Building Success: Sheds, Bitcoin, and Business Blessings in Texas

Ever wondered how to build a thriving shed business in Texas? Join us as Edwin Miller from SE Yard Solutions shares his remarkable journey from a subcontractor to a successful entrepreneur in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. You'll uncover how Edwin's preference for above-ground structures helps him navigate the challenging Texas soil and strict HOA regulations. Listen as he reveals his efficient on-site assembly model, which includes pre-kitting sheds, enabling him to manage long-distance projects and cater to custom builds.

Get an insider's perspective on the power of visual aids in gaining HOA approval. Edwin discusses the game-changing role of 3D configurators and detailed drawings in meeting HOA requirements, along with the logistical benefits of on-site construction. Discover the strategic considerations that influence his business direction, from equipment costs to site accessibility. This episode also sheds light on the critical importance of legendary customer service, offering real-life examples and strategies that encourage organic reviews and fuel a robust referral program.

How can Bitcoin enhance your business transactions? Edwin delves into the resilience and benefits of Bitcoin, providing insights into its role within the shed industry. We also explore the impact of digital currencies and how blockchain technology can offer secure digital identity verification. Finally, the episode wraps up with a heartfelt discussion on integrating faith into business, emphasizing the significance of prayer and gratitude in overcoming challenges and achieving success. Don't miss this enriching conversation that blends practical business advice with digital innovation and personal growth.

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Transcript

SHED GEEK: 0:07

Okay, welcome back to another episode of the Shed Geek podcast. Sounds like cloudy days in Illinois and cloudy days in Texas today. Edwin, you want to introduce yourself, the name of your company and give us a little idea of who you are and what you do, sir.

EDWIN MILLER: 0:29

So I'm Edwin Miller, my wife and I. We started our company SE Yard Solutions back in December of 2018. And I started out mainly just doing subcontracting work. For well, I did subcontracting work for Tough Shed, installed sheds, traveled a little bit with them, and then I went and also did contracting work, installing a lot of sheds for backyard products. They're the company that sells through Lowe's and several other different outlets that they have and I also was focusing more on trying to do.

EDWIN MILLER: 1:11

Privacy fence was really what I wanted to do. Didn't take me very long to figure out that come July and August here in Texas, you start trying to dig holes in some of this caliche they call caliche dirt. I'm like, yeah, that's not really for me. So I was like I'd much rather build above the ground. And so, yeah, I uh, yeah, so we, I I knew how to build sheds and eventually that just kind of took uh kind of what took off.

EDWIN MILLER: 1:38

I uh tried to do some other things, but it didn't really nothing ever really worked out. So, like I always kept coming back to sheds, um, did some work for some different companies and then in uh, I guess it would have been 2021, 2022. Trying to think now, it would have been like 2022 when I really got serious about trying to actually build my own shed business and go after my own clients and and actually try and build a brand. So that's kind of where I started. I just had my website that we designed and built and had my Google my Business page and got a few leads that way and I just kind of went from there.

SHED GEEK: 2:18

So, yeah, that's awesome and you're in the Dallas-Fort Worth area.

EDWIN MILLER: 2:24

Yes, yeah, we live out here. We're based in Paradise, Texas. We're about an hour from downtown Fort Worth, so we're kind of on the northwest side, so we service the whole DFW area. I mean, we'll go out to. Yeah, I built a shed in Lubbock the other day, had a guy that needed a small shed out there so I drove out there to build it for him. We service quite a wide range of wide area. I'll go just about anywhere if you pay a delivery fee.

SHED GEEK: 2:55

Yeah, I know you've been down close to San Antonio and over close to Houston at times. It seems like I've seen on Facebook.

EDWIN MILLER: 3:03

Not Houston as much as the Austin San Antonio area that's about. As I mean we built one this winter down there. We had a guy that really wanted one, so we built one for him down there. But I've never really I mean I did do some work in Houston. Yeah, that was quite a few years ago and I that was in the middle of summer and I realized I don't care to work down there in the summertime. It's really humid, you're getting some of those swamps down there and it's like, yeah, not for me. I'd much rather sail a little bit further north if I can. So we try and focus most of our work within 100 mile radius of here.

EDWIN MILLER: 3:40

But gotcha there's there's other areas that we will cover you definitely have a little different business model.

SHED GEEK: 3:47

a lot of the shed industry builds, delivers you know um, but also offers a oftentimes an on-site option. Uh, but that's what you do all the time. This is like our friend Tom Burbage over near London. We've had him on the show and he said man, that's how everything's built over here. We've taken lumber straight through their home out into their garden and he said it's just a little bit different model, but that's kind of your wheelhouse. Smaller, I would say smaller sheds for the most part is probably a bit of your target audience, but I've seen you build some pretty large structures as well. Is that common?

EDWIN MILLER: 4:36

Yeah, so that is our target market. We do on-site only, site only. We've really tried to design everything we do around being efficient around the whole on site build model. So we'll have uh out here at our location in paradise we will kit everything and then take them out on site. Like myself, I can build the largest I've ever built by myself in a day of the shed that I kitted was a 12 by 20. That I did. It had double doors, it had 60-inch all-center studs, a single door, three windows. That was a really long install day but you can do it.

EDWIN MILLER: 5:16

And I really wanted to design it around the concept of a one-man crew being able to go out into someone's yard and build a pretty decent-sized structure that way, because most of our audience I mean if you live in a neighborhood, you're getting to where HOAs are regulating the size of sheds, so 80 square feet. Some people, like a lot of HOAs, don't want anything bigger than 8 by 8. I mean, 100 square feet is common, no bigger than 100 square feet. Then you're getting into height restrictions with HOAs as well and so they tend to just be smaller. You're going to do that base model 8 by 10. A lot of people want an 8 by 10 or an 8 by 12. But we do build bigger structures. A lot of those are going to be custom. We've built two-story structures for some folks. We do build some bigger ones, but by far and away our target market is going to be a lot more that smaller shed. So, and that's what we've tried to optimize around efficiency around.

SHED GEEK: 6:50

How can we be the most efficient at being in and out in your yard with minimalists? I lost you there for a minute but I got you, I got. I think I got the uh the the most of what you said there. I just lost you there just a little bit on the end, um, but but yeah, no, that's, that's great. Uh, with hoa like being a common theme in in your potential clients, or the majority of your clients. How does that process usually work? Do you have to uh contact the hoa is that all on the customer? And they give you the specs that you have to build in. What's that process look like?

EDWIN MILLER: 7:26

so we have. I have contacted hoas where I have built sheds and try to build relationships with them. But you also get most of the time what to answer your question. I do not work with what it is on. We will provide everything that we would, that they would need to pull a permit, like in the city, and I'm like this is typically what HOAs require. I'll draw, I'll have like specs with height, obviously on.

EDWIN MILLER: 8:02

We have a 3D configurator that we invested in from the get-go and that allows them to see the 3D drawings, how it's going to look, the colors, all of that. So HOAs have a good idea of what materials are used to build it and how it's going to look, how the completed product is actually going to look. So that is typically what we'll do is we'll send them like they have all that information and if they need more, we're more than happy to provide all that. But we try like we can design around what the HOA wants. But that's typically what the HOAs are mostly concerned about how it's going to look. So if you can provide drawings or 3D rendering image of how it's actually going to look, a lot of times they are willing to go with it okay we found that that's the most common way to do.

SHED GEEK: 8:51

Just let the homeowner yeah, no, that makes a lot of sense.

SHED GEEK: 9:56

so you've been doing this for a couple of years now. Any, any insight as to where you feel like you want to move the next direction? You know, do you want to stay in the on-site build or do you eventually want to get into the, the portable side, where you're actually getting involved in the transportation and pre-building model and having a lot? Or, you know, know, creating a digital storefront, however that looks, and putting that model out there? Are you content, happy and feel good about like the on-site model that you currently have.

EDWIN MILLER: 10:39

I mean, I've looked at that and obviously there's always going to be a market for that. That and obviously there's always going to be a market for that. That uh, shed lot. People come in and they want to shed yesterday. You know, a lot of times if you're not booked out, you can get a shed to them pretty, pretty directly.

EDWIN MILLER: 10:56

Um, I'm pretty content with staying in my lane with onsites. I think that's really where our expertise lies in perfecting that process. Because if you're looking at it from an efficiency standpoint, setting up your factories to build that shed in-house and delivering it pre-built is a little different than setting up a factory process to kit a shed and then build it. Up a factory process to kit a shed and then build it if you can. So you give up efficiency gains if you're trying to build them in a shop now. So I think the best path forward for us is to gonna be to focus on that on-site model where we kit them and then take them out.

EDWIN MILLER: 11:40

I'm not saying we can't do shed lots, because again, they're designed around the concept of moving them. I've worked at more than one startup shed startup and that's what we did. That's how I learned how to build portable buildings is in a shop, so I know how these structures need to be designed to hold up. When you try and pull them, the joist doesn't pull out on them. Walls, don't you need to. You want solid top plates on your walls. You need some of those. If you especially get into bigger buildings, you embrace some of that the corners up and stuff, so that your mule doesn't push your walls in. So we design them to where all that stuff is.

EDWIN MILLER: 12:17

I mean, if we build on site a lot of times we can get away with three runners versus four. The only reason for a fourth runner in like a 10 wide building is so you actually have so it can fit on a trailer transport. You don't need it structurally, like even ibc codes. You don't need that for your span on your floor, joist. So there's some things like it's not that hard to just throw. If you do ever want to move it, just throw two extra runners underneath that shed that are spaced appropriately for a shed trailer if you need to. So we just build it um to where it's not necessarily going to be moved and then it's not that hard to just throw some extra material in there.

EDWIN MILLER: 12:54

But what I found, I mean I've worked with um, I've worked with both models and the. The cost of transporting sheds is only going to go up from here. Like insurance isn't coming down, equipment doesn't seem to be moving down much. I mean there's more equipment coming in on the market, uh, as far as moving sheds is concerned, but the cost to operate the equipment isn't necessarily going to go down. So it's like do I want to add that additional overhead to my business or do I want to try and maximize the efficiency of being able to build your shed on site and you don't have to worry about equipment coming in your yard? None of that stuff that the customer has to worry about.

EDWIN MILLER: 13:38

Like I could get in places that I mean I built on. There's no way you could have got a shed down the side of Lake Bridgeport where I built it, if it was pre-built. I mean it was enough. It was hard enough to get it down there on site. I mean I had to use the neighbor's driveway and it was so steep I was like I unstrapped my lumber and it all started sliding off the trailer when I parked. I'm like, yeah, there's some stuff like that. It's really hard to get in Areas like that servicing people and that was out in the country.

EDWIN MILLER: 14:17

He had an HOA, but as far as billing restrictions, he didn't necessarily he was out in the county. You get into areas like that where it's just. To me, it's not worth the upfront investment to really maximize that. Now, if we go to trade shows and things like I, can always hire drivers to haul sheds. So to me, when I looked at how I wanted to structure my model, I'm like I can try and go out and get all that equipment or I can take that money and put it into market and really try and capitalize on the onsite market. So that's kind of the approach I've taken is to just, instead of trying to operate a transportation business, I will focus more on what we do best, which is getting a shed built in your yard efficiently.

SHED GEEK: 15:09

What's the customer experience been like for you? In that way, you reach a lot of your customers organically through your website and through marketplace. Definitely. A quick shout out to our team at shed geek marketing for uh building the SE Yard Solutions website. I certainly hope that you're happy with it and we've obviously uh shamelessly plug ourself from time to time, but we're happy to have you as a client and definitely there's more conversations there about marketing and we want to pursue those with you and others. But if anybody's curious, just go over and take a look SE Yard Solutions. com. But how's your customer experience been there, Edwin? Like what, what? What have you experienced versus a traditional? You've worked in shops before, so what have you experienced? The customers expectations are um versus like going to a a lot speaking to a salesperson and then either ordering some piece of inventory or custom shed. What's it like going through you and what? What do they say? What do the customers say their experience is?

EDWIN MILLER: 16:23

Well, a large part of it has to do with the website. You need trust. So when people find you, if you direct them to your website and that's a big part of it is actually investing in the digital side of things. If you're going to build it with no inventory, build a business around not actually having a lot full of sheds, and that's where, like, we built the first website and we got compliments on it because it was, I mean, we just built it with simple tools that we had and then, when we like, but we didn't really have any tracking, and that's why, like I had, y'all build it and y'all did a phenomenal job.

EDWIN MILLER: 17:01

People can find what they want. They find the all the information that's relevant to purchasing a shed is. The home page looks great and, like I've got compliments on that as well because they like something that's easy to find. They don't want to have to fill in all kinds of information before they get any. Like they want to put in personal details before they find information that's relevant to what they're looking for, and so we don't try. I mean I would. There are some areas we need to to work on as far as capturing leads, but you just want to make sure that people can find what they're looking for before they have to really do a whole giveaway their phone number and email address and all that stuff, the customer expectations. There's definitely been some hesitancy. They want to see the work you do. That's mostly going to be the older people and I do have one display that I built. I don't know a lot, but it's not.

EDWIN MILLER: 17:56

The amount of people that actually go out and take a look at that shed just to be comfortable is minimal, because we have a good web presence, we have great reviews online. We focus like that's the biggest thing. If you're going to build a business around a digital, like a commodity style, capital intensive business, like sheds around a digital I the digital concept reviews are the most critical thing to get it going and that's what we found. We just really focus heavily on trying to get reviews and then just pointing people to that and then leaning on those reviews in our marketing and putting people back to that, and that overcomes almost all the objections that people have, like let's say, they find us a marketplace and so they're not really comfortable, right, and so we'll just direct them Like you can go find their reviews, find out what people are saying and like 99% of the time, it takes care of almost all the objections because they can see what people are saying and it makes them a lot more comfortable.

EDWIN MILLER: 19:00

So the biggest piece of advice I have for people, if you're trying to build out like a digital business like this, is you need to get as many reviews as possible and then just point people in that direction if they have questions about quality, about your customer service and and when you add, like the biggest thing to get reviews is just ask for me. I mean, it's amazing how many people like they'll give you a review if you just ask them. So that's, that's what we do and that's really been the biggest key for us is that side of it.

SHED GEEK: 19:36

If reviews are so important to the business, would you agree then? What we're essentially saying is that reviews are influential, right? So that's essentially what you're trying. You're trying to get your. You know, we try to do the same thing with the different areas that we work in. You know, with marketing, rto, whatever it looks like. We're trying to create such a good customer service experience that that they will, without being solicited, they will go and and speak well on our behalf. Now, nothing wrong with soliciting, right? And I appreciate your comments here today. That means a lot. I'll, I'll, I'll send you a gift card or something. But, uh, um, the reality is you want to do such a good job that you want that influence. You want your neighbor to say, hey, you should really use Edwin, you should really go to SE Yard Solutions Like, and that's what you're trying to do. You're trying to because if you, if you ask someone sometimes that it's solicited, maybe it loses some of the value as opposed to if it's unsolicited, right? If they just can't wait to tell people about it and, and you know they just had such a good experience You're trying to create that legendary customer service that Anthony Mitchell talks about there in Georgia. I love. I love that he said that's what we try to do every time they come through the door legendary customer service, and I just think that's brilliant. I mean, that's that's. That's the best source of influence, that's the hottest lead you could possibly get.

EDWIN MILLER: 22:22

Yeah, it is, and you hit on a good point there. The other thing that we do is we implemented a referral program, and so that's something that I try to keep up as much as I can. Sometimes it can be a little bit difficult to keep track of all that, because you're going to have a customer that might have got referred to us but they never mentioned it to us and so it's kind of like, well, I don't even know who to give a referral to. So that's something that's kind of in the back of my mind as I look at building it is how do I build out a better referral program? But yeah, it's the solicitation. As far as the solicitation of reviews, so I never really think of going to give a lumber yard, a review. It's just something that doesn't really cross my mind. Give them a lumber yard or review, I just don't. It's just something that doesn't really cross my mind. Even if I get phenomenal customer experience, I'll just go by and if people ask, I'll tell them when I think of giving a review.

EDWIN MILLER: 23:23

Most of the time it's going to be like in a restaurant business Like that's, the food's good, and so, yes, I want people to give me those reviews without me asking for it, and it's becoming more common. But if you just direct people's attention to the fact that you could give me a review, like we like, reviews are essential to our business. You know, give a review on Google or Facebook, which is where most of our reviews are at, most people are like oh yeah, sure, I'll do that. They're also saying I'll also tell all my neighbors.

SHED GEEK: 23:53

It's just a matter of like.

EDWIN MILLER: 23:55

Most of the time, if you provide that great customer service you, you only have to ask them once like, they're like oh yeah, sure, great, right, where are you at right?

EDWIN MILLER: 24:03

it's a matter of it's. It's not like we're trying to push them and we're not like giving them like oh yeah, you go give us a review, you know we'll send you a 50 gift card or whatever. Like we're like, we're just simply asking for an honest review, an honest assessment online, and most people are more than happy to do that. So the yes, I wish it was more people would just think of doing that. But in I've just found that in in a the shed visit, they don't typically, especially because we don't have an actual I mean we have a physical presence here. I mean they could come out, but there's no displays here for them to see, where, like, there's not even a like an actual physical storefront for them to give a review to. So they typically don't.

EDWIN MILLER: 24:48

So it's a matter of us asking and actually solicitating the review, because otherwise they just don't really think of it unless they have found us through a review. Now that's. The other thing is is, as your review base builds, if people actually organically find you because of review, they're more likely to give you a review. The other thing is, there's a lot of people that choose us over some other shed builders because of our reviews like they're like, they're just like we wanted to visit with you because your views are great.

EDWIN MILLER: 25:21

Uh, people like working with you and then if we provide that same kind of customer, we meet those, meet or exceed those expectations. They're more than happy to give us review as well. That's how they found us. They, they want to tell more people about us. So that's that's kind of where I felt like I used to kind of be like oh yeah, asking for a review. That's kind of like, isn't that a little cheating?

EDWIN MILLER: 25:40

Isn't that kind of like really not necessarily cheating, but isn't it kind of like honest, is that 100% honest? And then I was like, as I thought through the process of how it actually works and why people don't give reviews, I'm like, oh well, this I don't. I mean. I'm so guilty of so that's kind of where it's hard. It's very important that, like if someone asks me to leave a review, I will most of the time just bring my attention to the fact that you need a review that helps you.

SHED GEEK: 26:14

So, that's.

EDWIN MILLER: 26:14

That's where I fall.

SHED GEEK: 26:16

I'm so guilty of not doing it, even whenever I should be. Uh, I think we're all. We're all probably built that way. It takes a little extra time and you want the. You know you want the service to be such such a good that you just can't wait to talk about it. But I see your point and I see what you're saying. I didn't realize we'd talked so much about reviews today, but I feel like it's made for a really good conversation and it's got me like evaluating the way I think about different things.

SHED GEEK: 26:42

But although reviews became a hot topic, there's another topic that you're really passionate about and I wanted to kind of bring to the audience, and it's a topic I've not touched on yet and I'm going to admit that I'm I'm coming in super green here. So like you're talking about someone who knows nothing about what you're discussing right now, but I want you to take it from the, from the bottom to the top. Give me the complete run through of. You know, uh, bitcoin and sort of like this, this, this was is a virtual currency. Am I saying that correct? You know, like I don't even know. I'm so green on it, I don't pay attention to it so much. I need to learn so much about it. So, Edwin, you're my, you're my teacher here, you're my educator here. Uh, let's talk about bitcoin and let's talk about how, like this, virtual currency could have an effect on business and how that ultimately affects shed business.

SHED GEEK: 28:34

I just want to kind of give you the mic to just run with it, man, because I almost don't even know what questions to ask. I'm so green on. I've been trying to educate myself and I just get lost, so I need somebody to break it down to me.

EDWIN MILLER: 28:48

Yeah, well, yeah, that's definitely something that I I mean, I've spent the last decade plus really trying to understand money and how our monetary system works. Uh from, uh, from the ground, what drives the wheels of money and what actually is money and Bitcoin. A lot of people think, oh, it's new, it was invented in 2008. And that's true, it was that's when it was created. But to really find the reason why Bitcoin was even created, you have to go all the way back. You have to go way back, like 100 plus years. I mean, bitcoin is the invention of decades of trying and failing other digital currencies that didn't work they didn't really make it and Bitcoin finally put enough of the right pieces together and we had an Internet. That was so. You couldn't have Bitcoin in 1995 because the internet was not widespread enough and the speeds globally weren't fast enough to make it make it work the way it does, and so it was just an evolution over time that happened, and so Satoshi Nakamoto, the uh famous anonymous creator of Bitcoin, uh, finally was able to put enough of the right pieces together in the right order that it actually worked. Surprisingly, almost, because this was not the first time, this is not the first current digital currency that people have tried to create, and so after that you got a whole bunch of people trying to mimic create, and so after that you got a whole bunch of people trying to mimic. Anytime technology comes in, you're gonna have people trying, because so it's so easy to do and like especially if it's an open source project. Anyone can see the code and go mimic it.

EDWIN MILLER: 30:42

But the way that bitcoin was created was it was designed in such a way that the longest block chain would always win. So let's say you had something happened. You had two actors trying to create division and so they would be able to split the blockchain. Let's say we're able to get 25% of it. Well, there's enough if the other 75% of the network that's working there's nodes. So let me back up a little bit.

EDWIN MILLER: 31:15

So the way that an overarching view of the way Bitcoin works is you have a miner. You have a computer essentially doing hashes, which is guessing. There's an algorithm that they follow, guessing numbers to fill up blocks. Then you also have nodes. A node is essentially you can run it off your computer and all that's doing is validating that these transactions belong to this block and they're broadcasting transactions. So you have your miners that are mining, they're looking for blocks. Then you have your nodes that are essentially holding everything accountable the branch of a bank, essentially and these nodes are dispersed throughout the globe. At this point, I mean, you've got them in practically every single country on the planet North Korea, iran, russia and as long as these nodes are operating, the Bitcoin network is always going to be accurate.

EDWIN MILLER: 32:14

Then you also have the code. So there's the code that stands behind it, and it's extremely hard to change the code because you have to get all the nodes and all the miners to agree to a change in code. So it became this. So, as it started from the ground up, it had to be like there was not enough people to really challenge it. And as this, as this network grew and grew and grew, in order for it to be changed or altered in any way at this point is for all these parties to come together and agree. You can't back date transactions either. Um, so, because once it gets broadcast to the network, every single node can pull up a retro transaction, and the only way to reverse it is if you can co-opt all those nodes, and they're all operating on different servers. I mean, obviously there's some on the same servers, but there's so many servers and satellites, it's impossible to really reverse a transaction, and so that's the way the Bitcoin operates.

EDWIN MILLER: 33:16

And then you so, as you kind of went through, as it became bigger, became a thing. Obviously more people wanted to improve it, and so because there's definitely issues with that, it's not exactly super fast, it's not secure the way a lot of people want to say it's, it's you can. It's harder to once, it's harder to remain anonymous on bitcoin than on some other blockchains, but you kind of need that if you want an open ledger of money, because if I can't see that you spent money, how do I know that you're not going to spend it again? So you have to be able to validate it that way. And so then there was all these other people and teams that came up with other projects, but none of them have been as successful or been able to be as decentralized as Bitcoin, because it has a big network effect where it has eventually become so big that in order for you to overtake it, it's, it's almost impossible in this world, because if not impossible, I mean you you would have to have so much computing power, you would have to take so much energy off the grid like it would.

EDWIN MILLER: 34:23

It would be, the amount of power would be just completely out of this world, like if we we would know it was happening. If there was an attack on the network, we'd know what was happening because of the amount of power it would take electricity because of the miners you have to plug in. We would know that something was happening. There was no way that we wouldn't know. And then the only thing you would do really is destroy yourself, because once you spent all this million, hundreds of millions of dollars to bring all this power online, to buy all these computers, to mine it, to break it would mean that all that investment is lost because now you broke it. Now everybody's wealth is gone. So you're not really incentivized to spend all that money to try and break it, unless you're like some nation state, which you could.

EDWIN MILLER: 35:09

But again, I mean, I even have proof that it's really hard for a nation state to co-opt it. China tried it, nigeria's trying it, the US is essentially starting to try doing that. But all these other coins came in and it became just like the Internet boom. Essentially, they became a business that they were trying to make money off of this idea of virtual currency, and you have Ethereum that might go somewhere, but that's not really going to be a currency. Then you have a couple of other ones that may go somewhere, but it's kind of like the dot-com boom. You've got to kind of wait until it shakes out to know which ones are actually going to go, but they're not really going to be.

EDWIN MILLER: 35:57

I don't think there's any ever going to be any that are going to replace bitcoin at the store value. So it's the thing that makes bitcoin special is the hard cap. It's that code that's encoded like. The 21 million is all that are ever going to be made like if there's a digital scarcity, which is one of the things that was really invented with, really solidified with bitcoin. We've never had that before. True, actual digital scarcity, 21 million, we know, and actually I'm going to be exactly 21 million, just under 21 million because of the way the math works out. Um, that are. That's all there'll ever be mine once those are mined.

EDWIN MILLER: 36:36

It's like good luck trying to get more, because you're like I explained earlier, you're going to have to try and get all the nodes, all the computers. The entire network has to agree to do more and at this point there's enough people that are going to say no to that that the chance of that ever happening is so minuscule that it's essentially not even a reality. So then you kind of, if you go through history as it kind of kept growing and getting larger and larger, you had all these other coins came in trying to mimic it, and a lot of these are just rules. There's a lot of Mark and I rules. There's a lot I believe it was Mark Andreessen but a lot of these venture capital firms. Let's say, you had a software business and you're trying to raise money for it. If you went to a VC firm and you pitched the software company tied to a meme coin or a virtual currency, a digital token, you are much more likely to get funding. And the reason you could do that is because of the way that money works. When you invest millions of dollars into a private equity, a private company like that, you have to hold it for a certain amount of time per the SEC rules, the way that all the regulations work around it, so you have to hold on to it. So now you have to hope that the business will make it through the ups and downs of the business cycle for you to actually make money on it and, at least you know, get your money out of it and hopefully make a return on that investment.

EDWIN MILLER: 37:59

Well, with these digital currencies, you didn't have to wait. You could essentially mint as many coins as you wanted to, as you could get them listed on, like Coinbase or Kraken or any of these other digital currency exchanges, and you could pump the price. Because if you could let's say you created 5 million coins and the venture capital firm holds 40% of that float they could try and pump that price as much as they can and then dump it, and they could do all that within five or six days of them making the initial investment. Let's say, you invest $10 million to try and help this startup. Go on, you can make it in a matter of weeks instead of months. That's why you saw this huge.

EDWIN MILLER: 38:45

I mean, and investors were just gobbling it up because virtual currency was a big thing, right? This is the next thing and all these coins that were hitting the market, so they just began creating all this and it just created put a bad taste in people's mouth because you get rug pulled and these coins are never like, they'll never go up in value, um. So I always tell people if you're looking at, don't do what I did. I made money on some of that stuff and then I lost probably lost all of it because I kept hanging on to it. So I'd invest in it. But I always come back to Bitcoin. It's the only thing that has consistently gone up. You have Ethereum. It's obviously hung around a little bit, but a lot of the stuff that they're doing on there is really iffy. I don't know if it's ever going to make it, just because of the way it's designed structurally.

EDWIN MILLER: 41:25

But I always come business to thrive thing. Or the largest expense to to actually hold gold is the security of it. So let's say you own a gold mine somewhere in south america, you mine it. That's, getting it out of the ground is expensive, but one of the larger aspects is, once you have it, how do you transport it? Because whoever has it, you know possession is nine-tenths of the law. So now you need to invest in security to actually transport it. So if you take that to a personal level, that's also the same experience.

EDWIN MILLER: 41:59

On a personal level, I mean, let's say China invades the US and I mean I'm in a border state. They could. I don't think they're going to come here, but they could. Right right, I mean, in the face of an invading army, I can't take out my real estate and move it with me to south america or canada or whatever. I could take my gold, but who wants to lug, you know, suitcases that are weighing 500 pounds around when you don't know whether you're even going to be able to have reliable transportation? So you probably or if you have a digital store value you remember 12 words you can literally walk across the border and no one knows. You have it and there's the way that it's going to affect business. So one example I have of Bitcoin, how Bitcoin can help, is I don't think I'll ever forget this story.

EDWIN MILLER: 42:50

I was building a shed for a customer out in East Texas and he does some investing real estate investing and has some other investments. And he was telling me about his friend has a lumber company, owns a lumber yard and a lot of these. You know they'll carry a 60-day note and that's why he had a lot of credit extended to his contractors. Well, for some reason, his account, his bank account, got mixed up and the FBI seized it, essentially flagged it as a terrorist account. They locked it, froze his assets, boom, shut down. He could not operate his business because he had no money. He couldn't pay his suppliers, he couldn't keep extending credit to his contractors because he couldn't. He didn't have access to funds so he needed to take out a loan. So my customer said he knew he was good for it and he knew he didn't do it, that he wasn't affiliated with a terrorist organization. So he lent him the money and obviously, it all cleared up.

EDWIN MILLER: 43:57

But now I mean that account got flagged. Now any bank that tries to touch it, that account, without getting clarification, is going to have questions because there's all these red flag laws. So now that account is tainted and that guy, like his social security number, is tainted like everything. If he had a way to at least pay off his suppliers outside of the financial system let's say Bitcoin, because Bitcoin they can't, it's been proven. They can't stop Bitcoin from actually moving If you hold it, if you do it right. I mean China tried it, the US an interesting story I had some money, some Bitcoin, on a software wallet that the founders were doing some, definitely doing some questionable things as far as what they were pitching and they were actually.

EDWIN MILLER: 44:51

They were actually. They were operating within the guidelines that FINRA and the powers that be put out for essentially banks or not necessarily banks, but what they? The guidelines that they've kind of said if you do this like you're not doing criminal activity. Well, they were kind of admitting to the fact. They knew there was probably some money laundering going on on their platform. So, anyhow, they got arrested. This happened a couple of weeks ago.

EDWIN MILLER: 45:19

I had some money left on that account. The fbi sees the servers. But because I had set it up right, I still have access to my funds, at least something down. There's not going to get into the technical details. There are um some funds on there that are still. I still have access to them because of the way I had them, the technical details.

EDWIN MILLER: 45:46

I had them in a will pool and that essentially just takes your utxos and combines them into one, takes multiple utxos, multiple small transactions, and bundles them up and so that, because of the way that they had their system set up, I don't have access to those yet. I'm working on all that. But the rest of the coins, like I, have access, full access to them because it operates outside of their jurisdiction. Access to them because it operates outside of their jurisdiction. They can't stop it from happening because there's I don't know how many hundreds of thousands of computers, how many hundreds of thousands of nodes around the globe that are transacting that. Yes, this transaction happened and this wallet still holds these keys, still hold these coins because they haven't moved. But that's just one story of how.

SHED GEEK: 46:33

Of how it affected you, but I had, and the reason that I'm bringing it up is because I had. I saw where recently, a shed industry said now accepting Bitcoin on Facebook, or I don't remember where. I saw it, but I thought, wow, that's, that's interesting. It's at least interesting enough that I feel like there's a conversation there and surely there's somebody that knows a little bit about the details of this and, as me and you were just doing discovery and finding more conversation, you were talking about this and I know there's others around that you know have some thoughts on this. I've seen Jason Graber at Shed Suite mentioned some different stuff on analytics and things like that, but I want to dive into these conversations more. One just so I understand it more, but but two so that the audience understands it more and how that would affect their business. Uh, how do you even accept bitcoin as a form of payment for a shed? And the fact that that's happening already, um, it's just got me perplexed, uh, uh, and I'm and I'm definitely curious your thoughts on it.

EDWIN MILLER: 49:08

Yeah. So I've never accepted Bitcoin for a shed, even though I would. I've tried to sell sheds. I've offered substantial discounts to people who don't buy a shed with Bitcoin, but right now the tax implications of doing that in the US are so onerous that it's probably not going to happen Because you get taxed on any capital gains. So let's say I buy Bitcoin at $30,000. It goes up to $60,000, and I use that to buy a shed. I have to pay capital gains tax on that any time.

EDWIN MILLER: 49:39

If I use those funds to pay for a coffee for $5, I have to pay capital gains tax on the $5 that you spent. So it's really onerous to actually do that here in the states. Um, you have an address, you can. It's becoming easier and easier and easier to accept payments. Um, one of the ways you can do it, depending on the wallet you have, uh, you can download on your phone. People can just scan a qr code. You hold it up, they scan a qr code and it will send the funds. They'll sign it that way. Uh, if they have a signing device. Um, they're right again. It's very similar to the early days of the internet, like it worked, but there, as as more and more people started working on and developing, it, became easier and easier for people like me to use it, and so that's kind of the way bitcoin it's becoming even in the god. It's been about four years now since. Kind of the way Bitcoin it's becoming even in the. It's been about four years now since I've really been in Bitcoin. It's become substantially easier to do all this stuff, but it's really, once you get into the nitty gritty of it, it's not that hard Once you understand what a key is like your signing device. To understand what a key is like your signing device, your wallet signs it with a key. Like I said, a lot of things are moving to a QR code, where you can scan a QR code, and it's simple. Easy to do it that way Just accept payments.

EDWIN MILLER: 51:02

It would be just like any other form, like just accepting cash. It's a peer-to-peer transaction. That's how I would do it. I'd either give them my wallet address, which is just a giant string of numbers and letters. As long as it goes to that address, I can then confirm that I actually have it because it will come in my account.

EDWIN MILLER: 51:26

The other thing is, let's say, if your credit card gets stolen, the bank can refund your money. You can like when a bitcoin gets spent, like I said earlier, like you can't reverse the transaction. So let's say, your customer puts it, puts in one or two numbers or letters wrong and it goes to the wrong address. Like it's tough luck because it's not coming back unless you can contact the other person to get him to refund the money. Like it's tough luck because it's not coming back unless you can contact the other person to get him to refund the money like it's not coming back. So like there's personal responsibility has to be noted. Like there's no refunds once that money is gone. Like there is no recourse period unless you just happen to have sent money to some benevolent person that was willing to give you your money back wow so yeah, and that's the thing like.

EDWIN MILLER: 52:12

That's one of the other things that makes it such attractive as a currency, because you don't have a central power saying, oh yeah, you know the banks that made all the problems in the first place. You get bailouts, which is what happened in. Oh wait, and part of that is what really spurred Bitcoin, because a lot of people are like man, this doesn't make any sense. These are the guys who created all the problems. No one gets criminally prosecuted. You instead get more money. So there's a level of personal responsibility that has to be taken when you actually look at doing this, doing this one of the other examples of bitcoin. If you have time, that I wanted to give real quick that could affect all of us.

EDWIN MILLER: 52:57

On a personal level, yeah, go for it. Um, is this? This actually happened to uh, someone that I was listening to a podcast recently they were talking about like so hackers are really starting to target a lot of bitcoin or prominent Bitcoiners because they know if they can get the transactions to go through like there is no recourse. I mean the FBI can go and try and seize it, but there is no recourse If they custody it and do it right, like there's no recourse for anyone to get those funds back. But he was talking about his sister, so he was driving the car one time. About his sister. So he was driving the car one time he got this scammer called him and told him that he had his sister kidnapped. Like had kidnapped his sister and, um, they even played. Like a woman in his dress on the background said her boyfriend, you know, wouldn't do to pay the ransom one night. He was like, okay, he the scammer knew just enough, had said just enough of the details, right to where he's like there's legitimacy here. So he quickly had he had a passenger in the car and call around to try and verify that sister was actually taken and his sister was at a boot camp I believe it's boot camp in the Air Force and he finally threw enough phone calls, got ahold of someone. They shut. They shut the training camp, whatever it was I can't remember what he said, where it was. They shut it down because they had word that one of their trainees was essentially kidnapped, and so they shut it down for an hour while they tried to. While they tried to, they found her, verified that she was actually on base. They shut the entire base down because of a scammer and one guy trying to verify that his sister was in fact not kidnapped.

EDWIN MILLER: 54:41

So you know and that is going to become more and more common, I think, as AI starts to pick up you can impersonate people. You can already impersonate with AI. You can impersonate all the video. You can do video calls to try and verify the identity of the person, and AI can make one that's almost as realistic as your shelf. So, in a world of robos and scammers, how are you going to verify that you are who you say you are? And this is the other thing where Bitcoin comes in. So the guy was able to verify that he was.

EDWIN MILLER: 55:15

But if you have a way to digitally represent yourself online. Let's say you can spend two or three cents to verify that. Everybody can know that it's you and it's not somebody that's impersonating you. Everybody can know that it's you and it's not somebody that's impersonating you. And that's where, like the keys you're holding your own personal private keys with Bitcoin come in, because it takes actual mining energy. It takes money, like you have to either A spend fiat money, us dollars, to acquire it, or you have to spend money to set up a computer, a mining rig, electricity to mine bitcoin. It takes actual physical work, like you can't just create it out of thin air. It takes capital to do that. So if you have and then then you have a way to cryptographically and digitally sign that.

EDWIN MILLER: 56:06

This is me, this I am willing to put hard work behind the fact that I am who I say I am. Suddenly it becomes very costly for scammers and impersonators to verify anything, because it takes real effort, takes real energy to do that. And so as this starts to become commonplace, like knowing how to move money around, how to sign your transactions, which is not that complicated to do it's going to become more and more imperative. And especially, this might resonate with a lot of the shed industry, because I know a lot of people are very much into believing God and that we should go do good in the world, like I do. I'm a Christian and so missions are a big part of what we do.

EDWIN MILLER: 56:56

I mean, let's say you have someone. Let's say your son or your daughter is over in Kenya and you get a phone call that someone kidnapped her. Like how are you going to verify that? How are you going to get money to them? I mean, let's say someone's in South Korea. You're a business owner, you're doing well. They get kidnapped. And someone in North Korea and they ask you to send money to North Korea. How are you going to do that? How are you going to verify that they have her? If you send money to North Korea, you're probably going to get sanctioned, like it's like and once, once that genie is out of the bottle, like you'll always have eyes on you because everything is tied to your bank account.

EDWIN MILLER: 57:39

So, like you ask, how is this going to affect the shed world and how it's not just the shed world. Like it will revolutionize the way we do business and the way we think about taxes because of the incentive structure that's in place now. If the government can't access my funds without my consent, they are incentivized to essentially not kill me and not freeze my assets, because if I die, my capital goes with me. The more capital that we have in society, the more businesses we can create, the more society prospers. And so if suddenly the incentive structure gets flipped to where they are actually incentivized to provide the services I need to create and build a society in such a way that it benefits everyone, without robbing me blind via taxes and everything else that they try and impose on us, like, how is that going to affect business? Because they cannot.

EDWIN MILLER: 58:42

Like, we have there's a lot of like, there's proven, it's been proven that they they have not been able to stop transactions from happening and that they have not been able to actually break the encryption that stores your keys. And so if they are designed or if they are suddenly forced to deal with that reality, how is that going to affect taxes and the way we actually build society? That reality, how's that going to affect taxes and the way we actually build society? Like there's the whole, you know second level, and there's third level and there's fourth level thinking that how is this going to actually change it? Like, I don't know, but I'm here for the ride. I love everything about it and I love trying to think through how that's going to affect it.

EDWIN MILLER: 59:25

And personally I'm the I would much rather get in the boat and risk sinking with everyone else than just try and play it safe and know that at some point the boat we're on is going to sink anyway.

EDWIN MILLER: 59:38

So that's that's kind of me, because history has kind of told us that all, all fiat currencies go to zero and all societies that rely on them um, end up kind of imploding, and that's essentially what we are on and I think there's a lot of hope for us. I think there's, and all societies that rely on them end up kind of imploding, and that's essentially what we are on and I think there's a lot of hope for us. I think there's tons of hope for us to actually create and build a better society that's structured much more in line with the kingdom of God, because the incentives actually line up, instead of an incentive structure that essentially says if you don't do this, then you are subject to seizure of property and assets and imprisonment. So that's kind of a high arching. I mean there's tons of, tons of little rabbit trails we could go off on that, on how that could play out, but that's kind of how I feel, gosh man, I just love your passion for it.

SHED GEEK: 1:00:31

How I feel, gosh man, I just love your passion for it. It's equally as passionate about that as you are. Your business, your shed business, but they coincide just the same. As I tell people all the time, you know, I don't know, you know how I separate my work and home life from ministry and church and that, and that might not be everyone's thoughts, but you know, I'll stop in the middle of the day and pray with someone, or you know what I mean Stop in the middle of the day and talk to God and invite the Holy Spirit to give me direction and give me, you know, the mentality to handle things the right way. You know, and as the story is told, my flesh wins sometimes and I'm imperfect, but always striving, as Paul would say, to do the better thing and to finish the race.

SHED GEEK: 1:01:16

Man, you know we talked about at the beginning of this. Will we fill an hour? Will we fill 45 minutes? We've filled an hour and it's happened really quick. I want to wrap up, but I want to give you the same opportunity as I give everyone else. That didn't prepare you for this. But is there any questions you want to ask? Gloves off. Podcasting faith church business sheds doesn't matter what it is. I spent a lot of time asking you and getting your thoughts on things. Anything that you want to ask today before we wrap up of me, just any question that comes to mind.

EDWIN MILLER: 1:01:53

Well, I listened to a lot of your podcasts so I knew the question was probably coming and I didn't really prepare and really think about what I would want to ask you.

EDWIN MILLER: 1:02:02

But one of the one of the questions I guess that I have is and I know you've been asked something similar to this is like you see a lot of different businesses and, as far as the way that the shed business is structured, where do you see the most opportunity? As far as building the traditional model and building out inventory shed lots or going more along trying to reach those people that you can't deliver one to like, which one of those do you think has the most opportunity ahead of it?

SHED GEEK: 1:02:44

If I narrowed it down to those two, I would say gosh, there's really good opportunity in both. I don't know if I identify a clear winner in my head. I would say building a digital storefront is way cheaper than just opening up a new lot, just opening up a new lot. So that's sort of why we went the direction of marketing, because we knew that that you know, a full suite marketing company would be able to build websites. You know, do all of your tracking conversions. You know, like, do your organic and your, your, your paid SEO. Like right, like try and like create more SEO. But then also, you know, run ads and like reach customers and target and retarget those customers through data that you're able to collect through those conversion tracking tools.

SHED GEEK: 1:03:42

You know, like you, we were all fussing about. You know, um, self checkout, which I shamelessly admit that I've been defending for a long time. Uh, but now look at it. You know. Well, I mean, and the reason I do is you know there was a time where we had full service gas stations that people pumped your gas and then you got to where you pumped your own gas. So whenever I hear people say, well, I'm not going to do my own shopping. It's like man, business changes over time and business responsibilities change. I just always picked on the people who were picking on Walmart Cause I was like, of all the things they've got to pick on Walmart, like it's kind of hard to justify, like the number one employer in America is costing jobs right, like they're changing business because they're changing structure. That's the way they have to, just the way we all have to. But now you can walk in and just scan the items, put them in your cart and walk out Right, like you don't even have to like go to checkout. So like that's just an example of like job duties and description and responsibilities change over time, but that doesn't always necessarily affect employment. But that doesn't always necessarily affect employment. Plenty of reasons you know Walmart to be frustrated. You know whenever they started capping everyone's insurance at 32 hours. I'm not a fan of that. So like there's there's things we could complain about, but still yet they've made like lots of like created a lot of benefit to society anyway.

SHED GEEK: 1:05:09

So I think the digital storefront has so much potential. But I am seeing like these few mega area mega lots pop up. You know sam and susan's doing that in in south carolina and looking at doing that in phoenix and other places. So I always find that interesting to listen to their thoughts. You know my buddy, jeremy martin, down in Harrodsburg, kentucky. He's got a huge lot or he's hiring like five or six salespeople to compete, you know, and sort of like you know, trying to soak up an area.

SHED GEEK: 1:05:38

So I could see, we'll have to see, I don't know, we'll have to see how those things play out, but I can tell you that a digital storefront allows you to reach so many people. When we try to educate people through SEO, we try to talk about how you service a 50 mile radius. But not all fit, not all people in that 50 mile radius are going to drive by your lot necessarily. Or if you, if you do a hundred miles, you know there's some people in DFW is not going to drive down to Waco, but that person in Waco might be able to reach the people in DFW with a good online presence. You know Travis Beachy is doing a great job with Tik TOK down there, you know.

SHED GEEK: 1:06:15

So I mean there's, there's opportunities and possibilities that you just have to like, try to think broader and like I don't want to say gone are the days that you can just build a shed and set them up front in your house and sell them. But gone are the days that that's the only opportunity, because there are people investing in digital assets that are figuring it out and I kind of feel like those. You know they'll, they'll have more opportunity, I'll say it that way, by creating that digital storefront and trying to reach customers. I mean, we just had a conversation with somebody the other day about getting away from the dealer and manufacturer RTO approach and going to direct a consumer with the RTO approach. You know like that changes everything, because you know the RTO companies can only pay premiums for so much. And now I'm hearing six, seven, eight, 9%, just to keep someone on on.

SHED GEEK: 1:07:11

You know where we went a different direction and went service-based with marketing. So, um, there's, there's big conversations here. Maybe that question has, like more questions come out of the answer than an actual answer to your question. There may, it may just, you know, generate more conversation. But, um, I always love talking to you about all these things. I love it whenever we have our private chats. But, uh, it's nice to put a microphone to it, podcast to it and I don't know, just kind of get some details to it. I felt like we're, uh, going to be friends for a long time, and every time I get a chance to get down to dfw, I want to. I want to have lunch with you, more so yeah, yeah, absolutely.

EDWIN MILLER: 1:07:52

Anytime you're in the area, feel free to swing by. We've got a little place here. You can park your rv out here. Hey, we don't have a hookup, but you're more welcome to come out anytime that's all right, we'll come down.

SHED GEEK: 1:08:03

uh, I appreciate the invite and we'll make it happen. I'm gonna get off of here because I think we're going to go eat some lunch now, but my brain is expanded today because of all the conversation and you've got me so interested in understanding the virtual currency more. We may have to have a conversation that's just about that sometime so that I can understand more and see where opportunity lies there.

EDWIN MILLER: 1:08:32

So yeah, well, I mean in closing, like, if I may, Sure.

EDWIN MILLER: 1:08:37

One of the things I just encourage people is just get started, start putting on your balance sheet One, two percent of your balance sheet. It could make it. It could literally mean the difference between life and death for your business and for your personal finances. And in the end of the day, like what is one or two percent if you lose it all, you know it's not that much. So that's kind of where I I always try and encourage people to stay start out there, figure out how it works and then just just go from there. And, by all means, if people want to reach out to me I mean they weren't happy more I'm more than happy to to help them any way I can. I'm no expert, I'm not the guy that I would necessarily reach out to for help, but, uh, if you want to know where to start, I'm more than happy to to point you in the right direction what's a good way for them to get a hold of you, edwin?

EDWIN MILLER: 1:09:20

um. They can go to the website. There's contact information there. Email um, email us. The best way, Edwin m at seyardsolutions. com. It's going to probably be the best way, really.

SHED GEEK: 1:09:32

Appreciate the talk today, man, I felt like it's been a little while since I've got to pray on the podcast. You care if I close this out in prayer, and then that'll give me a chance to go get a bite to eat too and follow up on all these phone calls I'm missing over here.

EDWIN MILLER: 1:09:46

Yeah, absolutely, absolutely.

SHED GEEK: 1:09:48

All right, lord, thank you for this day, this opportunity and this conversation. Thank you for all of our blessings that you've bestowed upon us. Help us to be good stewards of all that that you've challenged us to do and trusted us to do. Give us the strength to grow through it and not just go through it. Give us the strength to meet the challenge and embrace the difficulties, the conversations that happened here today. I said you'd bless them, bless somebody and some conversation that Edwin might have with them, should they choose to call.

SHED GEEK: 1:10:22

Thank you for giving him a heart in this area and just his conversation overall, and we thank you for his business. Lord, it's been a blessing to us to be able to serve him and to be able to serve others and, as that you'd keep us in that mindset and all that we do and trying to be a servant in every area, just thank you. Thank you for your son that you sent to die for our sins, and we give you all honor and glory in Jesus name. Amen. All right man, I will talk to you soon, you too. Thanks, Edwin.