This week's episode of Automation Unplugged features our host Ron Callis interviewing James Garrett. Recorded live on Wednesday, December 6th at 12:00 pm EST.

About James Garrett

James Garrett is a visionary leader who has a passion for innovation and excellence. He has over 20 years of experience in the electrical and custom integration industry. He founded Garrett Integrated Systems in 2014.

This year, Garrett has grown rapidly through strategic acquisitions of other tech companies in the luxury home space. Some of the notable acquisitions include The Loop Technologies, and Sound Technology Group, both leaders in their respective markets. Through these acquisitions, Garrett has expanded its product portfolio, customer base, and market share, and has established itself as a dominant player in the luxury home and Estate markets.

Interview Recap

• Expanding their business through strategic acquisitions this year and the lessons they’ve learned along the way
• The importance of defining and refining processes to run a business with multiple locations
• Vendor selection beliefs and best practices

SEE ALSO: SmartTouch USA’s CEO Discusses Building Better Relationships With Trade Partners

Transcript

Ron:

Hello, hello, Ron Callis here with another episode of Automation Unplugged. Today is Wednesday, December 6th, 2023. It is a little bit after 12, but a little bit before 12:30. So we have a special show time. This is Wednesday, our normal show day. And that was, you know, frankly, to accommodate my schedule and our guest’s schedule. And, you know, but we do that. We're flexible people and we move things around. So I appreciate you all joining me.We are in the month of December, so we're winding down the year. What are we doing here at One Firefly? We're in the home stretch of a lot of our planning and decision-making for 2024. I know just for example, in the last week, we are in the home stretch of our marketing planning, right? So developing our marketing plan for 2024. For those of you that are active marketers, that's a wise thing to be doing, coming up with the game plan for next year, making sure that your business strategy is aligned with your marketing strategy so that you put the wind in the sails of your business and you're moving to that next destination of growth or prosperity. We're also in the final stages of budgeting and planning across the organization, mapping out organizational structures that align with our assumptions around growth and where we're taking the business. What's going to be growing? What's going to be shrinking? What are new markets? What are new products? All of that forecasting is getting wrapped up. And we're actually, now that we have Kendall in the seat as our Sales Manager, and she's fully back from maternity leave, we are in the final stages of our sales planning, really the strategy. How are we gonna put our sales organization here at One Firefly in the pole position to succeed in 2024? So I'm mentioning all of that just as a reminder or a nudge for you. If you haven't completed those processes or maybe you haven't started some of those processes, those are good things to do. And we have a good two or three weeks more of that. And then I'm admitting, I'm going to be taking the back half of December and early January off. I'm going to travel a little bit with the family. And I hope all of you are able to take time with your family and your friends, relax a little bit, and reflect on the successful year that we've all just completed. I know this has been a tough year for many, not for all, but for many, it's been a tough - or maybe I'll put an adjective - tougher year than maybe ‘21 or ‘22 in some cases, particularly for my CI friends out there that are tuned in. And, you know, ‘24 is a wild card. It's not exactly sure exactly how ‘24 is going to go. I don't think it'll be worse than ‘23. I think it'll have its own unique challenges. But I also think there are some glimmers of hope and light in terms of, you know, theoretically why things might ease up a little bit and at least in some sectors, things might get a little bit easier and better. That's my hope. We will talk to our guest today, and again this is, I'm going to go over to Deborah just to confirm this - I want to confirm before I announce this, Deborah's going to give me a thumbs up here only because I am always moving fast and furious. And what I'm trying to confirm is our show number. I'm pretty sure this is show 255, but all right, I see a thumbs up. There she is on my screen. She gave me something. So this is show 255 of Automation Unplugged. And today we have a longtime listener. This gentleman reached out to me years ago when he was a little bit earlier in his journey with his business. And he had expressed to me how much value he found in listening to the business owners and entrepreneurs that were telling their story and expressing their journey here on the show. And I told him then, we got to get you on the show. And then here we are. I would love to say that I am his first podcast. I am not. He has participated in other podcasts before this podcast. But then he told me it's because he wanted to practice. And I said, OK, that's totally acceptable. So I'm glad he's had his practice and now he's ready for the big time here. I'm totally joking. Of course, all the shows he's been on are fantastic podcasts and producers of good content. So today's guest is James Garrett. He is the founder and CEO of Garrett Integrated Systems. I've known James, like I said, for a long time. He's a good guy. He's a hard worker. He is moving and shaking. He is full of spit and vinegar, and he is out there growing his business, focused on taking care of his family and his team, and taking care of his customers. So I'm excited for this conversation. Let's go ahead and bring in James, and let's get the party started. Mr. James, how are you?

James:

I'm doing pretty good this morning. It's been a long week, and it's only Tuesday.

Ron:

You were on an airplane as recently as yesterday, right?

James:

Yes, I flew to Boise yesterday morning and got home about 10 o'clock last night.

Ron:

And what were you doing out in Boise?

James:

We were just checking in on our latest location with the general managers and meeting some prospective clients.

Ron:

Okay, cool. Well, James, for folks that do not know you, I know that could be hard to believe, but there might be a few that do not know of the James Garrett. Can you tell us a little bit about yourself, a little bit about the business, where you guys are located, what are multiple locations now, where you guys are located and what type of work do you guys do?

James:

So we're headquartered in Battleground, Washington. That's where my home office slash show home is at. And so we cover the Portland metro market here. And then we just recently acquired a location in Gig Harbor to cover the Seattle market. And we also have a location in Boise to cover the Boise market.

Ron:

Okay. And how long have you guys been around? How long have you been in business? And what type of projects do you guys do?

James:

So I've been in business since 2014, when I first started my company with a red pickup truck with flames on it. And we've grown from doing Craigslist ads and TV mountings to now primarily focusing on the luxury market.

Ron:

Was that your branding? Like, did you go get your vehicle with flames and was that the branding of the inaugural business?

James:

It was not, it was a good deal on a truck. I needed a truck. That's so I could put my tools in it. And their claim to it was that the flames added value, and my claim was, no, it actually detracts value.

Ron:

So they tried to charge you a premium because of the flames?

James:

Yeah, I literally rocked the flames until I could see little kids pointing at the truck. I'm like, oh, yes, there's flames on the front of this truck.

Ron:

That's awesome. And you did mention new locations. So you are, your home base again, where's the city? Where's your home base? It's in Washington.

James:

It's right across the river from Portland. It's in Battleground, Washington. It's a town of 20,000 people.

Ron:

Okay. So Battleground, but Portland's the primary, the bigger city near your home base.

James:

Yeah. It's the Portland metro market.

Ron:

But you have done some acquisitions. This has occurred in the last 12 months?

James:

Yes. Since February, we've acquired two companies.

Ron:

All right. Well, there's obviously a lot to dig into there. I know that our audience will be super keen to understand - what are you doing and how are you doing it? Are you game to share some of your thinking around that?

James:

There's some that I'm willing to share, and then obviously there's some things that I will not share at this point.

Ron:

So there's secrets.

James:

Yes.

Ron:

Don't worry, audience. I'll twist his arm. We'll get the secrets.

James:

All right.

Ron:

But before we go there, tell us about your background. Where do you come from? Tell us the origin story for Mr. James Garrett and Garrett Integrated Systems.

James:

Got you. I was born and raised in The Dalles, Oregon. I grew up in Iowa. So I lived in a small town in Iowa and started off as an electrician. But I've always had a passion for electronics. When I was very young, my mother woke up twinkling with Christmas lights on her because I've been playing with ropes, cords, Christmas lights, electronics ever since I was a little kid. So that's where my passion has always been.

Ron:

Yeah, I want to go deeper there. You rewired the Christmas lights?

James:

No, I would, I loved putting up Christmas lights. So my mom took a nap and I decorated her with Christmas lights when I was like three years old, and she woke up with twinkling lights all over her on the couch.

Ron:

Oh, that's hilarious.

James:

Yeah.

Ron:

That's hilarious. Okay. All right. So you've always liked electricity and wires and tech.

James:

Yeah. Yes. So it's been wired into me. Graduated high school. And when I graduated high school, I wanted to go into electrical engineering, but didn't have the grades. Or I couldn't see myself sitting in an office all day, every day. So I started an electrical apprenticeship. And I did that for two and a half years until I saw a guy wiring houses for surround sound. And then I harassed him until he finally hired me. So I worked that job for a few years. And that was in 2004, when I graduated. So I've been in the electrical industry since 2004.

Ron:

Okay. And what was the impetus to start the business? What was the idea? What was the big idea?

James:

There's a little bit more that happened. So, after 2004, I worked for a couple of companies. In 2012, I moved back to Washington. I worked for a local AV company here. And my wife, who was my girlfriend at the time, recommended that, you know, maybe you should start your own company. I'm like, okay. And the idea was that I could do something better. Not that they weren't doing a good job, but I wanted to do it my way. And that...I needed more of a challenge. I wasn't technically being challenged enough.

Ron:

What was the job when you worked for an integrator? And we don't need to name the integrator. What was the job or function you had in the business?

James:

I was just a technician. The latest one was in 2012. I was just a technician, a helper, basically. And then that's kind of what led me to starting my own thing with the red pickup truck with flames and doing Craigslist postings. And it just kind of grew up from there.

Ron:

I'm curious. I'm getting super into the weeds here.But back when you were at that technician level, what sort of training or certifications, or I'll even go onboarding, thinking of hiring and training, were you put through? Did you go through CEDIA training or manufacturer training or was it all kind of on the job training?

James:

It was all on the job, but I had already worked for an integration company before that. So I had a lot of experience with Crestron, video distribution, stuff like that. So it was post-2008 market. I felt like it was still trying to recover some in the 2008 market. And that company, I think, was still trying to recover because they had been hit pretty hard with the 2008 market as well. But yeah, it was just a lot of automation, right? It was before our energy market, the new energy management that's coming out.

Ron:

Right. Okay. So in ‘14, when you started, you made the comment that you felt you could do things differently or better. What were some of those gut feelings that you thought should be different in your own enterprise?

James:

It would be taking care of people. The places that I've worked for, I've worked for a couple of companies, and I worked for a couple of companies where they had done a very good job of taking care of people. And then some other companies that, in my opinion, they didn't value the people on their team. And you could tell. And I decided that if I was going to do my own thing, I was going to take care of my team and put my team first. So when I thought of starting my own company, it was more of thinking of others and elevating others and following my true calling, which is to be a leader.

Ron:

What has been hard now as a business owner, and you're nine years in, in accomplishing that vision? Or has it been easy?

James:

I can't say it's easy. There's some stuff that comes naturally and there's other stuff you have to learn. I only have a high school education, so there's been a lot of learning on the job, learning as you go, having really good mentors there to guide me along the way.

Ron:

Where did you find those mentors?

James:

I was very fortunate to have married into one of them. One of them is my father-in-law. He's worked in business for a large... It's still considered a small business, but it's not small for several decades. And he's been a huge mentor. Trying to absorb what he has learned is so hard because he's got such a vast amount of knowledge with acquisitions and finance and this best business practices, and so it's just like drinking from four fire hoses just trying to learn the knowledge that he has.

Ron:

That's very interesting. Are there other mentors outside of your father-in-law? Are there industry specific people or types of people?

James:

I've been very fortunate to have a lot of mentors - as some people say - fall in your lap. I'm a big believer of karma. You do the right thing. Good things happen. And, and so following that, I've had a lot of good karma.

Ron:

Awesome. Anybody you want to shout out?

James:

I do, but I don't know if they want me to.

Ron:

Are those the secrets? Those are your mentors, not to be shared.

James:

It's just one of those things that some of them like to be on the sidelines. They don't want to have their name thrown everywhere. So that's one of those. I'm going to respect that without confirming that I could bring their name up first. I'm going to respect them to not bring it up.

Ron:

That's fair. So this last year has been...what has this last year been like for you with acquisitions? And that's a loaded question that you probably could spend hours on. So maybe I'll actually back up and I'll ask the question, what led to the idea of expanding through acquisition? Maybe we'll start there.

James:

That would be my father-in-law. He gave me...it was just a random topic that was brought up one day when we were cleaning out one of my cargo containers. And I had never thought of that. And then he explained it to me. I'm like, okay. And this was, mind you, this was a couple of two, three years ago that the idea was brought up. And I've just been dwelling on it and thinking about it. And then, then the opportunity came around, I think, October, November of last year and I just jumped on it. Let's see if we can do this. Let's see if it happens.

Ron:

And what's the process you've gone through? What has it been like? Because you've completed, you haven't just brainstormed, you've executed two acquisitions in the last...you know, less than 12 months. So what, maybe at a high level, could you go through some of the processes that you have thought about and then executed?

James:

What do you mean? Like there's a lot of processes

Ron:

From just designing who would you want to acquire, to then figuring out who are the candidates?

James:

Got you. Okay. The first, the first one was more….again, I'm a firm believer of putting out there what you want. And this is going to broach the topic. One of the topics that I brought up was vendor relationships. I have very good relationships or friendships with my vendors. And one of my vendors came to me one day. We were talking. He's like, how's everything going? I'm like, good. And I just broached the subject that, hey, I'm wanting to grow through acquisition. So if you know anybody who's looking to sell a company, just let me know. And then like two days later, he reached out. He's like, I found someone. I'm like, okay.

Ron:

You weren't supposed to be that fast.

James:

Exactly. It was like, okay, I guess it's supposed to happen. And so that was the first one. And it was a very good opportunity. And so we jumped on it. After the first one, I then learned more of…okay, for the next one, we're going to dial in my wants, a lot more of what I'm going to want out of this one. And so that led to our second one, which was a more strategic acquisition. But again, through vendor friendships, the second one approached, we were able to go through that one as well.

Ron:

What are some of the biggest lessons you've learned so far in this past 12 months that you could share with folks that are tuned in and kind of leaning into this part of the conversation?

James:

Biggest things that I've learned in the past 12 months? No amount of preparation will prepare you for what you're going to go through. You can have a transition plan. Transition plan is very good in an acquisition, but a lot that I've learned is I've been very fortunate in the first two acquisitions that I've wanted to do and tried to do, we were able to close. My father-in-law did step-by-step walk through with me because my first acquisition was his 48th that he had performed so he had had done many. It was the first in our industry that he had done, but he had done 48 before, 47 I should say, before mine. So he was kind of just letting me know, like, you know the likelihood of us getting to the point where we can even get to an agreement. You can have some skeleton come out of the closet and the deal’s off because you find out something in due diligence that it's a deal breaker. And so in doing acquisitions, you have to get in and understand the human being who's built this company, that's their baby, and you have to understand what they've done and how they've done it, what processes they have in place. It's such a huge amount of information that you're taking in all at once to try and understand what someone has built over 16 years.

Ron:

As you went from acquisition one to two, what did you do differently?

James:

I decided on the second one…..so my first acquisition, they did a lot of different products than what we do, right?

Ron:

The vendor mix was different.

James:

The vendor mix was different. So it was good in the respect that I now have access to multiple vendors that I didn't have before. But it also gave me an insight of some of the products that I chose not to sell. I got to learn that this other company did sell them, and there was a reason why I didn't sell those products. And so I was educating this location on why some of the issues that they were having, there's a reason why we don't use these products. And they're like, that's why we're having all these HDMI problems. And so we're now introducing at that location a lot of products that we're using here. So on my second acquisition, I was more like, okay, I wrote down, I kind of created a sheet of wishlists, right? What I want in my next acquisition, as far as qualities. And one of them was product mix to match what we're doing, because then there's less change that I need to implement in the next acquisition. And people have a habit of not liking change. So when you do an acquisition, the first thing that most people are afraid of is like, do I still have a job? What's going to change? And so on the first one, you know, I'm like, I'm not going to change anything for the first six months to a year because I want to understand what's going on here before I just start changing everything.

Ron:

Anyone tuned in that might want to sell their business, whether that's to you, or to maybe they're thinking about having an exit or positioning their business for an exit. What would you advise, knowing what you know from the vantage point through you and your father-in-law consultant of what you're looking for in an acquisition? What would you advise someone wanting to position themselves to be attractive for acquisition? What should they be thinking about or what should they be doing?

James:

Well, one of the things that I've heard over and over and over again is to, you know, set yourself up so you can sell your company, because a lot of people just own their job. And I've had a couple other people approach me or be introduced to me. And I was looking at it. I'm like, I have to bring in people just to continue this on because you are running every aspect of it. To sell the company, you're selling your job at that point. You're just selling your contact list, if that makes sense, because I have to replace everything. So it's one of those things where if you're wanting to sell your company, you need to have it basically so they could run without you. It is where it's going to be the most attractive for someone to come in and buy it.

Ron:

How would you think about the folks that are running their business, where maybe they are actively selling in the business, or they are actively maybe even doing the installations, or maybe they're doing the programming. What would you advise they do? Should they start now designing themselves out of a job? I mean, should that be where they should place energies.

James:

That's saying someone needs to change. If someone is actively wanting to sell their company and get out, then yeah, then they're going to have to figure out how to have it run without them. That's the ultimate thing is, if you think of bigger companies, they have systems and processes in place that the company can run without them. And so for someone to want to sell the company, then yeah, they have to have that in place. Otherwise, it's not going to be attractive for someone to come in and buy it unless it was like, say, one of their technicians that wanted to take over their position.

Ron:

How are you thinking about valuing a business? When you're looking at a business, maybe what is the way or the ways, plural, that a value is being placed on that business to be acquired?

James:

That is what I'm still learning. That is my father-in-law. He's my CFO. So he...he is the one who understands that, and that's one of the fire hoses that I'm drinking from and learning but that's something that he's not handed off to me yet, because I'm focusing on other things. But I do know that when we're looking through the finances, we do an NDA, we have to look through the finances, we have to dig into everything and uncover everything. But that's where I'm learning about EBITDA. And if it's a five or eight multiplier on how it is, there's a lot of factors that determine that. We also have to look at the pipeline because we need to understand the project base and what's going on with that. But again, that's more of my CFO's line than what he does.

Ron:

Got it. Jason Sayen here, I'll just put it on the screen. He's like process, process, process. I completely agree, Jason. Thanks for jumping in here.

James:

He's very good with documentation of processes.

Ron:

Jason's the best. So how do you think about, James, observing the processes within the companies that you've acquired and needing or wanting those processes to be, you know, perfect or stellar or ideal versus taking what you think you're already doing, you know, effectively at your business and then maybe -

James:

I can't hear you. Your mic cut out. I cannot hear you. You got really quiet. I'm turning up my headphones all the way. The good news is it's you and not me. I didn't know if it was my headphones. It's really quiet. It's super quiet. There you go.

Ron:

How about that?

James:

Way better.

Ron:

All right.

James:

I can hear you again.

Ron:

My microphone A gave out on me, so that's why I have a B and a C.

James:

I think it's a loose connection. I think you hit the wire on the bottom and that's when it started cutting out.

Ron:

I think you're exactly right. I don't want to troubleshoot that live and bore people watching me fiddle with wires. So yeah, just switch mics.

James:

It's a different form of entertainment for us.

Ron:

It is a different form of entertainment, but no. So the question was about process and, you know, the businesses you acquire have a process and you have processes. And so how do you think about whether you're acquiring a business running great processes or you're planning to maybe implement processes that you think you're doing well at the mothership or at the, you know, the headquarters? How do you just, how do you think about that? Or is it still a work in progress?

James:

That's a super heavy question in my thought process.

Ron:

It's Jason Sayen’s fault because he's the one that commented.

James:

It is. I know. And we've been going back and forth for quite some time and having him document our processes. The problem that I ran into is that I have my own set of processes here. Boise has their own set of processes. I can't say that one is doing it better than another. But as you continue to grow, that's when you have to think about exponential change. So you can have a set of processes in place, but it's going to vary by person and company to person and company. For me, my definition of processes are going to be different than someone who has one location, because I'm looking at processes that are going to be fluid through all locations. So there's processes that are really good that are in play in Boise, and there's processes that are really good that are in play in Seattle, and there's processes that are really good in Portland. And with my new COO and myself, we are now going to probably be working with Jason to have a higher set of processes that we can then implement across multiple locations, which would assist with onboarding of new locations. Is that the answer that he was wanting? Yes, Jason, we need you.

Ron:

Yes, Jason, we need you. Jason, you can leave a comment and let us know how James did with that.

James:

I'm still downloading the information, so I'm not ready to say I need to do these processes because, you know, he's... anyways, but yes, it's different.

Ron:

I mean, I can say even from our perspective here at OneFirefly….documenting processes and refining processes, refining meaning on a regular cadence, critiquing them and defining within that a given process, what's working and what's working less good. And having a team, a leadership team and an entire team on board with that self-reflection and refinement process.

James:

Right.

Ron:

That is the way I've been able to grow my business. Like I would not be the size business I have today. Not that we're big, but we're also not small. I would not be able to serve the number of clients we serve if it weren't for that regular process refinement cadence. And it's hard work. It's heavy work. It's mental work. Jason's a saint going out to our industry and trying to help all of us improve processes.

James:

That's why his knowledge is so great is because he gets to go and help people document their processes. But then let's say he's worked with a hundred different companies. He's gathered knowledge from many different companies to then take it, bring it to the table and offer best recommendations from just things that he's seen.

Ron:

So, yeah, no, that makes sense. I'm curious at a super high level, you are now in how many, what would you call, geo markets? I know you're up in Boise and you're in the Portland market. Are those the two? Is there one more market you're in?

James:

Seattle.

Ron:

You're in Seattle.

James:

We cover the Seattle market with that one. The idea is that we have like a two hour radius.

Ron:

How are those markets performing? What are you seeing right now in 2023? And I'm just going to put the umbrella that 2023 in much of North America has been hit and miss, a lot of middle market jobs and lower end jobs have been in fewer supply, upper end jobs, you know, luxury jobs have been in greater supply. So I'm curious, like what are you seeing boots on the ground in those markets?

James:

I think that the three markets have so much potential, untapped potential, is what I'm personally seeing. I see the lower market, you know, if you're trying to do projects in the $500,000 range of, when I say $500,000, that's the build value of the home. They're not, the builders aren't wanting to put much of anything in there because where they're at is trying to cut costs as much as possible because of the interest rates, right? So that market is either steady or declining a little bit, but there's no growth. Whereas the luxury market is, they're in a whole separate market is the easiest way to explain it. Not affected.

Ron:

You feel that work is still out there in abundance?

James:

It's very plentiful.

Ron:

If you look into your crystal ball into 2024, what are you forecasting, at least in terms of the opportunity for your business, or the demand for your services, which really broadly go to the demand for CI services throughout, at least residentially, throughout the country.

James:

I see it growing. I mean, our industry is growing, even if we see a slight contraction because of the interest rates in the lower markets, the luxury market is growing because, you know, people are not going to stop building their massive homes or needing technology. With the luxury market growing, I find myself, when I'm thinking of the luxury market, I think of myself. I want my life to be simple. I want to be able to very easily manage my home. Or if I have multiple homes, I want it to be very easy to manage multiple homes. Well, that's us. That's our industry. We are very much in demand. And in the luxury market, you've got clients that have multiple homes. Well, what they want is to have consistency across multiple homes. And with what...I was going to go off on a situation, but I decided not to because I didn't want to dive into that information.

Ron:

Yeah, no, we don't want to disclose any sort of secrets. No particularly juicy markets or projects that then might entice people to, we've been thinking about going into that market. James says it's good. Let's go there.

James:

I'll just say we're hiring.

Ron:

You're hiring. That's exciting news. As you look ahead the next year or two, any particular technology categories that have you particularly buzzed or excited?

James:

Circadian rhythm lighting is huge. So circadian rhythm lighting is massive. It's not going to go away. It's just going to get deeper. You're going to see a lot more vendors bringing it in and wanting to focus on it. There's a couple of vendors out there that have done an amazing job with it. And they're years ahead, in my opinion, of other companies that are trying to tap into it.

Ron:

In that circadian rhythm topic, do you find that it's exciting for you to sell it, or do you find that it's exciting because there's demand for it? And if there's demand, where's the demand coming from?

James:

So my experience is, most of the clients that I've interacted with don't even know it exists, right? And so doing what we do, we educate. This is what's out here. And most people don't even know about it. And when you start explaining and showing them the difference between Home Depot fixtures versus the circadian rhythm lighting, you show them and then they see it and they get it and they understand it. But most people don't even know what it is, what it does, or the benefits of it.

Ron:

What's been your experience once you complete an installation? What's the response? Is the testimonial coming out of the other end? A positive one?

James:

Yes, people love it. It's just seeing the excitement when the finished product is done is why I do what we do. I love seeing the excitement in people's eyes, whether it's their theater, firing it up for the first time, listening to their Focal Towers in their theater. Seeing the joy on their face is like, that's why we do it.

Ron:

Around the corner in February is the Lightapalooza show. Are you going to head out to that show? Are you going to be able to make it?

James:

When is it in February?

Ron:

Oh, gosh. I knew you were going to do that to me. I know it's coming. I'm supposed to know that. I'm going to be there.

James:

I’ll probably have someone from my team there. I probably won't be at that one. I have a family vacation myself at the end of February that I need to be at.

Ron:

That's, that's hilarious. Here, I'm going to do this now that I've said it and I know people are going to go, Ron, how can you talk about it?

James:

Exactly. Yeah, I'm not going to be at that one. I'll probably have a team member there.

Ron:

There you go. So there's the lightapalooza.com website, February 26th through 29th at the Renaissance Phoenix Glendale Hotel and Spa. And, yeah, it should be fun.

James:

Yeah. No, it's awesome. I will not be there though. Sadly.

Ron:

I know the buzz for this show in particular, I mean, it has been growing. You know, there's robust education, you know, lots of people.

James:

Oh, right. No, it's awesome. I've heard so much good stuff from it, from our, some of our vendor partners. Oh, look, look at that.

Ron:

Oh my gosh. Look at that guy. How'd they let him in?

James:

Oh man. I'm going to miss seeing you in person.

Ron:

I know, man. I know it'll be disappointing for you.

James:

But we'll catch up in another event. It's all good.

Ron:

We will. We'll see each other. That's all good. I did want to go down a different path, which you touched on a little bit, which is vendor selection.And I know that it sounds like in your acquisitions, your vendor relationships have, it sounds like, been pivotal in you being able to identify good targets, good potential partners. And I'll give you from my perspective here at One Firefly, you know, we do marketing for lots of folks out there. It is common that we'll find dealers often…..I don't want to say I'll put them in a class, but I'll attempt to and hopefully it's not offensive. I'll say younger businesses that might find it interesting to try to pick up as many lines as possible. And there's almost a bit of like, if they want me, then I should say yes. Sort of attitude.

James:

That was me early on. I completely get it. It was one of the lessons you learn throughout the years.

Ron:

Also, I want to expound on that. Tell me, what lesson did you learn? Why is that not necessarily beneficial to your business?

James:

There's a lot of lessons to learn. In the beginning, I wanted to offer everything because if I could offer everything, I could….I can meet all my client's needs. But if you offer everything, then you need to be able to specialize in everything. Meaning if it's Vantage or if it's Lutron or if it's this or it's that, you have to have people that know how to service it. You have to have people who know how to install it. But then if you get into the aspects of processes, you get into ordering. Well, if you're ordering from multiple vendors, then you have to track multiple shipments. So there's a lot of cons, in my opinion, of having too many vendors.

Ron:

What do you think? What's the right amount? All right. That's the $800 or that's the million dollar question. What's the right amount of vendors?

James:

Well, if you look at Snap AV and Savant, one, right? They want you to go through them only. But realistically, that's not the best bet either. So you have to find the perfect blend between one and 300.

Ron:

What is it for you? What do you…..I'll give it a scenario, like you could pick a control line, and you could use that control line, we don't even have to name brands so it's more of a concept, right. You could pick that control line and you could choose to do that control line and maybe their lighting line, maybe they do lighting control and automation. Or you could say, I'm going to do this automation line and I'm going to do this lighting line. And again, as big pillar categories, we also know there's audio and there's video and there's all the security and there's all these other stuff you have to do. But you could pick a pillar and you could say that I'm selling automation to my client or I'm selling lighting control to my client. And my customer is not necessarily buying the brand of the stuff that I'm selling. They're buying me, Garrett, and I'm selling lighting control. And if they tell me they want brand A, B, C, D, E, F, I will say….you'll go through discovery. You'll learn what they want to do. And you say, I can accomplish that with my lighting control system. And here's my solution. I'll call it an option A.

James:

Right. And an option B is that you pick up control line ABCD and lighting line ABCD, lighting control, right? Fixtures are different. You generally got to carry at least a handful of fixture lines. Right.

Ron:

And you could have the perception that you want to be able to say yes if a customer says, “I want brand A.” And I want yes if a customer asks for brand B. And yes if customer wants brand C. And I think what I'm hearing from you is that you did that initially and that that was harder.

James:

I'd say when I….not with just control systems, but let's just say products or TVs. I offered a ton. I have shrunk that down. Basically, I've got options A, B, and C. This is what you do. In your discovery, you understand what their budget is, what their expectations are, what they want, and then you educate them on what is going to be the best option, A, B, or C.

Ron:

Okay. And you're doing that by price categories. So you're saying I have…..and I'll just pick audio and ceiling audio. I could get you into this price point or this price point or this price point. And this may not be a great example, but theoretically that could be different vendors because you're hitting a different price point.

James:

Right. So some vendors might only be an option A because they don't have the quality to reach option B or C, in my opinion, right? So to speak, a good, better, best. And some builders want that option. If they can just look at the three different options, then they understand what they're getting with each one, and then they can choose.

Ron:

That makes sense. I'm going to try to sneak in one more topic here. I'm mindful of time. We'll see if we can knock it out in five minutes. And it's in the Savant Power category. So you're out there. Well, just tell me, Savant Power, what are you thinking about that? And how are you designing that into your business or promoting it or talking about it? Or what do you think?

James:

Gotcha. Well, from my understanding that, not to plug you at all, but we actually worked together to come up with the Savant Power template for the webpage that is now being utilized. So I see the potential in Savant Power and energy management. And so I'm outfitting my own….when I say my own house, my own home, which is also our show home, with Savant Power so that people can come, they can experience it, they can understand what all it can do, because you try and explain it and it doesn't do it justice. Because you can, with the energy management, you can literally press a button and be relying only, you can turn off grid power and you can be running off battery or solar or however you program it to do.

Ron:

So tell me what you think from the customer's perspective, let's empathize with the consumer. What do you today assume or theorize the customer's gonna care about? What's a high level problem they have that this is gonna solve in your markets?

James:

Well, Seattle market is definitely not worrying about solar as much as the Arizona market because it rains every day in the winter. But so there's a couple of different customers. Some want to reduce their reliance on the grid, and so they want to be able to utilize battery power, they want to be able to utilize solar. We have other clients that don't want…..are building properties that aren't even on the grid so then you have to utilize solar, generator, and battery, and the combination of those. And that's where, in my opinion, Savant really shines with their Savant Power, and they truly believe in it. If you look at their track record over the past few years of how much they've invested into it, they know where the market is going, especially with the grid, and nothing against Tesla. I like Tesla, but with all the electric vehicles, all of the new demand on the grid is making it less reliable, and it's also antiquated.

Ron:

What's your take on the energy automation side, the idea of smart breakers and the ability to have load shedding, i.e., let's say a thunderstorm is coming and I want to make sure my battery gets charged up.

James:

I absolutely love it. Remember, I started off as an electrician. I started off wiring these electrical panels back in 2004 through 2006. I love the idea of the energy modules and the fact that, with a flexible load management, you can easily select a different scene and shut off wings of your house that aren't important. Where I live, they have above ground power lines. So the power goes out in the wintertime when tree branches hit, it can go out for several hours. So I like the ability to, you know, turn on the generator if I need to to maintain the battery charge and then shed non-essential load. It’s very appealing to both myself and our clients

Ron:

If you look at this industry, you have Sonnen entered the industry four or five years ago. A little bit less active right now. At least that's my perception. And Savant has gone all in on power and energy automation. And then you have, I know Apex Technology, Jimmy and team, they have some neat things. I know that Rosewater is out there. Joe Piccarelli is moving and shaking with his product mix. Do you see this? Is this going to remain a small category in our industry? Or do you see or forecast this is going to be growing or accelerating? Or is it too hard to, is it too early to tell?

James:

I think it's going to be growing and accelerating rapidly. I'm just trying to stay here and think. My belief that it's not going to go away. It's not a fad like 3D and HD DVD. It's here to stay. There are some clients that still feel it's too early, but the same thing when they hear about invisible speakers. This is new. I'm like, no, it's actually been out for several years. We're on like version three or four now. So we're good to go. And that's kind of where energy management is. It's not being talked about enough, but by the dealers in my, I guess you could say my belief, there's a lot of, we talk about it a lot more than maybe some other others do because we see where it's going. You know, when I was early on, I wouldn't have been able to talk about it because there was no way that I could fulfill it.

Ron:

Got it.

James:

Because with energy management, you got to coordinate with electricians. You got to design engineering. There's permitting. There's a lot that goes into it. And Savant, again, plug them because they understand that, they offer the engineering documentation. They have a lot of services they offer. If someone is wanting to do it, Savant will do the whole thing if people aren't comfortable doing it, if that makes sense.

Ron:

Got it. Love it. We'll put links in the show notes to that Savant Power page on your website. So anybody that wants to check it out. James, thank you for spending time with me and the audience here on show 255. For folks that want to get in touch with you directly and maybe see if you want to buy their business or they just want to ask you questions. Where would you send folks to get in touch with you?

James:

So we've got our website, which is garretsystems.net. And then we have my email, and it's This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

Ron:

Awesome.

James:

Two R's, two T's.

Ron:

Two R's, two T's. We'll drop it into the show notes on the One Firefly website, and we'll drop it down on all the social channels down into the comments. I will....I'm trying to read. Sean Stermer here made a comment on LinkedIn. I'm not going to put it on the screen because I don't know what Sean means here. But Sean, thanks for listening. And thanks for commenting. James, thank you, sir, for joining me on the show. It was a pleasure. And man, congrats on your continued success. You're making things happen. And you just have a wonderful energy about you. And you're doing good things. So congratulations on that.

James:

Awesome. Well, thank you so much for having me. I enjoy listening to you and finally being on your show.

Ron:

Awesome, my friend. All right. Enjoy your week, my friend. Be well.

James:

You too.

Ron:

All right, folks. There you have it. Show 255, Automation Unplugged. James, he's buying businesses. I tell you, there's more merger and acquisition activity from my perception happening right now in the CI space than at any point I can remember. There's either…..a lot of people are starting to age out of our industry. They're looking for opportunities to position their business to sell so that they can retire. There's a lot of new startups and startup aggregators coming in. There's new franchise type opportunities coming into the industry. Well, I'll name them. Of course, you have Bravas that's buying businesses. You have Hi Solutions. You have a newer business called Savvi Homes. You have, over on the east coast, you have Level Up, and then you have a new one I’ve just been hearing about here lately called Daisy, so all sorts. And I'm sure there are many more people, you know, we have good clients that are doing lots of acquisitions, so a lot of moving and shaking happening out there. It's exciting times. And I'm going to try to bring as many of those voices and opinions and thought leaders here on the show in the coming weeks and months. So on that note, I think we're going to try to squeeze in one more show here before Christmas. So on that note, I'm going to sign off and I look forward to seeing you all soon. And if you would be so kind within your listening platforms, this is for the audio podcast for my audio listeners. Please give us a review. It helps ultimately boost the show, boost the visibility for Automation Unplugged. And I will give the plug to One Firefly. This is the day job that pays the bills, that allows me to come on here and bring these interviews to you. And thanks to Deborah and Rebecca and Karla and Carlos and the whole team here at One Firefly. And Miguel, I don't want to leave anyone out. Everyone that's involved with getting this show produced every week or every couple of weeks so that we can bring this content to you. So on that note, I'm going to sign off and I will see you all soon. Thanks, folks.

SHOW NOTES:

James Garrett is a visionary leader who has a passion for innovation and excellence. He has over 20 years of experience in the electrical and custom integration industry. He founded Garrett Integrated Systems in 2014.

This year, Garrett has grown rapidly through strategic acquisitions of other tech companies in the luxury home space. Some of the notable acquisitions include The Loop Technologies, and Sound Technology Group, both leaders in their respective markets. Through these acquisitions, Garrett has expanded its product portfolio, customer base, and market share, and has established itself as a dominant player in the luxury home and Estate markets.

Ron Callis is the CEO of One Firefly, LLC, a digital marketing agency based out of South Florida and creator of Automation Unplugged. Founded in 2007, One Firefly has quickly became the leading marketing firm specializing in the integrated technology and security space. The One Firefly team work hard to create innovative solutions to help Integrators boost their online presence, such as the elite website solution, Mercury Pro.

Resources and links from the interview:

• Garrett Integrated System Webpage
• Garrett Integrated System LinkedIn page
• James Garrett LinkedIn Profile