Transcription
Hey guys, how you doing?
So, this video is going to be about me being in business for about a year and the struggles I went through. Um, what I learned, what I wish I would have done different. [snorts] Um, and just overall just being in business for myself.
Um, my name is John Moore. I'm the owner of J& Tech Drones LLC. I'll start there. Um, like I said, I've been in business for about a year and about three months. Uh, I didn't know what to expect. I can say, uh, before I went in business, my wife got me a drone, um, a Bine drone for my birthday. Never had a drone before, never had a remote control really. And, um, I fell in love with it.
Um, about 3 months after that, I thought, you know what? Um, it's weird, um, the algorithm on YouTube and everything. Once you start watching drone videos and other people doing different things, this is before the Evvada, before the Evat even came out. Um, I didn't know anything about the Evvada one at this time. Um, you start getting all these uh ads and videos hit your YouTube, make millions of dollars, not millions, but you get my point. You see them all the time. You want to make money, you want to make money with your drone, get your 107 today. I don't know how many times have I've seen that. Um, I bet you're thinking the same now. About good grief. You see them all the time.
So I thought to myself, you know what? I have a job. I have a job. I'm a data analyst for um basically a tech company. We made college software and I basically support it. So I've been at that job, I don't know, you go around probably about 14 years now, work from home. And I thought, you know what, I could um I can get my 107, see if I can pass it and uh start making some side money. That's that was the whole premise behind it. And I thought it'd be a lot of fun because I like flying drones a lot.
Um, my first drone I ever had, the B1 drone, like I said, did not have optical avoidance and it did not have it did have return to home. Um, so we're I take it out one day, say I don't know what, 36 stories, maybe 24 stories building here in Waco and I want to go around it, you know, make a good shot of it. I'm going to post it on Facebook. Um, well, you probably know what happens. I get around the back side of it. Well, guess what? I lose signal. And this is the first time I've ever lost signal of any drone I've ever had. It's my first drone, period. Um, I got it for got it in November. I probably crashed it I don't know, probably three months after that. So, I go around the building. I'm freaking out. Maybe I think you can catch me getting signal again. And I go around, look up. I don't see it. I think, man, I lost it. I thought maybe it landed on the overhang in the building and I just couldn't get to it.
So [clears throat] anyway, after looking about an hour, I went home, came back. No, sorry. After looking by an hour, I went home, was telling my wife about it cuz she got for my birthday. And we did have um insurance on it in a sense, but you have to have the drone to get insurance on it. I mean, you have to have the drone to get a new drone replacement. So, someone called my cell phone. I remember I had my cell phone on my drone and I thought, you know what, someone found it and they ain't answer. So, I said, she said, "Why don't you just go down there and look?" So, I drove down there and we parked and I knew where it lost signal at. So, I thought, "Well, um, I saw she saw something over over on the concrete and I was like, she said, "Is that it?" I said, "I bet you it is." So, I walk over there. I mean, it's it's in pieces. I mean, it just because it tried to come back to me and it hit the side of the building. It just fell straight down. That was my first crash.
Got a replacement drone and all the research I was doing, everyone had the DJI drones. Didn't know anything about DJI at that time, but everyone had the DJI drones. Um, I bought my first drone right after that. Um, my wife was not happy with me because she just got me one and six months later I bought my I bought my first drone that was the Mini4 Pro. I thought, you know what? I'mma conquer the world with this thing. I got this. When I'm about past my 107 license, I thought, okay, fine. I need to figure out what my business is going to be called. And I was thinking about this up until that point. What am I going to call myself? Um, I'm going have a logo. What's my logo look like? And I had no idea. Um, I came up with J and E text drones and it was not LLC at that time. So J, John, and E, my wife's name's Ellen and of course text Texas and drones. So J and E text drones. Pretty self-explanatory. You think about that way, right?
So I first contacted the Chamber of Commerce, I thought, and a few of them around me, thinking, you know what, I'll get my name out there. I'll contact them and everything will be great. Um once I contacted them, they contacted me back. I was all excited. Did great. They wanted me to pay around $500 to join their join their um I guess to join them. And really what it gave me was meet and greet to meet people and they would put my uh information on an email address and a flyer. I thought, no, I'm sorry. I just got my business and I just bought this Mini4 Pro and I don't have money to spend on $500. Give them $500 really for nothing. So I thought, okay, well, I'm not going to do that.
So I thought, you know what? I'm going to create me um a Facebook page for, you know, J Tech drone. So that's what I did. Um I got on Canvas, got me a logo. Um it was horrible. The first one, very horrible. Um it was black with the drone. You couldn't really see it. I thought, "Oh, I I thought it was better than sliced bread." I did. Uh I didn't know what I didn't know. So um I went in and got that created the page and I thought you know what I need to go out what I what I've read after that created the Facebook page everything I kept on reading was practice practice practice make your portfolio and that is true make your portfolio um and I'm going to stop right here and just explain what I did incorrectly.
Um I register with IRS JC drones get my EIN number. Um, I thought, great, I'm ahead [clears throat] of the game. Come to find out what I should have done. You should always get your LLC first. Um, find your name, create your LLC, get registered, like I'm in Texas, got registered with Texas later on. I did. And then, um, of course, if you do all that at the same time when you get your EIN number, it's a less hassle. So, always register your EIN number with your LLC first and keep it that way. It'll save you a lot of headache.
Same thing with insurance. um some jobs I needed insurance. So later on, I would say about eight months into it, I say, "You know what? I need insurance." So I got insurance. Um I went to USAA, that's my insurance company. Asked them, they didn't do it, but they had a sister company. They work with the Hartford group. So I got insurance with them. Um at that point, I did have the Air3. I did have the Avat 2 and I had the Mini4 Pro. That's what I had. Of course, I had my laptop, action 4 camera. Um, again, this is probably about 8 months into it. Yeah, it's about 8 months into it. I had those devices.
So, the reason I say insurance is because third party third party uh companies like Dronos or Drron.io, um, Drronology, uh, VTEC, there's a number of ones you can sign up for. Go ahead and sign up for those. You have your 107. They're going to ask for information. Probably fill out W9, but fill those out. Um, I didn't know anything about that for months until I stumbled across them and started learning, oh wow, I can do that. So, you want to sign up for those third party um third party companies because they will help you get started and you'll be going, you'll go out there, do a job. It's fairly easy. Us, come back, give them the give them the data.
Um again uh the first I think the first um maybe six seven months I had just the Mini4 Pro and that's why I did everything with my my first job I got actually someone contacted me through my Facebook. I was really shocked about it and I didn't know he he bought a new he bought a new piece of land and he wanted me to go uh drone the land give it to him so we can sell it. I gave him a bid. Um, I was so new. I charged them mileage. I only charged them one way. Just again, I was super excited to get this job. Here's the I thought, "Here's the Golden Gates. I'm going to do it. Here's the Golden Gates." But it's far from that. So, I go out there, do the job, give it to him, and uh he's happy. And we're we he basically contacts me now when he buys another piece of property. I go ahead and do that job and go from there.
Um, so some of the things, again, I'm going to stop here. Some of the things you definitely want to do, um, find out what you call your business. Uh, if you don't create, if you don't want to spend a lot of money, create your Facebook page, find your lo create your logo and try to really think about it because I changed my logo halfway through it. And I had some things I had printed out like shirts and I had a flag because at that point I was doing some proono work. So, I was doing some proono work for some different races, droneing the race. Um, that's another thing, too. You want to get out there and do proono work to get your name out there. The grind really is is getting your name out there. Once you get your name out there and people know, oh, you drone stuff. Hey, I can hire you. Great.
You go back to the list. You want to make sure that you get your LLC. What's your name? Do that first. Get it registered with IRS. Get your EIN number. Facebook. I mean, if you don't have a website yet because you got to pay for money for all that, go ahead and create your Facebook page and put everything there. Share out to your the things you do. Share out to groups like we have a wake up group here I share out to and a China spring group we share out to. Um I started to do like new construction. I'd go there and [snorts] and do it and uh every now and then get a progression of new construction and and then I shared it to these groups and it got out there. Hey, this guy's droning these. And it really getting a construction job is great because it's usually a long job and it really does help you. Uh right now I'm doing the the one you know is Extra Coco in Temple and it's a yearly job. So those jobs are great.
So anyway, back to the story. Those are the first things I would do. Like I said, I think I said eight months or so I got insurance because some jobs I realized they needed insurance like a million- dollar policy. I was like a million-dollar policy. And again, like I told you before, I had the Evvada, Mini4 Pro, and the Air3. The whole reason I got the mini, the Evvada is I was going the VA 2. I was going to do indoor stuff. I thought, you know what? I saw people advertising. I thought I can do that. I can fly around be pretty easy. And I was learning manual mode at that point, too.
Um, some of the things, again, like I said, I wish I had done. I wish I would have got my LLC first. It was such a headache to get to get in touch with them to update my name from Janie Tech Drones to Janite Tech Drones LLC and then of course I register with the state of Texas. Um the third party groups definitely get with them like Drono Dronology Vitec fortune but hey get with them and they'll you'll get work.
Um, I can say the first year in business, again, I have a normal job, but the first year in business, um, I made about $4,000 and I was over excited. I was like, "This is great." Um, could have been better. Yeah, it could have been better, but hey, I was happy with it that I could see the businesses growing. Every year that I'm in business, I want to surpass what I made the previous year.
Um, one thing I did notice, and you see a lot of people um, griping about this is that, you know, at first when I got jobs through like thirdparty companies, I didn't care how much they paid. They paid 50 bucks, paid $75, $150. I didn't care. I went and did it. I drove out and did it. And yes, I didn't make much money because you think about the gas, the time, but I didn't care. I just wanted to get the jobs in there. People were going to Best Buy, buy a drone, and it was getting really saturated. Get their 107 or some people not even having their 107 like a lot of real estate agents they'll have the kid down the street to drone a house great this stuff and that's it. Uh the FAA kind of cracked down in that. So that has kind of helped a little bit to the uh the industry.
Another thing is when I started uh getting getting uh clients that wanted me to put something together to I didn't have software I needed to edit those. So I went the Cap Cut way first. There's a free version and it was great. um it worked out really good, but then I could see it was kind of cheesy a lot of the stuff they had. Um, you know, more for you more for like YouTubers and stuff like that. So I b my I went the Resolve way, Resolve Studio. I bought the full-blown version and uh that's what I use even today. Um I really like it. It it does everything I need it to do. Um, like I said, most companies when they come they ask for a drone operator that a lot of them really want raw data. Some of them do want you to put a video together and so be it. Um, but it's good to have good software. You can actually um edit your videos.
Um, after me having my Facebook for a while and I created a Gmail account, janite drones um, janie tech drones@gmail.com. If you're like me, when you see someone's Gmail, like when you see someone's email and it does not have their domain name for at least for me, I'm like, he does not take his business seriously. Um, so at that point I was like, you know what? And I need to get I want to get a website domain name and email with my name. So I went with Squarespace. I was already using Square to charge people. So I thought, you know what? I'll use Squarespace for my website. So that's what I did. I created a website, janite drones, uh.com. And at that point, um, I I paid a little more money. I think 20 bucks for a year to get your own domain email. And so I went in and created that. Um, and again, it's john.mmore@janitechdrons.com. Now, again, I like this because first of all, it has my first name, last name, and the email address with my domain, my business name. Um, I think that really makes you get recognized a lot more. Um, because people see, you know, you're more professional. You're not a fly by night.
Did I think I get rich off of this? I mean, from all the ads, you think you're going to make a ton of money, but that's not the case starting out at all. I mean, like I said, I made four grand my first year. Um, did I get work all the time? No. I mean, I was busy sometimes, but not really. Um, a bulk of that first time was was one guy that was sending me on different jobs. Now, I still work with him, which is great. Um, but it, you know, having multiple people get you is something that that's what you want and you want to keep those clients. That's the thing.
Again, my first year, later in my first year, I had my Facebook page, I have my website, I have my domain and my email address and I'm constantly adding stuff to my website and or updating it or trying to see what else I can learn and trying to see how do I get my name out there. That is the biggest thing of anything, getting your name out there. It is a grind. You see a lot of people, they gung-ho and because they can't get jobs or can't get their name out there or they're not or they're trying to live off of this, I mean, they just go out of business totally or hang it up. Um, luckily, like I said, I have a current job I I work with and so this is my saw job. So, I'm not dependent on this job to actually make money.
During this period, I actually started creating YouTube videos, created a YouTube channel and started to create YouTube video of me flying different things uh with the Mini4 Pro and the Air3. Um, one thing I can say is getting your name out there is when you have your Facebook page, your website, your Instagram, uh, your YouTube channel, all these things, and you start you start making sure your SEO is great. And I didn't know anything about SEO with websites, but you start making sure that's great. So, um, when you Google yourself, you want something to come up and it's going to take time for you to build the right website, build the right of anything so people can find you because people are going to find drone operators in this area. And you want the your SEO from your website to be like, "Oh, I do this, this, and this." So, your name comes up.
Also, um, Google reviews help a lot. Uh, I have Google reviews linked to my website. So, when you go to my website, you see it right there so people can see the reviews right away. Um, after I do a job, I try to get the people to actually give me a review. I don't I'm not pushy. I say, "Hey, when you get a chance, will you please give me a review?" Give them the link. They fill They can go there. They can click the link, fill it out, and you're done. Google reviews really do help.
Some things I wish I would have done differently. Um, that's a good question. Um, I know exactly. I would not have bought the Mini4 Pro. I would not have. It's a great don't It's a great drone, but it's not great for what I was looking for. I would have I would have not bought that and I would have bought the Air3. The Air3 has really been my workhorse in my drone business for a long time. I say a long time, but I'm on my second year. But it really has. And it's dependable. It has enough weight. It's fast. Um, the lenses are great. Um, and it does not get moved around in the wind like the Mini4 Pro does. The Mini4 Pro is a great drone, but to me, it's not great for people that want to have a business. It's just too small, too light. It gets blown around. Even with the stabiliz stabilization, you can see the video move. You really can. And you don't want that for your clients.
Another thing I wish I had done sooner is open a business account. Um, and I didn't get into this till later on, but I wish I had opened up a business account early. Um, I think it would have helped me a lot, but and I don't not that I want people to go in debt, but because I didn't have my LLC and I finally whatever reason, I was like, I got to get my LLC. And that was a headache in itself. When I had my LLC and I got registered with taxes and I have it registered with IRS, of course, I knew the paperwork was right. I went down to the bank and I got a business account. Um, so basically everything's coming from my business account that I'm paying clients and getting money. Um, I like that a lot better. It makes everything cleaner. Um, that keeps the funds for separated that keeps the funds separated. Um, I just I just think it makes it for a more cohesive u work environment for yourself. you know, there comes a lot of responsibility because like I owe my business account and I was able to get an American Express card with a great limit. Um, of course that looks your personal credit too, but with a great limit that it was able to grow my business. And with those offers you get with new credit cards, a lot of times you want to look for if you can get 12 or 24 months with no interest. So, you pay the minimum payment and you have that payment drafted out of your account. So you're never on you're never late, but you make sure that that device is paid off before that time.
You know, again, you got to get out there, get your name going and stuff like that. Proono work creates your portfolio. That's a huge part. Um, I got sick and tired doing proono work. Um, everyone wants everything free. So, I mean, it's good. It gets your name out there and I still do proono work even now. So, as far as more things I can find I did wrong, I'm sure there's a ton. I just for the life of me I should have wrote them down. I can't think of me right now. I can't think of me right now. And I'll uh I'll uh if I think of something in a minute I'll let you know.
Uh let me go back to the topic. How fast did I think I was going to grow? I had no idea. I had no idea at all. I thought maybe I was confident enough that I was good enough that I'd have a lot of people knocking on my door. Want this, want this, want this. But the first year, even the first six months, it was all was a really a grind. It's still a grind. Nothing like falls in your lap. Um, so I always post new stuff to different groups, what I can do, my my services and stuff like that.
I can say what's sacrificed for me going into business and getting getting this business started. You got to tell yourself, is this a business or a hobby? You know, at first when I started, okay, great. I'm getting my 107, do little things is more of a hobby. As I started doing more jobs, I became more businessminded that you know what, this is a business. And at that point, that's when I wanted to create my website, my domain name for email address and all that right there and my LLC. uh just to just to make myself um just to be more businessoriented like okay I need to make these changes so people see me as not just some guy flying a drone you know some I want to be a professional drone pilot when they say hey who do we contact Janitech Drones LLC um
Gear choices first year I've already gone through this a little bit but I would not have bought the Mini4 Pro I would have bought the Air3 I got the power 500 battery and that has been a lifesaver because I can be on the field and I I have a way to charge my batteries if I need to. Um with a large project or just if it's multiple jobs in one day, you got to have a way to actually charge your batteries. Um the other thing, um I know it says gear software. You got to have editing software. You got to have a computer that actually can work with the editing software. Um I'm I have a Mac. I don't have a Windows PC. So, I have Resolve and it works great for me. Everything, my Mac works great for everything I do. Um, [clears throat] you need somewhere to store your files. I did notice this when I started doing more jobs that I'd have files to download and these files are not they're, you know, these files are not small. So, you need somewhere to store these files. You can get a server and I haven't gone that route yet. It's on my it's on my mind to think about my own server. Um, now I have hard drive. I storage of my business hard drive. But as far as your own server, I don't have that yet. It's it is on my mind later on. Um where you would give a client access to this one partition, not partition, you give access to this one file so they can log in and see it. But I went with Pixie set and I actually I totally like it. It's a great service. It looks very professional. U you upload the photos and videos and choose the layout and they can see all their stuff to download it. It's you can put your watermark on it so people see the things before they buy it or before they have downloaded they pay you.
I've talked about this before and I'm kind of jumping around but how do you get most your clients? First the third party the third party um people like I said Dr. Drono IO and those companies that's where you'll get most of your clients starting out because you know you won't know where to get them at and try you think people are going to knock on your door to to get get stuff drone they don't. They want to get free. Um, and people just sometimes don't see it as a need, like, well, you're flying a drone. That's like a hobby, you know, it's like a camera in the sky, you know.
Um, another big thing is practice, practice, practice. Be able to control your drone. Um, I can say if you get into FPV, it helps wonders learning how to control a drone. I know it may work a little differently, but still, you just understand the concept so much better.
Have I ever have I ever thought about quitting or um when times got tough or slowing down? Uh, no I didn't. Um, luckily I'm in the position to where things have grown. They have grown a lot and there's a lot ahead I think in the future. So, I'm really excited about it.
Um, how do you push through slow periods? Like a lot of times in the winter time you'll get a slow period where the weather's bad. You just don't get a lot of drone jobs. I mean, again, if you're doing this job to start out to be your career, I mean, it's going to be tough. I That's one thing they don't tell you in all those videos and stuff they do. They don't [clears throat] tell you that, you know, it's going to be like I know I've said so many times, but they don't tell you it's going to be a grind. It really will be a grind. I mean, I can't say it enough. Get your name out there. Like I said before, I would any job that would come up, I'd throw a bid on it and I'd go get it and try to get it done. Um, but as I started making more money doing it or getting more jobs, I kind of cut back on taking the bare minimum for a job. I'd be like, "No, my time is worth more than that." Um, so I would I found myself even now. I found myself be like, "No, I'm good. Um, I'm not traveling that far to do that job. Yes, it gives you $100 or whatever like that, but that's fine. I'm good. Um, they someone else can pay that or someone else can go do that."
Things that take a hit. Um for me, um I'm married with a a daughter. She's in high school and my wife. Um because when you go do these drone jobs or you go go capture sudden, you're taking time away from the family. You are. And to have that support of your wife to know, hey, look, and also your kid to let you know, you're going out to do something you love, but you're also, you know, you're away from the family. And are they seeing this money? M possibly not too much because you're trying to grow your business. The money that comes in usually pays the equipment or pays, you know, I don't get a salary from this. It all goes to the business. So that's something that takes a hit your family.
Um, one [clears throat] thing as like I said, as I got in business and for myself, especially after the first year, um, I started thinking more and more that I had to find a way to separate myself from everyone else that was around me. Do I have a lot of people around me? They're drone operators. There are a good amount. Um, but I need to find some way to get around them. And for me, even this is even before the whole DJI stuff happened, but it was right on the cuff of it that we knew something was going to happen. I was running to a problem that I wanted to um I want [clears throat] to try to solve. I wanted to get away from competing against a guy that went to Best Buy, bought a drone, an Air3 or Mini4 Pro or whatever, a Mavic or anything, and then under bidding the jobs I was trying to bid on. Um, and do I fault them? Not at all. Because I did it when I started. I bid for every little job. I don't care. I just basically pennies. It didn't matter how much it was. $50, $75. I did them all. It It didn't matter. And you're like, "Okay, you drove, you know, you had 20, 30 miles." No. No. 50, 60, 70 miles away, 100 miles away. Um, but it made me feel good. I know one job when I very first started I was gone like six hours you know I only made like $300 but most of that if you think about the time back and forth I mean it was a long day you know was I proud about it ex yes I was over the moon I was like I'm doing it I'm doing it and um I tell my wife that now I said what am I doing what am I doing she said you're making it happen you're making it happen and that's I'm a real um I'm real competitive And uh if anyone that knows me, the people that know me, they know this, but I'm extremely competitive. So, I always want to be the first, get in, get out. I mean, do things better uh than the other person to come. And so, that's that's a little bit my drive, too, though, of being in business for myself is is being the best I can and being where people call me and not not these other people.
So, like go back to the story. what I wanted to get away from. I wanted to get away from the guy that went to Best Buy, bought a drone, and outbid me my jobs. So, after a year, and I know this is this video is about a year, the first year in business, but I'm going to go into the point of the video. So, after a year by year and a year and what year and one month um because I wanted to do this, I purchased the DJI Matrice 4E. That's the mapping version of the Enterprise drone from DJI. I also purchased the Emlet RS2 Plus and the telescope hole. Now, this is a really big purchase. Um, if you think about it, the drone you're talking about probably about six grand. The emolet service probably the emlet um RS2 Plus about three grand. Three grand. And the poles, you know, a couple hundred dollar. But there's other stuff that comes with that. You got RTK service. you get ground points. Um, and again, getting those, it takes time to learn them. Yes, you can pay someone two grand to go do it, but you know, to me, I was like, you know what? I can do this myself. I can learn it, Google it, and figure this stuff out, watch YouTube videos, and that has helped a ton. So, that was my thing. get out there, get the higher paying jobs because a mapping job will pay a lot more than it will for um just going out there grabbing some real estate thing for someone.
After I got the Matrice 4E, I thought, you know what? Go big or go home, right? [clears throat] So, I went and purchased the Matrice 4T, the thermal version. The thermal version is it's not $6,000 like the mapping one. It's around eight grand. you get this, which I recently got the speaker for it. I bought it I did buy it originally with the spotlight. Um, and then you want to buy extra batteries. Well, the DJI batteries are not are are not cheap. You know, you're talking about 200 B. You're talking about I don't know what five or $500, $600 for two batteries. With the thermal drone, I have not got a job with that, but I just recently got it. I'm still trying to learn it. Um, I do have a new service that I put out, and that's something, too. New services. What do you offer the other ones don't? Um, I have a [clears throat] a new service I put out for pet rescue and because his thermal, it worked great for it. Um, it is a paid service. It's not a free service. I thought about doing proono for a little bit, but I don't know. Um, this equipment is expensive. So, it's a service that I think people will recognize that you offer that no one else offers. Um, or if they do, they're going to charge also. So, it all depends. for Janie Check Drones LLC. Having both of these in its wheelhouse makes a huge difference. It does.
Um, am I going to buy any more drones anytime soon? I have one more coming. Um, but it's not a high-end enterprise drone, and we'll talk about that later once I put a YouTube video about that. It's more going to be for I'm not going to say what's I'm not going to say what's going to be for anyway.
So, in closing, what exactly am I looking for in 2026? Because right now the date is I think December 22nd. What am I looking for in 2026? I want to grow exponentially. Um that's my thing. I want to I want to really grow. Um just today I got the logo on the back of my truck and I'll show it on the video. But I just got that done. Super excited about that. It's another way to advertise. I did it myself at first and it looked real cheesy. So, I went in and paid a company to do it and I really like the way it came out. Recently, I've also signed up with sam.gov. I want to get government jobs, so I got approved with that. I got my cage number and all that. So, these things help you grow your business. Um, [clears throat] you know, open a business account, get a credit card in your name, be credit savvy and smart when you do it. Don't get something you can't pay off because you're going to be paying interest like crazy. Um again the government jobs I was really excited get approved by the government to do government jobs.
Um also uh January 15th I want to get involved well I want to get involved in SAR search and rescue. January 14th I have a meeting to go see if I want to join. I know I'm going to join. So that's something I'm going to do also. U join that. It just gives you another credential. Um I think it' be extremely exciting. Do you get paid for those? No, [clears throat] you don't get paid for those, but especially for emergencies, but you get paid in different ways. You do meeting people, be the go-to guy for the police and fire department or the local people be great also.
Um, what was so [clears throat] funny, uh, Lighting by GGA hired me to do Christmas lights and that video's already been out by the time this video drops here. Uh, that's a great gig. They do permanent lighting. They want me to do other um, they want me to do other lighting also. I did the zoo. I did Round Rock. I did about four other houses. Uh there's some houses in for um Dallas Fort Worth they want me to do. Super excited about that. Great company to do jobs for. Um I'm grateful for the work from them.
So for me, what do I see in 2026? It's grow my business exponentially. I think it's a great I think it's a great pastime. I think it's going to be a great business. Do I say and tell other people, hey, go in business for yourself. the drone job. It's easy. You can make a ton of money. No, not at all. It is a grind. There's a friend of mine that actually is thinking about it. I think he's going to do it. He needs to get his 107, but I've told them all about this and no one told me about this stuff. You can Google it like that, but until you're in it, you just don't know. So, that's what this video is about. It is about trying to help people. And that's the same reason I started the YouTube video. Um, I basically with my job every day, I troubleshoot things. So, this kind of came kind of easy with every time I'd see someone with the Mini4 Pro, teach people how to do it. I would put a video out and I still do that, but it's a little different.
So, would I encourage people to get a drone business? Absolutely. If you like uh flying drones, do it. It's a blast. Is it going to be easy to fly the drone? It will. To get paid and get jobs, no. Um I mean, you have to buy a high-end drone usually first or when you get that point. Um, some people I know that I've seen, they start out with a very high-end drone and so, yes, it's a little easier because you get the high-end jobs. Most people won't. Most people will buy probably the Mavic or the Mini Air3 or the Air3s or even the Mini 5 Pro. Um, with that said, if you want to get in business for yourself, go ahead and do it. Um, absolutely. I wish you the best. Totally. But it's going to be a grind. I mean, don't think you're going to wake up and be a millionaire the next day. you're not. You know, that's the realization. It really is. I've seen people be in business and you see them send something. I haven't got a job in six months. Luckily, I've not had that problem. Um, but again, I reallyed the grind, the grind, the grind. So, I'm documenting my my business. I'll do another one probably a year from now to see where I'm at then. Hopefully, I'm still in business then. I think I will be. Um uh my channel's growing and YouTube also and that helps too gets your name out there.
But hey guys, I want to thank everyone for watching this. I know it's a long video, but um if you like this kind of content, please subscribe and we'll talk to you later. Bye guys.