The Crown Molding Took Four Times Longer Johnathan Lewis of Legacy Quality Craftmanship

0:00Welcome to Epic Entrepreneurs. I am Cliff McRae with Action Coach Business Growth Partners. Every week, we sit down with business owners, founders, and leaders to uncover the real stories behind building a successful business. The wins, the setbacks, the lessons learned, and the strategies that help them grow. No scripts, no fluff, just honest conversations with entrepreneurs who are in the trenches every single day. Whether you are a business owner yourself, thinking about starting a business, or simply enjoy hearing how successful people think and operate, you are in the right place. Let's jump into today's episode, shall we?

0:57Hi, everyone. Welcome to this week's episode of Epic Entrepreneurs. I am Cliff McRae with Action Coach Business Growth Partners, where we work with local business owners to turn big ideas into real scalable growth. Today, I'm excited to be joined by Jonathan Lewis of Legacy Quality Craftsmanship. Jonathan, how are you doing today? I'm doing really well. How are you? Yeah, I'm doing great. We're excited to have you here. So let's go ahead and jump right into things. Yeah, thanks. Excited to be here. Yeah, yeah. So for those of you who may not know it yet, Who are you? Who is Jonathan Lewis and what is Legacy Quality Craftsmanship?

1:31That's a big question. Jonathan, I live in Greenville, Tennessee. I've got a wife and a baby just over one year. She just turned 13 months and then I've got one on the way, a little boy. I think times. Yeah, family is big. I run Legacy Quality Craftsmanship. That is a remodeling company out here in Greenville, Tennessee. We service Tri-Cities pretty much all the way to Knoxville, but most of our clientele is in Greenville just because that's where we live. Yeah, my wife and I, we live in an RV. We have since we got married, and we've lived in several RVs. That's just kind of, I don't know, the life we wanted to live and keeps us out of, you know, large amounts of debt.

2:20So we're thankful for that. Yeah, that's who I am. That's who we are. Yeah. Yeah. And I'm sure you save a lot of money. I mean, you know, I'm sure you've seen rent prices. Yeah. A lot of money on that. Yeah. All right. So Jonathan, let's go ahead and get into it. Real talk. You know, what's something about running a business that people think is amazing, you know, but it's actually complete BS? So I think that people, you know, love the idea of starting a business because they're like, oh, you know, I get this free time and freedom and all these things. And I think that's an illusion, mostly because, you know, even if you do get the trade off of some physical free time, you're always thinking about the job.

3:04And so you never quite get a break from work, it feels like. And I think that's something that most people go into businesses not expecting. Like, you know, I can make my own schedule and do what I want to do. But in reality, it gets super – the schedule is pretty – it's not that flexible. Now, how are you working right now? Are you a 6 o 'clock p.m.? You're shutting down. That's it for the day? Are you working around the clock? I mean so I kind of mentioned before. I'm a big family man and I try to shut down. I usually start my days working at 7.30 and I go till 4 or 5. Most of the time it's 5.

3:50And then there's almost always some work to do when you get home, whether that's reaching out to clients or working on invoices, all those things. But I try to be done by 6. Now, what was the exact moment where you realized this business can either really work or it could completely blow up on my face and I lose all my life?

4:19So I kind of made a shift with my business. I started my business as a furniture restoration, antique restoration kind of company. and then I had a shift and I realized this does not make me the money that I need and there's not really a market for it and so because of that I went into more larger scale renovations and that swap was kind of a big moment for me where I was like this could work great or this really couldn't and alongside of that I started getting in with some realtors and the realtors that was another big moment where I was like either the work I kind of became pretty dependent upon them and either the work they were going to give me was going to provide or it wasn't and that was kind of a nerve-wracking time but God is good and he's faithful and he keeps providing and the business has kind of taken that full swing into the right remodeling.

5:33And it's been great. Okay. Now, what would you say is the most stressful moment you've had as a business owner? Like, hey, you know, how am I going to get to this type of moment?

5:47I think the kind of, again, that swap of on the estimating side, more of the business administration side, How do I estimate accurately without making sure I'm not losing a lot of money these large remodels? And so that provided a lot of stress. And of course, I messed up a lot and got a lot of numbers wrong and it cost me a lot of money. And that, of course, produces stress. That's been a learning curve. Now, have you ever thought about quitting your business and going back to a 9 to 5? I think that I have briefly considered it, but those are only at the end of long days where you're like, I don't know if I want to keep doing this.

6:35I don't think I've ever truly sat down and said, let me rethink this. I have the mind of an entrepreneur.

6:46And that's helped me a lot where I just say, I don't think I'd want it any other way. I just, I'll keep pushing through. It's going to be hard. It's going to suck. My business is only just over a year old. I've done this. I've been in this job for five, six years now with a few breaks in between, but I just keep coming back to it and I don't think I'd ever do anything else. Okay. Now, was there anything in particular that stopped you from wanting to quit and go back to a nine to five or it just was an allegory thought? I think it's kind of one of the things you asked me was what's an illusion or something that people think is great but it's not?

7:37I think while it's hard to come by I think there is an edge that being a business owner provides and looking at my family and my young child and saying like I can give them more. I can provide better if I stay in this position is a huge driving factor for me. And I think that's really been a huge like, no, I'm going to stay here. Okay. Gotcha.

8:12Now, what's a mistake you made early on that cost you either serious money, time, or reputation, would you say? Those initial misestimatings have cost me thousands of dollars. It's just I didn't know what I was getting into. And I really want to do things well and do things to most of my ability. I serve the Lord and the work I do, I want to glorify Him. And so when I mess up and get things wrong or there was one job specifically I remember where I built this large built-in for a kitchen and I miscalculated a few measurements and it threw off the entire project. But, you know, every mistake's a learning curve.

9:05Yeah. So I'm thankful for them. Yeah. It's not about how you get knocked down. It's about how you get back up, right? Right, right. Yeah. Yeah. Learn from them and grow. So let's say, and this is all hypothetical, obviously, but let's say if someone, you know, someone shadowed you for a full day or even a full week, let's say, what would surprise them the most about how you operate your business? I think that so our trade contracting trade remodeling it's kind of have a bad reputation the people that work in it are you know tend to be not the most upstanding reputable people and I think that if somebody shattered me for a day they would find the team that I work with to be very fun very uplifting encouraging like I don't think I'd want to be anywhere else even just for the fact that the team that I have is phenomenal we have fun all day I mean of course it's work but we truly enjoy what we're doing I have two guys that work under me full time and I mean we have a blast

10:26now how do you go about managing are you what kind of manager or are you basically, or owner, are you? Are you more laid back? Are you more strict? Micromanagement? How do you... So I think one of the best ways that I've learned and one of the ways I've, you know, tried to help other people learn is giving them tools needed to complete a job and then letting them learn from experience. And I have, like, I'm willing for the cost to come out of my own pocket if my guys will, you know, even if it takes them a little longer or whatever, I'd rather them learn and giving them the tools has just been the best method.

11:19I try not to micromanage. I don't think anyone likes to be micromanaged, but I also don't want to be hands-off because I do want to say, like hey I know you guys are newer to this trade than I am I'm here if you need anything any questions any points just I'm here but I also want you to figure it out and I know you're going to figure it out more if you do it yeah so you're kind of the same way like how you learn you know by falling get backed up like you said you want them to kind of do the same and learn from it yeah and so far I mean the example we had a a guy kind of learning that he is a natural knack for trim work trim carpentry crown molding baseboards all that kind of thing and that thing's kind of hard to come by and yesterday i let him do it for the first time cut some crown molding for the first time ever took him probably you know four times longer than it would have taken anyone else but he nailed it on the first try he took his time did it right and it it was great i was very like very pleased i was like hey you know I'm willing to give you a pay raise because if you're willing to learn these skills needed to do the job better.

12:32Nice. Nice, nice. It's producing good fruit, and they feel more confident. They leave the job site pleased with their work and wanting to excel, which is, I don't think you're going to find that in a normal 9 to 5, unless it's a very cultivated culture. I think that enthusiasm for work is rare and that's something I want to instill in my guys and I want them to look forward to coming to work I mean who wouldn't want to come to work it's a third of your life I don't want to hate it yeah yeah no you definitely don't want to hate it and you know I talk to people about this all the time You know, it's so huge to make sure you hire correctly.

13:23Right. Oh, absolutely. That's such a yeah, such a big thing. You're working with these people. You're seeing these people in one and you're seeing your own family. And if you can't stand, you know, your coworker, who are you who you're working with, you know, then that's not going to be a great way to go. Life. You can't stand people that you work with. Right. Right. And I and I mean, one of my approaches to hiring is I don't hire. well I don't advertise hiring I ask people I know who have already seen their character and seen that they would be a good fit if they want to join the team so I think even if I was to scale which is the goal I'd love to scale if I was to scale more I think I would take that same approach because it you end up with really quality people who want to be there and you know that's a huge blessing

14:18Now, let's talk numbers without getting too specifics. How long have you been in business so far? So about a year and a quarter running my own business. I've worked for myself for on and off for two, two and a half years. And then I worked under for some other people, for other people for the rest of those five years. so let's talk numbers without getting too specific what what time or i guess how many months did it take you for you know the business to start and start to scale and become profitable i think it was the first six months the first six months was me figuring out the business side of things and logistics and looking back on so i keep track of everything quarterly most businesses do but quarter one and two was just me.

15:13It was just me tackling projects and there was profit enough to provide but not to cover the business. A lot of that was I didn't feel comfortable charging people what jobs are worth because I thought to myself, I would never pay for this much money for someone to do this thing. It took months of learning okay this is what a business actually costs to run and the client doesn't see that so then when i got into year two it's really taking on the third guy was kind of when the table started turning and i started bringing in a lot of profit because i basically i went from two guys to three guys and was able to add a lot of efficiency And so I think at the end of quarter two, I will have exceeded quarter one's gross, which I didn't think I'd be here.

16:17Nice, man. That's awesome. So thankful for that. Yeah, that's awesome, especially how quickly, you know, that has happened. That's good. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. So what would you say actually moves the needle most in your business right now? Would it be leads, conversions, pricing, or your team? I really do think the team. And I try to take a certain approach to the job sites. And I let my clients know, like, hey, we are not the most experienced team you're going to hire. But we all want to grow and learn. We are going to get the job done. It's going to be done well. But we're also happy for your feedback.

16:59and when my team shows up on the job site every day it's just the client relationship that we have is huge and clients love my guys I think I've had two clients who have bought them lunch every day one of the clients gave us a gift this morning at a job site and I think that produces a lot of word of mouth and that word of mouth keeps turning the needle So that's really, really good. So what would you say is one thing you're doing today that's giving you kind of an unfair advantage over your competitors?

17:48I think slowing down, not trying to grow too fast, too big, too fast and letting it be natural. I'm not saying other companies don't do this because frankly, I don't, I don't know, but I do see a lot of people pursuing the money, pursuing the, just the numbers. And of course the numbers are important. The money is necessary. You have to put food on the table. I have to make sure my guys put food on the table.

18:21But I think that client relationship is just huge. and taking the time, even if it's a couple days longer at the job site, to serve the clients in any way that we can. I don't see a lot of companies do that.

18:45Now, and this is all hypothetical, but let's say that someone's having some issues at the job site or whatever. what's the fastest way someone can lose their job working for you I think you said the question was what's the fastest way someone can stop working for me or lose their job essentially yeah yeah yeah basically lose their job like you know it's something on a job site and you hear about it let's say you don't hear about it from them but you hear about it from the actual client yeah what's the quickest way for or what do they have to do to have that happen I think an attitude of apathy is the quickest way to lose a member of my team.

19:25Just not willing or caring to do excellent. I mean, obviously people are going to make mistakes. My guys are going to make mistakes. But if they are willing to recognize those mistakes and fix them to the best of their ability, that's huge. and as soon as my guys lose that integrity, I don't think they'd have a place on my team. Oh, okay. I like that honest answer. I appreciate that. And on the flip side, you know, what makes someone instantly valuable to your team?

20:08I think you got to care about people. I mean, of course, as Christians, that's what we're called to do. Matthew says, you know, love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, and love your neighbor as yourself. And if someone who already does that, they already have a leg up. And then if they do that and see the needs of others and try to meet them, I think that's huge. Like a lot of the job sites we go to, the client will call us for something else. but in the midst of fixing that we will try and take care of other needs that we see in their home sometimes that comes with hey this is a big thing if you want to fix this this is going to cost us much more but sometimes it's just we'd love to take care of this for you because we see it as a need and I think I can tell within a couple days of a guy being on a job site what their attitude is towards people and i'm pretty sure you could probably tell you know like if they're a good fit ultimately for the company long term right oh absolutely yeah yeah for sure okay okay all right yeah so i appreciate that so let's go ahead into what's called the quickfire round and how this works is basically i'm going to i'm going to give you one word and then i just want you to tell me the first thing that comes to your mind when you hear each word in regards to running your business and then expand upon why you chose that in two or three sentences after this.

21:39Yes, sir. All right, perfect. First word is success. The word that comes to my mind is just time. Success in my business looks like more time for me to spend with family, people I love, my church. Yeah, time. Okay. Failure.

22:08having a hard time putting one word to this

22:24let's see trying to think of the word for it yeah no it's fine

22:30I kind of want to say dejected in the sense that if we walk away from every day or every job site or every week feeling like we didn't do you know feeling like we didn't do a good job or knowing that we didn't do a good job and that becomes the pattern that to me is failure because of course you make mistakes but like you said before it's about how you handle those mistakes and failure to me is there is real failure but it's also part of a mindset of like but most failures can be fixed and that is actually what my job mostly does is fix bad things that have happened whether from other contractors or from disasters and if you just let the discouragement of disappointments get you down that that to me is failure and i'm sure you guys were pretty busy with this this past winter right with all the snow and ice storms and everything we got yeah we we've taken care of several roofs and we i mean we're still doing stuff from hurricane helene we just the jobs that were right now there was a house fire and you know that's devastating of course I agree next word is burnout

24:08I think rest first of all that comes to my mind if you're not being intentional with your rest you're going to get burnt out real fast especially being a business owner I mean any kind of entrepreneur knows that it takes a lot of your effort and time and you need rest. That's why there's six days to work and one day to rest because you need it. Agreed. Scaling.

24:45People. I would love to add to the team. When I think of growth, what's next. I think I'm just finding the right people to fill the positions I need. Of course, you also need more jobs and clients and all the other things. But people. Competition.

25:12Friendly. I don't necessarily see any other companies as rivals. There's always enough work for everybody. And a lot of my really good friends are other contractors who are doing the exact same thing I am. And we hang out weekly and we discuss how to grow and how to help one another. It's a very healthy environment. Nice, nice. The last word is freedom. I'm not walking out yet. Uh-oh. Did I lose you? No, I'm here. I'm taking it. Sorry about that. It just got really quiet there for a second. Sorry.

26:01The word that's coming to my mind is team. Just I think having the right people, again, having the right people who have the right heart for it will eventually free up the time needed to do the things you want to need to do. And not necessarily like at the expense of others, but again, you're just properly delegating tasks such to a point where everyone has the freedom to do the things they want to do. I love that. Love that. Love that. All right, perfect. So yeah, we're going to go ahead and get off that. I appreciate you going through that quick fire round. And I want you on this next question to be as candid as you can.

26:46Let's just say that small business owners listening to the podcast episode with you today, Jonathan, let's just say they're having just a rough go at 2026. And I know we're almost halfway through the year, but let's just say they're not profitable this year. This is the first time they're not profitable. They're feeling stuck or overwhelmed running their business. What's a piece of advice you'd want them to hear from?

27:09I'd say the first thing is evaluate. and be realistic about where you are. You can keep putting your head down and grind as much as you want, but if you're not evaluating, it might be in vain. And then on the flip side, if your evaluation comes up and you're like, yeah, this is exactly where I need to be and what I need to be doing, get after it. Love it. So where do you think your industry is going?

27:44that's hard to tell i mean i live in greenville tennessee and it's kind of disconnected kind of from a lot of it's not a big city by any means what i see is constructions being driven by real estate as it always has been but i think less in a development sense and more in a rental property management sense. And I think there's a lot of money for people who want to just take on smaller projects in partnership with realtors with their properties. Because real estate's always going to be needed. There's always been people with the money for it. that's at least where I see it heading in Green County, where we are.

28:37Now, what's next for Legacy Quality Craftsmanship? What should people be excited about coming up in the new future for your business? Part of the scaling is we hope to get certified, we're working on getting certified in mold remediation. That's a lot of, especially in light of Helene and most of the current states of houses, the age they are in Greenville, mold is something we encounter frequently and I just want to be able to offer that service. So that's something we'll be working towards here in the near future. And yeah, we're getting more into the design side of things where we come alongside you and help you design your ideal space, not just come in and build it.

29:23We kind of want to be just available for all the needs. So that's what we're working towards. Okay. Perfect. And Jonathan, and finally, what's the best way for someone to connect with you a little more? What would you all do? So you can look us up. We're on Facebook. A lot of our projects are on there. You can contact me directly. I'd love to talk to you. My favorite thing to do is just to sit down with you, talk through what you'd like to do or want to do. You can reach me at Jonathan at ContactLegacy.com. Jonathan at ContactLegacy.com. And then we have a website. We're working on getting a domain for that.