Seven entrepreneurs. One honest conversation about summer slowdowns, pipeline gaps, and why the best fall seasons are built in spring.
GROWTH PILLAR: Leadership & Ops
WHO THIS IS FOR: SMB owners / Solopreneurs / Coaches / Service-based entrepreneurs managing seasonal revenue
WHAT THEY'LL GAIN: Practical strategies for summer cash flow, forward-planning frameworks, pipeline mindset shifts, and seasonal business ops that actually hold up.
Most entrepreneurs don't lose the fall — they lose it in June. That's the real message from this East Trade Winds Mastermind session.
Host Percy Barr brings together six sharp contributors for an unscripted round-table on one of the most common blind spots in small business: the summer slowdown. It's not just about July and August. It's about what you did — or didn't do — in the months before.
Wayne Pratt reminds us that months are meaningless. Seasons are not. Build for fall now, while you still have runway.
Tony Gyenis shares how forward-visioning — staying one to two years ahead — turns slow seasons into opportunity windows. His story about acquiring warehouse rollers before he knew he needed them is worth the listen alone.
Carl Richards points out that a September podcast launch means work starts now. Sixty to ninety days minimum. Waiting until you're back from the cottage is how January becomes April.
Noemi Beres confirms the podcasting world never really stops — and that the best booking windows close faster than most people expect.
JoJo LaRiccia brings it back to trust. Show up. Keep moving. Life shows up for the people who do.
Bernie Franzgrote ties the room together with a runway metaphor that applies to every entrepreneur planning an event, a launch, or a rebrand: the marketing has to breathe before the moment arrives.
Percy anchors the whole session with a simple reframe — this is spring. It's the right time to plant.
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Percy (00:06)
We all know that the summertime people go away for vacation and traditionally in a brick and mortar location, it's kind of a dull time unless you're in a tourist situation. So.
You have to kind of prepare for those, those times. So you have cashflow and you have proper staffing and you get people off for vacations and things like that. We're mostly entrepreneurs. So the idea of a vacation is, going to the coffee machine and getting a fresh cup of coffee. And then by the time you're back, you're off vacation. So that's kind of where we're at, but what are we doing to promote business now so that we have the appropriate cashflow to handle this over July and August and.
into September because that usually gets, it's usually thin that first couple weeks because people aren't quite getting back. So what are people doing or have you even thought about that?
I know some of us are reactionary in the sense that our next thought is what we're doing next as opposed to what we're doing next week. Has anyone done any planning on that?
Bernie (01:02)
I actually, I think for myself, it's, it's been, the knack 4 business podcast runs hot and heavy throughout the year. July and August is not recording and more planning and strategizing how I'm going to reformulate things. You know, if I'm offering more new or tweaking platform, right. Because then I can stop and introduce it into production mode. That's for me. Over to you Wayne ⁓ as a coach.
you have to make very sure that you eat your pet food, that you're actually living what you say you're living. So I try to look at seasons. Months are actually meaningless in your mind because you can't get around your ahead of a month. That requires calendars and... But seasons you understand. And I'm already thinking fall. I'm already building for a fall season.
and it's going to be prosperous and it's going to be fun and it's going to enlighten others. So that's what I'm excited about.
Percy (01:57)
Carl
Carl (01:58)
Yeah, ironically with the space I play in, we have clients who want a September or October launch and that means work actually begins basically over the summer, late May, June into July. So I'm not quite as, not to say my business is season proof, but certainly we do find that as much as it can be quiet in some ways, it's also busy in others.
So yeah, so we plan knowing that and we let people know upfront that if you want to launch in September or October, you got to start thinking about it now, not when you're sitting at the cottage for four weeks and you got to start planning it now. So that's how we attack it.
Percy (02:36)
You're absolutely right. The worst time to plan it is when you're sitting on the dock, three beers in and you're, you're right. yeah, you're thinking about strategy for your, for the fall. That's, that's terrible time to do it.
Carl (02:47)
And you don't wait till October, you know, don't wait till September when you're back to say, want to launch this fall because again, it's a 60 to 90 day window. And all of a sudden September becomes November and then November becomes January. And then January becomes March and April.
Noemi (03:01)
Same as Carl, like, you know, in the podcasting world, you never stop until Christmas. It's like you, it's, we're always on basically. And the only thing when we can do is like basically Christmas time because everybody's finally on holiday. But you know, when people again, want to do podcast guesting and okay, I want to start in September, October, you already have to start it like almost now or in June because everything is so booked up.
if you have a great podcast. So yeah, again, it never stops for us. So it's kind of always on 24-7. That's the podcasting world.
Tony (03:34)
What works for me is that I'm running the business now but I'm always like a year or two ahead of myself in the sense that I'm already planning what's where I'm going to be in a year or two and that always works for me really well because whenever you need equipment, whenever you need something at the time, it's the most expensive.
If you've ever tried to get a generator when you have no power, you know, that's when you're not going to get a deal. So this is when, when I was plan up ahead, like we're expanding our crystal line and it's always in my mind of how big I want it to be. And already I'm getting people that have little collections here and there that, that want to sell their crystal or, or, or buyers that, that I want to get out of the business. And it's like, I just want to unload them.
And that's I like that talk because it's usually got a deal in there. But this isn't something that I'm doing now. But it's it's already coming to me. So when these opportunities come, you can grab them. So whenever there's a slowdown in business, I'm still like so busy doing other things in to get things. Because when we just look at our business and that and we have the time to say, ⁓ it's slow. That means.
You're too focused on where you are right now. You haven't done that forward work. It's not that you're living in the future. It's just that there's a certain expectation and I'm living right now and these are the opportunities coming to me now. So that seems to work for me. So I remember in the moving business I wanted I envisioned this going to one cottage or something in the truck and only go so far from the door.
And I, and I was envisioning this long, long, you what they have at the beer stores, these rollers that, ⁓ that, that moved the, the cases of beer and they're on rollers. These things, I envisioned these type of things portable that could go from the truck to the house. And, and we're, you know, you're just pushing the boxes into the house that could be 300 feet away. And, ⁓ so I says, wouldn't that be nice? And within about two weeks,
There was an auction in this one warehouse and they had these rollers and it was almost like a thousand feet but it was like an accordion. It all just came together and you had to push it apart and it would end up being about 20, 30 feet and it was like nine of them or something. And it's like nobody wanted them. This thing is worth thousands of dollars. And so at the end of the auction, like nobody even bid on it.
And so she said, what do you want? And I says, I'll give you a hundred dollars for it. So it's that kind of thing. And then in one of the, ⁓ the jobs we had about six months later, we did have that exact cottage and we couldn't get close, but I knew it because I was able to drive ahead realizing, Hey, we're about 400 feet from the road and we can't drive the truck on it because they have the septic system and the other factors to drive a
Bernie (06:10)
Sold!
Tony (06:34)
10,000 pound truck on it so we had to be really far away and so we rolled out these rollers and the client going man you guys are equipped but that comes with a vision you know it starts off with with what do you want to do and then it just comes to you and I got it for next to nothing so that's what so try that
Percy (06:53)
Tony the Bargain Hunter. Jojo!
JoJo (06:55)
Yeah, you know, you bring up a good point here. We we get nudges. We get nudges along the way. What we should do in the future. We're living in the moment. We're doing our job. And it's funny that you brought up the question today, Bernie, about the movie, because I'm going to be having a new offering where people can create a chapter about their life and we could do it in a movie form.
because everybody has an interesting story to tell. And it can be done in a chapter. We don't have to go on and on about every single detail, but I'm getting nudges and I'm paying attention. Tony would have something to say about this. When you hear something, when you have a dream, someone whispers in your ear, you're in a networking group like this, something happens. It nudges you saying, yes.
Yes, yes, let's forge into the future and see what possibilities exist and take chances because if you don't stick your neck out, nothing's gonna happen.
Percy (07:55)
That's it. Yeah. I know, Brittany and I were talking last week about doing a bit of a mastermind about business building in the fall. And so, you know, some of that planning needs to be done now so that, ⁓ you know, you have the right materials in place and, and you target the right audience. you can't, you can't throw out an invite on Monday and expect to do it on Friday. Yeah.
And unfortunately I've seen entrepreneurs do that where they've got so wrapped up in their business, they forgot they had a go live. And, you know, that's a real challenge. You know, I'm working with one gentleman right now who has a go live on Wednesday that has to, it has to happen.
And he's nowhere near of getting the copy together for the landing pages and the whole process. And it's just like, yeah, man, I appreciate that you're doing this based on someone else's timeline because he's presenting with another person, but you knew this three months ago.
So we're going to do the best we can and we're going to move forward. But you know, there needs to be some planning and entrepreneurs on a whole are terrible for this. We're, kind of reactive, you know, crap, there's a new market coming up. need to take advantage of that. Okay. But if he had been watching the trends, you would have saw that six months ago and you would have been prepared for it. Much like Jojo, you see, you're seeing things in the marketplace that, that, ⁓
You know, you should take advantage of, and yet you're, you put it off, you know, I'm too busy now. I'll get to it next week.
Bernie (09:20)
Yeah. Well, Tony and I are working on a Charity Golf tournament for the Phoenix Business Exchange. And so it's sort of like, I know the golf course, they are used to pre-plan, you so if I wanted to do something this summer, yeah, maybe midnight, you know, good luck
But that's a good example. There's a runway for everything that has to happen. And it's not so much availability, but it's also the marketing. So if you're launching something new, you got to ramp it up. Is there an appetite for it, et cetera, and connecting resources? In this case, it's supporting a charity. It's not a profit generator. It's more a marketing generator. So it's also leveraging that.
Percy (10:02)
Yeah. And, ⁓ you know, Wayne put in a thing, in the chat here, you know, the shorter the time to the mo to the more prizes are needed to attract people in the last minute. And that's absolutely true. I worked for one gentleman who, Wayne knows, just passed away a little while ago and, ⁓ in the computer industry. And he was notorious to say, okay, well, we're doing a golf tournament in 30 days. You know, and.
So our team of 12 people actually had to stop selling stuff to get this golf tournament off the go off the, the, ⁓ the landing or off the, off the ground. It was, it was just terrible. Of course. I mean, I'm salary plus commission. So, you know, he'd come to me and say, Hey, I need you to do X, Y, and Z. I said, that doesn't make me any money. Go away. And that's probably why I don't work for him anymore. So.
Bernie (10:45)
Do you factor in for tech changes too? Sometimes you'll get forecasts either Google or Microsoft or they'll say, hey, we're adding another layer of complexity just to prevent fraud for email spamming. So they'll add a tweak in there, which totally messes everything else up, especially if you go high level.
Is that something, you know, and they do allow for a calibration period, you know, you kind of, should know, but you know, if it's not, if it's not your main news feed, you don't right till you're not working. How do you, manage the ⁓ tech undulations that are going to be disruptors?
Percy (11:22)
So for most entrepreneurs, it's really difficult because we're working with four or five, maybe six, seven applications. Each of those applications have notifications coming out from the manufacturer that are talking about updates and things like this. I mean, it's more than we want to partake. For a lot of entrepreneurs, they don't have the technical ability to actually understand the notice in the first place.
So they're kind of, yeah, I'll deal with it later. And when you deal with it later, it's the day it went live. A good, a good example of that is a go high levels update to the demarc to avoid spam emails coming out from, ⁓ from go high level. Cause they were getting labeled as a spammer. That demarc thing was mentioned probably three to four months before they actually put it in place.
Yet, ⁓ everybody was, was scrambling the last week when it went live because your emails weren't going out unless you actually did some things with your DNF. If that was sounded all strange to people, that's what I do. I work in a strange world.
Bernie (12:21)
acronyms that make things go bump in the night.
Percy (12:25)
Carl
Carl (12:25)
Yeah, it's funny how you mentioned the tech piece because when I started this agency back in 2020, podcasts were still for the most part audio only. Very few people had a video component to their show and now everyone wants video and everyone wants transcription and everything has to be SEO. So automatically just from a tech perspective. And again, most people to Percy's point, they don't understand the tech and what goes on behind the scenes.
So where we used to be able, and we still can, but used to be able to definitely launch a show in 60 days, depending on what kind of show they're launching and how many moving parts, how many hosts, whatever, it could be 90 to 120 days to launch a show. To do it right, can you launch it in a day? Sure, it's gonna be crap, but to do it right and to have all those moving parts in place, it's gonna take at least 90 days. Just if for no other reason, just because of the tech.
Percy (13:17)
So I guess the other part of this question is so how, I mean, everyone's got a sales funnel and a process that a customer journey that people have to go through. Do you get nervous in the summertime when your funnel gets a little short? When your prospect list gets a little thinner?
You
Carl (13:33)
I don't because the networking groups I'm in, they run all summer long. And one of the groups I'm in is a business mastermind and we're always bringing people to the group. And there's another group that I just recently connected with. By the way, this group is phenomenal, by the way. You get a lot of great ⁓ fodder out of this group and great connections here. But one of the other groups I'm in, they didn't even start meeting until two or three weeks ago and they've got meetings scheduled all summer long. And it's not necessarily about
⁓ prospect so much as it is about, ⁓ meaningful or the right introductions to you and people who definitely want what you have. So do I get worried about it? I used to, but I think to Wayne's point earlier in his messaging of I can't, it's almost like saying, well, I can't get clients in the summer because, my goodness, everyone's on holidays and my, pipeline is going to be dry. I look at it as
I might not be getting as many leads as I do throughout the year, but I'm still, you know, gung ho to make those connections and have those virtual coffees and those I will do poolside or on the deck or whatever, or from my patio, you know, seriously.
Percy (14:42)
Yeah. When I was, when I was selling computers years, years ago, you know, the, in the, at the end of August, you could probably put my prospect list on the back of a business card. you know, things got really tight here in Kingston because everybody goes, if you're not sailing, you're golfing, you know, it's that kind of a town or you, you know, you've gone home or you've done it because we have a lot of transient people here in Kingston and, ⁓
So, you know, the most of the shakers who actually had to make the decisions were long gone. and you had to wait till they get back. Of course, when they get back, they're so busy trying to make up for the lost time. They've been away for three weeks. And, ⁓ I mean, they're overwhelmed. So you kind of, kind of try and get them before their vacation and kind of get them thinking about it so that you actually have a reason to call them back when they get back. Right. So it, you're, planting seeds, right?
And this is a, this is the spring. It's a good time to plant. so, ⁓ you know, look about, think about, ⁓ doing a regeneration, campaign to some of your older clients. take it, take clients that you've had before and phone them up out of the blue or contact them out of the blue and say, Hey, you know, we did this work three or four years ago. Just wondering how it's working out. You know,
⁓ or we've, we're doing some new stuff. I'd some new, some new, equipment has come out and I'd like to read, just take a few minutes and retouch that video for you. You know, we're doing it for free. It's no, there's no cost to it. Just thought was thinking of you when this new equipment came out, I thought I'd like to try it with your video, something like that. Cause I mentioned videos because Jojo put her hand up.
JoJo (16:12)
Yeah, you know what? Life gives us exactly what we need at exactly the right time. And if you're doing everything that you can to always, always do the right stuff and just keep moving forward, you're going to be successful. But if you get lazy and you think, I'm going to like, I mean, it's okay to take a day off. We need to balance ourselves. We can't always be working.
But if you are just like forging along, showing up, life is going to show up for you too.