[00:00:02] Speaker A: This is Short Term Rental Management, the show that is all about short term rental property management.
With your host, yours truly, Luke Carl.
Here we are, Short Term Rental Management.
It's a good day for a great day. And today we have a longtime friend of the show on the show.
For those of you who've been listening for a long time, you will be familiar with this gentleman. And today we have a lot to catch up on because it's been a long time, not a long time for the two of us. We talk almost every day, but a long time on the microphone. So today we've got Tim Grillo, Iowa native, a car guy extraordinaire, a motorcycle guy, tattoos, long hair, all the fun stuff that I am also interested in. And we are also from the same part of the world.
And today we're going to catch up. Tim, how you doing?
[00:00:59] Speaker B: Good morning. I'm doing great. All that. And you didn't even mention that I have a rental house.
[00:01:05] Speaker A: That's. I forgot about that. Tim has many rental houses. Yes. Because we are here on short term rental management, of course.
So, yeah. Tell us a little bit about your portfolio. Let's start there. Just refresh everybody's memory or if they're brand new.
[00:01:18] Speaker B: Yeah, My wife and I run kind of a, you know, small mom and pop operation. We've got a handful of long term rentals. I think we're sitting right about 15 right now. And then we've got eight short term rentals in a couple different markets. So we've got. Yeah, four markets total. Two. Two short term and two long term. So.
[00:01:37] Speaker A: Which I love that because it is pretty rare that I get to talk to anybody that's got long terms. My brain. They're the same damn thing. It's a house, you rent it out. You just do it a different way based on its. I mean, for me it's based on its location.
[00:01:51] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. It's just a little different processes.
We love them both. They're, they're, they're different, but they're a lot the same. So.
[00:01:58] Speaker A: Yeah, at the end of the day it's just a damn house. Right.
[00:02:01] Speaker B: Still roofs and air conditioners and toys.
[00:02:03] Speaker A: Yeah, roofs, air conditioners, plumbing, toilets, floors. That's about it.
[00:02:07] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:02:08] Speaker A: Of course you've got condos too. You've got condos there in Gulf Shores.
[00:02:12] Speaker B: We do have that. Yep.
[00:02:13] Speaker A: Yep. Okay. And once upon a time you were selling houses in the, in the vacation real. You were selling houses for the short term shop.
[00:02:21] Speaker B: And I was. That was a great little period of my Life. I went from corporate life to nomad life kind of. And you guys were gracious enough to let us join the team. And that was a great period of my life. Selling houses and helping other folks get into the same craziness that my wife and I got ourselves into. So it's a lot of fun.
[00:02:43] Speaker A: Which by the way, we are hiring, if anybody wants to take Tim's old job, basically careers at the short term shop.com we are hiring agents in multiple markets. So if you want to live in a vacation town, as KISS would say, live your life like you're on vacation.
[00:02:59] Speaker B: Yep.
[00:03:00] Speaker A: We can make that happen. Of course you will be working, which is fun too. But
[email protected]. we are hiring real estate agents right now.
[00:03:08] Speaker B: But anyway, five stars all the way.
[00:03:09] Speaker A: Oh, five star. Thank you. Look at that.
[00:03:11] Speaker B: What do they call that?
[00:03:12] Speaker A: Real for the employer. There's a website. What is it?
[00:03:15] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Not indeed. But like that. Anyway. Yeah.
[00:03:21] Speaker A: Trust Pilot or something.
[00:03:22] Speaker B: Yeah, it's, you know, anybody looking to get into something. If you love this industry, top notch organization, you know, Avery is a fantastic leader. You get to listen to Luke, you know, which is just a little added bonus. But it's a great, great place to have a career for real.
[00:03:38] Speaker A: Thank you. Appreciate that. But you've moved on now to photography, which I have like 100 other topics that I would like to talk about, but we should definitely get into that as well. So now we're. And you've always been a very interested in this subject and you have some photos and videos from background before that was even really a thing that ended up becoming pretty famous and I guess what the word would be viral, but it was kind of viral. Yeah. Even existed. Right.
[00:04:06] Speaker B: So, yeah, for sure.
You know. Yes, photography has been this, I don't call it a weird hobby, but it's kind of almost been a closet hobby of mine for a long time. My grandpa bought me my first camera when I was 7 years old and kind of. And he bought me a book, photography book. And it was talking about, you know, angles and composure and all these things.
And I was into it when I was a kid and I kind of stayed into it on and off throughout my other, you know, careers and hobbies. It was never like my primary like hobby, but it was always in the background. I always loved it and I was always fascinated by it. And you know, my last real corporate career, I was around it a lot and I was in a high performance automotive space and you know, there was a lot of photography in that. In, you know, really high end cars and race cars and all that. So I was around a lot of photographers and I was just always fascinated with lighting and techniques and all that and always asked a million questions during photo shoots. And then we got into this, you know, and we started off hiring photographers and there's some great, you know, lots of great photographers. But you know, like anything else, once you start doing it yourself, you kind of get a little bit frustrated or you think you can do this or that or whatever a little bit different. And so my wife and I started shooting around and then it just kind of led. One thing led to another and we really fell in love with the process and, you know, just everything kind of merged together with, you know, the hospitality world and my mom, both mine and my wife's past interest. We do it together. My wife does all the staging for the photography and I do the actual photography. So we work together and it's been great.
[00:05:37] Speaker A: Well, before we get deeper into that, go back to. Because you have these photos and videos of your own vehicles back when Tim has some. Tim has a couple of cars that ended up becoming famous.
And. And again, I think that was not the right word today. The name would be viral, I think.
[00:05:53] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. So the first real big deal, you know, I built a lot of cars in my life and I. I built this one particular Mustang that got a lot of attention and I got it all done and it ended up. It's kind of a long story how I got there, but ended up on the COVID of Hot Rod magazine. And that was one of my first exposures to like real pro level car photography. The. The guys that shoot the covers of those old magazines were like phenomenal photographers, but. Photographers. But yeah, that car ended up on the COVID Hot Rod. Then like right after that, it was in three magazines back to back. And so that kind of went nuts. And then early days of, you know, like Instagram and you know, Facebook reels and stuff. Real. Actually it's before Facebook even had reels.
But there was a video of another car of mine that was just like a 45 second clip of it idling in the driveway. But it's pretty radical car.
It, you know, got. I don't remember over a million hits for sure is 1.5 million or so.
[00:06:49] Speaker A: This was a long time ago that was on.
[00:06:51] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. No, that was. Yeah, it was just. It was kind of an accident, you know, it was just kind of. Yeah, it was. It was a while ago, so it was not like today for sure.
[00:07:01] Speaker A: So, you know, these cars started gaining steam and you were fairly popular in the car world in general and. And then you said, you know what, let me combine my hobbies and kind of started taking videos and photos of your own cars.
[00:07:13] Speaker B: Yes. Yep, yep. And yeah, that happened for a little while.
[00:07:17] Speaker A: And then was this pre social media or.
[00:07:20] Speaker B: No, no, it's just early, early social media. Well, I mean, some of the stuff was pre. There were stuff there. I was definitely doing photography of cars pre social media, but, you know, nobody saw it because there was no social media.
But yeah, no, I have old pictures of stuff. Actually, one thing I used to love to do and this is, I've never even really told anybody this, but I used to go to junkyards and I love taking like doing photography sessions in junkyards and taking pictures of like, really cool old patina, like, you know, 40s and 50s and 60s cars, you know, that were all rusty and mangled and junk and just like, there's just cool artsy stuff. But that, that I, I love to do. So it was just weird. But I used to do that stuff all the time.
[00:08:05] Speaker A: Yeah. That's cool. That's cool. So now talk about the photograph, the cabin photography. So this is.
It's a different kind of thing, right? So it is. I mean, I guess it's fulfilling a couple of things. It's artistic, but at the same time it is a gig. Right. So like.
[00:08:19] Speaker B: Yeah, for sure.
[00:08:20] Speaker A: Talk about that. Like the artistic side of things versus, you know, just, you know, going to work.
[00:08:24] Speaker B: Yeah. And you can just kind of touched on, you know, when I started there stuff, social media didn't exist. And it's kind of the same thing. The, the short term rental world has evolved a lot in the last five or 10 years and, and with it, the photography has evolved a lot and it still kind of is.
You know, when this all started out, you guys were there. I mean, everybody's photos were just like cell phone pictures at best, and it was really bad. And then.
[00:08:47] Speaker A: Well, I mean, honestly back then we were impressed with the cell phone, an iPhone 4. It was literally like, you know, the 3, 4, 5 era, probably when, when Airbnb started was probably right around iPhone 4, I would guess. And the photos you could get out of an iPhone were literally. I mean, they were pretty damn good and they still are. You know, it's gotten to the point now where I think everybody realizes their, the quality of the iPhone camera is pretty good, but doesn't, doesn't mean you're any good at taking Pictures.
[00:09:19] Speaker B: Right.
[00:09:20] Speaker A: But back then, it was like, wow, dude, I've got this. I just paid a ridiculous amount of money for this phone. The camera is, like, super badass. And it was, like a. Even. That was a huge deal. So, honestly, when we first started, it was, you know, not that we're putting in our listing that we have iPhone photos for our vacation rental, but we were proud of it. We were proud of it. Like, dude, all my competitions got these terrible pictures that they took with whatever, you know, who knows what kind of camera.
[00:09:48] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:09:49] Speaker A: And. And we were running around with these modern, hip, cool, expensive iPhone. The iPhone was way more expensive than your average everyday. And it still is, you know, average everyday camera.
And we were proud of it. We were. And Avery was really good at it, and she spent time on it, and, you know, we edited the photos and things, and. And that was revolutionary at the time, you know, so we were. We were first to that space in the Smokies. Nobody was really, you know, even that sophisticated yet, and.
[00:10:19] Speaker B: Right.
[00:10:20] Speaker A: And here comes a little Avery. She was so young at the time, and she was hip and cool, and.
[00:10:25] Speaker B: Sometimes that's what it takes, you know, and that just starts, you know, I'll say, a revolution and evolution of things, you know, And.
And that's what happened. You know, it went from horrible, horrible, horrible pictures to the iPhone stuff, which was better. And then professionals, you know, I won't say they crept in because, you know, they were always there, but they stepped up their game.
[00:10:44] Speaker A: No, I did. When I started, there was like. And I don't even want to get in because he might still be there, but I'm not going to say any names, so who cares? There was, like, one grumpy dude in Gatlinburg who.
[00:10:54] Speaker B: That took pictures.
[00:10:55] Speaker A: We're going back. We keep going back to Smokies today because Tim lives there. All right? So. And we'll get. We'll get deeper into that, because that's. That in itself is uncommon. Right. So we will get deeper into this. Living there and all that. But there was one dude, he was like. He had a storefront. You know, I think he might have been. He was either on the parkway or he might have been in arts and crafts. I don't know.
[00:11:15] Speaker B: Right. Yeah. Yeah.
[00:11:16] Speaker A: And I called him up, and I was like. And he didn't want to do it. He didn't understand it. He. He was more. I think this. Again, I. This is a long time ago, and he. He was really old, you know? Anyway, I'm a little nervous that this guy's still around. And I don't want to sound like I'm talking bad in any way. I don't think he is. But either way, I'm not really talking bad anyway. But anyway, so I think he was more so interested in doing like, family portraits of portraits of people on vacation, you know, that kind of a thing. Or maybe he was just to the point where he didn't want to do anything because we called him and he did do some pictures for us and they were just horrible. I mean, they were like that, dude, have you. Do you even know what the Internet is? You know?
And then eventually, slowly, there was a lady that crept in from Knoxville that was like the very first person that I was able to convince, you know, to take pictures for a VRBO or for an Airbnb.
And she did a pretty good job and she was also grumpy. And. And then eventually we finally got some folks that were sophisticated and doing a great job, you know, so.
And that's, that's the evolution of it, at least from what I remember. But we're going back, you know, 12.
[00:12:26] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, I know. That's, that's, that's kind of what I'm talking about. And then now it's just, you know, the whole industry has evolved. It's not just like the pictures of change, you know, the whole, you know, self manage everything, everything, you guys watch it happen in front of your eyes. You know, self management wasn't a thing back then. And now everybody's doing that and everything.
And, you know, and now, you know, I'll say the platforms, I don't want to name too many names there, but there's a lot of platforms now where you can rent a, rent a vacation home. But, you know, it's all, it's gotten. The competition has gotten to be a lot more. It's just a lot more mainstream to use those, more so than, you know. And so in that the pictures and the homes and everything have evolved, you know, I mean, the homes are way more than they used to be and amenities are way more than they used to be. And so the photography is the first line of sight for, you know, grabbing people. And so that's kind of what we've really focused on with our own property. That's kind of where this started was how do we really make people feel like or imagine themselves using the space, you know, instead of just taking a normal.
I don't want to be careful what I say here, but just a normal MLS type photo of like a house for sale Instead of doing that, we try and capture the vibe of the space and you know, and the amenities and, and really frame out the amenities and, and you know, have let people imagine themselves being there is kind of what we're going after. So.
[00:13:45] Speaker A: And this is fairly new, but are you saying you're not interested in doing MLS type photos or any, any other? Like, are we strictly focusing on overnight rentals?
[00:14:00] Speaker B: From a marketing standpoint, that's all we market. Will I shoot MLS photos? Yes. And have I? Yes. You know, is it our main thing? No. You know, focus and energy and marketing and everything is towards the short term rental side of things.
My wife spends kind of a, I don't want to say an insane amount of time, but she spends a lot of time on constantly changing out her staging game. You know, that's a big part of what we do is we go in and set everything up and we bring a lot of stuff along and that she sets up the cabins with and you know, things cloth napkins and just all kinds of, you know, decorator stuff. That, that's her lane. But uh, so that's definitely our focus, the MLS stuff. I just go out and do it myself. She doesn't get involved in that stuff. But so yeah, we do both. But the STR is definitely the focus.
[00:14:46] Speaker A: And again, a lot of this has to do with where you live, right? Like this.
[00:14:49] Speaker B: Absolutely.
[00:14:49] Speaker A: This is a lot. This is a lot of what's going on where you. Let's talk about that. So you move.
[00:14:53] Speaker B: Yeah, this wouldn't, this wouldn't be possible, you know, in a normal town, you know, what we're doing, you know, there's.
[00:14:59] Speaker A: Not, there wouldn't be any business.
[00:15:01] Speaker B: Right, right, right, right.
[00:15:02] Speaker A: Not enough anyway. You would have to do other things.
[00:15:04] Speaker B: Sure, absolutely.
[00:15:05] Speaker A: Yeah. You probably would be more doing more MLS stuff, you know, way more always for sale than anything, really.
[00:15:11] Speaker B: Yep.
[00:15:11] Speaker A: Yeah. And let's talk about that. So you grew up in Iowa, but you lived in many places?
[00:15:18] Speaker B: Yeah, you know, short story. You know, I grew up in Iowa. I was actually in the construction industry up there for a long time out of high school and about 16 years and then had an opportunity to go into a career in the automotive world, which was a passion of mine.
You know, I was in the high performance and racing industry for a number of years. And in that time period I moved to Kentucky for that and lived in Kentucky for I think eight years. And that's when my wife and I started buying houses and we started with long terms and then kind of got into the Short terms and I'd never even been to the Smokies and we were only four hours away and we bought a couple over here and we just absolutely fell in love with it over here. And you know, the timing just was kind of right for us to make that leap, if you will, into being entrepreneurs and self employed and all that. So we both decided to quit our jobs and, and move here, you know, and, and we moved here and uh, we absolutely love it. It's, uh, you know, it's not, I'll say it's not normal. You live in a vacation town too. It's, it's, it's kind of weird, but, uh, it's a great, you know, it's a, it's more of a entire lifestyle than it is just a career. You know, we're not just like, oh, this is our job. This is like what we do every day. We get up and we pretty much live, eat and breathe is this industry. So.
[00:16:37] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. To me, again, I live in a vacation town almost like exactly like yours. There's, there's a number of them throughout the country.
And to me, the weirdest part about it, I don't know if weird's the right word, but to me the biggest factor is that other people don't understand it.
[00:16:58] Speaker B: Right.
[00:16:58] Speaker A: They do not understand that we're not living like a regular, a normal life in these towns. It's, it's a little bit different life.
[00:17:06] Speaker B: Yeah, you can't, you almost. There's just, it's just different and. Exactly, it's like, it's the way he says, hard to describe unless you've done it.
And you know, the people that are here.
You know, you got a, you know, a mixture of people that are here. You got the, the locals that have been here for generations, you know, in the mountains here. And that's, that's one group of people. And you have some retirees and then the rest of it is really a lot of, I'll say, similar storied type people. You know, you got a lot of, you know, people that have moved here because of the opportunity to work in this type of environment. So, so that's kind of cool. You've got a lot of people around that are, you know, fairly like minded, different stories and stuff and different, you know, objectives and whatever. But it's pretty cool.
[00:17:51] Speaker A: Yes. And we've talked about this extensively and I am, I'm quite certain that we 1000% agree on this. But I want you to talk to me a little bit about the fact that Living in a vacation town. Well, let me back up about the people not understanding it. I think the biggest factor there is, there's the money.
The money that is, you know, existing in these areas is almost 100 coming from somewhere else.
[00:18:19] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:18:20] Speaker A: So there's no actual industry of any kind, any job in these areas. And, and these, these are, we're talking very small town, tourist driven towns. And there's tons of them where wherever you grew up, going on vacation. Again, Tim and I are from the Midwest. So, you know, Branson was the closest place. Right.
[00:18:37] Speaker B: And Wisconsin Dells.
[00:18:39] Speaker A: The Dells, you got Myrtle beach. These kinds of places.
There's no jobs there other than hospitality. And that's not.
This is where it gets weird.
The hospitality industry does not make enough money as a, in general, like being a bartender, being a cleaner, being a, you know, or even a vendor, a plumber, etc, to live in one of these areas. They're expensive areas because of all that money coming in from other places. These, you know, these folks are coming in from Atlanta, they're dropping their money, money in this area and then they're leaving. I read a study one time. This would have been, I believe it was Gulf County, Florida, which is two counties over from me, which I do have a house down there.
Don't quote me on the county. It might have been Bay County. I don't know.
$10,000 per family is what they were calculating was being brought in.
Or maybe it was per household for two families. So it was either five or $10,000 per family that they would bring in on top of accommodations for, you know, restaurants and knickknacks and gifts and shopping and all that ice cream and, you know, coffee and liquor or whatever else, you know, it was. Again, it was either 5 or $10,000 per family per car load, basically that that is being brought in from other areas. That money is being made in the metropolitan area in general or, you know, in any area that has industry and then brought to these towns that does not have industry other than hospitality. So that's where it gets weird. But I guess the point I want to get to before that was, or what I'm bringing it back around too, is that Tim and I have always been very passionate about the fact that if you do live in one of these towns and you answer your damn phone, you will do well. Talk to me about that.
[00:20:36] Speaker B: Yeah, it's a big deal. And it's a weird. Even that is a weird dynamic. And what's weird to me is the lack of awareness of the Locals of all that money that is floating around. You know, you got all this money floating on the, around the air really of all this activity that's going on with all the tourism.
And a lot of the locals that have been here a long time don't even really realize it. And they, they work actually in the industry and some of them don't even really realize it. You know, they don't understand that, you know, this person from Atlanta or California or New York or whatever that's calling them is supporting the entire area. You know, really, I mean, to a degree.
So the, the, the ways, you know, you can call it, you know, people say mountain time and beach time. It's a real thing. You know, the locals are just kind of on their own time. So people that come into these places that have come from a higher paced environment, you know, whether it's the Midwest or New York or whatever, they tend to do well because exactly what you said, they're used to having to answer the phone and get after it and, and just, just doing that, you can, you know, stay pretty busy. Obviously you have to do good work because, because word travels and all that. But, but yeah, just, just having the work ethic and then I hate to throw that word around too much because the people that aren't answering the phone, you know, I don't want to say they have bad ethic or anything. They're just raised different and they're, it's just a different culture of the local, you know, environment. I mean, it is the mountains, it is the beach and it is a slower moving pace and there's beauty in that. So there's, there's a balance and all that. But you know, when you're trying to run this much business of all these, you know, vacation homes that are around, it takes a high level of responsiveness to get things done. So. And that's.
[00:22:24] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, there's two dynamics. There's the folks that grew up there that I, I'm not able to relate to as well because I didn't grow up here and I grew up in a cornfield much, you know, similar you in the Midwest. And that was a whole different vibe, you know, completely different vibe.
And down here I do feel that as a, you know, I can relate to the people that have moved to the area. And I feel that for the most part those type of people were drawn to this area, this being yours, mine, whatever, vacation, because while they were there, they were on vacation and they liked that vibe.
So people are moving to these areas to continue that vibe, not necessarily to be on vacation the whole time, but to have that like, I don't have any problems vibe.
[00:23:07] Speaker B: Right.
[00:23:07] Speaker A: Unfortunately, when you lose. When you move to the beach especially, or even the Smokies is pretty expensive.
And then you start to realize, dang, if I want to live like right in the action or close to the beach or close to town in Pigeon Forge, this is kind of expensive. And I'm paying tourist prices for the restaurants I'm paying to. You know, there are local places, but in general, you know, I mean, I go. I go to my favorite salad place. I'm. I'm one of two locals out of 30 non locals. And it's $40 for a SAL a drink, you know, and that's every day, you know, I gotta have my salad, you know, so. And if you go to the grocery store, it's all relative. Like the prices at the grocery store are more expensive. You know, everything's a little bit.
[00:23:51] Speaker B: And well, and even on that, just the way the tax structure is built is different. You know, there's a lot more sales tax in these places because the economy is driven from tourism and most people buying stuff are tourists. So. So when you're local here, you're paying that higher tax on everything, which, I don't know, I've learned to accept it and love it. And to me, it's just a big ecosystem. You know, we're talking about the locals and the, the transients and all that. The locals are, Are totally essential to everything.
And, And I've really embraced that. And I, I have a high degree of respect for the, you know, the, the locals and the generational locals and stuff. And, and really, to some degree, when you have big stuff you need to get done. I lean on them a lot. And.
And having those relationships is. Is crucial as well.
[00:24:35] Speaker A: Yes. Because you gotta. Again, we're repeating ourselves. I feel like I'm repeating myself. But these, these are small towns, and I think the. One of the big problems there is this. You got somebody coming in from Arizona, coming in from Colorado, buying this, you know, vacation home, which is a wonderful thing. We want you to do that.
The local economy wants you to do that. Let's bring in that Colorado money. Come on.
But I think it's very easy for you to not understand that it is a. Such a small town. It's a good old boy network. And you come in and you're. And you're almost talking to these folks like it's a big city because.
[00:25:12] Speaker B: Right.
[00:25:13] Speaker A: You just don't know any Better, you know, oh, you hear about it on the Internet. You heard about it this, that and the other gets talked about a lot on forums or whatever. So you just assume that it's this bustling, sophisticated place, but really at the end of the day it's not. My pool guy wants, my pool guy wants to ask questions about my kids, you know, and if you shut them down and act and treat them like they're just some big city person that's getting the job done and you're never going to talk to them again, it doesn't go well.
Yep, the short term shop is hiring. We are hiring real estate agents in the best vacation rental markets in the nation. If you live in a beach town, a mountain town, or want to move to one and you are a qualified rockstar realtor, please reach out to us theshortermshop.com careers we are currently hiring in multiple markets theshortermshop.comcareers Anyway, let's get back to the photography.
Photography questions in general. How many, how many photos do I want on my listing?
[00:26:25] Speaker B: Oh, you know, that, that any of that varies depending on the size of property a little bit and what your amenities look like. But generally I, I like to see 30 to 60, you know, as a general rule of thumb, you know, on the smaller ones like a, like a one bedroom, you know, a one bedroom with not that many amenities. 30 can be plenty. You know, when you get into four, five, six bedroom and swimming pools and you're going to need closer to 60, maybe even a little bit more than that depending on, depending on the place. So to me it's a, you know, you want a good mixture of capturing the, the vibe and the flow of the property with showcasing the amenities.
So that's, that's kind of the way we try and focus, you know, we really make sure we get, you know, I've seen it go too much both directions, you know, where it's all just far out shots and you got a real good, you know, overview and that's kind of like more like the MLS type stuff. It's like you're, you know, looking at houses for sale typ type of thing. But then I've also seen people go where it's nothing but artsy and really cool close ups and all that. But you can't really tell where you're going to sleep or where the kitchen is, you know, type of thing.
[00:27:29] Speaker A: So, so anyway, yeah, I, I agree there's no wrong answer there. And I think a lot of it boils down to how many Good pictures did you get? Because they're, you know, you're going to have some. You might have some pictures that look almost identical. They're both great pictures, but they're almost identical. And. And it also evolves. Like back in the day, you know, I would say not back in the. Not in the early, early days, but I would say just right before COVID probably 19 era, somewhere in there, I was putting 60, 70 photos or 80 photos on my list.
[00:28:01] Speaker B: I had 80 on one.
[00:28:02] Speaker A: Yeah, I feel. I felt like people wanted every little angle of every room back then, and now I think people don't care. And it's just like, move quick, let's go. And. And we're seeing that also in the bookings, you know, where people are only booking four or five days in advance, and it used to be six weeks in advance. So I definitely have narrowed it down. It used to. I think the culture's changed a little bit. I think in the 1819 era, people were still a little bit scared of Airbnb or Verbo renting a house, and they're like, oh, I need to see every single angle. Is this. Is this room even real? You know, and now I think people are just over it, and they just see that you got 180 reviews, and they're like, okay, cool. That. That bed looks cool. You know, let's go.
[00:28:41] Speaker B: You know, I think, too, also, as. As the photograph evolved, you can get more things in one shot than you did in the past. You know, you can capture some amenities while capturing some of the flow type of thing. And, you know, and. And there wasn't as much thought put into that before, to be quite frank, you know, and, you know, I don't want to sit here and, you know, toot our own horns, but we spend a lot of time, you know, when we're in a property, we're not just popping in, and we're not just there for an hour or two. We're usually out of property for 5, 6, 7 hours.
Capturing all that and setting things up and. And really trying to make the photos as efficient as possible, you know, so, you know, without having a gajillion photos, capture as much in the photos as we can, you know, without making it, like, the other way where it's so crowded either. So that makes sense.
[00:29:30] Speaker A: Yeah. Well, you know, the biggest benefit of you is that you own rentals, right? You know, so it's like you're ace in the hole there, you know? Oh, yeah. You know, you could. I'm. You're probably even Answering questions about rentals and stuff.
[00:29:40] Speaker B: Oh, people ask me all the time.
They ask. Yes, I photography clients. Asking about what? You know, if it, if it sneaks out that we own our own rentals, they start asking a thousand questions.
[00:29:51] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. Which is my job, by the way.
[00:29:54] Speaker B: I know.
[00:29:54] Speaker A: Don't bother Tim with this stuff. Come to Luke. That's what we do over here at the Short Term Shop. The short term shop.com stsplus.com but, but that is, that's your ace in the hole. That's your, that's your little secret weapon there. You know, it's like, well, yeah, I can take you some great get pictures. But I also, you know, I talk to talk and walk the walk, baby. Let's do this.
[00:30:15] Speaker B: Right.
[00:30:15] Speaker A: So that's brilliant. Brilliant.
What are we doing in there for six hours?
What, what, you know, what takes that.
[00:30:22] Speaker B: Long setup and really set up. I mean there's a lot of lights. Yes. So we bring in, we bring in like studio type lighting and we don't use them in every shot, but we use them in a lot of the shots.
[00:30:34] Speaker A: What brand of a light? Was there a brand that we like or you just found these randomly or how does that work? Work?
[00:30:39] Speaker B: No, they're, they're, they're a full on professional.
[00:30:44] Speaker A: You know, you did some obsessing over the last.
[00:30:46] Speaker B: Oh yeah.
[00:30:46] Speaker A: What are they? I'm curious.
[00:30:48] Speaker B: They're, they're Goddocks is the brand Godox.
[00:30:52] Speaker A: There's got to be a thousand brands.
[00:30:54] Speaker B: There is. And these are, you know, so, you know, not get into too much of the obsessiveness. I have the most powerful wireless ones you can get. So mine are all wireless. So that was a big deal for me.
[00:31:06] Speaker A: What do you mean wireless? Like they don't need to be plugged into an outlet.
[00:31:09] Speaker B: They don't need to be plugged into an outlet. Or the camera. Correct.
[00:31:12] Speaker A: Or the camera. Oh, right.
[00:31:13] Speaker B: So there's a trigger on the camera and I can independently control the lights at different powers all from the camera. So if I want one over in this corner, this power, one over here, this power, you know, I can run up to eight on my thing. And so you can basically kind of set it all up and, and light the shot the way you want it and you know, so you have that and all this.
[00:31:34] Speaker A: How does that work? Is that Bluetooth? It can't be Bluetooth.
[00:31:37] Speaker B: Honestly, I don't know what that is.
[00:31:39] Speaker A: It communicates with the camera.
[00:31:40] Speaker B: It communicates with the trigger which is hooked onto the camera.
[00:31:43] Speaker A: I see, yeah.
[00:31:44] Speaker B: And then. And then they're. And then batteries power the light, you know, which, you know, they're. It's kind of a huge battery to be able to have, you know, because they're powerful lights, you know, they're. They're powerful enough that you can use them for, like, people out in pure sun. You know, you can have the sun right, you know, right at you. And I can fix it with the light, you know, so they're. They're. They're a strong, you know, wattage wise. And then. And so the batteries are huge. Like, they're, you know, the size of a softball or bigger.
And anyway. But having the wireless is a big deal for moving around a house and. And setting up all the different shots. You know, when you're in a studio, it's not a big deal. You can just plug them in and you're never moving them. But this. We're moving them, you know, 200 times a day.
[00:32:29] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I would assume, you know, the biggest part of it is you got to get it in the right, like, right little spot. And if it's plugged in, that's a pain in the ass.
[00:32:37] Speaker B: Yep. And sometimes that means, you know, we have stands and tripods and all that for the lights, but sometimes we're holding them because you can't. You can't physically fit all the stuff into a lot of the nooks and crannies, you know, so sometimes I got my wife hanging over the edge of a staircase holding a light or whatever. Whatever it takes, you know, so.
So that. That's part of it. The. The. The staging is definitely a big part of it. You know, you think about, you know, I'm talking about trying to capture as much in a photo as you can. That. That's awesome. But it can be, you know, from a logistical. On site, it can be a pain because you really have to pay attention what's in the photo, because it's easy to get your own gear and junk in the picture if you're not careful, you know, so you're constantly moving. You know, we bring pretty much, we have our setup down to two, like, the biggest totes you can get. We have two huge totes, plus all the lighting and the camera gear. So, you know, you got a lot of stuff sitting around and moving and moving of things. And once you set up the kitchen and you may have, you know, it's kind of like when you set up a cabin, what it looks like you got stuff everywhere, you know, and so you're moving Stuff around all the time and just kind of, you know, moving from room to room. But a lot of stuff, you know, it is multiple things in one photo.
[00:33:42] Speaker A: So let's talk about editing. Editing. So this is time consuming. What is this? Like how many photos. Let me ask you this, how many photos are being dumped into the machine?
[00:33:53] Speaker B: Yeah, that's a great question. That's kind of going to get a little technical. So basically, for every photo that, like every finished photo that you see, I'm taking three to eight shots of different exposures and stuff, you know, so if I'm taking a picture of a living room, let's just say, you know, if there's windows involved, you're taking photos or everything's dark but the windows, and then you're taking where the. Everything's exposed right in the room. And then you have. Every camera has a dynamic range of color that it can capture, and no cameras can capture the entire dynamic range of color. So you're taking things at both ends of that spectrum and merging them together. So there's a lot of time in editing with just that. And as the more windows and views and things like that that are involved, the longer the editing takes to really get it right. So the editing can easily take as much time as the photo shoot, you know, so, you know, if you're there for six hours, the editing can easily take another six hours on a photo shoot, you know. And the drones, the same thing. You know, we use, we use a drone for a lot of stuff and it's like, it's dynamic range. We have a very, very high quality drone, but the camera is still not as good as the camera we use on the other thing. So we take more shots with the drone than we do with the normal camera. So you're doing all the editing with that as well. So.
So anyway, you know, so if you just say, you know, 60 shots, you can easily be dumping, you know, 300 into the editing software when you first start out. And because there's gonna be shots you don't end up using and stuff like that. But very easily having 300 or so, that's pretty normal.
[00:35:30] Speaker A: 300?
[00:35:31] Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:35:32] Speaker A: Okay, so you're narrowing it down and then how many do you give the client? Like 100?
[00:35:37] Speaker B: No, just really 40 to 60, usually sometimes 70 or so. But if it's one that has a lot of. If you know, certain cabins have more detail, you know, people that have put a lot of, you know, detail into their cabins, they usually get a lot more detail out with the photos. If there's a lot more stuff to take pictures of, we. We take them.
[00:35:57] Speaker A: So what do you recommend for seasonal, like Christmas and fall leaves and things like that? Is there a decent system there?
[00:36:03] Speaker B: Yeah, I mean, really, you have to be.
You have to decide if you're okay with it being a year behind.
You can either do it right when you set the stuff up and try and get a photographer in there right away, or you kind of do it mid or late season. You know, if you take fall pictures, a lot of times it's too late to post them that fall to get those. That fall bookings. So you need to plan ahead a little bit, you know, so a lot of the seasonal pictures will do for people. They'll have us, though. We've actually had people hire us, like the end of Christmas, you know, right before they take it all down, take their seasonal pictures and they're gonna use them next year for next Christmas.
[00:36:36] Speaker A: Yeah. Then the downside is it's possible you've changed your couch.
[00:36:40] Speaker B: Sure.
Yeah.
[00:36:42] Speaker A: But that's just part of it.
[00:36:43] Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah. And. And you know, you don't need to reshoot the whole property. You know, we, we generally try and do it to where, you know, like the seasonals are going to be like a, like a five picture thing. You know, like for Christmas pictures, you know, we try and you know, you know it's going to be a picture of the, the tree and usually, you know, the smokies, it's all, you know, around the fireplace. There's. There's a decent amount of decor and that kind of stuff and you know, a few other pictures with it. So.
[00:37:08] Speaker A: All right, any tips and tricks on how to make my listing stand out with photos? I mean, are we to the point now where it's like, you've seen one hot tub, you've seen them all.
And then I guess along those same lines, how do you feel about. Well, I'm going to leave it with that for now. No, I tricks on good photos to make my listings.
[00:37:25] Speaker B: I love that. I love that question. I get people ask me that all the time, like, what do I need to do to prepare?
So, you know, everybody talks about amenities and amenities are important and how to me, how you make that great in photos is how you frame the amenities. So it's a team effort. You know, there's things I can do with the photos to make them look as good as possible with what you have, but the more that you do ahead of time, you know, like what do you just have a hot tub or do you have a neon light and some twinkly lights around your hot tub? If you have a neon light, you know, that has. That says something, and maybe some ivy on the walls or. And some twinkly lights, we come in and do twilight photos and shoot that at night or as it's getting dark, that will explode. You know, the colors will explode. The lighting in the hot tub will explode. We actually.
Will actually add lighting to the water. We'll bring our own lights and put them in the water and.
And that can really, you know, help with the colors and things, you know, back to editing.
Green water is a pet peeve of mine. You know, you see a lot of these when they're shot with the. The light that's in the hot tub. When it comes out in a photo, the water will look green. And not many people want to jump into, you know, water. And so I always make sure my water is not green. You know, I do, you know, whether it's purple or pink or blue or whatever, you know, it kind of depends on what's going on with the rest of the setup. But that's true with anything, you know, like your kitchen. You know, we, you know, simple people. I don't say they don't think about, but there's a lot of simple amenities that we all provide. You know, kitchen utensils, crock pots and that kind of stuff. And that's kind of what my wife does. We don't just, like, take a picture of that sitting on a shelf. She, like, sets it up. She'll set up like a little setup with a cookbook and measuring cups and whatever. And we kind of take a. You know, we take a.
You know, might be stretching, say, a lifestyle shot, but we, you know, we try and put people in the place, you know, and into the amenity. You know, if it's a sauna or a hot tub or whatever. The more framing you can do around that to make it more inviting goes a long ways. You know, game rooms. There's a lot you can do. You know, do you. Do you just have a pool table or do you have, you know, a complete setup with a cool light above it and, you know, things to take, you know, cool pictures of.
[00:39:32] Speaker A: So what about wine and cheese on the hot tub? I see this all the time. Personally. Annoys the hell out of me. How do you feel about it?
[00:39:40] Speaker B: Yeah, I'm mixed on that. So, you know, I'll say everybody wants that.
And we don't do.
We don't do any kind of labeling of alcohol so we don't do a wine bottle or, you know, a beer or anything like that that is like, you know, where there's a label. But we will do photos. Absolutely. With, with glasses and, you know, coffee cups, wine glasses, whatever it may be. You know, I mean, coffee cups on the deck. We absolutely do, we do do wine glasses.
You know, the food stuff is borderline. We do, I'll say we do a little bit of it, but not a lot that. So, you know, basically the argument there is it's really cool looking and it can really make the photos look neat and stuff. But does it create an expectation of. You're providing that stuff as a host? You know, are you providing the wine and the cheese? That's kind of, that's kind of the catch 22 there.
So we try and, you know, when we do work that stuff in, you know, we try and do it subtly and not too in your face. So.
[00:40:42] Speaker A: So what about people? We see that a lot. You know, not a lot, but a lot of times, like new, new, new owners are coming in. They're like, oh, I want pictures of people in my hot tub, my pool table.
[00:40:52] Speaker B: I'll say.
We've, we've just, we've just started messing with that a little bit.
To me, it's a, again, it's a fine line. I'm not a huge fan of it. We will do it if, if people are adamant about it. And at this point, we're not providing models and stuff. So if people want to do it, they've, they would have to provide their own people for the pictures and, you know, take care of all the paperwork that goes along.
[00:41:17] Speaker A: Have you done a shoot with people yet?
[00:41:19] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:41:20] Speaker A: Oh, you have?
Was it weird?
[00:41:23] Speaker B: It was different. I wouldn't say it was weird. It was different.
You know, it was, we shot, you know, there was no faces or anything like that. So, you know, we spent a lot of time shooting it. It that way. So. So it's not like you're old or just taking a picture of this like, person smiling in the hot tub waving at you, you know, it's not, it wasn't like that, but it was different for sure.
[00:41:46] Speaker A: Okay, well, any other ways I can stand out? Like, you know, everybody's looking for bookings these days, you know.
[00:41:52] Speaker B: Yeah, I think anything you can do with mostly high contrast, but lighting Twilights. I'm a big fan of twilights. You can really.
I'm a big fan of lighting in general. So the more light, cool lighting features your house has that can make it explode in a picture and make it explode. You need the right lighting outside, which, you know, everybody just says twilight. That's really, really the big thing about twilight is getting the lighting right, you know, and right at sunrise and sunset, you have great lighting to make your windows and the outside your house and things explode. All the, all the work you put into putting twinkly lights around, things kind of disappear during the day. So the only way to really get that stuff is to shoot it, you know, as it's getting dark or even when it is dark. And so I'm a pretty big fan of that. Like I said, having your amenities framed in a manner to where the photography does well, having the right things in the home so that, you know, when, when, when we go to shoot that there's some cool stuff to take pictures of.
Like I said, we do bring a fair amount of our own stuff, but we don't want to get too over the top of where it's not the actual stuff that's going to be there for the people. You know, we do things just like highlight type stuff that we bring.
But really, you know, again, the, the lighting matters a lot. You know, we'll, we'll do our job to, with the lighting to make the stuff that you have look as good as physically possible.
So that, that's really, it's really kind of a back and forth. We talk with, we like to have a conversation with clients around some of the stuff and some planning, you know, before we just come in and shoot it. That way, if they want to do any more preparation, they can do that. And you know, we do a lot of that consultation type work ahead of time.
[00:43:28] Speaker A: So is it possible to have the photos make my home look too good?
[00:43:35] Speaker B: Sure, yeah. Work it is.
You know, that's one thing.
Another thing in the editing we do, you know, I spent a lot of time getting rid of cords and, and things that, you know, make the picture look bad. But I try not to, you know, we're not going to physically change the home.
So, you know, is it possible for the house to be cleaner when I shoot it when the guests get there? Yeah, that's possible. You don't want that. You know, that's, that's something that you need to. If the house is cleaner when I get there than when the guests get there, that's a problem. And honestly, I don't see that happen very often. Usually it's the other way or other way around. I actually tell people I don't, I don't need the house spotless. For. For what we're doing, it doesn't need to be as clean as what it would be for a guest, really, because it doesn't show up in the pictures, but it's not worth, like a little.
[00:44:20] Speaker A: Dust in the corner. You don't even care.
[00:44:23] Speaker B: No, not at all. Not at all. And. And really the biggest thing, the biggest thing for me that's the hardest not to overcome is windows. You know, windows. If the windows are filthy and there's a great view outside, it can be challenging.
Pretty much most everything else we can work around.
[00:44:37] Speaker A: So.
Okay, wonderful, wonderful.
Let me backtrack.
I'm gonna. I should have talked about this earlier and I wrote it down because I wanted to bring it back up. The vacation town thing. At one point in time you looked at moving to the Virgin Islands. Yes, tell me about that. I want to hear that whole story. Like.
[00:44:57] Speaker B: Well, yeah, so we got started in real estate and I was at the point with my day job where lots of people get. Where you just want to go do something different. You want to go, you know, be self employed and all that. I've always had this itch to do to be self employed for a long time. So anyway, my wife and I were on a little journey of going, you know, we're. Every time we went on vacations, we were kind of looking at like, is this where we want to buy a vacation home? This was before we knew about the short term shop or even knew who you guys were or anything. So anyway, we went on vacation to the Virgin Islands and properties were very affordable there at the time. And I absolutely fell in love with the island vibe. And I kind of. I saw a lot of opportunity in exactly what we were talking about before everything was on island time. And I'm like, man, you could literally do anything here and make a good living. You could work on. You could change car tires.
[00:45:47] Speaker A: I mean, how did you pick that particular area? Had you been there?
[00:45:50] Speaker B: No, no, we. No, we just went on vacation and we went on vacation and I fell in love with it while we were there. I mean, it was like a mix of. To me, it was like a mix of beach and mountains because it's a very. The islands are mountains, you know, so it's. The roads are very similar to East Tennessee. The landscape is really similar to east Tennessee. It's just surrounded by ocean and.
And I just fell in love with it. We were there for a week or whatever and absolutely fell in love with it. Went deep in the process of buying a place. I actually, it's an interesting place because it is technically, you know, it's part of the United States, but mainland banks at the time, I don't know if this has changed, but they wouldn't touch it. They wouldn't loan to there. So you had to go through the banks on the island, which was kind of everything you would imagine it to be. It was kind of a weird process going through them. But I had gotten all.
All the ducks in a row and lined up and ready to buy a house, and we were literally had like, several places picked out, and we were going to buy something, and my wife kind of pumped the brakes and said, hey, why don't we. If we're going to get into this vacation rental thing, why don't we pick something on the main, you know, the upper 48, you know, to start out and then see where it goes.
And. And then, like, right as we did, we did that, and we actually moved from Gulf Shores to co. Or from. From. From the Virgin Islands to Gulf Shores. And basically right as we did all that covet hit. And it was. I was pretty glad because starting out as a newbie on an island that you have to get on an airplane to get to while code was going on would have been challenging, so.
[00:47:24] Speaker A: Well, I would.
I would love to hear those stories had that happened.
[00:47:29] Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah, me too.
[00:47:30] Speaker A: Probably never would have met you, but.
[00:47:33] Speaker B: Yeah, no, you know, and I'll be honest, I'm. I don't want to say I'm glad, but I'm kind of glad we didn't do that. I mean, we've.
We absolutely love living here.
[00:47:42] Speaker A: What an adventure that would have been.
[00:47:44] Speaker B: It would have been an adventure, but, you know, there are challenge. There are real challenges with family and kids and grandkids and all the stuff, and it would have been an adventure for sure. And I'm not gonna say we wouldn't ever do something like that still, but I know we.
We fell head over heels in love with Tennessee, and this is home for us for now, you know, and what's not to love?
[00:48:04] Speaker A: It's amazing.
[00:48:06] Speaker B: It's so amazing. Every day I just walk outside and it's just, you know, we have to pinch ourselves. Like, we actually lived here. And it's funny because when we first started looking at East Tennessee, I was like, shot out of a cannon. And I was like.
I listened to Avery's podcast. You know, this was early in your guys years. And I was like, man, Luke and Avery say this place is awesome. And I just. I couldn't quit talking about it. And My wife, we went and we stayed in a hotel in Pigeon Forge. And my wife could not have hated it more. And she's like, I want nothing to do with this. She's like, this is not anything I want to be involved with. She didn't, she's just not. We're not into the super high touristy stuff anyway. We end up buying here. The numbers were too good to pass up, so we bought a couple cabins right out of the gate. And then in the process of owning those, we started coming here more and more, and we discovered everything that's not Pigeon Forge. You know, Pigeon Forge is great. It's. If you have kids and you want to bring your kids on vacation, there is nothing better than Pigeon Forge, Tennessee.
But where we were in our life, that's not what we were looking for. And we live 15 minutes away from Pigeon Forge and in a little town called Where's Valley? I know you're familiar with Where's Valley, and it is one of the most special places on the planet to me. And that the fact that we get to live here and hike here and just be here, just being here is just stunning every day. And, you know that, honestly, that's kind of what, you know, I'll say. Re sparked. Some of the photography stuff is, you know, we started taking the camera and we go on, we hike a lot, and we're out in the, the landscape here, and it's just stunning. And, you know, we start taking the camera all the time. And that just kind of rejuvenated the juices, if you will. And, and it's just been, it's been awesome living here. So anyway, I know I'm going well off of, uh, the Virgin Islands, but this is home for right now.
[00:49:58] Speaker A: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. I think I would love to hear those stories, but, yeah, no, it ended up working out the way it was supposed to. And I agree, man. I, I, I got a, there's a big, giant chunk of my heart down there right around the corner from where you live, you know?
[00:50:11] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah.
[00:50:13] Speaker A: I don't get there as nearly as much as I would like to, but, you know.
[00:50:16] Speaker B: Yeah, I, you know, frequently I drive right past your first cabin, and I think about just, just the impact and the lives that's touched, you know, and including mine, and the pain in the.
[00:50:30] Speaker A: Ass it's been for me.
[00:50:33] Speaker B: Well, you know, I tell people all the time these houses are just, they're just a tool. You know, we're in the hospitality industry, and that's what we do, you know.
[00:50:41] Speaker A: I would not trade it for the world. I don't even mean to say anything bad because I'm going to tell you right now, man, that house, every detail of that house, the memories and the time standing on the porch the day after a big party and Terry was there. He's a close friend of ours and I don't think anybody realizes how close friends we are. And we had a big party one night at that house that you're talking about and the next day I'm standing on the porch. This is a long time ago, my friends. This would not happen today. I was hungover as hell and I took a trash bag. My truck was right down below the railing on the porch. The porch is up higher. And I threw the trash bag into the back of my truck and a beer bottle fell out of the trash bag and dente side of my truck. And I was so mad. And oh man, the time that, you know, when we first bought it and Avery's mom had just gotten diagnosed with cancer and she came there to help us with cancer and, and I mean, just all these memories over the years, not that the cancer is in the beer bottle, are, are, you know, compared to each other. Obviously she's fine.
Only reason I even bring it up is she's, she's now, she's 10 plus years cancer free now. So.
[00:51:50] Speaker B: You're touching on something though, that's really important in all this to me. And those are, you know, brief, brief moments in time that are sacred to you and to me. The beautiful thing about what we get to do here is we're, we're stewards of that for literally thousands of people. Like every three days we're getting new people in these places that get lifelong stories. Like, I mean, what you're talking about is stuff that happened in a moment of time and you remember it for your entire life from these properties. And that's what we're doing here.
[00:52:18] Speaker A: Yeah. And this doesn't happen in long term rental. And that's the beauty of overnight rental is that I can go there and sleep in it and have a relationship with it and enjoy it and create memories and all this stuff.
[00:52:28] Speaker B: It's one.
[00:52:28] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:52:28] Speaker B: And we get to create memories and help people, you know, provide places for people to create those memories for themselves over and over. And that's, that's what this is all about. And we, we absolutely love it and we're very fortunate and blessed to get to do this.
[00:52:43] Speaker A: All right, well, what else did we miss? Anything? And also, of course, I do want you to tell us how we find you and everything, but, you know, we could go all day.
[00:52:52] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, no, I think, you know, that that's really it. You know, we're here to, to help capture these amazing places and present them to your guests. And that's, that's, that's our goal and we put a lot of time and effort and energy into doing that well and we take a lot of pride in it. So I'm very. Thanks for having me on. You know, I really. And again, I could talk about this stuff and get super nerdy about it, and I'm trying not to do that. But, uh, you know how to get a hold of us. Uh, I know my name's hard to spell, but it's Tim Grillo Photography. My wife doesn't like having her name on stuff, so we just have it undermined. But Tim Grillo Photography. And we're on Facebook, Instagram.
Also, you can use scrollstopperphotography.com and that will get you to our website. We kind of dual branded it because my name's hard to spell. So scrollstopperphotography.com will get you the website and our, our information to get a hold of us is on there. So.
[00:53:42] Speaker A: Wonderful. All right. Love it, Love it. We need to have you on again sometime to talk more about guests. Tim used to be on the show all the time because we, we get, get two of us together and it's just, it just goes.
[00:53:53] Speaker B: Yeah, we don't need to talk for photography all the time. I mean, it's great. I mean, but I love talking about just this business in general, so. About nothing anytime. Yeah. We can talk about freaking motorcycles if you want.
[00:54:04] Speaker A: Yeah, motorcycles.
Yeah. I'm trying to get more into college football, you know, the Midwest, you know.
[00:54:10] Speaker B: Oh, yeah, yeah.
[00:54:11] Speaker A: But I bought you an Iowa shirt last year.
[00:54:13] Speaker B: Yeah, it was hanging right here and it's not. It's upstairs.
[00:54:16] Speaker A: That's the coolest hat ever. You need to. It's coming. It'll be college football season before you know it, so let's get going on that.
[00:54:22] Speaker B: Well, I mean, from everything I've heard, Iowa is way better than Nebraska, so.
[00:54:26] Speaker A: Yeah, well, everybody is better than Nebraska for the past 23 years.
But yeah, it's heartaches and that's just part of it. And we're going to have some heartaches and in my, in my house.
[00:54:38] Speaker B: Well, and it's, you know, I live right, right up the road is a pretty intense college environment, so.
[00:54:44] Speaker A: Yeah, Tennessee right there. Go, go. Got to go to the games.
[00:54:48] Speaker B: Yep.
[00:54:48] Speaker A: So they've had a rough couple years. But you know, it is what it is.
[00:54:51] Speaker B: There's some big hires here recently. So.
[00:54:53] Speaker A: Hey, speaking of rough couple years and you're the car guy. I did want to. I wanted to bring this up again, tangent unrelated to anything. What the hell's going on with Chevy?
[00:55:04] Speaker B: Yeah, they're going through a little bit of a thing. I'll say. What's that going on? Chevy is.
Well, I want to be careful. I always.
[00:55:10] Speaker A: Here, let me put.
[00:55:11] Speaker B: Let me put say one word. I was going to say CO is what's going on.
[00:55:14] Speaker A: CO. Yeah, I don't want to. I had a 2023 Chevy 6.2 that blew up twice and under 60,000 miles. I lost the motor at 27,000 and I lost the motor at 25,000 after that or whatever the math was. Just under 62 motors on a 20, 23. Under 60,000 miles. And now, now I've gotten rid of it and now they've recalled 600,000 of these things. What in the hell, man? So anyway, yeah.
[00:55:44] Speaker B: This is a tough one without getting too political, and I don't really have any strong political feelings, but there are things, our government, there's regulations that have gone into place on fuel economy of entire fleets of vehicles from manufacturers and the manufacturers have had to make decisions on how they manage that. That. And different companies have done it different and unfortunately. And for, you know, Chevy, Chevy chose to stick with V8s in their big vehicles, which I love, you know, because who, what American doesn't love a V8 in their SUV? No, but the way they manage the fuel economy has had some massive failures that have led to like complete engine failures. And it frustrates me because I was, you know, around that a lot. And I know I don't want to say how easy of a problem it is to fix, but the stuff that's failing is fairly minor and those are fantastic engines, except for a couple little things. And a couple little things, unfortunately are a big deal right now. And, and then, you know, you mix in. There were a lot of supplier problems during COVID and substitutions being made and material problems and, and, and availability problems. And you know, there was. There's literally thousands of cars sitting around waiting on parts to arrive from. From, you know, vendors so the manufacturers could finish them and stuff like that was going on. So things probably quality wise slipped a little bit.
You know, I think that's not. Chevy's not the only one that's had that happen to, you know, I Mean, there's. You can see that we've got a. We've got a 20. Gosh, I think it's a 20, 23 Ford that's having some issues. That is frustrating as well.
[00:57:20] Speaker A: So anyway, yeah, anyway, way off topic, but you're a car guy and I did want to say, hey, man, you know, that's 600,000. So if you're. If you've got one of those cars, I feel bad for you. But not as bad as I feel for myself because that son of a gun cost me a lot of time and money that I'm never going to get back. And I already.
[00:57:38] Speaker B: That thing calls me. A lot of time. Yeah, I spent on the phone with you during that.
[00:57:42] Speaker A: Dude, my car broke down. It broke my car. My family down on the interstate, two hours from home on a school night. Man, that's not cool, you know, And Chevy did not give a damn. They did. They could not.
Didn't matter. They did not care. Oh, sorry your car broke down. Tough. Tough crap. Deal with it, you know.
[00:58:00] Speaker B: What are you driving today?
[00:58:02] Speaker A: Same car, different. Different motor.
[00:58:05] Speaker B: I decided to throw that out there.
[00:58:07] Speaker A: 5.2 or whatever. It's 52 or 3. 5.353. Yeah, I got the 5. 3. So, yeah, I mean, it was.
It was going to be difficult to trade in a broken down Chevy to Toyota. So I just traded it into Chevy and then here I am stuck with it again. But, you know, anyway, way off topic. Love it. Love it. Love you need. If you need new pictures on your rental in East Tennessee, give Tim a call. He'd be happy to help. So Tim will get you back on the program here sooner than later. And we appreciate your time.
[00:58:38] Speaker B: Sounds great. Thanks for having me.
[00:58:40] Speaker A: All right. Don't overthink it, Sam.
