. Anyway.
20:18
That's that's adapting very quick on the fly.
20:20
Yes, exactly. Yeah, right.
20:22
That was fun. I think the more fun that was
20:25
when I had got out of that, when I finished that meeting, I
20:32
realized we had not launched the public site.
20:34
It was still in beta. And so I called, I called up our
20:38
engineer at that time and I was like, turn it on, like push it,
20:42
push it fly. She's walking back to her.
20:44
Office right now. And he, you know, that was kind
20:49
of a fun moment for us to kind of chuckle about afterward.
20:51
And, you know, he got it there, launched it right away.
20:55
And she went back and didn't know any different, you know,
20:58
just started posting. So how does it work on the
21:00
employee side? Do they have to verify their
21:02
identity somehow when they sign up?
21:05
Yeah, yeah. So there's, you know, a lot of
21:07
the standard things that staffing agencies do.
21:09
We have a a background check that they go through.
21:12
There's, you know, some, you know, I 9 type stuff that we do.
21:17
There's different things like that depending on what service
21:20
we're we're providing On the W2 side, obviously there's a lot
21:24
more, OK. So that was going to be my
21:25
question, are these 1099 or W twos or like a mix like a how's
21:30
this work? Yeah.
21:31
So we have two services. 1 is the 1089 side, which is a lot
21:38
more. It was a lot more gig economy,
21:42
just open marketplace style. And then the W2 side of our
21:47
operation is much more of that standard staffing model and and
21:51
yeah, those, those workers belong to our company and then
21:56
are obviously subbed out to the companies that use them than the
22:01
standard staffing model. We have both both options.
22:04
And so are you, what kinds of jobs are you actually filling?
22:09
And are they, they tend to be different if they're sort of
22:12
1099 gig style versus W2? Yeah, they, we primarily work
22:19
with the light industrial space. So warehouses, fulfillment, you
22:25
know, third party fulfillment centers, any private label
22:29
company that does its own warehouse and fulfillment in the
22:32
back, those are our bread and butter.
22:35
We know how to do those exceptionally well and have a
22:40
lot of, you know, long standing clients that have used us that
22:45
some of them have switched primarily to our platform.
22:49
And then, you know, we also work with the hospitality side.
22:53
So events and catering and those are of course are more like,
22:57
hey, I need, you know, 100 people this weekend and then
23:01
I'll talk to you in a couple weeks for my next event.
23:03
So it's a little bit different style where you got the
23:06
warehouse that's every day I need a minimum of X and I might
23:10
ramp up during my busy season versus, you know, single event
23:15
style. And so is it your client that is
23:19
choosing whether they want to go the 1099 or the W2 route or how
23:24
is that determined? Well, certainly in certain
23:26
environments there's no 1099 option available with regulatory
23:31
type environments that we have. There's a lot that's going on
23:34
there, I think in our, in our economy and our, you know,
23:38
different, different governments in the states that we work in.
23:42
And some are more supportive of sort of, I would say the Uber
23:45
model and more, and some are less supportive of it.
23:49
We actually think that there's some benefits to both.
23:53
As I've, I've kind of mentioned before, we, we believe that both
24:00
are great tools. You know, they are, as I
24:04
mentioned, there's sort of like a hammer or you know, a
24:07
screwdriver. Both can fasten things together.
24:10
They're used for different reasons.
24:11
And what I think companies that choose to go more of a 1089
24:16
approach are those that have maybe less of a regular hosting,
24:23
less of the the same standard people that are going to be
24:26
coming back. It's really like say I need, you
24:30
know, 50 people and I kind of don't care exactly who those
24:34
people are. I just need them to show up.
24:36
I need them to do this job. I need them to help me with this
24:39
and we'll be we'll be done. Some are much more maybe cost
24:44
conscious. Think of mom and pop shops that
24:47
are just trying to get someone in, you know, one or two people
24:52
and try them out for a little while.
24:54
If they like them, maybe they'll bring them on full time.
24:57
So those are other 1099 approaches that people might
25:00
use. And it has a lot to do with, you
25:04
know, how does the worker want to handle the situation?
25:08
Do they want something that's a lot more stable?
25:10
Do they want to feel like they are part of this organization?
25:15
Or do they want to have complete free reign over where and when
25:19
they want to work, which, you know, is the essence of a
25:22
contractor. I think they get to choose when
25:25
and where they want to work for what price they want to pick.
25:27
And they don't have to have the tools or whatever.
25:29
They can kind of do that themselves, and that's what the
25:33
the other ten O 9 approach does provide.
25:36
And you're saying there are some geographies that are less
25:41
accepting of sort of the 1099, the gig economy approach.
25:45
Are there other types of government or regulatory, I
25:49
don't know if you're going to call them, hurdles or situations
25:55
that you and your clients have to navigate?
25:58
Yeah, I mean, and there's also environments that are more
26:00
favorable, like Tennessee and Georgia have been more favorable
26:03
to the gig economy. They find it that that is a big
26:05
boom to their economy for people being able to, you know, find
26:11
work and stay out of unemployment.
26:14
Like I, I once had a conversation with, you know,
26:17
some of the people here in Utah, including the governor, and
26:21
said, I know that we're concerned with unemployment.
26:25
I can tell you I can get someone to have money in their pocket
26:28
faster than they can get to the unemployment app application.
26:32
So you know, and I know it's not a long term solution.
26:35
There's maybe not benefits for the some of these guys, but they
26:39
also just need money to feed their families.
26:41
So that's what I'm saying. There's a great tool there.
26:44
Sometimes it's the stepping stone for them to find the next
26:47
thing that would get them those benefits and things like that.
26:50
And if that's what they need, then I say, well, we will get
26:53
you in however many doors and let you prove yourself and that
26:59
will help you find a job with those things.
27:03
The worst part is if they're just at home, they're not
27:05
getting any answers back. You know, they're filling out
27:08
applications, they're feeling down on themselves.
27:10
And I really care about the confidence that people have from
27:14
being able to bring income to provide some support for
27:18
themselves and their families. That matters to me.
27:21
And that's why I think to to say that the 1099 option is bad or
27:27
try to regulate against it is a little bit of a miss because it
27:32
is an option to get someone out of that situation and then build
27:37
the next step and build the next step and build the next step
27:41
you're. Saying get them off the couch,
27:42
get them working a contributing member of society, which is what
27:46
they ultimately are seeking themselves.
27:49
And that builds some confidence that gets some some momentum,
27:51
gets a little money in their pocket, they can start paying
27:53
some of their bills. And then, you know, being out
27:57
sort of the workforce, the the next opportunity can kind of
27:59
present itself. That's right.
28:01
And not all environments are completely regulatory supportive
28:10
of that. And the unfortunate part is I
28:12
think that they're only looking at the way to make money is to
28:17
be a full time employee for a company that provides you
28:19
benefits. And not everyone is at that
28:24
point. I watched it with my own eyes as
28:27
a kid. Like I saw my mom trying to put
28:29
stuff together with temp work and go to school.
28:33
Now, she later on became a great employee and she had a master's
28:36
degree. And not like, but you got to get
28:38
people a start sometimes. And and I don't think that that
28:42
start has to be money out of the pocket of the government.
28:44
I think that's start can come from them, you know, figuring it
28:50
out themselves, getting a start themselves, putting some money
28:52
in their pocket themselves. An entrepreneurship is not an
28:55
option. You got to give them another,
28:57
another road and and then build on that a step at a time.
29:02
You know, as I mentioned, opportunity well nourished
29:05
yields more opportunity. That's the key principle of
29:09
which you know we follow is get them moving in the right
29:12
direction and so. I've had the chance to talk to a
29:16
number of other, I'll call them more traditional staffing
29:19
agencies and a couple of things that I hear from them that's
29:23
affecting their clients and and therefore them as well.
29:26
And, and they tend to be in similar industries like light
29:29
industrial, quick service, hospitality is sort of the
29:34
uncertainty around tariffs and sort of all the, the new
29:41
regulations and movements around immigration.
29:44
Are you seeing, does that stuff affect you guys at all or are
29:47
you kind of immune to that because you're you're set up?
29:49
It certainly effects our clients.
29:51
I will say that we have some clients that do a lot of
29:54
importing from overseas. We have some clients that use a
29:57
lot of you know, immigrant workers and they are working a
30:02
little bit out of fear right now.
30:06
They're they're trying to adapt. I think some of them might even
30:09
be supportive of the overall direction that the
30:13
administration is going in, but are certainly trying to figure
30:17
out how to make their business work under these constraints.
30:20
And so I think, you know, companies that are struggling
30:25
with, you know, tariffs, struggling with, you know,
30:28
potential immigration challenges with their worker base, there's
30:35
ways to solve that and there's ways to do that the right way
30:38
and, and stay clear of that. And you know, that's something
30:44
that we provide as a company. We are trying to help a lot of
30:48
our existing clients navigate that and make some adaptations
30:51
and changes. But I'll say the one thing is
30:53
this the the best school you can have when you have uncertainty
31:00
is flexibility. Like as a company, you have to
31:05
be able to flex and you got to be able to figure out how to
31:08
make those moves fast. And if you don't make if you're
31:11
not making them, your competition might be making them
31:14
and getting ahead of you in that area.
31:17
So being flexible and our clients that have relied heavily
31:22
on a base of on demand flexible staff have been able to do that
31:28
in some of these uncertain times.
31:29
Just think about it, you know, tariffs are at a certain rate
31:34
one day and the next day they are different.
31:36
And so that impacts your margins and you need to determine how to
31:41
adapt to that. And if you have a large staff
31:45
that is full time, you're looking at potential, you know,
31:49
layoffs as an option or in the case that it's the opposite way,
31:54
which you know, are the are the high times something goes the
31:58
opposite way and your business is booming.
32:00
And now you're looking at a long period of time potentially to
32:03
try to get people in the door to allow you to take advantage of
32:06
that. It's hard to staff up and staff
32:09
back down when when you've got sort of that, what's the word
32:14
I'm looking for sort of that consistency in terms of, you
32:17
know, you know, what to expect, right.
32:19
And with the rates, the tariff rates going up and down, you
32:22
know, I've heard lots of companies, they've got orders
32:25
that they told, you know, their factories overseas to just, you
32:29
know, sit in their warehouse, just sit there to stop
32:31
production or O OK, now the tariffs are lower.
32:35
Like ship everything. As quickly as you can.
32:37
Now nobody can find a container to to send over.
32:41
Yeah, it has a cascading. Effect exactly.
32:45
And so you've got to be able to be nimble and you got to be
32:47
fast. And unfortunately, when when
32:50
uncertainty settles in, often times what the human instinct to
32:56
do is nothing like just wait. I don't know, let's just wait.
33:03
And I certainly don't recommend the opposite, which is like run
33:06
down a path and expect that that's what it's going to be all
33:09
the time. And, you know, set the ship in a
33:11
certain direction and let it roll at full speed.
33:14
That's not the way to go. But just like when you're going
33:17
through an obstacle course, you have to move nimbly through it
33:21
in order to get it done. And you got to take every
33:26
obstacle for what it is and figure out how to get over it.
33:31
And sitting there and waiting for potentially the obstacle to
33:34
move is probably not the best strategy.
33:38
Hunter, you mentioned that you guys are able to kind of help
33:41
your clients navigate some of these uncertainties around
33:46
tariffs and immigration. What does that look like?
33:48
What What are you guys able to offer them from a practical
33:51
standpoint? Well, like you mentioned, when
33:54
shipping goes down low or increases rapidly, our ability
34:01
to staff up and staff down is I think the fastest solution out
34:06
there, even faster than than a traditional temp agency model
34:11
because of the marketplace effect.
34:14
Because you don't have access to a temp agencies maybe 200 person
34:19
roster or 500%, you have access to hundreds of thousands of
34:22
people and 10s of thousands that might be downloading it at any
34:26
one month, right. And it's fresh, it's always
34:30
fresh. And so, you know, one day you're
34:35
saying, I don't, you know, hold off.
34:38
We can't, we can't have this many people working today
34:43
because our, you know, shipments stuck in port, right?
34:47
You have a very flexible staff. Those people are not going to
34:50
never come back. They like working for you.
34:53
Just keep them on your favorites list deep in your group and just
34:58
tell them, you know, we're not needed today.
35:00
And guess what? They'll go find work on a
35:02
different place on our marketplace.
35:04
That's the advantage to them. You're not leaving them without
35:07
an opportunity because you've let them go or something along
35:10
those lines. And now they got to start over
35:12
from scratch. There's a full marketplace of
35:14
opportunity for them to go find the paycheck that they need.
35:17
And then when the shipment comes back in, guess what?
35:21
They'll be the first ones to come back.
35:23
You send out those personal invites through our platform and
35:27
the people who've worked for you before are like 90% more likely
35:31
to work for you. And so again, and once they
35:35
worked for you, about 5 shifts, that person's almost guaranteed
35:39
anytime you invite them, they'll come.
35:41
They know your system. They know you know how to get.
35:44
Started point that 5 shifts. Yeah, exactly now.
35:47
They're familiar, they're comfortable, they're just right
35:49
back. And so a lot of times they're
35:52
like, well, I just want someone here and I want them to be here
35:54
forever. And it's like, I'm sorry, but
35:56
the retention days are over. Like the days then maybe for
36:00
your full time staff, but for these type of hourly roles,
36:04
people will switch for as short, you know, small as $0.50 on the
36:07
dollar more an hour and so and for and for, you know, if their
36:12
family's sick or if they're moving on to something, they'll
36:14
switch for any reason a a full time person and inevitably is a
36:19
turned over person. So the way to think about it is
36:22
not retention, it's silent flow. Build a roster of individuals
36:28
that can come in and keep your business moving along with the
36:32
push of a button. And that's what we allow them to
36:34
do. And then on the regulatory side,
36:37
I'll just answer quickly here. We have both options.
36:40
So if they're like, hey, I'm a little bit more concerned about,
36:45
you know, making sure we have, you know, E verified workers and
36:51
you know, one thing or another, you have options, you know, we
36:54
have different staffing options to fit those needs.
36:57
And so we know a lot about that. We know a lot about that in
37:01
almost every state because we are constantly looking at those
37:05
things. I was going to ask, what
37:06
geographies are you guys available in?
37:09
Yeah, we have done things and we are obviously a lot in Utah and
37:13
Las Vegas and Dallas, Fort Worth area of Texas, some in Houston.
37:18
We have some things in Miami, we have some things in Virginia.
37:24
We had, you know, shifts in various states across the.
37:28
And as you sort of think about new markets and that chicken egg
37:32
problem, I'm going to guess it's when you find the paying client
37:37
who says, hey, can you guys help us here?
37:40
Then you guys have some system on the back end where you know
37:43
how to go and find the types of folks that are looking for these
37:47
opportunities to work there. And you say, OK, now we can sort
37:50
of put you guys together. Right.
37:53
And one thing to think about is the 10, I'll just let you know
37:56
like the 1099 model is faster to spin up just like that very
38:01
first experience with the the Convention Center.
38:04
I told you like we had third amount of people signed up
38:07
already that we're just waiting for when the opportunities came.
38:12
And when they did come, because it was more gig focused.
38:16
It wasn't like I'm, I'm relying on this as my primary bread and
38:19
butter income. It's oh, I'm, I'm just ready to
38:22
make some money here and there. So they're waiting.
38:25
And as soon as that opportunity posts, boom, we can fill it as
38:29
long as it's at a certain volume.
38:32
And so if you're looking at like a small client that's doing like
38:35
10 to 20 a day, we can do that in almost any market from the
38:39
ground up in a matter of weeks will be ready to go at a very
38:44
low cost and. That would sort of be like the
38:46
minimum threshold, like, yeah, 10 shifts per day.
38:50
Yeah, yeah. And I mean, they can start
38:52
smaller than that, but it's going to take, you know, a
38:54
little bit longer commitment to know that they're going to
38:56
regularly have things going. 'Cause you guys are.
38:59
Actually want to. Costs involved in getting costs
39:02
up in a new market. Right, right.
39:05
So, but then once you get to a point where you're doing more
39:08
volume in a market per, you know, per month and you have
39:12
clients that want to say, hey, I want to really, you know, have
39:16
the same people back. I want to be able to tell them,
39:19
you know, a little bit, treat them a little bit more like an
39:20
employee. Then we'll maybe switch them
39:22
over to AW2 model and let them kind of do it that way and say
39:26
let's get some regular people in there so.
39:31
W2 When you go that model that tends to be folks that are
39:35
working there a bit more regularly.
39:38
That's correct. So the steady.
39:40
And they can do that on a 1099 side, but it's not, there's
39:44
nothing on our platform that says you have to go anywhere or
39:47
do anything. It's all choice, you know,
39:51
accountability and flexibility. On the W2 side, obviously it's a
39:57
little bit more of a commitment and you know, assignment to go
40:03
work for a place for a certain amount of time.
40:06
What's the biggest resistance you get when talking to
40:10
potential new customers? What is it that you have to?
40:13
What's the fear of concern that you have to overcome?
40:18
I'd say that that the biggest one honestly is I've worked with
40:22
a lot of staffing agencies and my experience has been horrible.
40:25
And I, I hate to say that, but you know, and I'm not saying
40:29
that every one of our shifts is perfect and it's going to be
40:32
rays of sunshine, but we have certain things that regulate
40:37
that. I'll give you an example.
40:39
A lot of times someone picks up someone from a temp agency and
40:42
they don't like them. They might say, I don't like
40:45
that person. I don't want them to have them
40:47
come back. But do realize that that
40:49
staffing agency is going to send them somewhere else because they
40:51
have, they've, they've got, they've taken the time to
40:54
onboard this person. We have, you know, a thing that
41:01
allows us to monitor that and hold people accountable.
41:05
So they're all the workers are rated and reviewed, you know, at
41:08
the end of the shifts by the by the supervisors.
41:12
And those ratings can be seen by other prospective employers.
41:15
That's correct. Yeah, Just like an Uber driver,
41:17
like you can see just a person, you know, five star.
41:21
How many reviews do they have? Yeah, 255 stars.
41:24
That looks great. And then we have a thing called
41:26
a Bacon score, which takes attendance factors and
41:29
performance factors. And think of it like a credit
41:31
score. It kind of puts those together
41:33
on a scale of 1 to 800. And you know, if they're in
41:40
that, you know, 6 to 800 range, you're looking at a really great
41:45
person. And they have a history of
41:49
showing up on time and working the whole duration of the ship.
41:52
They have a history of getting good star ratings over those
41:55
shifts, and those would be indicators that this is a person
41:59
that both knows how to show up, work hard and, you know, work
42:04
well with others. What's behind the name Hunter
42:08
Bacon? Well, I did as you mentioned, I
42:12
did work previously in you know, some creative fields and that
42:16
was in the advertising and marketing space for a good
42:19
portion of my career initially. Kristen Porter, as you
42:21
mentioned, and as I came into this, I was like, I don't want
42:24
to have the same name. I don't want to be confused with
42:28
anybody else, you know, people this or gig that.
42:31
And I just wanted to have something unique one day.
42:35
My son, my he was 10 at the time and he had a notebook notepad
42:39
and he had changed the name of the notebook from whatever it
42:44
was Yusa Sharpie wrote over the top of it and made it say bacon.
42:47
And it made me laugh. I thought, OK, that's good.
42:50
I want when they think of us, I don't want them to think of
42:53
boring staffing. I want them to be thinking of
42:55
something fun. But I thought of bringing home
42:58
the bacon, which is what we want to help our workers do and save
43:02
your bacon, which is what we want to help our companies do
43:05
when they have a staffing need. And I thought, we're going to
43:09
call it bacon. I, I can remember the teams when
43:12
we first told them that we're going to name the company that
43:15
none of them believed me. And I said, no, I'm absolutely
43:17
serious. And I think they all started to
43:20
believe that it was a good name when we started to get calls,
43:24
You know, we would do calls and they'd say, you know, I'd say
43:27
I'm the CEO of Bacon. I'd love to talk with you.
43:29
And they'd say, wait, what did you say?
43:33
That's what you want, that's what you want.
43:35
I love it. I've started a number of
43:37
companies and different brands in, in my past and I've done
43:41
some of the sort of the old traditional boring names.
43:44
And then I've done some of, you know, what you're describing,
43:47
kind of the more like unusual, like fun names.
43:49
And I, and I think that path is so much better for all the
43:53
reasons that you just mentioned. I, I love that.
43:56
So I want to check myself on a, on a stat I've got here.
44:00
I see that you recently raised 16 and a half million in seed
44:05
funding from some notable investors like Greyhawk Capital.
44:09
Is that right? Yeah.
44:10
I mean, that's over time we've done and we've done, we've done
44:13
a little bit more than that over time.
44:14
But yeah, that's about that range that we've raised.
44:17
And Ray Hawk's one of the noteworthy ones.
44:20
They're a great support to us. We've been able to do some
44:24
fundraising over the years and get support for our build.
44:28
And so how are you putting those funds to use?
44:31
Is this mostly in engineering talent?
44:34
You know, is there a lot of sort of human customer service that's
44:38
there? Yeah, certainly engineering and
44:42
product, we always want to put some into being successful at
44:46
that. But a lot of that has been our
44:48
growth in the new markets and growing over the years.
44:51
And, you know, taking those and putting it into marketing
44:55
dollars and into, you know, sales team members to get us out
44:59
there and help us grow and expand and help expand the
45:01
business. What's probably the biggest
45:04
growth lever that you are able to pull?
45:07
Is it like you're running? I mean, I guess I'm thinking
45:11
about this from two different aspects.
45:13
Let's talk first about how do you find the clients?
45:15
Is that like a lot of cold calling?
45:17
Are you, I don't know, running LinkedIn ads to the folks?
45:20
What's that look like? So we actually have a pretty
45:23
strong outside sales team that go out there and meet with
45:27
warehouse managers and you know, staffing managers, things like
45:31
that. And I just asked them are you
45:33
using temp labor and if so, how's it going?
45:36
And usually the answer is we are and it's going OK And we say,
45:41
well, we got good news. You know, we're, we do solve
45:43
that staffing problem, but we're not a traditional staffing
45:46
agency. We're we're an app and we do it
45:48
this way and maybe should give it a shot.
45:51
And that's kind of the approach they take.
45:54
That's that's been our primary driver.
45:56
But Readman, more recent years as the market has kind of
45:59
changed and shifted, we actually have a lot of inbound work that
46:04
comes from word of mouth or from, you know, online, you
46:08
know, advertising that people see the need for staffing.
46:12
And I think that there's two things there.
46:15
One, I think that those warehouse managers are younger
46:19
folks who are used to finding things through their phone.
46:21
I'll just be honest. They'll, they'll click around
46:23
and, you know, it used to maybe not be that type of person, but
46:27
now it is more and more a younger person that is trying to
46:31
find a staffing solution. And they've grown up with social
46:34
media, Uber and Lyft and DoorDash, and they're looking
46:37
for something new. And, you know, maybe the second
46:42
reason is we're becoming more popular.
46:45
There's a lot of services out there, a lot more than when we
46:49
first started this company. And maybe people know a little
46:52
about them and they want to try them out.
46:54
So the inbound has been stronger in more recent years?
46:57
Is there any thought about growing through acquisition?
47:00
Does it make any sense for you guys to consider acquiring, you
47:04
know, local shops that have a big presence there and kind of
47:07
putting your tech in place over top of that?
47:10
I'm really glad you asked that because that it makes a lot of
47:13
sense to do that. We've actually looked at some of
47:15
those opportunities and this is one of the differences that I
47:19
think we have found as we have looked at those opportunities.
47:23
There's been some challenges because some of these people
47:26
this is their livelihood and they're not really interested in
47:28
getting out of it anytime soon. And so they might be interested
47:31
in an acquisition, but they might be saying not right now,
47:33
maybe in another five years, 10 years, something like that when
47:36
they're ready to retire. But there's a lot of people
47:38
retiring right now. You know, Silver Tsunami is they
47:42
kind of refer to IT industry term of people that have built
47:45
great successful businesses but have little to no technology
47:51
implemented could really benefit from that.
47:53
And we're interested in meeting with them.
47:55
But I'll tell you one thing that we learned as we went through
47:58
and met some of these, the power of the technology is that it
48:03
helps the core margins improve. Staffing historically is a
48:09
pretty slim margin business as much as companies, you know,
48:13
either like man, you're charging me a ton to, to bring these
48:17
people in, but there's, that's because there's a lot that you
48:20
have to do. You got to cover all those
48:22
finding and you know, processing and all these types of things in
48:28
order to get that person to be able to work successfully for
48:32
you on short notice. But what we have found is that
48:35
our margins are usually about double per shift what US
48:42
traditional staffing agencies. Doing.
48:43
How is that possible? Well, we can service more shifts
48:48
with less people because of our technology.
48:50
We can get shifts to happen more automatedly.
48:54
We have a thing in our platform called a backup algorithm that
48:58
if someone is about to know, we know kind of the percentages as
49:02
they play out for no shows. And so we plan for that in
49:07
advance and we are going to send backup workers based on that
49:12
algorithm. And if you don't need them, if
49:14
we have the, you know, situation where someone where you know,
49:17
some, everyone shows up and you got to have a backup worker, you
49:21
can send them away. And we pay them for just showing
49:24
up. We pay them a an amount for
49:27
being being there. Just being on standby basically
49:30
just. Being on standby.
49:31
And they could show up and say, hey, we've got enough folks, you
49:34
can go home, but here's your fixed payment amount that we
49:37
agreed to. That's right.
49:39
And and we do that, our company does that.
49:41
So we, you know, that pretty finely tuned after, you know,
49:48
hundreds of thousands of shifts to know how many are likely to,
49:54
you know, no show. And by the way, that kind of,
49:57
it's built off of our bacon score.
49:59
So we can look at the configuration of workers and
50:01
say, what's the likelihood we're going to need a backup in this
50:04
situation? So with all that, you don't have
50:08
to have someone in the recruiting seat calling people
50:12
every day and determining if they're going to be there and
50:15
making, if someone knows, shows how am I going to rapidly fill
50:18
that? The app just does it
50:19
automatically. And so we can do things with a
50:22
lot less soft. And our margin per shift is what
50:28
we're shooting for. We want to be the best.
50:30
And So what ends up happening is you can say to a staffing
50:33
agency, this is how you're currently running it.
50:36
And if you're running it in a much more of a manual way, we
50:38
might be able to convert that to our way and have you make, you
50:43
know, double the amount per per shift that you work.
50:47
So would you think about just licensing the tech to other
50:51
staffing firms? We thought about it.
50:54
I think for now, we're focused on continuing to do what we're
50:57
doing and, and building and growing.
50:59
And but we have thought about that and that's more of like a
51:03
business model thing. Like, you know, does the
51:05
business model outpace the business model we currently
51:07
have? And I think markets just shift
51:10
and change. And we actually have had
51:13
staffing agencies come to us when they've got sort of an over
51:20
supply or an over too much demand, you know, too many, OP,
51:24
too many shifts to fill and they aren't ready to staff up that
51:28
fast. And they'll come to us and say,
51:30
hey, can you guys fill these tents for us?
51:32
And we'll just Rev share it. And we're happy to do that.
51:37
But staffing agencies, we don't, we don't feel like we have to
51:40
compete and we'd like we can compete alongside them.
51:44
There's plenty of business for everybody.
51:46
Hunter, what's a serious challenge that you've overcome,
51:49
whether it's personal or professional?
51:51
What did you learn? How did you get through it?
51:55
I'll talk about some some person, some professional ones.
51:58
I'll talk about professional ones first.
51:59
So one of them is that margin game, and it's taken us about
52:06
two years to dial that in and adjust things and figure out how
52:10
to make the platform do the most and figure out what the right
52:14
staff is to allow us to grow and scale.
52:17
And that was, you know, it's kind of the boring stuff.
52:21
It's not the why I'm starting something up and I'm making
52:24
T-shirts. And you know, it's the stuff
52:27
that when you really dig in as ACEO, you have to push the
52:31
organization and say, we are striving to be the best at this.
52:35
It takes lots and lots of small changes.
52:39
And so that's been a really learning, you know, big
52:43
challenge for us to make that adaptation from just rapid
52:46
growth as fast as we could to also profitable growth.
52:50
And so that's been an interesting change.
52:54
COVID was a different challenge for us.
52:55
You know, we went from being a primarily hospitality focused
52:59
business to a much more light industrial.
53:02
Now we're majority light industrial and that shift took
53:06
some courage on our end and some, you know.
53:11
So the hospitality industry mostly shut down.
53:13
It was gone. I mean, it was shut down all so.
53:14
Your business pretty quickly you dropped.
53:17
One day, I remember one day and remember Utah Jazz games, one of
53:22
our, one of our players popped for COVID and you know that the
53:28
whole NBA shut down. And then the very next day
53:30
everyone said no events like just shut them down.
53:33
And yeah, we had thousands of shifts in the hopper and they
53:38
went to essentially 0 / 2 days. And so we had to shift quickly.
53:44
And luckily we had some warehouses that had just become
53:47
new clients and we're liking the shape of that and decided to
53:51
ramp that up and we offered and. If those were sorry to
53:55
interrupt, Hunter, if those were just to kind of paint the
53:57
picture for folks, if those warehouses are doing e-commerce
53:59
fulfillment, that's something that went through the roof.
54:02
Nobody's going to the stores. Everybody's buying stuff online.
54:05
That's correct. Yeah.
54:06
It it went rapid and they could not adapt fast enough and
54:10
everyone's thinking I'll stay at home.
54:12
So they were not only getting more demand than they ever had,
54:16
but they're dealing with a mindset of the average worker,
54:19
which was I'm not supposed to, I'm supposed to be at home.
54:22
And they're saying, well, then people won't have things.
54:26
So we actually looked at it as a way to help the economy and we
54:29
said, hey, you come work with us.
54:31
We're just, we're not even going to charge you fees for the 1st
54:34
60 days. We just want you to get people
54:37
to work and let those people work so they can put money in
54:39
their pockets and get your business, keep your business
54:42
moving along. And that earned us, you know, a
54:46
handful of really great clients coming out of that and then.
54:50
Gamble on your part A. Little bit of a gamble, but a
54:54
bigger gamble was, as I mentioned, sitting there
54:56
wondering what to do in the midst of COVID.
54:59
Yeah. What do you consider to be your
55:02
superpower Hunter? Yeah, IA couple of things.
55:06
I would say that creativity is definitely something I've built
55:10
on. You know, in the early days it
55:13
was advertisements, creative advertisements, maybe design
55:17
related things and just being a really creative person through
55:20
visual expression and you know, fun, fun communication.
55:26
But then learning to adapt that in a different way, different
55:29
solutions to solve business challenges or challenges for
55:33
people in general. That's one of my strengths and
55:38
I've really come to appreciate and learn how to take those
55:42
creative ideas and then turn them into strategy and game plan
55:47
and, you know, something that fits a business model.
55:50
So I think that that's a real strength.
55:52
I think the other strength that I have is just being able to
55:56
really get the best out of people.
56:00
I one of the challenges I do have is I find I do that much
56:04
better on an individual basis. And so it really usually impacts
56:07
the people that directly report to me or that I have close, you
56:10
know, work with. And, you know, I feel like I'm
56:14
currently learning how to expand that further in this role.
56:18
But seeing what moves people, we could sense for that having done
56:25
lots of different things and met with lots of different people
56:27
and worked alongside lots of different people, I think is
56:30
where that comes from. Even my family culture, my dad
56:33
is Filipino. My mom is from here in the
56:35
United States, Mixed culture family, You know, it's like any
56:41
place, any people, any person, I feel like I can get along with
56:45
you, connect with you and figure out what's going to get you
56:48
excited and motivated and help you build a path toward it.
56:53
And I really like to do that with the people I work with.
56:56
What are some strategies that you found that have been helpful
56:59
in doing that? I mean, it sounds really basic,
57:04
but you got to really listen. And you can't just listen with
57:07
your ears. You got to listen with like your
57:09
eyes, with your heart. What are they?
57:12
You know, what does your heart tell you that they are feeling
57:15
right now? To think that people are just
57:18
working machines is the wrong way to approach it.
57:23
And part of my experience in the military actually, you know,
57:27
like it was a very thoughtful, a contemplative Marine, but also
57:35
very disciplined and hard working.
57:39
And I learned that sometimes barking orders is not the best
57:43
way to go, right? So you got to earn people's
57:47
hearts and minds, not just expect them to go in a direction
57:51
at all times because people will do something, you know, if
57:56
forced to, they'll do it, but they won't do it willingly and
57:59
with effort and with commitment. And as soon as, you know,
58:04
something breaks down, they're all just wait for the next order
58:08
instead of figuring it out themselves and pushing through
58:13
it and coming back with the result.
58:15
And ultimately, what I want is a result.
58:17
I don't just want, you know, compliance, I want a result.
58:22
And so I'm looking for not just earning their, you know,
58:27
compliance. I'm looking to earn their hearts
58:29
when I'm working with them. Oh, that's powerful.
58:31
I like that a lot. Anything in terms of daily
58:35
practices or habits that either help you start your day Hunter
58:39
or kind of keep you centered and on track as you go through it.
58:42
It's. Part of a new one recently.
58:44
So on the days when I'm not running I just make sure to go
58:47
for a walk to do my planning while I'm walking.
58:50
I find that my planning while I'm walking is actually more
58:53
productive than sitting at a desk because sometimes my I'll
58:56
want to open up my phone or open up, you know, check an e-mail or
58:59
something like that and it gets tracked really quickly.
59:01
And a walk doesn't allow me to do that.
59:04
I got to be moving along and I got to be thinking of each one
59:06
of those roles that I have, you know, whether it's being a
59:10
father, you know, a member of my church, whether it's being ACEO.
59:16
Like I'm looking through those roles and saying what do I need
59:19
to do and what is the most critical thing to do that I
59:21
could say to myself, if I only got that one thing done today, I
59:26
could check it off and say I did the right thing today.
59:28
So. Do you like to do that in
59:30
silence, or do you listen to music on your walks?
59:36
I've tried both. I think the silence is better
59:39
for me. You get little thoughts and
59:43
promptings and stuff. You can get a little deeper and
59:47
I imagine for some people that's not the same, but for me that's
59:49
what works best. For me, they're they're usually
59:53
not always, but usually has to be some kind of noise.
59:56
So sometimes it's like upbeat music, sometimes it's slower
1:00:01
tempo music, just, you know, sort of what my body needs and
1:00:04
then no affiliation, but brain dot FM has these sort of these
1:00:12
what do they call these tracks? Help me out here the.
1:00:15
Yeah, there's like like white noise tracks or different like
1:00:18
tracks to help you get your mind and a certain.
1:00:21
Binaural beats I think is. Binaural beats.
1:00:25
And there's something about that that man really puts me on the
1:00:28
zone. So yeah, often times for me, the
1:00:32
the quiet is sort of deafening. But yeah, like you said, sort of
1:00:35
to each their own. Everybody has their their own
1:00:37
preference. Hunter, I've just got one more
1:00:39
question. But before I ask it, I want to
1:00:40
do 2 things. First, I'm going to invite all
1:00:42
listeners to just pause for a second.
1:00:46
Go ahead and hit the follow button on your favorite podcast
1:00:48
app. We've had a really interesting
1:00:50
conversation today with Hunter from Bacon Work, and I want you
1:00:53
to continue to get more great stories like this.
1:00:56
Hunter, I also want to let people know the best way to get
1:00:58
in touch with you before I ask that last question.
1:01:01
What is that? And then go to baconwork.com if
1:01:04
they're interested. That's probably the best way to
1:01:06
do it. You can also go to the App Store
1:01:08
if you're a worker and you want to find opportunities, store or
1:01:11
Google Play Store, download it there, search bacon work and
1:01:14
it'll be one of the first things that pops up.
1:01:17
Download it and create your account.
1:01:19
Those are ways to do that as well.
1:01:21
You can do it all right through your phone.
1:01:23
All through your phone. Excellent.
1:01:25
So last question for you, Hunter, you and I reconnect a
1:01:28
year from now and you're celebrating something.
1:01:31
What is that thing that you're celebrating one year from now?
1:01:35
I would like to see this W2 side of our business surpass our 1099
1:01:39
side of our business. And what that would mean is
1:01:41
we've expanded the the into more markets and the larger clients
1:01:46
and maybe provided yet another opportunity for people.
1:01:52
One thing I didn't mention before too is we actually have a
1:01:54
direct hire solution. So they can do temp, they can do
1:01:57
W2 and they can just go direct hire through our platform.
1:02:00
They want to do that. So we're trying to provide
1:02:04
basically any way for someone to get to work because when people
1:02:09
work, they have confidence. And when people have confidence,
1:02:12
it builds more confidence and they get more opportunities to
1:02:15
work. And so we've opened up all those
1:02:18
doors and some of them more recent than others, and I'd love
1:02:21
to see all of those doors have lots of people passing through
1:02:24
them a year from now when we talk again.
1:02:27
From a marketing and operational standpoint, what does it look
1:02:30
like to try to really beef up that W2 side of the business?
1:02:36
You know, we got to get our sales team to learn how to sell
1:02:39
it better. We got to learn how to get the
1:02:42
marketing dialed in better than we have it now.
1:02:45
It's mainly optimization is what I would say because we've done
1:02:48
these shifts before, we know how to do them.
1:02:51
But now we got to build the right marketing and sales
1:02:55
channels, go to market solution in order to scale it at a more
1:02:59
rapid pace. And the same thing goes for our
1:03:01
direct hire platform. Excellent.
1:03:05
Well, Hunter Sabrasos from Bacon Work, I'm going to be the first
1:03:07
to thank you for sharing both your time and your story with us
1:03:10
today. I really appreciate it.
1:03:12
Anthony, appreciate your time and I appreciate you having me
1:03:14
on the show. Folks, that's a wrap on another
1:03:17
episode of the Inspired Stories podcast.
1:03:19
Thanks for learning with us today.