Speaker 1: 0:01

Welcome back to another episode of that's Delivered. I'm your host, Trucking Ray, and today we have a special guest with us. Today, it's a show that brings a fresh perspective from the road, one that intersects closely with the trucking life. I'm joined today by a special guest, Gar Russell, a founder of Fireside RV Rental. He spent years living full-time in an RV with his family, while running and scaling a national RV rental franchise. His story is that of freedom, the challenges and lessons that resonate with everyone who lives their life by the mile, From business setbacks, including bankruptcy, to rebuilding. Far more than just grit and clarity. Far more than just grit and clarity.

Speaker 1: 0:43

Gar's journey is packed with insights about leadership, family and staying steady through the change, Whether you're an owner-operator or dreaming of a side income or just needing a reminder that tough roads can still lead somewhere good. This one's for you, somewhere good. And this one's for you, Gar. Welcome to the show. Thank you so much for giving us some of your time and talking about your experience with life and being on the show with us here today. How are you doing?

Speaker 2: 1:15

Hey man, I'm blessed, I'm happy to come on and talk with you. I love that intro. I was like I had my head bobbing there.

Speaker 1: 1:22

That's awesome. Good, I'm glad I can get things correct. Sometimes you know I get things right. So, yeah, I want to make sure everybody gets to know your story and also share the words of encouragement for a lot of people out there. They're looking at hard times and you've seen them, so tell us a little about yourself. How did the RV life even begin or even play a factor for your family, and what kind of shift did it bring for you every day in your life?

Speaker 2: 1:49

Yeah, so our RV adventure started our 10 year wedding anniversary. I bought my wife a camper and we lived in Michigan at the time. I brought it out to Grand Haven, michigan, set it up there at the campground and, uh, she wasn't really digging it. She was, uh, she was seven months pregnant with number four. It was the middle of July. She was hot, miserable, you know, in her defense, chasing a toddler around. And uh, she actually was like you know what? I'm going home, I'm hot, I'm miserable, I'm pregnant. Uh, this ain't no fun, you know. Thanks for the camper. But and uh, so there I sat, I loved it.

Speaker 2: 2:29

In my mind's eye, you know, I like to picture myself sitting by a campfire and I'm feeling all bad for myself, so I'm going to make myself a marshmallow. And that just fell under the fire too. You know, life was just falling apart for me. But uh, so I went and actually, you know, I was an entrepreneur. I am an entrepreneur, I had some real estate and I thought you know, I'm going to rent this thing out. I'm going to put it on Craigslist, see if somebody wants to rent it, you know. And man, sure enough, within a couple hours I'm getting messages People want to rent my camper. So that's, that's how the RV rental business started. And then, you know, fast forward a little bit to make my so my wife don't sound like a villain there she had our baby, you know, and life was all good and we ended up, you know, using the RV as well and we actually ended up full-time RVing for five years. So we're, we definitely love the RV lifestyle, but out of that little painful moment there, that's how this company was born.

Speaker 1: 3:29

Yeah, it's something how your perspective can change, uh, in the blink of an eye with you know the right circumstances and you got. You know you made lemons into lemonade. I mean that's beautiful, uh, and then you also got to share that time with your wife. Um, that's some beautiful years being able to do that, but you maximized it right. So for now those are in the trucking. We know what life's like on the road life in a vehicle. It kind of parallels, you know, being in the RV, lifestyle life on the road. What was that like for you guys?

Speaker 2: 4:02

Yeah, we had a blast, man, our first time we hit the road. It was for just a couple months. I wanted to get away for the winter a little bit and yeah, we had a great time. It was my wife and I, our four kids and my mother-in-law we brought, and it was good. And that next winter came and I thought, man, I want to go longer and longer and we just, we loved it. You know, and uh, we would pull into truck stops at night. You know, on our travels if we're trying to get from one place to the next, tuck in between a couple semis, fire up the generator, go to sleep. You know, and uh, we just had a blast. It's we, we. Two years ago we got back into a house. But we always say, man, once our older two are, you know, out doing their thing, we'll get right back into an RV and hit the road again. It's just such a blessing, it's so much fun.

Speaker 1: 4:55

You got your eye on one. What's your? What you looking at If you're planning ahead?

Speaker 2: 4:59

You. No, we kind of go back and forth. Part of us thinks, okay, we'll go to a fifth wheel this time, which we've had a fifth wheel before, and we'll do a toy hauler because we can open the back, throw, you know, bikes and this and that in there. But then another part of me there's this Berkshire 45 foot, you know class A diesel too. That you know, I almost bought during COVID man, I'm glad I didn't. That was a 550 000 rv. That probably wouldn't have been the best investment.

Speaker 2: 5:28

But well, yeah, we've kind of gone back and forth the pros and cons. Right, because you, well, you know how it is, you're trucking. Right, when you get somewhere it's like you're there and you're not just gonna drive the semi and all just stop at a mcdonald's. Everything is very like calculated and premeditated. Right, because you got this big old rig. And so we thought, well, if we do a fifth wheel with a truck, we can unhook. And then, you know, drive to the mountains, this and that. So I don't know, we'll see, you never know. With me it's always an adventure.

Speaker 1: 5:59

Keep it open yeah. So let's talk about this. How did Fireside RV rental get its start and how did you make that grow and do where it is nationwide that part of it that's inside of me just kind of kicked in.

Speaker 2: 6:27

I thought, all right, I've got real estate. I manage my own real estate. I'm renting my RV. I've got time with my. I also own a credit counseling business. I've got time. I can, you know, deliver the cameras and stuff. I'm going to see if my buddy wants me to rent his too. I'll tell him, hey, I'll rent yours for you as well, but I get half the money. And I asked my buddy he's like, yeah, that sounds good, go ahead, do it. It's just sitting there, I'm only using it two or three times a year. And then I asked my other buddy and he's like, yeah, that's cool. And then I asked my sister-in-law and she's like, no, that's not cool. Like not letting somebody sleep in the bed of my camper, that's a horrible idea. Where'd you come up with that, you know? And I thought, all right, well, hey, I'm two for three right now. I think I'm onto something.

Speaker 2: 7:11

And so kind of one thing just led to the next. You know, I started getting involved in some Facebook communities of people that were renting their RVs and right around that time there was some peer-to-peer platforms just like you have Airbnb and Turo, you know for renting your house and your car. There were some peer-to-peer platforms coming up called RV Share, outdoorsy, and so I got in some Facebook groups others that were doing it. I started just adding value and sharing what I was doing and I had some guy in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan say, hey, it sounds like you really know what you're doing. How about I start a location for you up here? Because you know, I branded it and logo and all that kind of stuff. I'm like, yeah, all right. Well, yeah, I'll, kind of you'll be my Guinea pig, you know. And then he's like, yeah, let's do it.

Speaker 2: 7:50

So we did it and several months later I thought, all right, I got like a little business in a box here now. And then, uh, I threw a video out there about hey, you know, come, come on to location for me. And I think I charged like $995, you know for the location and then a couple more and I'm like, all right, now I've got some systems, processes, I hired my first employee and then I went to $5,000, you know. And then I'm going to do A, b and C for you, you know, fast forward. And now it's a hey, we're at, we're a FTC regulated franchise. Now it's hey, we're an FTC-regulated franchise, federally trademarked, and it's 35K. Here we are.

Speaker 1: 8:33

We have about 70 locations across the country now. Wow, that's amazing. That's a real, true-life American dream success story. So how nice, and thank you for sharing it with us. I mean, I know it probably wasn't always easy. There's some ups and downs, I'm sure with everything, a lot of drivers out there thought about owning their own equipment or building something for themselves on the side. What advice would you give them for someone who's trying to start a business while they're working full time, probably on the road?

Speaker 2: 9:02

Yeah, and we've had some truckers that have have started fireside franchises. And the best piece of advice I love to give for my journey as an entrepreneur is all work works, so you take an action, you try something. It's either going to work for you, so it's working, or it's going to work on you, so it's working. All work works, so you may try something in it. You don't necessarily get the result that you thought you would, but you learn something that worked, or you know.

Speaker 2: 9:37

The thing about entrepreneurship, right, is, you've got this bug inside of you. You feel like you're gifted as an entrepreneur and you want to start a business. Well, you, you feel like you're gifted as an entrepreneur and you want to start a business. Well, that doesn't necessarily mean you're gifted in all the areas of a business, right, because there's sales, operations, marketing, accounting, human resources, there's all these different areas. So you're going to figure out what your strong suit is Like. One thing I learned is the accounting, bookkeeping, numbers. That's not my strong suit, but that doesn't necessarily mean, again, that you're not gifted as an entrepreneur. You just learned the area that you need to outsource. So my piece of advice to you would be don't fight that. Don't say, well, I'm going to learn accounting, I'm going to this and that. No, work your strength and then hire your weakness, because, at the end of the day, it's actually going to help you move forward that much faster. To do that instead of trying to be all things you know.

Speaker 1: 10:41

You can be a C student, they say, but surround yourself with a lot of A students so you get to pick people you know. Hey, help me out here, I need your help. So that's great. I mean also the lows. There's got to be some things that, like you mentioned I think you said that there's some bankruptcy. You hit some hard times, especially when the business for your home one of the, I think it says when your business and your home are under the same name. So it'd be a little tricky there.

Speaker 2: 11:08

Yeah, there's definitely lots of. You know, like I said, all work works. There's definitely so many pitfalls you hit as an entrepreneur and if you study, you know successful entrepreneurs, you'll see a bankruptcy in their history somewhere. Potentially, you know, you'll see some major setbacks. But that's the thing about entrepreneurship is you have to take that setback and say, okay, what did I learn? And you use that for your comeback.

Speaker 2: 11:36

You know, and I'm sure there's people listening to this right now who are saying, yeah, I've been there, like that's happened, or or are saying, yeah, I have that fear, that's why I'm not starting a business, you know. And two, that's one of the beauties of, first of all, staffing your weaknesses. And second, you know, like a franchise. You know and I'm not necessarily saying this to promote my franchise, I'm just saying there's people out there who have the systems and the processes and all those things in place. So, if you, if you feel like, man, I really would love to sell a product or I'd love to sell a service or start a business, you know, in a certain fashion, do some research, because you'll probably find somebody who's already doing it and they'll probably have a coaching or a mentoring program, like, unless you're coming up with a brand new invention.

Speaker 2: 12:27

That's you know, it's just totally new. If there's a desire inside of you for a certain kind of business, there's probably someone out there that's already doing it, that can teach you, that can mentor you, that can coach you. So be open to that. It's you know, entrepreneurship is lonely many times, and it shouldn't be. You know, we think we have to do it all on our own, but no, there's people, there's communities, there's coachings, there's programs and plug into those.

Speaker 1: 12:58

Absolutely. I think that's great. Many times we look at ourselves and we say, man, I can't do that, but you can always lean upon someone else that could help you get that accomplished. So great words of advice, and also not being shy about talking about the pitfalls. I mean people like to know, hey, this guy, is he telling me the whole truth? And so that comes with the good and the bad. You got to accept them both. So, yeah, that's great Great news. So when you're mobile, structure is everything. Truckers know this because they get their bags prepared, they get the truck set up. What habits or systems did you put in place to help you stay disciplined while running a business from an RV?

Speaker 2: 13:39

Yeah, you're right, habits is a key right there and yeah, and systems and processes. And you know, the first thing that you need to do if you're going to launch a business is you've got to start documenting and documenting your journey, documenting what you're doing, because then, once you have things documented, now you can duplicate, Now you can bring someone in to do a specific role for you. So, as you're documenting, as you're learning and this is also a cool hack when it comes to businesses as you're doing this, document your journey as well in video, because down the road, you can actually use that in video, because down the road you can actually use that. You can use that to market, to mentor others, to encourage others, and you can use that to go back on and encourage yourself. But, yeah, you've got to document. You've got to document what's working, what's not working, because if you're not doing that, you could literally try something that you tried six months ago and you forgot. You tried it because it's not documented.

Speaker 2: 14:43

You know it doesn't. You don't have to be super um, you don't have to be super nerdy, geeky to document. You know you can literally shoot a video, especially with ai. Now. I mean, heck, you can take chat gpt and you can literally create a custom GPT. You can literally, like I can, go into my GuardGPT and it has my books that I've written, it has access to my videos, my documentation, and I could go in there and ask it questions and it will pull out information based. So, with AI being brought into the equation now, it's so easy to document and systematize and automate things.

Speaker 2: 15:21

It really is.

Speaker 1: 15:24

I love that. I like to email myself that way it pops up, but then my problem is trying to find it again, so maybe yours is better. I like that. Having that all together with the AI platform Great advice.

Speaker 2: 15:38

Yeah, if you have that $20 a month membership. I just stuck with chat GPT. There's so many out there, but it it? Yeah, it has that memory, so you can go back and I love it too. With emails too is great. What I'll do with emails is I'll put them in folders and then I'll snooze things too. So I'll have an email and you can, you know, click the snooze button. It kind of looks like an alarm clock and I can put it out for a week. So then when it pops back into my inbox, it's almost like a task management system. And then what I also like to do with email too is I like to I set up email accounts for all my kids. My eight-year-old has an email account and I'll email them special moments in life, you know, special things, memories, pictures, all that kind of stuff. So someday I'll give them access to that email account and they'll have all that documentation and those memories and all that kind of stuff. And it's pretty cool.

Speaker 1: 16:28

Cool Dad, I like that. Yeah, I did the same thing. Uh, my daughter. She's 18 now, so maybe she'll look at it when um life slows down a little bit.

Speaker 2: 16:38

So yeah, good for you, man, that's awesome.

Speaker 1: 16:41

Yeah, so that's cool. Um, so it works. Yeah, um, she's like what's all these emails that? Yeah, so, um, now think about leadership. You know it matters whether you're running a fleet, managing dispatch or building a rental network. How has your leadership style involved over the years, the early RV days to now?

Speaker 2: 17:04

You know it evolves from. First, as a leader, you know you think your job is delegation. You know you do this, you do that, and then you didn't do this, you didn't do that. But then you start to realize, as a leader, it's more about serving your staff, to where you're mentoring them, you're coaching them, you're helping them grow as a person, you're investing in their life. And then, when you're doing that, you're getting on to.

Speaker 2: 17:33

The next phase is where you're actually starting to build a legacy. You're starting actually to have impact. You're starting actually to have impact. And when you have impact on your staff, on your customers, that's when you have loyalty, that's when you have an employee who's going to stay late to get something done without you even asking, because they know that you care for them and they want to care for you. And so, yeah, leadership is such a powerful thing and really that term legacy leadership has just been floating around in my mind about the last month, six weeks, of leading in a way to where, even if somebody leaves your team, you've made an impact on them and they're out at their new job and they're quoting you and they're saying oh yeah, I learned this from Gar, you know, and that's just so powerful you literally are, you're, you're causing transformation inside of your team, and that's just, that's powerful man.

Speaker 1: 18:38

Absolutely.

Speaker 1: 18:38

Leadership can be misused and abused, but it also can be used to motivate and inspire people in a beautiful way, not just for what the leadership can get, but those relationships and those bonds they can last for a lifetime to use, and that we don't want to mishandle it so very well that you speak on that and give encouragement to other leaders out there as well. Let's say, hey, you know it does matter. You know what I do, it's not that, it's just a parking orders Right, so good job. Do you think the RV rental model could be a good side business for a driver, especially for those with land or seasonal home base? What would you say?

Speaker 2: 19:26

Yeah, most definitely I do. If you've got land, you can run a fireside, yeah, right on your land. Because basically what we do is we're a management company, right? So we take people's RVs, we group them together, we bring them into our possession and then we rent them out for them on their behalf. And so if you have land instantly right there, you're earning revenue because you're charging the owner for storage of the RV when it's not being rented.

Speaker 2: 19:51

But then the other side of it too is you know you've got to have a team, because if you're on the road and you've got a rental, you know the RV is going to need to be cleaned. You're going to need someone to do a walkthrough of the RV. Or if it's a travel trailer and they want it delivered, you're going to need someone to deliver it for you. So if you're good at delegating and managing people, you can easily build a team. And I usually recommend with a new franchise, you know, run it yourself first. And most of our franchises they're owner-operator, husband-wife teams. They love doing the business together. The kids are involved.

Speaker 2: 20:28

The husband's usually working on the RVs too. That's a billable item $125 to $145 an hour to work on an RV. So there's multiple ways to monetize it. And then, yeah, once you've come in and you've learned the business and you've built a team, then yeah, you can structure it in a way where you're doing both nice and you guys um how they get help from you guys.

Speaker 1: 20:52

Is that more so from the, the franchise or um pattern, or is it something else that you provide?

Speaker 2: 21:00

yeah, so we're. We give them all the systems and the software and the training and the coaching and mentoring and basically everything they need to be up and running and to continue to run. We have a full corporate support team. We've got about I don't know, I haven't counted recently, but maybe six or eight full-time staff that is there to support the franchisees with different things. We do a yearly retreat, we do what we call open office hours, where you can click in several times throughout the week, and we have mentorings and coachings. So that's the beauty of a franchise model is you're literally purchasing into a proven system, so you're never like out there wondering, okay, what's next or what do I do in this situation. And then, too, it's a whole community right, we've got 70 locations around the country, and so we're all doing this together, we're all encouraging each other together in this business. Most of the franchises in our community are Christians, christian entrepreneurs, doing this together. So it's good to know that you have a community of like-minded people that are doing this business together. It's encouraging.

Speaker 1: 22:11

It is. That's very encouraging. Thank you for letting us know that too Many people they are concerned about what we are doing business with, what's going on behind the scenes, what's the future look like, so that stability is good to put out there as well. You can help thousands of families take trips, but for us you know road warriors out here, truckers it's not always about vacation, it's about making a living. So still, I bet there's a story or two that reminded you of why road life matters. Do you have any success stories that you can share from your experiences?

Speaker 2: 22:47

Yeah, on road life with the family when we were traveling, yeah, I mean tons of beautiful memories for sure. I remember, actually, when I was young, I would ride with my grandpa in his semi and go do some trips and it just yeah, there's just something about doing that together and building those memories, which is great and so, uh, it's it's, it's definitely, it's definitely, uh, something that we look forward to doing again Once we get a couple of kids out of the house, get back on the road and making those memories together.

Speaker 1: 23:19

Nice, yeah, so at time together, it's well spent making great memories together. That's awesome. So what's one of the biggest myths you heard from living a dream on the road and what is it reality kind of really like for it?

Speaker 2: 23:37

One of the biggest myths as far as life on the road. You know, I don't know I'm trying to think I don't know if, as far as before we started traveling, I didn't necessarily hear any myths or loss. I mean, we hear more myths in regards to homeschooling. You know, because we traveled and homeschooled the kids, you know there's several myths we would always hear about homeschooling, like, oh, your kids are going to be socially awkward and this, and that they're going to be behind all these things, these things. But my kids are all extremely extroverted and and uh and people, people and uh and that you know fall behind and stuff like that. But that's none of that has been the case, that's for sure breaking those boundaries.

Speaker 1: 24:18

I love it as a family. What about security and things like that?

Speaker 2: 24:22

uh, maybe there's some concerns on some people's minds as well oh security as far as life on the road yeah yeah, you know, the first couple winters that we hit the road I would, I would bring a, uh, carry a gun with me, because I was like I don't know what it's going to be like, you know, and and I don't even know if all states, I don't know if I would have gotten in trouble in some states, I didn't even really research it. Like I had my concealed permit, you know, in Michigan, and then I had my little gun safe that I kept my handgun in, and so I carried the first couple winters we went, but man, um, we never really ran into. Actually, when we got home one winter somebody was breaking into our house as we were pulling back into our house, but as far as on, the road you know, we've never really had situations where we felt like, uh, unsafe, or anything like that.

Speaker 2: 25:16

You know, we really didn't.

Speaker 1: 25:18

That's good to hear Good feedback. So for listeners out there um facing burnout, debt, business struggle, what's something that helped you mentally reset and keep pushing?

Speaker 2: 25:30

business struggle. What's something that helped you mentally reset and keep pushing? You know it's. It was always, uh, in those negative times of yeah, you know of, of, you know, tough times with the business finances, different things like that it was always just the hope that things are are going to get better, you know. And just pressing into God and just remind, remembering all the times where life got hard and God brought us through, you know, and just remembering those times gives you that hope. And you know, as you have that hope, then that just gives you the faith that you need to just keep pressing on. And that's very common in entrepreneurship. You know, to have those up and downs and back and forth. And well, what if this doesn't work out? What's that going to look like? And it's just knowing that, even if something doesn't work out, you've learned something and you take that into the next adventure, you know.

Speaker 1: 26:23

I like that Great, great advice. So what's next for Fireside RV Rental?

Speaker 2: 26:38

Do you see any new opportunities that could apply to folks like in the trucking world? What would you say RVs is. You know we call it wheel estate. I write about that in my wheel estate storybook is it's a home on wheels, you know. So people rent RVs to go camping, people rent RVs to go to races or music festivals, or we work with insurance companies. You know, if somebody's displaced because of something to do with their home, if somebody's displaced because of something to do with their home, and so we just keep looking for those opportunities to help people get outdoors and use real estate. And there's over 12 million RVs sitting around the country doing nothing most of the time. So it's kind of sky's the limit as far as RVs sitting around doing nothing, and then also people that want to experience the outdoors but don't have an RV. So it really creates this great opportunity.

Speaker 1: 27:35

I feel like you're talking to me there. I got my RV sitting outside right now. Better go check in there, make sure everything's okay.

Speaker 2: 27:43

Yeah, right, yeah, yeah, they sit around. You know the tires start dry, rotting Next thing you know you got some mice in there, this and that. And the cool thing too about an RV that's just sitting putting it with fireside is now you get to depreciate it under IRS Tax Code 178. Same as you get to depreciate your real estate investments. So now it's a write-off to offset your taxes and you also get to write off the storage and insurance and repairs. And then, obviously too, you have the earning potential of it earning you money instead of it just sitting around, you know.

Speaker 1: 28:20

Turn it into an asset versus a liability.

Speaker 2: 28:23

Exactly yeah, you turn that liability into an asset.

Speaker 1: 28:27

Great, great job. Help people with the business mind. It's not easy. We're bombarded by social media, we're bombarded by stress of life. But to think about a way that we can actually provide for ourselves a little more, a little something extra. For, like you said, if a camper's sitting outside not doing anything most of the year, what can it do for you, right? So here's the way to do it Fireside. Thank you for that advice. I think it's great. I think you got a great story. I think you could keep on sharing that. I think that people need to hear more of that. Thank you so much.

Speaker 2: 29:00

Yes, sir, you're very welcome, do you?

Speaker 1: 29:01

have anything else you wanted to add before we go, any words of wisdom or advice you'd like to give for people out there that are listening?

Speaker 2: 29:10

No, if there's any listeners out there that they're looking to do something on the side entrepreneurial adventure on top of what you're already doing, I would just encourage you to just try something. It's very easy to have these different ideas and then the next different idea, but you got to just try something. If it doesn't work, it doesn't work. But forward movement always brings clarity. So try something, Take a step forward and if it works, great. If it doesn't work, you've learned something. And now when the next idea pops up, you take what you've learned into that next idea. And who knows? You know you could have the next big idea that people need to solve a problem that exists. You might be the solution to that problem.

Speaker 1: 29:58

All right, awesome, so check out FiresideRVRentalcom. Is that correct?

Speaker 1: 30:05

Yes sir, all right. So, man Gar, I really appreciate the real talk that you brought to the table here. You know trucking NRV, the life may be a little different, but on the inside it's pretty much the same. So it's all about resilience, purpose, learning how to keep moving forward, like you said, one step at a time. And even when the plans change you can. You can move with it. So to the listeners out there, whether you're on mile 200 or mile 2000, remember that sometimes the biggest breakthroughs come after breakdowns, and you can learn about this by Gar's journey and his franchise at firesidervrentalcom. So until next time, stay steady, stay sharp, keep on delivering.