Welcome to invest in yourself, the digital entrepreneur podcast. Join the podcast mogul Phil Better as he interviews successful entrepreneurs that make their living in the digital world. Now let's join your host Phil Better and his special guest today on Invest in Yourself, the digital entrepreneur podcast.

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to another episode of Invest in Yourself, the Digital Entrepreneur Podcast. I am, of course, your host with the most feel better, and I'm very happy to introduce our guests today. They are a seasoned veteran with a rich tapestry of over 2 decades of experience. His journey, much like yours, was filled with some trials, tribulations, and uncertainty that life often throws us. But it's precisely these experiences that have forged him into the person he is today, a true beacon of transformational and an inspiration for others. The name Blue Collar King wasn't just plucked out of thin air by its by its founder. Instead, it was born from a deep rooted passion and a life a lifetime of hands on experience in the blue collar world. It's a name that carries with it commitment to excellence and a profound understanding of the industry.

So please welcome our guest, the blue collar king himself, Matt Merry. Matt, welcome to the show.

Yes. Awesome. Great intro, Phil. Thanks for having me. I'm super excited to be here today with with you and your audience. Thank you.

You're very welcome. I I love being a hype man. I figure as a

host I see that. I feel it. You got me you got me going. You know? It's like, yeah. Let's wait. Let's go. There we go. That's the energy I want brought

to the show. So, Matt Yep. We're gonna start off with the first question. I wanna thank you obviously for being here. But the first question is, why did you become an entrepreneur? What was it that struck you to become an entrepreneur?

Yeah, it's a great question. So I started off, I mean, it kind of upbringing was blue collar. My parents were blue collar and they worked at the grocery stores. Dad was a meat cutter. Mom was a checker and they met at, I think it was either gemco or lucky stores eons ago in the seventies and grew up blue collar. Dad was a mechanic and stuff, always in the garage, working on cars. And I can remember being out there with them and always, you know, doing stuff, you know, blue collar stuff, if you will. And I got introduced to air conditioning and refrigeration in 1997 by a family friend of ours, who owned, an HVAC heating, ventilation, air conditioning business and said, Hey, you like mechanical stuff.

You like working on stuff and wiring up, you know, stereos for cars. That's kind of what air conditioning refrigeration is. A bunch of mechanical stuff and wiring and electronics and stuff. Why don't you come do this? I was like, all right, cool. So I started my journey in the trades in 1997. It was August of 97, and I did that, for about 6 years. I worked for for the company, and, unfortunately, times got tough for them. And we were all pulled in on a on a Friday, and they they basically closed the business and laid everyone off.

So, I had a side job going on. I was commercial industrial technician, and I had a residential side job going on. That was like a friend or family member or whatever at the time. So my entrepreneur journey, it wasn't really by design. It was more kind of like by default. It just happened to be that I was just gonna do a couple side jobs. And then I had to go out and figure out what was the next thing for me that I was 28 years old in 2003 when this happened. And, one side job led to the next and it just kinda kept going and going.

And here I am 20 years later and I'm I'm still on my summer side job. I've got over 40 employees. I've started 2 companies. I still have one Evolution Mechanical. I started another company off the backbone of evolution mechanical called Ecotech refrigeration. And I've launched my personal brand and coaching consulting business, the blue collar king. So this is I'm still on my side job and and ever

You you you think you'd figure it out by now. You know? Get an actual job, but I love this how you look at it as as your side job.

Yeah. This is my side hustle. You know what I mean?

It's just what I'm doing. I love it. And and, obviously, it's doing great for you because you can see the energy that you're bringing. When you had to decide, like well, you didn't really have to decide. You you were formally informed that you had to become an entrepreneur pretty much on that Friday. What did it look like? Like, what was you're you're you're young. You know? You're like, oh my god. It's 2003.

You know? 2001 just happened, and 2008 hasn't even been a it's 5 years away.

Exactly.

What what were you worried that you would have to go back and do another 9 to 5 or that, or stay in the blue collar world? Or did you have visions of running your own little empire?