On this episode of The Mobile Alabama Business Podcast, we sit with Karen Simmons. Karen is one of those undercover entrepreneurs. Listen in as we discuss how she uses her background as a CFO to run multiple businesses at once.
Transcript:
Karen Simmons: My name's Karen Simmons and I was a CPA for 25 years. I'm a Yaya. I have two grandchildren, now I dabble in different businesses and I'm having the time of my life.
Marcus Neto: Yay.
Karen Simmons: Yay.
Marcus Neto: I finally convinced her to come on the podcast people, so she's here, Karen Simmons in the real flesh and blood. So I am very excited to have you here, because I very much respect what you bring to the business community here, and so it is a pleasure to have you. Thank you.
Karen Simmons: Well, thank you, and you humble me. I don't see anything different about what I do. I choose to multitask, multi-business. A lot of people don't understand it, and that's okay. You be you, boo and I'll be me, and the more projects I seem to have going on, the happier I am.
Marcus Neto: And that is for sure. She walks in today and tells me, you sold two buildings and a business since the last time we saw each other-
Karen Simmons: I did. Since Friday, yeah.
Marcus Neto: Yeah, and the smile on your face tells me a lot, but I know that even though you've sold some responsibility, that you probably have some ideas about growing the other aspects of what you have going on. That'll-
Karen Simmons: That's why I did it. One, and I'm not going to say anything about it yet. It's very small, not many people even know about it, so it's not affecting any of my clients and friends. And I want to concentrate more in the areas that I'm the best at. I see a huge need in Mobile right now for what I'm developing. And it encompasses everything I already have.
Marcus Neto: Well, I'm going to get you right in there in a second, but the thing that I wanted to hit on with you is this idea of you have finally figured out what it is that makes you tick, happy, what you want to focus on, however you want describe it. You're zeroing in on it, but I'm sure it's been quite the journey to get there. But what would you say to somebody that they're still trying to figure that out?
Karen Simmons: Give it to God. I've done it. When I was part of a big firm, CPA firm, worked myself all the way up to partner and it was miserable. Gave it to God, the next day something happened and was a sign. I was totally exhausted in a tax season in 2019, gave it to God on the way home, because I don't remember driving home because I was crying exhausted and beat up. The next day, my second person who I talked to this week because I respect him so much, came in and said, "I don't want to work this hard. April 15th's my last day." I said, "I can't do this anymore." That was on March 15th, corporate due date, and so that was my sign. So yeah, you got to sit back. Quit trying so hard for what you think you want to do.
Marcus Neto: It's interesting that you say it that way.
Karen Simmons: I do. My sister one time, she had a daycare with 60 kids and she said, "I don't know if I can keep doing this. I don't know, but what else would I do?" The thoughts everybody has, and I said, "For the next 30 days," it was the first of the month just happened, I said, "At the end of every day, do a smiley face or a frown face. At the end of a month, how many more do you have of the other? If you have more frown faces, you are not doing the right thing." Because people say, "Why do you work so hard?" I hate the word work.
Marcus Neto: Yeah.
Karen Simmons: I enjoy so much when I did realize I don't miss tax returns, but I miss the people, I miss the conversations, I miss the wins. Man, the intuition of just, or seeing patterns and numbers and stuff and going, "Well, there it is."
Marcus Neto: Well, so let me translate for the people that are listening.
Karen Simmons: Okay.
Marcus Neto: All right? So you had a CPA firm and were very successful in that CPA firm.
Karen Simmons: Yes.
Marcus Neto: And realized that you don't like the historical perspective of what the numbers tell you, but that you are very good at looking at numbers and being able to tell almost a path or a future and where the business is heading, and what they need to do or what they don't need to do in order to guide themselves and have a more prosperous and successful year.
Karen Simmons: That is so insightful that I have never thought about it that way, so thank you. It's true.
Marcus Neto: Am I right? Okay.
Karen Simmons: Yeah. Yeah, now that I think about it.
Marcus Neto: So I love that, because my relationship as a business owner, not knowing that about CPAs caused my relationship with CPAs to always kind of be this antagonistic. Because I always had expectations that they were going to, hey, here's what you need to do. Here are the things that we need to do to set you up for next year, blah, blah, blah, whatever, and we never got there.
Karen Simmons: I've always said after December 31, it's too late. It's too late, especially if you're cash basis. So, why do you want to do that? What I'm seeing now is, now that I got to step back, let me stop for just a second. One time a businessman, he was going through something and we were out and he said, "Well, you never called me." I said, "Does your doctor, lawyer call you? How do I know there's a problem unless you reach out?" So fighting with the government's a pain in the ass, and I got tired of doing it for something that happened in the past, and you're absolutely right.
Marcus Neto: That isn't really even, I mean, you're kind of somewhat responsible, but it's not your business.
Karen Simmons: But you still take it on, because they're entrusting you with their stuff. But yeah, I do miss the strategy part and the financials, and where do you want to be in five years? I would ask so many people that, and then somebody could turn around and call me a tax lady. I'm not a tax lady, I never was. I'm the most non-stereotypical CPA that you could have found. I mean, I punched one guy in the arm because he did something stupid one time, a client, and-
Marcus Neto: I'm sure he didn't mind.
Karen Simmons: I do have a funny story.
Marcus Neto: What's that?
Karen Simmons: Okay, so client told me one time, I said something snarky to him and he goes, "You would not believe what happened." He said, "Remember when you called me, or texted me such and such?" I said, "Yeah." He said, "I looked in my phone, I said, that bitch." The person next to me I was talking with said, "Who are you talking about?" "My CPA." He said, "Man, my CPA is a bitch too." They were both my clients. True story.
Marcus Neto: Yeah, no, you do. And I oftentimes wonder, are you from Mobile?
Karen Simmons: Yeah.
Marcus Neto: You're from the south?
Karen Simmons: I am.
Marcus Neto: Okay, because I always get a lot of, especially from my fiance, Chrissy, I always get shit about being an asshole. And I find that, I think people from the north are just a little bit, northeast specifically. I don't know if it's the cold winters or whatever, but we're just a little bit more direct and we don't have all the niceties that the southerners have. It's not all sweet tea and that stuff.
Karen Simmons: I grew up in the best place off Dauphin Island Parkway with no air condition and no heat.
Marcus Neto: Okay, so-.
Karen Simmons: And I helped to raise my brother and sister and there were a few bars I picked my daddy up from.
Marcus Neto: Yeah. Hard knock life.
Karen Simmons: And I took care of mom until my sister started taking care of her. And so you do what you got to do. And I ain't got time for bullshit.
Marcus Neto: Yeah, but I love it.
Karen Simmons: If you ask me a question, if you text me a question, I'm going to say yes or no. It's a, yes or no.
Marcus Neto: You speak my language. That's for sure. But no, I have very much appreciated because we had some meetings last year and I very much appreciated you sharing that. Going back to that insight of CPA versus CFO kind of role, it didn't occur to me that there was a difference between the two. And I've been searching for this person that was, I'm a creative, right? Barely a business owner. And so you started talking to me about financials and I'm just kind of like, I can read a profit and loss statement. I know bank, I know how to deal with banks. I mean, all that stuff. But really it's this area in business that most people look at and go, "Oh my God, I really don't know this as well as I should." And I read books on it and it doesn't come-
Karen Simmons: I disagree with that statement.
Marcus Neto: What's that?
Karen Simmons: Those financial statements aren't what you do. So you need to stick with what you do, but you need to have a friend-
Marcus Neto: Agreed.
Karen Simmons: ... consultant, whatever, that can hear the voices coming out of the numbers because they talk. They tell the story of your business. If I look out of trends, I can tell you exactly when stuff happened. And so finding that person that has the understanding, because why would I do my own webpage? Why would I do my own whatever? So I don't think anybody should beat themselves up or just say, "God, I got to get to know that." No, you don't. Just find somebody you can trust.
Marcus Neto: Yeah, I'd agree with that. I mean, hiring to your weakness. I mean, in a sense. I just, for whatever reason when it comes to business, it seems like the finances are such a huge part that in the past I've not had access to somebody that was able to share or had the ability to give me that information.
Karen Simmons: Don't make it a one time thing though.
Marcus Neto: Yeah, no. For sure.
Karen Simmons: Because your life's continuing to change and so the numbers change.
Marcus Neto: Well, I don't intend on making it a one time thing. I'm hoping it wasn't a one time thing.
Karen Simmons: But I suggest getting something scheduled. The first Wednesday of every month. I know what client I'm at that morning.
Marcus Neto: Yeah. Well, we'll talk afterwards.
Karen Simmons: But it's for the listeners too. And it doesn't have to be me. I'm not trying to sell me. I'm just saying that it's-
Marcus Neto: Oh, I'm only worried about me. You guys got to worry about your own self, your own damn self. And if she gets busy, I'm in. I'm getting in the door first. So everybody line up behind me. So let's go back a little bit because I mean, we jumped right into it and I think I wanted to give people a feel of who you are and where you're at and what you do and stuff. But why don't you tell us a little bit about yourself. You said you're from Mobile. You said a little bit about your life, but where'd you go to high school? Did you go, obviously you went to college, married, you mentioned your husband. Why don't you just tell us a little bit about who you are first?
Karen Simmons: Well, South Berkeley. Palmer-Pillans, B.C. Rain High School, 1984.
Marcus Neto: She's going to give me the cliff notes for review.
Karen Simmons: That's it. That's all there is.
Marcus Neto: Oh my gosh.
Karen Simmons: You don't want the in and outs. Hard childhood. Yeah. Me and my brother and sister are still all on our first marriages. Good mom left dad three months before my wedding. So that's why me and my husband paid the bridesmaids back for the dresses and went to Vegas and got married in 1988. June will be 36 years.
Marcus Neto: I love it.
Karen Simmons: Had an ACT scholarship to South because I couldn't afford to go anywhere else. And then started in chemical engineering.
Marcus Neto: Really?
Karen Simmons: And none of those letters on those tables are in the words that they represent. It made no sense. So I started partying, shooting a lot of pool, lost my scholarship, and then met a guy in a bar.
Marcus Neto: In 1987?
Karen Simmons: 19... Yeah, somewhere in 1986, I think. And it moved pretty fast. He worked off offshore. First 15 years we were together, we only saw each other, five of them.
Marcus Neto: Oh, wow.
Karen Simmons: He was gone two weeks out of three. We to write letters. I wish we would write letters now. I need to start that. And phone calls. And I didn't have a phone that I could take down to the beach. It was a landline.
Marcus Neto: You remember back to the day when phones were attached to walls and had cords and the long distance costs went down after what is 10 or 11 o'clock or something like that. It was like, "Okay, now I can call. It's like 11:01. Okay, are you there?" It's like, yeah, you don't remember those. Now it's just pick up the phone and call whenever.
Karen Simmons: It's nothing. I could hear mine ringing a minute ago. He got me back in school. He said, "You're too smart."
Marcus Neto: Knowing him-
Karen Simmons: He said, "I'm gone." Yeah. And has it been easy? No. It's hard as hell to be married sometimes.
Marcus Neto: Preach.
Karen Simmons: And I do believe in the every seven years, our seventh, our 14th or 21st was the worst.
Marcus Neto: The worst?
Karen Simmons: I think the only reason that 35th isn't is because we went through a two-year battle with him for prostate cancer. And I had two scares with, I have two times. Two time I've had vulva cancer and people go, "Vulva?" I said, "Yes, the V, exactly what you're thinking." And I'm not scared to talk about it. It's just another body part. And I did have me a shirt made that says, "God love the tatas, but don't forget about the hoohas." And I do wear that shirt because it is will. And I've since met other people who have had it. And I've met people that told me later on that, "I went to the doctor because of you." And so I'm not scared of talking about it. It is what it is. I never had chemo, had some awful stuff, but it wasn't chemo. And my husband's been clean about a year now after two years battle.
Marcus Neto: Nice.
Karen Simmons: God told me to get out of the CPA a firm because then he got sick. COVID hit. There is no way in hell I'd want to deal with that the CPAs have to deal with now.
Marcus Neto: With the ERC and the PPP.
Karen Simmons: All of it.
Marcus Neto: All that stuff. It's just a glimpse of us.
Karen Simmons: All of it. Well, if you fall and get the ERTC employee retention tax credit, you got to go back and amend that year's tax return. It affected. Bullshit. Well, no wonder this is full circle to what I'm doing. And how that works is the CPAs are so busy that they don't have time for the small companies, smaller, however. Five ten one person, they don't have time for them. And so getting a phone call back, I'm hearing all this stuff. For years, and especially on the podcast, I'd always say, you find a need and you price it reasonably. You got yourself a business bottom line.
So right now we have payroll vault, which is doing great. Caitlyn and Jimmy are rock stars, and Katie still helps out on projects and stuff. And I'm fully in, and then I have a bookkeeping company, and then I have the consulting. So whatever the need is. And some people are a monthly retainer. They want to pick up the phone and call whenever they can and schedule visits. I'm the liaison between your CPAs. So I have partnered up with three different, they're not together in one firm to fit personalities. And I get everything ready for the tax return and then hand it off.
Marcus Neto: Yeah, let them crunch the-
Karen Simmons: I don't even do my own tax returns now.
Marcus Neto: ... final numbers and stuff. Yeah. No, it's interesting to me because the financial aspect of running a business and maintaining cash flow and stuff like that is something that most business owners are keenly focused on. And having somebody like you in their back pocket, I mean, it'd be key. I know for me it would be, just because I've always felt like I don't have that background. I know words, I can put words together like you wouldn't believe. But when it comes to numbers, it's just like, eh.
Karen Simmons: But the people who think they do and don't, but just don't want to admit that they don't, are the worst to work with.
Marcus Neto: Oh, yeah.. Because the ones that are definitely
Karen Simmons: You just want me to tell you what, we affirm whatever you think. And I will never do that.
Marcus Neto: Yeah, no, I wouldn't want that.
Karen Simmons: I am so brutally honest to my detriment sometimes, but I don't care.
Marcus Neto: I love it. All right, so go back in your history in your mental bank here. What was your first job?
Karen Simmons: Oh, I sold fiberglass. That's why, I think why I became better account.
Marcus Neto: That was your first job?
Karen Simmons: My daddy was a fireman and we had a big old backyard, Bayfront and Terrell Rd, and he started a fiberglass business. He was always starting something. And well, he was at the fire station or in the bar. So he said, "You need to seal the stuff for me." I'd lay out the mat and the cloth and 50 gallon drums, acetone and the resin hardener. And I repaired a sail boat one time when I was about 13.
Marcus Neto: Nice.
Karen Simmons: And so I said, "I'm not doing that," because I knew he'd take my money. So I said, "I get 10% of anything I sell." And he agreed. Now don't forget, I was 11 the first time I said, "Fuck you," to my dad.
Marcus Neto: She's negotiating at 11 for 10%.
Karen Simmons: Well, I had to back it up. So I started a ledger and I kept up.
Marcus Neto: Nice.
Karen Simmons: The date, the sale, my cut, and I would take my cut off the top.
Marcus Neto: Nice.
Karen Simmons: And then I would hand in the rest. And so that lasted a little while. So then 13, 14, he decided to get a, no, it's a little bit older than that. He decided to stop doing fiberglass and get a shrimp boat. So I was his deck hand.
Marcus Neto: Oh, gosh.
Karen Simmons: It is very cold at three o'clock in the morning in February.
Marcus Neto: I can't even imagine.
Karen Simmons: And so it wasn't automatic. So I would have to run up on top of the boat to do the rope with the winch to pull the nets up. And then I emptied the nets and I picked. Those tiny little catfish, they hurt worse than the big ones. If you step on them, I don't know what it is, but yeah, pull a catfish out of my foot. But I will tell you what, by that time I'm about 15, I was hot man, up and down that boat on a bikini in spring. Tell you what, I was the talk of Mobile Bay, I think. I looked good, but I was also 15.
Marcus Neto: I love it. I love it.
Karen Simmons: I love that. And so I grew up right across the street from the beach. And so...
Marcus Neto: Knowing that about your dad and teaches me so much about you now too.
Karen Simmons: Put it this way. I was 16. Dad, you know it's true. So I was 16 years old and he's on the back of the boat and he's enjoying life. And I had to drive the shrimp boat through the old Dog River bridge. And I did that fine. It was a nervous wreck until it came up to where the Rivers shack is, used to be the Beachcomber Pope Dock. And I hit a little bit too hard. Phillip came hollering, screaming at me. But yeah, then I went to work at Quincy's.
Marcus Neto: Well, I don't know, what's Quincy's?
Karen Simmons: Quincy's is a restaurant. They had the best yeast rolls where Naman's is on Dauphin Island Parkway now. It was there. Interesting. That's the old Quincy's building.
Marcus Neto: Nice. Yeah, those probably predates my time here in Mobile, but-
Karen Simmons: I'm sure. I predate you.
Marcus Neto: A little bit. Not much, but a little bit.
Karen Simmons: Best job ever bartending. And that's probably how I'm going to end up.
Marcus Neto: Really?
Karen Simmons: Yep.
Marcus Neto: Interesting. I don't see that for you, but okay.
Karen Simmons: Oh no, I'm fun. I'm a great bartender.
Marcus Neto: I can see you as a bartender, but I just don't see you as the bartender. I see you as the person owning the bar that stands behind the bar and tells the barer what to do. But you're hanging out there having fun like the bartender would just not having to do all the that the bartender does.
Karen Simmons: Oh, and bullshitting. Oh, no. I make mean drinks.
Marcus Neto: Oh, I bet you do. Yeah, yeah. No, for sure. So now, if you were talking to someone who wanted to get started in running their own business, what's the one bit of wisdom that you would tell them?
Karen Simmons: Make sure you got a lawyer, a banker, and a CPA.
Marcus Neto: I have heard that so many times and it has short of the CPA, it has saved my ass in a number of different ways. So if you've not heard that before and you're just hearing that for the first time, by all means, listen to what she just said. A lawyer, a CPA and a banker. A banker's going to give you money, CPAs going to tell you where it went. And a lawyer's going to help keep you out of trouble because lawsuits and shit like that is not fun.
Karen Simmons: Not where it went. Yeah. CPA is for the-
Marcus Neto: CPAs do.
Karen Simmons: CPAs do.
Marcus Neto: Where it went.
Karen Simmons: I took a step to the right and turned it in the other direction.
Marcus Neto: I get it. I know that you would've done it differently, but I'm just saying most CPAs are going to help keep you out of trouble with the tax man.
Karen Simmons: Well, perfect example. So you've going to get a business. So what do you do? You get an LLC. Why? Because you see LLCs everywhere. Everybody gets an LLC. You're going to totally screw yourself on taxes if you're successful, if you do it taxed as an LLC. Well, the lawyers don't tell you you can't have one without the other, the banker, the lawyer, and the shoemaker and everybody, because lawyer doesn't know that once he files it in probate on Secretary of State, if you don't fill out and pay the privilege tax return, you're going to get a $50 penalty in the mail. It's all these inner workings. There's too many variables. Everybody wants a piece of you. How many people start a business and don't realize that Mobile County wants to tax you on your assets in your company and you got to file it and it's paid in arrears. So yeah, all the little stuff.
Marcus Neto: It is extremely helpful to have other people that are more up to date on all those things and can keep track of it. As a business owner, there's certainly no way that you can. Any books, podcasts, people or organizations that have been helpful in moving you forward?
Karen Simmons: Yeah, podcast, love podcasts. But I like to hear different from different ones one the same type. I don't buy anybody's just one story.
Marcus Neto: Different one. Okay.
Karen Simmons: I'm going to look at the different perspectives because ain't nobody got everything right.
Marcus Neto: So give me one or two podcasts that you listen to on a regular basis.
Karen Simmons: Right now, the political, Russell Brand.
Marcus Neto: Okay.
Karen Simmons: Tim Pool. Tells a lot about me, probably more than I really want people to know. And I love the book, Traction. When our old podcast Katie and I were doing together, Katie's my daughter and I'm so proud of her and I learned a lot from her. She's taught me, when we first started the, Cheers To Business podcast, somebody had heard it, a financial advisor here in town. He texted me, he said, "Have you heard of the book, Rocket Fuel?" And I said, "No, what are you talking about?" He said, "Get it. That's you and Katie." And what it mainly says is that every visionary needs, what's the word?
Marcus Neto: Needs an implementer. It's an implementer.
Karen Simmons: Yeah, but it's a different word for it. But you're right, implementer.
Marcus Neto: It's implementer. I've got, we're reading the book right now.
Karen Simmons: Oh, cool. The pros and cons of each, because I'm a big visionary and I'm big picture, but I've got to have people around me that will go in those trees and identify the leaves. I can look at that force and say, "You got a problem right there." But to drill down in the details drives me insane. I'm not good at it. And I was a CPA a and I'm not good at details. I just get bored. It's tedious. I could never do audits. I hated them. But you need those people to go down in the leaves. And I'll tell you, Danielle is my hand assistant in the courier company, coworking space. My brother runs our business in Fair Hope, and that team over there is amazing.
Marcus Neto: She's glossing over the fact that she owns not only the consulting and the bookkeeping and the payroll. Had we mentioned a couple of properties, we won't go into that again, because I know you can't get into it too much.
Karen Simmons: It just went down.
Marcus Neto: But then also, there's a manifold, an engine manifold company over in Fairhope that makes engine manifolds for boats that aren't manufactured anymore.
Karen Simmons: It's not just boats.
Marcus Neto: It's not just boats?
Karen Simmons: No, no, no. Here's the backstory real quick. In 1996, my brother, something like that, went to work. He's a mechanical junior. He went in the Navy. We all did stuff so we could go to college. My sister's a teacher. None of the relatives thought we would turn out as good as we did. And were still very tight to this day. We'll all get together this weekend.
Marcus Neto: That's awesome.
Karen Simmons: So he's mechanical engineering. He went to work for this company. Well, I had started in the CPA firm, sir Frankel Polowski. And I'm very sad to say that Mr. Polowski died recently and he was a friend to me. We were better together, not business married. But yeah, about two years into it, the owner wanted to get onto QuickBooks. He said, "My sister does that." And from then on I was their CPA.
Marcus Neto: Oh, wow.
Karen Simmons: So after I was their CPA 16 years, so this is, we've owned that business eight years now.
Marcus Neto: Oh, wow.
Karen Simmons: Her and her husband wanted to leave the country. They live in Panama now. So I said, "What do you want to sell for? Said sell it to Mark." "No, I need your business sense on it." I said, "Sell to both of us." And yeah, I said, "Well, I'll come back in a month. You tell me how much you think it's worth and I'll tell you how much I think it was worth." Well, my number was higher than hers. And she said, "Why would you do that?" I said, "Because this is what I think it's worth." And if I shave a dollar for the sake of a dollar somewhere, it's going to cost me 10. You can't do that in business. You have to be fair.
Marcus Neto: So you pay her a higher number? That's awesome.
Karen Simmons: No, it's right.
Marcus Neto: Yeah. That's amazing.
Karen Simmons: No, don't ever call me-
Marcus Neto: No, I know it's right.
Karen Simmons: Don't ever call me sweet.
Marcus Neto: But I mean that just blows me.
Karen Simmons: Well, here's how. I took her number, figured out a way with interest. If she financed it over 10 years, she'd end up with my number. Spare all the way around. And in two years that business will be paid for.
Marcus Neto: Nice.
Karen Simmons: And so he's always been there. My brother, this is how proud I am of him. You know the Black Pearl in the Pirate movies? He redesigned that exhaust system because on the movie screen, looking at it going, there's no exhaust back then in those days. So he redesigned it to come out the back end and it's all parts in it.
Marcus Neto: That's hilarious. I had no idea.
Karen Simmons: And we do mainly manifolds and heat exchangers, agricultural, the muffler in a city in Alaska we made from scratch is bigger than this room. Think about it. How big is the generator got to be to support a city?
Marcus Neto: Yeah, that's huge.
Karen Simmons: Right?
Marcus Neto: Yeah, no doubt.
Karen Simmons: We're global. We're very little local. In fact, I brought the sales tax to do, filed the sales tax, and I think we collected $156 in the last quarter for sales tax. That's how little we do locally. Nigeria, China.
Marcus Neto: Big ships.
Karen Simmons: We go all over the world. But no agricultural, John Deere parts.
Marcus Neto: Sorry. Yeah.
Karen Simmons: Some space stuff.
Marcus Neto: Really?
Karen Simmons: Yeah. We have parts in Disney rides.
Marcus Neto: That is so cool.
Karen Simmons: Because we make, those people in the back and our supervisor back a woman, we've had three machinist welder of the team and they're artists. I cannot, college is not for everybody, just because I went...
Marcus Neto: Over and over, and over again. If you've listened to this podcast, you hear that over and over, and over again. It's true. There are people that have sat in that seat being interviewed, and they have been not even to high school or they've been to high school and finished or dropped out, or they've been to college and dropped out or graduated or they have graduate degrees. There is no recipe that you can push a kid through as far as an educational system that will guarantee their success.
Karen Simmons: No. Plus are they doing what they love? All right. So I truly believe that everybody's given a God-given talent. And if you are not doing that talent, you're not going to be truly happy.
Marcus Neto: Yeah, for sure.
Karen Simmons: And you are working.
Marcus Neto: Yeah. I 100% get that. And I understand the intent with what you're, because it seems easier if it's something that is within your wheelhouse, that's within your skillset that you're gifting, if you will.
Karen Simmons: You have to feel productive at the end of the day.
Marcus Neto: What's the most important thing you've learned about running a business?
Karen Simmons: Listen to your people. I know that sounds cliche, but it is the truth. It is. You are nowhere without your people.
Marcus Neto: Especially right now. Even finding people.
Karen Simmons: Well, it goes back to every tragedy has an opportunity. I said at the beginning of COVID on the podcast, I said, "You people got to stop crying. Pull your panties up people, because where's there an opportunity?"
Marcus Neto: Yeah.
Karen Simmons: Well, that's how the cart rear company was born. I was doing some fractional CFO work for a guy who had a little toxicology lab. We turned it into a COVID lab. Now it's a full molecular lab. And I work myself out of jobs a lot of times and I'm fine with that. And so yeah, he needed a career company. I said, "Dude, open up a career company." He said, "I ain't doing that shit. You do it." And I said, "All right." So that's how Medco Logistics was born. It grew to the height of COVID with 33 drivers all over the southeast was insane.
Marcus Neto: Just a little side project.
Karen Simmons: Well, it's kind of like hurricane money. And so then it's still alive. We only have two routes just because it's not that much now. And I rebranded it when I saw the COVID because I always thought COVID was bullshit anyway. And I'm very sorry for everybody that died. One of my friends died, but I'm not getting the shot and I'm not wearing a mask. So I don't care what you say. But in seeing all that, the illogicalness of it. And then so when I saw it starting to go down, quote, unquote, I rebranded it to runner for hire. I always needed a runner. Well, now you can't get anybody... If you couldn't get anybody to work or they didn't want to. You need stuff needs to move back and forth. A lot of its electronic now, but banking.
Marcus Neto: Well, especially your CPAs need paperwork and stuff like that.
Karen Simmons: Right, but it's never picked up. So my slogan was, "We're the DoorDash for businesses. We'll pick up and deliver anything, but your kids or food." It's never caught on. Just never caught on. So that's not a big important area in my life. That's something that came up. I'm very fortunate. One of the drivers that's with me now is since the beginning. And...
Marcus Neto: I just think it's interesting how you have a very good knack for seeing opportunities and knowing what it's going to take in order to make it a viable business and not just something that piddles along for ever and doesn't really do anything.
Karen Simmons: And you got to know when to get out. At what point do you cut your losses? And if it's not working, pivot. You got to be a Roomba man. I mean, at every aspect in business-
Marcus Neto: You've got to be a Roomba.
Karen Simmons: You have to be.
Marcus Neto: Isolate that. Send it to post.
Karen Simmons: It's true. I've always said it. I tell you to have to listen to my podcast.
Marcus Neto: No, honestly, I don't. I don't listen to... I listen to one podcast.
Karen Simmons: Which one?
Marcus Neto: I don't spend any time in the car.
Karen Simmons: See, I'm always in my car.
Marcus Neto: I got a new car. I got a new car in December and I still haven't filled up from when they filled it up for me when I got it from the dealership.
Karen Simmons: Do you walk home?
Marcus Neto: No, but I'm like three miles from the house. It takes me-
Karen Simmons: See, we live down in [inaudible 00:32:16] River. And so yeah, I drive. I go to Fairhope once a week.
Marcus Neto: I'm in the car like 15, 20 minutes a day if I'm lucky if I come here. You know what I mean, so yeah, please don't take that any other way then I just-
Karen Simmons: No, I don't. In fact, I was kidding. It didn't matter.
Marcus Neto: But yeah, no, that's hilarious. Be a Roomba, pivot.
Karen Simmons: You have to, if you... And I made a grown man cry one time.
Marcus Neto: Doesn't surprise me.
Karen Simmons: Well, yeah, there's more than one. But anyway, no, this guy was on, I said, "Why are you doing here in my office?" And he said, "What? I can't make a success. I need to make a success of my business." I said, "But you keep doing the same things so you won't listen to me. So quit paying to not listen to me." And he was just beat down trying to make it in this business. And he could only see it one way and you can't. And that's what a Roomba, that's why you needed be a Roomba.
Marcus Neto: 100%. And man, it's hard being on that side of things where you see something so clearly. For the last number of years, and let's not spend a whole lot of time on this. But for the last number of years, it's been my goal to educate people on the fact that if you own a business, you have to market it. You have to advertise it, whether it's through me or whether you do it yourself or whether you pay some big agency on Madison Square Avenue.
Karen Simmons: Just because you hang a shingle doesn't mean anybody knows about you.
Marcus Neto: No, no. People don't just automatically find you because you started a business. You have to tell them about it. And then oftentimes you have to tell them about it six or seven more times before they actually want to do business with you. And so-
Karen Simmons: And how are you going to be louder than the other million?
Marcus Neto: Yeah. But the thing that gets me is time and time again when I sit with somebody and I'm just like, "Man, if you would just do X, Y, and Z," and then they make a decision based off of, it could even be tens of thousands of dollars. But when you're talking about hundreds of thousands, it's negligible. And oftentimes I'm talking about thousands of dollars.
Karen Simmons: You get what you pay for.
Marcus Neto: And so it's just kind of like, man, if you had just put this money into Facebook ads or if you just put this money into a new website, you wouldn't have to spend so much money on SEO. Or if you put them into Facebook ads, people would know your website exists or that your business is there. Or if you had whatever.
Karen Simmons: Buying organic food is cheaper than a copay. Same concept.
Marcus Neto: It's funny because the podcast previous to this was on Men's Health and Weight loss clinic. But yeah, no, I get what you're saying. All right, this is new. 12 rapid fire questions.
Karen Simmons: Bring it on.
Marcus Neto: You think you can do this?
Karen Simmons: Oh, I know I can. I can do anything.
Marcus Neto: What's your favorite type of music?
Karen Simmons: Country.
Marcus Neto: What is your favorite-
Karen Simmons: Old rock. Eighties.
Marcus Neto: What's your favorite type of food?
Karen Simmons: Steak.
Marcus Neto: Favorite restaurant in lower Alabama?
Karen Simmons: It was, [inaudible 00:35:11], but I'm loving, Grace.
Marcus Neto: Oh, favorite city outside of Mobile.
Karen Simmons: None. Fowl River. Dauphin Island. Promise.
Marcus Neto: City, well, the next question is null. City you want to travel to but have yet to visit?
Karen Simmons: Oh no. I love going places.
Marcus Neto: Oh, okay.
Karen Simmons: Yeah. I want to go up in the Vermont, the eastern, in the fall.
Marcus Neto: I have not been to Vermont, but I've been to the northeast. Obviously I grew up there and yes, by all means go.
Karen Simmons: My sister and aunt just in September, went and took the train that goes through multiple states. Yeah, I'd like to do that.
Marcus Neto: I would throw in mid-lake, the Shenandoah Valley area of Virginia as another alternative to that too, that's also,
Karen Simmons: I've been up by Asheville and Biltmore and stuff like that. And it was fall. That was different.
Marcus Neto: It's the same thing. Beautiful. Sorry, that wasn't rapid fire. What comes to mind when I say guilty pleasure? Keep it clean. Keep it clean.
Karen Simmons: Cheeseburger from Checkers when I got a hangover.
Marcus Neto: All right. Dogs, cats, or none of the above?
Karen Simmons: Dogs.
Marcus Neto: Summer or winter?
Karen Simmons: Summer.
Marcus Neto: Favorite movie or TV show?
Karen Simmons: Gilligan's Island.
Marcus Neto: Okay.
Karen Simmons: I stopped watching the news and I'll find Gilligan's Island, our Andy Griffith in the morning. And that makes my day happy.
Marcus Neto: Yeah, that's awesome. Favorite holiday?
Karen Simmons: Christmas.
Marcus Neto: Everybody's going to say Christmas, because we just finished christmas.
Karen Simmons: No, but Halloween's a close second, especially if I get to wear my gorilla suit.
Marcus Neto: There you go.
Karen Simmons: That's fun. You scare them little kids and you're beating your chest. You jump out at them in the bushes in the dark. It's awesome.
Marcus Neto: The idea of you in a gorilla suit, this is something that we have to talk about.
Karen Simmons: After first year. I got the gorilla suit. Katie was a banana and she held up a sign that says, "Eat more apples." It was priceless.
Marcus Neto: That's great. Favorite color?
Karen Simmons: Blue.
Marcus Neto: Favorite cereal?
Karen Simmons: None. Don't eat that shit.
Marcus Neto: Oh, come on now.
Karen Simmons: No.
Marcus Neto: All right. That's the end of-
Karen Simmons: It's poison. Don't need it.
Marcus Neto: Into the rapid fire questions. What are you most thankful for?
Karen Simmons: Oh, my God. I have a ritual in the mornings and I just say, "Thank you, thank you, thank you." And then I release whatever doesn't serve me. And I am so thank... I've never thanked... I've never thanked God for my clients, but for whatever gifts he gave me to enable me to do what I do.
Marcus Neto: To get those clients.
Karen Simmons: And then that makes me thankful for what I've been able to do to get where I wanted to be. I wake up sometimes and go, "How did I get here?" And it hasn't been easy. Leaving the firm was awful. Starting my own was struggle. Selling what I built, and I tell you what, the licensing board for the CPAs me off so bad. I said, "Take my CPA," and I paid $75 too much to ship them my CPA certificate in the frame. It's in the hallway. They got it in the closet somewhere.
Marcus Neto: Oh, that's so funny.
Karen Simmons: I said, "Keep it. 400 bucks. I can get it back. Catch up on the education. You can keep it." Regulatory bullshit, it's ridiculous. I wonder if I get in trouble for saying all that.
Marcus Neto: No. Well, if that was that-
Karen Simmons: No, you're fine. You're fine.
Marcus Neto: If that was a real question. No, it's so important. And I think so oftentimes we get so caught up in everything that we don't stop and think about all the things that we have to be thankful for. And over the course of the last year, with all the BS that I've been through, it's just been so impressed on me, what is important. And I don't know if that's me coming into, I'm getting older and I think there are certain things that happen. You hit 35, 40 as a guy, you start thinking about the temporariness of life and everything that I own from the thing that I used to the-
Karen Simmons: You don't have to be a guy to do that.
Marcus Neto: ... thing that I shaved with are all throwaway things. Do I go and get a safety razor because now I have something that I can hand down to my boys? At the time, I didn't have any guns tradition like, hey, I'm hand these guns down to my, I didn't have anything like that. And then you hit 45, 50 and it's like, I don't have time for anymore. I don't want to deal with that anymore. I want to spend time with people that care about me and have my best interests at heart. And I want to pour my life into people that are those people.
Karen Simmons: When I'm around people and I hear somebody get upset about something that is so mundane and I've actually asked, will this really be important? Next month will be important next week? Move on. Just move on. And so what I've tried to do is, and it's difficult. After I found out I had the vulva cancer, I actually got down, once I thought about it, I got down on my knees on the back porch and thank God for me having cancer. So I try to remember that now when something and stuff's going to happen in business, if you expect it to be a rose garden, you are totally misguided. You're going to get hurt.
Marcus Neto: Got to do something else.
Karen Simmons: People are going to mess up. So my thing has always been, if you-
Marcus Neto: No, they won't just mess up. People will intentionally go after you to screw you.
Karen Simmons: That's true too.
Marcus Neto: So, I'm sorry, go ahead.
Karen Simmons: No, it's both. Yeah. But in the case of staff or team members-
Marcus Neto: Mistakes are made.
Karen Simmons: They're going to make them. But if you tell me, I'll help you fix it. But if I get blindsided from the left by a off client, why didn't you tell me what would've helped you fix it? Or I would've told them what happened. I'd rather tell somebody I somebody screwed up. But here's how we're going to fix it. So every time something bad has happened and bad being a business deal, or how about a payroll client that's been wanted by everybody and they stiff you for a very expensive payroll that costs thousands. You just got to stop and you just got to stop and say whatever reason this is happening. "Okay, we can-"
Marcus Neto: One of the interesting things that's happened over the course of the last year is Chrissy's gotten into Joe Rogan's.
Karen Simmons: I love Joe Rogan.
Marcus Neto: I know. So do I. He is interesting and I love a long form format. At some point in time, I'll have enough confidence in myself to do something along those lines. But one of the things that she got out of that was the Jocko Willink video on YouTube where it's good. Oh, so you didn't get that, because Jocko is a former Navy SEAL. So it is like, "Oh, so you didn't get that assignment? Good, good. Now you have time to prepare for..." So you didn't-
Karen Simmons: You would be killed if you went. Who knows.
Marcus Neto: Exactly. Yeah. So it's all these, you think about all these bad things, but they all have, there's some reason why those things happen. And if you just, you said something earlier, if you just stop to look for the opportunity in that thing-
Karen Simmons: There's always opportunity.
Marcus Neto: There's always opportunity. And so it's important to keep in mind. All right, so where can people find you?
Karen Simmons: Where can they find me?
Marcus Neto: Yeah.
Karen Simmons: I got to get some business cards or something.
Marcus Neto: That's usually helpful.
Karen Simmons: Yeah. Everybody's got my cell phone number. Yeah, if you wanted-
Marcus Neto: You're on the socials.
Karen Simmons: I have a bio at cfocsi.com and I probably need to update it, I'm sure. Let's see. (251) 533-5775, karen@cfocsi.com. Karen.simmons@payrollbulk.com, services@sweetbooksinc.com, services@runforhire.com. Info-
Marcus Neto: You can stop there.
Karen Simmons: At pro.works.
Marcus Neto: I think we get the point. She's reachable. Do a Google search if you can't find her.
Karen Simmons: Call me.
Marcus Neto: All right. Well, I want to thank you again for coming on the podcast. To wrap up any final thoughts or comments you'd like to share?
Karen Simmons: It made me laugh. One, thank you for having me on. I don't post a lot on Facebook and [inaudible 00:43:33] business stuff, and I don't think that's the platform to know what I ate for dinner, but anybody wants to. You go, "You be you, boo."
Marcus Neto: Go for it. Yeah.
Karen Simmons: Just the business people out there. Just take a minute, look around. What are your clients missing? What are your customers, whatever you want to call them, the people that pay you, does it have value? If you have value in, I don't care if you're selling widgets or what, or marketing or anything. Does it have value? And did you smile at them? Yeah. That personal connection of going corporate has more value now than it did 20 years ago. I think it was taken for granted before COVID.
Marcus Neto: Karen, I appreciate your willingness to sit with me and share your journey as a business owner and entrepreneur. It's been great talking with you.
Karen Simmons: Marcus, thank you for having me.
