Transcripts For CNBC The Profit 20170528

If you dont like money, dont follow my process. I make the tough decisions. Were closing the store. Were done. Im not talking about it anymore. I back them up, spending my own money. Its not always pretty. Man perfect flavor. Lemonis . But this is business. You got to trust the process. I do it to save jobs, and i do it to make money. Thanks for your business. This is the profit. [ bell rings ] west end coffee provides freshlyroasted Gourmet Coffee to local restaurants and specialty shops. Coowners Becky Schramm and john brown were in a relationship when they bought west end coffee for 500,000 in 2012. But a year later, their relationship ended in a nasty breakup, and trouble started brewing at the business. John youre ridiculous. You dont know what youre doing. Lemonis and their employees are constantly caught in the middle. Man i think theyre both good people. I just think they dont like each other. Lemonis with their business relationship strained and their losses mounting, time is running out. Theres a huge market for freshlyroasted Gourmet Coffee. If i can just get john and becky to put their claws away. John so, now you think you got a big [bleep] and you think you can run things, you know everything. Lemonis . And act as a team. John im done. Becky whatever. Lemonis . Well be making money in no time. Bryan welcome to another day in the west end. Lemonis [ inhales deeply ] smells good. [ sniffing ] [ sighs ] john tired of you blaming me. If you think youre so [bleep] great, go do it. Becky thats why im here. John [ sarcastically ] right. You want him to resolve our personal issues. Thats what you want. Becky im worried about the business, not our personal issues. Lemonis theres two things that i found when i walked into west end the smell of great coffee, which was nice, and the cursing not so nice. Hi, there. Becky hello. Lemonis im marcus. Becky im becky. Lemonis becky, nice to meet you. Becky very nice meeting you. John marcus, privilege. John brown. Lemonis john, nice to meet you. John nice to meet you, sir. Becky thank you for coming. Lemonis the smell when you walk in here is awesome. John it is. Thats what everybody says. Lemonis and so, is this whole warehouse is all the manufacturing . John it is. Everything is in this 3,500 square feet. Lemonis well, why dont we take a look around . John please. Please. This is our storefront. We have an extremely Loyal Customer base. People are coming in buying 7, 8, 9, 12 bags of coffee. Theres a lot of locals that live maybe 20 miles from here. They dont want to drive the downtown, so we do ship. Becky were in whole foods and earth fare and fresh market, as well, so they can just pick it up at the grocery store. Lemonis oh, you are . John yes. Lemonis thats nice. Who got that account . Becky the previous owner. John previous owner. Lemonis and what will the entire business do . John we did 840,000 last year. Lemonis how much profit . John i want to say, last year, it was 40,000 at the most. Okay. This is our production area. Lemonis how much is your rent a month . John 2,750. 2,750. Lemonis thats a bargain. John its a bargain. And it goes to 3,000 september 1st. Lemonis and then at the end of that period, it goes to becky hell jack it up. John we dont know. Thats the end of the lease. Lemonis any time you can have a longterm lease, it really gives the business an opportunity to know where its going. The longer the lease, the better the deal. Becky thats green. Thats cooked. Lemonis and so, this is what the seeds look like. John thats the seeds. Lemonis and so, theres a misnomer when people say coffee bean. John its a little green fruit that turns red when its ripe, ready to be picked. Lemonis but it tastes nothing like coffee. John no. Roasted coffee undergoes the same chemical process as baked bread. Lemonis how did you learn how to roast coffee . Becky we didnt. Lemonis why havent you learned . John just havent had the time. Lemonis why havent you learned . Becky um. I mean lemonis i mean, this is the whole business. Both it is. Lemonis you should really learn how to do that. It would be like owning a repair shop and not knowing how to change the oil. John youre right. Becky thats true. Lemonis roasting coffee is the single most important process of this company. Everybody should know how to do it. Becky we got the master roaster when we bought it. He stuck around. He only works one to two days, so thats when i got my son to start learning to roast. Hes our junior roaster, daily roaster. Lemonis its good you have a backup, cause if the other guy disappears, you have a plan. Becky marcus, this is my son, bryan. Bryan, marcus. Lemonis how are you . Really nice to meet you. How long have you been doing this . Bryan about two months. Maybe a little bit longer. Lemonis you like it . Bryan uh, yeah. Becky [ laughs ] you can tell the truth, honey. Bryan its a challenge sometimes, but its fun. Lemonis whats the challenge . Bryan um, the dynamics between them. I mean. Lemonis the dynamics between them are interesting . Bryan very interesting. Lemonis the coffees awesome. Lemonis whats a machine like this cost . John used, about 60,000. Brandnew, about double that. Lemonis lets crank this up. I want to see how it works. Im fascinated by it. Now its time for me to try roasting coffee. I want to have knowledge and an appreciation for it. And so, will i see that turn brown over time . Bryan yep. Lemonis how quickly can you get product . John three to four days. Lemonis because youre going through a distributor. And do you know how much margin youre losing through that distribution . Between going to the actual farm to here . John i do not. Becky we do not. Lemonis the fact that john hasnt taken the time to find out how to improve margin is troubling to me. He doesnt seem to see the importance of finding out what his cost would be by eliminating the distributor and going directly to the source. How many pounds do you roast a year today . John a little over 100,000 pounds. Lemonis i always look for ways to save money. If we could just pick up 30 cents a pound, over 100,000 pounds, thats 30,000 a year. If you ran this like a tight machine with two shifts using every square inch of the place, whats the maximum you could roast in a week . John probably around 7,000 pounds. Lemonis so thats about 364,000 pounds a year. Youre only producing 33 of the capacity of this facility. West end coffee roasts over 100,000 pounds of coffee a year and generates about 840,000 of revenue. But its highly unproductive, operating at only 33 of their total capacity. If they would get sales in line, the same facility with the same equipment and the same labor could generate over 360,000 pounds of coffee, yielding them over 3 million in sales. With 50 margins, thats why this is an attractive business. [ machine beeping ] thats pretty awesome. Theyre good, though. Bryan its cause you loaded them right. Lemonis but, of course, tasting the coffee will be the most important test. Im not a big coffee drinker. John okay. Lemonis i like coffee ice cream. Does that count . Becky yes. John sure. Becky it might be a little bit strong for you. John might be a little bit strong for you, and we make it pretty strong. Lemonis oh, its good. John but its good. Lemonis but its really good. John and its fresh. Lemonis its obvious that they have a good product, and beckys son bryan shows me that the employees are motivated and they enjoy their work. The tension between john and becky could be the reason this business is really struggling. Tell me the story of how you met. John she became friends with my wife. We would hang out together. My wife and i my exwife and i had problems. I went to my wife, and i said, if you want to try to work this out, you need to get rid of becky. Lemonis why did you want her to get rid of becky . John so that my exwife and i could work it out. We were like an inner circle. There was like the three of us that were, you know. Lemonis yall were having, like, a there was like a triangle thing going on . John sort of, yes. Lemonis sort of. Okay. John yes. Cohorts in crime, maybe. I dont know. Lemonis [ laughs ] [ laughing ] let me check out these recipes. [ laughter ] this is a classic case of t. M. I. I dont know what sort of graph or chart we could put up for this one, but i think we should move on. So, how many total employees . John seven, counting us. Becky we have bryan as a roaster. We have brandon who does repairs. John lets go back to bryan for just a minute. I had a plan. She came in, overrode it, put him in there. Becky he wanted to interview a guy that worked at home depot in the garden department. John i wanted to interview anybody that might have been qualified. Becky whereas bryan at least knows how we run our business. Lemonis this is how you guys coexist all the time . John all the time. Lemonis how does it make the employees feel . John like [bleep] lemonis and when you guys were together in a relationship, was it normal . Becky not since we got here. This kind of really was the downfall. Lemonis can the relationship be repaired if youre not working together . John i no longer want to be with her. Im looking for a wife eventually. Becky theres news, cause he told me he was never getting married again. John i told you i was never gonna marry you. Becky [ laughs ] lemonis well, its an interesting place. How do you work in this environment . I mean, i only got a dose of it. Man very carefully. Bryan its been calm today. Lemonis todays been calm . Man 2 todays been calm. Bryan nice and calm. Man 2 mmhmm. If they ever get on the same page, they can do a lot. Its just. Hate. Hate and mistrust. Bryan i mean, i think we all do a pretty good job of knowing how to do everything. I think if you just kind of threw us into most spots, we could probably all just do it. Lemonis its interesting to me that the employees function at such a high rate despite the negativity coming from john and becky. I need to dig into the structure of their business relationship to find out if its the dysfunction thats holding this business back. Hows the equity allocated between 50 50 . John im 82, and shes 18. Lemonis how much money did you actually give to the seller . Becky 499,000. Lemonis 499,000 . John yes. Lemonis and how much of cash did you put in . John cash out of my pocket was 12,500. Beckys was 77,000, cash. Lemonis so, 500,000 is what the seller was given for the purchase of the business. Becky thats right. Lemonis when you handed them a check, 77,000 came from you, 12,500 came from you personally. Becky 100,000 from the bank. John shh. Lemonis a hu becky 100,000 from the bank. Lemonis so thats 200,000, about, right now. And where did the other 300,000 come from . Becky his 401 that got rolled over into the retirement pension plan, which then is a stockholder, shareholder. Lemonis slash lender. John yes. Becky yes. Lemonis john and becky told me that they paid 499,000 when they purchased west end coffee. Becky came up with 77,000 in cash. John came up with 12,500 in cash. They received a 100,000 bank loan, and the remaining 300,000 came from johns 401 k retirement plan. If you look at the numbers literally, becky would actually only own 18 and john 82 , but theyre acting like its a 50 50 partnership. Do you pay yourselves . John we have only taken a 5,000 officer salary once in those two years. I was living, like, off of savings, and thats pretty much depleted. Lemonis whoa. John yeah. Lemonis and why havent you listed it . Becky i dont want to sell. Lemonis do you want to sell it . John i really dont, but i cannot continue for her to control my money. Lemonis how does she control your money . John she has the ultimate shareholder voting majority. Lemonis how does that work . John because shes a director on that qualified pension plan. My mistake. Becky all i did was sign. John she could fire me as c. E. O. And president if there was a shareholders meeting. Lemonis its obvious to me that john didnt fully review the contract before signing it with becky. While john has put in most of the money either from cash or his 401 k plan, he gave becky the right to act as a director of his 401 k plan. This gives becky the right to actually vote him out and fire him. Whos responsible for keeping all this stuff straight the balance sheet, the p l . John i do. I look at p l almost daily just to see where were at with saleswise compared to last year. Lemonis 834,000 in sales. This is through. John this is 2013. The next page is 2014. Lemonis gross is actually down gross profit. Right . John correct. 83,000. Lemonis okay. Whats happened . John expenses. Lemonis when you say expenses, you mean cost john im sorry. Cost. Cost of consulting. Excuse me. Lemonis the bank loan. 100,000. John yes. Lemonis and so, youre trending down. Right . John correct. Lemonis well, ill give you a lot of credit, both of you, for putting together solid financials, but i dont know how responsible you are in managing the people here, and the biggest risk in this business right now its you guys. John oh, yeah. Were whats broke. Becky yeah. Thats why i called you. Lemonis but im not a guidance counselor. Becky oh, i know, but. Lemonis you know what i like about both of you . Becky [ laughs ] lemonis you have passion. Even if i dont agree with the content all the time, you have passion, and thats not something that you can teach people. The criticism that i have is that the business is bigger than both of you. John agreed. Lemonis you guys made this investment together. Youre either gonna go forward together, or youre gonna burn together. I want to do business with people that will always do the right thing without conditions. But i just cant understand it. I need you to explain to me again why it is that you think its okay that accidentally, you secured a right that gives you the ability to fire him from this business when you only put in 20 of all the money. I need to just hear from you, cause i think if i cant get a good explanation a true, honest explanation i have to leave. Becky he has threatened to fire me, and to me, thats the only thing that i have to hang onto. Lemonis you are taking his ability to control his destiny, which is what i think is driving the anger and the hate and the mistrust. Becky no question. Lemonis and you know it, and youre using it as a weapon. Becky it was a twist of fate, for sure. Lemonis it was an accident. Becky i dont think lemonis it was an accident. Becky totally. Lemonis and so, what reassurance does she have that youre not gonna sign the paperwork, play nice for a week, and then blow her up and blast her to the moon . John that i absolutely will give her that right and that opportunity for us to Work Together and build this as it originally was envisioned. Lemonis are you willing to say to him, im willing to take the chance, john, to fix this issue, but i have something that i shouldnt, and im gonna give it back . Are you prepared to do that . But weve got the get tdigital tools to help. Now with xfinitys my account, you can figure things out easily, so you wont even have to call us. Change your wifi password to something you can actually remember, instantly. Add that premium channel, and watch the show everyones talking about, tonight. And the bill you need to pay . Do it in seconds. Because we should fit into your life, not the other way around. Go to xfinity. Com myaccount lemonis you secured a right as a director in his 401 k plan that gives you the ability to fire him from this business when you only put in 20 of all the money. Are you willing to say to him, im willing to give it back to you . Are you prepared to do that . Becky i am. Lemonis right now . Becky sure. John that would go a really long ways, cause you hit the nail right on the head. That is what is causing the hurt and the anger and the frustration. Lemonis and the mistrust. John and the mistrust. Absolutely. Lemonis im all about getting this business from 1 million to 5 million or 6 million. The product is good. I believe that i can create sales and generate revenue that you guys couldnt, and i feel like i bring that to the table. So, heres my offer. John okay. Lemonis im willing to put up 200,000 for 51 of the business. 200,000 gives you the ability to buy inventory that you dont have today. Out of the 200,000 that i offered them, i want 100,000 to go towards paying the debt off that they used to acquire the business. In my opinion, Small Businesses need to be less burdened and more focused on growing. The second 100,000 will go into working capital. As the business goes from roasting 100,000 pounds of coffee to roasting 364,000 pounds of coffee and we improve the productivity of the business, receivables will grow, and the need for more Raw Materials will grow, as well. John im just not sure that 200,000s enough. I mean, thats valuing our business at less than 400,000. Lemonis i put the wild card discount. John so thats tdiscount price. Lemonis i have to discount it cause i have to mitigate my risk. And so, the wild card in this situation is you guys. If you guys destroy and blow this place up, i can mitigate my losses. If im wrong, then we all make a lot of money because id rather have 49 of something that does 5 million than i would own 100 of nothing. John can we take a few minutes to talk about it, or. Lemonis sure. John yeah. Like he said, the big thing is, we have to start fresh, regain that trust and respect for each other. Im willing to come in here fresh as a daisy and say, hi, rebecca schramm. Im john brown. Thank you for being my business partner. Can we run this thing together and Work Together . What do you think . Becky i agree. This is a good business. Theres money here. Lets get out of our own damn way. John okay. We appreciate the opportunity. Were both willing to put all that energy, all that effort, all that passion, all that emotion, and well put it into fighting for our business and building our business with you. Lemonis okay . John yes, sir. Lemonis do we have a deal . Becky we have a deal. John we have a deal. Thank you, marcus. Lemonis great. We have a lot to do. Hey, john, id like to get everybody together. Its a new day, and im feeling hopeful. I want to get the entire Team Together so i can let them know the deal that i made with john and becky and also give them the new direction. John and becky and i have made a deal for me to invest 200,000 into the company. Ill have 51 of the business. Theyll share 49 . Im 100 in charge. The nonsense has to stop. Were gonna run this like a real business. Were gonna look at packaging. Were gonna look at sales. Were gonna look at delivery. I want to add new accounts, and if we cant handle the local people, then were not ready for the big leagues. I believe in the product. I think the product is great. So i am here to sell coffee. I am not here to babysit. cause if we sell coffee, what happens . Man we make more money. Lemonis thats it. And if we make more money, what happens . Man we retire earlier. Lemonis we retire earlier. [ laughter ] exactly. Now its time to get this warehouse and inventory in shape. I want to take the top 10 skus, and i want to see this inventory to the brim all the time so if youre off for a day or the other roasters not here, we can still function. Because im gonna grow volume, i need to know exactly what it costs to make a bag of coffee. How much is the clip . John 8 cents. Lemonis how much is the bag . John 31. Lemonis so, were at 39 now. John plus the labels gonna be 3. Lemonis so thats 42 cents. How much is the raw bean . John lets say, on average, 3. Lemonis that takes us to 3. 42. What else needs to go into there to get a finished product . John labor. Lemonis take me to how much the labor is. John lets figure 12. Lemonis 12 cents . John yeah. Right. Lemonis so it costs 3. 54. And what do we sell a onepound bag for . John 12. Lemonis that margins killer. How do you compare to the competition in terms of your cost per pound . John most roasters do not sell a full pound of coffee. Lemonis what do they sell . John 12 ounces. Lemonis heres the thing. The fact that youre selling 4 ounces more, youre not getting more price out of it, so youre giving away beans, and youre not getting any extra volume or any extra margin. So why do it . John yep. Youre right. Lemonis now that i know what it costs, i want to understand the process to package the coffee. What are we doing here . Man just filling these bags. Lemonis how do you weigh it out . Man this machine actually weighs it out for me. Lemonis so, lets see it. So, you go right here . Man yeah. Not too bad. [ both laugh ] rookie lemonis all right. Rookie mistake. Holy crap. Hold on. Johns probably not gonna let me in the warehouse now. Man [ laughs ] lemonis wasting his money. Hey. Becky hello. Lemonis how are you . Hey, i wanted to let you know that at 3 30, were meeting with the owner of larkins and the head chef. Larkins is one of the most popular restaurant chains in all of south carolina. Not only do they have four locations, but they have a massive banquet facility. Try to get all of their business. And then we want to explain what the terms are, so i want you to bring whatever you need to explain how they pay, when they pay, how it works, how they order. Landing them as an account for them to use west end as their sole provider would be very lucrative to the company. And then youll obviously do the pitching, okay . John absolutely. Sure. You got it. Lemonis while larkins is the biggest restaurant chain in south carolina, for me, this is a test drive of john and becky proving they can Work Together. Once they prove to me that they can do that, ill be glad to open up much bigger doors. Hello, guys. So, i brought you here today for a couple of reasons. My primary reason is, i really havent seen you guys Work Together. And so, i want to see if the two of you can actually Work Together in a business setting. Thats what this is about for me. John we are prepared to do that. Lemonis and by the way, you better sell something, too. Becky finally comes around, and he wants apple, and he wants chocolate chip. Give him [bleep] apple and chocolate chip. Lemonis the two of you arent capable of owning a business. Theseare heading back home. Y oil thanks to dawn, rescue workers only trust dawn, because its tough on grease yet gentle. I am home, i am home, i am home lemonis im looking for a little bit more collaboration, and you guys working together is the deciding factor for me. It really is. John okay. Lemonis thats what this is about for me. John we are prepared to do that. Lemonis and by the way, you better sell something, too. This is an important meeting for john and becky. I want them to prove to me that they can Work Together, and i want to see how they act around potential customers. Well, first of all, thanks for at least considering to take this meeting. I know youre getting ready for dinner, and thats tough. Man appreciate that. Woman great. Yeah. Lemonis how many restaurants do you guys have today . Man we have four restaurants and then a banquet facility. Lemonis and how many different how many clients or how many customers do you see on a daily basis across all the businesses . Man we see about 1,300 on a daily basis. Lemonis so almost a half a Million People a year . Man yeah, but if you add in the catering, that is actually another 75,000 to 125,000. Lemonis whats the percentage of people that actually order coffee or tea of those 600,000 people . Man 25 or 30 . Lemonis wow. Larkins sees over 600,000 customers per year, and a little over 1 3 of them order coffee. That equals about 220,000 cups per year. In one pound of coffee, you can make 40 cups of coffee. Based on that, larkins would need to order just under 5,800 pounds of coffee per year. West end sells it at a wholesale price of 7. 25, then from this one meeting alone, they would generate 42,000 a year in sales. Thats 5 of their annual revenue with just one meeting. Ill turn it over to you guys. John okay. We appreciate the time that you guys have given us today. I realize how valuable that is. And were here just to tell you about west end coffee. We are a fullservice coffeeroasting facility. Man if it was a custom blend. Becky i dont know if were gonna offer a private recipe for larkins. If thats the case, we wouldnt have that on the shelf. John to answer your question, chef, if you order that on monday, youll have it in your kitchen on friday. So it may not necessarily be true that we would not have your coffee on the shelf. In fact, its very likely that would have your coffee on the shelf. Lemonis well carry a safety stock. John yes. Theres any equipment issues, anything like that, were here for you. Woman so you provide equipment and repairs . John we do. Ill let becky talk a little bit about, you know, how we do that. Lets say they call in with a problem. A machines leaking. Becky well, then we call brandon. John well, no. I mean, then she talks to the customers, gets the information. Lemonis and well probably make some frequent visits stop by, check on the machines, make sure theyre right. Man 2 that was one of the things i was gonna ask. Lemonis were not gonna wait for you to call. John i can pledge to you that we will do Everything Possible to make sure that we earn your business every day, every order. Lemonis were really asking for a shot at your business. Well overservice the account. Youll probably be telling us, our coffees good. Go away. Becky leave me alone. Lemonis and our goal is to help you sell more coffee because its great margin. John yeah. We would love to have you guys. Woman yeah. John definitely. Lemonis were glad that youre gonna give us an opportunity for your business. Woman thank you. Nice meeting you. Man thank you. Lemonis now that weve had a successful sales meeting, i want to head back to the warehouse and put an Inventory System in place. For example, they carry over 35 flavors of syrups way too much for a small distributor. If it doesnt sell, its got to go. I dont really want to carry things anymore that we dont sell volume of. So, amaretto. How many are on that . John this says 60 on my list. Lemonis okay. Ill keep it. Blackberry. John 11. Lemonis butter pecan. John 41. Lemonis okay. Butter rum. John 8. Lemonis and what is all this over here . John those are smoothies. Lemonis how much do you sell of it . A lot . John we do. Its seasonal. So thats why we got stuck with the expired product, is cause we ordered too much. Lemonis this is all expired . John yes. Lemonis why dont we just throw them out . John cause thats like 4,000. Lemonis whyd you buy this much . Becky lets have that argument again. John hes asking you a question. Lemonis its not an argument. Im just asking a question. I mean, were selling expired merchandise. Im just curious. Becky i ordered enough for a year. Lemonis you made a huge inventory mistake. Becky ill cart them out of here in my [bleep] car cause im sick of hearing about the [bleep] smoothies, honest to god. Lemonis but, no, its not the smoothies that i have a problem with. What i have a problem with is not having an Inventory System and an ordering system. And when you make a mistake, you just have to understand that it was a costly mistake. Becky yes. Lemonis i cant stress enough how important it is for any business to have an Inventory System. A simple spreadsheet would have saved john and becky from having to throw out thousands of dollars of expired merchandise. John so, wheres that email from your hotshot attorney to resign as trustee of the pension plan . Becky ill get it in a minute. John youre either up front and honest, or youre not. Becky i dont claim to be perfect. John oh, no. I never said im perfect. But you wont admit when you make a mistake or anything else just like the smoothies. I thought again, stupid, foolish me. I can work, and i can make this work, but it cant. Becky and you shook his hand. If you didnt feel like shaking his hand, you shouldnt have, because thats a gentlemans contract. John ill do the deal with marcus, but not with you, and especially with no resignation letter. Youre horrible at doing the right things until youre forced to do it. Becky and i told marcus i would do that. John unless i have that today, effective today, were done. Im not selling my soul to anybody to put up with your [bleep] tha. Oh, burnton gravy . Ie. Gotta rinse that. Nope. No way. Nada. Really . Dish issues . Throw it all in. New cascade platinum powers through. Even burnton gravy. Nice. Cascade. You. Smells fine, but yourin your passengers smell this bell dinging new febreze car with Odorclear Technology cleans away odors. For up to 30 days smells nice. Breathe happy, with new febreze. John ill do the deal with marcus, but not with you, and especially with no resignation letter. Youre horrible at doing the right things until youre forced to do it. Becky and i told marcus i would do that. John unless i have that today, were done. Lemonis so, whats the good word . John ask her, has she done anything you asked her becky you just tipped it for me. I contacted my attorney, asked him for that resignation for the director, as well as the trustee. Lemonis why isnt the paperwork signed, becky . Becky i dont have the form, but i will get the form. Lemonis its a piece of paper, becky. Becky alls i can say is, you should probably be happy that i didnt sign it because hes contacted Business Brokers to try and sell it. When im thinking weve got a deal. And now hes out shopping around. John i didnt say i was trying to sell it. Becky john, you did. You talked with the guy on the phone. Yes. John okay. So im gathering information. I think this is a free country. Becky for what . john i think i can get additional information. Becky the deal is done. Lemonis its been a week, and i thought we were on the right track, but now im finding out that not only did becky not do the one thing i asked her to do, but johns now meeting with brokers trying to sell the business . We already have a deal. What is it that youre going to find out . Find out if i took advantage of you . To find out if the price you got was right . John to find out if the price we got is right. Lemonis too [bleep] bad. You made a deal. And so, i dont think i gave you a bad deal. We shook hands. John yes, sir. Lemonis and it meant nothing. Poof. Gone. John no, thats not true. Lemonis but you were gonna go list the business. The only reason you didnt list the business is probably cause she wouldnt agree to sign the paper. John no, no. That [scoffs] lemonis becky, is that true . John i was not going to do that. That was never my intention. Lemonis well, why did you do it . thats whats not clear to me. John because of her. I would love to do a deal between you and i. Lemonis no, but we shook hands at the table, all three of us. Becky do we want to read texts . Im more than done. You have no savior. We will sell this for our original investment and start over without each other. Marcus is irrelevant at this time. The business will be listed for sale tomorrow, miss 18 owner. You will be lucky to get your initial investment back, and after that, good luck. Lemonis i got news for you. John okay. Lemonis um. I am relevant. I made a deal, and i bought 51 of this business. And i can throw you out. John i understand that. Lemonis but i dont operate that way. And i was the one guy that was helping you get the release of your freedom, cause i was the only relevant person that was able to get her to agree to do it. John and, marcus, youre very relevant. I apologize again. Lemonis im relevant cause im standing here in your face. John yes, sir. I get it. I understand. Lemonis ill tell you the issue that i have. I know that i have a 51 stake in a coffeeroasting business that i think has a lot of capacity left and makes a good product. What i have to decide is who should be here and who shouldnt be. Its starting to become clear to me that john and becky cant Work Together, so im gonna figure out which one of thems gonna stay and which one of thems gonna go. Who is in charge of sales . Becky in charge of sales . Lemonis sales. Who is in charge to sell the product in this company . Becky i guess i dont understand the question. Lemonis so, when you get a new account, whos responsible for it . Becky for collecting or selling or what . Lemonis mary and joseph. Whos responsible to sell the product . Becky i do. Lemonis so youre the salesperson . Becky i guess so, if you want to say that. Lemonis whats the largest customer you have right now . Uh. John table 301. Lemonis if i called that customer, who would they say is their account person . John i would say me, but they could say becky. Lemonis what would you say theyd say . Becky i would say me because emails come from me. Lemonis why are you guys both doing the same job . I dont understand that. John right we dont have clearlydefined roles and responsibilities, which is something ive been talking about for over a year. Becky he sucks at ordering. Like, on that toranis order. They wanted the order in, and i told you weve been trying to get this guys business for two years. John weve got this guys business. Becky he finally comes around, and he wants apple, and he wants chocolate chip. Give him [bleep] apple and chocolate chip. John you were flying off the handle, ready to do it without me intervening whatsoever, reviewing it or nothing. You were just gonna do it. In fact, you did it, you tried it, and it didnt work because i called and shut it down cause i didnt want any more of the corporate money wasted. Lemonis the two of you dont know what youre supposed to be doing. Youre so busy fighting that youre not busy selling. And so the reason this business is for sale, was for sale, should be for sale is cause the two of you arent capable of owning a business right now. Youre not. Youre not capable. If this business has any hope of surviving, i need to convince becky that she needs to do the right thing and sign over this right that she has to control his pension plan. It may not fix everything, but i think its a step in the right direction. Why do you still hang out . Becky i want to own my own company. I want to call the shots. I want to, you know, have my own destiny. And thats the whole reason i never signed that paper, because its like, youre not gonna lock me out. Lemonis in business, youre gonna find yourself in situations that you either dont like or youre not supposed to be in. And with this piece of paper that you have or can sign, you really are holding him hostage. You know you are. Its your leverage. Becky it is. Lemonis and im a big believer in leverage, by the way, so i can see your point, okay . But now that we have a deal, your destiny is controlled by you and by me, not by him, because if he cant behave, then ill throw him out. In this particular moment, you have to be able to lay your head down at night and know that youve done the right thing. I have to know that you know how to do the right thing. That form, to me, though, is very symbolic. Becky i can appreciate that. No question. I can appreciate that. Lemonis i want you to sign the form, and ill hold it. Becky im willing to try. Lemonis lets go talk to him. Come on. Look, its important to always do the right thing in business, even if you feel like its gonna turn out bad for you. Two wrongs dont make a right. Tendering my resignation in order to better facilitate the sale of stock. Print that out. Hereby tendering my resignation as trustee of specialty coffee roasters, inc. , retirement plan. Its what youve been asking for. Right . John yes. Yes, sir. Lemonis i am tendering my resignation in order to better facilitate the sale of the stock to marcus lemonis, llc. Can you sign that . Becky okay. Lemonis so, let me tell you how relevant i am. John okay. Lemonis i now control you. She doesnt control you. And so if you ever go around my back again and i find out that youre meeting with brokers, i will not only not do the deal, but i wont give you this paper. And im gonna leave you to the wolves. John okay. Lemonis dont ever [bleep] with me. Are we clear . John were clear. Lemonis okay. Now that becky signed the document, we should be able to move forward and focus on business issues. I need to delegate roles so that everyone has a clear role here at west end. You are the inventory manager. You are responsible for everything back here. And you better know every cost on every product. You are now responsible for sales. John okay. Okay. Lemonis 100 . So no sales calls will come to anybody but you. John okay. Lemonis nothing can be ordered and a p. O. Cannot go out without two signatures. Were gonna have a check and balance all over the place, checking for mistakes, checking for inventory we dont need. Its a very tight discipline. John lets get to work. Lemonis ive done everything i can to set up john and becky for success, and its time for me to go away for a few weeks. I need them to prove to me they can Work Together when im not here. As far as im concerned, its doordie time for west end. This is a cluster [bleep] you guys cannot Work Together. One of us has to go. If your business is in trouble and you need my help, log on to. Beckand if you tell me dointhats not true john youve been doing everything because marcus asked you to do everything. Thats why. You think you own this place, and you think you run it. Lemonis i come back at west end coffee, and, again, im struck by two things the smell of great coffee and john and becky fighting again. John look, the bottom line is, you want me gone, i want you gone. Becky no. I can work with you. Ive always said i could work with you. John no. No. Lemonis as i look around this warehouse, i notice that they havent done one single thing that i gave them to do. The warehouse is still full of expired products and items that dont sell, and the worst part is, they dont have one single stock of backstock coffee. Its as if i wasnt even here. Hey, guys. John hey, marcus. Lemonis how are you . John good morning. Lemonis so, all the changes that we made back there theyre all different again now . John need to talk to miss rebecca on that. Lemonis there was supposed to be bags, and there were supposed to be 5pound bags. Why arent they made . Becky the reason that we decided lemonis who told you guys that you can decide that . John its her. Lemonis you were in charge of sales. John yes, sir. Lemonis any new accounts . John two followup meetings with larkins. Lemonis interesting. I have pages from my twitter account. I guess west end coffee is too busy to quote us. John what . Lemonis im not calling them out. Im just saying he called me out. And i look like i dont have my [bleep] together. And then i talked to him, and he said to me followups been terrible. Do you want to be in this business . John i want to be in this business. This is my business. Lemonis well, itour business. Excuse me. Yes. Lemonis im scared to have anybody come here because we cant follow up with the local restaurant, and if you guys are now not talking again, how do we deal with that . Ive been gone two weeks. Becky hes pissed off because you took a lot of what he was doing before. John im not pissed off. Becky thats not true, john. John he gave it to you, and i said, here you go. Becky he throws everything on my desk, and he says, marcus wants you to do it all, so ive been doing it all. John im a very strong business leader. Lemonis you cant even follow up on a sales call. John well, thats a whole different story. Becky yeah, its different when it comes to him. He gave you one thing to do make sales calls. Lemonis i mean, come on. This is one guy. John im giving you enough rope to hang yourself. Lemonis this isnt working for me. Im not gonna do this, play these games. Its important in business that you treat people the right way. In fact, for me, its nonnegotiable. I dont care if its a coworker, an employee, your boss, or a customer. I know relationships go bad, but when it comes to this place, you have a responsibility to make sure he gets paid, he gets paid, he gets paid, and you make money. And right now, this is a cluster [bleep] and what i dont like, john, is, i dont like how you talk to her. Even if shes wrong, as men at least how my mother raised me we have a certain responsibility to be respectful to women. Look at her. And you dont care. You dont care how she feels. Im surprised her son hasnt just beat the [bleep] out of you. I dont know why he tolerates it. You know what . You guys cannot Work Together. One of us has to go. Lemonis you know what . You guys cannot Work Together. One of us has to go. John and beckys relationship is so toxic that i no longer believe that the three of us can Work Together. The only chance this business has of surviving is for one of them to go. John hes right. One of the three of us has to go. Well, its not gonna be me. Its my money. Becky alls you want is your money. John no. Thats not all i want, is my money. Becky youve looked at buying other businesses. John youre not majority owner. Youre 18 . You better start [bleep] acting like it. Becky thanks. Youre just gonna run it into the goddamn ground. [ sobs ] [ crying ] i just feel like ive been fighting so long because i love this company. I had to fight for it. Im not giving up on it. [ sobbing continues ] my sons grown. This is my new baby. So im gonna take care of her. John i want my business, and i want to run my business my way. I just dont see a way of moving beyond that with becky. I left a 120,000ayear job to come work for free for two years to build something. Its my baby. I paid for it. Lemonis i came here to help you guys, and i came here to make a deal, cause i want to be in the coffee business. My job is to make an investment in a company and go out and sell. And the minute i leave, all hell breaks loose. John you got marcus here to get rid of me. Becky no. John, ive always said we could Work Together. You continue to buck me on it. Lemonis tell me something that should make me not walk out that door. John well, i cant speak for her, but i can speak for me. Lemonis okay. John i think ive proven myself. Lemonis how . John i think you saw what i can do at that larkins meeting. I saved her in that meeting. Im not gonna say you cant do this without me. Becky i can certainly do it without you. Ive done it without you since marcus left last time. Ive done everything. Youve sat over there and done nothing. Lemonis well, you actually didnt do everything since i left, cause you didnt do what i asked you to. Becky are we gonna just keep beating me up, or are we done . I mean, i dont know, marcus. I really cant take much more. Ive been taking it for a year from him, and now ive gotten it from you. Lemonis youve been telling me that he abuses you and yells at you ive seen it. But its hard for me to want to do business with you, too, because you didnt even follow one thing. You dont even have one bag. Humor me. He failed at his task, but so did you. And so what it proved to me is that if i gave you a milliondollar account, in my mind, you guys cant fulfill the business. Why . Whats your reason . Becky its just the way weve always done it. Lemonis what you just said to me is the reason that i cant do business because youre unwilling to change the way youve always done it. I believe in people, process, and product. I can improve the product, we can work on the process, but sometimes, you just cant change the people. This is your resignation. John oh [ sighs ] lemonis i wish you luck. Becky i appreciate that. Thank you. Lemonis i wish you luck. John thank you, marcus, for everything. Thank you. Lemonis thanks. John a Million Dollars just walked out the door. Lemonis west end coffee could have been a great business, but i dont get in business to be a mediator. I get in business to make money. While i understand that sometimes people cant Work Together, in this case, theres no way that we could turn this business around with the two of them. Live at the nasdaq mark site, kicking off the holiday weekend. Dont pack up and leave just yet. The guys have ideas you can put to work when the markets open back up on tuesday. Heres whats coming up in the show. Money will always be paper. But gold will always be gold. And theres something in the charts that suggests now is the time to buy it. Well explain. How would you like to protect your profits at amazon for nothing . Nothing . Yeah, thats right. Nothing. Well break it down. And talk about car trouble. Gm shares are tanking. And there are signs that its about to