Intro
Broadcasting live from the Business Radio X studios in Dayton, Ohio. It's time for Dayton Business Radio. Now, here's your host.
The Mag
Welcome to Dayton Business Radio Stone Payton here with you this afternoon. Please join me in welcoming the broadcast CEO with Renegade Acquisitions Mr. Kenneth Armbruster. Good afternoon, sir.
Kenneth Armbruster
Good afternoon. How are you doing?
The Mag
I am doing well and have been looking forward to this conversation if you would give us a little primmer a little overview, Mission purpose, what are you guys out there trying to do for folks there at Renegade?
Kenneth Armbruster
Our mission, we are looking to consolidate the crematory privately owned crematorium business. And we are looking specifically to revamp the way refractory bricks are installed. So we also look for, even though there's not that many, we look for crematory rebuild services. My background is in construction. Okay. So indirectly, indirectly, I have some form of experience within the industry, although the processes involved in rebuild crematory retorque, rebuild are slightly different than what I'm accustomed to. But indirectly, I do have some level of industry experience. And like I said, we're looking to consolidate this industry. We're looking to put our own unique spin on it, and, you know, hopefully, make this industry in this world a better place before we leave it. So that's, that's the basics of it.
The Mag
So what is the business imperative, the value proposition, the business case, I guess, for consolidation, why go to all this trouble to consolidate other than just make money
Kenneth Armbruster
Well, a lot of privately owned crematoriums, you know, the owners are looking to retire. Okay, our kids don't want the business that kids don't want the responsibility. So there's really no plan of succession. And not just true crematoriums, but true of funeral homes in general, throughout the Midwest. And, you know, there's there's room for improvement as well. I mentioned briefly, finding more economical ways to do concrete and refractory brick installation. But also, if we look at other parts of the industry, if we look at the transport aspect of the industry. Now, without going into too many horror stories, you know, it's not uncommon to have mix-ups, mix-ups clean, you know, body mix-ups, in that part of the process. So, you know, GPS tracking on your horses. That's just, that's just one example, one value proposition if you will, have many.
And I would say, you know, a lot of times when it comes to rebuilding the actual crematories, a lot of that just gets outsourced to independent contractors. And there's a lot of inherent problems with that in itself. You know, because an independent contractor is in no way committed to your particular operation. And therefore, you know, what they're under no legal commitments either. So they can take your unique trade secrets, they can take, you know, your unique company information, whatever, and just run with it and just do whatever they want. So there's really a lack of organization, in the actual repair part of that industry. And, you know, those, those are just two brief areas of improvement. But I imagine, you know, there's always going to be demand for it. Because as long as we're in this world, there's always people dying. But in terms of the industry itself, you know, it's just not generally that attractive for the younger generation. So, so, you know, it's just kind of a unique opportunity to your new industry, that we're seeking to capitalize on.
The Mag
I realize you guys are getting some real traction right now. But when you first went out to the marketplace and tried to share this story, and you shared this framing, and you're pitching this idea, was it initially really well embraced, or did you have to do some selling?
Kenneth Armbruster
No, no, no, no, no, not true at all. Because now, mind you, when I first started pitching this, this was actually before and I don't want to talk about the politics of or even the legitimacy of what is called the COVID 19 pandemic. I have my own opinions on that which I keep to myself. However, even before that it was not very well received. There were a lot of funeral homes, there were a lot of privately owned businesses within what is called the bereavement sector, going out of business, losing revenue. And really, a lot of that has to do with, in a sense, it being a saturated market. But you know, more than that, it's just no plan of succession. Now, when we talk about the crematory rebuild, you know, I just mentioned, you know, a lot of reliance on independent contractors, therefore, if you want to, you know, say own and operate or rebuild the company, you know, actually file it with the state and actually have employees. You know, it is possible for a lot of your work to get outsourced to independent contractors, and so keeping employees you know, that's, that's a challenge.
But then again, I could already relate to that, like I said, I did a form of construction, commercial concrete work, specifically for a number of years. And so I can relate to how difficult it is to keep qualified workers that are also reliable. But if we really want to talk about it, see, it was not received very well. But how do I explain this? There are people that are only imperative, and the only thing they really do is their critics, okay? So they've never actually created anything themselves, they've never actually produced anything of value themselves, but through their careers.
And through years of practice, they've become very good at denigrating what other people do. And they've become very good at identifying and pointing out the flaws inherent in other people's operations. But it stops right there. Okay, they will critique something, and they will point out the weaknesses, but they won't follow up with any kind of alternative solution. They won't follow up with any kind of proactive measures on how we can A fix what they're critiquing B improve it, C do something entirely different that at least moves us forward. You know, so I initially I'm not going to mention any, not that there's like, any confidentiality agreement or anything, I'm not going to mention any specific government organizations I ever, okay. Going to certain Government Organizations, which shall remain nameless, you know, I spoke to individuals who had prior experience a significant amount of prior experience in acquisitions.
And, you know, I told them, This is what I want to do. And then, you know, they just say, No way, you know, this has no chance of being profitable. I can point out all these reasons why this isn't going to work. And yet, they stop right there. They stop right there with I can identify problems, I can identify weaknesses, but in terms of actually coming up with something proactive, and in terms of actually offering an alternative solution. I have none. You know, what I'm saying? What, I'm saying is, in any industry, there are inherent weaknesses. If we were to take something tech-related, for example, like a digital marketing company, what is the inherent even though there's a lot of demand for digital marketing, if it's good, what is the inherent problem with that? It has no hard assets, it has no tangible assets. The only assets of a digital marketing slash software company are proprietary rights on the software, maybe a few licenses, maybe a few, maybe some intellectual property, patents. There's no real estate, though, you know, if your business is entirely online, so was it received? Well, not really, okay. Are there inherent problems and challenges? Of course, but that's true of anything, you know, I mean, so.
Kenneth Armbruster
If I just look at the weaknesses, you know, if you want to talk about a saturated market, there is a saturated market of critics, there is a saturated market, there is a saturated market of people who think that identifying the weaknesses and identifying shortcomings in anything, okay? Is an accomplishment, is as a badge of honor, it's really not, it really doesn't take any skill at all to do that, it really doesn't take any quality of character to do that. It takes skill, and it takes the quality of character to produce stuff, and move people forward, and actually create things that move the world forward in a positive direction. That is real merit. That is real value. So I choose to identify with the people who produce real merit and value. If that answers your question.
The Mag
Well, it certainly does. But it prompts another one on how to use specifically but I'm really asking for me and everyone else, how do we remain resilient in an environment like that? Are there some go-to preparatory methods here?
Kenneth Armbruster
Yeah yeah, good questions, good questions, good questions. First, the first practical step is you caught off, those people I just described, you know, the naysayers, like they are gangrene, okay? Because there's no helping them and there's no changing them, okay, they will not change their stance, because they are chemically addicted to the feeling of superiority that comes from dumping all over what you're doing they, over the years, you know, they have become chemically addicted to that sensation, that are like a drug addict, in essence, their drug of choice being their own criticism of you. So don't try to change those people. Just cut them off completely.
And the better you get at removing yourself from those people, inversely proportionally, the better you get at, at becoming sensitive, fine-tuned to the people that are actually conducive towards you getting what you want. So you know, you cut those people off, you move, as much as it depends on you as much as you're able to invite people into your life, who are proactive, you know, who can help you. In addition to that, one more practical thing, okay. It sounds cliche, and it gets overused, it is cliched in the way that it is typically explained. People say there are 24 hours a day, and mathematically whatever that computes to in a week, you know, there are this many hours in a week, okay? You got time, blah, blah, blah, blah, but they don't really tell you how to change your habits. They don't really tell you how to alter yourself such that, you know, being proactive, become habitual, you do it automatically, the way you do it automatically.
Okay. Let's say hypothetically, as an example, let's say I wanted to produce a website and I wanted to become proficient. I wanted to produce a website from scratch. And I wanted to become proficient in whatever coding language, I believe it's JavaScript, HTML, whatever that is used for the back end of a website. Okay. It is not habitual, for me to sit down and teach myself to code. Okay. It is habitual, for me to maybe go to work, maybe talk to the people I talk to every day, maybe go for a run in the morning, if I'm really dedicated. So how I make what I know to be productive, what I know to be conducive toward my role habit is I sit down, I start coding as best I can. If I can't, if I don't have the server or the command prompt that I need right away, okay. I do as much research because anyone can open Google. Okay, I open Google and I looked for the command prompt. I looked for the domain software, okay.
And I timed myself, I literally, the timer on my phone, I started, okay, and I just go to work. And I just take the next step that makes the most sense to me, towards my end goal, building that website, okay. And eventually, eventually is a fact. I'm going to figure out what the correct command prompt is for JavaScript and to figure out what the correct software I need to install is it's only a matter of time, okay. And at the exact point in that process, that I feel fatigued, worn out, drained, emotionally, mentally, whatever. I stopped the clock I literally stopped the timer. Let's just say hypothetically nine minutes have gone by, okay. I just proved that I can dedicate nine minutes to this today. Okay. And this was actually a productive nine minutes, I actually learned a lot that I didn't know before about coding in JavaScript within that nine minutes was to one more minute tomorrow.
So tomorrow, I'm going to have a plan or third practical step, I'm going to have a planner with no more than seven items on it, okay, because any more of that you're gonna get overwhelmed. Okay, seven of the most important things to do. One of those most important things is coding for 10 minutes, which I've already demonstrated, I can basically do. And if I haven't got a void figured out doing the next most productive step that reveals itself to me towards that goal for a duration of only 10 minutes. And guess what, I'm going to set the timer again. And guess what, I'm gonna do 10 minutes the next day. And if I'm starting to enjoy JavaScript at this point, I might even do 11 minutes, okay, let's, let's seven, seven items a day, no more than that. Okay. Whatever activity is most germane towards my goal? Okay, I've identified I can do this for 10 minutes. Well, now I can do it for 10 minutes every day.
Now I actually have a habit. Now I've actually started to develop not so much an addiction, but enthusiasm for coding, which I did not have before, you know because I had not changed my habits to accommodate that. And that's really all we are, is a collection of habits. And the people we draw into our lives are really only the people and can only be the people whose habits in some way sync with ours in some way or in line with ours. Okay. So we cut off the people who are infectious to us, okay. And we change our habits so that we can then draw in the people that are supportive, and, and beneficial to us.
The Mag
That sounds like marvelous counseling. What I love about the approach that you described in some detail there is it makes me feel like I have some degree of control and the discipline and the rigor, the structure that you laid out actually liberates me, it doesn't confine me, I just love that. So
Kenneth Armbruster
That's the whole point of it, you are in control, you're in control of that entire process. There is nothing I just described, where the central lotus of control in any way strays away from you at any point. That you know, anyway.
The Mag
Well, before we wrap up a couple of other questions, I want to make sure that I get in here one I'm, I'm curious to know, we've, we've been very transparent you have about some of the challenges in your environment. But what are you finding most rewarding about your work right now?
Kenneth Armbruster
What's most rewarding more than anything? Okay. I mentioned briefly changing habits. Okay. What I did not mention was changing personal qualities about myself, I am overwhelmingly more organized as an individual. Since I started doing the two reasons that's relevant, being more organized. First of all, makes me an asset. It is something of value that separates me from well over 90% of the population in the US and the world. Okay, and I'm not I'm not tooting my own horn, it's just a fact. Take a walk, step outside and look at the people around you, and you make your own conjecture about how organized they are.
But in addition to that, okay. It acclimates me to a level of thinking a base level of thinking, Okay, that is a higher degree of complexity, okay? But complexity in the sense of being able to manage more, okay, and even if I'm not having direct success, in terms of, say, raising capital, or in terms of attracting the most qualified people to be on my board to be on my team, even if I'm not having the best possible success, I'm still having some success. Okay. And even though I don't really know how to explain it. Okay, that level of thought and that level of organization does carry over into other areas of my life and other areas of my life, specifically pertaining to make money. Okay, and does magnify those other completely unrelated areas, okay. So I'm making myself more of an asset to the world overall.
But I'm also making myself more effective in other areas that have nothing to do with Renegade Acquisition. And that's that there's, there's, I think my dad said, "Life is what happens while you're making other plans", or even better Bruce, Bruce Lee, Bruce Lee said, The martial artists, "when you accept compromises in one area of your life, it transfers over into other areas of your life". Okay. So the level of organization and complexity that I approach what we're talking about with, because I have trained new habits, and because I have trained new ways of thinking it will manifest and it will carry over into every other area of my life, okay. So even if we're not achieving direct success, we are achieving indirect success by learning a new way of thinking, and a new way of interfacing with the world.
The Mag
So I knew we were going to learn about a very interesting business in this conversation, I had no idea we were going to gain this much insight that applied so broadly, to what is really our, you know, our tribe out there, the people who are out there every day just trying to hammer it out. I can't thank you enough. Before we go, though, I want to make sure if some of our listeners would like to have a more substantive conversation with you or someone on your team to learn more about what you're up to or collaborate with you in some way. What's the best way for them to connect with you?
Kenneth Armbruster
Website, renegadeacquisitions.com. My direct contact, my personal contact information is on there. We have a Facebook page as well. And like I said, my email address is on there. You can contact me through the website and contact me via email. There's there's really, you know, my contact information is public, you know, oh, yeah, that's right. We got LinkedIn too.
The Mag
I think that may have been how you and I got connected. Well, Kenneth Armbruster, ladies and gentlemen, Kenneth Armbruster CEO with Renegade Acquisitions. It has been an absolute delight having you on the show. And I think maybe we ought to circle back and have more conversations again sometime.
Kenneth Armbruster
I would definitely appreciate that. That will be awesome.
The Mag
All right, man, thank you so much for sharing your story.
Kenneth Armbruster
Thank you. Have an awesome night.
The Mag
All right. Until next time, this is Stone Payton for our guest today Kenneth Armbruster and everyone here at the Business Radio X family, saying we'll see you next time on Dayton Business Radio.
Image source: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ken-armbruster-b0a364ba/
