Today's Program:  Finishing up the 3-minute commercials...

Sandro Menasci
Electronics have changed my business completely.  Gasoline brought in the customers.  But when pay-at-the-pump became popular the oil companies didn't need dealers anymore.  They found it was more profitable to push Twinkies over repairs.  Repairing cars has also changed with electronics.  Cars now have computers that talk to our computers.  When we get a car that doesn't start, we no longer assume it is a bad battery.  It can be a software problem.  Even the way we do billing has changed.  We used to process credit cards manually.  Now it is a simple swipe.  The whole system has changed the way we do business.  We need technicians, not grease monkey. 

Joe Zingale
I am a bit of an anomaly.  I am not the owner of the company, my nephew is.  I have been the owner of many other companies.  I started working with Jeff a year after he opened.  We started working out of his home with 8 guys doing installation.   Even then we did high-end residential homes.  But looking back so much has changed.  We have a staff of 165 people now.   We still do the same type of work but the way that we do it and the technology that goes into some of the projects is like going from the ice age to Star Wars.  Our designers are so talented.  We have a division in Tucson now.  We have a whole separate landscape/maintenance group.   We have yards we can simply dial into to maintain (reads ph levels, etc).   A lot of our growth now is in maintenance which we didn't even consider when we started.  In this economy it is so nice to have recurring business where most of them pay.  We never thought we would be as big as we are now. 

Mark Menasci
Business hasn't changed so much for me.  I started in 2003.  My father had a saying, "Steal with your eyes".  If you see something that looks good, make it your own.  I try to live by this.  As I was working for a "lucky" guy, I began moonlighted.  I put flyers out and thought I would be bombarded.  But I got no calls.  I placed a nice ad in the newspaper hoping I could handle the calls that would come in.  I got one phone call...but I still work with him.  That first call caught me totally off guard.  I didn't have invoices or anything so I went to drugstore and got a ticket book and walked into the first appointment with my briefcase (It was empty but I looked good!).  My name got out there through family and friends and business grew.  As far as how business has changed, I look at how to do new things.  Exchange servers used to scare me but I learned.  I can handle many jobs remotely although I prefer making a presence.   I do IT work for a local internet provider.   I work with home owners associations.  It is amazing how it has grown and I am still just one guy.  Its funny to think at the beginning you are worried about the phone ringing and now...you worry about the phone ringing. 

If you need a good laugh ask Mark about buying a Whopper at JFK.