Mya Stone runs Stone Capital Partners, a people first M&A firm out of Grand Rapids doing buy and sell side deals for founder owned businesses doing $1M-$100M a year.

After walking away from law, Mya built and sold a hospitality startup, then helped grow a body shop company up to 47 locations. When that business got hit with a lawsuit, she had to rebrand every location overnight. She sold that business and later started Stone Capital Partners on the single idea that the right people are the real asset.

Here's what we covered:

→ How a Harvard advisory board told her she wasn't ready to be CEO

→ Scaling and losing a body shop rollup to a lawsuit

→ Why most business owners have no idea what their company is worth

→ Being a young woman in a room full of suits has an advantage

When owners build a business they rarely think about what it's worth or who it's for once they're gone. Mya's whole career is proof that the people side of a deal matters as much as the numbers.

Thank you Mya for making the time to come on and go Beyond The Hustle with us!

Chapters

0:00 Intro

01:47 Raised by grandparents, Harvard by 16

04:47 Walking away from a Harvard law career

06:19 Building and selling a Boston hospitality startup

10:08 Told to lead people, not run the company

11:28 Scaling a body shop rollup to 47 locations

21:48 The real messes inside family owned businesses

25:19 Telling employees about a sale, and the fridge that changed everything

32:47 Cold calling, urgency, and the truth about the silver tsunami

47:36 Being a young woman in a room full of suits

~~~

This episode is powered by Drive Creative:

🌐 https://drivecreativeagency.com/

Subscribe for more conversations with entrepreneurs and innovators who push Beyond The Hustle

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Apple → https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/beyond-the-hustle/id1896663240

Do you have a story to tell? We’d love to hear from you!

Learn more about being a guest on Beyond The Hustle by visiting https://www.beyondthehustle.show

Aaron McCarthy spent 20 years in corporate IT before deciding he was done climbing someone else's ladder.

In 2018 he convinced his wife for them to take a SBA loan and started Maven IT out of a borrowed front office in exchange for free support. No staff. Just him and a laptop.

In this episode we covered:

→ Why he picked recurring revenue as his model before he even had a business

→ How a cold call to a Smoothie King franchisee turned into a 50-location relationship

→ What actually happens operationally when you acquire a business

→ The cybersecurity basics small businesses skip until they get hacked

→ What he's looking for in his next acquisition strategy

Aaron’s got a simple filter: will it produce recurring revenue? Can I improve the operations? Can I learn it myself first? When those boxes check, he moves.

Aaron, thanks for coming in and sitting down on Beyond The Hustle. Appreciate you dude!

Chapters

0:00 - Intro

1:00 - Who Aaron is and what Maven IT does

2:30 - 20 years in corporate and the recurring revenue light bulb

5:05 - Why he bought a commercial cleaning company

6:15 - Transitioning ownership and what he inherited

9:00 - Starting Maven IT at 40 with an SBA loan

12:25 - How the Smoothie King relationship started

15:15 - How the MSP space has changed and where new growth comes from

20:05 - AI, cybersecurity, and what's actually happening in the space

25:34 - What small businesses should do right now about cybersecurity

~~~

This episode is powered by Drive Creative:

🌐 https://drivecreativeagency.com/

Subscribe for more conversations with entrepreneurs and innovators who push Beyond The Hustle

Prefer to listen?

Spotify → https://open.spotify.com/show/033gI3Y3rhCbWjbPqfVmMf?si=3ad1a107ca2244fa

Apple → https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/beyond-the-hustle/id1896663240

Do you have a story to tell? We’d love to hear from you!

Learn more about being a guest on Beyond The Hustle by visiting https://www.beyondthehustle.show

Matt McAlpine went from washing kegs at a cider farm to running Michigan's largest cannabis beverage operation.

The early days at Blake’s Hard Cider were tough… Their first big bet (getting non-smokers into dispensaries with a 2mg drink) didn't land the way they planned.

They adjusted and deployed 150 refrigerators into dispensaries which doubled average sales per store.

And they went from near zero to manufacturing 60%-80% of all cannabis beverages in Michigan.

In our episode we covered:

→ How Matt scaled Blake's Hard Cider from 10,000 to 1.3 million cases

→ Why the "get canna-curious consumers into dispensaries" strategy failed

→ The play that unlocked 51 dispensaries and doubled their average order size

→ How Michigan stacks up as a cannabis beverage market

→ How 37,000 Michigan liquor stores present the real opportunity

Matt thanks for coming by the studio to record and share your story of struggles and successes!

Chapters

00:00 Intro

01:00 Who is Matt McAlpine

03:14 Chrysler and the manufacturing leadership program

05:50 Leaving corporate for Blake's Hard Cider

07:53 Scaling Blake's from 10,000 to 1.3 million cases

10:05 Blake's Beverage Company and acquiring regional cider brands

13:40 How Emerald Canning Partners was formed

15:37 Building the facility and the early product launch struggles

20:35 Who the real cannabis beverage consumer is

24:24 Brand partners, the full portfolio, and owning the fridge

30:38 Michigan's market share and the 37,000 liquor store opportunity

36:43 Why cannabis beverages beat alcohol for recovery

44:00 Operations, team building, and the hire slow fire quick mentality

50:00 What fires Matt up and where ECP is headed

~~~

This episode is powered by Drive Creative:

🌐 https://drivecreativeagency.com/

Subscribe for more conversations with entrepreneurs and innovators who push Beyond The Hustle

Prefer to listen?

https://pod.link/1896663240

Do you have a story to tell? We’d love to hear from you!

Learn more about being a guest on Beyond The Hustle by visiting https://www.beyondthehustle.show

Kelly grew up in Eight Mile in Michigan, the same streets Eminem rapped about.

His house was absolute chaos: a drunk stepfather, a drunk mother who once stabbed her husband and set the house on fire, and a kid who learned to survive by reading the room before anything else. By the time he got to college, he was selling drugs, racking up arrests, and lying on every job application about his two felonies. Then he went to jail.

That four months in a cell changed him forever: Kelly realized he was good at sales and started a telecom brokerage from nothing. He built it into a multimillion-dollar company even without a website.

Kelly wrote Harder Than Life. Then Happier Than Life. He built a podcast and an AI-driven cybersecurity company.

And he keeps going back into the hard stuff because he's learned feeling it is the only way through it.

In this episode, we tackled:

→ Why alcohol and drugs are always a symptom of the disease

→ The childhood trauma that drove his addiction for decades

→ His TLC framework for rebuilding your mind, body, and life

→ What faith, surrender, and a specific prayer to God have done for his business

→ Why the thing you keep avoiding is your actual portal to growth

Kelly told me you can't heal what you're unwilling to reveal… Everything opened up once he stopped sugarcoating how bad things really were.

Thank you Kelly for bringing this level of honesty into the room!

Chapters

0:00 - Introduction

1:00 - Kelly's Background: Eight Mile, Eminem, and Growing Up Poor

3:30 - Selling Drugs, Getting Arrested, and Two Felonies

6:45 - Jail, the Wake-Up Call, and the First Honest Job

10:30 - Dillon Shares His Own Story: Heroin at 18

14:00 - Faith, God Moments, and the Power of a Specific Ask

17:00 - Why Kelly Stopped Drinking and What Happened Next

21:30 - The 15 Days of Anxiety: Healing Childhood Trauma

25:00 - What Being Happier Than Life Actually Looks Like

27:30 - The TLC Framework: Train, Learn, Coach

32:00 - Finding Common Ground in a Divided World

35:30 - Final Message: TLC, Truth, and How to Get Both Books Free

~~~

This episode is powered by Drive Creative:

🌐 https://drivecreativeagency.com/

Subscribe for more conversations with entrepreneurs and innovators who push Beyond The Hustle

Prefer to watch?

YouTube → https://youtu.be/T8LzJkBrfAc

Do you have a story to tell? We’d love to hear from you!

Learn more about being a guest on Beyond The Hustle by visiting https://www.beyondthehustle.show

Early on in his sales career, Dan received a $0 commission check. With a wife and kids at home to take care of, it was a moment that changed him forever…

Dan Russell is VP of National Sales at Trion Solutions, overseeing payroll, HR, and benefits for over a million employees across the globe. But before any of that, he was a mortgage banker trying to do right by his clients in an industry that stopped letting him.

In this episode we tackled:

→ Why Dan walked away from mortgage banking at its peak

→ What a $0 commission check teaches you that success never will

→ How Trion handled an employee dying on a client's floor in real time

→ Why asking for help is the most underrated skill in business

→ What community investment actually looks like when no one's watching

A huge takeaway from my time with Dan was that asking for help isn't a sign you don't have it together… it's how people who actually have it together got there.

Dan, thanks a ton for coming in and being so open about the hard moments. Appreciate you dude!

Chapters

0:00 - Introduction & Welcome

1:00 - What Dan Does at Trion Solutions

1:55 - How Dan's Company Got Acquired

2:49 - The Mortgage Banking Days

4:35 - The $0 Commission Check

5:43 - Why Dan Left Banking and Found PEO

8:20 - Sink or Swim: Learning a Brand New Industry

10:55 - Why You Have to Know Your Product

21:55 - What the Best Business Owners Have in Common

27:48 - When a Client Called About a Dead Employee

34:36 - Community Work: Covenant House and Beyond

38:45 - Homeless Youth and the "Lost Generation"

41:53 - Advice to His Younger Self

46:39 - Stop Trying to Do It Alone

47:07 - Why Starting Matters More Than Being Ready

49:39 - Gratitude as a Practice, Not a Feeling

~~~

This episode is powered by Drive Creative

🌐 https://drivecreativeagency.com/

Subscribe for more conversations with entrepreneurs and innovators who push Beyond The Hustle

Prefer to watch?

YouTube → https://youtu.be/nPJQmvcdogY

Have a story to tell? We’d love to hear from you!

Learn more about being a guest on Beyond The Hustle by visiting https://www.beyondthehustle.show

Maggie George is a criminal defense attorney and partner at George Law Firm in Royal Oak, Michigan. Before she ever set foot in a courtroom, she spent 13 years with a mortgage lender, worked a stint on Capitol Hill, and raised a one-year-old while taking the LSAT on maternity leave.

In this episode of Beyond The Hustle we covered:

→ What it's actually like to defend someone you know is guilty

→ The drunk driving death trial that almost ended in a mistrial

→ How AI is already changing who walks through a defense attorney's door

→ What running a law firm with your husband looks like when it actually works

Maggie told me that she never wants to be the smartest person in the room, and if she is, she’s in the wrong room.

Chapters

0:00 - Introduction & Teaser

1:00 - Meet Maggie George: Attorney, Partner, and Career Chameleon

3:00 - What Criminal Defense and Civil Litigation Actually Mean

5:00 - From Capitol Hill to Quicken Loans to Law School

9:00 - Running a Law Firm With Your Husband

12:00 - What Happens When You Know Your Client Did It

15:00 - The Drunk Driving Death Trial That Almost Ended in a Mistrial

19:00 - What Law School Doesn't Teach You

22:00 - The Clients Who Come Back Sober

25:00 - Building a Brand in a New Market: The Florida Expansion

30:00 - How AI Is Already Changing Criminal Defense

36:00 - What George Law Does and Who They Help

37:00 - The Best Advice for Anyone Starting in Law

~~~

This episode is powered by Drive Creative

🌐 https://drivecreativeagency.com/

Subscribe for more conversations with entrepreneurs and innovators who push Beyond The Hustle

Prefer to listen?

Spotify → https://open.spotify.com/show/033gI3Y3rhCbWjbPqfVmMf?si=3ad1a107ca2244fa

Apple → https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/beyond-the-hustle/id1896663240

Do you have a story to tell? We’d love to hear from you!

Learn more about being a guest on Beyond The Hustle by visiting https://www.beyondthehustle.show

Business has always been Billy Baumann's love language.

Billy is the founder of Second Chair Advisory, where he helps private equity firms find the deals nobody else is seeing. But the path to get here wasn't a straight line… It was winding, expensive, and completely humbling.

But what came out the other side was someone who speaks a language most M&A advisors can't: the language of someone who's actually been broke, actually made payroll decisions at 2 am, and actually knows what it costs to build something from zero.

In this episode of Beyond The Hustle, we go into:

→ How to use your personal network to get your first clients when you have no money and no credibility

→ Why profitable and actually making money are two completely different things on a balance sheet

→ How Billy is using AI agents to generate proprietary deal flow for private equity firms

→ What the M&A world looks like for trade business owners who've never heard of EBITDA

→ Why seasons matter in business and why some people are only meant to be in your story for a chapter

Billy, thank you for coming on the show and getting deep. Appreciate you man!

Chapters

0:00 - Intro & Welcome

1:00 - Meet Billy Baumann

4:00 - Business as a Love Language: The Donut Shop Story

8:30 - How Billy's Entrepreneurial Mind Showed Up as a Kid

10:45 - College, Failing Out (Twice), and Finding His Way Back

13:00 - Early Sales Jobs: GNC, AT&T, and Learning to Sell

19:45 - First Real Business Opportunity and Building a Team from Scratch

23:15 - Going Broke, Defaulting on Credit Cards, and Betting on Yourself

27:00 - Landing the First Big Placement and Growing Through Referrals

31:30 - The Grant Cardone Era and Getting Shredded on Stage

36:40 - 2023: Losing His Father and What Came After

41:00 - The Home Care Company, the Pivot, and Finding M&A

47:30 - How AI Is Changing Deal Flow for Private Equity Firms

55:00 - A Step-by-Step Example of Using Claude to Build a Business Plan

1:09:26 - One Piece of Advice for Every Entrepreneur Starting Out

~~~

This episode is powered by Drive Creative

🌐 https://drivecreativeagency.com/

Subscribe for more conversations with entrepreneurs and innovators who push Beyond The Hustle

Prefer to listen?

Spotify → https://open.spotify.com/show/033gI3Y3rhCbWjbPqfVmMf?si=3ad1a107ca2244fa

Apple → https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/beyond-the-hustle/id1896663240

Do you have a story to tell? We’d love to hear from you!

Learn more about being a guest on Beyond The Hustle by visiting https://www.beyondthehustle.show

Dan Dulka and I started Drive Creative over 10 years ago but that’s when the real education began.

The first year or two was mostly brute force since cash was tight.. Right when we landed manufacturing clients and a public company with $2 billion in annual revenue, Covid hit. We lost most of our business overnight.

But instead of pivoting fast, Dan shared how we held on and hoped. But hope is NOT a good strategy.

In this episode, we tackled:

→ How Covid forced a full pivot

→ Why implementing EOS changed our partnership and the way we ran the company

→ How we’re rebuilding our team model around AI to create more leverage without losing culture

→ What "AI Thursdays" looks like and why we started it

Though it’s taken 10 years, it really does feel like something shifted three years ago. Like we went from hustling through the work to actually building something with intention.

Dan, thanks for coming on the show and sharing the story of Drive Creative!

Chapters

0:00 - Introduction

1:10 - Who Is Dan Dulka and What Does Drive Do?

3:15 - Building the Team: AI as Leverage, Not a Replacement

6:00 - Training AI Like You'd Train an Employee

9:23 - AI Thursdays: How Drive Is Getting Their Team Up to Speed

13:33 - How Drive Started 10 Years Ago

15:20 - The Early Grind: Cash, Clients, and Brute Force

17:05 - How Covid Devastated Their Manufacturing Focus

18:37 - The Three Pivots That Turned Things Around

23:06 - How EOS Fixed a Fractured Partnership

27:47 - What the Operating System Actually Does for a Small Business

33:18 - What Entrepreneurship Gives You That a 9-to-5 Doesn't

39:55 - Facing Fear: Everest Base Camp With a Heights Phobia

44:21 - Bravery in Business Is the Same as Bravery on a Mountain

49:12 - What We'd Tell Ourselves on Day One

~~~

This episode is powered by Drive Creative

🌐 https://drivecreativeagency.com/

Subscribe for more conversations with entrepreneurs and innovators who push Beyond The Hustle.

Prefer to watch?

YouTube → https://youtu.be/0WBF1-0kicU

Do you have a story to tell? We’d love to hear from you!

Learn more about being a guest on Beyond The Hustle by visiting https://www.beyondthehustle.show