This week on The Huddle Paul, Daniel, Jose are joined by the Crystal Sims, Shannon Vogel, and Andrea Blackbourn from the WIFI Mentorship Program. To learn more about the FCIF or the WIFI Program, use the links below.

https://www.fcif.org - The Floor Covering Industry Foundation gets families back on their feet when battling catastrophic injuries, severe disabilities, or other life-altering medical crises.

https://www.womeninflooring.org - WIFI is here to empower, connect, support, encourage, develop, educate, inspire and attract current and future women in the floorcovering industry while playing a major role in the growth and future of the floor covering industry and the next generation of women in flooring. 

Create your FREE Installer profile at https://gocarrera.com and become part of the future of the industry TODAY!

GET TRAINED! Find a list of training dates here: https://gocarrera.com/resources/training/

The HUDDLE is where the flooring industry can get together and talk about everything! Lead by Paul Stuart from Go Carerra who is joined by Daniel and Jose Gonzalez from Preferred Flooring.

https://www.preferredflooringmi.com

https://www.stuartandassociates.com

welcome to the huddle we're here

every Tuesday at three o'clock to discuss maintaining forward progress in your flooring career

we have some special guests with us today I'll call it the ladies of Wi-Fi

um Andrea Crystal's on uh we may have a couple more joining us as well with me

as always Mr Daniel and Jose's here I think he's getting water or something right I was gonna say in his brother

that's not there uh Jose from preferred Florida wasn't a lot of weight [Laughter]

so uh today what we're gonna go through is um you know women in flooring uh it's

been a topic here on the Huddle before and I'll introduce our guests here and

and let them tell a bit about themselves uh Andrea you want to kick us off and let us know a little bit about you

sure uh Andrea Blackburn and I'm here in Dalton Georgia the carpet capital of the

world and I am the executive director of The Floor Covering industry foundation

and I am a board member on the women in floor covering nonprofit awesome so

that's what Wi-Fi stands for women in floor covering industry industry yes

women in the Floor Covering industry yes awesome Shannon uh

welcome to the Huddle would you like to kind of tell us a little bit about yourself sure my name is Shannon Vogel

and I'm the owner of a social media company social that specializes in the flooring industry

and um I'm on here today because I think we're going to talk about mentoring and Crystal Sims is um someone that I've

been mentoring for a little over a year now and uh excited to have this conversation

awesome Crystal welcome this is not your first trip on the Huddle but uh you want to

chime in and say hi to the guests

hi sorry I'm still uh you're still on the job site right now yeah

like a true warrior yeah

um are you embarrassed about show you oh show you the job site yeah asked about your co-workers that's why you don't

want to have them on video they could probably have their butt cracks hanging out they're flying people

par for the flooring industry a standard issue

getting ready to clean up taking this on location okay sorry you can

awesome so

um a little bit about Wi-Fi maybe uh origin story how did this come to be

yeah um so Emily Finkel who who some of you

may know she is a design professional in the flooring industry and had a long

career at Shaw Industries and then retired and started her own curated

collection of flooring and Interiors called Emily Morrow home and then she recently

has taken a position as a vice president in the design area at engineered floors

but Emily started Wi-Fi was her idea and I think their first conversation was

with Tanya Kern who's one of um our friends in that's a an editor of

Fortunes magazine and they were kind of the first two that was like we you know

should start a non-profit that can really pull women together can provide opportunities for networking education

and really highlight flooring as um a fun and engaging profitable career

for women and from there they started to recruit people to join the board I had

known Emily for several years because we both are from the Dalton Georgia area and worked with her on a previous

non-profit and women's group for a different

um non-industry non-profit and she invited me to join the board along with

several other women and we started working on putting together the

organization its structure um it's 501c3 and the rest is history I

guess so it's a it's a non-profit to promote women and flooring of all different

um areas from like Crystal installer to some manufacturing reps and and uh

possibly even Tech reps and just women and flooring in general correct yeah retailers

Distributors all across the industry awesome and you guys have a mentoring

program within Wi-Fi is that is that also correct yes we just launched our

first cohort of mentoring an adult to adult match um so it's centered around professional

and personal development I think for me when I think of mentoring always think of like Big Brothers Big Sisters like

you're going to have a fifth grader you're gonna go eat lunch with this is not that this is an adult friend and

um that's why I was so glad Shannon was able to get on to talk about her relationship with Crystal

um but I think that this we've had a lot of interest um The Forum is live on the um on the

Wi-Fi website so you can sign up to be a mentor or a mentee it's a six-month match and as part of the intake process

you can specify your skills that you have to offer what you think that

um others could glean from you and then if you're a mentee what you would how

you would like to grow professionally and so we have a committee so you match on the on the on the the skill of the

mentor and the need of the mentee yes well you're you're on the right podcast

that's what we do at go Carrera with flooring installers how about that oh well here we go

so yeah um that's that's um you know with the rise of

some I'd say awareness that people like Crystal have brought to uh our industry

that it's a viable uh profession whether it's installer social running social

media for for dealers or companies um it sounds like a really good

opportunity for women to get guided through the process of maybe this industry

um in a creative but also very rewarding way so Shannon you want to give us some

background of how you met Crystal and how that all came to be and you be you're a mentor for crystal

yeah so it's kind of a cool story um I was asked to be an ambassador for Tyson and newcomers meeting and

um I came in and I think Jose actually started the conversation and planted a

seed and then Jim Aaron from fcef and I started talking about we had some

things in common being from South Carolina and something just sparked where Daniel was the third piece and he

said you really should go meet my sister um I feel like there's some synergies there and Crystal was about to

um do her competition the next day and she was struggling a little bit with public speaking and you know just all

the things that we struggle with being seen in public and being heard and using your voice and just the Stars aligned

and I was like girl sit down a minute I got 10 things I'm going to tell you right now if you remember two you're

going to do better than you did before we had this conversation I don't know where this is going so I gave her all of

these tips on public speaking and just whatever was in my heart at that moment

and um she just looked at me and she goes you know my brother told me I need a

mentor and I think you're the one would you be willing to be my mentor and um literally it was the stars aligning

for the perfect relationship that had somebody called me and said hey you need to call this girl environment tour I

would have been like yeah I probably don't have time for that right now but her energy and enthusiasm and willing to

grow and learn just lit my soul on fire and we meet um whether it's once a week once a month

however often we both can we jump on a zoom and we have what's funny is I

thought why can't be her Mentor because like I don't have a degree in that I don't have a certificate for that like I don't have a checklist for that and she

was like I'm not expecting a checklist I just want help so we Have No Agenda we

just start talking about whatever is going on and what is so crazy and cool

is that there are times where I'm the teacher and there's sometimes where she's the teacher and nine times out of

ten we are going through the exact same thing having the same experience the same struggles were different ages from

different states we do completely different jobs in the industry but we have so much in common and just watching

her growth and progress and how fast she learns and has evolved I'm in full

support of the Wi-Fi mentoring program and anything that I can do to contribute to that process because watching

watching how much crystal is grown and how much I have grown from Crystal's experience is I mean it really is one of

the greatest joys of what I do yeah it must be real satisfying to have

um not just to Mentor somebody but to have that connection like that right

outside looking in right you said that it's adults and it's not like a five-year-old sitting at a lunch table

but I've seen it they become five-year-olds sitting at them just having fun and then we try to drag you

into our lunch table and I swear I'm gonna change my last name to Vogel Gonzalez dash part Sims a family has

welcomed me in and been super vulnerable and just generous with their heart and

information and we I think we've all grown we don't know any other way to be honest

like you got to kind of wear who you are on your sleeve right if you're trying to hide something you're still trying to

hide and the idea is not to hide the idea is to to be yourself uh out in the

open wide open Full Throttle all day every day well that's a real um attribute that you guys have to be

honest with you is you open out you're you're very transparent with the way that you approach business I mean that's

what attracted me to you guys and and we became friends and it's that those when

those synergies happen it's pretty special and Crystal do you have time to chime in on what Shannon uh said about

your guys's kind of gearing up and becoming friends and the mentor uh

process with her I always have time to talk about Shannon

um yeah just like she said the the night we met it was really

I think that was the first day of the competition the day we met and uh I was just in a really tough spot mentally

because it was a lot to process that day and still to this day where I I used one of

the pieces of my advice that she gave me and that was uh when you're feeling um

scared or nervous or you know fierce in setting in write those fears down on a

piece of paper and when you walk into wherever you're going throw it in the trash and and leave it there and

for some reason I did that the next day and I came in with a whole new attitude

and ever since then it's like like she said everything the way that we connect is

extremely special and the way that she connects with my entire family and anybody she comes around to be honest

um I love Shannon too right

it's been a really neat experience to have that Mentor like I told Daniel I

think that day that I realized that he was my mentor that you know for the last eight nine years

whatever it had been and I was like I really am looking for something

I was looking for something more more deep more personal um a guidance of a woman who's strong

and powerful and when I met Shannon it was just like this is everything I need and yeah that night I asked her to be my

mentor and I think that it's extremely powerful to have someone walk alongside

you in in life and for us to be complete strangers and be completely comfortable

with each other it's been really uh life-changing for both of us I would say and tell that you guys were ever

strangers to be honest yeah we passed lives we've known each other one cool

thing to add on to that was crystal with you know one of the things we talked about early on was she was like I don't want Daniel to feel like he's not good

enough or not enough to be my mentor and I was like we're gonna put all that pressure on me go have five things to

teach you that I can't teach you I'm going to teach you things he can't teach you because he hasn't been a woman in this industry if you're lucky enough to

have five people walking alongside you and helping you more power to you it's not it's not to me versus Daniel because

we have so many different things to contribute yeah that's a good point many times just

as a note with mentoring I I went through different business coaches and

different mentors myself and oftentimes uh having a couple I couldn't I I had a

mentor teaching me how to copyright because I couldn't I couldn't write an email to save my life in my mid-20s and

I was growing my business and I so I reached out to someone who teaches

copywriting and they had a very specific skill set in a very specific way of teaching me that point is is that often

we need more than just you know that one point of view or that one angle and I

would assume that in being a woman in in the construction field flooring in

particular that comes with its own bit of challenges can you guys speak to some of those challenges that you faced and

how you overcame them oh now turn me loose I'll get on this one well you you've only got like 15 minutes

so yeah I gotta jump in a minute uh if you want I'll start um go ahead so I started in constructing

flooring in a family business in a small town and I'll never forget things and I'm not bashing guys at all I am team

you know I'm all friends with guys I'm not putting anybody down or put anybody in an off light

but I had a rep come in and I said hey I've got this big commercial project I'm really proud of it it's a ton of square

footage it was a great product I wasn't beating him up for price I was just like I need you know I need my price and I

thought oh that looked kind of high so I go to my father who I was not allowed to call Dad I had to call him Steve because

no special treatment because you know if you're in a family business it's twice as hard try to be a female family

business with you know all men in your family and the rep gave my dad

and my ex-husband a better price than he gave me and I was like do you think we don't

talk to each other so that's one one part we can talk about the second is

um when I go to a trade show like I would do everything in my power just to shake things up in general anyway so

I'll go get on stage or do whatever it is that I'm doing and I'll wear a really nice you know Fancy Pants Nordstrom suit

and really nice expensive shiny shoes and then I'll start talking and then

I'll take off my jacket and people see my tattoos and then they see my funny colored hair and then they honestly look

at my chest and they can't reconcile what's happening and they start talking to me differently and then if I've been

home recently and my Southern accent comes out then they'll start talking to me like I'm stupid and it is my superpower to flip it

around and just say like the most intelligent thing I could possibly muster to come up with and then

literally watch their brain not be able to reconcile what's happening the whole idea of talking to me like I'm less than

or Dumber because I'm a woman just makes no sense especially I've got

25 years of experience in this industry and I've done every job there is except being a rep I know my so

um yeah those are my two those are my two sub boxes to get us going well that that's a that's a good push down the

hill right there uh Andrea what about you and have you I and and I get it this is not

meant to be a man-bashing thing that's not the purpose most most of the time it's it's uh

a matter of lack of uh exposure and lack of of knowledge right they're uh not

stupid just a bit ignorant to the uh Dynamics and working with women

specifically in a construction industry you know we have a lot of general

contractors over the last 15 years you'll you'll have a you have a pretty

good chance to have a female project manager or a female project uh

engineer or you know even superintendents but uh so I feel like

you know that it's the path is getting better on this but a lot of that still

happens for sure I said it faces probably a lot of

Industries and a lot of workplaces um I have spent my career working in

fundraising and non-profits and um spend a lot of time on the board side

and um your your boards tend to be heavier male than female

and um so that you know you're dealing with executive level people who are primarily

male lots of times they're um can be significantly older than you and so I think that the Dynamics of that

is just being aware of different people's communication styles that may be related to their gender it may be

related to the area of their country uh area of the country um I've been with the Floor Covering

industry foundation for almost six years now and it was my first experience with having a board that was remote and

spread across the country and so people talk different people have different

ways that they interact than um people do in in the South

and definitely the the gender you know it can be easy to interpret something as

targeted at you in a certain way because of your gender but you but there's also

a lot of other variables that lead people um to how you experience them and so one

of the things that I have kind of as a saying in their family is always assumed

um assume somebody's doing their best and it really takes takes it off the

plate of feeling like that that you are not getting something that you deserve

it may be that someone else just has a different perspective um one of the things with women I'm sure

that y'all have heard this statistic or out there on the internet that if there's a job listing and there's 10

different criteria for that job that women feel like they have to have all 10 of them to apply for it whereas men

don't feel like they have to have two or three and they feel like they're qualified and they should apply for it and so I think that one of the things

that I thought was really interesting about Crystal and Shannon's relationship is that they're not in the same sector

and just how powerful it is to be able to realize your skill set and how it

might be transferable to a different um part of the industry and also to have

someone who's cheerleading you um you know who's in your back corner who's like you know what you could do

that you could do this you Crystal you can stand up in front of an audience and speak I just saw her do that at Tyson

she was great and I think that those connections it's kind of feeling like

that you've um with a mentor that you have a cheerleader or that you have a a

coach that you can really be honest with about your insecurities and there's some

safe space there maybe you don't want to say to your boss what you think your weaknesses are but your Mentor creates

that space where you feel like that you can be vulnerable that you can talk

about things that you want to do different where you can share experiences and how they can help be

Workshop how to make those go better next time so I don't have a ton of uh

great stories about in charity and non-profit you know people lots of times are their best selves and so I've had

some really good work environments some good folks surrounding me um but it's also been just really cool

to see this group of women launch this group and really see the

enthusiasm around it well I think it a lot of it boils down to awareness

I was talking uh I've got a friend that's a a male nurse I mean he he he's

a guy and he's not getting it's not a sexist thing it just when you see a male

nurse and he's got hairy arms and he's got really hairy arms it's like it's just it's it's not always like

uh obviously with some of the stuff you pointed out shared was clearly that way but I'm saying first perception

sometimes is just somebody in a position that we don't recognize as normal and so

we act weird about it the truth is is that humans can do a lot of different things in general and it's your own

personal like uh desire of what you want to do in the world right so if you want

to be a male nurse be a male nurse if you want to be a female Florian installer bring it on right so uh Crystal I I

wanted to ask you a question I I know that you and Shannon obviously hit it

off right away but with your you're you come off a little shy

sometimes right and you may have been how did you overcome that to ask Shannon

to be your mentor

I believe that would have taken some courage um it did and I was and I was extremely

nervous and I was shaking but but that's where I needed growth and so

I can't grow if I'm scared to even ask those simple questions and that's definitely something she's shown me

um and even family so sorry yeah we've

actually established that I'm extremely introverted uh which I didn't even know surprisingly

but um even those first couple meetings that we had together I was I was uh a

little bit hesitant to be myself I guess but

lost that pretty quick now I'm just crazy I think she would agree

crazy amazing it's cool when we do video calls and you'll watch crystal get a

light bulb and then when she gets her notebook out and she starts writing it down I'm like that sat with her that resonated that's going to come back

let's keep working on that and one of the things that we talk about when she gets one of those light bulb moments is the world's going to give you a lot of

practice opportunities once you're open to that lesson that you're about to learn so this is not all fun and games

it's not all easy it's not all you know sunshine and rainbows it's hard work but that hard work is paying off and and

really I think like I said her growth is um just incredible to watch so right

there uh Shannon you said the hard work right and I just kind of want to add a piggyback off of your guys's

um interpretation of of being a woman in the industry is you know it almost

sounds like history just keeps repeating itself over and over right uh when you come from you know the times when

segregation was coming in and and people of color were coming in because you know I I didn't live through that part right

I was on the back end of that for sure uh 80s but coming into to the flooring

industry for me was kind of the same it wasn't in the same instance right but

we still had to face diversity coming in because I wasn't respected as a leader I

wasn't respected as the guy running the crew because I was a person I was a Hispanic male and usually people of my

demographic didn't speak English and they were doing drywall they weren't leading Crews of guys twice their age

and actually better than them so it was different coming in so I think um

I think even from now into the next 20 years we're gonna have to start over with another demographic coming in and

being the first and being um the the first group to establish

himself and set presidents the way that women are starting to do I want to say women have been doing it for years but

now it's like everywhere if nobody has got uh their own individual uh platforms

to um speak their voice and to stand up for one another then I think that that's

weird to me but just so you guys know I think we're going to keep repeating this and and I love Yeah well maybe maybe not

as much as you think if we can start thinking like Andrea just spoke which is assume that people are doing their best

work and assuming that assume the good first like assume that it's a good male

nurse assume that it's a good female instructor minded right they have to be more open-minded because I even had ties when

we you know um gentlemen approached me and he's like I don't even understand saying this

whole women in flooring thing because I was like we were over here today and he's like I don't understand that like why can't everyone just be equal and

it's like you do realize that that is the entire goal so

like come on man like just have an open mind you can't say oh I respect what

they're doing but I just don't understand it and I don't want it to be like this it's like if you if just come in with an open mind

let everyone you know balance themselves out and that the only way to do that is

you know programs like this where it's it is it's you know putting people in the spotlight and saying you know we are

equal we are here let's start treating it as such so that way you know years

down the road it it doesn't have to be that way yeah IT addresses the the

um awareness part of it that's really the the whole goal if if it's not as if

you're trying to form your separate group to then segregate yourself away from Men In flooring the whole idea I

would assume is like bring awareness to the fact that hey we're just because

we're women we are really good at this too and we can you know we got an

installer that almost has has competed in installer over the year we have plenty of examples of sales reps and

leaders and and and uh people like Shannon do you own your own

uh company doing the social media do you work or something right before you leave I do I'm doing my own company I'm about

to turn into a pumpkin I have to jump off but thank you all so much for this conversation I really appreciate the

opportunity to be a part of it and um if there's another one uh sign me up I love this group tell us quickly uh how people

can find you like social wise uh you can find me anywhere on social media Shannon my maiden name is Bilby b-i-l-b-y Vogel

um I've got the same picture everywhere it's um short hair it's probably blonde I've got a full sleeve of tattoos

um Shannon reach social dot media um but yeah I'm all over the Internet so just find me anywhere and reach out

connect even if we don't know each other you can connect with me on LinkedIn or Facebook and I'm happy to probably knows

yeah she probably knows it to put you in my community awesome great thanks well thanks for joining us today thank you

for being on and uh thank you appreciate y'all take care thanks so one thing I do want to add is

um you know going to the women's portion and sitting in and watching how they

interact any men out there listening who are having a hard time accepting that we

have to as a group come together man women are so empowering of each other

but everything like all encompassing right like some of the guys out there are all women's empowerment This Woman's

empowerment that you know what no it's empowerment period because we could learn a lot from them to be honest in a

way that they they support each other when they ask me why I was there I said you know I'm here to learn from them

and there's a lot of people there that are smarter than me so I was learning a lot of stuff

yeah well I guess what I was getting at is that a lot of

times um you get men will tear each other down specifically in installation and you

know we might we might step back and learn a valuable lesson of what it's like to support one another we we

promote that a lot on this podcast the huddles of you know it's like we're a big family and a huddle and it's about

supporting one another don't there's no need to tear each other down like let's try to get better as an industry that's

gonna you know they'll uh Rising tide uh you know uh lifts offices All Ships so

like that's the attitude we should have so I also

go ahead I just wanted to kind of piggyback off of that too I was going to say that that's one of the reasons women

have these uh conferences and things because we'd like to empower each other

and like Daniel's experience how there was a gentleman who didn't understand it we

are oftentimes not understanded um on that or understand it understand

we are not understanding that's a new shirt for us

um but that and I I really thought it was cool that I think there were

maybe five guys that ended up coming to the Women's Conference in Las Vegas and

every all of the women there were super excited for that support and it would be really cool if if more men showed up to

just kind of get an idea of how we Empower each other and the things that

that we could do to make the world a better place and assume that everyone's doing their best and I

think that's a misconception right because or like it's just the information isn't out there because you

you hear a Women's Conference and you think oh this is just going to be all women but and and then like men are loud

or something small print right at the bottom everyone is invited you know so I I did I signed everyone up and we had a

great time there and we did we tried to go to the next one on the women's breakfast and they were like yeah they

were like this is for women only so I'm pretty sure I let y'all in

by the time it was like you guys can come in it's like you know what you guys want your moment we will give you your

moment just know that we're we're over here supporting YouTube for the record that's the second time I got kicked out

of one the first time my sister was in the competition I went to the it wasn't

like what what you had going up I went to the uh the women's uh event just to represent her and I walked in I'll never

forget I walk in and everybody just stops talking and stares at me I said hi

my sister Crystal she can't be here and then chatter just kind of uh commands

but I I'm really good at putting myself in uncomfortable uh situations like that just to bring awareness well frankly I

think that the guys should be able to go in and say hi and show their support I think it would it would do nothing but

help when we come together again what I said earlier I assume none of us are

really wanting to segregate ourselves away from each other I think there's too much of that in the world as we as we uh

witness if you watch enough news which I try to stay away from but fact is is

that you know coming together and learning from different cultures and different upbringings in different pasts

that's how we grow as as people it's certainly been a big influence in my

life with different people uh that I've gotten to uh you know have the pleasure of mentoring me

the whole reason you find a mentor is because of their their past experiences that they can bring you know some

knowledge and light to you I mean that's that's the whole point so uh I did want

to ask uh you Andrew the uh floor covering the fcif

tell us a bit about that what's what's that about how does that play into what

you do sure I'll be happy to shift and talk about that a little I did want to say

one thing just to figure on what y'all are talking about which is I feel like in this day and age with the labor

shortage I know myself with my team it's like we can't afford to not build up our

team members you know because if we don't they'll find somebody else who will you know and so I just feel like

it's such an important business practice to make sure that you're creating a culture that is where your people want

to be and if your people are you know people that have different skin

colors or different genders or they're people that have small children and they

whatever it is I feel like in this day and age we really have to to keep the

talent connected to our organization we have to be flexible and Make spaces

comfortable for everyone and programs like these mentoring programs or other

programs in the industry if there's not something that you feel like is really

helping you make your staff feel engaged you need to find something as a leader

they can make them feel engaged because if not they'll get going so I feel like

that I think Piggy and jumping on there too is you know training opportunities and

and helping them helping employees and staff and growth and and

um you know trying to have advancement opportunities and and those types of

deals as far as you know working with different

um individuals needs at a company you could do a there's probably podcasts

that are just dedicated to that it's such a deep subject but from a surface

level I would say uh employees are important uh the most

important piece of the business I mean the rest of it's just brick and and mortar and you know uh equipment

it's the people do have to you know they're the ones that make the wheels turn so yeah I think that all that's

important as well so kind of related to your employees and thinking about how you can help people

with whatever is going on in their life um so my day job is that I work with the

Floor Covering industry foundation and it's been around for 41 years and it is

a 501c3 that it was started to help people that have catastrophic medical

conditions who work in the Floor Covering industry um it can also be their household family members as well

and we have three criteria for assistance one uh the first one is the

your serious medical condition um it could also be an injury that takes you out of work for a couple months

could be that you have a child that was born with disabilities and you need medical equipment or special therapies

we help a lot of people that have lasage cancer sometimes families have an

elderly parent that's now living with them and maybe they need a bathroom made handicap accessible or it could just be

that their medical condition has caused them to not have the same income that

they'd had before and now they can't afford their Medical Treatments and so maybe we're helping provide medical care

or even helping pay People's rent or mortgage um so all kinds of different things the

medical assistants um the medical piece is the first criteria the second one is

um that you have to be financially stressed and we don't go by federal

poverty guidelines which is what a lot of non-profits do instead we look at the actual situation

um in the past two months for the family and if their expenses are higher than

their income then we usually can help them as long as they don't have a lot of other liquid assets and then the third

criteria is employment in the Floor Covering industry which has to be five or more years and if they're not

currently employed then they couldn't have left more than five or more years unless it was because they're retired or

their disability or injury put them out of work so does this uh does this apply to uh

1099 installers that may have you know that that's that's how they operate in

the flooring industry may not have health insurance maybe maybe not

um sure okay and this is something that you know I don't think a lot of people really know about right I'm like for my

birthday my birthday was in November and you know Facebook asks you do you want to have people donate to a cause and I'm

like yes and that's my first thought was the fcif so I put it on there and there

was actually I think I got over 300 donated by people I remember that and

it's like that that kind of stuff is awesome and I think a lot of them were actually in the industry so it's like

not only are are we coming on here talking about the industry and saying you know support each other we're

donating and and supporting each other that way too and we just have to get the word out because I think a lot of

installers they they wait too long right and it's

too late and it's like if you know about it right now you have to set your pride

aside and know that hey I need help and this is an organization that could help

me out tell us how um how does it obviously you kind of gave

the criteria how does it work I I'm an installer I I have an injury that's

going to prevent me from doing my job for the next you know two months or something I go to a website

there's our website is the acronym for our organization so it's f c i f for

Floor Covering industryfoundation.org and we have a application which is a longer form and

then we have an inquiry form which is a short one-page document and that's the best way to start a conversation with us

um so that we can learn more about your situation um see if you probably will be a good fit for the program that way we can

um make sure before you go through all the trouble of filling out a long form and sending in all of your supporting

documents that we feel like that it's going to be a good fit um and then we review your you know

income and expenses what medical bills that you have um and verify your conditions and your

employment most of our grants are for six months and then they can be renewed

and so your Grant would specify all of them are different um most commonly it's for medical care

so it would be a check for you to pay for your doctor bills and it could be yours that we anticipate coming or lots

of times people are behind at the point that we get involved so they're to help make payments on existing medical bills

that they have um and then after six months you will you would you could

turn in your paperwork showing that you spent the grant as intended and then you can reapply

um for us so it's um so we're pretty big pretty big program we'll add this to the

description in our when we post this on YouTube for the FC

if.org is that correct yes okay so we'll post that in the description of of uh

this video so there's also I assume a way for uh

individuals who have some means to go on and donate sure yep okay we um

we raised just under a million dollars every year and we have donors that are

individual people just like us to large corporate donors that are manufacturers

that are trade show trade media Distributors

um people all across the industry and so whether it's you know you give fifty dollars or you can get five thousand

every little bit helps and is going to turn around and impact a family that's

part of our flooring family do you have a number of uh you know an average or an approximate amount of

families that you guys help a year yeah I think that I didn't look at it

before I got it on the call and then we had close to 150 families applaud last

year and probably a little bit under 100 that we helped so we certainly people apply with us that you know don't meet

the qualifications for whatever reason our average Grant that's paid over six months is around nine thousand dollars

so that's going directly to a family wow so it's pretty impactful so while we you

know don't help thousands and thousands of people the families that we do assist we're really helping them in a pretty

financially transformative way yeah that's a that's a big help for someone

who you know I mean get you through six months of rent you know save your mortgage that's that's meaningful money

right and that's why I said try and get there you know if you know it's going to get to that point that's where the

inquiry form comes in right because it's like yeah start doing it before you start losing everything instead of after

everything is already gone in the audience I mean we'll again we'll

we'll have the link to the description in our description below um like support one another this is what it

looks like um if you got a few hundred extra dollars go in and donate it's helping a

family I I can tell you one thing that's I I want to say unique uh but honestly

I've been in flooring since I got out of high school so I'm not sure of other industry but you know I know there's

other organizations uh that do some of this not necessarily write your grants

but I remember being that a CFI convention wants and an installer friend

of of mine had just lost his son the day before and uh he was 18 years old and

you know there's obvious medical expenses and things that funeral costs and and stuff and you know

the CFI came up and gave me I believe if I remember like twelve hundred dollars

to give to him uh as that they had gathered at the they'd you know it just

gotten around I mean we do care about one another in our industry is what I'm getting at and this is a way if you do

care that you can support others that you may not have direct contact with but it could make a big impact in someone's

life so I encourage you to check them out in the description below and you can

kind of see some of the you know I'm is there some examples on there on people's

uh I'm actually on the website right now and they do have a link for stories right right on there so it's uh you know

they have different links you know their history give do you qualify and then

stories right there so you can go on there and see some of the stories that people have actually you know they've

gone through the process and how how it's probably helped them yeah that's awesome well

um plugging On Through To we're we're coming close on time here I do want to

make sure to you know give a special thank you to Andrea and Crystal and

Shannon who joined us it's it's um it's great to hear some of this uh

some of the relationships that get built through the industry and how we're pulling together to solve some

complicated problems uh but in closing I wanted to ask you Andrea do you know

Crystal I do so Crystal is one of our volunteers

with Wi-Fi and she is on our committee that's launching our mentoring program

and then Crystal and I and these guys we all just hung out in Shannon in Vegas together so nice is Crystal going to uh

become a mentor uh Crystal asked me if people could be a mentor and a mentee and I said you're an

overachiever aren't you I want to do both at the same time and transfer them down look yeah that's

what it's all about though I think yeah yeah so yeah I'm not sure could I'm not Chris

I'll have to speak for herself what she wants to commit to but our program is six months and then people can continue

that relationship you know however they want after that but the program is structured with

um monthly content um first this for six months and so I would suggest that people you know if they want to be a

mentor and then later be a mentee to maybe do one at a time to start out with

construction there's some structure around it initially now yeah would you

guys happen to have um a a mentor program for uh for a gentleman to be

mentored by a a female to help understand perspective well I will put

that on on the brainstorm list One Mentor program right now but we haven't

said that men are excluded I think even even if it's like a group right right like yeah I think that could be valuable

I will say that when we were at uh I forget maybe it was it was one of the comp conferences at women in flooring

kind of table a lot of guys don't know how to even interact and it's not that anybody's

trying to be sexist or anything like that just like how do you approach different scenarios I had posted the

problem to the table like well how do I run ads without yes you know what

specifically women to come in to my company and become installers how do I run ads without coming off sexist in the

very first place and so they addressed that it's those kinds of things maybe

not a mentor mentee uh uh situation but at the least almost like our message to

the industry uh you know at the end of that six months or something would be cool for for people like me that you

know I still need to learn yeah everybody needs to learn is there any way to

approach it it would be great is there a cost to the program or is everything included in the membership

so to join Wi-Fi as an individual member it's 150 a year and then lots of

companies have made large corporate donations and have chosen part of that donation to be sponsorship of their

employees um but yes anybody can can join on the website to be a member of Wi-Fi and then

the mentoring program is just one of the benefits of being a member oh sweet

good and affordable on top of that for sure all right well that's bringing

us to the end of the podcast I want to thank uh the guests again uh everybody who participated uh thank you to the

people in the background Ashlyn and I know that Daniel and Jose kind of helped you know coordinate to make this happen

so I'm glad it happened I'm glad that we were able to get everybody on and kind of uh you know further the the ball down

the field on since it's called the Huddle I'm always using uh football analogy sorry bro

he's got to be decked out today by the way so moving that that ball down the field

on um you know opening up this this dialogue on how we can you know uh

better accept I I do want to mention one more time what you said that really

stood out to me is assume people are doing their best and trying their best and that they deserve to be in the

position or what they're doing I think that goes across the board whether it

was me when I started installing at 19 or Daniel's story about looking like he

was 10 when he was installing and you know I mean the all those things just assume people

are doing their best and and uh that they deserve to be in that position so

yeah and then I just like you don't realize how much this industry

supports every like we support each other right we got fcif we got the the

Wi-Fi mentoring program now you know women supporting the women and um the like once you started talking

about that it took me back to just this last CFI convention to where um you know they have Raffles and stuff

and you see everyone putting in for these Raffles and I think almost every single prize that was won by some by you

know someone that's been in the industry for a while went to someone that was new to give yeah like like you know you see

these kids in there and they're they're like I really need a stretcher and then someone wins a stretcher and then you

see them like hand it off like right away no questions asked you need this like this is going to help you out so I

I really like that aspect of our industry is that we we do we support each other and you know I'm grateful for

everyone that that listens and you know that supports us and what we're trying to do here you know

um we got Jeremy and hold hand here they're always on and you know just it's

amazing the the support system that we have and I'm really glad that that we

have that yeah well said uh and speaking of support if you want to support this podcast if you're viewing it uh in

whatever uh platform you know consider giving us a like uh subscribing to our

YouTube channel uh follow us uh we get a lot of people that I would have never

thought was was listening to us and attending um that come up to me and said yeah I

see you guys uh I see you on the podcast I love the the show the guys are awesome and and and uh you know so if you if you

like the content that you're receiving and uh you want to support us a little bit you know just consider hitting like

And subscribe and share with everyone and then share yeah do it all

right guys well thank you guys again uh Daniel and Jose for joining Crystal

thank you for joining on location that that had to be uh an extra Challenge and

Andrea thank you so much for for being on and bringing to light a couple of these uh organizations that I think we

should all consider sporting thank you so much Paul it's been great and it's great to see everybody else again so

soon after our trip to Tice but I look forward to working with you all awesome okay well signing out we'll see you guys

later and uh thanks again thanks everyone all right bye-bye

bye Crystal okay bye