Employee Ownership and Rural Market Success With Adrian Rodriguez of Commercial Tire

Adrian Rodriguez is the Vice President of Marketing and Retail Sales at Commercial Tire, a leading tire and auto service provider with over 45 locations across Idaho, Washington, Oregon, and Utah. Before joining Commercial Tire, he spent a decade with John Deere, sharpening his expertise in marketing and retail strategy. Adrian helped lead Commercial Tire’s transition to 100% employee ownership in 2019, fostering a culture rooted in accountability and local investment. Outside of work, he’s an avid skier and downhill mountain biker, embracing extreme sports with the same energy he brings to business.

In this episode…

Tire and automotive services often operate behind the scenes, yet they serve as foundational pillars of local economies. As some businesses evolve toward more employee-centric models, the conversation around ownership, community impact, and internal culture is gaining momentum. What does it look like when a tire company becomes 100% employee-owned — and how does that change everything?

According to Adrian Rodriguez, who leads marketing and retail sales for Commercial Tire, becoming employee-owned was both a strategic and cultural transformation. The shift not only enhanced operational efficiency through collective accountability but also redirected profits into local communities where employees live and work. By fostering a deep sense of ownership at every level, the company unlocked new opportunities for innovation, loyalty, and long-term sustainability.

On this episode of Gain Traction, Mike Edge welcomes Adrian Rodriguez for a deep dive into Commercial Tire’s evolution as a 100% employee-owned company. Adrian shares how this ownership model impacts culture, accountability, and profitability. He also discusses B2B and consumer marketing challenges, the importance of community engagement, and how internal values drive lasting success.

Here’s a glimpse of what you’ll learn: 

• [01:45] How Adrian Rodriguez’s career started with free pizza and an internship at John Deere
• [02:41] How a decade at John Deere built Adrian’s marketing foundation
• [04:09] The bold move to 100% employee ownership at Commercial Tire
• [05:35] The culture shift that employee ownership created across the company
• [09:59] Navigating the COVID-19 transition as a newly employee-owned business
• [12:18] Why employee ownership accelerates community investment
• [17:00] How Adrian’s team markets to fleet and HVAC companies
• [19:19] Challenges of marketing consumer services with a “commercial” brand name

Resources mentioned in this episode:

• Adrian Rodriguez on LinkedIn 
• Commercial Tire 
• Dan Kahn on LinkedIn
• Kahn Media 
• Mike Edge on LinkedIn
• Tread Partners

Quotable Moments:

• “If every employee saves just 15 minutes a day, that’s real money and real efficiency across hundreds of people.”
• “Ownership isn’t just a title — it’s a mindset that drives innovation from the tire tech to the C-suite.”
• “We’re not teammates — we’re employee-owners. And that changes how we think about the whole business.”
• “Do epic sh*t. Whether it’s leading, marketing, or community building — go all in.”
• “Tires may not seem glamorous, but they touch every aspect of how society moves.”

Action Steps:

1. Create a culture of ownership: Encourage every team member to identify ways they can improve efficiency daily.
2. Use visual tools for sales enablement: Leverage video cards or segmented brochures for tailored B2B outreach.
3. Build wealth locally: Adopt models that allow profits to return to employees and the communities they serve.
4. Embrace marketing playfulness: Use creative, localized campaigns to connect with new markets despite brand name challenges.
5. Lead with mantras: Choose a powerful phrase that reflects your culture and let it guide decision-making.

• Adrian Rodriguez
• Commercial Tire
• Gain Traction Podcast
• Mike Edge
• Tread Partners

Transcript

00:02
Welcome to the Gain Traction Podcast where we feature top tire and auto repair professionals, shop owners, industry executives and thought leaders and share their inspiring stories. Now let’s get started with the show.

00:19
Hey folks. Welcome to the Gain Traction Podcast, the official podcast of tire business. I have a great guest today, Adrian Rodriguez with Commercial Tire Vice President of Marketing and Retail sales. Commercial Tire has 45 locations in Idaho, Washington, Oregon and Utah. Great company. Can’t wait for this interview. But before we begin, let me read you this Sponsorship this episode is brought to you by Tread Partners. Tread Partners is the leading digital marketing agency that specializes in digital marketing for multi location tire and auto repair shops. Tread Partners works with clients that have hundreds of locations, down to five locations. Let Tread Partners take a look under your digital marketing hood today. To learn more or to contact them, visit treadpartners.com My past guest shout out today is for Dan Kahn. He’s the founder and CEO of Kahn Media in Los Angeles.

01:09
Man, we had a great interview. Kahn Media is actually the media company for sema. So it’s a very cool interview. Had a lot of fun talking to Dan and we talked about his book which was great. But you can listen to the podcast at gain traction podcast.com Adrian Rodriguez, welcome to the Gain Traction Podcast.

01:28
Thanks a lot. Happy to be here.

01:30
Yeah, I’m happy to have you here. So, you know, let’s just talk about in the beginning, you, where’d you start in life and how did you get to tires?

01:41
Well, I won’t go all the way back, but let’s go back to undergraduate school and.

01:46
Perfect.

01:47
I’ll be honest with you, I was kind of a little lost and looking for something to do and internships were kind of a thing at the time. And so honestly, I saw an email come through saying free pizza. If you listen to this internship talk, you’re.

02:02
You’re kidding.

02:03
No, no, that was it. I’m in college and I’m hungry, right? So. So it’s this company called John Deere and I’m not familiar with John Deere much besides that. You know, I see their hats and sometimes their tractors. So long story short, I go and give me some free pizza and I end up with a internship. Did that three years in a row in undergraduate. Went on full time with John Deere and was in their marketing department, all different roles in different places around the country for about 10 years. So that’s kind of what cut my teeth on marketing and retail sales and those sorts of things was those are the Free pizza and John Deere.

02:42
I love your story, but I, I mean that’s a great, respectable company to start with, man.

02:47
Yeah, no, in fact there’s a lot of. And so you kind of asked, how did I get into tires? I mean there’s a lot of similarities between the two industries that I’ve found really kind of translate well. And so in between my time at John Deere, I took some time off, I’ll be honest, had some fun, traveled the world for a couple of years, came back and kind of needed something more full time and was introduced to the founder and the president of Commercial Tire here in Boise, Idaho area. And you know, kind of just talked him into giving me a job. And, and you know, it translated really well.

03:22
I remember one of the first days when I was talking to one of my co workers, he said, we operate in places you’ll never even know about, these tiny little cities in Idaho and Washington and whatnot. And said, oh, I’ve been there’s a John Deere dealership there. I called on that one. So it was a great translation of my skill set and kind of the experiences that I had. So that brought me to Tires going on now seven years.

03:46
That’s fantastic. I love that story. So, you know, one of the things that I wanted to talk to you guys about, that you guys are an employee owned company, which is phenomenal. I mean, A, there’s the rare and then B, they’re really rare in our industry. So was that in place when you got there or did that get in place after you got there?

04:10
So probably about a year and a half in Mike is when we became employee owned and went a lot of employee owned companies typically kind of are kind of a longer term cycle of transition. So typically they’ll go 20%, 25% and then over the years the employees will buy them out. Well, fortunate for us, in late 2019 we converted to 100% employee owned. And so that is not only unique to go 100% right out of the gate, but also pretty unique in our industry. Like you said, off the top of my head, I can think of maybe only a handful of employee owned tire retailers like us. Yeah, so it’s really been a great thing, a really big learning curve for all of us because it adds a lot of different layers.

04:57
We’re not only concerned about profitability as a senior leader and longevity and strategy and those sorts of things. But you know, everyone is a shareholder now and so you bring on a board of directors and things like that. So it changes the way you think about the business a little bit, I bet.

05:15
I mean, I would think that it gives you so much of a feel of ownership that I mean like even walking out to the parking lot make you conscious of just what looks good or bad or you probably have more opinion about something, I guess in the I care vibe. Does that make sense?

05:36
Yeah. No. In fact, that’s one of the huge benefits of employee owned companies is they tend to grow faster and excel a little bit faster. Because if you truly create that culture of ownership, then you’ve got everyone from the brand new tire tech thinking, how can I make this process a little bit more efficient? How can I save, like maybe it’s even just tire chalk. How can I save a little bit here and there? And you get that kind of culture all the way up to the president of the company and the senior leadership. You know, what kind of impact does that make? I always talk about, you know, we try to make it relatable to our employee owners. And I say, well, if you think about just a couple things is one, how can we all save time every day?

06:18
That’s a huge difference whether you’re in accounting, whether you’re a tire tech, whether you’re in marketing. If we all saved a couple minutes, 15 minutes a day, times hundreds and hundreds of employees, times 365 days, that’s real money, that’s real efficiency. So things like that I think really create an advantage and it’s this new culture of ownership. So it’s really been kind of a great thing for us.

06:40
I didn’t think of it in the math way that you just put it. That’s a really cool way of doing it. Because you, I mean if you’re thinking about saving time and you’ve got hundreds of employees and everybody thinks they can shave a minute here or there, man, that adds up, that gets real. That you create some massive efficiencies over time.

06:58
Well, not only that, I think you. We like to think about the ideation perspective, right, Is like, you know, especially as a senior leadership team, we’re not on the front lines every day. You know, a lot of us, not myself personally, but started on those front lines, but that was years ago. So if someone’s doing that job today, has this idea that we can save our time, save time, drive profitability across the company and they elevate that because they have that feeling of ownership, think of how much more rapidly we can improve as a company with that kind of culture.

07:30
Oh, man, it’s unbelievable. Well, it makes me think of. And I’m just gonna go ahead and pull this out, but you. You got a mantra that you kind of live by. It’s. You showed. It sits on your desk, if you don’t mind.

07:43
And I can show it to you. So you asked me what kind of mantra I live by and what’s something simple? And I was like, you know, I got this sign on my desk I had created. And so here’s what it says. It says, do epic shit. So no matter whether it’s, you know, marketing leading, you know, acting like an owner, the thing I like to live by personally is. Is, you know, just that phrase itself, you know.

08:08
Yeah, but it really fits well with the culture you just described. Like, you’re not. There’s no, there’s nothing, there’s no boundaries to doing epic shit. I mean, you’re just like, what can I do today to. To maximize not just for myself, but for the company at large? And, and man, it’s such a winning attitude.

08:27
Well, and. And, you know, you think. And I think as you think about that phrase, and I think about how that translates to, you know, before we call it teammates, you know, I think that’s. That’s the culture every one of us is trying to make in business is, oh, we’re all teammates. We’re not employees, you know, well, now we’re employee owners together. So how do we do epic shit together as employee owners to raise all the tides, you know, and really drive. It’s, it’s really a wealth building tool at the end of the day. So each one of our employee owners, it’s a way for them to kind of gain wealth in a way they wouldn’t have the opportunity otherwise. In addition.

09:04
Yeah, and I just, I think it got. It’s got to build that culture that you look at. Everybody in the company has. I mean, they’re all owners, right? So everybody has their part to play, and every part’s important. I mean, it’s just kind of like the, you know, the, I don’t know, somewhere in scripture or whatever it says, you know, the. The eye is. It can’t be an ear, and the, you know, or, you know, one appendage can’t be the other. But you need all of them. You don’t want to miss any of them. I mean, you know what I’m saying? It’s like, so you need every part of the body, and it’s kind of like you’re the, You’re One body working in one. One place, doing one go.

09:41
Absolutely. And that’s what we’re trying to really kind of cultivate here with that employee ownership message, Mike.

09:46
So I love it. So. So go back a little bit. You said 2019, man, that must. That’s a big transition. And then you guys hit covet, or. We all did, but, I mean.

09:56
Yeah. Yeah.

09:57
So how was that?

10:00
Well. Well, as you can imagine, Covid was fun for all of us. So not only had we just kind of transitioned, trying to figure out this new way of operating and trying to build culture, and how do we not only communicate employee ownership to the market, because it’s also, I think, a benefit, especially in the Pacific Northwest, to do business with other people who live there. They want to know that their money is going to a good place and going back into their communities. And then. So we. We were dealing with all that, and how do we figure this thing out? And board members and these kinds of things. And then Covid hits, and I’ll tell you what, you easily forget. I. At least I did. You know, were having daily meetings, Mike, the senior team, on what do we do?

10:44
What triggers do we need to pull, what do we need to prepare for? And then, by the way, we’re all employee owners, so we gotta keep this thing going, too, for every one of us employees. So it was a challenge, but, you know, we made it through, and, like, hopefully most did, and I think we came out better for it on the. At the other side.

11:02
Oh, I definitely think it helped companies come together. I mean, look, it busted a lot of companies, and the heartbreaker for me is busted a lot of good restaurants. You know, I mean, that just. That was the nature of it, unfortunately. But if you were able to survive, I think people that made it through as a team really came out stronger because of it. It’s like adversity always. I mean, it can go two ways, right? But if you. If you come out together on the other side and you’re victorious, then it’s kind of like you just, hey, man, went through all that together, you know, and it’s like, it builds that camaraderie even more, you know, it’s kind of like being a foxhole, I’d say together. I mean, that’s maybe extreme or whatever, but, you know, men that go to battle, they.

11:46
They have a natural bond because they went through everything together. So that’s awesome. So the building community thing, I think that’s huge. Anyway. I think. I think that’s the nature of our. Our Industry as a whole. But I would say that you guys are probably a little bit on steroids in regards to the focus of that just because it is employee owned. So, you know, the, you do take a little bit more ownership individually for every little league team or high school sport that you’re involved in or sign that you put on a, you know, the wall out in left field or center field or whatever.

12:19
Yeah. And I think from a community aspect, Mike, it’s interesting. So when you look at our footprint and we talked a little bit about this before we started recording today, but you know, we operate in a lot of rural communities. Yeah. And so. So knowing your neighbors is something that’s just a reality.

12:36
Yeah.

12:36
Right. And so with employee ownership, we’ve got locations in these small communities where the profitability of the company is going right back to those people who live in those communities, you know, rural or not. And so not only have we been involved in communities across the board since 1968 and when our founders started the company, but now it’s kind of like you said, it’s kind of accelerated a little bit. We’re now, we’re building wealth within those communities through our employee owners. So I think instead of it going back to someone in Wall street or you know, just one person’s pocket, I think that really kind of creates a different perspective and I think it really helps us build that community.

13:21
Because at the end of the day, I mean, you know, I’ll go to the grocery store and see, you know, fellow employee owners and I’ll see customers and things like that. And especially in the rural communities, you know, it’s accelerated even more.

13:33
Tell me a little bit about, I’m curious. So you guys are. What, what’s the. I know you call yourself commercial tire, but I know you also do some pasture light truck, but as a percentage, commercial. What is 80, 90%?

13:48
Yeah, so I’d say commercial. When you look at business to business, that is the lion’s share of what we do. That’s anything from, you know, huge mines down to like H vac landscape companies. So all that.

14:03
That’s what I was going to ask you. I was curious. So you’re really, you’re pretty extreme then.

14:08
And yeah, that’s kind of that commercial B2B part that we have. But then we do have significant amount of consumer. And so that would be your. What a lot of people think of is pretty typical is your passenger light truck, you know, someone needing a set of new tires, got a Flat. We do mechanical things like that. So that is a good portion of our business. But a lot of it is, you know, we do everything down from, you know, ATV tires all the way up to these huge tires that ship direct, you know, to the mines.

14:37
That’s awesome. And I’d say you kind of almost bound to be broad because if you’re in that many rural communities, they kind of look at you as the go to guys for everything, don’t they? I mean like if you’re dealing with, let’s say for instance, managers or folks that are running mines and things like that, well, they still, they’re still coming to you about for their, their wives car, I’m sure.

15:01
Well, you know, and it’s funny you say that because a couple years ago I asked our founder Bob, you know, I said well why did we even sell passenger light truck or named commercial tire? You know, that’s a significant part of our business. And he said, well, years ago, you know, farming, you know, was one of our big and still is one of our biggest areas of focus. He said, well then the farmer was coming to me and he said, well, what about my wife’s Cadillac? I don’t want to do. I like you, we got a good partnership. I trust you. I want you to put the tires on her car too. So he said all right. Well, you know, and you know how it goes when you’re building a business. It’s like absolutely. You just say yes and you should.

15:39
Yeah, no, it’s funny, I. So I’ve talked to multiple commercial tire dealers or ag folks that are primarily ag and one of them I know relatively well, they do a lot in the ag. I mean it’s a pretty cool operation. But it’s funny, they actually have what is considered to be a very successful, you know, consumer side and they really don’t want to be there. But they’re there because all of their customers rely on them and their consumer side. Out of just one, they have three shops. But the one shop I’m thinking of, it’s so big, yet it pales in. It’s big in comparison to most people dealing in consumer tires, you know, across the country. But it’s just a small part of their ag business, you know, in regards total revenue. But it’s just like for them it’s just necessary.

16:32
But to somebody else it would be a great business, you know, I mean like on the consumer side, if you were just doing one store in your head. But yeah, they Were just like, hey, it’s this. It’s foregone conclusion. We’re not getting out of it. We. We got to have it. I mean, you know, because everybody relies on us and everybody brings their spouse’s cars or their own. I mean, their trucks, all that personal stuff.

16:53
Yeah, absolutely. So we’re. We’re trying to service the customer in any way that we can. That’s for sure.

17:00
Tell me. God, I lost my train of thought here. I had another question for you on the commercial side. So you do everything from my. Oh, I know. I was going to ask you on the fleet side. So you’re. You’re down with H VAC companies, plumbing companies. You’re a marketing guy. I’ve always been curious, how do you market to those folks?

17:18
So for us, really, it’s more about, I would say, materials that enable those salespeople. So we have a big outside sales force, so they go directly to these companies in our areas. And so really, from a marketing aspect, what we do is then provide all the materials that can help explain the value that commercial tire brings things in a professional way. So, you know, whether that be, you know, we just made these really cool video cards that show videos of all the things that we do as commercial tire, and those are leave behinds that could be brochures, it could be, you know, a lot of different things that we’ve done in the past from a marketing perspective.

18:03
Now, do you dial that into like a vertical? Like, I mean, is the. Is the. Is the collateral that you put create. Is that. Is that strictly for the. A specific vertical and you do it each. Each way, that way. Does that make sense?

18:17
Yes and yes and no. So we do. So we do it by each one of those segments.

18:24
Okay.

18:24
So we call kind of that H vac landscape. That’s kind of what we call fleet partners.

18:29
Okay.

18:31
And then, of course, we’ve got, you know, OTR and we’ve got AG, and then we’ve got traditional trucking. And so we’ve got materials for each. But then we also have. Because you think of these larger companies and they may need all of those things. Yeah, right. So we’ve got materials that talk about just the general value that commercial tire brings. So from a marketing perspective, that’s kind of really how we’ve approached the market. And then the consumer side is a whole different animal, as you can imagine. We’re talking, you know, streaming video and social media and all those different things.

19:03
Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah.

19:05
A little bit different spot.

19:06
I’m curious. So on the consumer side, you know, you, you brought up that when you talked to Bob that one time about why you do it and everything. Okay. Is it a challenge to be in the consumer side with the name commercial in your business?

19:20
Of course you, of course you’d ask. That’s absolutely. Yeah. So a lot of that is kind of, you know, we’ve been around since 1968 as a commercial tire.

19:31
Yeah.

19:32
So I think for the most part we’re pretty well known entity and company. Where we see challenges is, and I was just looking, actually they just came out with a new survey here in the Treasure Valley, which includes Boise in the last five years has grown 14%. And that’s pretty dramatic for a city. And so where we have challenges kind of from a marketing perspective is how do we tell new people? Yeah, you know, people have been around their whole lives. They know commercial tire, they know what we do and the value we add. But if you just move from a different state, well, that’s a challenge we have to overcome. So a lot of that’s awareness. We’ve done some pretty playful things in our advertising, but, you know, it’s something we’re always working at.

20:16
That’s cool. I was just curious going back to you personally because you get some pretty cool hobbies. What do you like to do?

20:25
Well, you know, because you’re extremist, I think. I don’t know. Well, me, I’m pretty focused on what it is I do. So in the winter you can find me on the ski mountain. I ski over 50 days a year, so that’s pretty much where you can find me here, you know, while the lifts are running, then. And then in the summer, I downhill mountain bike. So typically when the lifts start back up, I throw the mountain bike on those lifts and ride back down the same mountain.

20:53
So, okay, it’s this, it’s the same mountain.

20:57
Same mountains.

20:58
Oh my gosh, dude, you are crazy. How fast can you get up going down on a bike? I mean, that’s insane to me.

21:05
Oh, shoot. I mean, you’re 40 plus miles an hour. And skis, same thing.

21:09
Yeah, but I always feel like at least with skis, you know, you got a little bit of a cushion. If you’re going to fall, you’re going to hit snow or go into some embankment or whatever. I mean, when you’re just on that dirt, dude, you’re. Do you just wrap up? Do you have elbow pads and everything else?

21:23
Padding, full face helmets, all the whole thing?

21:26
Oh my gosh. So have you. So have You. So have you broken anything ever?

21:34
A few too many times. In fact, it’s kind of a funny story, my start at Commercial Tire. So I went kind of through an interview process, talked to the founder, talked to the president of the company and HR and a couple other folks. And so, you know, this is over a couple of weeks. And finally we said, okay, I think it’s good fit and here’s going to be your starting day. So it was a Monday, and lo and behold, I broke my collarbone on a Saturday riding my bike before starting work. I show up in a sling and they say, well, wait, wait, we didn’t. This is not what we bought. We bought a functioning person. You’re. You’re one less army. And of course, my first thing I was going to do was go and work in the stores.

22:15
Oh, God, yeah.

22:16
All about that. So you can imagine how well you can do all the things at a tire store with one arm. So that. That’s how I started my tire industry careers.

22:28
Oh, that’s brutal. What a start. And then they’re looking at you like, what the heck? We’re training you, dude. We need you. You know, sorry, I’m wounded. I can’t lift tires today.

22:39
Yeah, well, luckily they kept me around, Mike.

22:41
So I guess I was about to say you did something right. That’s awesome. You know, I’m curious to know a little bit more about Bob. Bob’s the founder, right?

22:49
Yes, Bob Schwinkelder.

22:51
Okay, so tell us a little bit about Bob. I think it’s always important to go back to the beginning.

22:56
Yeah, so Bob started, I think he was 25 when he started the company in 1968.

23:02
That’s cool.

23:03
He started with a partner. They were selling Firestone and you know, in, of course, you know, Idaho, Washington, Oregon, Utah, where we operate as a lot of ag. So that was a big focus for them. And then, you know, as he grew the business, in fact, he was one of the. The initial people who kind of brought on Bridgestone, if you recall. Bridgestone, you know, was. Is a Japanese company, really popular in the U.S. you know, at one point. And so we’ve been a Bridgestone Firestone affiliate, strong affiliate for now for many years. And throughout that, you know, Bob kind of grew organically and, you know, where the demand was needed. You know, we put a store in and we’ve kind of grown it from there.

23:50
And, you know, when they brought me here about seven years ago, were probably, you know, around 40 stores or something like that. And we’ve continued to grow, as you can imagine. Boy, the m. A. That’s happened in our industry in the last 10 years.

24:05
Oh, yeah.

24:06
Crazy. So, you know, it’s same thing we’re doing is how do we.

24:10
Y’ all don’t get it. Y’ all don’t get any phone calls, though, right? I’m just kidding.

24:16
They don’t come to me. Let’s just say that.

24:18
Well, so did I have the number right? Is it 45?

24:21
You know, it. It’s store. Actual storefronts or. That’s accurate. We’ve also got three retread locations.

24:31
Okay.

24:33
And then we’ve got, you know, operations with powder coating and some different things. So we’ve got warehouses. So when you look at brick and mortar, it’s, you know, a little over 50.

24:45
Okay. Yeah. That’s cool. You guys are impressive, man. I. I’m glad that you said yes to this interview. I really appreciate you being on.

24:54
Well, thank you. No, I, I. It’s always exciting. I think tires is not as exciting as. As some people, or. I’m sorry. Tires is more exciting than I thought it would be. And I think from the outside looking in, you know, it’s. It’s kind of one of those things that. Wow. It’s. It’s kind of a fun game, honestly.

25:11
It really is. And you know what? What I love about it is it affects all of us. I don’t care what industry you’re in or what you do or. Because personally, you need tires. Right. I mean, but it is a. It’s a cool business. But as big as the industry is, it’s one of the smallest big industries, I think, that exists out there, because I feel like you’re, you know, that old cliche like you’re 7 degrees away or 6 degrees away from Kevin Bacon or whatever. I think in this case, in this industry, you’re really probably only 2 degrees away. You know, somebody that knows somebody. I mean, it’s a. It’s a pretty tight circle, and it’s pretty cool. And as a Great people in the industry as a whole.

25:48
Absolutely. And, you know, you talked a little bit about, you know, Covid and those sorts of things and then community. And one of the things that we talked about as a senior team and we kind of. It kind of became clear to us is how important tires are.

26:03
Yeah.

26:04
So. So you have all these businesses that shut down, you know, but we are the. We are part of the reason things get to the grocery stores. You look at emergency services, what are they rolling on, you know, what do planes land on? I mean, tires really help our communities and our society move. And, you know, it’s not a real easy or sexy business. Dirty, it’s tough, it’s hot, you know, and. But really it’s. It’s so important. And so that was something we kind of realized is this is, you know, this. We’re doing something that’s so valuable to the way that we live and the way that people get around that, you know, it’s something to take pride in.

26:46
I agree, and I’m glad you said it that way. I think that’s good. And I think all our listeners. Our listeners are primarily dealers or people that work in tire dealer shops and, you know, auto repair shops. And I think that’s a great way of putting it. We should take more pride in the fact that we touch everybody and it’s extremely important product.

27:05
Absolutely.

27:06
Well, Adrian, I can’t say enough in gratitude for you being on the podcast. I’ve enjoyed having you.

27:12
Absolutely. Mike, I certainly appreciate you asking me to be on.

27:16
Absolutely. So to all our listeners out there, thanks for being part of the podcast. You know, we love you guys and stay in touch. You can always reach [email protected] till next time, we’ll see you on Gain Traction.

27:30
Thanks for listening to the Gain Trip Traction podcast. We’ll see you again next time. And be sure to click subscribe to get future episodes.