The High Value Man Conversation
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The High Value Man Conversation
Run your life like a SWAT Operator with Travis Ala - HVMP Special Episode
In this special episode of the High Value Man Podcast, we are honored to host an exceptional guest with an incredible story of resilience and triumph.
Meet Travis Ala: a serial entrepreneur, coach, SWAT team member, and Marine Corps veteran. Travis has faced immense challenges, only to rise stronger each time. In this episode, he shares his inspiring journey from the very beginning, the obstacles he overcame, his profound reconnection with faith, and how he now runs a successful million-dollar business.
Tune in for an enlightening conversation filled with valuable insights and powerful life lessons.
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https://www.instagram.com/mrunstuck/
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Everybody who thinks your friend is now no longer your friend. That moment sent me on a trajectory that ultimately led me to find God. Hey, if I'm a better shot than you, but you're in my stack, let's go to the range, because you're the one that's going to be taking shots to defend me. The struggle is always the mindset.
Speaker 2:I've always looked at suicide as selfish. If you don't like the way something is, learn the lessons you can in the seasons and then go, reapply them and develop a table where you can create an infinite opportunity. If you are in your 20s like, the skillset you need to develop is. This is the High Value man Conversation Podcast, a show dedicated to the mission of building high value men. One great man means a great family, a great neighborhood, a better city, community state and the world. The question is, if not you, then who? All right, my friends.
Speaker 2:Well, welcome back to the High Value man Conversation. I am in studio with Mr Travis Alla, a serial entrepreneur. We've got about 10 franchise locations roughly under management right now, over 100 employees, a ton of business expertise and a former SWAT operator. And what we're going to talk about today is how to run your business and life as an operator, the leadership lessons you need to put into your life if you're an entrepreneur, if you're a high-performing man, if you're on the path to becoming a high-value man, if you're in a relationship, how to treat your life as an operator, the lessons, the teaching, the tactics, the strategies and how to do it in such a way that you also don't face burnout, which you're walking through right now, but you get a lot more done in less time. So welcome to the show man.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, I appreciate it. Man, it's always great to get with you in any part of life, so this is just an added bonus.
Speaker 2:Yeah, man. Well, I know that we're going to dive into how we met, but I'd love you to just give the listeners a little background of who you are what you do and how we came to meet each other with Mighty man Sure.
Speaker 1:So grew up in a not so unheard story of poor childhood right A lot of different stepfather situations, abusive alcoholics. My biological was out when I was two. I was in jail and committed suicide when I was 22. In between there, my mom did her best to find good leadership and father figure for the household, and that just sent me on a life of pursuing leadership, pursuing being the guy in my family, right, that didn't really have one. I had an older brother that was a knucklehead and had a younger sister that was figuring life out too. So if it was to be, it was, it was a big job, yep.
Speaker 1:Yep, so caught all the ramifications for the older brothers, yeah, you know stuff. And my younger sister caught all the grace for me not doing those things right.
Speaker 1:So fun place to be yeah uh, but that that's what sent me ultimately down the path of the careers I chose. But, uh, it was just very much whether it was team sports, anything that had tribe kind of feel to it, yeah Right, football, basketball, I mean, chess club, it didn't really matter. I was moving every two to three years. So any opportunity to get involved in tribe kind of feel and feel like I kind of belonged and I've had something to bring to the table and learn from people that had wisdom, counsel, guidance or just were powering through life, yeah Right, because that was the other way to numb out everything I was growing up in. That led to a life that was very much about me, right. Um, that led to a life that was very much about me, right. Lots of accolades, lots of awards and, you know, being the guy about who I was versus whose I was, kind of conversation, right, led into a lot of cool things through school and sports and, uh, and captain of this and king of courts, that and what have.
Speaker 1:You was originally going to texas a&m for architecture that was the plan and like a week before graduation pivoted, decided to join the marine corps. Okay, all my friends had gone to college and just kind of pissed away their their opportunities and I was like I have drive but I didn't really have discipline at the time or patience. So I was like the military sounds like they're out to go and if I'm gonna do it, you got to do the best because my ego is at play. So I've got to go to the marine corps okay and uh, did that?
Speaker 1:excelled the marine corps, because again I was able to make it about, about me, but about my guys, to my left or right. But it's constantly an environment of competition and iron sharpens iron. But also, who's the best today?
Speaker 2:Sure, you kind of need it in the military though especially the Marine Corps. Yeah, you need that mindset.
Speaker 1:And it was a great thing. I would change nothing about it. I mean, the Marine Corps gave me a lot of tools, a lot of mindset, a lot of drive, a lot of how to pivot, fight or flight back against the wall. Calm yourself, just make decisions, and when your mind gets into like a life or death threat, things just slow down. If you train it right, right, you're prepared right, you can slow things down to just make decisions right uh respond, not react, right yeah big difference there and that's a key thing later in business that that's been helpful.
Speaker 1:Uh, I, right around four years, got medically discharged from the marine corps and went back into restaurants at something I had done before getting in the military. I'd had a job since I was 12.
Speaker 1:Any reason to be away from home was a thing and that didn't really check a box for me. So, pretty natural transition law enforcement after the military and started my career in Annapolis, maryland, and about two years on the road pivoted, got into SWAT and got into narcotics and undercover work, hostage rescue type stuff. I was a team leader on a SWAT team. I was a lead detective on an undercover unit and firearms instructor, honor guard, all those things right. And again all about being the best in the room, things you need to be right. Lives are on the line, yeah, but very tribal, very much like I got my guys. We do life together. When we're off, we're at the bar together, whatever right, and racking up any accolades I could detective of the year, office of the year, biggest drug busts, all these things.
Speaker 1:It was always seeking boxes to check versus fulfilling holes inside right and kind of cheap highs and what have you Right around 2015,. That job in itself was very humbling. You see a lot. This career spanned almost a decade. It was task forces and everything out of DC, baltimore, like you see a lot of things. You see how people really are as far as human nature and how dark it can get. Yeah, and in 2015, I was involved in an accident. I was one of four people in that accident. I was the only person to walk away. It was a real trajectory shifter for me.
Speaker 1:Pivotal moment, yeah pretty much an opportunity to rise or fall hard, went down a downward spiral for a good year or so of judgment and isolation, and it was all over the news, social media. I think we've been on headlines before, but not for these kinds of reasons, and everybody who thinks your friend is now no longer your friend. And that moment sent me on a trajectory that ultimately led me to find God Really had me questioning. What am I? What am I here for? What am I doing Like have all these awards, all these medals, all these ribbons and all all these reputation markers and overnight gone like?
Speaker 2:that they're gone yeah.
Speaker 1:And the people that want you in their rooms are now like, yeah, I don't like that guy, I can't be associated with. Yeah, right, political. So you know politics are huge for sure. So, from that birthday journey of purpose and you know, really figuring out whose I was versus who I was, and that moment you know I didn't want to leave the job on anything but my ability and my decision Case got dismissed. No wrong wrongdoing, it was an accident is what happened and decided I had a daughter on the way. I'm gonna re-evaluate life, what's about and what I want to do.
Speaker 1:Went back home to texas and got into sales, excelled there, got into business and haven't looked back. Yeah, so everything that you started in sparking and saying came from sales and learning it along the way, putting it on my shoulders, right, but the difference being that success there was less about me over that trajectory and it was more about building a team, finding my purpose, putting God at the center. And, like Zig Ziglar said it best, I think you know if you help enough people get what they want, you get what you want Right. And looking at it through discipleship and looking at it through leadership and development and helping other people rise. It's taken off like crazy and it's also more fulfilling and it's also tied into the purpose that I was able to identify.
Speaker 2:Yeah, when was your come to Jesus moment? So you're running this military SWAT career, you're finding some success, you're building your tribe. What I heard you say is it was mostly about the world, about Travis. Then you have this life-changing moment where, if you've ever experienced a true accident, it's one of those things that just reminds you how short and how brief life really is, and that's God's hand saying listen, there's something else for you. But when was your like your awakening where, where, um, you started to move towards a greater sense of fulfillment and you know more of a God-centered life?
Speaker 1:Probably like most at uh, one of the lowest points of my life. I would say over that year that I referenced, I probably thought about suicide a dozen times or so. Yeah, and you know, it's one thing to think about, it's a whole other thing to consider it.
Speaker 2:Sure.
Speaker 1:Right and I think that's important in conversation. But I found myself with opportunity, in isolation, to a lesser mind. I think had the Marine Corps not been there, there would have been plenty of opportunities for that thought to transfer to consideration, transfer to consideration. And it was in one of those moments, I think, that I got myself to a point that everything paused my whole life, kind of I won't say flashed, but highlighted before my eyes of where have I came from, where am I at, where am I going? I had a daughter on the way. Where am I going?
Speaker 1:I had a daughter on the way and that was a very big connection for me of you know, my, my biological, committed suicide at this point, uh, three or four years prior, and I know that how that affected me and my sister, and he wasn't even in our life, right, so it gave me kind of a forward looking window as to what my daughter could walk into. Yeah, and then also considering my family, what that impact would be, and I've always looked at suicide as as selfish, right, like I've, I've I've had to go to morgues and let families know and be there for that process, being able to very vividly contextualize and visualize that whole journey of what that would look like in thought before consideration really woke me up to okay, so that's not an option and that's a definitive thing. I'm telling myself. I've said it like I haven't allowed myself to go there, but I'm allowing myself to go there to say this is not an option. So, if that's the case, then what are we doing Right?
Speaker 1:And that moment being that low and realizing I'm as low as I can go because this is not an option is what really woke me up and shook me of. Ok, I need to take everything off and lay it down and audit my life been, um, you know, accolades and and success, and I need to audit all of this. And what am I taking with me moving forward and raising a daughter and raising a family and creating legacy? Um, because I'm as far back as I can go and I can't go any further, that's good. And if I'm going to now set forth on a path that's unknown, because I have a career that I could continue at the end of the day, but do I want to?
Speaker 1:uh, I have an opportunity now to write this next chapter right and design it rather than default it Right. So I would say that that moment was the big come to Jesus moment, because prior to that, I wasn't even open to God in my life. When the accident happened, I had people telling me man, god's got plans for you. There's guardian angels over you.
Speaker 2:And I'm like what are y'all talking about?
Speaker 1:Yeah, At this time I was coming up just before my second divorce and my first wife was a Jehovah's Witness. My second wife was Jewish. I was raised Mormon, like I've been all over the map. So anybody who was talking God or Christ, I was like man, I'm not hearing it. But that moment allowed me to, in that audit, wipe the slate clean and be like, okay, I clearly don't have this figured out. So I need to be open to considering some new thought processes and new ID ideologies. And, uh, shortly thereafter, uh, I had actually been at a conference where, uh, keith Kraft spoke and that was the first voice that really hit me and some ideologies and whatnot. That was like this guy's got to figure it out, yeah, and it, had it been any other point in my life, I wouldn't have listened to it, and Scott Unkelbach had been mentoring me a little bit prior to that and took me to that conference.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 1:Pulled me to that conference. We'll say Okay and I got involved. It was network marketing, which what drew me was tribe aspect of it Business opportunity.
Speaker 2:Business opportunity yeah.
Speaker 1:But what kept me was the relationships and the tribe and a lot of things developing over time. Yeah, and that was the hook that ultimately pulled me here. I mean I picked up, packed everything and moved sight unseen and rented a house off Craigslist in Nashville at a truck stop at two in the morning. It's like I hope it's there. Here's my deposit. And been at Elevate for 10 years now. That's awesome, yep, 10 years and been dating Mighty Men not the men but the platform there, since it was a dozen guys at Rudy's but I've very much been like dip my toe in all this, like you guys, are a little vulnerable for me, so I had a process.
Speaker 1:I was walking at the time and I've walked through it. Now. You know, like my name is a staple of my life, I travel around it, so it was a hook then that allowed God to really work on me in process and for me to give my life to God in 2019,. Uh, josh baptized me. Uh, josh craft, and I haven't looked back since. Right, I've been very obedient, very, uh, surrendering, and that's ultimately where what led to you meeting me in mighty men, right.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, that's a long answer to your question. I love that, though, cause I you know our, our story is so important for us to recognize the moments when God's had his hand on our life for one. And but also, nothing makes sense looking forward, but the dots always connect. Looking backwards, right, and so the what I picked up from this is that tribe community like having purpose, meaning from either the Marine Corps or the SWAT has always been very important to you, because I found this is that a lot of men that were raised without a strong father figure, we search that, we seek that, like we need that. Men need tribe, and so you had this desire in your heart, but you're like each tribe you're a part of was not completely congruent. There's like aspects that were missing, maybe not driving in the perfect direction, but you gain skill sets at each one that allow you to be where you are now, and what I love about, um, and just I think of this, as you know, when the student is ready, the teacher appears, and so you were at this point of humility, because life humbled you, and life will humble everybody at some point, and it's typically in the pit. There's another great saying that there's no atheist in a foxhole, right. So you're taking bullet fire and you're in the foxhole and you're going to reach out for somebody. You're going to reach out for God. So, god, please help me. And so you're in this pit and the pit becomes the moment where you start seeing a greater perspective, pit, and the pit becomes the moment where you start seeing a greater perspective.
Speaker 2:And then Scott Unclebach, who is Garrett Unclebach's father, and Keith Kraft, pastor. Keith Kraft is the pastor at church. They are best friends, have been best friends for 40 something years. They've been doing life together, built Elevate Life Church, built this Mighty Men movement that you guys have heard me talking about, but it's every Saturday morning. 300 men strong show up, put God first. We fellowship and it's a group of Christians that are not like any other Christians you're going to meet across the country. You know that's like the coolest thing about it and I'm I'm very new to the cross and when, when I was, I've been on a very similar, I think, spiritual path as he was. Like you know, honestly, I understand there might be something else out there, but it's not for me, like it's not for me.
Speaker 2:But it took relationship and it took good men that are doing life the right way Faith, fitness, family, finances. Our pastor, for example he's 60 something years old, 20 inch biceps, like just jacked, and it's like, okay, I can respect that guy because clearly he's following something that is very meaningful to me, which is also fitness, and I think a lot of the Christians that you meet standard Christian, standard American Christian is out of shape, not bold, is like hiding, is passive, is the type of guy that's like. If your faith is creating those fruits in your life, I want nothing to do with it. And so the segment that we have here at Elevate is powerful, because it's literally 300 dudes that are just on fire for God but are running businesses, operating them like gangsters, like making money, great relationships, phenomenal impact on their kids and creating transformational change inside the community.
Speaker 2:So that's a little plug for Elevate, but I love it, man, because what I think is so neat is that when good, powerful, strong men take the lessons, learning, suffering and struggle from their past and all those skill sets, and then put it under the umbrella of the Lord, it turns into a whole nother area. And so you know, you think about where your life has been. Let me ask you this, though Since 2019, has your life gotten easier?
Speaker 1:Yes and no.
Speaker 2:Okay, it's different hearts, yeah.
Speaker 1:Right. So, uh, no, it hasn't gotten easier.
Speaker 2:You've scaled in business. You've gone through massive transformation.
Speaker 1:Right, and you have to do. The harder things you make, the harder choices, right. Following God is not an easy thing. Yeah, so it definitely has gotten harder, but by doing so, a lot of other things have gotten easier.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Right. So it's a flip, because if you choose to do life the easy way, it's going to be hard.
Speaker 2:For sure, if you choose to do it hard.
Speaker 1:There's a lot of things that are going to be easy, yeah, so catch 22 a little bit, yeah, no, the decisions and walk of life has been much harder, uh-huh, but the carrying it out and the fruit of it has come Probably more fulfilling, yeah, more fulfilling, swifter at times and in an easier way to digest and discern. For sure, and that's sometimes the hardest thing to do in life is to make a decision. Yeah, for a lot of people, even go-getters and hard chargers like us, sometimes a decision is hard to make.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:But we got to make it. But when you're walking this life, it's easy, decisions are easy to make and the discernment is easy. It's like, oh, that's not from God, that's fear-based, that's not from God, yeah yeah.
Speaker 2:So it gives you a rule book and a blueprint.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I love that I think probably the coolest thing, too, is you know, you had a tribe with the military, you had a tribe with the SWAT team. What I love about our tribe is there is deep, meaningful fellowship and intimacy, and so many guys are suffering, they're struggling, they're isolated, they're alone, just like you were, and there's not a dude that will literally show up at your house, check in on you and be there open, honest, vulnerable. I've shed tears with you, you've shed tears with you, you've shed tears with me Like we've walked through seasons in a short amount of time knowing each other, because there's this level of a vulnerability-based trust that really allows friendship and fellowship to develop, which is so powerful. And so I think the missing piece, where so many guys will find aspects of tribe, the piece that's really missing, is that open, honest, transparent, vulnerable, intimate between two men where it's like listen, I know that my life is not about me, god is a source and I can let down the burden the mass has been carrying for so long.
Speaker 1:No, 100%. I mean, in the Marine Corps and law enforcement and SWAT and all these different rooms and all these different environments, you have the tribe. It's like, hey, left and right, blood's thicker than water, all those conversations, but hey, how's your marriage doing? You know, I got that, don't worry about that.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:She's lost her mind, Whatever right. Sure it's always ego-driven responses and there is no vulnerability right, it's all toughness.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So 100% yeah so a hundred percent, yeah, and. And the real tough thing for anybody that's not part of a tribe that leans into the difficult conversation with, the real tough thing is being able to be open, honest, transparent, and it's like massive freedom too, and the other side too. Okay, so we got 2019. You are, it was solar that you were in, right 2019.
Speaker 1:Or roofing, I did mess with solar. Yeah, I consulted for some solar companies, uh, but it was energy efficiency okay. So insulation, radiant barrier, uh, ventilation, it's like door-to-door, yep, yeah. So lead gen online digital marketing, right, uh, but yeah, door-to-door knocking neighborhoods.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Hey, your attic's too hot, I'm sure. Right Like my attic. Yeah, I don't call it there. Yeah, it's supposed to be hot. It's like, yeah, it's not. But yeah, those kind of sales pitches, for sure. Yeah, not as glorious as roofing and big ticket items. But you cut your teeth in sales though. Yeah, for sure. Well, and before that it was fitness sales. So I was a GM at LA. Fitness and fitness sales will cut your teeth too.
Speaker 1:Yeah, man I was doing door to door for $30 memberships too, yeah, printing things out with paint on computer and you know, cutting them by hand, little handmade flyers, and then going out plastering cars If you got one on your windshield, that was me Sorry or going door to door for, you know, eight to $13 commissions, yeah.
Speaker 2:I love that man it's. I make this recommendation all the time, though. If you are in your twenties, like, the skillset you need to develop is sales. You need to be able to know how to take a no search for a yes. Knock on doors be rejected. It will serve you in every single domain of life relationship. It'll serve you in business, entrepreneurship, any line of work you're in. If you can get into sales and, like, actually become good at it, that becomes something that will carry over into every other frame. So, energy efficiency, door to door knock-in between gym and housing, then you're building teams right. Tell me a little bit about that, because I know that's a key part of where you're going into now, sure, so the first sales team I built outside of the gyms, right fitness.
Speaker 1:The core competency I had was team building and scalability and making things simple, whether it's a sales presentation, building value in a tour or whatnot. So very quickly the leadership there found out that we can take Travis and put him in a gym that's not performing well. Culture sucks, leadership sucks. The team is just ad libbed and he'll pull a team together, create structure and we can pull him out and they'll run itself. So very quickly they found that out and they hopped me around DFW at a couple different clubs and I got recruited out of that environment through the energy efficiency opportunity. It's 100% commission, but it's like, hey, if you do it and you bet on yourself, you can make money.
Speaker 1:Right now you're doing about 10K a month at LA Fitness. You can do 20 to 30K. I'm like, no, you can't. Yeah, no, you can. I was like, all right, well, show me. And he did, he did. He gave me the opportunity and I got to a point where I was making 22, 28 K a month and I was like, okay. So the company I was with for they've been around about 14 years doing on average about 1.2. I went there and my first year I think I did about 1.5 myself.
Speaker 1:A lot of us I'd say a good 40% of that was self-generated business. Put myself in network market or network, not network marketing, but networking groups and yeah, and just relationship building and everything From there. It was, hey, you want to offer yourself a manager position? Right, and that looked like I need to build a team and I need to train them and they may not be doing what I'm doing, but what can they do? There was a point in time where I had four guys on the team and we'd be going through quarterly numbers and I would have more than all four put together. Wow, and I had to learn like, that's great and I have some sales ability that they don't. But what is it? And I got to figure out. How do I pass this down to them? Like, how do I teach them where their gaps at?
Speaker 2:Like I need to fill these because if I had four guys doing at least 80%, of what I'm doing as a team.
Speaker 1:we go here Right. And that's a pivotal point, I think, for any entrepreneur or sales minded person is they get to a point where they don't want to pass on that secret sauce or those traits because they don't want to be competing for their sphere.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, and I never.
Speaker 1:I never had that ego in that aspect because the military and a SWAT kind of beat that out of me.
Speaker 2:It's all team.
Speaker 1:It's all team and it's ready to leave, ready to follow, and it's very much like, hey, if I'm a better shot than you, but you're in my stack, let's go to the range because you're the one that's going to be taking shots to defend me. So it's the same concept that I was able to pull into the whole entrepreneurial journey. So that first year building the sales team that they gave me that opportunity, we went from 1.2 to six and a half mil Dang, what's up. It was great, it was a fun ride, but it was a different culture than what they had. They had a very homey same office manager for 14 years.
Speaker 1:We were doing a lot of competitions and a lot of team outings. We hit our goal for the quarter. We're going to go race Ferraris, whatever. So you know you got to work hard, play hard. Yeah, and I got ready it was a bit ready to bring on another three to five guys and I just I also brought the competitor to the table to be bought out through relationship and what have you. And I went to the owners and said what's it look like to get a seat at the table? Like 1%? How do I earn it? Yeah, then it wasn't asking for anything. I was like kind of scaled your company to a pretty good number, yeah, and about to bring on another three guys.
Speaker 1:We, you know we can realistically, if we look at these projections, take this to 10 plus mil annually and so 40% margin profit like bottom line. At the end of the Interesting part was that conversation led to not interested in that Matter of fact, some of the offices not liking how much fun y'all are having.
Speaker 2:Basically they feel how dare you make money? Yeah.
Speaker 1:And they feel like they're not included. It's like, well, I mean.
Speaker 2:Sales is lifeblood. Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 1:And the owner was very much like I'm paying some of these guys 20, 30 grand a month and I write myself a 7k check. It's like, well, it's your business, you can do whatever you want, and it's because you're writing them those checks that they're bringing in this revenue. So, long story short, the opportunity I was asking for got quashed. The competitor at the table got. Now we're not interested and we actually need to take you out of the sales manager position, put you back on the field, and we need you to let three people go. We want to scale this back to about three to five mil. Wow, and we know we can do that just by putting you on the field with a couple of the guys you have.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And we can let so-and-so, which was the ops guy, run the team. Uh-huh, let so-and-so, which was the ops guy, run the team. I was like interesting.
Speaker 1:That is not a growth mindset owner or company For sure, yeah, so I called up the competitor and had a conversation of hey, you're doing $750 annually and you're doing all the work he was selling and installing and said, would you like the keys or the answers to the test? Like you were just looking for a buyout here by this company, I'm interested in rolling what's that look like? And he was very interested, of course, brought a buddy of mine to the table that had the capital and we talked a conversation of he. He was going to infuse X amount of capital, they were going to do 50, 50, and they're going to split five points a piece to me or not, you know, um gateway over, call it five upfront, vested in another two and a half each year for the next two years, off of numbers. Yeah, cool, let's go.
Speaker 1:I didn't have any money at the time. I mean, I was a cop, turned sales, turned learning business. Yeah, and we did. We went from 750 annual He'd been around for about eight years, okay, and we were on pace for a $3 million a year and it was about six months of well, attorney's, this, we're waiting on that, pay for this and it was just always the runaround.
Speaker 1:Meanwhile, the buddy I brought to the table was in Bora Bora every 45 days and I'm running the company and I was like, yeah, I don't need this, I can probably go do this without help. So we were using the same crews the other company was using right, it's just a marketing game at the end of the day. So I said I'm going to go bet on me, I'm going to go do my own thing, and that was 2019. I did that. I did about 970 or so in sales on my own. I net about 350. Not bad and took 100K of that. There's a God story there, but took 100K of that, bought that first, I cryo and from there I said, like I just told you the journey of I was trying to find a seat at the table, which very much tied to the childhood thing.
Speaker 2:Yeah, now you built your own table.
Speaker 1:Exactly. Yeah, I was was like it doesn't exist. I'm gonna go build it, yeah. So I've got people like miles you've met, uh, entry-level positions. Now, after a year, you're open to stock options in the company and it's a. The vision is employee owned company. Y'all run it. I don't, and I'm just creating opportunities for leaders to develop and and grow. So there's a tribal aspect, but there's also to develop and and grow. So there's a tribal aspect. But there's also the ownership and value in in, in reaping what you sell.
Speaker 2:I love that man.
Speaker 2:I love that, and that's such a good lesson that anybody listening really needs to anchor down is in your seasons of life, when you're first developing your skillset.
Speaker 2:You need to earn a seat at the table. A hundred, 100%, like you have to be able to put in the work, be humble, be teachable, be coachable, be willing to follow the SOPs, but also be paying attention to the things you like and dislike, because at some point you need to build your own table, because the areas where you find the biggest gap in the companies you're working for, man, I would run it differently yourself. Great, go run it differently, because you can go be that guy to actually create some really positive, powerful change that is going to make things better. And that same rule applies to every domain your relationships, your future marriages, your friendships, everything else. If you don't like the way something is, learn the lessons you can in the seasons and then go reapply them and develop a table where you can create an infinite opportunity. 100%, yeah, I love that man. I want to fast track to where you are now. So you opened your first iAcryo location roughly 2020, 2019?, yeah, 2020.
Speaker 1:We broke ground three days before the shutdown. Okay, that was a fun time.
Speaker 2:Oh, covid man, but you pushed through. Yep, you pushed through, and I think that that season was the sink or swim for most businesses. It was the entrepreneurs that saw that as like this is just an obstacle. It's just an obstacle, it's not going to prevent my dreams from happening. Gave them permission to double down and then everyone else that was already halfway out the door, like that was all. Covid happened and I'm going to shut my doors. I'm never going to go back into it.
Speaker 1:Everybody's shutting down your opening. You have to have an abundance mindset. My investor he put up half at the point, shut down half. He's like, well, we got to wait and see. I remember showing up at 11 o'clock at night pounding on the door like nope, we don't have an option, we're going, we're running. How are you? So it, it'll work out.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it was uh. Yeah, man, I love that. So you got first location 2020 and you have six now yep, six I cryo locations. And give us a little plug for what I cryo is sure, so essentially biohacking it's a wellness center on a holistic side.
Speaker 1:Iv infusions, red light therapy, cryotherapy, compression, sensory deprivation, hyperbarics, you name it. So anything to hack the body or compliment what our body can do on its own, uh, we pretty much offer it. Yeah, so it's like a one-stop shop. There's there's places that do red light, there's places do hyperbaric and there's places do cryo. Just we wrap all all the modalities in one.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I know that you guys have some other projects on regards, in regards to supplementation and like really taking this next level, and the beauty about the world that we're living in is you don't have to be stuck with your symptoms or your suffering. There's so many ways to self-heal and to create some really powerful ways just to get more out of life, and so that's what I love about your business model. So iCryo six locations. You also have a gym that you're opening up. Have you broke ground on that yet?
Speaker 1:Yeah, so we're in the middle of some remodel right now. We put new paint on it, bought some new equipment. It's just aesthetic pleasing at this point. Yeah, changed some things that requiring code stamps and whatnot through the city.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:But it's about 95% of the way there.
Speaker 2:Okay, so gym. And then we have smoothie kinks. Yep yeah, how many of those you have?
Speaker 1:So we managed three up in Iowa, okay, and we're looking at doing a similar structure and growth plan there that we did with iCrafts, okay, and we're looking at doing a similar structure and growth plan there that we did with iCrafts, okay. So we've found a bit of a niche in franchising. The team has, and what we built, that table is feeding itself at this point and there's a template there that's working across the board, and one it doesn't need me as much anymore and two from business and consulting and coaching. Typically nobody wants to mess with franchises, so it's very captive and open market that's very target, rich.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And what I love about it is I've never been the person to be like I'm going to come build the whole new thing. I've just been the accelerant. Or how do we refine and whatnot? Because that's really all military has taught me. Right Refinement of systems you get something and you refine it over time.
Speaker 1:So with franchising, we can go into any state, any market. It's location agnostic. The model's already there, the business in the box is already there. Most people haven't opened it or they just get in their way. It's a process issue and we don't have to figure that out. We're like cool, here's how you do the business.
Speaker 1:Let's teach you how to be a business owner. Let's teach you how to have culture. Let's teach you how to have systems and automate and scale and make this people dependent or system dependent, not people dependent, right. So that allows for fast growth and and a lot of quick, easy impact. But it also allows for a great business tree, which is what this is essentially going to these struggling locations, whether the I cryos or other brands, and when you can focus on the people, not the profit, and you can affect the culture, which affects the experience for, for customers and guests and everything inside, then that also affects the community and all those things. So it's being able to build a business that's based off biblical principles, that shows itself in the environment and can impact the community.
Speaker 1:It's awesome to watch.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's amazing. So you have roughly 10 franchise locations under management. What I heard you say is that a lot of franchise owners are stepping into the idea of entrepreneurship but they don't have yet the skill set of truly being an impact-driven, culture-driven entrepreneur and so you're just giving them the fine tuning because they already have a business in the box. Yep, that's the coolest thing is if you have invested in the franchise model. We worked a lot with franchise models, previously worked on Bedros.
Speaker 2:He had 1,500 at one point, fit body locations and the struggle is always the mindset. The mindset of okay, I have a passion for fitness, I love helping and serving people. I the mindset of okay, I have a passion for fitness, I love helping and serving people. I might be a great coach, but I can't connect the dots of like how do I do what I do so well and also teach the culture and then run a business? But, like, the business SOPs as a franchise owner are all there. It's just a matter of like following the playbook and so teaching the mindset of how to actually be an effective, culture-driven entrepreneur.
Speaker 1:100%, I love that have the right expectations, like that's the map.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'm going to give a little plug to Travis on this. So if you are a franchise owner and you are struggling, suffering, not hitting your numbers, like reach out to this guy because he's clearly done, he's got a track record of it, he knows how to build teams, establish culture, get you to hit your KPIs and numbers, and most of it is in between your ears, nothing else. Yeah, I love that man. So what's next for you?
Speaker 1:It's almost like right now, it's just fatherhood, both in the business and with my daughter. She's seven. The business is running itself and we've got six high crowds right now. We've got four over the past two months.
Speaker 2:Wow.
Speaker 1:Right, so we actually it is seven, my apologies. One is just being built right now, so it's in development in Vegas. So still four of those came over the past two months. For the first five years is building out the team right and building out the model and scalability and developing people. Now that it's there, it's just throw gas on the fire and go and it takes care of itself. So I say fatherhood, because what's next is I have a lot of free time. I get to look and watch the team that I've watched develop and grow and a lot of these principals take it and run with it, and I've moved from CEO to founder and chief visionary officer.
Speaker 1:Basically, I just focus on where are we going, and I do some calls with my team from a leadership development, not on the day-to-day sales side, just on like hey, where are you at, what are you doing to grow you, kind of thing. That's good, uh, which is also where I met with my daughter, right. So it's a great place to be and it also ties into my main focus. Right now has been a pivot to coaching, right. Coaching men on being men and meeting them where they are and really navigating all the walks of life across everything that I just said right walks of life across everything that I just said.
Speaker 1:Right, it is all blending together on the same path and the same thought process of a day-to-day, naturally right. So that's where I'm at right now is letting those things grow as the team grows and as God places favor on it, and just stewarding it properly, making sure the core values stay the same, making sure our vision and our growth doesn't outrun our purpose. We don't have speed over service kind of thing, and then just keeping my hands off to allow the development to continue. That's good. And be present there, be present with my daughter, and then really dive deep into God's got more than he needs me to do and this was just a another qualifier and a walk it out piece to be able to, to talk to guys, meet guys where they're at Like I can meet a CEO right now or a business owner of one location and say, operationally, business-wise, professionally, here's what you're missing, here's what you need, there's the team.
Speaker 1:They can take care of all that. Personally, let's have a conversation, because what you're doing personally is affecting your profession and vice versa, and those templates all go together the way we treat our employees, the way we treat our spouses, the way we treat our employees, the way we treat our spouses, the way we treat how you do anything is how you do everything yeah.
Speaker 1:So, um, definitely getting excited about that transition, but also being very intentional about setting it up and you know when, when you're a high driver like us, you can get all that free time. You're like cool, I want to fill it right now. There's so much I can get done.
Speaker 1:It's like well, before I do that, let's let's look at the end. Let's walk it back, let's make sure I I stack this up as I use this analogy the other day. It's like when you have an empty plate which and you always have a full appetite you can very quickly fill up your plate before you even get to the main pieces of the buffet, and then you're like well, I really wanted this. Now I have to ruin my plate. I'll come back for seconds maybe, but you can't really do that in life with opportunity. Yeah, that's good. So that's where I'm at is being strategic about what I put on my plate.
Speaker 2:That's good and I've never had that opportunity before or I've never been aware it's good wisdom. I think that wisdom comes with maturity and taking a lot of hits between the legs and realizing okay, this is what's most important. What I heard you say is that being able to really father your culture, personal life, relationship, life, business, life based on core values is, first and foremost, like your biggest priority, and I think what's so cool about that and I want to honor you, travis is that you didn't have that growing up, like you didn't have that father figure voice honoring culture, core values and like speaking into you with like a hands-off, loving approach, and that's such a reminder to so many men that didn't have that is that you get to create it. So, because you didn't have it, because you didn't have it, you get to be so much more intentional with exactly what you want to create inside of your faith, your fitness, your family, your finances. I love that, bro.
Speaker 1:It's beautiful man, it's a, it's a fun. It's a very rewarding and fun place to be.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I'm making sure that I pause. Enjoy it, do it right.
Speaker 2:Good, All right. Well, that last little kind of segue on this is uh, how's the love life?
Speaker 1:It's great.
Speaker 2:Cool, it's good. I know we both have walked through um different seasons in that and, uh, what I love so much about where you are right now is that I feel like the, the lady that you have, is really bringing out the best in you.
Speaker 1:The lady that you have is really bringing out the best in you. That she is and you know I give her props to that because she is who she is and she's done a lot of work and had very high standards. I had to get myself to a place to attract that.
Speaker 1:Right and that's where a lot of guys miss it, yeah, right, and that's where a lot of guys miss it, yeah, um. So there's there's a lot of great and honor in that of being able to get myself to a place that's gonna attract, yeah, and deserve, um, that kind of woman, yeah, which she definitely is. Um name's amanda, by the way. I don't want to just throw an empty she out there, uh, but I give honor to her for pushing yourself to be that kind of woman too. So it's a different walk. It takes intentionality and it takes awareness and it takes constantly looking to refine and grow and staying intentional Values, all these things that we've laced together, whether it's business, whether it's family, spouse, partner, dating life, daughter, like all these things.
Speaker 1:Once you bring things back to the main thing, keep the main thing. The main thing, which is the Bible, right, like these biblical principles in this template applies to everything, and I learned that through pastor Keith and I mean I've been coaching with him for 10 years, had coaching call with him yesterday and I'll always take an opportunity to honor him and honor Josh as well the the way that walks itself out, like you had asked me earlier, has it gotten harder, like it has, because those decisions are hard, but the template is simple and it's real easy to make the decisions simple, to to make hard to do, sure, right and um, yeah, it's, it's been awesome, uh, but again it's a.
Speaker 1:A relationship like that's no different than the gym. You gotta show up every day, yeah, and you got to be aware and you got to pay attention and you got to be intentional with where are you going with this? What's the end in mind?
Speaker 2:Yeah, and walking that out, that's good man Requires us to be our best selves. Yeah, I love that. You know, the piece that you touched on is that you had to become what you wanted to see first and foremost. So you had to do the deep work on Travis, work through your stuff, and if you don't do that it ends up just showing up inside the relationship. And so you had to become the person that you wanted to see in the relationship. So, good, it's good man. Where can everybody find you?
Speaker 1:TravisHalacom.
Speaker 2:TravisHalacom.
Speaker 1:Make it simple A-L-A. I love that Even a Marine can follow that. Yeah, I love that bro.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so if you guys are on the path you're looking for some help in the coaching department, if you are a franchise owner, if you're a business owner, if you resonate with Travis's story he's got such a powerful story, he puts out a ton of content, he's got a great Instagram profile and he's doing great work here inside the Monument community. Give him a follow, give him some love, because it's another guy on the mission and just shows fruit that when you follow a template that works like, your life just gets better.
Speaker 1:That it does.
Speaker 2:Love that Awesome bro Appreciate you Likewise man.
Speaker 2:As always, if you enjoyed this episode, do us a big favor. Give us a like and a share. Subscribe, share this with another man on mission to become a high. As always, if you enjoyed this episode, do us a big favor. Give us a like and a share, subscribe, share this with another man on mission to become a high value man, and do us a big favor. Follow Travis first and foremost, but drop us a comment Biggest takeaway that you got from this conversation and how you're going to apply it to your life. Much love, many blessings. I'll talk to you guys soon.
Speaker 1:Boom you guys soon boom, you're off the podcast. Get back to the fucking mental lab.