Jeremy Weisz 6:05
I love that because it speaks to results. I mean, you’re focused on results with a client, I mean, how, however you get there, you get there, but you want to get them results. And who are some of the key hires, you mentioned, initially, you had an admin, which is key and getting stuff off your plate. And then you had a creative director, who are some other key hires. Throughout the years,
David Littlefield 6:25
the first media director I had was very well respected in the Oklahoma community, and she was ready for a change. And that was a big leap of faith on her part to join me at that time, because we were small, hadn’t built our reputation yet. But over over the years, 21 2027 years ago, lose track of time, we were the first agency in Oklahoma, in this region, to start an account planning practice. And that was, that was a critical hire in it was a former client that I hired, it was a very bright lady. That was a very good strategist, but very intuitive. And I challenged her to come in and start an account planning practice. And that’s, that took us to a different level for 25 years. Most recently, you know, back in the old day, there used to be an ad that people would run the famous quote, I can’t remember the guide said it, but I know that 50% of my advertising is wasted. I just can’t tell you which.
Jeremy Weisz 7:31
Exactly. I think it was the one big advertising guru who said that too, right? Yeah, someone in the industry. Yeah.
David Littlefield 7:37
But anyway, so I’m gonna say, Sam, what, three years ago, we started an analytics practice. Yeah. And that is, in you know, with everything moving, you know, more, there’s still a balance of traditional media and digital. But there’s so many more tools now, in that digital space where you can close a loop and track results. Those are summative critical hires. And then I will say this, I was very fortunate, as my son Sam, went to school out in San Diego worked for Mirum International Digital Agency for several years out there before he came back and joined us. And he’s been a critical hire and a just a godsend.
Sam Littlefield 8:26
I mean, I think, and he has to say that because I’m his son, Jeremy,
Jeremy Weisz 8:28
I actually you could say the opposite because your son are you gonna lean into you hard?
David Littlefield 8:35
Yeah. Right. So we were fortunate that, first of all, fortunate that my son wanted to be in this business, but it’s fortunate for us that he had that background. And fortunately for us that he’s really good at this. I’ve got friends that have transitioned to family members, and it hadn’t gone so well. Now. So I would say Sam’s another critical hire
Jeremy Weisz 8:56
the I’m gonna I look forward to hearing about how this transition phase goes because it’s not easy whether it’s even if it’s an outside person, let alone family, it just there’s a lot of other factors that can complicate things as well. And I think so I’d love to hear Sam to start with just the analytics practice but I mean, I think if I went to San Diego I don’t know if I’d ever go back to anywhere else but San Diego so
Sam Littlefield 9:20
fun fact I moved back July 26 2016 is 104 degrees in Tulsa and I got off that plane and I was like, man, I made a mistake. It took me a while until we got into fall here. It was good weather and the leads returning um, but no, I’ll tell you the we we actually kind of is a godson we stumbled into the analytics business, which was really fascinating how that happened. We actually were hiring for an account manager for a key account of ours. And we found this guy in about six months in, quickly learns name’s Chris Kaiser. Chris. Chris has been with us for three years and we quickly learned That his brain works a lot differently than most account managers do is very result oriented, very data driven. So he started suggesting some things to our clients. And we sat him down and I said, hey, what you’re doing is kind of in that analyst, analytics manager role. And he goes, man, you’re talking about my dream job. And so we had a transition plan. Chris basically was an account manager for us for about a year. And then we transitioned him to a full time analytics manager, which has been huge, because you know, to dad’s point earlier, we need results. Well, in today’s age, we need results right now, what are we doing today that is working? What are we doing today that is not working? And how are we changing that on an ongoing basis. So Chris, in our media director, who we actually found a media director out of Tennessee almost one year ago to the day, her name’s Kelly, and she’s phenomenal. 20 years of food experience. So her experience tied together with our analytics manager has been a game changer.
Jeremy Weisz 10:55
What’s interesting is both of you had worked in previous agencies before so and say, I imagine you grew up in the agency role because your dad for you, Sam, what a observations lessons did you learn from your dad from afar? And then also going into the San Diego experience?
Sam Littlefield 11:15
Yeah, no, it’s it’s an interesting story. And I’ll try to keep it short, Jeremy, um, we dad told me growing up, you know, it’s been this way. We grew up at the agency, we came up here after school, my mom was the CFO for 20 years. So she picked us up from school, and we’d come in well, that I know that we were probably reckoned with everyone’s day, because we wanted to play around and then we throw a tennis ball around. But dad, actually, he always told me goes, man, never get into this business. It is a wild crazy ride. But he goes when times are when times are good, it’s fun. And obviously, given the pandemic of this last year, when times are bad, it’s a an interesting business to be in. We grew up here at the agency. And so the interesting thing is, Dad said that this was a wild and crazy business when times were good. It’s a fun business to be in when it’s like last year’s pandemic, that’s a really interesting business to be in, to say the least. So when I went to San Diego, I Honest to God, I never really thought about getting in this business. I was an English major. I had aspirations to be in sales, I this kind of my natural personality fit. And I got, I landed this job at this global agency in San Diego, and I kind of faked my way through it and somehow made it within a few years on their account management and new business development team. And I woke up one day, and I was I was single, I was 25 years old and living in one of the most expensive cities in the nation. And dad was at a conference up in Palm Springs. And so I drove up and took the day off and saw him and I said, Hey, I think I think I’m ready to come home. And that I think your jaw dropped when I told you, I don’t think you’re expecting that. But I quickly realized that there is this is a really, really cool and fascinating business. There’s especially in today’s age, there are so many different outlets to marketing marketing means so many different things and what it did when he started this business 41 years ago. So I’ve been back for five years now I say, you know, officially five unofficially, I turned 30. In October. I’ve been in this business for 30 years. It’s been it’s been a great a great five years for sure.
Jeremy Weisz 13:22
Talk about the transition. I’d love to hear both of your takes on you know, David, the transition, how to smoothly transition in general and then also navigating that it’s a family member.
Sam Littlefield 13:39
Well, I’ll get you start dad.
David Littlefield 13:41
Okay, for starters, Sam and communicated to us that we had, we had a plan that was probably going to be a year and a half or two years out before we did this, but Sam sat me down one day at lunch and said, Hey, you know what, I’m, I’m really ready, ready to go. And so what we did was, I made him in 2020. January, I made him president of the agency, not knowing COVID was coming. And I told him, I said, Look, we’re there’s enough scenarios for potential conflict between the two of us. And the most important thing to both of us is this father son relationships. So I said, let’s try to keep the conflicts to a minimum, you run operations and help me with business development, and I’ll take care of everything else. And I made him president so that gave Sam and then COVID hit in what March April? Yeah. And but that gave Sam a runway if you will, to prove to himself to the staff here we got 20 employees that okay, there’s a there’s a new sheriff in town, some things are gonna change but not a lot and I would say everybody is been very respectful. And I, there’s a Sam are in a CEO network called Magnet. I don’t know if you’ve talked any magnet agencies or not. But I’ve been in that for over 30 years, got some great friends in there. And Dan Nelson, up in Milwaukee, shared with me that when he transitioned to his son, the best advice she said he could give me was, if people come to you with the problem, tell him they got to go to Sam. Don’t try to fix Sam’s problems. Yeah. We haven’t had any buddy come to me.
Sam Littlefield 15:41
And I’ll even I’ll backtrack before that. Jeremy, when I first started five years ago, the first thing we set when we sat down first day, we shook each other’s hand said that Father, Son relationship first business second. And of course, we butted heads. I mean, it’s inevitable. But it was tricky for me coming into an agency, our our tenure here our average, 10 years, 13 years, people, people come and work here and they stay, it’s great place to work. It’s a great work life balance, we have these awesome clients coming in when people saw me at the age of 1213 years old. And then here, here’s the next generation taking kind of a tricky, at some times tricky situations. To be completely honest, there’s a lot of people that don’t work here anymore, and that it was just kind of finding that fit. So when I approached dad, and again, we we’ve mapped out kind of what that is seven year plan. And after two and a half years, I and I move really quick, just as fast as I possibly can. And we were on a road trip to Oklahoma City so that I’m ready, you know, and I’m ready to take this over, I’m ready to go. And I can tell you know, after 40 years, he’s he’s ready for his next phase. And so what we’ve been working on from a transition standpoint is how is dad still involved on key accounts when he needs to be? And you know, I’m running operations, new business, he’s in charge of the finances. But also, you know, how do we, I have full access to a guy that has 40 years of wisdom, I couldn’t have gotten through last year by myself, there’s no way I had to let go some people because of this frickin pandemic, which is just, you know, the worst thing ever, Dad always says it takes some years off the back end of your life couldn’t be more true about that. But having him here as a sounding board, is by far the best. I mean, his office is right there. I mean, we’re 10 feet away from each other. And it’s a pretty, we have a pretty cool dynamic and relationship. We know how to turn it off. And when you turn it off, if we go and hit some balls, golf balls together, you know what sometimes we don’t talk work. It’s just father, son. So that’s I think that’s been really nice. We know a lot of people that our Father, Son, Father daughter taking over companies that do not go smoothly. So we’re for sure fortunate in that sense, no doubt.
Jeremy Weisz 17:56
I think, you know, one of the things that sound like you did is you really divided responsibilities and just gave the reins over on certain departments to Sam, which basically you are the boss now, right? What are some other things you did? And then or maybe the opposite? What have you seen with other people’s transitions that maybe they made some mistakes that you’re like, well, I’m going to be sure to not do that. And when we when we transition?
David Littlefield 18:22
Well, I’ll start on that. Because in that CEO network Magnet, there’s been six or seven agencies that I’ve seen transition some to family and some to other people. And there’s another gentleman, I won’t name names, that wouldn’t be cool. But his dad transitioned to business him in basically said, I want you to do this. But one of the first things I said to Sam, when he said to me years ago, do you think I’d be any good in this business, I said, I think you’ll be great at anything you decide to do. But if you want to come back from San Diego, and join me in the business, it has to be your idea, not mine. You know, this, this other friend of ours, his dad never said that to him. And so he not only forced his son to take over the business, and fund his retirement, he never ever really left. And so in this guy was 89 years old, and still showing up at work. And in this one example, took over a piece of business that he had a relationship with, and our friend is going oh my gosh, what what’s going on here? So I said to myself, I’m not going to do that to Sam. I mean, I’m going to be here, I still got one foot in one foot out, I’ve cut back on my hours. But I’m not going to sabotage what Sam’s doing. I’m here to help him. So there was a an example of me learning a lesson from someone else that I didn’t want to do.
Sam Littlefield 19:56
Well, and I’ll add on top of that, Last year was a blessing in disguise is still terrible. But with that pandemic, Jeremy, and you know, we go to a completely remote model for months, basically the entire year, there was, there was a lot of growing up that I had to do really, really fast. And like I said, luckily that I had his wisdom and dad was a great sounding board. But in Part of that is there were so many opportunities from a leadership standpoint that I just had to walk into and own it and go, that I think, our employees here now the 20 others that are here, they quickly realized, okay, this is this is dad calls it a new sheriff in town. I’m not the biggest fan of that saying, but hey, here’s here’s the next generation. And this is the way it’s gonna be. So
Jeremy Weisz 20:47
I’m curious, Sam. So you went to your dad, and you said, I’m ready. Okay, so I guess it was two and a half years, maybe he was expecting another two and a half of five years or so. What was it to you that you thought that at that point that you were like, I’m ready now.
Sam Littlefield 21:09
We have a saying, When is the fourth quarter and there’s five seconds left? Who wants the basketball, you know, you want the last shot. And that’s kind of been instilled through my whole entire life. And I wanted the ball. I wanted key client relationships, and I developed the relationships. I started vocalizing more and meetings across the board, I started thinking differently strategically. In a new business world, I became so comfortable, it’s just God. It’s just fun. I mean, you you have. Dad’s always said, clients come to us because they have a challenge. And we have the solution to help them sell more stuff. And that started to click way sooner than I thought it would. And like I said, at that time, I thought I was ready. And then the pandemic happened. I was like, Oh, my gosh, this is a whole new set of challenges. And I had to do a lot more growing up in but like I said, we were in the middle of a road trip to Oklahoma City. And I learned and I had no idea how he was going to take it. But I turned to him. I said, I am so ready. And I mean, like I’m as ready as I think that was in the fall. And then we announced that I was president A few months later going into 2020 before the pandemic.
Jeremy Weisz 22:18
It’s interesting, because you know, everyone has different leadership styles, right? And you mentioned, you know, because of the pandemic, you kind of just have to step up and even more more in that time than any other time to kind of lead a company and lead through this crazy time. What what are the differences or similarities between leadership styles? Oh, man, David, I don’t maybe you want to you want to go first?
David Littlefield 22:49
I’ll just give you one example. I don’t know if you know about the enneagram. Are you familiar with the enneagram? at all?
Jeremy Weisz 22:59
No, I’ve heard the term but I don’t know.
David Littlefield 23:01
Well, it’s a personality Briggs personality. Yes. Yeah. Like Myers Briggs. And anyway, I’m a six and the enneagram. And Sam’s not. And so I’ll give you an example. If somebody would come to me with a little off kilter idea. Hey, why don’t why aren’t we doing this? My style would be? Well, you know what, let me let me think about that. The that’s a possibility. Let me get back to you. Okay. Sam, if they asked him that, Sam ago, yeah. You know what, we’re not doing that.
Sam Littlefield 23:39
For the contrary, if it’s an amazing idea, boom, go go and do it. Go and execute it right now. I don’t have to think about it. I’m very, I’m a gut oriented person. That That would be my mom in me. My mom has always talked about a good good gut. And so someone come in pitches an idea and it’s amazing. Absolutely. Run, go. And sometimes our creative director has been here for 15 years, 16 years. And sometimes, you know what, I’m gonna let you sleep on that one more day before you really give.
Jeremy Weisz 24:13
So you’re full steam ahead?
Sam Littlefield 24:16
You’re not exactly yeah. And hey, if it’s a terrible idea, it’s not on strategy. Nope. We’ll move in a different direction.
David Littlefield 24:24
Well, Rocco, our creative director said that says that to you, because for 15 years, I was saying that. Okay, let me think about it. So, PCI.
Sam Littlefield 24:35
Let me give you a good example. This morning, the internet went out. And we discovered that it’s because the firewall with their phone system, and he goes, Hey, we have two years left on our contract. But we have the option to potentially get rid of our phones down. I was like, get rid of our phones. We live in a zoom world. We don’t need phones anymore where you know, dad might take a couple of weeks to think about it but I was like No, if it’s a nuisance to our internet, we don’t need phones. It’s it’s little things like that, but
David Littlefield 24:57
so my so my comment was okay, we You better keep that phone number because I’ve had that phone number
Jeremy Weisz 25:03
I think you can transition to like a Google Voice or something. Talking about Yeah. So that’s, that’s some differences. What’s another maybe similarity or difference that you can think of as far as leadership goes?
Sam Littlefield 25:24
I’d say similarity. And I think this is it’s just intrinsic from me growing up for 30 years with dad as my father. We look out for the best interest of our employees and our people. You know, I’ve read a lot of leadership books, the best leaders are those that are not emotional, and that can, you know, make a game time decision. And you know, you’re, you’re taking the name out of the situation, looking at profitability and numbers, and hey, of course, we have to run a profitable business. But I mean, at the end of the day, I think the reason that people stick around here is because we offer this wonderful work life balance, obviously, we’re here to service our clients. And we’ve got to, we got to make a living and come in and work every day. But however, we we really do, treat our employees with a lot of flexibility. We’re very understanding people. And we’re very family oriented. Obviously, we’re in a family, business and family at the end of the day is on the most important things I say. That’s a similarity.
David Littlefield 26:24
So Jeremy, have you ever heard of a concept called adult PTO? Yes. Okay. It’s unlimited PTO. And as an example of what Sam was talking about, we used to bank extra PTO days, and you can carry forward 15 or 20 days. And once you bank that many, then you just burn it. Well, we have people and they they love working and they’re in there don’t need to take as much time off. And so they’re leaving in the last two weeks in December, because they’re very don’t want to burn their PTO. So we just said everybody down probably this and when you first came back, so about two years ago, okay. And we just said, Okay, look, you know, what, we’ve always been flexible, if you need time off, or you got to go to family funeral, or your kids sick or whatever, Louis. So we’re just gonna take that to a different level in this, we have what we call adult PTO, it’s, we’re not going to bank it anymore, because there’s unlimited. And there’s got to be a trust there. Like Sam said, we got to show up and work to get our work done and be respectful of others, because you know, if an art director just blows something off, that affects everybody that works here, right. So I think our people appreciate that.
Sam Littlefield 27:39
And then I’d say one more just from similarity standpoint. I worked at a 2000 person agency in San Diego 12 offices worldwide, sexy clients, cool atmosphere, fun employee events, etc. and coming back here to a 20 person shop, it’s a whole different ballgame. But being an independent agency, having a smaller staff. One thing that I think that the two of us share in common is why we’re in this business, we take our client’s business very seriously. We have great relationships across the board, Grasshopper Ditch Witch, Incredible Pizza and we’ve got a bunch of other awesome Tulsa and Oklahoma brands. But I think one of the reasons that our clients hire us year over year is not that we’re great people to work with, but we take their business so serious to your earlier point about results, right? That’s what we lose sleep over is how can we bring better ideas to our clients? How do we kick the competition’s ask? We have competitive clients, which I think is really cool. They want to demolish the competition. And we’re very competitive people as well. So that passion and that excitement for clients business translates across the board here. And that’s why I think we develop this great work and result oriented work.
Jeremy Weisz 28:54
I want to highlight some of the type of work you do and the type of clients you serve. And I’d love for you to start with Ditch Witch what are some of the things you did and they’ve seen an amazing trajectory? With with their business?
Sam Littlefield 29:12
Yeah, I mean, we’ve done so I remember the day we picked up Ditch Witch, almost 20 years ago, we were down in Dallas for the big 12 basketball tournament dad got the phone call from his client, still our client at the time and one of dad’s really good friends to this day, just through 20 years of relationship, but we have a really cool opportunity to digital. We started with them very traditionally, obviously back in. Oh 102. You don’t get not many agencies get to say that they took a company into the digital age. And we did. You know, we launched them on social media. We launched them digitally. Ditch which is this amazing client, where if you’re if you bring them an idea that’s on strategy, and is it they can get behind, they’ll let you do it. And there’s a lot of brands that don’t let you do that. So
David Littlefield 29:59
yeah. I’ll give Credit Suisse great credit because they are open to new ways of thinking a lot of a lot of b2b manufacturers don’t want to take the risk and a great example of bringing a big idea to them. And Sam mentioned them being so competitive and wanting to, you know, crush the competition. In 2019, we were privy to some new technology in VR, virtual reality. And so we, they have a drill that they invented that, then you no longer have to tear up a street, you can be on one side of the street, you need to get a pipe underneath the street, the drill goes under the street up, under up, and you just pull the pipe through. And so
Sam Littlefield 30:47
biggest product launch in 10 years. Yeah,
David Littlefield 30:50
yeah. So we developed with an outsourced VR company, a, you put the goggles on, and you are sitting in the cab of this drill, and the drill bit go underground, in through the water and through the rock and through the dirt. And it was a roller coaster, and you actually ended up on the moon is pretty cool. And if you’re back in the cab, as you turn around, you’re seeing the work environment. It’s just an incredible if you if you know what I’m talking about on VR, but
Jeremy Weisz 31:21
I have an Oculus quest to go. I totally dig VR,
David Littlefield 31:27
we launched this, their biggest trade show in the underground construction equipment category is so big, it’s only every two years. And we launched this at IQ. And we had three of these setup that customers and prospects were lined in competitor sales people were lined up waiting to get into these sayings in the salesman for their number one competitor, word demolish they were they were walking around with their heads hanging down because we just kicked their ass on this deal. It was the talk of the trade show. And it took some courage for this switch to let us we brought them that idea. And they’re like, Whoa, can you really pull that off? So it’s a combination to bring in the right thinking with the right Nick technology and have the client say, yeah, let’s give that a shot.
Jeremy Weisz 32:21
People don’t know what Ditch Witch does. Can you give us an overview? What about?
David Littlefield 32:26
Yeah, you know, gosh, years ago was it 75 years ago, an engineer graduate from Oklahoma State University is named Ed moles on invented the gearbox that turns a chain that turns the trencher. The boom that goes into the ground, invented the trencher. DMV literally invented the trencher, which invented the whole trencher category. And that’s what started Ditch Witch and then they evolved over 75 years, they wanted to be the experts, the leader of underground construction. So if you need to dig a hole, that’s where the drill came in. The coolest
Sam Littlefield 33:07
applications is obviously we rely on the internet for everything. They literally provide the pathway for fiber to the home. So people have internet because of digital equipment. Yet it’s a fascinating world
Jeremy Weisz 33:20
as amazing. So Ditch Witch let’s go to the food space, because you guys I know do a lot in the food space. Incredible pizza.
Sam Littlefield 33:31
Yeah, so we just a little backstory right before the pandemic, which we’re calling the world’s worst timing, the world’s best timing. We worked with a consultant, and we worked with rib crib, which is a 55 location barbecue chain here in the Midwest. They had worked with numerous big agencies down in the Dallas area and Kansas City, and for years have flat sales. And they came to us in their first year after working with us. They had their first top line revenue growth in eight years. So we said okay, we’re on to something here. Our people loved the food and restaurant world. And so we have a lot of Oh, man, let’s call them Heart to Heart conversations internally. And we decided we’ve got this great b2b experience. We need to own that with Grasshopper and Ditch Witch two awesome clients of ours. But we decided to launch on the National Front in the food space. So we kind of took a leap of faith. And so as you go to our website, everything, we have our b2b segment, but on the nationally we’re going after restaurants and entertainment venues. And we got in touch with incredible pizza towards the end of 2020. And they have the most amazing story how they created their brand 20 years ago, obviously COVID about killed on they’ve got seven locations across the Midwest, from San Antonio up to Memphis and we worked with their CEO and VP of Marketing and they were when the world started to come back to normal earlier this year. They hired us on for a full year. analytics engagement. And we’ve been working with them and they have, over the last 20 years, they’ve got the best sales that they ever had in the history of the company, which is huge. And the cool thing is back to your earlier point about results, you know, they’re obviously straight b2c, and their sales today. I mean, they are so reliant on Thursdays, Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays. In our program, we’re able to attribute people actually walking into a physical, incredible pizza location. And we can attribute that to the marketing dollars and the messaging and the creative that’s out there. So the cool thing is, we work with them on a daily basis, and we tell them, hey, here’s what performed well, this week. Here’s what didn’t, here’s our shifting budget and dollars. And here’s how we’re reallocating money towards different tactics based off performance. That has been an awesome thing for us a whole different world, just to dad’s point earlier about the b2b in the dealership networks. But it’s been a really fun space to be in and we just picked up a new new brand out of the Maryland Delaware Pennsylvania area that’s in the food space. So we’re starting to get some traction there.
Jeremy Weisz 36:14
I go for barbecue brisket. Remember hungry I am a sucker for barbecue brisket. I am was went to I went to Madison for school University Wisconsin, but I almost went to Austin just because the brisk the barbecue was so good there. The thanks for sharing that I want to talk about Grasshopper, you mentioned grasshopper mowers a couple times and what you did there?
David Littlefield 36:40
Yeah, I don’t take that one. Yeah, again, because we have that expertise, nationally. And actually internationally, we do work for ditch, which in Europe, we built a reputation in that b2b manufacturing space and had an opportunity, some small, six, seven years ago to there in moundridge, Kansas, which is about a three and a half hour drive outside of Tulsa. And they asked us to come up and they were intrigued with what we’d done for ditch which, and a couple of other manufacturers that we were working with. And we showed them how the whole program worked and how interrelated the new digital space was with the old traditional space. And at the end of the meeting, the marketing director said, you know, our current agency that we’ve had for 22 years has never brought this up. And we’re like, Okay, well, perfect time to change. And they they did that’s in it’s hard for a brand to leave their agency of that many years. It’s their friendship, they had friendships, relationships, and, you know, I think until they saw a glimpse of the future, and they weren’t in it, that that gave them the courage to change. And so a lot of hand holding there because, you know, when you’re marching off into a new direction, with with very hefty budgets, they wanted some assurance that, okay, if we’re going to shift these dollars, you know, how are we going to make this work, and they have grown tremendously in the last seven years. And, you know, our, our biggest success is clients, they, they don’t just hit the automatic button in January and hire us again, you have to prove your mettle. So every day, and the proof is a if it ain’t broke less, don’t go fix it. So that’s what we strive for. That’s why we’re loving the analytics practice, coupled with our media group, because that’s really where you, you can prove what’s working.
Jeremy Weisz 38:52
Yeah. Last question for both of you. Um, before I asked you, I would love to know, you know, obviously, out of the, besides the two of you, mentors, colleagues have been influential in your business career and it doesn’t have to be someone you know, it could be like a book or something like that, that you actually respect in the fields or in business. So I’d love to hear each of your, you know, whether it’s distant mentor or, you know, mentor colleague that, you know, before you answer that I just want to point people towards LittlefieldAgency.com everyone check out more. I love their website that you could go b2b, then you can or you can click on the food route. I don’t know if I’ve seen many websites that really have that kind of cool look and feel but it’s very, you know, specific to you can go where you need to go. So go to LittlefieldAgency.com to learn more. There’s more information about everything that we’ve talked about there. You can go check out more episodes on InspiredInsider.com as well. And I think it’s really cool you guys do in VR. I think You know, not just from a b2b standpoint, you could tell they’re on the cutting edge because I believe VR is the future in a lot of realms. And you’ve already started to implement it for some of these companies, which I think is really cool and b2b and and will be in b2c as well, because I don’t know if I’ve seen anyone really implement I mean, I’ve utilized it myself, but it from a marketing perspective, I don’t know if many people if anyone is really doing stuff like that. So it’s really cool. Um, thank you. Yeah. So for each of you, I love to hear distant mentor meal books or programs or actual personal mentor and you can you can name a few, it’s fine. I know. Obviously, each of you probably have learned a lot from each other. But outside of that, who else would you consider some lessons you learn?
David Littlefield 40:51
Well, I’ve got all this mentioned too. Early on in my career, I met a man. His name is George Olins that was a lawyer. And we have avoided lawsuits and all that kind of stuff. But just business law, and good advice and cancel. And over the years, you can imagine over 40 years, there’s, there’s ups there’s downs. And when I hit a downside, I wonder there’s three major times in that, that we had to let people go out of our control. 1987 2002 right after 911, the two big ones, and I could go to George, anyone in the business that we’re in, he just was the voice of calm. And his favorite saying was I’d go in and I’d be all upset. I’m like, Oh, my God, I gotta let five people go. And it’s not their fault. It’s not my fault. And they got house payments and car payment. Oh, my God, you know, some of these people have worked for us for a long time. And he first said he would say, is anybody dying? No, nobody’s dying. And he goes, Okay, so listen. That’s the worst thing that can happen isn’t the worst thing that can happen. So he called me down and helped me think through some things when I really needed help and and he passed away about three years ago, and I missed, I missed talking to him. My other opportunity, this Magnet CEO network that I’ve been in for over 30 years, that we meet three times a year, it’s an open books, people share financial share information, share the good stuff, the bad stuff. I’ve heard every story you can imagine. And you can learn a lot from how other people have done things and made mistakes. And you can learn from how they’ve done things well, and you can emulate them. And I’ve got about five really good friends that are CEOs of independent ad agencies that I can call and now Sam, Sam has been in this since he came back he goes, and now he’s on the board there. He’s so even more active than I am now. And there’s just the ability to talk to somebody that you don’t have to explain your business. And they can help you think things through it’s just been tremendously valuable.
Jeremy Weisz 43:12
Oh, Sam, I know you have a call in a minute. So hey, yeah, give me give me a quick,
Sam Littlefield 43:18
quick quick spiel magnet for sure. As huge. I’ve got some really good friends that I can call on any given day a million sir. And hey, I’d be remiss, I mean, this guy here on the screen with us right? up with me for 30 years from a son standpoint. But man, I learned I learned stuff from him all the time. And like I said, wouldn’t have been able to get through last year without his guidance and counsel and it’s why we’ve got the great father son relationship and a great working relationship. He came from nothing and he built a pretty sweet little legacy that I get to continue on. So it’s a it’s a sweet deal.
Jeremy Weisz 43:53
I love it. Thank you both everyone check out LittlefieldAgency.com. Learn more. And thanks, everyone.
Sam Littlefield 44:00
Jeremy, thanks, man.
David Littlefield 44:01
Thank you, Jeremy. Thank you.
