00:00
Hi, welcome to Power of the Network. I'm your host, Tim Locker, Vice President of Broadband here at CBM. This week I'm joined by Chris Harness, Chief Operating Officer at Hometown Internet. Chris has got a long history in the communication industry, been building fiber networks since the early 90s. So we're going to talk to him, learn about his experience and what they've got coming at Hometown Internet. Join us.
00:29
Chris, thank you so much for joining us today. It's a pleasure to have you here in the studio with us. So, appreciate your time. It's my pleasure to be here and go over this with you guys and just get to know everybody. Absolutely. It's going to be fun. tell us first off, tell us the story of Hometown Internet. Well, Hometown Internet actually started off as a wireless company and they've got a grant there in Harrison, Arkansas for 140 miles of fiber build and we actually just got that done about
00:59
three months ago and it's kind of kicked off into the bead awardee. So is that build your first fiber build then? The first fiber build in Arkansas for Hometown Internet, yes. Okay. How many customers did that hook up? It's got 2,000 passings and right now we're at 300 customers right now. Okay. So we're growing. Still adding on, yeah. Okay. Awesome. What's the...
01:27
What's the mission? How long has company been around? Well, Barryville Broadband had been around for probably about seven years. then Rodney Balans, the founding owner of Hometown Internet, started it three years ago. And once they got awarded the ARPA grant there in Harrison, it just kind of...
01:55
bloomed up from there and started growing. Okay. So, started as a wireless provider now. And obviously, and we'll get to the bead funding here after a little bit, but that's obviously going to be a major growth for you guys. It is going to be incredible. Estimate somewhere around 20,000 passings compared to 2,000, 10 times the size. Yeah. So, mean, to give those people out there in those areas, Internet is
02:24
people are so excited because they have nothing. even Starlink is starting to fade out out there because all the growth of the trees and we get calls every day when you come out here. They're looking at the bead map when you're going come out here. So we just kind of have to explain everything to them so they don't get too excited too quickly. Well, talk about your service area. So you're kind of down Missouri, Southern Missouri and Arkansas region kind of down in the. So in Arkansas, we'll start off there with
02:52
We're serving part of Marion County, Boone County, Newton County, a little bit of Jasper, Carroll County. We're going all the way to Bella Vista. There's a swath down through there in Benton County that we'll be hitting as well. And then we get on the north side of the state line there, we'll be in Berry, Stone,
03:20
Lawrence and Newton counties and a tiny bit in Jasper. Okay. So right there in that kind of south central Missouri and north central Arkansas. Yeah. Ozark area. Ozarks, yes. Beautiful country. It is beautiful. And you live where? Right now I live in Rogers, Arkansas and I'm actually building a house in Aurora, Missouri so I could be more centrally located between everything. Okay. I like to keep my eyes on the project as it's growing. Yeah. Awesome. Awesome.
03:50
What do you think it is that makes hometown different? What makes hometown different is we are just so local. mean, you know, there's other ISPs that local, everybody we're growing, we're growing from our area. We're bringing local people in and growing them as employees and stuff into the fiber market. And we really are, we're just looking for internal growth from local people. Yeah. That's what we're looking at. So,
04:20
One of the most important things for you guys then is basically you're serving your hometown. Serving our hometowns. And it's a thing is every one of us live among the route as we're building. We've got people in Harrison, Berryville, Eureka Springs. We've got people in Rogers. We've got people in the Lawrence County area. mean, it's serving the people that work there and our families and our friends and everybody along the way.
04:48
How excited is everybody to get the fiber? Everybody is overwhelmed. It's all people can ask. I don't know how many calls I get a day asking when we're going to start building fiber in those areas. It's just, it's always overwhelming sometimes. What do you think will be the biggest change other than just, know, obviously fast internet, but what will it do for those communities? It'll allow a lot of those people to be able to work from home.
05:18
And sometimes when the weather's bad, the kids, they actually be able to do their schoolwork and stuff from home. Yeah. Yeah. I think it'll grow the areas where, you know, it's less dense. We'll start seeing people build houses more from the city and just kind of spread out. I think we'll see more growth in the areas that we're passing. Yeah. I think, I mean, there's certainly...
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this day and age when people are looking to build a home or figure out where they're to live, internet's a big thing. If you don't have it to offer, you're not going to draw new people, That's correct. And it's funny you brought that up because I'm building a house, right? And we kind of talked about this last night, but we don't have internet down my road. And it's one of those things is I actually have to wait because it's kind of in the center edge of our build.
06:09
I mean, I get it. That was one of first things I thought. said, well, you know, I mean, I could run off a hot spot for just a little while. Yeah. But it's, I get it. That's, you know, people are like, oh my gosh, you know, there's no internet here. So we don't want to move here. But once we build a fiber past it, everybody's going to be, is overexcited and, and now are looking out past the box, you know, and thinking I can do this. We can have more land for our family to do this. Yeah. You know. No, that's exciting.
06:35
Talk a little bit about your background. I know you have a strong construction background. You've been in the business for years. Tell us the story of how you kind of got to where you are. back in 1996, I started working for Shots Underground in Nixon, Missouri, and I started on a shovel. And I kind of grew, went from shovels to excavators to, in a short period of time, they felt that I was
07:05
ready for a supervisor position. And my first project was 150 miles at the age of 23 across from Springfield, Illinois to Decatur. And I just learned from there and I learned things to do right and things to do wrong. And I really got good talking to people because everything is owned by a farmer out there from one side of road to the other. And you really have to get in there and be a people person to make this stuff work.
07:32
So you're battling easements and permits and those kinds of things? and permits, yes. It's an ongoing battle. And after that project, I worked in other areas. I worked on a project in Colorado. I've been all over from Colorado to New York working. there for a while, the internet or the telecom business kind of slowed down. And I took a stint from that.
08:02
into the gas industry and then right back into the telecom business when it started booming again. I managed projects from DTI back in the day to Bluebird, AT &T, Lumen. I pretty much worked for all the big companies, running big projects. And one day I decided, you know, I want to try working for ISP.
08:30
and I went to work for Total High Speed and I got their Ardolf project rolling with them and the team effort and we just kind of grew from there. Then Austin Gold, the main owner with Hometown Internet, called me up and said, I could really use you to help me grow this business here. I just kind of took off from there and that's where I've started now with Hometown Internet.
08:59
Fiber to the home type project then? It was one of my first fiber to home projects. It's actually my third one. Okay. And it was really, that fiber build is something that nobody else wanted to do in the area. AT &T had not served that area forever because the ground conditions, the rocky and everything else. I said- That's your whole world down there. Oh, the whole world. Yeah. You know, that's what I grew up on. I know ways around that stuff and
09:28
You know, we dug in and found ways to do things that made more sense and it just grew. You know, and right now they're at the very little last bit of their project. What do you think some of the biggest changes since, you know, when you started back in the 90s to now, you know, in the last 30 years, what sticks out to you as a good change, better change, and what's still the same?
09:56
Well, the basics are still the same. The whole idea behind the internet is still the same. just, technology has come so far and everything's so shrunken where, you know, everything big 1200 pair of cables to a fiber to size your pinky, you know, serving 10 times the many people that cable would actually serve. But then we talk about how much things have changed, you know, things have actually kind of reverted like we talked about last night. It's more simplified.
10:27
So the fiber world is a little more simplified on some of the stuff and repairs and maintenance on stuff and it's become actually just as easy as copper to work with. What do you think it is? I mean it seems like people that aren't, there's a lot of people that aren't comfortable with fiber, you if they haven't been around it. What kind of misconceptions are there I guess in the fiber?
10:54
Well, a lot of misconception is people think that fiber puts off waves, which that's not correct, but they don't understand that, you know, it doesn't have a, until you put the wifi in your house, there's no waves, you know. And people think that the government are looking at you through their fiber. I'm like, it's not the way it works. People just have a big misconception that is all, the government's all in all this and they're not. Yeah.
11:23
local people just trying to get you internet service. You know? Well, and too, like, so, you know, years ago it seemed like, you know, a fiber cut was a big deal. Oh. And, it's going to cost you hundreds of thousands of dollars and all this. And really, from a construction perspective, it's not a big challenge to, you know, to go fix a fiber. Yeah. Now you're right. You're right. That's why I saying it's gotten easier. And, you know, we talked about, you know, you know,
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hundreds of thousands of dollars to repair a fiber, in reality, the guys can burn a 288 in just a few hours and do two butt splices and have the whole network back up and going again in less than a half a day. Yeah. I can remember even back when I was splicing, when I first started, if there was a cut, they always wanted you to use temporary splices. And I'm like,
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Every time I would argue, like, I can get the machine out and I can fix this permanent, you know, and save myself another night of work, you know, like I can do it just as quick, permanent. Mechanical slices. Yeah. That was the biggest joke ever. I mean, it was a temporary, but you know, things start falling out. get bit, you get a move around, mechanical slices come off of it. Yeah. And then you got to reschedule, you know, to come back and fix it correctly. So I was a big advocate for like, let's just do it right the first time.
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because we're here, we got the equipment, why would we dump it up? Yeah, that's right. If you do it right the first time, you don't have to go back. And it makes things so much easier and the customer is always happier. Oh no, we got to go back, we got to schedule another outage. And you're like, another outage? Oh my goodness, how long is it going to be? Well, it's going be another eight hours. And they're like, well, that's starting to get into our prime time. they're like, you know. What's one of the worst outages you've seen?
13:19
One of the worst outages I've seen, well, you know, one of the worst outages I've ever seen was when the tornado came through Joplin, Missouri, and I actually worked a lot of that. I mean, everything was down for a long way. It was terrible. It was a total rebuild. That's probably one of the worst outages I've ever actually seen. Yeah, I can't imagine. Yeah. You know,
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I can remember being downtown splicing and having the cops knock on the door like, what are you guys doing? And like we've got 911 service down, you where you miss that one critical circuit or whatever. you just never know. some of the things, I remember we were in Iowa City and we were doing a cutover and everything, everything all ready to go. We'd go out and start to work at midnight.
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and it's getting about 3 in the morning and like stuff ought to be coming up, but this one circuit wouldn't come up. And finally it clicked. like, oh, we were testing earlier and I didn't, we had to jump her through the panels at one of the switches and I didn't put them back. And I'm like, hold on a minute. think I, you so I run down there and I put them in. I'm like, how about now? Yep. You know, but some of the crazy things that happened in the middle of the night.
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You get tired, you're working all those hours trying to get everybody up and going and it's just little things you forget. But at end of the day, you remember that little thing and it got everybody back going again. Yeah, you learn from it. What do you think is going to be the biggest challenge? What are you up against now trying to get this build off the ground? I know you guys have signed your contract for the bead, which is a big deal.
15:14
In Missouri, there's not been too many. think only a handful that have signed so far. think said, I think six of us have signed. The biggest thing right now is getting over the hurdles of the environmentals. And then the next thing will be materials. You know, there's only six of us in Missouri signing. know, it shouldn't be too bad getting some of the materials. It's just who's going to be really proactive in pushing on that stuff.
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to get it coming in, just stagger our shipments so it sense for everybody. What's your projection for timeline of the build? What's the goals and what's reality, I guess? Well, the goal is two years for sure. Reality is the more I see electric companies and stuff dragging their feet on their make ready and
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environmental permitting, national forest permitting. Some of those permits are anywhere from 260 to three years to get one. some of the areas we're going is national forest. So I can see that's going to be some of the biggest hurdles and that's going to push our timeline out to the probably the very end of B2B, my guess. Yeah, in certain areas. Explain for those that don't know, the make ready.
16:42
So some of your projects can be aerial, some of it will be underground, but if you're going aerial, then you have attachment agreements with power companies. Explain what the make ready is. So make ready is where poles are too short or power is too low or you have to raise and lower coms. And make ready is on the power company's timeline and they're busy.
17:10
It's not their only thing that they're worried about. They're worried just like us, getting customers up and keeping customers up. know, make ready is this one that has to change out polls and do some changes in the line work and for other columns to be moved up and down. basically, there's a lot of engineering that goes involved in those polls. And so you're making a change to it where, you know, that could change us back where
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you know, going over now you've, you're, typically the comms are going to be lower than the power. So now you've got height issues over roads and drives. so, yeah, that's, so that's where they come in and change the poles and stuff out. you know, when you have to have 16 foot over roads and driveways, you know, that's, you know, I has changed out four poles is to get, and it keeps, when they change out poles, they got to watch the uplift on the power.
18:07
Because if there's too much up-flip on the power, it causes those, the power lines that push off the... Off the insulators? Off the insulators, yes, correct. Yeah, because, you know, any time you have a turn in the line, you got angles that... But also the up and down is another angle. Correct, and people don't think about that stuff, that's right. Well, we can just move one pole. Well, that one pole could cause up-flip on six poles going one direction or the other. So, if there's a... You've got a stretch of aerial and...
18:36
you don't have the right height for the fiber. Who makes the decision if you're going to raise everything up, so you're going to put six, eight new poles in, get everything up so that you can continue aerial versus maybe you do an underground dip? So I'll look at that and I'll look at the cost difference between the make ready and to bury it past that. And I'll look at the timelines.
19:02
So you have that option. I have that option to do that change. So when we do our environmental, this falls back to environmental stuff, we do it worst case scenario that we're going to bury everything past the poles. So that covers us. So if we want to make that change, we can make that change and not have issues. If you don't make that environmental rule when you're starting, now you have to go back and redo your environmental because now you're disturbing the ground. Yeah.
19:29
So there's a lot of things that are involved in making that get, the environmentals will be quicker if you're saying, hey, we're just going to go aerial, but then if you got to come back and do underground, then you're waiting again. That's correct. So we do, worst case scenario is that everything's buried and it covers anchors and everything on existing pole lines. Yeah. it makes things go a little faster. And then another thing we do as we're looking at this make ready and the power lines of aerial versus buried, you know, it's just,
19:58
It's just cost. Most of it is cost. Believe it or not, the aerials is almost identical cost at Barrett. It's just how quick you can get it done. Aerials so much quicker, but timelines are slower. Well, so I'm glad you brought that up. What would be the criteria? What's more important at this point in the game for you? The cost, the speed.
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or the quality, where would you rate those three? Well, I'm about quality. I mean, I think, are you able to do all three? I like ice cream and cake, but I can't eat them both. So I want to say that, you know, if I can get the majority of the quality, I mean, I'll take the speed and the time or cost.
20:55
And when I say quality, the biggest thing was quality is your cleanup. Once it's put in, I'll take time to come back and do that. The timelines are strict and you've got to make a decision what makes the most sense when you're building this plan. If it takes you two days to do your cleanup, it takes time from production.
21:20
Normally what we do is that that quality thing you're talking about will kind of push it back a little bit, then come back and quality everything. Yeah, clean it up at the end. Clean it up at the end. Yeah. What do you consider for maintenance? Like, know, aerial versus underground. Well, you know, maintenance-wise, they're really both the same.
21:45
to go out there and change, you know, squirrel juice through it. And you got to go back four poles, know, and move slack and then come back, put strand back up, relash it, get it ready for splicers. Buried if it's there, you just dig it up, fix the conduit, pull a piece of fiber in between. I mean, it's all preference on that. But speed wise, getting somebody back up buried normally, they quicks us away.
22:18
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22:44
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23:08
So you mentioned managing materials, getting things coming in and flowing. What does that look like for you? I think right now we're near as bad as like we were in the COVID era. Some lead times are starting to come up, but talk about how you pick the right partners, how you pick the right manufacturers, and how having that team behind you can help.
23:37
make your project easier? you definitely have to have the right partners that support you and your project for one. And as long as you're working and scheduling things with them, you can keep your materials flowing. It's all about communication between each other as far as being partners. And I'm going tell you, most of the vendors and stuff that work are great people. I have no complaints on them. And it's just when it comes down to it is,
24:07
is how long it takes to get from the manufacturer. The vendor can't control that. And it's how many other people are wanting the same thing you are. we just try to work with each other and make it flow. That's about the only thing we can do. The thing is now, and we try to do this too, if you've got, obviously this is a large project, a large build, you just got to get the orders in.
24:33
get the delivery scheduled, and then you can manage those changes if something needs to be bumped up or bumped back or whatever, but getting it in the queue and getting it in the flow of the factory is the... Yeah, that's huge. and most people are understanding that you need more or need less. Oh yeah, well we can bump that back. We got another customer that could use this stuff as well. We're good with that. Like I said, it comes down to communication.
24:58
much tougher to move something up than it is to move it back. Oh, unless it's already made and sitting there waiting to be shipped out. mean, most of time it's not like that. You just got to understand in this business, that's the way it is. Everybody else is doing the same thing. Yeah. So you're not the only person waiting on something. What do you do for fun? Fun. Oh my gosh, I work. I don't know what fun is anymore. I normally like to...
25:28
got my own equipment. So I like to go dig and do stuff. I know that sounds crazy, I love to do stuff like that, but also in the old trucks and motorcycles and stuff like that. enjoy, to be honest, I enjoy people watching. Go out and walk some town and find a bench to sit on with a friend or something and just enjoy being outside. So it's challenging when you got so much going on right now.
25:57
Yeah, not a lot of time to relax. I really have no time. If you noticed this morning, I've been on the phone since 6 o'clock this morning. I have no time, it seems like. Is that a good thing? Is it bad thing? Are you wired that way? Do you like it? I'm definitely wired that way. I do like it. But sometimes we all need a mental break and we need to know, hey, maybe I'm just going to shut my phone off for a while.
26:20
Like I did earlier, I just shut it off so I don't have to hear it and stuff. And just take a little time for myself to talk with you and just talk about all this stuff. And at the end of the day, if we don't do that for ourselves, you just go crazy. Yeah. Yeah. I'm going to take a little mental break next week. I'm going to go fishing. So I'm very forward to that. Yeah. I'm going to Miami the week after that for four or five days. So I am taking a break for myself too. Good. Good. Yeah. I think you need to. I think it's important if
26:50
If all you do is work, you know, I don't know, think you just, there's more to life than that. So, you know, when you work with people like yourself and David, and it's not like you're just, working because you're good people, you're, I consider everybody a friend. Yeah. You know, it makes work lighter. Yeah. It makes it easier. That's what's so neat about the, you know, the telecom industry. You know, it's,
27:17
It's a small industry. know, when you look around, you see the same people, maybe just in a different shirt or whatever, but it's a really good group of folks. What I normally see, this is what I've normally seen in the business. I'll see an employee come around three times in their career. Yeah. Back to the same place where they started. Yeah. It's funny, but they do. Yeah. So pretty neat. mean, not very many places are like that. You don't ever see that same person come around three times. Yeah.
27:46
You know, it's, you know, from the sales perspective, you know, it's, you know, for me, it needs to be fun. You've got to enjoy yourself. You've got to enjoy what you do. But, you know, there's this misconception that, you know, it's a party every day. And there's, you know, that couldn't be further from the truth, but it is nice when, you know, your customers, they do become friends and, you you build these relationships that
28:15
that frankly last forever. that's one of my favorite things about it is just the people. I'm going be honest. I wouldn't want to be on the cell sides because everybody's yelling at, where's my stuff? Where's my stuff? I try not to do that because it's in the day. They're like, I don't want to talk to this guy and do this click.
28:30
I'm on a phone call. I'll call you back later and you don't hear from me. Well, on the flip side though, if you're calling me and saying, where's my stuff? That means you ordered some stuff. So that's a good thing. Oh, yeah. We just got to take care of It's just a timeline. And at the end the day, I'm going tell you, pretty much everybody we work with is spot on. I can't complain about them. Yeah. Well, we're super excited to be what part of it we can do for you.
28:58
It's just such an interesting time. we've heard, you know, I was talking to somebody last week and I'd mentioned Bede and they're, oh yeah, well, it's been four five years already. We'll see if it even happens. Well, you guys have a contract. Yeah, we're signing. It's happening, right? It's happening. You've got to be patient with the government stuff. Everybody knows that. So what do you say to those people that still have their doubts if the whole program is even going to happen?
29:26
Like I said, you've got a contract. here's what to say. Get your paperwork done and get a DNA and sign. I mean, if you really want to do it, and you're an awardee and you got everything, sign your paperwork. Yeah. You know, they'll get you started. It's a real thing. Yeah. It has taken some time. You know, anything like that's political and, you know, different changes of, you know, establishments and whatever. I mean, it's here. It's coming. So we're excited to see.
29:56
It's been a long time overdue. Yes, it has. It's been way overdue. when you look at things and you think, man, how this should change everybody's life. It's amazing because I remember when it was party lines. mean, it was expensive to call the town right next to you. You know, it was all long distance. Anything from your local exchange was long distance. Yeah. It's not like that now. You can call anybody anywhere and it doesn't cost you anything extra.
30:24
It's amazing. One thing in air busing is at the tip of your fingers. Sometimes that's kind of dangerous. But in the day, if you need it, it's there. You just got to use it. It's interesting. For me, I consider myself old. I'm 51. But technology-wise, just trying to get used to using the AI tools, I'm more like, okay, I need to know this.
30:54
Well, Chris might know that. So I'll call Chris and ask him. Chris AI, yes. But I'm more trained that way to like call and ask somebody and have that conversation versus type it in on my phone. So you could type it in on your phone and you can type it in, get three different answers from three different AIs. But when you got somebody like yourself or myself and we've been in the business, we have some of those answers. If it's something more technical, yeah, I'll look at AI.
31:24
and see it. You know, sometimes I use AI to find the ground conditions and stuff and errors were working. There is pluses to it. know, so I mean. I had a simple deal just last week. My little puppy got his second remote for the TV chewed up. And the first one I ordered from Amazon, it was no longer available, so I had to pick a different one. So it comes in, put the batteries in it, and like it won't power up.
31:54
And so I fiddle with it for a little bit, but I go, send it back. So I just had him replace it with the same one. the next day I get another one, what's the same issue? It's like, well, maybe this is not, maybe it's me, right? So I go to AI and I type it in. I took a picture of the remote and I type it in and it says, you know, this works off infrared and you can't see it. So take your phone camera and shine it to the end of the
32:24
of the remote and see if it, push the button and see if it blinks red. Well, sure enough, it blinks red. And I'm like, okay, so that worked, but it still won't hook up to my TV. they're like, oh, just unplug it for 60 seconds, it'll reset. So I do that and thing works. know, so. It has its place, like I said. I do I think some of it makes people dumber? Yeah, a little bit.
32:51
Because depending on one thing and not depending on their minds or depending on learning something from somebody else. Because like I said, it's not always right. Yeah. You got to be careful with your Be careful. Yeah, for sure. Like I said, I use it for some work things. know, most things I try to depend on myself to go out or people I know. know, for some reason I had never ran into this problem. I'm going to call somebody. Yeah.
33:19
you know, somebody's been there a little longer than me or somebody that's just what they do. You know, we all, we all got to depend on each other for that kind of stuff in this world. one, one thing that's kind of unique with you guys is you've, you've got your own construction crews. Yes, that we do. have a Southern Underground owned by Austin Golden. There is, we have 29 directional drills and five plows and tons and tons of employees and
33:47
other equipment. We, an aerial crews, we've got 13 or 14 aerial crews that we can just unleash on stuff. So you guys are pretty well set up to manage the size of this project. Yes, we are. We are very well. In reality, do you need a staff of 50 or 60? No, you do not. With in-house construction, you can manage that differently than you can...
34:15
other contractors because they're all responsible to you, you know, say, I need to know this, this, and this. And you can say, do this, this, and this, and they'll go out and do it. Whereas sometimes you have to go back and forth with a contractor to do so. Yeah, different relationship. Different relationship, yes. Talk about your leadership skills. What would be your leadership style? How do you get things done?
34:43
My leadership style is to, I kind of groom people and I don't get upset. I have one tone normally with everybody and I try to make people feel comfortable doing their jobs. When they feel comfortable doing their jobs, they excel at their jobs. mentoring is a big part of this business. If you don't have...
35:10
confident people that can fill your shoes for a day or two while you're gone, you're going to come back to a mess. So my whole leadership is to grow the people below me to take my job at some point. And I always try to be positive with everybody. Anything that we do in this business can be fixed. It can be fixed. Don't worry yourself about that. We'll handle it.
35:38
Yeah, it's not life and I mean, short of safety. mean, safety is, yeah, safety is huge. But other than that, it's not life and death. Anything can be fixed. Correct. Yeah. If it's not life and death, it can be fixed. You know, just reassure and be positive with your people and they'll cultivate and they'll grow. Yeah. I just, like I said, positive, think through everything and just, I treat everybody like family.
36:08
That makes a big difference too. Yeah, people got to feel welcome. They to feel wanted. You know, everybody comes to work for a different reason too. You know, that's one thing I've kind of picked up on that, you know, people are motivated by different things. Correct. know not everybody is motivated by money. You know, some people love the environment they're working. They think of them people as family because you spend more time at work than you do at home. So if you make a good environment,
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will want to come to work. Even the people in our field. Out in the field, we go out there and we check on everybody, Austin, me, know, management, that's not something they normally go out there and do. We'll go out there and if, hey, you need a little help here, we'll jump in there and help them. know, it's lead by example, you know? And the guys out in the field are so appreciative.
37:04
of seeing that and us helping them, they're willing to do whatever we ask. Well, and I think too that idea that nothing is beneath you. That's correct. You're willing to jump in the hole and get on the shovel or take the garbage out of the office or whatever it is, clean the toilets. Oh yeah, most definitely I've done that a lot. People are like, what are you doing? I said, I'm cleaning the bathrooms. Just for example, our two installers are both sick. So Friday, I'm going to installs.
37:34
And they're like, really, are you going to do those? I said, yes, I'll do them for you guys. I said, we're not a team if we don't hold each other up. Yeah, that's a great example. I mean, you've got to do that. What excites you the most? mean, there's a lot ahead of you here. It excites me to get started on the construction. It excites me to see things coming in. I'm ready for it. Yeah.
38:02
I'm ready to start building and making dreams come true. That's Austin's quote. I like to make dreams come true. And it's kind of funny, it kind of rubs off on you, but when you can bring people a little joy with the internet, come on. Most of the people in our area, it's not a very, they don't have a lot of money in some of those areas.
38:31
and we try to cater to those people. them sitting at home with their family watching movies on the internet, I mean, that brings them great joy. And that's the other thing that kind of makes us different is we want to help these people like that too. We want to make it affordable for them. So they can have that enjoyment out of it. And it excites me to see them go, oh, well, we watched...
38:58
Snow Princess or whatever, know, I mean, the kids just loved it. We got internet now. It excites me. In some of the construction plans, know, I've other telcos and stuff that I've talked in the past have done different, whether it's free internet in the parks or libraries and schools, you guys have different programs that you're looking into as you move into this?
39:27
We will be doing some stuff like that. Just like the owner took the ball field that had been set in Pierce City for years and had no attention that he went in there and redid it all and then donated it back to the school. That's awesome. So it's, we have plans to service the community as well. Yeah. No, I think that's important. And you know, in your
39:53
Born and raised in that area? Born and raised, born in Springfield, Missouri. Raised in Crane, Missouri. Okay. Well, that's got to be special, you know, to be able to do that. It's very special. It's very special to see something that you had never thought was going come to that area. Yeah. And it's simply because of the rock, right? It's just cost too much for... Yes. ...you know, why everybody's overlooking. Oh, yeah. I mean, yeah, that's why exactly everybody's train is like, oh, that's too expensive.
40:20
Well, there's ways to do it and ways not to do it. And when you live down there and you know, hey, I can do this, this, and this, or I can get an easement from this guy. Where else in the country do they have the same struggles? Well... I mean, your... In that southern Missouri, Arkansas area in the Ozark country and all the rock, I mean, we don't have that in Iowa. No. We've got little spots of rock, but we don't have what you're facing. Yeah.
40:51
Well, know, other areas, Tennessee, Tennessee is really bad. it? Oh yeah. mean, it's rocky. I mean, anything I would say from Nashville all the way to, uh, Jay, Oklahoma, that whole area right there in the center of the United States is nothing but rock. And it's, it's, it's challenging for people. And when we get people from out of state that comes in, I'm going to come in here and take all the work.
41:18
And they're there for a few weeks and say, we've to pull out because we don't know what we're doing. Yeah. You know, it's just, just, people don't think about that. It's a whole different It's a huge challenge, yes. It's a huge different change in process, huge change in process. Because in these areas, you know, solid rock is different than flint rock and heavy rock areas because when you're born in solid rock, you just set up and just, you just bore. You just let it eat.
41:44
Well, when you're working in these really chunky rocky areas, it deflects your borehead up, down, side to side. And to be able to navigate that, people from other areas like Iowa, they don't like, I don't know what to do here. I'm pushed down 15 foot and I was at four foot, you know, two rods ago. I'm like, well, you know, you got to pull back and you got to take your time and get around that stuff. It's a challenge. It's definitely a challenge. Yeah. Here in Kansas City, you know, a lot of granite. Oh yeah.
42:14
different challenge, but that's like you said, it's more solid and you just kind of go Yeah, you just got to take your time. So machines are built like air hammers and AT machines. That's what they do. You you set up, you get in the ground and you just let it do its thing. Yeah. You know, and you'll get through it. But like I said earlier- Kind of the same philosophy for when you get going. Just get set up, let me do my thing and we'll get through it. That's right. Let's get through it. Yep, that's right. Exactly same philosophy. Yes, it is.
42:43
I think it's awesome. There's been some folks that, there's been some things in the news that folks, some of your competitors, they don't think you can do. Well, let me tell you something. Even the ant can bend a rubber tree to plan. Yeah. Okay. You just got to get in there and dig in and do it. See, here's the difference is,
43:11
We have our own construction, so we can make things happen differently. And I don't have to wait on 10 different people in the engineering situation to give me an answer back. I'm going to make the answer myself, and we're going to take it from there and make it happen. There's a big difference in that. I've worked with big companies, and oh, we've got to make this change. Well, it's going to be three or four weeks where we can get it in and get it drawn. And I said, well,
43:40
You know, and this is a lot of things I've done in the past is with bigger economies like that, when we're the mid-mile or something like that, I said, well, why don't you let me look at this and we'll walk it out. And I said, I'll give you the solution to this and we'll just change it in red lines. And here you go. And nine times out of 10, they're like, oh, this is great. Yeah. You know, where were you when we was engineering this? You know, so this difference is we'll be able to make the changes we want instantly, not waiting on somebody else. Yeah.
44:10
And you're good with all that experience to be able to do it on the fly. There's probably not too many things you haven't seen. There's not too many things I haven't seen. I know, I can't remember where it was at. We drilled through two or three railroad cars. I'm like, the railroad had probably an accident. They just backfilled and buried them off. Like, we can't get through it. And finally we got to dig in and they're like, here at top of railroad cars. like, that's strange. I mean, you come across that stuff. Yeah. You know, how do you know? You don't know until you get into it. Yeah. Yeah. 100%.
44:40
Well, it's great. Well, we're super excited for you. like I said, we want to do everything we can for you to help you get through your project and make those dreams come true. We want to make dreams come true. And with partners like you guys, dreams can come true. And it's appreciated very much. Awesome. Well, thank you. I appreciate you joining us. I appreciate it too.
45:06
Just wanted to say thanks again to Chris for joining us on the show. We're really looking forward to see his project taken off and helping him reach his goals. And I think the fiber to the home in that area in particular is so critical. There's just not been any internet down there for those folks. So they're doing some good things down there and we look forward to seeing them succeed. Remember, if you need help with a project,
45:31
or looking for representation here in the Midwest, look no further than CBM. You can find us right here at cbmrep.com. Thanks again for joining us on Power of the Network. And until next time, we'll see you next time.
