Deep Dive: The Y, with John Ehbar

John: 0:02

We do serve about 65 million people a year annually throughout the world. And you're right, we are in 120 countries. We started way back in 1844. So it's funny on applications, when I have to put in what year did your business start, I usually have to write it in because there's not an option to put 1852 for Buffalo. But it does, the work we do all stands for how it originally started that we are trying to solve local community issues.

Emilia: 0:26

In today's Planet Odoo episode, I'm taking another deep dive. This time we are jumping into the nonprofit and philanthropy world of an organization that I'm sure each and every one of you has heard of before. The Y. I'm talking with John Ehrbar, president and CEO of the Y in western New York. We are chatting today about the inner workings of the organization, how it was founded, its core missions and of course, its business processes and structure. You're going to want to stick around for this one. I'm your curious host, Emilia, and this is Planet Odoo. Hi, John. Welcome to Planet Odoo.

John: 1:00

Thanks, Emilia. How are you? How are you doing today?

Emilia: 1:02

Good, good. It's a sunny day in Buffalo, so it feels nice to be here. And I'm excited that you joined us in Seneca One Tower.

John: 1:09

Yeah, happy to be here today.

Emilia: 1:11

So today we're going to be talking about the YMCA from the nonprofit lens and an organization that is globally renowned and has quite a presence here locally in western New York. And the reason we really wanted to kind of bring you in is we have nonprofits that kind of come to us all the time and they either have compliance needs or they have certain specific needs for their software. And I really wanted to jump in and kind of talk about what those kind of things are so that those who are listening and are working for or representing a nonprofit can kind of know what to think about since we do reach out to a lot of people in the start up space. So let's jump into the YMCA first. So how did you come to the YMCA?

John: 1:52

Yeah, well, I was almost born into the YMCA, so I learned how to swim. I did a lot of programs at the Y, and I was fortunate. During college, I got a call. This was in the late 90s to say, Hey, John, when you graduate, would you like a job as a sports director? And that was my interview. So I since 1997, for the past 25 years, I've worked for YMCA in Cleveland, in Spokane, Washington, and now here in Buffalo, New York.

Emilia: 2:15

Are you originally from Cleveland?

John: 2:17

Yeah, I'm from the Cleveland area.

Emilia: 2:18

Oh, okay. Yeah. And then what steps did you take to kind of get where you are in this current position?

John: 2:24

Yeah. So it didn't naturally occur that overnight I became the CEO in the western New York. But, you know, I've always had the philosophy to do my job well and look at what job I want to do in the future and see what skills do I need to get there. So I continued to build my skills. I continued to look at professional development both inside and outside our work. And so I started as a sports director. Then I ended up running a facility in northeast Ohio and became again built on my skills to become a vice president of operations in Washington. And then for whatever reason, they decided to hire me to lead the charge here in western New York.

Emilia: 2:59

Oh, wow. Is there anything within the ecosystem of the Y that spoke to you specifically?

John: 3:05

Yeah. So I've always been a person who likes to help others and the fact that, you know, I'm able to help people in their journey in life, I've really I really enjoyed it. When I first got my job out of college, I thought it was going to be a job and then I would find my career later, but it ended up being my career. So I just I really enjoyed it. I've enjoyed the people I work with and the work that we do.

Emilia: 3:26

Yeah. Speaking of the work that you guys do, can you tell us some things about the Y and kind of so we can dig deeper into the inner workings?

John: 3:33

Yeah. Do you want me to talk about how we started or where do you want me to start?

Emilia: 3:37

Yeah, yes! So the Y's website states that you're in 120 countries and reach over 40 million people each year. And these numbers are huge. And so I kind of want to jump into globally and then locally.

John: 3:51

Yeah, sure. And it looks like our website might need some updating because we we do serve about 65 million people a year annually throughout the world. And you're right, we are in 120 countries. We started way back in 1844. So it's funny on applications, when I have to put in what year did your business start? I usually have to write it in because there's not an option to put 1852 for Buffalo. But but we have been around for for quite some time. The Y originally started to it started in England, in London, England, and it was really in response to the social conditions and the work conditions for people. That was about the time of the end of the Industrial Revolution. So there were a lot of people, mostly young men, working in the trades, working 12 hour days, sleeping on the streets, sometimes sleeping inside. So there's a guy named George Williams in England who really wanted to improve the spiritual condition of young men engaged in the trades and they bonded around Christianity. So that's that's where our name came from. It was young men focused on on Christian principles over time. Now we don't serve just young people. We don't serve just men. We don't just serve people who are Christian. But it does, the work we do all stands for how it originally started that we are trying to solve local community issues. So so that's how we've evolved quite a bit over time. We're not the same as we were in 1844 and you can see our reach with so many people has really grown over the years.

Emilia: 5:17

And so when did you guys rebrand as the Y and what was the kind of decision making process behind that?

John: 5:22

Yeah. So over time, you know, the YMCA, especially in the United States, you know, in the 70s, there was a song by a group that has caught on that is not necessarily my favorite song, but but and people have gotten over time. People have had misconceptions about what we do. So and we're also there's a little confusion because there's YWCA, there's YMCA, there's other groups. We, it was about 2010 when we rebranded, and a lot of that was to redefine ourselves to the public, reintroduce ourselves to the public, to say we are the Y, we are about youth development, we're about healthy living and social responsibility. Those are the three kind of buckets of work, our three areas of impact that we've done throughout time. But we have not done a good job telling people about through time. So that was that was the purpose of the rebranding, to introduce us new and to bring new life to an organization just like you would when you rebrand anything.

Emilia: 6:19

Right. Right. So you mentioned that. Each individual location or area serves to kind of help the people of that area. So I'm guessing the missions may be a little bit different to each location. And so my question is, how do you as a business go into that location and kind of decide what is needed?

John: 6:41

Yeah. So that is a difficult part of our organization. We're not a typical corporation. We've been around forever. And so it's more of the bottom up style as opposed to top down leadership. So we are we're a federation, meaning there's we're autonomous in every community, although there's national councils that we, that we, we kind of are related to, if that makes sense. So, so our mission statements are all relatively similar there, although we we're allowed to have differences, right? So at the world level. So we have a world office in Geneva, Switzerland. At the world level, the the mission is to empower young people and communities to build a healthy spirit, mind and body for all. In the United States, it's very similar. Depending on from Y to Y, it's a little bit different, but we all have the phrase about putting programs into practice that build healthy spirit, mind and body for all. So. So anything that falls along those lines is really what we look for. And we try to find whatever the local community needs might be. So there might be like in the United States, for example, or in Australia, I think England and Canada, we have fitness centers and child care centers, swimming pools, things like that. The need we're trying to solve here is there might be obesity or lack of physical activity that maybe otherwise in Europe or other I'm sorry, not otherwise, but other areas of the planet don't have as much issue with as we do. Whereas in Africa there might be some YMCAs that are focused on job development or safe drinking water or Aids prevention and things like that. So we really try to tailor ourselves to our local needs, and we're all governed by a local board of directors, which is kind of serves as the community voice to help guide us.

Emilia: 8:26

Oh, wow. Okay. And so I guess now bringing it into the area that you serve or the population that you serve, how have you seen it grow and scale to what it is today and and evolve knowing that the needs have changed?

John: 8:44

Yeah. So, you know, as I started to mention, like here in western New York, we've been around since 1852. And and at the beginning it was more of the social social groups. And over time we've introduced swim lessons to help people learn how to swim at YMCAs in the United States, basketball, volleyball and racquetball were all invented. We started to add more physical activities, group exercise classes, camping got got its start. So we've,we've really grown. We've what we're known well for here is our child care services, our youth sports and our healthy living options, which is not just working out, but it's also helping people with cancer recovery. Or regaining their strength after having cancer or diabetes prevention, chronic disease management. And we're even working with people with arthritis and Parkinson's and so forth. So we're really trying to keep our we can do community assessments, a needs assessments, and we're trying to continue to build our our corps of volunteers, which is the eyes and ears of the community, to help us recognize what what issues are out there that we need to provide some solutions for.

Emilia: 9:50

Okay. And then do you bring in kind of a new department as these needs arise or what kind of departments were brought in or created to to facilitate this? Well, you you did just say obviously a couple of them, but I guess departments that currently exist and that you lean on heavily.

John: 10:07

Yeah. So at our. Well let me answer this locally then I can go nationally. Sure. And so locally, I came to Buffalo in 2019 and I saw a need. The Buffalo area has a lot of water, right. There's there's the Niagara Falls area that we have a great lake. There's the ponds, lakes, rivers and a lot of swimming pools. And so drowning prevention or drowning is an issue. So is in addition to that, we also have some areas that are not really where kids don't get a lot of services or there's a lot of transportation barriers because of cost. So we created in Buffalo a youth outreach department where we bring programming out directly into the community as opposed to having people come to us. So so that's something that's a simple way that we can evolve at our national office, some of the departments that have been very that are helpful to our local, as I mentioned, their 750 local wise in the United States at the national office, there's you know, one of the larger departments now is on diversity, equity and inclusion to help make sure we have the best practices in place. We do welcome everyone from all walks of life, but we want to make sure people from all walks of life feel welcome. So they help us with that. Our IT department is growing right now. It's more important probably now than ever just because everything is turning into technology. Leadership development has always been a strong point of the Y. We've always been ranked up as having one of the stronger internal development programs, which certainly helped me throughout my career and has helped other staff and the other area where we probably rely a lot on. And I think this is true of wise throughout the world, is on grants and partnerships. So you know, revenue comes from all types of sources, but especially in other parts of the world, grants are incredibly important for funding. So our national councils, our national resource offices are are very good and strong at being able to develop those relationships to get large amounts of funds which they can either distribute out or have local wise apply for to to meet again to meet some of those programmatic needs.

Emilia: 12:10

Okay. Yeah. So then speaking of revenue and fundraising and grants, obviously the type of company federation that this is has a board of directors and we don't have I don't think we've talked to anyone on the show yet who runs in that way. And how does having a board of directors help grow a company like this?

John: 12:31

Yeah, I think it's the nonprofit world is quite different from the for profit world. And even within the nonprofit world, it's different. So, you know, I happen to work for a very large nonprofit, right? So, so locally I report to a local board of directors. I don't report to our national CEO. I report to a body of people from here at the national office. Same thing. Our our national CEO reports to a board of directors, which is made up of influential leaders throughout the country. And then even at our international level, there's a board of directors who are made up oftentimes of YMCA leaders throughout the world. So having the board of directors, as I said before, it's kind of our eyes and ears. It helps us sometimes open doors in the community. So, for example, someone like me or our new national CEO, Suzanne McCormick, who came in in the last year or so, it's helpful. There's always continuity when you have the board of directors so the individual leaders can come and go. But by having the board of directors, it keeps the continuity. They help guide the strategic plan to make sure and then not just guide it, but make sure, evaluate it, make sure we're staying on track with it so we don't we don't make the plans and put them away. We actually work them. So that to me, that's the most powerful thing and being able to open. Doors to larger donors or other organizations with with whom to partner, I think is really the benefit of having the board of directors.

Emilia: 13:53

Speaking about revenue streams and fundraising and grants, what is the approach when looking at those two areas of revenue?

John: 14:01

Yeah. So with with fundraising. It's important to build relationships with donors and potential partners. It's important for whether they're individuals. Sometimes there are other YMCAs. There are YMCAs in other parts of the world that are actually funded by YMCA in the United States who are able to generate more money. So so we have something called a World Service fund that a lot of YMCAs put money into and then goes to help fund other programs throughout the world who wouldn't be able to raise money otherwise. So so that's important. The grant work is important for any time you're working with a fundraiser or a grant provider. They have certain expectations in place. That's why they're giving you their money. You know, they want you to be a steward of their money to make sure something can happen. So oftentimes at our at our national office in in Chicago, in the United States, the big grants are for food to prevent food insecurity. So so we can our approach or our national approach is to try to get these large grants from from the grantors and say, okay, local YMCA is here's we have some money and here's some criteria we're either looking for or the or the person giving the grant money is looking for and we can apply in. So we always the lens we put on that is does our local Y have the capacity to deliver a program for which there's money available? So that's kind of how we look at it through grants. And there are a million types of grant. There's micro grants all the way to these giant things. And and I do think one of the softwares we use is to actually find grants that are appropriate to us, which is very helpful. Not all YMCAs do that, but I've found that to be a worthwhile investment. But fundraising, I think that's something we always have to continually do, whether it's for capital improvements or just to make sure you can do programs or just to make sure you can help people who couldn't otherwise afford to be in your program be part of it, because that's really important to us.

Emilia: 15:55

Um, so you mentioned the softwares that are involved, and this is something that kind of comes back to our customers who work in a non-profit space and could be very small, could be very large. But what are some of the softwares that you find yourself using on a day to day at any scale? Things that are very important?

John: 16:13

Yeah, I was trying to think, you know, before I walked in here about what kind of technology we and it's totally different from what I started 25 years ago. But for most, most YMCAs that have some type of membership base or consensus programs, we having some type of web based management system for our members is important. Like I mentioned, those 4 or 5 countries that have the fitness type centers. I think it's important to have easy online use, easy online sales for people. Typically YMCAs do not have unless you're a large like New York City or Houston or LA might have large IT departments. For most YMCA, there are some YMCAs in the United States whose, you know, budget just doesn't allow for any IT people. So so any software we use has to be extremely user friendly and require the least amount of it intervention on site, if that makes sense. So it's also important we also use, you know, customer relation management type software for so we can target messages through email. Do you know, gather? I think gathering the voice of the consumer is important to us. So Net Promoter scores are something we've been paying attention to and we have software that allows for that. Then obviously we have the stuff that I think almost every Y in the world needs at some point is some type of accounting software, the HR or payroll, because laws keep changing. I happen to live in a state where there's a lot of laws that keep changing, some for good, some for bad. Um, fundraising software, even if it has a capability to text to give. And things like that is important to look at. I think for most nonprofits, some type of project management software is always good and then depending on the size and the scope, the type of nonprofit, there are some nonprofits that are heavily government funded so they don't have to rely as much on fundraising. But for us, I, I have found it valuable to have a wealth screening technology where you can you can pretty much look up any person or organization and find their giving history to figure out what who some good prospects might be and and what amount is appropriate to ask them for, because that's usually some of the hardest part to do so. And then some grant seeking software. There are some sometimes I mentioned like the Diabetes Prevention program and other programs. I can't speak to other countries. The United States has some some privacy law, health privacy laws, and I can't imagine Europe doesn't as well, because I know I've traveled to Europe quite a bit and there's usually more heavy compliance even getting on the Internet. But so there is we have two software that can meets the criteria to meet those laws to keep stuff private is also important.

Emilia: 18:59

Okay. So you're looking at like HIPAA certified.

John: 19:01

Yeah, HIPAA. United States would be HIPAA. HIPAA compliant because for instance, in Buffalo, we don't have that. So we have to rely on partnerships of of other either consortiums or other groups that can provide hold that host that data for us or do the billing to the government or whatever that might be, because we don't either don't have the solution for it or don't have the training for it or aren't sure how to implement it, right.

Emilia: 19:26

And then all of these softwares you just listed, are they the same software?

John: 19:31

No, it's very unusual to have have one package. Now. There is. There is there is a company that about two thirds of the YMCA is in the United States. Use that. That has the operation software, the accounting software, the fundraising, which is convenient because it speaks to each other, speaks the same language. There's actually a 2 or 3. There's about 2 or 3 key vendors. I think YMCA is across the country use there are there is at least one YMCA in the South that I think creates its own software. They have a but they have a large IT department to do that. But for the most part, we try to if we can't find a general enterprise system that can do everything we try to find, we want to make sure our systems can translate well to each other. Most can, but but that's when with the YMCA, that's the heart. One of the hard parts about us being autonomous. I think it's frustrating to our national office. There's 750 of us. We can pick and choose and you know, each vendor can do their own contract with each person. So it's very sometimes hard when we want to do some impact reporting or some benchmark reporting. Sometimes I can see how it might be difficult for our national office to be able to pull data consistently or in the same way. So we're working towards that and that's one of the reasons our IT department has started to to really firm up and get a little bit stronger recently.

Emilia: 20:53

So what kind of I.T. department do you kind of have and who do you look for when when having that IT department. Or do you not have one?

John: 21:02

Our IT department is Jake.

Emilia: 21:05

So that guy Jake. From State Farm.

John: 21:06

Jake from the Y. I will tell you now he's very skilled and he's great at networking and and things like that. So typically like a Y, so our size YMCA, we are about just just north of a $20 Million annual operating budget. Normally there would be about two to maybe IT people, usually someone who knows networking and someone who can either do desktops or desktop support or help with some of the software needs or data entry. For now, it's meeting our needs. But but we are using some very user friendly software that doesn't require a lot of internal programming or key knowledge of of code or anything like that.

Emilia: 21:48

Okay. And so you mentioned as well just kind of the software that you're using for outreach. So obviously everybody's got a website, right, and some kind of marketing capabilities, email marketing, text marketing. How do you handle on such a large scale that outreach and marketing?

John: 22:04

Yeah, One of the things there was a group of this is one, one example in the YMCA where something did not come straight from our national office. Our national office picked it up from otherwise. But there was a group of YMCA is creating a what they call an open platform, which is basically open source, but specifically for YMCA. So they developed this this platform that to make it a lot easier. And I'm speaking at the very basic level because I am this is not necessarily my skill set. But but they our national office has now has, for lack of better word, deployed it to localize, to be able to use and or to to be able to assist wise with creating websites without having to to go through expensive either expensive vendors or or the very time consuming process of design. So so we have a very robust shared system to, to develop that. So if you were to look at various YMCA websites in the United States, you'll notice they're all quite similar. If you look at one's in Canada, you'll notice there's are different from the United States, but theirs are all quite similar to each other. So, so that is that has been extremely helpful for because again, we have limited marketing staff as well. Now with the rebranding, I will say that in 2010, now the rest of the world did not rebrand. It was just the United States. So most most of the other wise throughout the world, my understanding is we're not real happy with with the United States decision to rebrand the YMCA. But but with that, some of there are some brand guidelines that were put out which makes it very easy to tell what's and those are always updated on a regular basis. And our Y's are actually audited by our national office every two years as as one of our requirements to be a YMCA to make sure we're within that. So but some of the we most YMCA have someone in charge. It might if they don't have a marketing person, they might have a fitness director who does social media posts and things like that, and we try to use those things to the best of our ability.

Emilia: 24:07

How cross-functionally savvy.

John: 24:09

Yeah, we have to be that way. Sometimes we have to.

Emilia: 24:13

And so as part of these brand guidelines and branding, you know, rebranding. Excuse me, what are some of the larger marketing campaigns that you guys have launched?

John: 24:22

Yeah. So so while at our at our national level, a lot of it there's a few different ones. One is just on on fundraising, letting people it's called for a better us. It's just letting people know that who the Y is and why we exist. We don't want people to think of us just as a fitness center, even though we have those. We don't want people to think of us just as a swimming pool or just a daycare. Right? We want people to know we are about improving people's lives so and improving ultimately improving lives or improving communities as a whole. So so there's been a lot of more kind of the I don't they're not really sales, but I would call them more like that. Now, recently there's also been money put into membership growth because in the United States that is a huge revenue driver for us so that we can do our mission mission work. But those are the two key ones. A few years ago they put together a it was called Zoe for President. It was during the presidential campaign and it was just a little girl running for president. But it was just talking about the how the why has these youth development programs that can inspire someone and build someone's skills up and confidence and and all that stuff to eventually be president. So it was meant to be kind of a tongue in cheek thing during what could have otherwise been seen as a contentious political time during the United States.

Emilia: 25:40

So speaking of partnerships, do I guess do you guys work with any for profit organizations in partnership capabilities?

John: 25:49

I think that's a good question. Oftentimes it shows up in terms of sponsorships or there are some YMCAs that do corporate partnerships or corporate discounts for people. You know, here here in Buffalo, we have one of our facilities actually has a. When the larger banks is actually has a branch inside one of our buildings. So we have some unrelated business income like that. We also have it was here and in Idaho and I'm sure otherwise throughout the United States we have physical therapy, sometimes hospital collaborations, which are sometimes for profit, sometimes non profit, but usually usually when for profits are involved, it's more on some type of some type of sponsorship level. Not that not that there couldn't be any key partnership that I was trying to think off the top of my head. I couldn't think of any that were not related somehow to the funding piece other than with professional sports. Like here we have our our football program flag football program is with the Buffalo Bills. We have a our basketball program with the Cleveland Cavaliers. So we have some of those partnerships. But again, there's there's some give and take for both just like it would be with any partnership.

Emilia: 26:59

Yeah. How do you approach kind of creating those partnerships?

John: 27:03

I think it goes back to finding out what is our need and who can help us. And so sometimes for profits come in mind and then we say, Well, I'm not sure how this is going to work. Other times there might be a natural non-for-profit or non-profit organization that might tie in well with what we're doing. So so I think it all depends. And and I you know, I won't share exactly what the details were, but I just, you know, just came from a meeting where I was introduced to a leader of another organization. And just a new opportunity just came up just from these meetings. So I think just by getting out and talking or if for profits have ideas, a lot of for profits have some type of social responsibility or corporate responsibility, arm not all do or whatever they might call it. Now, I'm not quite sure. But but, you know, I would encourage people in those positions to to actually initiate conversations with nonprofits to see what their priorities are because they might align. It's hard to know without having a conversation.

Emilia: 28:02

Right? It's so funny for a software podcast, a lot of what's the people who sit in this room have to tell me is that a lot of it is just the people, people, conversations. The people are what's the most important to our company? And you know, the software and the technology aside, like just having a conversation is really where it's at. Even though there's, you know, a CRM and marketing and all these things, it's the people that's like the strongest part.

John: 28:23

It always is. And you have to I mean, you have to have the software to make stuff happen. We have to stay in compliance. We have to be able to produce financial reports for the bank, for our loans and or for grants and so forth. But I think I think it's true of every business because the stuff we do, the stuff the even if you're doing food distribution, you're still talking to people in the community. If you're doing sales or in marketing for a for profit, all you're doing is building relationships, right? So but yeah, no, I think it's key. I think that's one universal thing probably throughout the globe that. If you have to be able to build relationships to be successful in whatever venture you're in.

Emilia: 28:59

Yeah, I guess speaking to that, do you have any a lot of again, a lot of the people we've had in this room are in very high positions and that's amazing. So I always ask them if they have any advice for anyone who's looking to get into a position like theirs at some point.

John: 29:14

Well, yeah, I think it's always important to like how I started the conversation to be looking ahead. You might not know where you want to be, but I think having some humility and recognizing there's. There's always opportunity to learn. So I've always told people, if you think you know everything, that means you need to start learning again because you don't, you're just wrong. So I think being willing to learn, being coachable, being building up your capacity to deal with change and eventually manage change is really important. And I just think it's important to have a little bit of patience because it can be difficult. All of us, all of us want to be at a highest level as soon as possible. And sometimes it takes time. Sometimes it takes luck. But I think it's but I think with the time and luck, if you if you put in smart work where you're working, not just for what your job description says, but what the next person, what the next level up job description is, I think that only puts you in a in a strong position.

Emilia: 30:12

Wow. Yeah. I always I think a lot of people look at the job that they want one day and then they see, you know, five years of experience and this and ten years in this. And they're like, All right, let me get started.

John: 30:21

Yeah, yeah. And honestly, if you could fast forward that the number doesn't matter, because if, if you come up to me and I'm like, Man, man, Emilia, she's way better than these people who've worked here five years and she's been here a year. But look at what she's actually accomplished, that the.

Emilia: 30:34

Value that they add.

John: 30:35

That speaks so loud, s loudo.

Emilia: 30:37

Okay. So then lastly, I would love to ask if there's anything you are really passionate about that you're currently working on at the Y. Anything you would like us to know about in kind of as you're expanding and growing?

John: 30:49

Yeah, I think, you know, that's a hard question for me and it shouldn't be. It should be a real easy question. You give me an easy one to end off on. I you know, I have always cared about bringing services to under-resourced communities. So so we are continuing to add new opportunities for drowning prevention programs in our area, for food programs, for getting sports out, as I mentioned before. So I think those community based things, we have a very large one cool thing I think that is international. We have our what we call the turkey trot every Thanksgiving and the last Thursday in November, every year we have up to 14,000 people running in Buffalo and and if you're not from the Buffalo area, I'll just tell you, it's not warm at the at the end of November. So it's but it's a really neat community gathering event. And we were actually the it's the oldest ongoing race in the world. So it has been it's lasted longer than the Boston Marathon than any race in the world. We actually got a plaque from Poland a couple of years ago just to signify that that we put in the history museum here. So so I think that's always a fun community event where anytime there's opportunity for we can open doors for to talk about, you know, sponsorship opportunities for anybody or for people to participate. We actually have a virtual participation. So even if you're sitting somewhere in the middle of Europe right now and want to participate, saying, Hey, this sounds neat, we can do that.

Emilia: 32:11

So that's so funny. And speaking of growing a small business to a very large one, I'm guessing it wasn't always 14,000 people.

John: 32:17

No, it started with six people. Yeah, same, same route, though. Six people has turned into about 14,000. And we've made it through two world wars, a couple pandemics and some awful snowstorms here in Buffalo.

Emilia: 32:30

Yep. I love it. All right. Well, thank you so much for joining us and kind of giving us some eyes on the inside as well as to kind of the inner workings and operations. And if you're a nonprofit and you have questions or anything like that, please leave a review. And I would be happy to ask an expert. Well, that's my cue. Thank you for joining us today. And if you liked it, take a look at some of the other episodes above. We have tons of other stuff. Talk to any expert from the Belgian team or join me and talk to more people from Northam. Go check out all of our episodes on your favorite streaming platform and come back. Bye, guys.