Meghan Hovee, Founder and CPA of Hovee & Co

Changing the narrative for small business owners underserved by traditional accounting firms. After graduating from Rockhurst University in 2014 I started working for Deloitte. During my time at Deloitte, a desire to impact small businesses in Kansas City surfaced – I realized small business owners needed more from their CPAs than was currently offered in the industry. I took a leap of faith and started my own firm in 2015.Hovee & Co outsources accounting services to small businesses across the city, not only to complete ongoing tax filings and keep the entity compliant, but also to facilitate optimal accounting processes and assist leaders with strategic financial decisions.

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-Transcript-

INTRO: Welcome to In A World With Real Media. I’m your host, Brad Burrow. In this podcast, we’ll dive into the lives of the most successful people in business. We’ll learn how they overcame adversity, took advantage of opportunities and learned from their experiences. Learn from our experts. It inspired, then go live your story. It’s In a World with Real Media.

Brad Burrow: Hello and welcome to the In the World with Real [00:00:30] Media Podcast, and I have Megan Hoy with me today from Hoy and Company, a CPA firm that, uh, your name comes up, uh, probably at least 10 times every Vistage meeting I’m in. So we’ll talk about that. But let me, let me just give a, give our listeners a little bit of a background on what you guys do. Uh, what Hovi and Company does is tax preparation, accounting, personal tax planning, financial accounting, small business tax, and book bookkeeping, and probably a lot [00:01:00] more things, right? Yes. It’s

Meghan Hovee: A lot. Yeah. Yep. We cover, we cover a lot for small business owners specifically.

Brad Burrow: Yeah. And that’s really, your niche is small business, really. It is. And you’re not, uh, like enterprise and

Meghan Hovee: Exactly. Yep. We’re very focused in our, in our audience and who our, our target client is truly a small business owner. So,

Brad Burrow: All right. So I was doing a little bit of research and, and you, um, started at Benedict Benedictine. Yeah. And what an awesome campus, by the way. I’ve been up there several times [00:01:30] for baseball tournaments.

Meghan Hovee: Yes. It’s really cool. It’s really

Brad Burrow: Cool. And are you from like Nebraska or something like

Meghan Hovee: That? Oh man. It’s been a journey to get to Kansas City here in the Midwest. Um, so I grew up in the Pacific Northwest, grew up in Washington state,

Brad Burrow: Born in East. Okay. Why did I think Nebraska, that’s not even right.

Meghan Hovee: No, I, no, I landed in Nebraska. Oh, okay. At a point in time, so, okay. Yep. I spent two years after high school kind of volunteering, just, it wasn’t for credit, you know, my dad would ask me, what do you get outta that? I’m like, nothing, dad. I, I was just volunteering. So [00:02:00] I landed when my mom moved to Nebraska in my twenties. I started college in Nebraska. And then, um, I ended up transferring to Benedictine and from there got a full ride to Rockhurst. So that’s kind of how I really landed in Kansas City. Oh,

Brad Burrow: Scholarship, huh?

Meghan Hovee: Yeah. For what? Um, you know, it’s actually one of my favorite stories, so this is cool that it came up. Yeah. But, um, they just randomly, this one year that I was looking into Rockhurst, just kind of, could I get more out of, you know, financial aid than I’m getting right now? I, they just started a, like an interview [00:02:30] process for transferee, and it was like, we’re gonna bring in about 30 people from across the country and we’re gonna do an interview, and whoever wins wins a full ride scholarship. And I asked them, I said, so I have to do a bunch of paperwork, fill out an application? And they said no. And I was like, okay, great. I’m game cuz I love interviews. That’s like, no problem. So we did like three panel interviews and ultimately they, you know, they called a couple days and said, we decided sooner than we thought, and you kind of, you win the full ride. And they gave a couple other scholarships. Wow. But I got the, the full ride. So, [00:03:00] and it was based on leadership and service. So those two years volunteering actually served me really well to then, you know, end up at Rockhurst and kind of the rest of my career.

Brad Burrow: Was that with Reach? Is that Yes. Yeah. Okay. The youth ministry. Yep. Yep. Yeah, tell me about that. What was, what, what was that about? Oh,

Meghan Hovee: It was hilarious. I mean, it was young adults leading young adults, very young. I mean, I was 18. Yeah. <laugh> and just, you’re like in a van full of like stinky 20 year olds traveling the country, <laugh>, um, just kind of putting on retreats for, you know, high school kids or younger. [00:03:30] Um, and that’s, that’s how I started my journey. I think that’s what’s been unique about my business today is I started very like, passionate about just humanitarian subjects, really. So I was gonna be in education and then I thought about psychology, but I kept going back to being a bank teller day in and day out. And I thought maybe like eight hours a day, maybe like money and numbers is actually my thing in terms of a career. And then I can kind of pursue other, you know, passions outside of that. But,

Brad Burrow: So it’s funny, a couple things. My wife went to [00:04:00] Rockhurst. Oh really? And she’s an accountant. Oh my gosh. But, uh, you know, maybe, maybe there’s a, a feeling there, but, uh, accountants think different. Yeah. You know? Yeah. And so you hadn’t recognized that and you till later?

Meghan Hovee: No, so I just, for whatever reason, I didn’t even know what business was when I was at Benedictine. I had friends that were in the quote business program. I didn’t know what they were studying. I didn’t know what they were doing. I didn’t know what accounting was. I knew that when I had this, you know, revelation in my junior year, I thought, well, I’ve heard [00:04:30] of accounting and I think it deals with numbers and since I’m gonna make this shift, I’ll just start off in accounting and see where that leads me. And then I loved it. Tony Tokos kind of famous in Kansas City. He was like my first accounting professor. He’s like an absolute drill sergeant. And I remember one time he said, for all of you that passed this test, you can leave and you can, you know, go eat bomb bonds, but for the rest of you, you’re staying in class and you’re gonna, you know, retake the test, whatever. But I loved it. I just, I thrived. Um, and so yeah, I just kept going from there. But rockers really did [00:05:00] form who I am and my career journey. It was pivotal for

Brad Burrow: Sure. And then, so just kind of going through your career path, this from LinkedIn obviously, um, but Waddell and Reed, yes. So that was your first job?

Meghan Hovee: Yeah, that was kinda my first job in that world. Kind of, you know, bank teller, bank teller, bank teller. But in terms of getting more serious in my accounting career formation, um, yeah, I was a intern, but it was like a full-time gig, but an intern in the internal audit, um, department at Waddell and Reed.

Brad Burrow: See, I hear the word audit [00:05:30] and like I about have a heart attack. Yeah. Yeah. So, but you loved it. Did you love auditing or? I, yeah,

Meghan Hovee: I loved just the numbers and, you know, surrounded by other number nerds. So that was fun. <laugh>.

Brad Burrow: Yeah.

Meghan Hovee: But it’s, it, you asked great questions because I did, you know, from there I went to, ultimately Deloitte was the big four firm I chose to start with. And what I didn’t love about auditing, at least in the public company space, what I didn’t love is I had no gratification of someone happy. Like with the work I was doing. Yeah. That was, [00:06:00] I realized like, man, as a bank teller, you see a smile on the other side of the counter repeatedly. I have no one smiling about like, the work that I’m doing on like a micro level. So Yeah.

Brad Burrow: Yeah. That, that seems like, uh, some people are are built for that though. Yes,

Meghan Hovee: Absolutely. That’s the thing. Some people are, and just that I’m wired more for, like, I just wanna see that some, an actual person is happy about what I’m doing. I’m, I’m, you know, making meaningful change in a real person’s life. Um, and so yeah, I could do [00:06:30] it for sure. I love numbers and I’m happy to sit behind a spreadsheet for a day, but I don’t necessarily wanna do that with

Brad Burrow: Outright. So do you think that’s what drove you towards small business then? Yeah. Is is because you’re working with owners that, you know what, what I found about small business is that we’re passionate mm-hmm. <affirmative> about what we do. The other stuff that we have to do is not fun for us. Right. Or, you know what I mean? Yes. Accounting and stuff. And uh, yeah. You know, where you could actually make a difference in somebody’s future.

Meghan Hovee: [00:07:00] Yes. Yeah. That’s exactly kind of what happened. So I first told myself, well, I wanna kind of own my own schedule. I was getting married, getting into that phase of my life, and I thought, I wanna own my own schedule. You know, little did I know I would work myself harder than the big four accounting firms were gonna work me <laugh>. Yeah.

Brad Burrow: I’m, I’m thinking now you’re gonna own your own schedule, huh. That’s

Meghan Hovee: Interesting. Right. <laugh>, it’s about to be a ride. Yeah. Um, so I said I’ll do some tax returns. And that so quickly turned into helping small businesses cuz some of the clients that got referred my way were small business [00:07:30] owners in Kansas City. And what I found is they kept having me come out as a CPA charging much higher rates than just like a, a staff accountant. They kept having me come out. It didn’t really matter. They desperately needed someone to fill the gap in their accounting. And so I just kept doing it. And I remember one time telling my mentor, who’s been the most pivotal person in my whole career, um, just Bruce Moore Moose as we call him. But I remember telling him, I found this, I’ve been helping these clients and I kind of call it like a [00:08:00] CFO services. Um, and I said, it’s so fun, but it’s just such a niche. I’m sure I couldn’t really turn it into one of our like, core offerings. And I was very wrong. I would go on to prove myself wrong, but that’s where it started is I like doing tax returns, but I love the gratification of these business owners who would say things like, I don’t know what I would do without you. I couldn’t run my business without you. And they meant it wholeheartedly. Yeah. So

Brad Burrow: And so, so Hovi was started.

Meghan Hovee: Yes. Yep.

Brad Burrow: So tell me about [00:08:30] that, the whole decision to do it, you know? Yeah. I mean, you’re becoming an entrepreneur at that point. Yes. Um, you know, you’re, you’re kind of become who you’re helping. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>.

Meghan Hovee: Yeah, exactly. I mean, that’s what was has been cool is those people also served as my role models inadvertently, you know, I learned a lot from those owners and some of them I still work with to this day. Um, many of them I still work with to this day. So, um, it started off kind of as we many of us do in entrepreneurship, we just saying yes to whatever [00:09:00] comes our way. So, um, the first few years I was self-employed and I hired someone to know, help me answer emails when I had my second child like that. I mean, it was just very much myself and an admin. And it was late 2019, early 2020. My husband wanted to stay home with our kids for a little while and he’d really been the, the, um, breadwinner to that point. And he said, well, I want someone to stay home with the kids for a while. And, uh, you are so passionate about what you do, you should just support us. And I thought, and it had been a lifestyle business [00:09:30] at that point. Yeah. I’m very busy, but lifestyle. And I was like, ah, I think you’re crazy, but we’ll give it a shot. And it was not crazy. It worked out really well. So it was about covid. I mean, it was about, you know, early 2020 that I decided I’m going to scale. Like I’m gonna do this in a way that’s, it’s

Brad Burrow: Not that long

Meghan Hovee: Ago. No. Yeah. See it was probably, it was early 2020. I had myself and, you know, one other ongoing staff and now we’re, you know, up to nine women and we’ve just really gotten intentional about what [00:10:00] are our core offerings, what do we do and what do we not do so that we can serve our clients like to the most excellent standards is the

Brad Burrow: Goal. So give me your elevator Pete pitch. Yeah. You know, what is that? What do you do? Like if you were pitching your services to a company like ours mm-hmm.

Meghan Hovee: <affirmative>. So our elevator pitch, um, is really, I now say I, the small business market, zero to 5 million in revenue is how we define it in terms of our services. It’s not underserved. It’s simply not served. So small business [00:10:30] owners in that revenue range don’t have the accounting support that they need. And what we, our services is to come in, figure out exactly what you need so that your accounting and your financials are thriving. And then we put that in place for a fixed fee. So we want your accounting and your finance area of your business to be as streamlined and predictable as possible. And so that usually looks like a mix of, yes, we’ll do the tax returns, but also some element of bookkeeping or accounting [00:11:00] review so that your financials are really systematic. And then CFO sessions advisory. So we really advise on hiring on kind of forecasting, budgeting goals, just high level business goals that you have and how to get there. And that’s, that is what we do. You know, we don’t do more or less than that, but,

Brad Burrow: So I’m gonna be a little bit transparent here, <laugh>, you know, so I, I really, my biggest concern as a business owner for our [00:11:30] business is cashflow. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, I mean, that’s like where I, and you know, the other stuff I like if I monthly reports and all that stuff, if my cashflow isn’t good mm-hmm. <affirmative> in my mind, none of that matters. Sure. Now that’s wrong probably, you know, from an accounting standpoint, but what would you say to somebody like that that, you know, cuz we’re, I mean, one of my challenges is that I want to build this business to a point where I’m not in the day-to-day

Meghan Hovee: Right.

Brad Burrow: Uh, operation of, so Yes. But right now [00:12:00] it’s like I’m in the middle of it. Yes. Yeah. So what, what would you say to that?

Meghan Hovee: Yeah. So I’ll be transparent back with you. Okay. Um, and say, oh no,

Brad Burrow: Carly, get ready to edit this. So <laugh>,

Meghan Hovee: So I agree. Like cashflow is at the core of what we do as small business owners, and if you don’t have cash, you can’t keep making payroll and Yeah, absolutely. I think a lot of times I do see business owners get so focused on cashflow that as long as they have a lot of cash [00:12:30] in the bank, they aren’t concerned or aware of whether or not they’re making money. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. And so they’re just pushing the problem down the road. What our goal would be to do in that situation where a client’s concerned about cash is to come in and connect the profitability, the profit and loss report to your cash and say, well, here’s why it says you’re making money on paper, but here’s why you don’t have that much cash in the bank. I mean, I’ve, you know, a few months ago helping a client and it was like, how did I make that much money?

Meghan Hovee: Where did it all go? And it was just a matter of [00:13:00] looking at owner distributions for the year. Like I didn’t take all that home. And then we look at the transactions. Okay, I guess I did, I guess I didn’t make, make that much money. I guess I have taken it home. But we really need to connect your levels of cash with what your profit and loss report says. And, and, you know, make a come up with a plan to where you are profitable and you have sustainable amount of cash. Like, absolutely, it’s a good concern, but I can see it. I see sometimes even advisors get so caught up in helping their mentees with cashflow [00:13:30] that pretty soon that person’s over leveraged and really their pricing isn’t sufficient to support their infrastructure, their business infrastructure. I mean, so I just think it’s important to like, to really connect both and to continue to teach your client, um, you know, how, what their financial statements say. I mean, there’s a different language for most business owners

Brad Burrow: And you dive that deep into a business, you know, even understanding, you know, cost and Yeah. And profitability and margins and things like that.

Meghan Hovee: Yes. Oh, that’s [00:14:00] the value add of what we do. Right. That’s the, that’s the help people aren’t getting, and it’s like, again, small business, zero to 5 million in revenue, a lot of time, most of the time you cannot afford an in-house accountant that has that knowledge, that acumen. You’re right. And there’s not a lot of people, you know, saying that they will do that on an outsource level. You can get a bookkeeper, they may or may not get your books cleaned up and consistently categorized,

Brad Burrow: Probably not based on my experience. <laugh>. Yes,

Meghan Hovee: Exactly. I mean, it’s just, but that’s our whole mission is to revolutionize that. It just, people have put up with such [00:14:30] like subpar service for so long, and I don’t say it to sell ourselves, I say it because it’s true. Like I, I, I always say, uh, eight outta 10 new leads that call us, the reason they’re calling us is because their CPA is just quick communicating. Like, they’re like, I don’t know if they’re still alive. I don’t, and I wish I was joking. I wish I was joking. But so all that to say, I don’t want that to be the norm or the, and that’s why we are gonna continue to grow. Like there’s no plans to stop growing, is to continue that relationship. But yes, we get down into the nitty gritty of like, are you pricing [00:15:00] well enough? Are you paying the appropriate wages? Are you, you know, what’s your plan? Like, you’re concerned about this today, but we have to know what you wanna be, where you wanna be in five years in order to arrive at what we should be doing today. And I think I’m so big on processes, A lot of times people are just concerned with the symptoms of some of the negative symptoms that are happening in their business, but there is no process to prevent that from happening again. So we, I mean, yeah, we really do go to that, to that level. And

Brad Burrow: You, you’re a business consultant then?

Meghan Hovee: Yes.

Brad Burrow: [00:15:30] I mean, that’s what it sounds like to me.

Meghan Hovee: Yes. And, and to be honest with you, really a coach and I really, um, for whatever it, I mean, it is what it is, but I am kind of anti trend coach is a really trendy thing right now, so I just don’t use that label. Yeah. But yeah. Yeah, I agree. So yeah, we consultant coach, um, but yeah, we definitely call ourselves your outsource CFO for that reason. That is really what we do.

Brad Burrow: So one of the things I wanted to talk about a little bit was, uh, your [00:16:00] Vistage connections. Yes. Okay. So I’m in Vistage as well. And, uh, it seems like your name comes up at every meeting. <laugh> came up last meeting I was in. Um, but helping, you know, helping small businesses actually like that are going through the, the maybe they’re selling or they’re selling apart mm-hmm. <affirmative> or, you know, that whole process that Yeah. Man, that’s, that’s a, that’s a can of worms. Yes. Beyond accounting mm-hmm. <affirmative>, [00:16:30] is that something that you’re actively involved in with a lot of your clients?

Meghan Hovee: Yeah. Um, so yes, we are, um, you know, it’s not a ton of clients because that happens once in the course of your business, typically. So yes, we are, and we’re involved because we’ve been the ones, you know, sort of generating the financials and helping the owner understand them. So we’re kind of inherently gonna be involved in those conversations. Right. Buying or selling. Um, and so Yes. Absolutely. Um, my motto is, regardless of whether or not you’re thinking [00:17:00] about selling your business, maybe you’re in love with it and you’re in early stages, and that’s not a thought till 20 years from now, I am of the opinion that you should always be growing and operating your business as if you are going to sell it. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> not only because that can be a retirement asset, whatever, but also because it’s just gonna run then the be in the best possible way. So it’s gonna benefit your team, it’s gonna benefit your life, your quality of life. Um, so Yeah. Absolutely.

Brad Burrow: You know, I get asked that all the time, would you, um, you know, be willing to sell your business? [00:17:30] And I’m like, I don’t think so because this is what I’d be doing if I wasn’t doing this. Yes. You know what I mean? Yep. So it’s like I’ve, I’ve worked, worked so hard to build this up to what we’re our capabilities are right now. Yes. I I wouldn’t wanna sell it. Agree. Yeah. But I agree with what you’re saying. It’s like having the mentality that <affirmative> you’re building it into something profitable.

Meghan Hovee: Right. And yeah, it’s like whenever you’re wrapping up, whether maybe it would get, you know, operated by your children or [00:18:00] whatever, even if it’s like, I don’t think I am interested in selling. Well, what about when you’re 80 and you really just the time to, you know, whatever that is. Yeah. Um, you, if you’ve operated it in such a way that it’s sellable, it’s still, even then it’s gonna wind down in the best possible manner, or it’s gonna get passed on to the family in the best possible manner. So, yeah. Yeah. I agree with you there.

Brad Burrow: So I wanna switch gears. I wanna talk a little bit about Vistage, um, kind of your connections with Vistage, but I [00:18:30] also want to, you know, we’ve come through the whole Covid mm-hmm. <affirmative> thing, P P P and all that stuff. I mean, did your, what was that like for you guys? Sure. I know that, uh, you know, we were not panicked, but I’m like, I, I heard about the P PPP thing. It’s like, I’ve got to do that mm-hmm. <affirmative>, but, you know, it’s like getting set up to do business with the government. Yeah. You know, this daunting Yes. Things you have to go through. And, and you guys probably took care of a lot of that mm-hmm. <affirmative> for your clients, right? Yes,

Meghan Hovee: [00:19:00] We did. Yeah. Yeah. Covid was interesting. I mean, I thought when everything was set to shut down, I thought, does that mean my clients are all gonna have no business? And then does that mean I’m not gonna have any business? And it was just such an uncertainty. Yeah. And, um, what I found, we, we found ourselves busier than ever. And actually, I would say 90% of my clients grew even more in terms of really output. Yeah. Most, uh, we had a few that the activity dipped, um, but most grew. And I think [00:19:30] that’s kind of the, the small business product services that they’re providing were pretty needed regardless of whether or not, you know, covid was happening. So, um, but yeah, we did have to just jump in the fire, figure out p p p, you know, get applications made, um, and secure those funds, help secure those funds for clients.

Meghan Hovee: Absolutely. I think one really asset, one strong asset to our company is like our, one of our values, and we talked about the website. One of our values you’ll see up there is that, um, we absolutely [00:20:00] believe you need to be a researcher in this industry. Um, you just telling the one answer that you think you know is not an option. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, you have to know the right answer. And those answers change with every, you know, administration swing really like Yeah. Are, if leg legislation tomorrow is gonna change whatever tax deduction we told you about yesterday. Right. So it’s, so when p something like p p P comes up, it’s not a, it’s not like a, oh no, here we go, let’s not do it because we don’t know about it. No. It’s what we do every day. We’re always researching and figuring [00:20:30] out how to get you to where you need to be. So anyway, we dove in. We figured out P p P and p P P changed, you know, the le

Brad Burrow: That’s what I was gonna say it, yeah. Yeah. In the middle mm-hmm.

Meghan Hovee: <affirmative>, at first we thought it was this loan that you were, you know, gonna have to pay back. And then it became this loan that only certain people could have, but you were, it was gonna be forgiven. And pretty soon anyone could have P P P and it was definitely gonna be forgiven. So, you know, um, but we stayed with our clients through that and, and helped them, helped them obtain those funds. And yeah, COVID was a definitely an interesting time, for

Brad Burrow: Sure. Now, have you looked at the ERC [00:21:00] things that are happening right now? Do you know much about that?

Meghan Hovee: Oh, you know, you’re gonna get 55 emails today offering you Oh,

Brad Burrow: It’s, I, I get texts Yeah. Calls on my cell phone. I mean, it’s nonstop.

Meghan Hovee: Yeah. So, one thing that’s oversold, so you do have to have, whereas P P P is really just, if you’re a small business owner with payroll, you qualify, and ERC has more stringent requirements with revenue dips. So you do have to like look case by case. And that’s not what you’re told in those pitches that you get on your phone. A text messages, right? Yeah. Text voicemails, [00:21:30] emails

Brad Burrow: 26,000 per employee.

Meghan Hovee: Yeah, exactly.

Brad Burrow: That’s what it says. Yeah.

Meghan Hovee: Yes. So you, we’ve all memorized the script. Yeah. So yeah, you, I mean, you really need to be able to go to your accountant and ask, I’m hearing the, and we have clients do that all the time. I’m getting this pitch over and over and we’re, we can tell them you do qualify or you don’t. ERC is a good example. One thing we do in our firm is we say we are specialists at the day-to-day tax and accounting. I have clients who will have a high producing year, or they’ll become high net worth. And what I do is go out and find [00:22:00] specialists that I really trust to help process other, like, really special credits that have a whole book of tax code to themselves. Things like the r and d credit. So like ERC would be a good example. If, if I knew a client qualified, then I would help use a reputable firm to get them that credit. Um, but yeah, it’s not, it’s not like P P P where truly all these people that are getting the emails qualified. Yeah,

Brad Burrow: Yeah. Yeah. It’s really interesting, interesting times that we live in, you know, that there’s a lot of money in that for the companies that are helping you [00:22:30] get the erc mm-hmm. <affirmative> payments because they are putting serious effort.

Meghan Hovee: You know, it, you know that the There is, there is, yeah. And yeah, you just see the, in our industry, you’re not supposed to take contingency fees, but they can repackage their fee in a way that’s technically not a contingency fee, but it is. And so, yeah. You know, that they’re, they’re just making X dollars of whatever you’re gonna, you’re gonna get. So

Brad Burrow: That’s why you’re, yeah. And as a small business, you look at that, it’s like, well, it’s, it’s free money almost. Exactly. [00:23:00] You know why? I don’t care if you can make any money off of it if you’re helping me get it mm-hmm. <affirmative>, you know, so that I’m sure that they’re

Meghan Hovee: Yeah. And it’s understandable. Like, that’s fine as long as you really qualify and you get the funds and, and, and that’s all. Okay. It’s just more noise. Like for a business owner who doesn’t qualify, there’s just more noise and more time they might spend going down that rabbit hole that is not for them. So

Brad Burrow: You can’t turn it off.

Meghan Hovee: No, I’m getting them all the time. Like, I’m a CPA for Pete’s sake. Leave me alone.

Brad Burrow: <laugh>. Yeah. So let’s, uh, switch gears [00:23:30] and talk about Vistage. Yes. Tell me how you got involved with Vistage.

Meghan Hovee: Oh, such a fun story. I wish, um, I wish Rick from Legacy Brokers were here, but he’s told his story a lot. Um,

Brad Burrow: They’re just down the street. I

Meghan Hovee: Yeah, they are. Yeah.

Brad Burrow: Yeah. Yeah. I met him recently as well. They’re, they’re trying to do some podcasts and stuff and Yeah. Yes. Really nice guy. I

Meghan Hovee: Can see that. Yeah. He is a Vistage friend through and through. Yeah. Um, so my uncle was the first person to tell me about Vistage, and he just retired as, um, the CEO of a large engineering firm up in the Pacific Northwest. [00:24:00] So he had always told me how great Vistage was. Then I heard about it from another client, um, you know, that Vista, he was in Vistage. And I always thought, that’s too, that’s too big for my size. That that sounds great. And I’m just not there yet.

Brad Burrow: I felt the same way, by the way.

Meghan Hovee: Okay. Oh, good. Okay. It’s not just me. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. And, um, so Rick, uh, with Legacy, they, he had come, we had been introduced by a mutual contact, and we were working through some things. And as we worked through, you know, I guess you could say issue processing, like we say [00:24:30] in Vistage, but as we worked through it, he had said, you know, you are like Vistage material, I guess you’d say. Like you, it just, it seems like a good fit for you. And when I started in Vistage, I was a lot smaller. And so, you know it, and he introduced me to our coach, Jeff Hutzel. Yeah. And it kind of, what happened was I visited, we did the classic like visit the group for a day. Yeah. And I, for the first time in, you know, six years or however many years’ been, it felt like a weight lifted off my shoulders because as a business owner, sole business [00:25:00] owner, it’s a heavy responsibility. It’s day in and day out and it can be a little bit lonely. Um, not to be drab, but you know, walking into that room and hearing it was the issue processing and the, that like the support that people gave each other. The speakers are great, the coaching is good, but it’s the team like community. We drop all of our pretense. We come in here and we really help each other on like the ground level. That’s what sold me for sure.

Brad Burrow: And, and everybody’s going through similar things. It always feels like [00:25:30] to me, like mm-hmm. <affirmative>, you know, whether it’s cashflow or there’s issues, you know, with running the business mm-hmm. <affirmative>, client issues, whatever it is. It’s like you learn something from, you do kind of helping somebody go through something else that you’re like, oh yeah, I’ve been through that.

Meghan Hovee: Yes. I think the human brain, when we constantly tell ourselves, I’m the only one that’s going through this. I’m the only one who’s experienced something this negative, whatever. And then you get in that room with people and you realize, Nope, 30 other people or 20 other people have, have walked this path already.

Brad Burrow: Yeah. [00:26:00] Yeah. Awesome. So I wanna, I wanna kind of switch to focusing on small businesses. You know, obviously who you work with the most. And, um, talk about some of the challenges that, that, you know, we have as small businesses. For me it’s, it’s, well, CO’s changed that a little bit, but, you know, personnel, um, cash flow mm-hmm. <affirmative> marketing marketing’s completely different. Yes. [00:26:30] But from a, from a, an accounting standpoint mm-hmm. <affirmative>, what are some of the challenges that, that you see every day?

Meghan Hovee: Sure. So, um, you know, first of all is honestly finding good help. I mean, again, when come to us, a lot of times they’ve been doing their own books, then it’s kind of definitely wrong <laugh> Yeah. Most of the time, unless we have an accountant, you know, whatever. But yeah. So they’ve been doing it themselves. Someone else has been doing it and has dropped the ball, um, or it’s been getting done and they just haven’t had anyone walk them through it. [00:27:00] We see that a lot where it’s like, I’ve had a great bookkeeper, but my tax CPA won’t speak to ongoing financials, so I don’t have anything to do with these reports that are getting done correctly. I don’t know what they mean. Yeah. Dunno what to do with them. So what, first of all, getting that good help in place, um, is critical so that they’re right.

Meghan Hovee: I mean, it’s amazing. It’s amazing how, how a business owner can soldier on and run their business and grow their business and consistently have bad financials as they do it. Like, I mean, and the tax person just cleans them up just enough to file a tax return. [00:27:30] You know? So it’s getting the good help first of all. And then it’s, I think, you know, to having those meetings, if you wanna really scale your business, you do have to grow your understanding a bit by bit. You know, you can’t be, you can’t just ask your accountant, did I make money or not? Depending on how big you wanna scale, you have to start to, to learn those financials. So

Brad Burrow: When, when you sit down with a small business owner and say, you know, I would really like to grow my business mm-hmm. <affirmative> scale, um, here’s my goal. [00:28:00] Do you sit down with them and say, okay, that’s great. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, here’s, let’s figure out a plan to do that. Here’s what you’re gonna have to invest, here’s things like that. I mean, do you get down to that level?

Meghan Hovee: Yep, yep. Absolutely. So yeah, like an example would be, you know, someone that said, okay, we, we’ve taken on all these employees because we know we wanna grow. And then when I looked at kind of the, the year’s performance, the past year’s performance, and then the forecast for the upcoming year, you know, I had to say, Hey, you have to do X [00:28:30] million in revenue just to justify this employee investment that you’ve made. Let’s talk about whether or not that’s realistic. And like, yeah, let’s, let’s shoot for that. So we forecasted at that revenue point and then every, for a few months, I had to just keep pointing out the fact that like, okay, we didn’t quite hit that forecasted that goal revenue and you still have the employee spend. So I just, you know, you can look at a set of financials and you can focus in on any given category of expense [00:29:00] or overhead, but it does take kind of an analytical mind.

Meghan Hovee: It takes practice to step back and say, this is really the driver, this is driving our loss, is the fact that our employee spend is just, we’re not at a break even for that personnel spend. So yeah, absolutely. I’ll look and say, if we wanna hit this revenue point in however many years, you know, here’s where you have to start today. And you can’t hire that person for that role until you’ve hit this revenue point. Or you can, but then we’ve gotta change your pricing. Yeah, for sure. [00:29:30] We get into, let’s come, let’s say what the goal is and then back into where we, the decisions we have to make today.

Brad Burrow: So are you working with companies on a, on a, I mean, it feels like daily basis to do that. I mean Sure. Is it a monthly type thing or project? I mean, is that, yeah. Do you, does when a company works with you, with your team mm-hmm. <affirmative>, is that just part of the

Meghan Hovee: It’s just part of the package? Yeah. Yeah. So we, I will say we kind of have CFOs geared toward the different sizes. So we have one cfo, she, Michaela [00:30:00] you’d see on our website, she’s pretty dedicated to self-employed individuals. So people that maybe have an employee, maybe not, maybe they’re running their own more lifestyle business so she can speak to that self-employed world who maybe they’re on a schedule C on a tax return. Yeah. She’s kind of focused on that. Whereas my clients, most of them, yes. I meet with a monthly, at least I have, I’ve had clients a couple times, you’ll find me on some other websites cuz I have clients who will put me as the outsource C F O but as part of their team. Is

Brad Burrow: That right?

Meghan Hovee: Mm-hmm. <affirmative> and they’ll make, we’ll have an arrangement with one where I’m, I’m even more invested. [00:30:30] So each week I’m having meetings, I’m part of the admin meeting, you know, so it, again, when I say we tailor it, we want our core offer offering to be really easy to understand. But we do tailor it to what your business needs. You know, it’s, we, you can’t say one size fits all. You can’t come in and say every client needs a monthly meeting for those self-employed folks, that would be overkill for some of our bigger clients. They need to meet weekly maybe. So yeah.

Brad Burrow: What does that process look like? So let’s say, you know, we we’re interested in engaging. What does that process look like? You know, [00:31:00] to get us to the point where we’re now Yeah.

Meghan Hovee: In the, we’re rolling. Yeah. Yeah. So it kind of, I would say twofold. Number one is getting, you know, just getting access to the accounting to figure out do we have to improve the process? Is it good and we’re just taking it over. Do we have some cleanup? So number one, we do have to look at the nuts and bolts of the accounting and how you want to present your financials versus how they have been presented. Cuz if someone’s just been doing them on a tax basis, we have Vistage folks who come in all the time, that’s like our best referral source. Vistage people are really mm-hmm. <affirmative>, they’re pretty stellar. [00:31:30] Yeah. So they’ll come in and they might say, this is what I know I need to understand. And we’ll look at the financials and say, then we have to change up the process of producing the financials.

Meghan Hovee: So we have to look at that. That’s step one. And our turnaround time is like, hey, you, from the time you reach out and wanna talk, you know, it might be a week before we’ve looked at the financials and figure out kind of a quote for the accounting, the nuts and bolts. Um, and then usually it’s a first time actual session of doing that sort of CFO session. We do ongoing, it’s a first time that then we realize we uncover your [00:32:00] needs. Like maybe you just, you desperately need a lot of help, um, on a lot of levels. And so maybe we talk about meeting monthly or weekly for the beginning, or maybe you’re someone that I, I’m pretty good. My business is pretty systematic. I just want someone to give me good reports. Yeah. Okay. We can talk about meeting less often. So it’s, it’s getting into accounting and reviewing it, and then it’s also having a meeting with you to learn what your goals are, what your pain points are, and then we’ll, we’ll come up with a, this is what we think you need for like, fixed services ongoing. And then to be honest, [00:32:30] they change once in a while, but not often. Like, we do a pretty good job in that first onboarding to, you know, determine

Brad Burrow: Understanding

Meghan Hovee: Needs. Exactly

Brad Burrow: What needs to happen and Yeah. On a basis. Yeah. So how are you gonna grow?

Meghan Hovee: Yeah. Great question. <laugh>. Um, I’ve put a lot of energy into that over the last couple of years. Our method of growth is we have what we call now, it’s been more, um, we’ve put a lot more structure into it. So we call it an intern to CFO program. So we take someone who is green on like, [00:33:00] in the accounting, like they have some accounting, um, education experience mm-hmm. <affirmative>, but maybe they don’t have a ton of accounting work in the field. So we, we take someone who knows that they have to have the aptitude, we have to kind of determine that like, you would enjoy this work day in and day out and, you know, definitely be a people person.

Brad Burrow: I wouldn’t be a candidate, by

Meghan Hovee: The way, <laugh>. Right. I’ll say there’s a lot of Brads that would like no pass

Brad Burrow: <laugh>. Yeah. Yeah.

Meghan Hovee: So we have to kinda determine the aptitudes there, but then we train for it. They, the timeline can vary a little bit, but like six to nine months [00:33:30] it’s been our average. We train and those people are working with our clients kind of in a paraprofessional manner. We have paraprofessionals on staff. They work in that manner. So they learn clients, they learn communication, client service. They also learn the nuts and bolts of tax filings and QuickBooks and accounting. And then we stand them up to be a CFO who then serves their own clients. So each cfo, as we call it, has their own list of clients that I’m not helping those folks day to day. Rachel is, or Michaela is. Um, we all operate in that manner. So we’re just gonna continue [00:34:00] to grow our firm through that intern to cfo, um, program.

Brad Burrow: Now, will they be CPAs?

Meghan Hovee: They will either be enrolled agents, some of their credential or cpa, and we really support them getting their cpa. But like for, um, in our firm right now we have two CPAs and one enrolled agent. And Mikayla’s arguably more of a tax whiz than even Rachel or I, because she’s got such deep like tax and IRS knowledge. So we kind of, and she’s the one that focuses more on the self-employed folks. So it’ll range the credential range, but they’ll, they’re credentialed [00:34:30] before they become that cfo.

Brad Burrow: Yeah. That’s awesome. So you’re, you’ll help ’em get to that point.

Meghan Hovee: Exactly. Yeah. And we’ll pay for like the CPA testing. If that is someone’s dream, we’ll pay for that. So yeah, we wanna support whate. However, whatever level you wanna get to in your accounting career, we wanna support that.

Brad Burrow: So tell me some of the things that you’re doing from a, a marketing standpoint. Sure. And obviously Vistage is probably a great lead source for you. Yeah. Are you doing other things outside of that? Oh,

Meghan Hovee: That’s a great question. So we have historically always had just kind [00:35:00] of word of mouth as our main referral source. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. Um, and in just in the last year, I have hired Mari, who is our director of marketing. So she’s revamped our website. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, um, revamped kind of our social media posting. Um, Lord help us before we have Mari like it was myself sporadically, but yeah. You know, she really begged me like, can we please just remove everything you’ve done to the point of coming

Brad Burrow: <laugh>. Yeah.

Meghan Hovee: So we’ve a, we’ve added Marie Claire to our team in terms of really supporting [00:35:30] and having a more cohesive message that carries through the community. Um, so that’s really been our first marketing effort and we’ll go from there, but it’s just having someone dedicated to that has been

Brad Burrow: The first step. You know, I feel like you have a lot and your team have a lot of, of knowledge that could really help small businesses. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, I wonder if that wouldn’t be a really cool thing to think about is Yeah. You know? Yes. You know, just training us, teaching us why do I need to do this? How do I do this? Yeah. You know, that, that kind of thing. There’s always, I’ve seen [00:36:00] a lot of these, um, uh, marketing tactics out there where you’ll teach somebody something, but they’ll realize that, well, yeah, I can’t really do this. Yes. I thought I could. Yep. You know? Exactly. Exactly. And then you know who to call.

Meghan Hovee: That’s exactly, exactly right. Yes. So I, um, that’s been a passion of mine. I’ve always been passionate about public speaking and writing for that matter. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. Um, those are things that don’t scare me, like they do a lot of people. I just enjoy that. So that’s always been a dream of mine. And Mari has encouraged me that as you grow, [00:36:30] kind of move more into the CEO role, consider really focusing on that. And it’s been cool to come out to real media because I’m like, wow, there are people in this community that have the tools to get us to where we wanna be with that. So I agree completely sharing content and doing that systematically and consistently would be a great next step for us as we grow.

Brad Burrow: Do you find that a lot of the small business owners don’t really understand the benefit of accounting?

Meghan Hovee: Oh, for sure. <laugh>.

Brad Burrow: I mean that, I mean, that’s where my mind goes is like, really, [00:37:00] you know, we got into this because we love doing video. Yes. Or we do, you know, love doing what we’re doing, but yeah. Do we really benefit from accounting? Can you talk about that a little bit? I mean, just the, the process of helping somebody see a light bulb come on. It’s like, oh, okay, yes, I need to be doing this differently. Uhhuh

Meghan Hovee: <affirmative>. Um, I see that all the time. I also see, like, I know you’re used to it in your industry. Um, there’s a real, there’s a big underestimating of what it takes to produce [00:37:30] accurate financials. We’ve got great tools these days. Yeah. But if you’re not trained in accounting, you still won’t use the tools correctly. So it was funny to your point about putting out a little video and that actually causing people to realize as you share the content, oh, I actually need more help than I thought after you’ve taught me something about this. Yes. We, that’s, I mean, we do that with bookkeeping. We’ll say, you can do your own bookkeeping. Let us walk you through the basic steps to where you’re producing the right financials. You know, halfway in they’re like, oh, can you just gimme a quote to do this <laugh>? Yeah, certainly.

Meghan Hovee: Yeah. Um, I think [00:38:00] is there a benefit to accounting for the business owner without a relationship that advises on it? Maybe not very much of a benefit. So if I’m getting really good financials and I don’t understand them, then I, that benefit is really diminished. So I think the benefit is having good financials and then also having someone to make them meaningful. And, you know, there are business owners out there who can understand financials. My uncle, the CEO of the engineering [00:38:30] firm told me, you know, he scaled beyond what I have seen in most of my day-to-day with businesses doing zero to 5 million in revenue. Um, but he had told me, you know, I bought a textbook, a college textbook about accounting when he was just still a manager and I think asked aspiring. So you, if you wanna go to those links, that’s great, otherwise find someone to help you understand them. So then yes, there’s a huge benefit. Oh, last year I did 200,000 on the bottom line and this year I’m doing 250,000, but I have less cash and here’s [00:39:00] why. And do I wanna keep investing in equipment than, I mean, yes, there’s a huge benefit, but you’ve gotta be able to understand it.

Brad Burrow: Do you feel a sense of responsibility when you’re working with clients that you need to know what’s going on? Does that weigh on you at all?

Meghan Hovee: Yeah, definitely. Over, you know, I have had to work on that because I think, especially as I started out, I felt overly responsible and sometimes I have to let the, the client take more ownership, if anything. So, yeah. Oh yeah. And I, we hire, [00:39:30] you know, we’ve hired a lot of people a lot like me. And I will never change that in that people, our team cares so much about the person on the other end of the phone or, you know, across the desk. Um, we care a lot and that’s a really good tension to have. But yeah, we feel a ton of responsibility and we care when we hear, you know, negative events that happen with our clients or whatever, we care as if it was someone who’s part of our team. Um, so certainly I feel a lot of responsibility. How

Brad Burrow: How do you deal with that?

Meghan Hovee: Oh, you know, <laugh> therapy, <laugh>. Yeah,

Brad Burrow: I know. I mean, that’s a [00:40:00] lot of weight to carry around. It is

Meghan Hovee: A lot of weight, you know? Yeah. It, it is. Honestly learning that’s a huge belief I have is your business can only scale to the extent that you’re willing to grow personally and professionally. I don’t think a business can grow in a healthy way a lot further than your own capacity. And so I have had to work on, you know, having healthy boundaries in the beginning. A as you know, a small business owners, you tell me what you want done, you tell me when it wa you want it done, you tell me what price you want it done for, and we just say yes to all of it. Yeah. And I’ve [00:40:30] had to, but that’s been good. And I want my business owners to have the same, um, the same kind of healthy self relationship where they have healthier boundaries with their own customers and they can have more predictability in their lives.

Meghan Hovee: And same is true for my team. So I’ve had to just do a lot of, honestly, internal work when you’re working with, I don’t, at, at one time, I probably was helping 300 different people because we hadn’t dropped the tax only work. And so when you’re working with that many people and that many people have access to you, like yeah, you’ve gotta get stringent on, [00:41:00] you know, where you do bend a little bit. Yeah. And where you don’t sacrifice and making time for yourself. In fact, when I went through a more challenging event a few months ago, my uncle said, as the CEO of your, your firm, you, you have an obligation to get refreshed. You have an obligation to take a break and get rejuvenated. And so I think you gotta, the more, the bigger you get and the more people you’re answering to, the more you have to take that time for yourself and make sure that your kind of mental health is, is strong. Yeah. So,

Brad Burrow: So what, what, what does your business look like in five years?

Meghan Hovee: [00:41:30] Yeah, so five years, the goal would up to three offices at that point. Okay. So yeah, I will say our goal next year, 2024, our goal is to have actually specifically an Overland Park office. Tons of our clients are south of the river, and we’re just a little bit north right now. Yeah. Um, and so, and our team, we have a couple teammates that are out south. So our goal is to have a second office as we grow, we want to stay in small teams because that’s been very successful for us. So that means three CFOs and they each have a paraprofessional helping [00:42:00] them and keep the office to that size. Um, so that our clients continue to feel that small business. Like I know all these people I’m talking to, I know how they work together. If you were to look at our reviews or Google reviews, you’d see there’s a lot of reference to the team at Ho and Co and they all help. And so we wanna keep that team feel as we grow. But so three offices in Kansas City, metropolitan area would be,

Brad Burrow: Yeah. That’s awesome. Yeah, we have some space available if

Meghan Hovee: You, there we go. <laugh>.

Brad Burrow: Alright,

Meghan Hovee: Let’s [00:42:30] sign up after this. <laugh>.

Brad Burrow: Well, that’s great. Um, so let’s, I’d like to go ahead and wrap up. Um, so if somebody wanted to reach out to you, what would that process look like? How, how would they do that?

Meghan Hovee: Yeah, absolutely. So, uh, the process looks like, um, we have it contact us on our page. It is really helpful if people fill out the questionnaire that we have there. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, it kind of asks like, what is your business size? What are you currently doing for your accounting needs? What are you looking for? That gives us a lot of information [00:43:00] when we first, you know, see your submission. Um, and then we are, especially per my marketing director back here, she’s big on, there’s a phone call that happens. <laugh>. Yeah. <laugh>. So we wanna call and hear more of your story and go from there. So whether you, um, use the website or give us a call at our phone number that you can find online, um, 8 1 6 6 3 1 5 2 3 6. Um, yeah, those

Brad Burrow: Are, and then so would a meeting happen and, and then like, tell me the process of onboarding. How, how does that look? How long does [00:43:30] it take?

Meghan Hovee: Yeah. I will say too, my team would kill me if I didn’t say this right now we have one CFO going on maternity leave, so we’re looking at like the fall timeline for onboarding new clients. Oh, is that right? Right. Yeah. So it’ll be here before you know it. And, um, so you typically, we, as we’re getting full, we always have one person coming on to be cfo, which is true. Now we’ve got, um, a wonderful gal, Gabrielle, who I work with day in and day out. Um, but because we’ve got one going on maternity leave, there’s a little bit of a pause. Um, but when, you know, fall will be here before we [00:44:00] know it. Yeah. Um, and that process looks like, you know, we take down, our office manager will take down some information, um, about what you’re looking for, what you need, the, the experience you have had. To this point we like to know well, is has there been some dissatisfaction and why? And, and then, um, they will get a meeting scheduled with you and a CFO to talk through, you know, more of your needs and, and go from there. Okay.

Brad Burrow: Awesome. Well that’s great. So they can reach out to you. Um, we’ll put the link on, on in the, uh, podcast as well. Yeah. But, uh, reach out [00:44:30] and start that process. Yep. And, uh, third quarter. Fourth quarter

Meghan Hovee: Maybe, <laugh>. Exactly. Exactly. And it’s a good time. At least we’re not in like January and Yeah, good luck with your tax filing. You know, we can’t help you. So this is a good time of year. We love people that reach out this time of year or in the fall because those are like the proactive people that know I can’t get a turnaround and get a tax return done next month as a new client. Right. So we love people who are reaching out this time of year for sure. So, yeah.

Brad Burrow: Do you, one, one last question I thought of too. Do you have a preference? [00:45:00] Like I, I would imagine most of the smaller businesses are using QuickBooks. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, do you have a preference on what platform?

Meghan Hovee: That’s a great question. We are, we tend to use QuickBooks and the people that come to us tend to use QuickBooks. QuickBooks online specifically, just because QuickBooks has focused so much of their resources on their online cloud product.

Brad Burrow: It used to be terrible.

Meghan Hovee: Yeah. It

Brad Burrow: Is it better now? Oh, it’s the online version.

Meghan Hovee: Yeah. I don’t, I don’t think there’s anything in the, on the market that is superior, honestly. Okay. And I have my grumblings with support and service, [00:45:30] but the actual technology of the accounting software itself is great. And I’m not speaking for payroll. If you wanna get into payroll, that’s a different discussion. Yeah. I’m not gonna advocate for their payroll service. <laugh>. Yeah.

Brad Burrow: <laugh>.

Meghan Hovee: Yeah. But for their accounting, QuickBooks online. That being said, if someone uses something different, um, and they’re a good fit as a potential client, we will get in and figure that out. Like, we know how to figure out software.

Brad Burrow: I didn’t even know the other ones out there that

Meghan Hovee: It’s limited. Yeah. Yeah.

Brad Burrow: QuickBooks has really taken over the small business markets.

Meghan Hovee: It has taken it over. It’s, and if you wanna get to where [00:46:00] your enterprise software and your accounting software are, are one piece of software, true accounting, you know, a lot of people, they get a revenue report and they think that that’s accounting software. Yeah. Like, no, it’s not, it’s not giving you a balance sheet. Right. So, um, all that to say, if you get to that size where your enterprise, your operation software and your accounting are the same, that’s a, a high dollar investment. And typically our clients aren’t that size. So, yeah. But yeah. Awesome. Great question on that. Well,

Brad Burrow: I, I appreciate that’s, I’m sure like small business people think about things like this, how to do that. Yes. You know, [00:46:30] invoicing and all that stuff. Absolutely. Okay, so the last thing, this, this is the last thing that everybody does on the podcast. You have to do the movie voice. Oh, okay. I hope you’re ready for this, cuz you have to do in a world with real media and I’ll show you. So you gotta get really close to the mic and you go in a world with real media. Okay. So can you do your movie voice

Meghan Hovee: Just like yours, Uhhuh <affirmative> in a world with real media

Brad Burrow: <laugh>. See, you’re gonna watch. Just started with that.

Meghan Hovee: Brad <laugh>. That’s a good icebreaker.

Brad Burrow: <laugh>, you did great. You [00:47:00] did great. Well, thank you so much for joining us. I, I think this is gonna help a lot of people. And, and, uh, again, just tell me how, how would we get ahold of you?

Meghan Hovee: Yep, absolutely. Um, website or phone number is, is our kind of our main modes of communication. So the website is ho v and code.com. That’s h o v (as in Victor), e e a n d c o.com. That’s the new website. Okay. And our phone number is (816) 631-5236. [00:47:30] And I will say even with our little bit of pause here on our maternity leave season, um, with one of our CFOs, I will say that don’t hesitate to reach out to us because we make it our mission to get you help no matter what. So if someone contacts us and said, I heard you’re a great tax preparer and I only need a tax return done, we will handhold you to our colleague who we refer for that or whatever. Don’t hesitate to out, to hesitate to reach out because we wanna help no matter what.

Brad Burrow: That’s great to know. Well, thanks again for joining us. This is the In A World [00:48:00] Real Media Podcast. Please subscribe, share it, share it with your friends. Anybody needs small business, uh, help with accounting. You know where to turn now. We thank you for listening and we’ll see you soon.

OUTRO: This has been In A World with Real Media. Thanks for joining us. And be sure to subscribe on iTunes and follow Real Media on Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn. So you never miss an episode.