Episode 136: The Business Expert [1/7 Series] with Brian Will

Announcer:
This is The WealthAbility® Show with Tom Wheelwright. Way more money, way less taxes.

Tom Wheelwright:

Thanks for joining us for this first in a series of seven shows on the seven investments the government will pay you to make. We're examining investments outside of traditional stock market investing that the government actually encourages through tax incentives. And we're talking to experts in the field. Today, of course, we have Brian Will, who's an expert on business. He's started, built, sold four businesses, and is running more businesses now. He's a serial entrepreneur. And we're doing this because we truly believe that these investments that the government incentivizes are good for society, they're good for consumers, and they're good for the investor. So they truly are a win-win, and you could even say a win-win-win, wealth strategy for anybody who is willing to learn how to do them. So stay tuned for the other six episodes.

Welcome to The WealthAbility Show, where we're always discovering how to make way more money and pay way less tax. Hi, this is Tom Wheelwright, your host, founder and CEO of WealthAbility. So small business is vital to society. It's vital to how we operate in society. And it's so vital that the government actually wants it and needs it to succeed. So today we're going to discover, okay, why does the government do that? Why would the government want small business? And what's it doing to incentivize small business? And then we'll also get into the other side of it, what does government do that actually goes against small business? So there seems to be this contradiction within government policy that on one hand they're incentivizing, on the other hand they're punishing.

And we have a very special guest, Brian Will. Brian Will is the author of the The Dropout Multi-Millionaire: 37 Business Lessons on How to Succeed in Business With No Money, No Education and No Clue. So Brian, you and my friend Robert Kiyosaki would get along really well, who wrote the book, Why “A” Students Work for “C” Students. So it's really a pleasure to have you, Brian. It is just great to have you on The WealthAbility Show, because I mean, you've started like four businesses. You currently run a business, you blog on this, you write about this. So if you would give us a little bit more of your background and your story.

Brian Will:

Hey, Tom, I appreciate you having me today. And by the way, I love Robert Kiyosaki. His first book, Rich Dad Poor Dad, was awesome. And in fact, if you read some of my books, some of his Rich Dad Poor Dad stuff is in there. So you'll see it threaded throughout my books. But my background is different than most. I call it the most unconventionally educated guy in business. And when I say, that because I failed out of high school when I was 16 years old. I got back in, managed to graduate with a 1.2 grade point average. So that's pretty much bottom of the barrel. No college, went into the military, did four years Air Force, four years Army. Got out, tried to get a job. Got fired as a waiter, got fired in construction. I just got fired so many times, I finally decided I should start my own business, because I couldn't work for anybody else, I might as well work for myself.

So my first company was a landscaping company, only because that was the only thing I knew I could do. I could mow grass and dig holes. It didn't require an education. So started that business, and as I like to say, it did really well until it didn't. We had actually built it up to about seven franchises before the whole thing collapsed. And I learned a number of business lessons in that failure that have carried through for the rest of my life. So those are good ones. Went on after that, I started selling insurance, just because I didn't know what else to do.

Ended up starting my own insurance agency, built a direct-to-consumer call center, which didn't exist in 1999. Sold it in 2000 to a venture capital firm, because the internet was just starting to boom. That company went on to go public. It was called Connecture. Started another one that we sold to another venture capital firm, which today is called getinsured.com. And it powers probably 10 state exchanges under the ACA. Started another company, which was an online lead gen company selling leads in insurance and subprime credit. We sold that to a private equity firm in 2006. And then went on and founded a chain of restaurants, which I own today, and started another technology company. Got into the real estate business, which is one of my favorite businesses now. Wrote a couple of books, and then last year decided to get into politics. So I ran for city council in my hometown. Got elected.

All this to say, and a thread throughout my books … And the one you mentioned is my second book. My first book was called I Give the Dumb Kids Hope. And it was really my story about having nothing and coming from an abusive home and succeeding in life. The thread throughout there is it really doesn't matter what your background is, it doesn't matter what challenges you think you have, it doesn't matter what you think is holding you back. Your entire future is up to you and it starts today. And all you need to do is take responsibility for what you're not responsible for and move forward in life. So that's how I got here today.

Tom Wheelwright:

I love that. I love entrepreneurs. I actually started my first CPA firm in 1995, with the goal of serving solely entrepreneurs because I thought, “You know what? Entrepreneurs are really the lifeblood of the world.” And when I hear you talk, I'm going and so many of our listeners are going to relate to that, because first of all, we're all unemployable. Really, nobody wants me as an employee. Nobody wants an entrepreneur for an employee. Second of all, we all believe that it's under our control. We don't have to give up control to the government, to Wall Street, to an employer, that we can take that control of that. And so it is kind of a different breed, so to speak, from the standpoint that we really do look at what kinds of problems can we solve. And you've got four problems you've been solving, and now you're into this technology, which presumably is solving yet another new problem.-

Brian Will:

It is.

Tom Wheelwright:

… and really what entrepreneurs do. But what I want to start with, Brian, is so you're clearly a serial entrepreneur, like myself. I'm currently running for businesses. And I presume you see some virtue in business. There's a lot of discussion about business is bad, it's bad to be rich, et cetera. And yet you and so many entrepreneurs see, “Well, but wait a minute, business is good.” So from a society standpoint, what do you see as the virtue of business in the first place? Why should we even be having business instead of letting the government run everything?

Brian Will:

I am relatively passionate about this topic, and I'll give you a couple of quickies. So it's interesting. I have about 150 employees today … And I'll give you an example. We had our company Christmas party where I just had the management team in, and I had about 20 folks in. And we had this party for them. And we did a dinner, murder mystery theater. And I've done this many times before, but I remember sitting in the back of the room and watching all my employees. And they're having fun, they're laughing. And it dawns on me that all of these people are reliant on me. I pay them salaries that pay their mortgages and they pay their car payments and raise their children and buy groceries, and they go on vacations. And all of these people are reliant on me as a business owner, which number one is a big responsibility.

But number two, it's also a very cool as an entrepreneur to realize that you're contributing to your society. One of my restaurants is in my hometown/ and we get about 3.000 people a week that come into that restaurant. And they're all coming in to have fun and have a good time and have drinks and eat. We provide jobs in my hometown. We provide a place for entertainment in my hometown. This is what we do as entrepreneurs, particularly small business guys. We go out there and we do what needs to get done and we take care of people. And by the way, I think we employ over half the people in the country. I think I've seen that statistic.

Tom Wheelwright:

That is true. The small businesses do employ over half the people. And that's true in most countries, by the way. That's not just the United States. It's true in most countries, small business is the primary employer.

Brian Will:

Yeah. I mean, we're the ones out there providing all these jobs, and the government's taking shots at us consistently. And it amazes me that they don't get that.

Tom Wheelwright:

Yeah, that's interesting. Okay, so we provide jobs. Okay, that's clearly good for society. Let's talk about the consumers. A lot has been made lately, particularly about these rich guys like Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos and so forth. And a lot of potshots taken at these guys. And I find it ironic because the same people are complaining are the ones who made them rich. And because they're delivering something to the consumer. How do you see the consumer benefiting? I mean, if you look at what consumers consume, what they want, versus do they want something that the government provides? Do they want something that is kind of broad-based, or do they want something that is provided locally or by some type of a business owner that's going to provide something that is perhaps of a different quality, a different innovation than would come from, say, a government entity?

Brian Will:

I don't know that there's any government entity that have ever created much of anything, let's be honest. And I think the people that take potshots … And I saw an interview with Jeff Bezos. And they're like, “Well, you made X number of billions of dollars.”

And he said, “Yes, but I also provide jobs to millions and millions of people that also add up to billions and billions of dollars.” So it's because of the level of businesses he's created, the level of what he's given back to society, which is what has made him the guy he is. You look at Elon Musk. Elon Musk is an interesting guy too. And the thing I liked about him is when he originally sold PayPal for like 180 million, he sunk every single dollar of that money into building SpaceX, into building Tesla, and into building The Boring Company and Neuralink.

So this is a guy who was able to take advantage of what this country offers in free enterprise, make a bunch of money. And what has he done with it? He's changed the world. He's literally changed the world. You look at SpaceX alone, SpaceX alone, the government used to suspend a billion dollars to launch a rocket into space. He can now do it for about 80 million. And that's because he risked everything he had that he made in free enterprise to go build something that's made society better. He created Tesla, which is the electric car company, which nobody on earth has been able to duplicate … Even though I do find this funny, and I hope you don't take this one wrong, but there was just a thing where our current president went out and did this speech. And he had the CEO of GM on stage. And he said, “This woman is leading the charge for EV cars worldwide.” And Elon sends a tweet out and said, “They sold 27 last quarter. I sold 400,000. How are they leading the charge?”

But the government's against him, because for whatever reason. It kills me. And yes, you are right. There are people that think that they should get something from the government. There's always going to be those people in society, but they take what the government gives them, by the way, that the government got from me, and then they go buy products back from me. So it's like this weird circle.

Tom Wheelwright:

Well, that's what's ironic, because all that money that went from the government to consumers during the pandemic, and it was an enormous amount, trillions and trillions of dollars that went to the consumer, all went back to the entrepreneurs. That's where it went, right? I mean, it's not sitting in some savings account. They're not somehow investing that money. For the most part, they've consumed, and they've actually given it back to the entrepreneurs. Let's turn to the entrepreneurs for a second, because being an entrepreneur is not something for the faint of heart. So you've clearly gotten something out, not just financially, but you've gotten something out of being an entrepreneur and starting these businesses. Why do you do it?

Brian Will:

Well, I go back to my original statement, because I'm a terrible employee, number one. But number two, I've always been the guy that created a business that didn't require me to work 40, 50, 60 hours a week to do it. So I create businesses that give me a lifestyle that allow me … Like right now, I'm sitting here in Park City and I'm skiing this week. Last week I was skiing in Vail, and yet I'm still doing my business. I'm doing a podcast with you. I've got another one in an hour. I'm talking on my cell phone to the people in my office. We've got websites being built. So I have businesses that allow me to create a lifestyle for my family that I couldn't have if I had to go punch a clock every day. And so that's what's always been attractive to me. I call it the hope. I have hope of doing something more better and more fun that I would not have if I had to go to a job every day. So that's why I'm an entrepreneur.

Tom Wheelwright:

Interesting. So when you look at budding entrepreneurs, people who want to be an entrepreneur … We actually have a term for them. We call them wantrepreneurs.

Brian Will:

I love that.

Tom Wheelwright:

They're just starting out. They read Rich Dad Poor Dad, and they go, “Hey, this is cool. You mean you can do this?” And they want to start out. What would you tell them? What do you tell the budding entrepreneur about it? It's not going to be easy.

Brian Will:

Gosh, I'm going to tell you something you're probably not going to expect. And I do this in my book and in my podcast also. I'm going to try and talk them out of it. And do you know why? Because there is so much crap that's going to come at you in launching a business and being an entrepreneur. There are so many people that are going to try to take you down and so many issues and problems. And the stress levels when you first start out are very high. And they'll cause stress in your family.

And if you're not prepared to manage all that, if you're not prepared to operate in an environment of chaos, which is what I call a wantrepreneur, then you shouldn't do it. Now on the other hand, if I try to talk you out of it and you get mad at me and you say, “I don't know why you're telling me all this crap, I can do this,” that's the person that I want to go launch a business, because they've got the drive necessary to overcome the obstacles and hurdles that are going to get thrown at them.

Tom Wheelwright:

Exactly. To me, an entrepreneur is somebody that doesn't want anybody to ever tell them what they can't do.

Brian Will:

Exactly. So that's the first thing I do, is tell them not to do it: “You can't do this. It's not going to” … And when they get mad at me, I go, “Good, you passed the test. Now let's talk.”

Tom Wheelwright:

No, that's awesome. I read one of your blogs, and you were talking about how the American dream seems to be going to be average. The goal is to be average, not to rise above average. And then when you do rise above average, you basically stick out in the crowd and you're basically a target. So is that part of what you say you're trying to talk them out of?

Brian Will:

Sure, because society, the government, the economics in America are not designed for you to succeed. They're designed for you to be average. That's what I say in the blog, right? This country and this economic system is designed for you to go get a job and live an average lifestyle and be an average kind of person. It's not designed for you to go out and do something huge. If you're going to go out and do something huge, once again, people are going to start trying to take you down, from your employees, to your friends, to your relatives, to the government. I've been sued by the government for stuff that I didn't even do, just because that's what they do. It's crazy. Yeah. And then the bigger you get, I'll say this, you're going to like this, Tom. I have my own online hate group.

Tom Wheelwright:

I love that. I saw that. I love that. I actually think that's the greatest compliment you can have.

Brian Will:

I do. It's ex-employees, 100 or 200 of them, who got fired or quit or whatever, got mad for some reason. And they formed an online hate group. So the bigger you get, the more people are going to try to come after you. And in a world of social media, now they have a whole new venue to do it in. So people are like, “Does that make you mad?”

I said, “Hey, Elon Musk has a hate group. Jeff Bezos has a hate group. Bill Gates has a hate group, and I have a hate group. I'm in good company.”

Tom Wheelwright:

Yeah. I mean, I've always laughed at Kiyosaki, because he's got one guy who's built his whole career on hating Robert, which I find hilarious. He actually is a real estate investor who raises money by hating Robert, which is so ironic. It just cracks me up. Yeah. I mean, that's the thing. You are going to have your detractors. So you know, go, “Well, you can't just be doing this though for the money or even for the freedom.” There's got to be some other thing driving you. So when you think about your early businesses, what drove you into those businesses?

Brian Will:

My early business stories were … So I call this the stages of money. So I'll give you my quick stages of money. I got into business to make money. And I say this to entrepreneurs and I sit down, talk to them, and I say, “Hey, why'd you get in business?”

And they all say, “Well, I want to create a product that does blah.”

And I'm like, “Yeah, bullshit. I don't want to hear that. Why'd you get in business?”

And finally they'll break down and go, “Because I want to make money.”

I'm like, “Yeah, and you think business is the way to make a lot of money. That's why you did this. And potentially create a lifestyle.” And I think I would say maybe not everyone, but almost all entrepreneurs start out because they want to make money and they want to make a lot of money, and they see this as a venue to do that. And once they've started making money … We call this the paying the bills stage. Young entrepreneurs first got to pay the bills. They get past that. If they're successful, they move into this accumulation phase. This is where they start buying all the toys. And I did that. And they just start throwing money around like it's stupid and they think it'll never end. Think of professional athletes who are all broke today.

If they get past the accumulation phase, they start into the savings phase, like the savings phase, “Okay, now I need to” … what I like to call secure my lifestyle. I call it building blocks of lifestyle. You secure each block as you go. And then once you've secured your lifestyle, you move into the legacy. And the legacy phase is, what are you going to do? What are you going to give back? How are you going to take care of your children? What are you going to give back to society that allowed you to have this opportunity? And so I think entrepreneurs go through those phases. If anybody comes in and tells me right out of the gate, “I'm starting this business because I want to give back to society,” I always call BS on that. They got into it for money. They will grow into that if they're successful, but that's not why they got started.

Tom Wheelwright:

Yeah, although I mean, let's take an Elon Musk. He gets a lot of hate mail. I love Elon Musk. Part of what I love about Elon Musk is he says what everybody else wants to say, but doesn't dare say, because he doesn't have the filters to prevent him from saying it. But you look at Elon Musk. Now, he truly has set out to change the world, no question. SpaceX, he set out to change the world. Tesla, he set out to eliminate emissions. That's his stated goal. His solar company, his battery companies, all of this is really world-changing. So yes, he's made a lot of money.

But one thing that I've discovered over the years is I see people who, they have a mission and they really want to … and then they're solving a problem and they're doing well solving a problem. And then they start going, “Well, I need figure out more ways to make money.” And then what happens is that they lose sight of the goal and they end up actually losing money. And that's when I see businesses tanking. And particularly you see it in private equity, right?

Brian Will:

Mm-hmm.

Tom Wheelwright:

Private equity, now you've had some successful private equity takeovers, but my research shows that about 90% of private equity deals go bust. They don't make any money on them.

Brian Will:

Oh gosh, Tom, I have a story for you on that.

Tom Wheelwright:

Well, so here's what I want to know is, do you find that? I mean, you've been more successful and sold more businesses than I have. Do you find that when people drift out of what they're trying to solve] and go only towards money, that that also tends to lead towards value? Then they put their accountants in charge. And if you have an accountant in charge, you know you're going to fail.

Brian Will:

So yes, and I think that's an ego issue and a king of the world issue that people get into when they start becoming successful. I will tell you a funny story. When I sold my first company to a Silicon Valley VC, one of the biggest ones out there, not going to say the name, but I remember the first time they bought my company and I had to fly out to Silicon Valley, to Sandhill Road, and go into the corporate boardroom. And we had to go every month. And the first time I walked into the corporate boardroom, I saw all the plaques on the wall, and it was all the deals they had done. There were probably 40 deals.

Tom Wheelwright:

Ego wall.

Brian Will:

At it was, “Paid 80 million, cashed out for this, paid 100 million, cashed out for this.” And I started looking at all these plaques. And here's what I also saw: “Cashed out for this, cashed out for … cashed out.” And then I went to my phone and I started plugging in the names of these companies, and they were all gone. The companies had gone. They were gone. They didn't exist anymore. And I remember talking to a couple of VCs, I said, “Hey, what's the deal here? You bought it for 100, you sold it for 300, and it's not in business anymore.” And what I learned is that venture capital is a game of making money. It's not really about the business behind it.

Tom Wheelwright:

It's not.

Brian Will:

They buy it, they hype it, they sell it to the public. And then more than half the time, they fail eventually, or they get sold out or they collapse in value and get rolled up into another company. So you're right, venture capital and private equity doesn't always work. In fact, I talked to another … when the private equity company out of Chicago bought us, they told me straight out, “We'll buy 10 companies. One will succeed and become a billion dollar company. One will break even, and eight will fail. That's okay. We know that. We're counting on the one.” That just amazes me.

Tom Wheelwright:

There's your 90%. See, that's my point. You've got eight fails. You've got one break even. You've got one success. And the success is worth the failures to them. But remember that the eight failures, that's probably you. So I mean, you talk about legacy. And part of the legacy, I mean, people remember Steve Jobs, because he left a true legacy. People will remember Elon Musk for the same reason. But these people that their businesses no longer exist, nobody remembers them, because in the end, they sold out. And they ended up not leaving a legacy because their companies did not go beyond them for very long.

So if we go back to the beginning now, all right, so we know that nine out of 10 businesses fail. When you're talking to somebody, a wantrepreneur, they're starting out in business and they've convinced you that, “Yes, no, I want to do this,” so they pass that first test, when you look at the steps to starting the business, can you walk through those steps? What do you see as the most important factors and the most important things to make sure that you're starting out on the right footing and that you're actually starting a business that will have a better than one in 10 chance of succeeding?

Hey, if you like financial education the way I do, you're going to love Buck Joffrey's podcast. Buck's a friend of mine, he's a client of mine, he's a former board-certified surgeon, and he's turned into a real estate professional. So he has this podcast that is geared towards high-paid professionals. That's who he's geared towards. So if you're a high-paid professional, you're going, “Look, I'd like to do something different with my money than what I'm doing. I'd like to get financially educated. I'd like to take control of my money and my life and my taxes,” I would love to recommend Buck Joffrey's podcast, which is called Wealth Formula Podcast with Buck Joffrey. I hope you joined Buck on this adventure of a lifetime.

Brian Will:

Yep. So again, I talk about this one a lot too. So if you're going to start a new business, here's the first thing that I tell first time or young entrepreneurs: “And I hate to tell you this, but you have no idea what you're doing, okay? If you've never run a successful business, you don't know how to run a successful business. You need to get your ego checked and go find somebody to help you. That is the absolute number one thing you need to do. Number two, you need to figure out who you are inside your business.”

I would say maybe 80% of businesses are started by what I call the specialist. And I use the Joe the plumber syndrome. It's Joe the plumber, who's been a plumber for 10 years, decides to start his own business. He starts Joe's Plumbing. Joe is a specialist. He knows how to plum. Joe's business will not fail because Joe doesn't know plumbing. Joe's business will fail because Joe doesn't know business. And Joe needs to get his ego checked and go find somebody to help him learn the business side, or hire somebody that can do that. So who are you in the business? Too many people think they're entrepreneurs and they're not. They're specialists.

Too many people think they can manage a company and they can't. They're the technician or the salesperson or the manager. And you've got to find the other personalities in a business in order for you to succeed long-term. Or if you just want to be a self-employed person and just do your own little thing, that's fine. But if you really want to build something with intrinsic value, you have to find all the pieces of the puzzle, all the personalities in your business, and then find somebody who can help you. Otherwise, you're going to be making bad decisions because you don't know how to make those decisions. And those bad decisions will probably lead to your failure. That's why so many businesses fail. I mean, you look at the statistics, 70% fail in the first five years. The IRS tells you that only half the businesses make money in any given year. The reason is because those people don't understand business, and their ego will not allow them to take advice and listen to it.

Tom Wheelwright:

At WealthAbility, we're all about making way more money and paying way less tax. The way we do that is through a wealth and tax strategy. We start by looking at your dream. If you are interested in looking at what your dream is and actually figuring out how do you reach that dream in as little as seven, 10 years or even less than that, please write to team@WealthAbility.com, because I would love to have you on The WealthAbility Show, and look at your situation and use your situation as an instruction for other people who might want to learn how to build massive amounts of wealth and pay very little tax.

Right, two different professions, right? One profession is the specialty and the different profession is the profession of running a business.

Brian Will:

Yes. CEOs are different than the rest of the company.

Tom Wheelwright:

Totally, totally agree with that. And that's why we always say business is a team sport, right?

Brian Will:

Yes, 100%.

Tom Wheelwright:

You don't do business on your own. If you want to be a business owner and you want to do that by yourself, you can probably do that. You can probably make a couple hundred thousand dollars a year, $300,000 a year. You're going to be fine. In my profession, CPA, we have a lot of solopreneurs. And they basically make a good salary. They own their job, and they're fine. And that's what they want. That's not what I would call the entrepreneur. That's not somebody who's going to build a business. That's somebody who's going to own a business.

And so that's somebody who goes, “Well, I know how to deliver the services. I know how to deliver the product.” But if you want it done right, you have to do it yourself. So rather than go out and find the people around you to do that with you. So besides the team, so team is clearly a very big part and what your role is in the team. What else do you see in a business? I mean, how important is the product? How is the way you deliver services, et cetera, compared to other aspects of running a business?

Brian Will:

Well, I'll give you another example of a guy that … I was working as an interim president for a company, an insurance company out in Portland, Oregon. And I had one of the guys that worked for me after I'd left this position calls me and he said, “Hey, I left that company. I've gone out on my own, and I'm going to be selling health insurance to businesses, so group health insurance. And I need you to help me come up with a line to get in the door. How do I get past these gatekeepers to get in the door to talk to these people?”

And I said, “Jeff, why do they want to talk to you? Why would they care? Why do business with you?”

And he goes, “What do you mean?”

I said, “Well, why are they going to do business business with you? Tell me why.”

And he said, “Well, because I provide great service.”

I said, “Who cares? Everybody provides great service. Why is your service any better?”

He goes, “Well, because I care about their employees.”

I said, “Who cares? Everybody walks in the door saying they care about their employees. What makes you different? What makes you stand out that they go, ‘Oh, this is the guy that I want to do business with'?” And I said, “Here's what you need to do. We're going to hang up. You go figure out why they need to do business with you more than anybody else, and then you'll have your line. You'll know how to get in the door.” And the point of that story is if you're going to succeed in business, you have to have some sort of differentiation, whatever it is you're offering. Otherwise, you're just to dime a dozen. There's a million insurance agents. Why are they doing business with you? That's the key. You've got to figure out that why, and then you have something.

Tom Wheelwright:

Yeah, I did a podcast recently with a PR guy, and he goes, “It's very simple. It comes down to two questions. Why you, and why now?”

Brian Will:

Yes, exactly.

Tom Wheelwright:

Why you, and why now? Why would I listen to you? And here's a mistake I see business owners make, and I'd like your take on this. I think business owners try to attract too many customers. And in fact, what they ought to be doing is attract the customers that fit what they want to do and who they are, that really we ought to be looking at, okay, why me? What is it that I want? And what kind of customers do I want to attract? Because those are the people I'm going to attract. I don't want to attract everybody. I don't want everybody as a customer. I'll tell you this, I run a network of CPA firms. We don't want everybody for a client. We don't. We have a very specific targeted group. This is who we want for a client, and that's who comes. So what's your take on that?

Brian Will:

Well, and by targeting and being really, really good at what you do, you create that reputation that makes you a standout in your industry and allows you to attract the target audience that you're going after. You're not selling something to everybody. Maybe I'm a high income person or I'm a professional athletes. Whatever it is, be really, really good at it, and that's what will eventually help you build your business. It might take a little longer, but you'll have a much more solid organization when you're done.

Tom Wheelwright:

Yeah. So you want to call that your brand. What's your brand promise, whatever that is, what makes you different. Because you have to attract the customers first, right?

Brian Will:

Yes.

Tom Wheelwright:

I mean, that's number one, you have to attract the customers. Hopefully you can figure out or get help figuring out how to serve the customers and deliver the product or the service that you're going to deliver. But one of the things I've read my whole life is that so many companies fail simply because of a lack of capital. They just run out of money. So how do you deal with that whole idea? Because I think that's something that's scary to a lot of new entrepreneurs, is, how do I actually raise the funds to start the business? I can go to family and friends, but only so long. If you're fortunate, you can be Elon Musk and you can actually go to your customers and raise the money, which is what he did with Tesla. I mean, you look at the cyber truck, and how many deposits do they have for the cyber truck? Never been built yet. So he raises money from his customers. So what do you say to people about, how do you get the funds so that you don't run out of money?

Brian Will:

Well, I'm going to flip it around and say there are a lot of businesses that failed because they had too much money, also. And I'm going to go back and look at the dot-commers that were raising money on the back of a napkin.

Tom Wheelwright:

Good point.

Brian Will:

I'm consulting for a company right now that had $2 million, and in six months they've blown through a million dollars of it and they have no product, no sales, they have nothing. And I just had a conversation the other day and said, “I'm not going to work with you guys anymore, because the path you're on is poor money management, and that poor money management is going to sink you.” And I think this goes back to these young entrepreneurs.

And it's going to go back to my very, very first point is, if you've got some money, find somebody who has done this before who can tell you how to properly spend that money and deploy that capital and/or raise additional capital to get you where you need to know. Or here's the worst part, what if they come in and tell you that your business isn't going to work? And that's also a possibility. So find somebody who's been there and done that to help you figure out the answers to those questions. Some businesses just aren't going to work, period. You're going to raise money into oblivion, not going to work. So this goes back to finding somebody who has already done it, to help you make good decisions.

Tom Wheelwright:

No, I love that. So one of the things we talk about in my book, Win-Win Wealth Strategy … This is actually, as we've talked about, the first in a series of podcasts and YouTube interviews about different types of investments that the government incentivizes. The government, worldwide, incentivizes small business. Worldwide, the best tax benefits come from being in business. A question I've got for you is, as you were growing your business, how important was it that you weren't paying tax so that you didn't have that additional expense? I mean, you're talking about managing your money. To me, one of the biggest parts of the money you're managing is your taxes. How important was that to know that as long as you kept reinvesting the money, that you would never pay tax?

Brian Will:

I'll give you the best example in the world, is real estate. I wish I had known 20 years ago what I know today about real estate, because I've only started investing in real estate in the last three years. Come to find out, basically I can generate tax-free income off of my real estate portfolio. And what's even better is half of my properties are in Atlanta and the other half are down in Florida, where I happen to have a condo on the beach. And so when I travel back and forth to Florida to check on my properties, I stay at my beach condo. What a deal.

Tom Wheelwright:

That is a great advertisement for our next in the series, because number two … or excuse me, number three in the series, not number two. Number two is technology, but number three in the series is going to be real estate. So I appreciate that plug for that one. But going back to business, so for example, Elon Musk, we've been talking about Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, they went a good 20 years before their businesses ever paid any kind of tax. And from a pure capital standpoint, you talk about conserving capital, you talk about actually not taking the first bid from anybody, right?

Brian Will:

Right.

Tom Wheelwright:

An electrician comes in the door, I read you saying, an electrician comes in and says it's going to cost $1,000 dollars, you go back and offer them 700, and maybe they'll take 800 and you save $200. Right?

Brian Will:

Exactly.

Tom Wheelwright:

So managing that finance is a key part of being successful in business, right?

Brian Will:

Yeah.

Tom Wheelwright:

So when you look at the tax side of that and the government actually providing those tax benefits, how important do you think … I mean, if the government taxed gross income, all right, or they taxed wealth-

Brian Will:

Right. We would all go broke.

Tom Wheelwright:

… like some of them are talking about, what would happen to businesses and the drag that that would place on a business?

Brian Will:

I'll give you a perfect example of Mark Cuban. I saw him do a podcast. And when wealth tech first came up, Mark Cuban, I saw him [inaudible 00:37:20] I called Elizabeth Warren and said, “What are you thinking? I can't give you 2% or 3% of my net worth, because I don't have that much cash. You'll bankrupt me, and I'll have to sell the maps.” I mean, this makes absolutely no sense. So some of these proposals are really just geared towards people who want to tax the rich and get something for free. But the benefits of being able to write things off in your business, even on borrowed money, is huge. And it gives you the opportunity, much like Bezos, to reinvest your capital into growth and more factories and more people, and quite frankly, more jobs and more taxes back to the government. So it's not like the government's not getting that tax money, they're just getting it in a different form, but it's allowing Amazon or SpaceX or whatever to grow their business. They couldn't do it without that. It wouldn't be possible.

Tom Wheelwright:

Right. So they're still getting the payroll taxes.

Brian Will:

They're still getting it.

Tom Wheelwright:

They're still getting the income tax from the employees. It's just not that the business owner doesn't have to use its money to pay taxes. It can use its money to reinvest. And in fact, I've actually noted that effectively we have a consumption tax in this country. It's just a progressive consumption tax, because as long as you reinvest your money, you really will never pay tax. It's only when you spend it or you save it that you start paying tax. And so this idea of being able to reinvest money and not pay tax, I think is an important deal. Now, you could say, there are people in the government that think all money belongs to the government and whatever we get back, that's just a grant from the government. And there's other people, we call them entrepreneurs, that say, “All money's mine and what I ever give to the government, that's a gift to the government.” So I'm guessing you're on the second side of that one.

Brian Will:

If you tax entrepreneurs out of business, then there will be no tax to give to the government, and the government will go away as well as the entrepreneurs. You're going to crush society. The fact that people don't understand that blows my mind. But then politicians aren't necessarily required to be qualified before they get elected, and that's kind of the problem. Speaking as a politician, by the way.

Tom Wheelwright:

Well, there you go. So here's an interesting one. Right now there seems to be what has been termed a war on small business. In fact, a book was written called The War on Small Business. I had the author, Carol Roth, on my show. What do you think? Is there a war on small business? Is there is this goal to have only big business, which then means that then you can unionize those businesses? What do you think's going on right now as far as business goes? Do you think these incentives, for example, will go away? Do you think they'll continue? What do you think's going to happen?

Brian Will:

I think there's always a segment of our political body up in Washington that is unfortunately socialist in nature and wants to get rid of small business and move everything towards a different type of government. That's not going to go away. Hopefully, they're not going to get control and allow those things to happen, because if they do, we're in for a world of hurt. And these are people that are extremely shortsighted. They don't understand how the world works. They don't understand how business works. They don't understand how taxes work. All they think is, “We want more and more and more and more money, and we're going to deploy it better than they can.” Show me any time in history the government's ever deployed money effectively, efficiently.

Tom Wheelwright:

Yes. You talk about real estate, and one of the questions I always ask people when I'm speaking is, how many of you, your goal in life is to live in government housing?

Brian Will:

Yes. I will tell you when … and because I come from the insurance industry, the whole ACA, Obamacare, was the biggest disaster, financial drain on this country I've ever seen. I saw trillions of dollars get thrown away on programs that never worked. Health insurance in this country quadrupled in cost. Benefits dropped by about 50%. And we now have a mess that can't be fixed. Now, I will tell you that most of the CEOs in the insurance companies I've talked to have said off the record that was intentional, because they intend, the government intends to move Medicare for all into the mainstream. And so the way you do that is you destroy what's actually working so that the people have no choice. And that's exactly what's happened over time. And this is where today you can still make $100,000 a year and get a subsidy from the government for your health insurance that costs way too much money, with a way too high of a deductible. The whole program's just garbage.

Tom Wheelwright:

So in your perfect world, how much control or interference would the government have over business?

Brian Will:

Very little. I would tell you that I would push more towards of a VAT tax in this country and get rid of the IRS. That would be me. Let it be a straight consumption tax. That way everybody pays. We don't have people that in the theory that nobody's paying. Yeah, they do, because everything they buy, they pay. And then if you make more money, you buy more, therefore you pay more, right? I don't care. Whatever your level of income is, the more you make, the more you spend. That's just a fact. I just came from Vail, and people are spending $2,000 a night to stay in a hotel. Well, that would be taxed and given to the government. They're buying all this crazy stuff in restaurants and whatever. So I think that's a fair tax to have. I don't think we'll ever get there, because it takes the control out of the government's hands to tax certain individuals or companies higher than others, so that they can give that money away.

Tom Wheelwright:

Well, the power of taxation is the greatest power that the government has.

Brian Will:

And not only that, but they can change it at will, and they can backdate it. I'll give you an example of how we got … So you're familiar with the ERC credits?

Tom Wheelwright:

Oh, yeah. Yeah.

Brian Will:

Okay. So we had RRC credits coming in. I had 150 employees. We have a $4 million payroll.

Tom Wheelwright:

For those of you who don't know, that's the employee retention credit. And this is, weirdly enough, a pandemic benefit that only really started applying after the pandemic was over.

Brian Will:

Yeah. And you know this as a CPA, but it was supposed to last until the end of, what, 2022, I think, or '21. I can't remember.

Tom Wheelwright:

Well, 2021. It was supposed to last [inaudible 00:43:43] got cut off.

Brian Will:

2021. And then in November, they said, “Not only are we stopping it, but we're backdating the stoppage to October 1st.” And because the payroll companies have been automatically managing this, they sent me a bill for $150,000. So I get a bill for $150,000 on a tax benefit that I had taken advantage of that they gave me that then they reversed and took it back. I guarantee you there is billions and billions and billions of dollars in ERC credits that the government is sending out bills for, that these small businesses can't pay back.

Tom Wheelwright:

Interesting. Interesting. And then on the other side, of course, there's billions and billions of dollars of ERC fraud.

Brian Will:

Oh, the fraud is astronomical.

Tom Wheelwright:

It's astronomical. Anytime you give away money, you're going to have fraud, right?

Brian Will:

Yes.

Tom Wheelwright:

I mean, by definition, that's by definition. So there's this argument that we really need to have controls over business, because otherwise then you end up with Exxon, which it's got this $55 billion of profits, biggest in the world, and it was just taking advantage of the consumer and taking advantage of the market. And the reality is that, I mean, there are businesses that [inaudible 00:44:55]-

Brian Will:

Sure, there are bad businesses.

Tom Wheelwright:

There are bad businesses. I mean, FTX is a really good example of that, a bad business, bad actors doing bad things and taking advantage of people. So presumably there has to be some kind of regulation on businesses.

Brian Will:

Agreed.

Tom Wheelwright:

But what's the extent of that?

Brian Will:

I think the solution to this is term limits. This is what I think the solution to all these problems are. If we get these lifelong entrenched politicians out of there, with these crazy ideas, and put these term limits in place and get new people in there, I think a lot of these problems would go away.

Tom Wheelwright:

Unfortunately, they have to vote themselves turn limits.

Brian Will:

Exactly. So it's not going to happen.

Tom Wheelwright:

Exactly. The same politicians who aren't going to give up a progressive income tax are not going to voluntarily retire from Congress early and say, “Well, I'll do it so everybody else does,” because there are only so many John McCains of the world that would be willing to do something like that. Not very many of them willing to do that.

Brian Will:

Oh yes, we need government. They do serve a good role. I'll be the first one to tell you that the PPP loans bailed out our company. When I laid off 150 people in one day and had hundreds of thousands of dollars in accounts receivable and zero income, that was the only reason that that restaurant chain survives. So there are good things they do, but entrenched politicians tend to take advantage for the votes. I even see that at the local level where I serve.

Tom Wheelwright:

So one of the things that's always been interesting to me though is that when you look at business, here you have really tremendous incentives. I mean, for example, everybody's been working from home for the last few years. And if you were an employee, you didn't get to deduct your home office, but if you were a business owner, you did, right?

Brian Will:

Mm-hmm.

Tom Wheelwright:

And in fact, I use an example in Win-Win Wealth Strategy that if you wanted to start a business out of your home, actually the tax benefits could easily be greater than the cost of starting the small business. It's so easy to start a small business. I mean, the reality is you can start a small business with this, right, with your phone?

Brian Will:

Yeah.

Tom Wheelwright:

You don't need an expensive computer, you don't need anything.

Brian Will:

I run a big business with my phone.

Tom Wheelwright:

Well, there you go. See? There you go. And thank you. Thank you, Tim Cook, and thank you all of Apple for producing that for us, the business that produces that. So I do think we should send thank you notes to Apple and to some of these other companies that have provided so much, like Elon Musk. So if you would give just a few words of advice to somebody thinking about starting business, other than talking them out of it, if you can give a few words of advice, maybe three things that they ought to be thinking about before they start their business, and maybe what the possible results are of having that business.

Brian Will:

So I end a lot of podcasts with this little story, and it goes like this. So we just talked about this. You have an iPhone? I have an iPhone, right?

Tom Wheelwright:

Yep.

Brian Will:

iPhone's made by Apple. Apple's run by Tim Cook. Tim Cook runs the biggest company on planet Earth, the most profitable business out there. The guy's clearly smart. He's got to be next level smart to run an operation like that. Apple, along with virtually every public company in most medium to major companies in America, have what's called a board of directors. And a board of directors, which everybody probably knows, comes in once a quarter and they sit down. I like to say they come into the giant boardroom at Apple and they sit down with their Jimmy John subs and they start eating. They're like, “Hey, Tim, tell us what's going on.”

And Tim says, “We got all these problems, and this issue, and Foxconn and China is a problem.

And I've got tax things.” And throughout this meeting, all of these people from different backgrounds with different education levels and different experiences, say, “Based on what you're telling us, Tim, this is what we think you ought to do.” And after the meeting's over, Tim takes all of their advice and he takes it and he makes the decisions moving forward on how to run Apple. Tim Cook has 12 advisors. And so I always ask small business people, even medium, “If Tim Cook needs a board of directors to help him make decisions, what makes you think you don't need at least one person to help you?”

Tom Wheelwright:

I love that. I love that. So going back, business is a team sport. This is not an individual sport. Don't think that you can do it on your own. And why would you try. There's a great book I read recently called Who Not How. A lot of the keys to your business success is figuring out how to do it, but figuring out who should be doing it, and getting those right people on board. So I want to thank you. It's been absolutely terrific having you on. It's been quite the pleasure to talk to another entrepreneur. Brian, I love entrepreneurs.

Literally, when I started my first CPA firm, I had two goals. And the first was I wanted to have a place where people loved coming to work. I really did want a place where people enjoyed coming to work. And second of all, I wanted to provide the highest level of tax advice to entrepreneurs, because I'm the son, grandson and great-grandson of entrepreneurs. So it runs in the blood. I love entrepreneurs. Our goal at our company, WealthAbility, is to help people be free, financially free from employers, from Wall Street and from the government. And business is, to me, the easiest way to do this. And I want to end with this. Why is it, do you think, Brian … Now, you can make a million dollars as an employee. You can make a million dollars as a solopreneur, frankly. But you can't make a billion dollars. All the billionaires did it through business. Why is that? Why is business the most powerful mechanism for financial freedom on earth?

Brian Will:

That's a good question. I've never considered that. But I would say in the case of giant companies, there's no way they could pay the CEO a billion dollars, because the government down, people would freak out. So that would never [inaudible 00:51:46]-

Tom Wheelwright:

Well, some of them are trying.

Brian Will:

Well, yeah. And then you've got dividends that have to get paid that are going to eat into that. It's a good question. I don't know that I have the best answer for you on that one, but you are right, all the billionaires did it through business.

Tom Wheelwright:

So my theory is that the goal of an entrepreneur is to solve a problem. And the bigger problem you solve and the more people you solve it for, the more money you make, because the exchange is always what I charge you has to be less than the value I give you. What I charge you has to be less than the value I give you. So if I charge you $1,000 for this iPhone, the value of the iPhone has to be worth more than $1,000. I'm not going to do a straight across trade. And if I can solve a problem … So in our hands, you and I both have the most powerful computers ever created in the world via the internet, via the iPhone and other similar phones. But we're really out there to solve a problem.

And so to me, I would say, “Look, I do think the government wants to solve problems.” I don't always agree with how they solve problems, but I do think they want to solve problems. And I do believe that the reason the government incentivizes business so much … I mean, literally every dollar you put back in your business is tax-free. Every single dollar you put back in your business is tax-free. And then when you can sell it, you can actually sell it, and the first $10 million is tax-free. So you can literally reinvest your money, sell it, and pay no tax. You can do that in business. There's really nothing else you can do that while you're still alive. Now, you can sell real estate and pay no tax, but you have to own the real estate. You have to own some real estate until you die, and then you have to die to get out of the tax. But with business, you don't. You actually can actually sell it, pay no tax, and you have it.

The reason that they do that is because I do think governments, in the end, they realize that they don't really want to do everything and they're not capable of doing everything, but entrepreneurs really are. And if we're going to solve climate issues, if we're going to solve employment issues, if we're going to solve that, I'm sorry, but it's not going to be the government that solves that. That's going to be entrepreneurs who solve that.

Brian Will:

Right. I agree with you.

Tom Wheelwright:

When we had food shortages in the '70s, people would go, “Well, we have to decrease the population in order to solve the food shortages.” Well, what happened instead is Monsanto figured out how to increase production. That was an entrepreneur figuring out how to increase production rather than reduce population. So actually, we have more food less expensive than we've ever had before in the world, and people are actually better off than they were 40, 50 years ago when there was this dreaded, “Oh my heavens, the world's going to fall apart because we have over overpopulation.” And now we're three, four times that population.

So I love entrepreneurs like you, Brian. I love any entrepreneurs that come in. The government will support. Yes, I do like your thought, Brian, that be afraid and be very afraid when you're starting a business. Don't go into it lightly. So I'm going to just … final words from you, Brian.

Brian Will:

Gosh, final words are I had a great time today. I appreciate your insight. I have not read your book I can see in the background, but I'm going to order it as soon as we hang up here.

Tom Wheelwright:

Awesome.

Brian Will:

So I appreciate everything you did, Tom. Thanks.

Tom Wheelwright:

Well, thank you very much. Thanks, everyone. And everyone, let us know if you like this format. This is a new format for us. And we're doing a whole series of these. And I really appreciate Brian being the kickoff. So he's the Guinea pig. But you always want to choose an entrepreneur for a Guinea pig, because entrepreneurs are always willing to be the Guinea pig. They're always willing, because like Brian said, we're willing to fail. And if you're not willing to fail, you probably should not get into business, because your chances of failure are pretty high, but your chances of eventual success are higher than anything else in the world.

Brian Will:

[inaudible 00:56:04].

Tom Wheelwright:

And that's why we always say at WealthAbility, if you're going to be an entrepreneur, that is the way to true financial freedom. And you'll always make way more money and pay way less tax.

Brian Will:

You got it.

Tom Wheelwright:

We'll see y'all next time.

Brian Will:

Thanks, Tom.

Announcer:

You've been listening to the WealthAbility Show with Tom Wheelwright. Way more money. Way less taxes. To learn more, go to wealthability.com.