Episode 5: Laura Spaulding

Welcome to the Power Up Your Life podcast. I'm Mandy McAllister. And I'm Kelly Resendez. Today's guest is Laura Spalding, our our friend Laura Spalding. She is the founder and franchisor of Spalding Decon, a leading decontamination company in The US. After seven years in law enforcement and serving in the military, Laura decided to start Spalding Decon as a one woman show.

She franchise this company. She was, featured in the Wall Street Journal, Inc Magazine, Entrepreneur Magazine. She's been a featured expert in growing a dirty business. In 2020, Laura took the company to a 608 growth rate to make the Inc 5,000 list at number seven eighty four. She she earned her spot on the entrepreneur franchise 500 list in less than four years of franchising.

You also might know her from her incredible YouTube channel called crime scene cleaning. You gotta check that out. She's got about a million and a half subscribers over a $100,000,000, or 100,000,000 views. Laura, we are so excited to have you here. Welcome.

Thanks for having me. So, I right after college, I got into law enforcement, and that's where I got the idea for my first business, which is crime scene cleaning. I was at a homicide, and the mother of a deceased asked me when the police were coming back to clean up the scene.

And I had never been asked that before, so, I didn't know the answer. And I thought, wow. That's, strange that I'm a police officer, and I don't know the answer. No one had asked me that before.

So I kinda went on this fact finding mission only to discover that back then, twenty years ago, there was really no one cleaning it up. So I decided to start my business, and I left law enforcement forever.

Nice. I'm sure that was a total relief after the journey that you've been on. Very much so. You know, you've become this incredible version of yourself. However many millions of YouTube subscribers of a thriving business that has had some pivots along the way, an incredible family. You've done all this really great stuff.

But along that journey, I'm sure there was a time that you felt stuck. Talk to me a little bit about when you feel stuck. What are some things you do to get unstuck?

Wow. Yeah. I feel stuck, pretty often, actually, because, unfortunately, you know, you kind of get in situations in business where you have to make hard decisions. And I think that know, the most recent time that I was felt extremely stuck was in franchising.

So I started to franchise my company in 2016, and, frankly, it was a bad decision. It was, something that I that I wouldn't recommend to others and that was just did not go well at all. And I felt stuck because once you get involved in that, you know, you've got contractual obligations to people. And that's the, literally, the epitome of being stuck because you wanna get out of it, but you can't.

So I I, was able to make the decision of we're not going to expand anymore. We're not gonna sell any more franchises. We're but I'm going to continue to support the 16 locations that I have now. And that has 16 locations that I have now. And that has given me relief that I don't have to, deal in that type of business anymore. It's just it's not for me. It's just not a it's not a good, business

model. So that, like, the actionable thing to get you out of it was to look at the circumstances differently?

So it was to essentially stop the pain, which was stop selling franchises. And, I was able to, you know, cut cut all the staff that was that was working on that. It's very labor intensive. Franchising is you have a ton of staff. We had almost a million dollars a year in payroll alone. And for a small business, that's a lot.

So, by stopping franchising and then focusing on the 16 locations that we have now, it it was like a a huge weight that was lifted off of me.

Warren Buffett says the the fastest way to get out of a hole is to stop digging the hole. I love it. Exactly.

Couldn't agree more.

Yeah. Laura, you know, you're in GoBundance Women with us, and I get the pleasure of being with APPLOD and and and watching you go through some of that. Like, really just, you know, it was transform transformational for you because you did feel like you were drowning there for a little bit. So just witnessing you kinda coming out on the other side and and and really just creating a new model for yourself.

So what what's going on now? Like, it it sounds like you've really taken this one business and expanded in it into multiple businesses. How have you done that?

Yeah. So, you know, it's really easy when you're stuck to feel the weight of the world on your shoulders. And for me, there was really a couple a couple of things that I did that I think were pivotal to to getting out of that. One was meditation. I'm big on transcendental meditation, you know, doing that twice a day. It really allowed me to kind of get centered and focus on the problem and try to see it from a wide angle rather than being so tunnel vision. So that was one.

The second thing is every year, I do a, what I call a think week. And I just go out in the middle of the woods or, you know, wherever by myself, and I spend an entire week in silence, just really working, reading, studying, and figuring out what my next plan is gonna be. So I think those two things are what really helped me pivot, and I decided, you know, that's when I made the decision. I'm not gonna franchise anymore, but I'm going to get into other businesses.

And I'm I'm big on vertical integration, so I wanted to take, businesses that are vertically integrated with my crime scene cleaning business. I have a real estate business, a property management business. So I'm looking into buying a mortuary transport company. And then, through the power of GoBundance, I've met wonderful people that I am, going to be partnering with and hopefully acquiring assisted living facilities.

That's awesome. You know, let's dig into this crime scene thing. Like, Americans are obsessed with it. Right? You look at the number of shows, other things. How did you kind of pivot as you're running this business into becoming a YouTube sensation as well? And how is that how is that supported the growth of the business too?

It's been pivotal. It really has. So, back in 2019, which is actually not that long ago, I was kind of a late bloomer into YouTube. I had this bright idea of, kind of doing I I don't know if you guys remember Cops where the cameraman just followed the cops along. So because I was in law enforcement, I was very aware of that show. And I thought, you know what? People love true crime. Why don't we create the same type of model? I'll hire a videographer to essentially just follow these crews around.

What when I presented it to my staff, they were like, oh my god. That's the worst idea ever. That's horrible. Do not do it. So, of course, I did it. And, I went with my gut, and I did it. And it turned out to be, a viral sensation. And we went from, like in a month or two, we got a 100,000 subscribers. And then it took a couple years to get to a million. And I think we're about a million and a half now on, YouTube.

So what I found out is the people that are obsessed with true crime, which happened to be 75% female, are also obsessed with what we do. So our demographic is female based. Well, most people were like, well, how are you gonna convert that? What how do you measure that ROI? Well, what we did is the viral awareness has helped the brand exponentially. So we get people stopping us in restaurants and gas stations and everything. Oh my god. I watch your show and all that.

So it's been fantastic for branding and awareness, which was the point. You know, how does a small business compete with, you know, billion dollar Amazon that can run commercials in every market? That's how you do it. Be viral. I I love that you took this contrarian stance that your team thought it was ridiculous and you did it anyway.

So kind of on that vein of contrarian thinking, you know, what is a a strategy or an opinion that many other people would disagree with?

That was a big one. My team thought that it was going to come off as sensational and, callous, maybe. You know? And what we did is it's all in the editing, of course. You know? We never divulge the person's name, the address, not you know, nothing like that. We even blur out if there's family photos on the wall and stuff. So it's not about them.

And what we wanna do is we wanna focus on the staff that actually does this hard job, and it's not easy. Not it's not easy from a mental health perspective, and a physical perspective. You know, we lose more employees because of their lack of physical fitness than we do anything on the mental health side, and most people would think it's it's contrary to that.

So, you know, the longevity of an employee typically is six to twelve months, unfortunately. It's not easy work. It's very difficult.

It sounds like that that dirty jobs. I really the the mental health piece of things is like, that's you're you're experiencing someone's worst day Yes. In many cases. Like, I I had to imagine that that was gonna be that that is surprising.

It's very heavy, and there's certain things that will that will trigger all of us. You know, I had to clean up, the accidental shooting death of a five year old, and that weighed on me, quite a bit, and that was before I had kids. In to this day, it was probably eight or nine years ago. But to this day, I can still see that bedroom. I can see that pool of blood. And, it just weighed on me. You know? And there's certain jobs that I will never forget.

Mhmm. And, I think we carry that with us, but I think my superpower is empathy. And, my ability to empathize with these families and help them at least get past that visual aspect of it, is rewarding to me, and that's what keeps me going here twenty years later.

Yeah. That's beautiful. You know, Laura, one thing I've always admired about you too is that you do have a lot of ends in your life. You know, you're you're a mom and you're in real estate investing. How do you kinda balance your time? Like, what are some of the strategies that you use to to do that?

So that was probably, you know, the one of the mistakes that I always say to myself is, oh my god. Why didn't I get into real estate investing sooner? I have the opportunity with the hoarding houses, the crime scene houses, and I didn't get into it until 2016. So it was like, what the hell was I thinking? I clearly, I was not Explain high level your play because we are all friends, but any listeners might not know exactly what it is that you do. Explain your play.

Yeah. So what what it is is, basically, when we get, you know, calls to clean up death scenes, hoarding scenes, drug labs, whatever it might be, we're we're obviously going to help these people clean it up. But if they wanna just walk away from the home, we will give them cash to buy it as is condition. And it's not for everyone, but we close about one in 10 offers because many people maybe grandma lives in Florida.

The family lives in, say, Michigan. They have no desire to come down to Florida. They don't wanna hire a real estate agent. They don't wanna clean out the house. They don't wanna make repairs. So in a lot of circumstances, that is the the path of least resistance for them.

So when I created the real estate company, they go in conjunction with one another. And that that's the real estate play that we've been doing since 2016.

Incredible.

Incredible. Really brilliant. Yeah. Seeing seeing a lot of opportunity right in front of you and learning how to take advantage of it. I I really admire your, focus on vertical integration because how do I get more things that feed the things that I'm already doing to to build my businesses? That's that's really fantastic.

Yeah. Yeah. So, Laura, you know, one of the main areas of focus that we talk a lot about is, like, who you're being, you know, to grow a company, I heard I heard a a very high level, you know, founder of a company yesterday talking about, you know, when I ask people what percentage did your business grow, his next question is, well, what percentage did you grow? Right? Because we have to continuously keep growing.

Like, what are some of those daily habits, rituals? I know that you touched on meditation, which, you know, for a lot of people that are type a drivers, like, they're allergic to the idea of just sitting in stillness or It was hard. Even going out into the woods and and, you know, taking some alone time with, like, not talking to other people.

But what other dailies do you look at or just disciplines in your life that have gotten you where you are, those habits?

Yeah. That was very difficult for me at the at the onset. It took a long time for me to kinda settle in to meditation and and get the benefits out of it. And I, you know, I would caution people, don't give up if it doesn't work the first month or two because it does take time, especially with, you know, somebody ADD like me. It's, you know, just trouble sitting down, but that's a big one. And exercise is another one.

But I think the the probably one of the bigger ones, the third component, is being being in go abundance and being around members of like minded people that I swear I get a ton of growth just by being in the presence of these brilliant women that they don't even need to be in the same field as me. We can learn from each other, and that's been huge for me and my my development and my growth.

Beautiful. Thank you so much for that. I think, you know, for myself, I I talk a lot about rituals and recipes and and, you know, you have to to really be in the right environment. And when you are in the right environment, you feel that accountability and support. And I'm so grateful for all of that that you've given to me in in my life. So thank you. Oh, thank you.

Yeah. Laura, there's so much to unpack here in this this conversation that we've had. I I very much love your contrarian views of things, and that that really helps you squeeze the juice out of things and really looking to, you know, peers and other people to help pull you up and solve problems in in that really thoughtful type of way.

I am totally stealing your think week, just so you know. I am making that happen. Thank you for that gift. And I I also really love the advice of stop digging the hole when you are when you are in it. You know?

Yeah. So I I I really honor all of the things that you've done, all of the the value that you've brought here and that that you've made happen in your life. You know, maybe tell us a little bit of how we can serve you. What is a resource or an introduction that would change the ballgame for something that you're working on now?

You know, I think right now, along with another GoBundance member, sister of mine, we're we're in the process of really looking at and studying the assisted living facilities, the structure of it, the financing, the finding of the units and stuff. So I think, you know, in in my perspective, that would be a great intro for us to, learn more about the space because, again, it has a bit of a vertical in integration with what I'm doing, you know, kind of cradle to grave if you don't wanna be too gory about it. But, that that's a a space that that I'm super interested in right now.

Awesome. I've got some people to introduce you to. Oh, that's amazing. I love it.

So, Laura, if anybody has more assisted living stuff or wants to know more about you, get in touch with you, what is the best way for people to get in touch with Laura Spalding? Yeah. You know, I have a personal, Instagram, personal Facebook. It's at The Real Laura Spalding. And if you're, you know, go go that route if you're not into the gore. But, you know, for for the following the crime scene cleaning stuff, it's just at crime scene cleaning on, you know, YouTube, TikTok, and Instagram.

Amazing. Laura, thank you so much for joining us on the Power Up Your Life podcast. We are so grateful for your time. Listeners, make sure you join us on our next great episode of Power Up Your Life. Bye, everyone.