How a Police Officer Turned Planter Boxes into a Thriving Side Hustle | Darryl Knight (MU Classic)

For anyone who's been following along, those that I have been obsessing lately about

clawed and clawed co-work.

Newsletter emails typically take us several hours to write and design and ain't nobody

got the time.

But earlier this week, I had a revelation.

Awwww.

So I thought I would give it a try.

I had co-work going to my email and analyzed 25 emails from one of my favorite content creators

then take a transcription of one of our recent podcasts.

And using the frameworks from this creator, but the voice from our podcast transcript,

they wrote an email.

Before I superior to anything I've ever created in less than 30 seconds, then yesterday

we did the exact same thing, allowing us to spend more time on other important parts

of the business and doing more of the things we love.

Clot is the AI for minds that don't stop at good enough.

It's the collaborator that actually understands your entire workflow and thinks with you.

Whether you're debugging code at midnight or strategizing your next business mood,

clawed extends your thinking to tackle the problems that matter.

Co-work brings clawed codes, a gentle power to your desktop.

No terminal required, so anyone can use and have clawed do real work.

Point you to a fold on your computer or add connectors like Google Drive and Gmail,

describe what you need and it handles the rest.

Like organizing files, building spreadsheets, or drafting reports from scattered notes.

Cue up tasks and come back to finished work.

Ready to tackle bigger problems?

Get started with clawed today at claw.ai-slash-mu.

That's claw.ai-slash-mu and check out clawed pro which gives you access to clawed's most powerful features.

Clod.ai-slash-mu.

One thing no one tells you about hiring globally is how unclear the costs can be.

It looks simple at first and then the fees start stacking up.

Pebble brings clarity with upfront all-in hiring costs and enables you to hire the world.

Pebble is an AI-generated global human resource platform built for founders, HR leaders,

and operators who are hiring and supporting teams around the world.

Pebble helps you hire, pay, and manage talent in over 185 countries with fast onboarding

that can be done in minutes.

Instead of juggling separate tools for contracts, payroll, benefits, and compliance,

Pebble brings everything together with building guidance and local expertise to support you.

This is especially helpful if you're managing teams internationally or planning to grow.

The fastest growing companies in the world use Pebble to stay organized and reduce risks.

And founders use it to scale faster without failing like they need to become HR or compliance experts.

Bottom line, it simplifies global people operation so you can spend more time growing the business

and supporting your team.

New standard discounted pricing at $3.99 USD per month per employee helps you contain costs.

Go to highpebble.ai to get a free estimate.

That's high, p-e-b-l.ai for a free estimate.

Disney Plus wants to know, are you ready?

Yeah!

For Marvel Studios Thunderbolts, the new Avengers, now streaming on Disney Plus.

Let's do this.

One of the best Marvel movies of all time is now streaming on Disney Plus.

Hey, you weren't listening to me.

I said Thunderbolts, the new Avengers, is now streaming on Disney Plus.

Need the new Avengers.

That's cool, then.

Marvel Studios Thunderbolts, the new Avengers, rated PG-13.

Now streaming on, you guessed it, Disney Plus.

This episode is brought to you by State Farm.

Listening to this podcast, Smart Move.

Being financially savvy, Smart Move.

Another Smart Move.

Having State Farm help you create a competitive price when you choose to bundle home and auto.

It's bundling.

Just another way to save with the personal price plan.

Like the good neighbor, State Farm is there.

Prices are based on rating plans that vary by state.

Covered options are selected by the customer.

Availability, amount of discounts and savings, and eligibility vary by state.

If you like flowers, you think they're pretty, you want them, but you don't really know enough

about them, but you can water them every day, then we'll handle the rest.

Welcome to the Millionaire University Podcast.

I'm your host, Brian Gear, and back in the saddle with you today, and on this edition

of the MU pod, I'm joined by Darryl Knight.

He is the owner of Front Porch Flora, where they design and handcraft planters delivered

right to your door.

Darryl, welcome to the show, my man.

Hey, thank you, Bradley on.

I think this is such a cool business idea that we're bringing to the MU listeners right

now.

Get to work outside, get to serve others, and it's beautiful with all the plants you get

to deal with.

We're going to dive in and talk about everything from how you started this business to how

you guys operate and how things are going, but I want to start out with you giving us your

origin story.

How did Front Porch Flora come to be?

I'd probably started when I was 12, and I was cutting grass with my cousins.

And then at 14, I met a family here on Long Island.

They have a bigger business, and they really taught me the ins and outs of landscaping,

design, masonry.

That's really where my interest in all of this started.

I ended up going to Farmingdale State on Long Island, which has a horticulture program.

I ended up doing some landscape design stuff there.

And then I joined the police department at 22 and everything kind of went on hold for

a while.

And then 2020, during the pandemic, I was on a fishing trip.

We met a guy that created this trade for growing plants.

It was really good for growing multiple plants altogether and one tray.

And through that conversation, we really started to dive into ways we could turn that into

a business.

The actual trade itself didn't end up materializing into anything.

However, the idea of it gave birth to us doing the service of changing out these flower

pots.

So 2020, we did a soft launch for Christmas.

And then 2021 was our first full year providing the service.

With that said, every house that we did was a custom build for their planters.

And then after my first year, my partner, he kind of bowed out and I ended up taking

over.

Things that I did relatively quickly, which convert our business into inserts, you know,

I call them.

So it's just a plastic insert that will fit inside them, all the planters that we provide.

By doing that, it lets me rebuild everything at my yard.

And then from there, I can just hire a driver and have them swap everything up.

Very cool.

Let's talk about exactly what you guys do.

You've got custom inserts that fit into planters.

So the crux of the business is what?

It's in the name right front porch flora.

But what extent do you guys do planter boxes?

How big?

How small?

How many?

What does that all look like?

I mean, it's grown quite a bit since 2020, as far as the largest ones we've done.

Yesterday, I just completed the largest ones, which was worth a wide.

But it started with just a regular planter going on your front porch that we change out

every season.

You know, in the spring time, there's pansies, there's tulips, high ascents.

And then once it starts getting hot or those flowers are done blooming, they'll change

out.

So you're getting into summer flowers.

So what we do is take all the guesswork out.

If you like flowers, you think they're pretty.

You want them, but you don't really know enough about them, but you can water them every

day.

Then we'll handle the rest and we'll get you set up with something that looks great.

So your ideal client is a homeowner or a like a commercial location where they want

some pretty flowers out on the porch or out in the entryway, but it's either don't

have the time or the desire or the knowledge on how to put together planters or what to

put out there.

Is that kind of your ideal clients out there?

Yeah, he really could be commercial or residential.

It doesn't matter for me.

I mean, we've had the majority of my customers are residential, but we do have, we do have

a few commercial locations.

We have a hair salon.

You know, he always has us do like pretty or neat displays.

And I think, you know, for him, he's just looking to kind of catch some eyeballs from

the street and then get attention to the front entrance of his salon.

So it's been working.

I think for the both of us, do we have other locations?

We do restaurants.

That's another common one that we've had.

So really anywhere, you know, if it's residential, it's more for you and if it's commercial,

it's more, you know, it's to make the place look nice.

And you know, any time that you can get, you know, restore, I think it's a win.

Yeah, absolutely.

So how do the people find you?

Do you guys, are you present on social media or is it more word of mouth?

Do you guys do any sort of advertising?

How does new business come in for you?

So we are, it's a lot of word of mouth and a lot of social media.

I mean, Instagram really didn't convert for us.

It was mostly Facebook.

And now it's kind of turned the other way around where I feel like a majority of our customer

bases coming off Instagram and I'm not seeing nearly as much through Facebook.

So we do run ads.

I think for me, the most advantageous thing that I've done is run ads on Instagram.

I think it's grown our following and it's also usually converted.

You know, if I, if I'm, if I'm aggressive enough, it's converted for us, you know, one

or two accounts every time we run an ad campaign.

So, you know, we tried something, there's a magazine that's local to us called stroll.

They usually do them for like more affluent areas.

So we did dip our toe in the water with that again, with that this year.

And I did a networking group, I joined the tip for about two or three years.

And I was doing that every Wednesday morning.

I had a great group.

So that was working.

I had a difficult time with, because I also have a full time job in the police department.

So at a difficult time, like make all of those meetings, so I got to the point where I

kind of needed to trim the fat a little bit because I was just running out of daylight.

So are you still working full time at the police department?

I am.

Yeah.

I'm in the last three years in my career.

Wow.

Wow.

Okay.

You know, I've been doing a lot of business and a full time job.

That's incredible.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Okay.

Good for you, man.

All right.

So what does, I guess, now I'm curious about your timing and, you know, kind of the numbers

in the business here too.

So, you know, how, I guess, maybe I'm asking how many people work with you too?

Because how do you do all this production?

Are you still building all the planters?

Are you still putting all the arrangements together?

What does your team look like and what does your distribution look like?

So I've hit some, this year in particular, I've had, I've had the hardest time with, uh,

with the team.

So I had, um, because the work is seasonal for the flower pots, a lot of times it draws

in either an older crowd or a younger crowd as far as people for the work.

I had an older woman who used to work for me.

Uh, I got to be a little bit too much for her, she's fantastic, but it just, I mean,

I would watch her and, and I actually feel like awful, um, you know, it's just,

arthritis and stuff in her hands.

So, um, we had to find other people.

I have a younger college age guy that works for me.

Um, he also has another job.

So this year in particular, I've struggled to kind of like keep, keep the work.

I usually try to pay really well and feed my guys.

I actually do, uh, I have a barter system with a, a local deli and a pizzeria.

So, um, I could feed my guys lunch and breakfast.

And, um, we do that in exchange for the flowers.

However, with that said, I also have.

Some guys that are like more experienced in landscaping and, um,

they do not have steady employment.

So really right now is I try to, I try to use those guys as much as possible.

Now with me, then they're going to be probably trying to get like day labor anywhere they can get it.

That's been a little bit of a trial and error.

Where I've had, you know, guys come in and, uh, you know, if they suck them,

just don't bring them back.

But, you know, if you had a good one, then I try to pay him, I got to pay him well and, uh,

up in feeding lunch.

So when this becomes a full-time operation, I may have to readdress like how much lunch I'm buying

everybody, but for the time being, you know, it's, it's working for me.

So yeah, so let's talk volume.

Like how many projects do you handle in a day or in a week?

You know, how many deliveries?

What does that schedule look like?

Are you guys going back and forth on more of a seasonal schedule?

Or are there, you got, you run in a truck every day making deliveries or picking up or swapping out?

How does that work?

No, so it's seasonally for like two to three weeks.

It'll be like slammed where we're trying to get out as many as we can.

The inserts, you know, if you're just doing inserts, you could do 15, 20, even close to 30 in a day,

depending on how close the houses are together.

We also offer some DIY kits.

So we just provide, you tell us what's on like you have in the size of the planter that you're

looking to do it and we'll provide the plants.

So if it's just the DIY stuff, you can really like crank out a lot.

If it's, I have to go to your house because you have your own planter and I don't have an

insert that fits it, then that's where I really slow it out.

Typically, I find that a lot of the customers that have that I must do something like custom for

them like that tend to be my more affluent customers.

And so I think, you know, they do they they spending that time does hold of value.

When I look at Long Island, it's like inundated with guys who like cut grass.

So I've set out to not cut grass and we've also ventured into the landscaping side of things,

right? So typical guy cutting grass is usually cutting grass so that they're front of mind when

there's larger projects that cut so they have whatever, maybe 200 accounts and they're trying to

they're really trying to get those larger projects throughout the year.

So what I feel that this is kind of a back door into that where I don't need a truck and trailer

and six guys to cut grass, but I still have like a roll index customers that know that I know a

lot about plants and trust me to do a good job. And so I've been building up the landscaping

side of my business doing it that way and just staying a lot leaner in the process.

Oh, okay. So you've got a you've got a backside to the business here doing landscape projects.

Yeah. So that's really for me, I think that is that's been like kind of where this is taking me.

It's a really like year two and three. I was getting a lot of customers who are saying like,

hey, could you could you do this in my garden? Could you do that in my garden?

And I was referring all the work to guys that I knew in the industry and I trusted.

And then I kind of was like, why am I giving away all this work?

So I started picking it up, but that obviously can't be new problems, but I mean good ones.

Okay. Yeah. No, I mean, that's I love that approach to it because like you said,

the guys on the mowers, they probably do landscaping and the mowing is the foot in the door, right?

You know, they're there once a week, mowing the grass and someone has a retaining wall

that build or a garden that needs fixed up. They're probably going to think of their lawn and landscape

company first, but this is perfect because they're going to think of the guy in his team who know

flowers and no gardening and think of you and then you're also not having to ride around on

a mower all day. Yeah. And think about the truck, the trailer and we talk about like, you know,

six figures with him with women. Yeah. Absolutely. Okay. I love that approach. So let's talk

I want to talk numbers and like pricing. So like how I guess pricing and your cost as well.

So let's let's call it all encompassing. You know, when you like do you guys have inventory

of planters or is it just the inserts and then what like what is your pricing structure?

The way is it subscription? Is it one off? What does that all do? So it's mostly subscription.

And I do charge more if it's going to be a one off. So typically a one off is about 20 bucks more.

So I'll charge for up tonight. I'm sorry. It's $90 for a small, which is up to 12 inches.

12 to 16 inches, which is the majority of planters is $112 and 16 to 18 is 145. After that,

it's custom billing. Okay. So for so if I'm doing a subscription, I guess what's how many

planters do people have and what is the pricing like I in my mind, people might have, you know,

like two planters on either side of their front door. If that's a subscription,

how does is that the $90 is it $90 per? So right before we got on this podcast,

I dropped off for a new customer. So she has two planters either side of the door. She's got two

mediums. So that'll be one 12 per season per planter. So it's about two and a quarter each season.

Okay. Gotcha. So then you're so you're going each season. So is that spring spring summer fall?

And winter. And winter. Okay. So you do winter arrangements like pine and

Okay. My prices do go up about $10 for winter. Winter just takes a lot longer to make.

Okay. Gotcha. So and when people subscribe, do they have the options for

one or multiple seasons or is there is it just flat across the board?

So what I did was originally we started off with you could either do two seasons or four.

If you did two seasons, your first season available was going to be summer.

The reason I did that was because the spring flowers,

they die out so quickly that my concern was people would want to buy a spring set up

and expect it to last until the fall. And when it burns out in the middle of June,

they're going to think that I suck and it's really just the plants don't last. So I kind of like

in a way and pushing the customer and start in the summer, we could try to get you early summer.

This way when when my regular summer rush starts, you're already kind of squared away.

But so with that said, yeah, we normally do four seasons. So

spring would, you know, you get your stuff and then mid-June, we're going to start swapping out

for summer. You're going to hold your summer stuff the longest until about the middle of September.

And then we're going to everything is going to get swapped out for like the mums and

panties again. And then those colors will stay in until right before Thanksgiving. And then

Christmas season is the worst. You know, a lot of Christmas time, but the Christmas

plants are the worst. Real change doesn't come from some big flashy moment. It comes from the

routines that you commit to. We know that as entrepreneurs. And that's also the idea behind

NutriFull. It's built around a simple, consistent approach to hair health that works from within

and delivers visible results over time, not overnight. Here's what sets NutriFull apart.

It's the number one dermatologist recommended hair growth supplement brand. And it's the number

one hair growth supplement brand used personally by dermatologists. NutriFull's hair growth supplements

are peer reviewed NSF certified for sport and clinically tested to measure improvements in hair

growth, quality and strength. NutriFull offers multiple formulas for men and women tailored to

different life stages like postpartum or menopause and lifestyle factors such as plant-based diet.

So you get the support that's actually right for you. Adding NutriFull to your daily routine is

easy. Order online, no prescription needed, with automated deliveries and free shipping to keep

you on track. Plus, with a NutriFull subscription, you can save up to 20% and get added perks like a

free head space membership to support your hair health journey. Let your hair become one less

thing taking up space in your head and see thicker, stronger, faster growing hair, with less shedding

in just three to six months with NutriFull. For a limited time, NutriFull is offering our

listeners $10 off your first month subscription and free shipping when you visit NutriFull.com and

Enter promo code M-U. That's NutriFull.com spelled N-U-T-R-A-F-O-L.com promo code M-U.

Spring in the desert is absolutely divine, and honestly, it's my favorite time of year.

The weather is perfect, not too hot yet, just this beautiful crisp warmth that makes you want to

spend every moment outside, and that's exactly why I've been refreshing my outdoor space with

Wayfair this season. I love working outside during this time, so I needed patio furniture that

could handle both relaxation and productivity. Wayfair made it so easy to find exactly what fits my

style and needs from comfortable outdoor dining sets where I can take my morning meetings to

cozy lounge chairs perfect for those afternoon work sessions. What I love about shopping on Wayfair

is how simple they make it to narrow down to exactly what works for your style and budget.

Their filters and thousands of five-star reviews help me find pieces that other customers loved,

and I could see exactly how everything would look in the real outdoor spaces of my home.

The quality is outstanding, and these pieces are built to withstand the desert elements while

still looking sophisticated enough for video calls. Plus, Wayfair's installation and assembly

services make the whole process seamless. No stress about putting together a big outdoor sectional,

they handle everything. Find furniture decor and essentials that fit your unique style and budget,

head to Wayfair.com right now to shop all things home. That's w-a-y-f-a-i-r.com. Wayfair. Every style,

every home. What I'm curious, what is what consists of a typical Christmas planter?

That we usually do like, they'll be colored sticks, they're usually like white red, silver,

gold, and then it's different types of cut greens. So you can have like,

could be cedar with like little like, these like little like seat tips that are yellow,

they look nice and they kind of like drape over the edge, juniper, which is like kind of a

bluer color. So pine cones. So it's very like season appropriate. It looks great for Christmas.

It's just, each piece is hand cut and each piece gets placed in. So with a regular planter,

I might be putting in six, seven plants, but they're already like grown in the soil and you put

them in and they all touch with the holiday greenery you're putting in each stick, almost like a

florist. So that takes a lot longer. Gotcha. Do you have planter inventory? Like if someone says,

I want your service, but I don't even have planters. Do you say, hey, we've got XYZ selection

or like keep them in stock or is they got to go get their own? No, I prefer to provide my own. So

I keep a bunch that I have in stock. Yeah, and then I have my inserts that already fit. So you

tell me what you want. You set up for the service. You know, and I typically I'll try to kind of like

guide my customer into doing like, let me provide the planter because number one, if you cancel,

I don't lose a ton of customers, but if you are going to cancel, it's fine. I get to keep the

planter and then I recycle that for another person of the planter and the insert, I could reuse

as many times as I want as long as they don't break. But then again, you could also, if you're buying

planters fairly regularly, like a lot of mine, they get from lows and they cost maybe, you know,

anywhere between 30 and 50 bucks a piece. But they, again, if you get I can get so much time out

of them that is worth it. But as far as cost, that's until you're looking at typical costs for

the insert, the plastic insert, try to keep those around. Those are about five bucks. So you're,

that's five bucks. But again, you get to reuse that multiple times. So, you know, if you got a

customer with two planters, two medium inserts, you're spending 20 bucks upfront because you need

two for the existing season, you're going to need two that you're going to pre-build before you

swap those two out. So you always need double the number of planters. So this way you can come back

with the new one and take the old one out. So with that said, and then I make my own plotting mix.

So I think if you're going to do it, that's the way you got to do it. So I'll get

I'll have top soil. And then I'll buy like a compressed bag of potting mix, peat moss,

and I just take a pitchwork and hand mix it. So typically with the insert, I'll, I'll put some

plastics from the each plan is like grown in a plastic case. I'm seeing if I have one laying around.

Each one's grown in a plastic cup, basically. So once you take the cup, so if you end up just

throwing out a bunch of plastic, but instead keep it turned upside down. Take up some of that

soil space because you don't need that much. So then I cover it with the potting mix that I make.

If you're kind of new to it, keep it as light as possible. This top soil itself will get like

concrete. Right. And that's it. You buy and make my arrangements. My arrangements follow the

typical like thriller, filler, spiller method where you do something that's like more of a centerpiece.

The rest kind of take up the middle ground and then I like something that cascades over the edges.

As long as you don't let it touch the ground because otherwise it's going to spread.

The one thing with the plan, the planters in the beginning, I was feeling there was soil.

So if you want something heavy enough to kind of keep it weighted down. So they don't tip over.

The issue was at the end of the summer season, those roots sometimes do sneak out of the drain

holes on the insert and then start to bite into the soil underneath. So that made it pretty

difficult to take it out. So what I switched to was mulch. So I had a tree guy. I have a little

two acres. So I'm able to do this. But if you don't have a huge piece of property, I suggest just

getting maybe like a small load dumped. But if you have a tree guy that isn't your neighborhood,

they're paying a dump those trees to treat chips. So tell them dump it here, no charge because

you're going to use it for the inside of the planter. It's out and you can compress it

in there. And if the roots do go through the pot and go into the mulch, it'll pop right out as soon

you go to take it out like the fall. Can you use like pea pebbles or like small river stone in

the bottom of a pot? You can absolutely do that. I mean, that's great for the weight. It's not

going to bite. The roots are not going to get like a great bite in there. It's just if you don't

have an abundance of that in your area, paying for that would be pretty pricey. Right. Okay, very

cool. All right. So what about looking more at your margins? So you've got subscriptions that are

about $200 for two planners. You've got, you said 20 or 30 bucks up front for pots that you

A get to reuse. So hopefully on many accounts, you're not even paying for new planters. You have

your inserts. And then what about the plant costs? Or do you get them from a wholesaler? Or are you

getting them from a garden center? What are your costs when it comes to the plant investment?

So the, ideally, you want to get it from another greenhouse. You don't want to get, you don't

want to be going to like losing all the boat to be buying your plants. One, I don't think

your quality is that great, but also two. The market is too much. Even if you were to get like

wholesale pricing at even a garden center, if you can try and get them from a wholesaler,

like a greenhouse, you're better off. You're looking at it in me. I would say about six or seven

plants and each one is costing you about three bucks. Your centerpiece is going to be your most

pricey. I try to keep that around $10. So with that said, if we say there are seven plants and one

of them is 10 bucks, then there are six six times three to 18. So you're at $28. If you say you're

using as far as soil, soil is another one that you can get, you know, multiple uses out of

your soil. I would say maybe five bucks worth of soil. Call it $10 worth of labor. So we were at

$28.33, $43 plus the planter and the in second. I usually figure that each one's cost at each

medium is costing me about 60 bucks. That's the way I like to think of it. So maybe I might be

paying it a little heavy. I'm not a huge numbers guy. I think maybe I need to be more so of that,

but if I were to do like huge volume on this job on this business, I think I would have to

become more of a numbers guy. I'm actually at a point now where with a hundred customers,

I kind of need to stop taking on new accounts unless it's really worth it because I still have

that full-time job. But with that said, so I'm figuring about 60 bucks and I'm at one 12. So

I'm talking about $52 a profit, potentially. Across roughly, you said about a hundred customers,

give or take, they're like some pay more, some pay more, whatever level they're paying it.

Yeah. Summer is my busy season because if you have a pool, a lot of times people will be like,

oh, can you do, can I get a subscription for just a pool planter for just a summer? So it

starts off as like another house I did this morning. They normally do four planters on the front

and they have queues that they do every summer around the pool.

Okay, gotcha. So do you get a lot of, if it's like today's July 1st as we record this,

do you get a lot of people calling on July 15th and they want a summer planter and you're like,

sweet, yeah, we can do it. Or is it, do you have them at a certain point,

do you have them wait for the following season? So on my website, I do have a cutoff listed.

I almost never follow it. I encourage people to reach out to us because inevitably I end up

with leftover material. So instead of me like one having a water at every day and two fighting the

deer in the rabbits for eating it, I rather sell it to somebody even if it's even if it's at a

discount because if I can get it off my hands and kind of liquidated again, you know, it's a win

for me. So I also don't offer a guarantee because you cannot, I mean, if you go to a nursery or

anything like that, they're not going to guarantee their, their plans, but that's, that's because

people just don't water or they do silly stuff like they drive with it hanging out the window and

don't realize that you're going to win burn your plan. But anyway, with that said, I tell them all

time, like if something is just not thriving, like the plan just is very, it's just a run.

Let me know and I'll come back and probably just swap it out for free. If it's insect-related,

it really depends on how much stuff I got laying around. But if I could, if I could do it and not

charge them, I will. But if it's something that I feel like I have to charge, you know, the insect,

I have no control over. We do treat some of the stuff before we put it out. But most of the time,

the issue is really people just don't want it. Yeah. So when you deliver a new arrangement,

do you kind of leave them either with a leave behind or with the knowledge that, hey,

for these things to thrive, there's a little bit of work you got to do. And that means watering it,

keeping your eyes peeled for, you know, insects, a bug damage, anything like that.

It's a little bit of customer education, just like, you know, summertime full sun, you have to be

skiing that thing until it's running out of the bottom every day, once a day.

You know, I try to like point out things to look for with wilting.

On my Instagram, I try to educate as much as possible as well, even if it's just like story stuff.

So I have care instructions that I leave with every customer at the start of every year,

start of every year. And that's it. If I mean, if I have a little bit of face time with the

customer whenever I'm there, I try to get the same thing done as well.

Nice. Nice. Okay. So I want to talk about the delivery side of your business. So you guys,

so right now you guys, you're local to Long Island, New York, right? So do you guys deliver

how far out do you deliver? How many delivery trucks or drivers or are you doing deliveries?

What does that all look like in your business? So I have one delivery guy and I have one truck

that I do delivery. So right now I'm running everything off of one truck and trailer. I also have

have access to some heavier machinery and equipment. That's for the larger projects.

But again, I'm trying to say I'm trying to be as lean as possible. A lot of times with the work

not being as consistent like a full time gig, this definitely more money paying for a delivery fee

for the larger projects. And as far as the deliveries go, I have a little toy pickup truck.

It's a 1987 Hilux. So it's turned some heads. It's got the logo painted on the side and it sips

on fuel. So it's perfect. Nice. I like that. I like that. Live shopping on what not is exploding.

I first heard about the app when our son started to buy rare tropical plant. He had so much fun

buying that he even decided to start a side business. There was no complicated funnel. It was just

him interacting with plant buyers in real time and it actually worked. I also used it to shop for

my family. I did most of my Christmas shopping on what not got expensive shoes for my teenagers.

Lululemon at a discount. It was a ton of fun to bid and win. But what's crazy about what not is

that it's not just for small sellers only. We recently interviewed John Roman on episode 777.

He owns Battlebox, a $20 million e-commerce brand and a huge part of their growth and customer

acquisition is happening on what not. It is the largest dedicated live shopping platform. Whether

it's beauty, collectibles, electronics, luxury, fashion, even cookies, sellers are building real

thriving businesses. Buyers spend over an hour a day in the app and sellers sell 10 times more than

on other major marketplaces because you're building real connections, not just listings and the

number of sellers making over a million dollars a year has doubled. And for a limited time, what not

will match your first $150 sold in the first month? Visit whatnot.com slash sell to start selling.

That's w-h-a-t-n-o-t.com slash sell. Whatnot.com slash sell?

America leads the world in medicine development. It matters. We get new medicines first, nearly

three years faster. Five million Americans go to work because we make medicines here at home.

And not relying on other countries keeps us safe. But China is racing to overtake us.

Will we let them or will we choose to stay ahead? When America leads, America cures.

Let's toe Washington to keep us in the lead.

Learn how at americacures.com. Pay for by Farma.

This episode is brought to you by Indeed. Stop waiting around for the perfect candidate.

Instead, use Indeed sponsor jobs to find the right people with the right skills fast.

It's a simple way to make sure your listing is the first candidate to see.

According to Indeed data, sponsor jobs have four times more applicants than non-sponsored jobs.

So go build your dream team today with Indeed. Get a $75 sponsor job credit at Indeed.com slash

podcast. Terms and conditions apply. And then do you have aspirations of expanding your area

beyond Long Island? Or is there so much business in Long Island? There's no need for it.

No, I definitely, I want to incorporate the city. I think the city, there's just a lot of,

there's a lot of accounts that could be had over there. Right now, it's just, I think I'd be

biting off more than I can chew. And my fear is doing that and then not actually like living

up to promises. So the larger projects that we've started, like we've done some

landscape lighting projects and bigger plantings, those four-foot planters that I was just telling

you about. So that was a job that I had to bid on. And that was for the kind of terrorism security

for a synagogue. So through that networking group I had mentioned, I had done work for an IT

guy. And then he was also in the networking group that I was in. So he gave me the referral.

We ended up getting the job. And a lot of it, I'm thankful because I'm a Coast Guard veteran.

A lot of things that I did in the Coast Guard were all based security. So at the time, it was

extremely boring. He's always like training and preparing for the day that never came. But

it actually ended up making me very uniquely qualified for that job because they're trying to

fortify and kind of create a deterrence looked at the front of the synagogue. And so we were able to

win that contract. And we just finished it yesterday. So they were a planter box. Is that

where design is more of a security apparatus, but they also wanted them to pretty, right?

Yeah. So that each planter is about a thousand pounds empty.

Oh, wow. That is made out of concrete. And then when you're done filling them, they're probably

closer to three thousand pounds apiece. Wow. Okay. Well, that's pretty cool. Yeah.

Yeah. All right. So when your seasons change, do the planters change as well? Or like, is that

something you have to account for? Is it kind of like, hey, you're starting in the spring,

you get the, like, it's a two planter account. You get these two planters. And they're with you

through the rest of time. Or do you change colors? Do they get requests for stuff like that?

We have that people request different planters, but I know it frequently. So typically it's,

you know, once they get one planters, they're kind of pretty happy with. I've been pleasantly

surprised that most people are not very picky about the planter. I generally try to steer people

to what I think with, you know, life that were my home, what would I do? And the same thing with

the size of the planter too. Like, if it, if it really deserves a small, I'll tell them, like,

I don't think you really need to pay for anything bigger. Like it might be in the way or whatever

the case might be. And the same thing with the color, like, you know, I'm going to try and give you

my honest input because I think you will look nice. So. Yeah. What about a window boxes? Is that

part of your business too? It is a part of my business. I only had one customer with a window box

so far. And she recently just took it down. So I'm going to do that anymore. Okay. Interesting.

Because I know they're out by me here. There's a company that they specialize in window boxes.

And then they also install drip systems for watering them. So yeah. Yeah. It's interesting. And I

guess to have a drip system probably doesn't work for planters around the pool. Because somehow you

got to get the, you got to get attached to the water somewhere or these house, these planter

boxes off the, you know, the second and first story windows have these little drip lines that

run through. So then the customer doesn't even have to worry about watering it. So yeah. I wonder,

is that in live in? No, they're, um, they're wow window boxes out here in Cincinnati. Okay. Oh,

it's not yours. Yeah. It's interesting. That's very cool. Which of these is my next question? So

what are your, um, you know, what are your aspirations for from porch flora as you keep getting

into this business? Like is this going to become your, your full-time gig or, you know, do you see

expansion opportunities? Do you see it becoming more of a landscape company? What does it look like

for you? So it's funny because it, it's changed quite a bit for me and probably part of my personality

of just like, sometimes I have a hard time seeing an opportunity and saying no, but I think, um,

you know, I've always wanted to have a nursery. So I think with my plant knowledge and,

and my interest in it, I think the nursery landscape company is really where I see this going.

With also like a masonry side. So I guess more so if we'll blend like landscape nursery,

set up awesome, very cool. All right. So that way you get, uh, you get to play dad to thousands

and thousands of plants and then maybe this is a part of your business where you still create

window boxes or flower boxes and yeah, have a landscape design aspect to it as well.

Yep. Yeah. So I enjoy making the planters. Um, it's not, unless you do a tremendous amount

of volume. It's not going to be huge money, mate. It's really like if you're, I would say,

like for, for the folks that are listening, if you're like a young guy and you're starting a

business, you know, and you're interested in landscaping, I would suggest maybe trying this

instead of cutting grass because, uh, or do both, um, because I think you'll find that you could

build your, your portfolio of customers and have a good, uh, before with them with a lot less

overhead. I think that's a good opportunity for some younger folks. Yeah. Absolutely. I love

that as, as an idea of forgetting into the landscape game because it sets you apart, right? Like,

it, correct me if I'm wrong, but you probably don't have a ton of competition doing what you do

out in Long Island or him, is that incorrect? No. There's a couple, there's a couple of businesses,

but I, and I don't consider myself to be a very big business by any means, but there's a couple

of other businesses on Long Island that I do not think are close to the same size. There's a big

nursery that does it, but, um, I've actually taken a few accounts from them. Yeah. So I,

you know, that's, I suppose that's really just who they're hiring. Um, that maybe they thought I

was doing a better job than whoever they hired. Well, in startup costs wise, like you said,

there's not as much overhead. So if somebody wants to start up a business like this out of the blue

in their area, I'm kind of, can you give us an idea of what the startup capital requirements might be

to do this? So it's pretty convenient because most of my planters are from loves. So the planter

and the insert, you know, you don't have to pull the trigger on that until you actually have the

customer. You could also hold off on buying a lot of material and just go with a, like a garden

center. See if you can get something as like a wholesale account. Um, so I'm trying to think of

what we put a decent amount into the website to start. But if you were to start like manually bill

for a short period of time, I think that that's, it's convenient to have the bills just automatically

hit on the card. And then we just make sure, you know, make sure you make good on it. But if you

didn't do that, I mean, you could get in real, really cheap. If you want to build out a website,

I mean, I think Wix, you could probably get pretty far with, with very little overhead. Yeah.

So I think I would say honestly, no more than five grand. And most of that would probably just go

to advertising. You could probably get yourself like a real big jumpstart. Yeah. Well, even if you,

if you just think about it, if you're talking straight granular without even having a website or

without having any sort of digital investment, you can start this up. You can go get a small book of

business. It may be even your parents neighborhood, wherever and find five people who say yes to you

building them a couple of planters for their front porch, right? Now you have a business because

they've signed up. They've paid you. And now you have capital dough by the planters go by the dirt,

go by the plants. And then you get, you know, it's just you get the ball rolling. So for, you know,

before you even invest any money, you could have money coming in and maybe a total startup investment

of like said, maybe, you know, up, maybe up to five, but maybe not even a grand just to get started.

And then as you start building, get a couple more clients, have a little bit of money coming in,

maybe mix it with a little bit of your own investment and get a website built and then eventually

start talking about possible paid advertising and get the word out. But you just go old school and

knock on doors. And this is an incredibly affordable business to start from the ground up. That's

why I love this idea. And the business is too. I think a good opportunity. Like if you see somebody who

maybe is in like a strip mall and they need to kind of like separate themselves from the people

to their left and right, really, you just got to talk through the owner of the manager and see if

they're willing to water something like that every day. I have one, I have a bakery near me. I

actually, they had these planters and they used to take, I don't know, something that they would buy

at a grocery store and just drop it in. But they always had a line out the door like every holiday

this bakery had a line out the door. And I was like, I need to do that planter and I need to put

my sign in it. So I went to them and I said, like, how about I do your planters for free? And I've

gotten, I think five or six accounts off of that one. And so, you know, I've done that a couple

times, even with some local businesses where I've, I've said, like, well, listen, just feel like

there's enough people coming and going here. So if you got any sort of like locally famous

places that always has a line out front and you think that they got the staff that's willing to

water every day, then maybe that's worth a shot too. Sort of a form of advertising in my mind.

Yeah, that's, that's called strategic advertising right there. Get a little, give them a free

planter and get your sign out front. It's like a little billboard. Yeah. I love that. I love

that. Awesome. Well, Darryl, this has been really cool. I just love this business idea. I think

there's so many of our listeners out there who might be thinking to themselves that this is,

this might be my way to get into entrepreneurship. So thank you so much for sharing everything about

your business and all the details about it. I want to make sure that anybody who wants to either

get in contact with you, learn from you, learn more about you, follow you on Instagram or on social

media, maybe even become customers if they're out on Long Island. What's the best way to get more of

you? Stop. We have our website is from porchflora.com. Instagram is probably the best way to reach us.

If you just go to at front porch flora, you'll find us and we appreciate all the follows. I run

just about all that you'll get me at some point. All right. Awesome. Awesome.

Darryl, thanks again, man. This has been awesome and best of luck to you. The rest of 2025.

All right. Thank you. And that'll do it for this episode of the Millionaire University podcast.

Big thanks to Darryl for joining us today. And big thanks to you, our listener for joining us yet

again on the wonderful episode of the Millionaire University podcast. If you guys enjoyed this episode,

please go ahead and leave us a five star review. It helps us grow our listenership. And also,

if there's anyone on your network who you think would enjoy this episode, go ahead and hit that

share button in your pod player and send this goodness their way. All right, guys, that's it for me.

Brian Gearns signing off. I cannot wait to catch you on the next episode of the Millionaire

University podcast. And I have one last question. You haven't started a business yet. What are you waiting for?

We'll catch you next time.

Rinse knows that greatness takes time, but so does laundry. So rinse will take your laundry and

hand-deliver it to your door, expertly cleaned. And you can take the time pursuing your passions.

Time one spent sorting and waiting, folding and queuing, now spent challenging and innovating

and pushing your way to greatness. So pick up the Irish flute or those calligraphy pens or that

daunting beef Wellington recipe card and leave the laundry to us. Rinse, it's time to be great.

Ever seen a musical so good you didn't want it to end, like you could live inside it forever.

Then you're going to love Schmegadun. Get your one-way ticket to Broadway musical paradise.

Have you ever felt trapped at a musical like you literally couldn't escape? Then you'll

hate to miss Schmegadun because you'll never want to leave and you can't. But the important thing is

you'll never want to. Get tickets at www.SchmegadunBroadway.com