Run an HVAC Business Worth Keeping
Are you building your HVAC business for the life you actually want, or are you assuming the only end goal is to sell it? A strong business should create more than revenue. It should give you options, support the people around you, and become something you actually want to keep.
In this episode of Cracking The Code, Brad Barron sits down with Stephanie Allen, CEO of AirWorks Solutions, to talk about what it means to build a business worth keeping. Stephanie shares how she and her husband have approached ownership, leadership, and long-term growth differently, including why contractors should stop relying on brute force to move the business forward and start creating more leverage through their people, systems, and technology.
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00:00:00:00 – 00:00:11:04
Contractors are so freaking used to force, I can force this thing forward. Stop using force and start using leverage to get to where you want to go.
00:00:11:05 – 00:00:34:05
Hey everyone, and welcome to another episode of Cracking the Code. Jason, I hope that you enjoyed that. I always try to do it for us. Jason is out today. Jason J.W. moneymaker as he calls himself. So for all of you listening in on you are just stuck with me. However, I am very excited to have Stephanie Allen on the podcast today and I cannot wait.
00:00:34:07 – 00:00:58:03
First, Stephanie is the CEO of Airwork Solutions. That’s an eight figure H vacuum plumbing company in California. She actually started that alongside her husband, Kevin. She’s also the co-founder of Just Start AI, which focuses on making AI practical and accessible for the skilled trades. She was the 2025 ACH Our News, one of the top 40 under 48 professionals.
00:00:58:05 – 00:01:18:20
She is a licensed California attorney attorney, so we have a JD in the House, which is, I think the first for me, which is super exciting. She’s got an MBA. She’s also the mother of four while simultaneously doing all those other things that she’s doing. So at the end of the day, I have to say, Stephanie, one pretty ridiculous resume.
00:01:18:22 – 00:01:38:20
Crazy, right? Like, it sounds like a crazy person. I don’t know about crazy person. Accomplished for sure. Busy for sure. And when you add four kids on top of that, which is pretty neat. That is that is one full schedule. But I just wanted to say welcome to the podcast, as I do, or Jason and I do with everyone that’s on.
00:01:38:23 – 00:01:55:14
I want to make sure we get an opportunity to hear from you and for you to introduce yourself. So for all the viewers listening in, Stephanie Allen, Stephanie, tell us a little bit about yourself, who you are, what you do and what you’re most passionate about. What are some of the things that people should know about you before we dive in?
00:01:55:20 – 00:02:12:10
Hey Brad, I’m so happy to be here. Thank you so much for that intro. And Jason, we’re missing you. I adore Jason, he’s actually helped me out of a jam a couple of times in business, so I really do appreciate the human that he is and the business. He’s a stud. Yeah. He’s awesome. So, I don’t know.
00:02:12:11 – 00:02:46:07
You got most of the nuts and bolts there. I am a contractor that is just trying to figure it out. I don’t believe that I have anything particularly dialed in, but I love sharing my story. I love learning out loud. I love bringing other people along with me. I think that in my experience, I have figured out that none of us have all of the elements that we need to be successful, that we have our particular genius, and we should lean into that, and we should fill the gaps with other people and their genius.
00:02:46:07 – 00:03:10:00
And that’s how we get stronger. Our, our core values at Air Works. I present them in an arch and the keystone of that arch because, you know, an arch, each stone needs each other in order to stay. But the keystone is what locks it in. Love it. And so our keystone is better together. And that resonates through pretty much everything I do.
00:03:10:00 – 00:03:35:09
I love connecting people. I love seeing the bigger strategy, the ripple effect of what’s happening. And so that’s why you’ll see I’m a little bit 80 and all over the place, but I get excited about things. I’m curious and I want to solve problems. Yeah, man, I love solving problems. One of my favorite things about being a business owner is the fact that we get to go in, we get to solve problems.
00:03:35:09 – 00:03:51:16
We get a, I call it swinging the sword for our teammates, for our coworkers, for our customers, for our community. We get a chance to do that. And at the end of the day, it’s actually why I got in to the field that I first got in before Baron, which was engineering, is I just love building things and love solving problems.
00:03:51:16 – 00:04:11:13
So I love to hear that. I’ve got another problem solver on the call with me today. Critical thinking is such an important skill. It’s one of the top. As a mom, I have for young kids now. Not as young as they used to be, right? My oldest is 11. My oldest is 11. These babies, they just don’t keep.
00:04:11:15 – 00:04:37:02
So my oldest is 11 and my youngest is two and a half. And I tell them my job. I have four jobs as a mom, and it’s to make sure that they’re healthy, make sure that they’re safe, make sure they’re a good person. So essentially building their character. And then we had to add in problem solver. So and basically every rule or consequence or anything that comes into play comes back to one of those four.
00:04:37:03 – 00:05:01:21
Right. What’s. And I can ask them what’s my job. Why do you think we’re talking about this thing? And I added problem solving because I think it’s such a critical skill moving forward. We don’t have to memorize stuff anymore. You know, we don’t have to actually do the research that we used to have to do, but we have to be able to think of where do I want to go, what problems do I want to solve, and how am I going to get there?
00:05:01:22 – 00:05:21:04
One of my favorite things about having guests on this podcast, and I know Jason would agree with me too, is that we get to learn something. And as a parent of three, I’m taking what you’ve said, I’m going to borrow it and I’m bringing it back to my wife, broken I in a house because that is awesome. That was said probably the most eloquently I’ve ever heard that said so.
00:05:21:05 – 00:05:45:18
Kudos to you. Well, you know, when people when your kids ask why I don’t want it to just be because I said so, because I don’t want them to ever take authority in that way. Yeah, man, I love that. Well, I can’t. So one of the things I’m excited to do is we’re going to dive in a little bit more into family and how that ties in, but I want to start real quick if you’re good with that on the air work story, because I think you have a really great story in your husband, Kevin.
00:05:45:20 – 00:06:02:12
And what I want to do is pause for a moment. So let’s go if you’re good with it, let’s go way back to the beginning. So you had a law degree MBA. Your husband, Kevin, was an HVAC tech. How did those two. My husband at the time, but. Oh, excuse me, I guess that’s true, because you guys were, I heard high school sweethearts.
00:06:02:17 – 00:06:20:20
Yeah, right after high school. We started dating when we were 18. I had gone away to college. Yeah, I had gone away to college. And when I came home, Kevin was the guy to call for parties. Oh, yeah, I like it. There you go. So, you know, he the beer. He’s like the life of the party guy. Yeah, he’s super fun.
00:06:20:21 – 00:06:39:13
When we rebranded and they put me on the logo, I’m like, why are you doing that? People love Kevin. Like, let’s use Kevin’s likeness. And I said, you know, another dude on a truck doesn’t stand out. So it was a marketing play, I like that. Well, at the end of the day, those are important too. So how did you take your two respective backgrounds that backgrounds?
00:06:39:13 – 00:07:00:21
Then merge them or converge them together and make what made you start air works? What was what was the reasoning, rationale, passion? What were the things that came into that recipe, if you will, to launch your own company? Ultimately, values like values are the whole reason that we started the company. We wanted to have a company that we wanted to work for.
00:07:00:23 – 00:07:27:14
In 2002, when Kev graduated high school, he immediately went into working in a commercial HVAC company for one of his best friend’s dads, and he he thought he was going to be a mechanic. He’s very mechanically inclined, works with his hands. Wasn’t an academic, but we’ve built this whole life on those skills, you know, and I there’s so much value in the trades and there’s so much of value in that type of thinking.
00:07:27:16 – 00:07:51:22
This is side note. So anyway, we, he started in commercial work. He was there, they sold the company. He realized it’s not just what you do, it’s who you do it for that matters. But he was trying to stick it out. Meanwhile, I got accepted to law school in Alabama on a full ride. So I went from California to Alabama, and I did the whole, like, if you love me will come, right?
00:07:52:00 – 00:08:12:19
And it was hard for him, but he said, yes, he would come. And then I was like, no, I’m not ready for you. Don’t come. I’m going to have the Gray’s Anatomy experience of law school. Maybe that’s dating me. And so I went by myself and we realized that we’re better together, that we needed to be in the same space if we were going to make things work.
00:08:12:21 – 00:08:32:13
And so by Christmas break, we were purchasing a home together. Oh, wow. And by together, I mean all on his finances because he’s the one working. And I was in school. So, Kev purchased a home that I called all of it, and we had a real estate inspection done, and I got him a job site. Unseen unmet.
00:08:32:13 – 00:09:00:19
All of those things for, Miller electrical and HVAC in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. Okay, so he moved out with a job, and it was the first time he’d ever done residential. Oh, wow. And he realized he didn’t love it. Like he didn’t love doing residential HVAC in the South. And so we actually decided to go into business with one of his good friends in Texas who had a carpet cleaning business.
00:09:00:21 – 00:09:24:18
And basically that friend said, I’m the white collar guy. I don’t know how to relate to the blue collar, and we need somebody to come in and do that. So, Kev, we we sold our Tahoe. I moved to a civic and bottom, you know, he was going to have a truck and moved him out to Texas. And, we lost $40,000 in a best friend.
00:09:24:20 – 00:09:58:20
Oh, no. He moved back, and then he started working in various HVAC companies in Alabama. And he started to realize that a lot of owners just don’t have the values that he had. And so he separated from a company when the owner wanted him to sell a system to an old woman that really just needed a capacitor. Oh, and that was kind of the catalyst for, hey, when we moved back, because we always knew we were coming back to California to raise family with family eventually.
00:09:58:22 – 00:10:29:00
Yeah, when we moved back, let’s start our own thing. And so in my third year of law school, I bought Kevin the contractor state study guides for Christmas. Merry Christmas present. Merry Christmas. You know, and they came on CDs and like this brown leather case. And now you’re dating us, Stephanie. Now you are dating us? Yeah. Downloaded those seeds on an MP3 player, and he was working for a company that would send him away for a couple of days, and he would work remote, like on HUD, housing and other things, and then he would come home.
00:10:29:00 – 00:10:51:05
So I’d packed lunches and breakfast and he’d go work out of a crappy hotel and listen to his EarPods, and he would. I don’t even think they were EarPods back then. They were probably wired. But he would listen to this training. And, about a month before I graduated law school, Kevin drove our you haul truck back to California and took the contractor state license exam.
00:10:51:10 – 00:11:17:07
And so we were 25 when we passed that test. And I say it’s the scariest test we’ve ever taken. And I’ve taken the California bar. You know, because he’s just you. It wasn’t academic, but he put so much into studying and passed the first time, and then we had to go to battle with California Contractors Board that he had enough experience to start a company and run a company at 25.
00:11:17:09 – 00:11:38:01
And, so although he passed in May, we actually got the license in August. Okay. Yeah, right. And we had moved back. I was studying for the bar. I took the took the exam and airwork started and I did the back office. I had a blue chocolate cell phone. I called the bat, so did I. By the way, I totally did too.
00:11:38:02 – 00:12:01:04
The rest is kind of history. So Kevin got to moonlight for a couple of companies here. They knew that he was starting his own thing and, you know, very honest about it and never stole any clients, etc. helped each other out. And we built and then in March of two. So we started in August of 2010. And in March 2011 was the last time he worked for anybody else.
00:12:01:05 – 00:12:25:10
March 2011. All right. Became your own people. You became like the man and woman of the operation. Yeah. And I was, still working in law, and I was answering phones and doing accounting, doing both backside law and the back end. So is that like phones, marketing, bookkeeping, whatever, right. Needs to be done all that. Yeah. All the non customer facing things necessarily okay.
00:12:25:11 – 00:12:44:10
And when we started Kevin said he would never pay an admin. He would never pay anybody that wasn’t in the field creating okay revenue. Fast forward ten years later and there was like a dozen right. So that’s interesting. So I love that story. So for you this question is for you. Then how does having Saturn all those seats sort of like the back end side.
00:12:44:10 – 00:13:04:08
How did that affect how you lead people today. Like fast forward to today. Like what did that teach you about leadership today? You know, I, I think this adventure is about building muscle and putting in reps. Yeah. And, you know, we’ve had a lot of different people come through the organization. I hope they leave better than they came.
00:13:04:10 – 00:13:28:09
I’ve learned things a lot of things along the way. Sometimes I think that because I had to sit in so many seats, I expect other people to be able to sit in so many seats. Yeah. And it’s been proven to me that not every person is capable of wide breath. They actually need to go more narrow, and they need to have guidelines, and they need to have systems.
00:13:28:15 – 00:13:56:00
And I rebel against all of that. So I don’t like being put in a lane, but my people tend to thrive when these lanes are created. As a leader, I will provide those lanes and then I welcome you to challenge them, break out of them. There’s no ceiling here. We believe in performance pay. We want you to always be able to grow and to build.
00:13:56:01 – 00:14:14:17
I love that I so I was going to say that one thing I wanted to note that I think is really important too. And you said something because it’s a topic that gets hit on a lot in this podcast, and I don’t want to skip over it because I’m assuming it aligns with your values too. You said, do you believe in performance pay?
00:14:14:18 – 00:14:31:08
I agree. Can you elaborate on that just for for listeners or people tuning in? What do you what specifically do you mean or define that by? Because I love it, I’m aligned with it. But I want to know your take on that one, because it’s a big topic that comes up in this podcast is performance pay and how it aligns with values.
00:14:31:08 – 00:14:51:09
It’s really interesting because when I started the business, I very clearly put on everything. No commissions will be paid here. We pay a living wage and nobody has to sell anything to put food on the table, right? And that is evolved. A lot of my leadership and belief system has evolved. But we do something that’s a little bit unique.
00:14:51:15 – 00:15:23:02
Just at the beginning of the year, I started profit sharing. Okay. With the teams and their IT. Every single person on the team gets profit sharing units. Yep. It’s not just reserved for the leadership level. And that really has helped create a sense of ownership throughout. Okay I think we’re going to get into building businesses worth keeping. And so I don’t necessarily I couldn’t wrap my brain around giving people equity in a company that I wasn’t going to sell.
00:15:23:04 – 00:15:46:01
So equity never made sense to me. But profit units mean that if we’re profitable this year, you get a part of that. And so what makes us more profitable, even down to clean trucks dealing with the trash correctly? Like I will point out how much that costs us. And it’s going to take off of the net profit and we’re all going to pay for that.
00:15:46:03 – 00:16:10:19
So for years, my husband and I had this kind of contention around our people not understanding the total cost of their decisions. I think at the end of the day, if you can create systems or in this case, what I’m imagining is a very hopefully transparent but empowering system, you create a different level of ownership within the company that.
00:16:10:21 – 00:16:31:17
Yeah. I mean, they look at it differently. They treat their truck as if it’s their truck. They treat their facility like it’s a facility, their iPad, like it’s their iPad. I really like that. I bet we could probably do an entire other podcast just on that topic, because I think it is something that is missed in the trades, and it’s a huge opportunity or growth area for a lot of companies.
00:16:31:23 – 00:16:49:19
That’s where my law degree comes in, because I was able to, like, manipulate different entities and how I wanted things to flow. And, this is the first year I didn’t do a great job at being super transparent early enough to do it, but they’re going to feel it in bonuses this year, and then next year I expect it to really take off like gangbusters.
00:16:49:19 – 00:17:08:14
But I’ve definitely learned some things in that a lot lives in my brain that I’m not great at getting out to them. We’re going to pause here for a moment, and before we continue on, I want to have a quick message from one of our sponsors. Field edge is the all in one field service management software built for contractors in HVAC, plumbing, electrical, locksmith, appliance repair and beyond.
00:17:08:16 – 00:17:24:21
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00:17:25:01 – 00:17:31:06
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00:17:31:08 – 00:17:50:10
Building a business worth keeping. I want to make sure that we we touch on that because also as we look next year to epic 2027, I know there’s going to be a talk or a breakout that you’re going to put on that’s going to hint at some of these things or actually restate we’re going to hint today, you’re going to dive deeper into some of those things.
00:17:50:12 – 00:18:10:17
But I’d like, if you’re willing or open to share a little bit about what you mean by that. A lot of messaging in the trades right now, and I know you’ve seen it and heard it and felt it is a common message of build your company like you’re going to sell it, build it like you’re going to sell it, get it ready to sell, etc., etc. you and I actually are very aligned.
00:18:10:18 – 00:18:27:20
My my goal at Barron and it sounds like yours at your in Kevin’s company to is to build the business that is worth keeping. Where did that come from? That’s a great term by the way. I love that term. I think it’s a really powerful term. I think there’s a lot of people out there that aren’t looking to sell to private equity.
00:18:27:20 – 00:18:47:03
They do want to keep their business, whether it’s they’re young and they want to grow themselves or whether they’re, you know, looking potentially to have that as an opportunity for their kids or grandkids or whatever to, to step into. Where’d that come from? And what exactly does that mean to you and your husband? What is building a business worth keeping mean?
00:18:47:04 – 00:19:11:09
The actual term I was flowing on a podcast, Power Women of the trades, actually with Kasey Pound. And I said it and she said, oh my gosh, Steph, that just gave me chills. Like I resonate with that. And so then I coined that term for what I had been trying to say for so long. And so for me, building a business worth keeping does not mean you’re going to keep it all of the time for forever, right?
00:19:11:10 – 00:19:39:14
I’m not saying built build a business that you’re stuck with. I’m saying build a business that’s worth keeping, that that fits around building a business to sell. So a business to sell, it has to be profitable, right? And it has to be durable. But I want more. So I want a business that’s profitable and durable, but also create options and makes massive impact.
00:19:39:18 – 00:20:03:20
And so I want the impact to resonate through my team, through my community, and then hopefully throughout the industry. And I want those options to make it so that I don’t have to make a decision to morrow to save, my personal financial self or I don’t have to make a decision that I have to sell in order to have a future.
00:20:03:22 – 00:20:27:14
I want to start building that flywheel much earlier. And so that’s a lot of what my conversation at epic is going to be about, is how do we leverage ownership for personal wealth? How do we leverage ownership early on and not have to sell to create our our generational wealth? A lot of it was done on accident for Kevin and I.
00:20:27:15 – 00:20:48:14
Like Kevin, he was a saver. And so he came into the relationship with a nice little floral and K. And so we started our 401k very early in the business. We figured out how to structure that to do massive profit sharing. And so Kevin and I started to build our nest egg and then we started to buy properties.
00:20:48:16 – 00:21:27:04
And so I don’t feel like the money that you’re making directly in the business is what’s going to create massive. Well, we want to send those Benjamins out into the world to make more baby bennies. Like that’s what we’re trying to do is make our money work for us. And so I don’t believe in owners that don’t get paid or owners that aren’t leveraging their assets early on, because someday they’re going to have a magical EBITDA that they’re going to get some crazy multiple for, because I think then you’re you’re building on this hope that this thing is going to happen.
00:21:27:05 – 00:21:45:10
Yeah. I, I could not be more aligned. One of the things I love most about working in a family business is that my dad and I get to do those things as well, and luckily we’re very blessed with a good relationship. I get asked all the time though, and it’s interesting. I brought this up before. Are you excited?
00:21:45:10 – 00:22:06:15
My dad’s name is John. Are you excited for John to retire? I bet you’re ready to just fully take over the reins. And and I look at them and I’m like, you’re crazy. Like, I get to work with my dad every day. He has given me opportunity right to by in and bonus in. And we and we leverage those those things that we can leverage right to make that work and be more effective.
00:22:06:16 – 00:22:26:18
But at the end of the day, the best I mean, my biggest asset that I get is time with my dad, right? And now, yeah, we we do those things like you talked about. We have our own holding company. We hold these companies. We make sure that we have our money working for us in other places. But, the lifestyle that we want to live is more than just how much money we make.
00:22:26:19 – 00:22:54:23
It’s the impact that we can make. It is the relationships that we get to build. It’s the time that we get to so with other people. And I just I think that’s so refreshing, Stephanie, because there’s a lot of people that aren’t maybe pursuing that or maybe don’t even know that they can be pursuing that. On that note, and I think actually, given your really unique background, right, being not only a business person, but a J.D. from the law standpoint.
00:22:55:01 – 00:23:15:06
What do you think are some of those leverage points that independent contractors are missing? Like, what are the things that what are a couple that you’re like, man, if you’re listening to this podcast, from what I know, if you’re one of those people that is building a business worth keeping, right. What are those leverage points? Like, what are a couple that you’d say if you’re not doing this?
00:23:15:06 – 00:23:45:05
Think about that. I, I definitely believe in the 401 K space. I believe in owning real estate. So we’ve definitely outgrown our building. We’re behind my my in-laws house, and so. And they live ten doors from us. Basically, Air Works was able to cover to pay rent to help cover the mortgage for my in-laws, to buy a local to home right next to us and and be part of my family life.
00:23:45:11 – 00:24:08:03
So the way that I’m able to work so much and travel is that my mother in law is a retired teacher and she, like, is living for her grandkids. And my kids don’t miss out on anything. When mom’s gone, my kids so much love poured into them. But we designed this life, right? I’m not building for a moment in time.
00:24:08:03 – 00:24:37:19
I’m building momentum to enjoy this. This ride. I think that humans are your greatest asset. And so you really need to invest in your humans. You need to invest in your relationship. Figure out how you are leveraging those. We do own a couple of homes that employees live in. You know, okay, so, you know, I think that there are a lot of different paths.
00:24:37:21 – 00:24:54:23
I’m not saying mine is the one that you have to, adopt, but realize that there are options out there. I started talking about this in front of a, a group that I was in, and a woman came up to me afterwards and thanked me. She said I didn’t know I could keep my plumbing business. I thought I had to sell it.
00:24:55:02 – 00:25:18:06
I thought that was the whole reason for us doing this, and I actually would like to. I she started her business because her son is blind and wanted to have something for him in the future. And so they’re building it around, being able to pass that to him. But they didn’t understand how to build a path that would make the money along the way without selling it.
00:25:18:06 – 00:25:46:02
So there was like this disrupt in our in her brain. And sometimes people just have to like, be given permission, that there can be a different way, be given permission, that it can be a different way. I love that, and I think that that hopefully for folks that are listening in on the call, they understand to your point that there are different paths, there’s different things that you can do and everyone’s why is different as well, and making sure that they understand what their why is how that relates to what they’re doing.
00:25:46:02 – 00:26:04:11
Hopefully they get up every morning and enjoy what they’re doing, and if they don’t get up every morning and enjoy what they’re doing, then they can assess what’s going on and again, own their life, own the things that they, you know, want to own and get after it. I think there’s a lays. My husband and I wake up and we’re like, let’s sell this thing.
00:26:04:12 – 00:26:23:14
I could tell you that for sure. You know, I am more on the we’re building to keep. We’re building to show the industry what can be done. I don’t want to do it alone, though. I want to link arms with other business owners. I want us to figure out how we take the best of what we’ve learned from PE.
00:26:23:16 – 00:26:47:18
But we keep our culture. We keep our differentiators, we get to plug in those things. And so I’m creating an ecosystem for that, where independent owners can come together to build options. And it’s kind of a design your own journey adventure where, centralized services will stay in place and resources will be in place, and you can leverage other people’s geniuses.
00:26:47:19 – 00:27:16:21
And we’re going to build this incredible ecosystem of intelligence to keep us getting smarter and smarter and smarter. So speaking of ecosystem of intelligence, that was a good Segway. Beautiful Segway. One of the big buzzwords going around, not just the electrical plumbing industry, but all industries, for that matter, is AI. I think that, I’m a believer that where we’re at right now in AI is just the baseline for what’s going to get better.
00:27:16:21 – 00:27:42:06
And that the acceptance. Yeah, right. And then how much people accept AI is only going to get more and more accepted in the future. So if those two truths are real, then as business owners, we need to not just be aware of what’s going on in the AI space, but be able to understand how it can improve lives and benefit our endeavors for our people and for our our industry and for our companies.
00:27:42:08 – 00:28:15:18
So I think that’s a really natural segue into a talking about AI. Also, just start AI as well, and I’d love for listeners tuning in if they never heard about just start AI. For you to give a little bit of a background on that and why, I guess it came to exist. Yeah. So I have a community with Jennifer Bagley called Josh star AI, and that’s what I encourage people to do, like just get started to day and the results of AI are compounding.
00:28:15:20 – 00:28:38:14
Just like money. If you wait to invest, the compounding, the exponential results will be less. So I want to get started as soon as possible, and I want to learn along the way and figure it out. I believe in continuous improvement and so you’re not making bad decisions. You are making decisions. You’re collecting the data and you may need to alter your strategy.
00:28:38:16 – 00:29:04:11
Right. And then you alter your strategy and you go back and collect more data. And it’s just this continuous improvement loop. So, the the reason just start came to exist is we actually had the hardest year of business we’ve ever had in 2025. And I knew I was going to have to shake some things up. And I was learning about AI, and I, I completely shifted my entire marketing strategy away from the traditional WordPress.
00:29:04:13 – 00:29:36:08
And with Jennifer and her group at CI web Group, and she moved me immediately into Webflow. So WordPress had it’s about 150, I’m sorry, 1500 lines of code on a page. Web flow is about 750. So we cut the lines of code in half and we started to see that we were getting results organically through AI search. And then she came up with this totally crazy autonomous agent build Hydra.
00:29:36:09 – 00:30:11:11
And we’ve taken my web flow site to Hydra at now 65 lines of code, a page. And so I was able to cut my marketing expense by 52%. And so we had a -10% in 2025. We’ve never posted a negative before. And now we’re trending about 12.5% net positive. So I’ve moved the needle 22.5% in a matter of a year by changing mindset, rolling up my sleeves, getting back involved with the business and employing AI.
00:30:11:13 – 00:30:31:17
What it’s doing for us is it’s giving us really immediate intelligence every day so we can pivot. How much do we have out in AR? How much are we expected on the board? What is the I? The reports that we’re getting daily are kind of mind blowing for me. What are we expecting today? And then at the end of the day, did we get there?
00:30:31:18 – 00:30:55:13
What was the gap? How far from goal are we? What’s going to have to happen in order to to hit goal? How many memberships did we sell today? What’s our goal for the month? You know, all of this comes now in a really quick, report in directly into our Google chat space as execs. So I digressed off of the why just start?
00:30:55:14 – 00:31:20:00
Why just start was because I felt as a contractor that I didn’t know what this thing was. It was kind of scary. And I was being sold a whole lot of stuff, and I didn’t know who to trust or what to buy, but I knew I wanted in. I just didn’t want to be duped. And so my friend, she became a really good friend through this process.
00:31:20:00 – 00:31:42:22
But this expert, Jennifer, I could send her, I have this offer. What do you think? And she would research it for me or with me and give me that information. And so just start a I started as that a community, a free community, still free for contractors to join at whatever level you are in AI and to learn together to brainstorm.
00:31:43:00 – 00:32:05:07
I truly believe we’re better together. And so how can we learn from one another? How can we leverage each other’s strengths and knowledge? And that’s what the space became used for. In the beginning, we were teaching people how to sign on to chat. GPT and Claude, right to, I just got off of a podcast where it was building our grok bot yesterday.
00:32:05:07 – 00:32:25:06
We built our meta muse agent. And so we’re starting to really teach the industry how to leverage these tools. The only way I know how to teach us to experience it first. And so I’ve implemented so much of this into the business. But then I can say this stuff is great and it works for us. Here are the things that I love.
00:32:25:10 – 00:32:45:08
Here’s what’s moved the needle. And here are the things that aren’t. Don’t do that. Yeah, I mean, it didn’t really work for us. Maybe it works for you. Sure. I don’t know. Yeah. I believe the way that you build muscle is reps. And so you have to take some of the beatings, right? You have to keep putting in the reps.
00:32:45:08 – 00:33:04:16
But if you have friends on a network that can help you from getting lashed for all of the things, you know, you’re you’re one up. I think there are so many one liners I’m going to take from you today, I love it. I’m going to go I’m going to run this transcript through AI and go like, what did Stephanie say?
00:33:04:16 – 00:33:24:01
That was just absolutely awesome because I don’t have note taker in front of me right now. But I’m like, man, I should be taking notes. This is awesome. I just I just wanted to share that I, I am such a big believer as well in coming together and actually having conversations, being able to share transparently what’s work and what’s not.
00:33:24:01 – 00:33:48:21
I just want to give you kudos. Stephanie, I really appreciate the fact that you’re willing to share, you know, performance of 2025, 2026, by the way, I coach and do work all across the US. And I will say that 2025 was a hard year for the industry. It was really challenging. Barron was not an exception to that. I feel like when we came off the 2022, 2023 Covid bump, all of a sudden it was like every quarter.
00:33:48:21 – 00:34:04:10
We’re like, well, a little bit slower today or it’s a little bit slower this month and all get better next quarter. And then it was like, well, I guess next year or, you know, hopefully next year. And so it was a summer that never came. The summer that I have. Yes, exactly. And we’re up in the northwest, by the way.
00:34:04:16 – 00:34:21:20
It was I remember getting outside and it was like 62 degrees and cloudy in July last year. And I’m like, what is happening right now? Like, this is bad spring weather. So I had to build a business that wasn’t reliant on that exact Southern California. It’s almost perfect all the time. So we changed a lot of things. I love it.
00:34:21:20 – 00:34:45:13
Building a business that isn’t reliant on the weather is really important. Memberships, by the way, are a big part of that. And and that’s something that a lot of people, I guess. On that note, let me ask you that. Are you leveraging AI? I guess when it comes to client acquisition and life cycle retention? Because I know that’s a big memberships or club agreements, whatever you would call them.
00:34:45:13 – 00:35:15:13
That’s a big topic in the industry. Sadly, it’s still a very underutilized way to make sure that you have essentially this, you know, database of customers that already trust you and already want to use you to be able to leverage in those. Again, maybe not just seasons, but years when the weather isn’t okay. Are you using any AI tools specifically for that customer experience when it comes to membership?
00:35:15:14 – 00:35:36:12
I guess growth when it comes to keeping in touch with those members for touchpoints, what technologies are you utilizing in your business when it comes to that customer for life strategy? A lot of different questions in there. Brad. I like to ask compound questions. I call them and Jason laughs at me, but I it’s like there’s eight questions.
00:35:36:12 – 00:36:00:18
Stephanie. Good luck. Those means I just get to pick what I want and whatever you want. So about six months ago, I adopted smart AC and we’re going all in on helping our customers take make their dumb equipment smart, and it gives me insights into the home on how they’re using it, how it’s running, etc. and when there’s open buying windows.
00:36:00:20 – 00:36:20:17
And so we changed our membership plan to a monitored plan for some. If I can’t get them on a full blown preventative maintenance where we go out because remember, we’re in Southern California, we have like one season all year long. So I can do one maintenance and check everything. We’re using the smart AC system to see, hey.
00:36:20:18 – 00:36:55:07
These customers have a need. They should take priority. We will move them up on the schedule. We will do a free diagnostic for them to drop by. Because we see we already know that something is going on. We are combining the data intelligence that we’re getting from the smart AC side with agents to reach out. So yes, we’re using AI in a lot of different ways, but I have also found that my particular community responds really good to Cummins.
00:36:55:08 – 00:37:22:17
And so I’ve saved my humans for human human interaction. And then all of the busy work has been delegated to AI. So our text messages, our email follow up, all of that is automation. Our follow up reminders, etc. that all falls into automation. It makes our customers feel very connected and it keeps our small family owned feeling.
00:37:22:19 – 00:37:52:19
We went when we were trying to cut expenses, we cut all of our CSRs basically, and we went full VA voice agent and there was enough pushback to make a move. And so the the department that’s really growing on my team is the CSO, is the call center department making sure that someone is answering the phone and they have we at Barron call them customer experience specialists, because at the end of the day, we truly believe that that is where the customer experience begins, right?
00:37:52:23 – 00:38:15:04
You want to make sure that they feel heard. And we we do use some AI at Barron in regards to eliminating the clunky ness of the, you know, phone tree type stuff for, you know, this press one for this, press two. But we have a dot we, I call we’re sort of like semi in with AI when it comes to call center.
00:38:15:04 – 00:38:39:14
But I agree with you. One area, even in the midst of more challenging seasons over the last couple of years that we have chosen not to make cuts to has been customer experience. Well, we actually have our AI answer. And so broccoli answers and then directs like an operator to our CSRs. Because we get spammed. There’s so much spam.
00:38:39:14 – 00:39:11:09
If we aren’t live, we have to have something in the in the front line. But then after that, we are trying to always direct to a human. Obviously, we’re using AI solutions. Broccoli is the one that we’ve chosen for after hours and overflow. Also speed to lead. So if you are not responding to Yelp reviews or LSA within seconds, you don’t get a chance there.
00:39:11:09 – 00:39:40:13
And so that happened. AI first, I completely agree. I think that’s one thing. If contractors are listening in, that is an easy way to adopt and start to win. Speed. Lean has become a huge part of what we do. We also do advertising on meta, so Facebook and Instagram and on those form fills. If we’re not immediately engaging that customer to capture that lead and to book that sale or book that service call, we find that our efficacy of that marketing just went down the drain.
00:39:40:16 – 00:40:03:10
It has to be immediate. They need to get a text instantaneously. And so we’ve definitely leaned into that automation there too. And because I’ve cut my marketing budget and I’ve cut some of the busy work in the office, we’re able to do more community events. And so we’ve become we were the summer concert, hosts for our community summer concert.
00:40:03:12 – 00:40:25:08
And that being back out in the community has been really good for us. It’s how we started our business. Our business started on relationships. Kevin and I had no money. We, started by volunteering for the chamber at events. Right? I couldn’t afford the VIP ticket, but if I poured wine in the VIP tent and then I got to be there.
00:40:25:08 – 00:40:48:16
And people love when you’re the person pouring wine, right? So that’s that’s kind of how we started. And then we figured out that we had planted those seeds, and we got to harvest from our relationships for a long time. But then those trees went barren and we had become more transactional company than a relational company. We had that background in the last two years.
00:40:48:18 – 00:41:18:02
And our membership plan, it’s about the relationships, our community outreach. It’s about the relationships. It’s how do we nurture the human relationship, to keep them in our, you know, in our business, in our sphere, what kind of trust factors that mean? So I am using AI, we’re recording calls, and then I can get that information on how I can coach my team.
00:41:18:04 – 00:41:40:14
So I have one on ones and I’m prepared for that because of AI going in and looking at all of the metrics and look and listening to the voice, recordings and being able to pull all that information together to tell me, how does this particular technician need to be coached today? Yeah, that would be so much heavy lifting work if I was doing it all myself.
00:41:40:15 – 00:42:05:19
You can definitely do more with less by leading into that. On the community note, and I think this sort of bridges to into leadership philosophy. So obviously community is part of how you as a leader won a position yourself. If you had to define you and your husband. Kevin’s I guess leadership philosophies, if you will, and if they’re different because you are two different human beings, you could speak to both if you’d like.
00:42:05:21 – 00:42:30:12
Everyone’s got different ways that they do things. But what are at least from a philosophy standpoint, what are some of, you know, two, three, four different things that you’re like, this is who I am as a leader. I mean, as a team, we inform and educate. We don’t sell, right. We serve. It is up to the homeowner to decide to buy, and we help them make that decision.
00:42:30:14 – 00:42:58:04
Right. I believe in taking the ceiling off of our team members. So when we go back to that profit pay conversation, it’s what type of growth, what type of energy are you going to put into this to be able to grow and then be rewarded for that growth? We believe that we’re better together. And so every person on the team is a critical asset to the team’s health.
00:42:58:06 – 00:43:20:02
If there’s a bad apple, they got to go. And I’m doing that to preserve the team. You know the worst that that person has to lose as a job. But the worst I have to lose is the ability to provide livelihood for the 40 other people on the team. I love that, yeah. No Colts, you got to fight for culture.
00:43:20:04 – 00:43:47:15
Culture is imperative. That was if I told my younger self at Baron. One thing to to be more protective of is making sure that if you find that person that should not be in the organization is to trust your gut and move faster on making that move. A lot of the biggest challenges that I’ve experienced as a leader have been a result of me dragging my feet to make a decision that I really knew that I should have made.
00:43:47:17 – 00:44:05:16
I’ve joked with Jason before, I could probably have one entire segment of this podcast. It’s just like, you know, I’ll use beat, not a swear word, but like, why the beep? Did I do that? It’s just like I could look back and go. But also, I fundamentally believe that it’s okay to fail. You fail forward, right? You keep make those mistakes.
00:44:05:16 – 00:44:29:12
And also life is messy. And, we grow as people and grow in our character as a result of that. So I tell my team it’s their job, right? But I don’t want to pay for the same mistake twice. Yeah, I don’t mind paying for it once. Let’s learn from it. How can we grow? It’s pretty incredible when you take a new team member who’s done something dumb or failed, and you bring them in a, you don’t yell at them.
00:44:29:17 – 00:44:45:07
No, that’s not how we work here. It’s what do we learn? How are we going to change this in the future? And they walk out feeling pretty in power, I love that. Well, we’re we’re coming up to the end of our time together. But I do have a fun section at the end. If you’re good with it.
00:44:45:07 – 00:45:01:13
I’d like to do some rapid fire questions with you. And so my encouragement here, though, Stephanie, is that you just go with what first comes to your gut. So there’s really no right or wrong. It’s just like when I say it, you go, that’s the first thing that I thought of. And so it’s sort of a fun little exercise.
00:45:01:13 – 00:45:19:21
We’ll give it a shot. But yeah, here they are. So what’s something you believed about business five years ago that you do not believe anymore? You’re like, don’t even think about it. Go wrap it. And now I’m stuck, right? Something that I believed about five years ago was that I had to do all the things. That’s huge.
00:45:19:21 – 00:45:40:20
I think at the end of the day, that’s a big one. What are what’s one thing that contractors should stop doing right now? Busy work goes back to the doing a whole bunch of things. Stop doing your own freaking payroll. Yeah, exactly. There’s people that can do that. Who? Not how. Yeah. What’s one thing that contractors should absolutely start doing now?
00:45:40:22 – 00:46:14:03
Learning about AI? Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. From what we talked about. What is one number every contractor should know? Net profit. What is the most underutilized feature inside service type? Right. I think marketing pro. Yeah. Love it. What is your favorite practical use of AI right now? I love creating bedtime stories with my kids, and we do that based on events of their day or things they need to learn or other things like that.
00:46:14:05 – 00:46:35:23
That’s I mean, pretty low leverage. But we’re creating these memories and these personalized stories. That is so cool. Another thing Stephanie, I’m taking away from this podcast is I’m going to do that. My wife will love that too. It’s really cool because one of my kids loves, like, mystery and challenges and we do riddles. And another one I was like in total fantasy space.
00:46:35:23 – 00:47:08:21
And so they’re curated for them. Two more AI questions. What scares you the most about AI right now? Access. I’m really scared that if you don’t put guardrails on your AI, what it can get into also that people believe that they can build anything and you might be able to build, but can you support? And most of these companies are not able to support and they don’t have, the data safety precautions in place, like they’re just going to open themselves up.
00:47:09:01 – 00:47:27:16
Yeah, that’s a great answer. I told you, there’s no right or wrong answer. But that was a great answer. How about this? Let’s flip that. What excites you most about AI right now? Oh gosh. There’s so much expansion. There’s so much possibility in AI. The things that I have never felt confident in, I feel like AI has given me a superhero cape.
00:47:27:20 – 00:47:50:06
I still have to show up. I’m the superhero, right? But the cape makes it pretty magical. And so, I can do graphic design that I’ve never done before, or I can very quickly build out entity structures that when I want to change something, I can change it everywhere else. And so just the ability to like, multitask on a super level is really cool.
00:47:50:07 – 00:48:19:06
Two more questions. And this actually goes back to building a company worth keeping. What do independent contractors have going for them that they do not appreciate enough? They have the ability to decide right now that they can enjoy the fruits of their labor, like inside the company. And, that there is a network of people that are doing it at the same time.
00:48:19:08 – 00:48:43:12
It’s just time to link arms and do it together. I love it. Last question. Forward looking vision casting for you. What are you building next? I’m building this community, an ecosystem for independent business owners, and I think that it’s bigger than the trades. I think that it’s going to be industry agnostic. We’re going to go in and we’re going to prove that you can still own a business and make money from it without selling it.
00:48:43:14 – 00:49:07:16
And that’s going to happen in every industry that has come into. I think that PE has shown us a lot of great things. I’m very thankful for PE. It’s also shown me massive gaps that I think that we are uniquely situated to fill as independent business owners, and so we need, and this is one of my favorite words I haven’t used the whole time, but we need to leverage, right?
00:49:07:16 – 00:49:26:10
We really need to leverage the intelligence that we have right now and let it take us to a whole new level. Contractors are so freaking used to force. You’re used to putting more hours in, you know, working harder. I can force this thing forward. Stop. Stop using force and start using leverage to get to where you want to go.
00:49:26:14 – 00:49:46:16
Well, it may have taken to the last 30s of the podcast, but we got leverage in. We did it. Stephanie, I just want to thank you so much for your time. You have been an exceptional guest. The values there are just evident. They eke out of you. The passion is awesome. Thank you. Also, not only on behalf of myself, but E.J..
00:49:46:19 – 00:50:06:14
Jason, he’s not here. But thanks for what you do for the industry. Thank you for being willing to to share your knowledge and just, again, be a part of building something bigger than yourself. So, absolutely. And I am so excited to see you guys all at Epic in February. I cannot wait, and if you see me in any shows in the in between, please come up and introduce yourself.
00:50:06:19 – 00:50:17:15
I’m on all the socials under Miss Steph Allen, and I’d love to connect Stephanie Allen on this episode of Correcting the Code next time. Have a good one.
