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2026: The year of SYSTEMS. But also, time to BREAK some shit!
I met a guy on the plane the other week who has a hugeeeee plastics business + just bought two more companies last year. We talked the full 4-hour flight and my takeaway: don't wait for conditions to be right. Get going, and break some shit. And fix all the stuff worth fixing / growing. He also told me to get out of my own way. And we are having lunch in a couple weeks here back in AZ.
2025 Goals Update (how did we finish?)
ECOMMERCE
Ecommerce 2025 Business Goal review:
Launching new stores the right way is TOUGH. Sure AI speeds up some of the tasks these days, but if you really want to win, you need to be the foremost expert in your field and give your shoppers a super easy UX along with totally unique media (images, videos, etc.) for selling whatever you sell. There is no shortcut around this. So the first 100 SKUs on the new site (website #2) have taken quite a while to get going -- esp. with how big website #1 grew last year.
And as I mentioned in my post last June, SYSTEMATIZING your merchandising, content, finances, ops, etc.... is what will truly take you beyond what you have ever seen/known. I know 100% for certain that I am the bottleneck in my business. I recently heard Tommy Mello (A1 Garage Doors / big $ entrepreneur) say "The hustler needed to die, for the leader to be born." -- It's a powerful quote, meaning he had hustled his whole life and had to cut those hustler tendencies to "do everything" off, in order to focus on building systems and really elevating. It took him 10 years in his business to realize this. Similar stories from Dan Martell and other entrepreneurs out there. I would say we are about 20% of the way there on systems in my online eCom businesses (last year we were 15%). And we are 80% of the way in the brick and mortar (running on EOS). So the systems need to be a focus this year. Which is why I want to launch store #2 to see what starts to BREAK. And then I will build the systems around that.
I know I need to hire a lot. I need to hire EXPENSIVE talent who will give me the results that are worth more than I pay. I'm not scared to pay killer leaders $250K, $350K, etc. if they are absolutely CRUSHING and helping to duplicate efforts that I can't.
Ecommerce 2026 Goal Setting:
Well... that medium-term goal of going from $12M to $25M is still there... and we are well on the way from last year. So here's the 2026 eCom Goals.
Brick and Mortar Goal Review 2025
We have been approached by a PE group for our B&M chain. I am not sure where it will go, but our industry is pretty competitive and the best time to sell is when you are both riding high and get approached. Both of which we are right now. But we will just continue to plow forward with new sites and business as usual. It would be awesome to take chips off the table though and just focus on one business.
PERSONAL
My baby girl was born in October of 2026. Too much to write here, but wow, I am so happy and it is so amazing to have her here now. My wife is just crushing it as a mom. And all of it has pushed me into the next gear.
My Misogi for the year: Launch a SaaS app (just to say I have finally done it). I have been building tons of digital tools these past 2 years thanks to AI dev (and honing my actual understanding of programming as well). Several of the things I have built I have deployed with my real life Dev on our ecommerce site. We've made some AWESOME tools that rank super well for what they compete in. So this year... I want to launch a paid app to help regular business people leverage AI day-to-day. I'm AI industry obsessed and constantly reading / learning. There is no excuse to not do this. So many projects never see the light of day and leave you wondering "what if?". So I will launch, just for the experience and learning. If it goes somewhere, that's awesome too.
Second Misogi: Have a 2nd baby (God willing <3).
I did not buy a hypercar yet. I have been SO CLOSE a couple times. And I'm so stupid for not buying the Black CGT with 9K miles my buddy offered me in Feb 2025 for $1.35M. That car was $2M a couple months ago and is now probably $2.5M+ (CGTs are going CRAZY). Sold my Diablo 6.0. Sold my White LP640 (kept the orange Manual one). So now I am down to only 3 Lambos
I have had my eye on houses though. Been in mine for 5 years (was only planning on being here 2 years). It's super nice, and hard to leave. 6 car garage in back, 3 cars up front. 1 acre. North Paradise Valley, AZ. But with how much we host I want to go crazier.
I'm HUNGRY as hell. Been getting up at 4am to work. Been crushing it in the gym. I'm hyped for 2026

I met a guy on the plane the other week who has a hugeeeee plastics business + just bought two more companies last year. We talked the full 4-hour flight and my takeaway: don't wait for conditions to be right. Get going, and break some shit. And fix all the stuff worth fixing / growing. He also told me to get out of my own way. And we are having lunch in a couple weeks here back in AZ.
2025 Goals Update (how did we finish?)
ECOMMERCE
Ecommerce 2025 Business Goal review:
- Goal: $13,500,000+sales in the eCommerce Business Site 1 ($10M site, $3.4M AMZ, $225K eBay).
- Actual: $16,000,000 (beat goal by $2,500,000) -- ($12.250 site, $3.6M AMZ, $190K eBay).
- Goal: $1,250,000sales in our Private Label Brand for same eCom biz, merchandise items not yet posted.
- Actual: $1,100,000 (missed goal by $150,000, due to supplier change for all SKUs)
- Goal: Launch second retail store by Sept 1st, 2025 w/ $20,000 in sales by End of Year
- Actual: Missed. Still have not launched due to excessive sales from Site 1
- Goal: Create/stage third retail storeby Dec 1st, 2025 // Launch third store by Feb 1, 2026
- Actual: Missed. Have one product loaded. Pushing launch to Q2/Q3 2026. Very excited about it though.
Launching new stores the right way is TOUGH. Sure AI speeds up some of the tasks these days, but if you really want to win, you need to be the foremost expert in your field and give your shoppers a super easy UX along with totally unique media (images, videos, etc.) for selling whatever you sell. There is no shortcut around this. So the first 100 SKUs on the new site (website #2) have taken quite a while to get going -- esp. with how big website #1 grew last year.
And as I mentioned in my post last June, SYSTEMATIZING your merchandising, content, finances, ops, etc.... is what will truly take you beyond what you have ever seen/known. I know 100% for certain that I am the bottleneck in my business. I recently heard Tommy Mello (A1 Garage Doors / big $ entrepreneur) say "The hustler needed to die, for the leader to be born." -- It's a powerful quote, meaning he had hustled his whole life and had to cut those hustler tendencies to "do everything" off, in order to focus on building systems and really elevating. It took him 10 years in his business to realize this. Similar stories from Dan Martell and other entrepreneurs out there. I would say we are about 20% of the way there on systems in my online eCom businesses (last year we were 15%). And we are 80% of the way in the brick and mortar (running on EOS). So the systems need to be a focus this year. Which is why I want to launch store #2 to see what starts to BREAK. And then I will build the systems around that.
I know I need to hire a lot. I need to hire EXPENSIVE talent who will give me the results that are worth more than I pay. I'm not scared to pay killer leaders $250K, $350K, etc. if they are absolutely CRUSHING and helping to duplicate efforts that I can't.
Ecommerce 2026 Goal Setting:
Well... that medium-term goal of going from $12M to $25M is still there... and we are well on the way from last year. So here's the 2026 eCom Goals.
- $18,125,000 in Sales with $1,800,000 in EBITDA
- eCom1: $13.5M Web, $4M Amz, $250K eBay
- eCom2: $250K Web, $25K Amz (launch Feb 1st, allow merchandising manager to do all product post-launch - w/ my high level guidance on what segments to tackle)
- eCom3: $50K Web (launch by Oct 1st, I will need to do the heavy lifting to get us to launch with 100 best SKUs and sections)
- Get new COO level person going with a growth mindset
- Hire additional sales person for main site in March 2026 (to get my merchandising manager cooking full time on product)
- Partner with solid YT personality for Web3 niche, pay either by the video or work in a salary
Brick and Mortar Goal Review 2025
- $13,500,000 sales in the Brick and Mortar & $6M EBITDA
- Actual: $12,900,000 sales and $5.1M EBITDA
- Goal: Lock down dirt for two new B&M sites, begin planning phase of dev.
- Actual: Locked down dirt for 3 deals (beat goal) with more in pipeline.
- Sites to come online 2026, with $2.5M sales each ($5M total) by end of 2027.
- Only 1 of these sites will come live in 2026, at best. So additional revised 2027 goal of $16M sales and $7.1M EBITDA.
- Sites to come online 2026, with $2.5M sales each ($5M total) by end of 2027.
- Actual: Locked down dirt for 3 deals (beat goal) with more in pipeline.
We have been approached by a PE group for our B&M chain. I am not sure where it will go, but our industry is pretty competitive and the best time to sell is when you are both riding high and get approached. Both of which we are right now. But we will just continue to plow forward with new sites and business as usual. It would be awesome to take chips off the table though and just focus on one business.
PERSONAL
My baby girl was born in October of 2026. Too much to write here, but wow, I am so happy and it is so amazing to have her here now. My wife is just crushing it as a mom. And all of it has pushed me into the next gear.
My Misogi for the year: Launch a SaaS app (just to say I have finally done it). I have been building tons of digital tools these past 2 years thanks to AI dev (and honing my actual understanding of programming as well). Several of the things I have built I have deployed with my real life Dev on our ecommerce site. We've made some AWESOME tools that rank super well for what they compete in. So this year... I want to launch a paid app to help regular business people leverage AI day-to-day. I'm AI industry obsessed and constantly reading / learning. There is no excuse to not do this. So many projects never see the light of day and leave you wondering "what if?". So I will launch, just for the experience and learning. If it goes somewhere, that's awesome too.
Second Misogi: Have a 2nd baby (God willing <3).
I did not buy a hypercar yet. I have been SO CLOSE a couple times. And I'm so stupid for not buying the Black CGT with 9K miles my buddy offered me in Feb 2025 for $1.35M. That car was $2M a couple months ago and is now probably $2.5M+ (CGTs are going CRAZY). Sold my Diablo 6.0. Sold my White LP640 (kept the orange Manual one). So now I am down to only 3 Lambos
I have had my eye on houses though. Been in mine for 5 years (was only planning on being here 2 years). It's super nice, and hard to leave. 6 car garage in back, 3 cars up front. 1 acre. North Paradise Valley, AZ. But with how much we host I want to go crazier.
I'm HUNGRY as hell. Been getting up at 4am to work. Been crushing it in the gym. I'm hyped for 2026
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