Anthony you think so . Lemonis . He might just get to the top. My name is Marcus Lemonis, and i fix failing businesses. If you dont like money, dont follow my program. 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. Surfside beach is a picturesque resort town. A great place to vacation and a great place to call home. Anthony leggio. [ camera shutter clicks ]. And his girlfriend, kristen christian. Kristen good morning, asl signs. Lemonis . Moved here from long island two years ago to start a family. Anthony i know, you want daddy time. Lemonis . And a business asl signs. Anthony do you want to finish doing this estimate . Kristen oh, yes, please. Anthony oh, boy. Here we go. Lemonis with a 200,000 loan from his dad, louis, anthony was able to get the sign shop up and running quickly. Hes got expensive machinery to make the signs, and the trucks to install them. In their second year of operations, asl generated 300,000 in sales and made a 45,000 profit. Anthony come on. Come on, get some work done. Lemonis but anthony wants more. Much more. Anthony i want to go big. Thats why im here. To make money. Lots of it. Lemonis to get there, hes gonna have to do more than just talk big. Kristen he already told me that he will be in, so. Anthony stop arguing with me. Lets just get it done. Lemonis hes gonna have to start thinking smarter. Anthony i just want a deposit. And if you dont like us or our company, well refund you back the money. Josh yeah, but all of the other sign companies arent doing that. Lemonis as an owner of a lot of businesses, i spend over 1. 5 million a year on signage, and i know that this industry has explosive margins. If i can get anthony to focus on growing strategically while putting the best process in place, all signs point to making millions. Anthony hey. Lemonis how you doing . Anthony mr. Marcus lemonis. Its such a pleasure to finally lemonis are you anthony . Anthony yes, sir, it is. Lemonis nice to meet you. Anthony pleasure to meet you. Lemonis you know what i love about highway 17 . Anthony its a lot of signs . Lemonis [ laughing ] all the signs. Anthony yeah, new signs, we do a lot of. We just did one, the car wash. I dont know if you saw it on the way here. Big l. E. D. Board, it was about 32 grand. We just finished it. Lemonis oh, whoa. Anthony customers really stoked about it. Lemonis now, i dont know your business, and im excited to learn it. And so i know a little bit about it, cause i buy a couple Million Dollars a year worth of signs across all these businesses. Anthony i know a good sign company. Lemonis i know you do. Anthony [ laughs ] lemonis but i got to get comfortable with what youre doing. So, what exactly does asl signs do . Anthony we are a onestop shop manufacturing plant. So we do high volume, low labor. Lemonis banners . Anthony all day long. Lemonis forsale signs . Anthony as many as you need. Lemonis signs on the building . Anthony absolutely. Lemonis backlit, nonlit, frontlit . Anthony yep. Lemonis do you manufacture it . Anthony we manufacture the signs. We manufacture a larger scale of things, bigger things. Lemonis thats what makes you different. Youre not just a sign company. Youre a sign manufacturer. Anthony right. And thats what i try pushing. Lemonis i did not know that. I did not know that. Now im intrigued. Do you like the way this showrooms set up . Anthony i feel comfortable with it. Lemonis the showroom at asl is total chaos. The walls are littered with signs. What im seeing in here, honestly, as i walk in, is i dont know where to look. And in order to tell a story effectively to the customer, you need to be clear and give them options. But you have to do it in a way thats easy to follow. Yeah, thatd be great. How are you . Kristen hi. Lemonis im marcus. Kristen kristen. Lemonis and so, whats your relationship . Kristen this is my boyfriend. Lemonis and where did you guys meet . Anthony new york. Lemonis whos that . Anthony thats this goodlooking guy over here. I even got him on the back of my shirts. Its just a little branding. Lemonis whats asl stand for . Anthony that is actually my initials, anthony sal leggio. Or american sign legion, i like to call it. Kristen [ laughs ] lemonis why are you laughing . Kristen first time ive ever heard the american sign anything. Lemonis it just means hes making it up. Anthony no no, no, no. Ive had that. Lemonis youre totally making that up. Kristen ive never heard you say that, ever. Josh its always been asil to me. Lemonis [ chuckles ] kristen asil. Anthony asil. Kristen [ laughs ] lemonis who made the logo . Kristen josh. Anthony josh. Josh it was supposed to be a joke. Kristen [ laughs ] anthony well, jokes on him because now im using it. Josh now its everywhere. Lemonis and so, what happens when you get married . Does the signcompany name change or. . Anthony [ sighs ] if she wants. Kristen i dont need my face on there. Lemonis you dont need to be doing this . Kristen he can keep that. Lemonis building a brand in any business is the key to success. And building that brand around the owner is not a bad idea, as long as the owner is likeable and relatable. Its nice to meet you, by the way. Josh hey, nice to meet you. Lemonis im marcus. Josh joshua thomas. Lemonis so, you do the designs here . Josh i do all the design work, run the machinery, i do all the production renderings. Lemonis and do you do some of the design yourself as well . Kristen yes. Lemonis and does he . Kristen he tries to. Lemonis shes doing all the work . Anthony all the work. Every little bit of it. Shes doing everything. Lemonis whats mr. Asl do . Josh we like to keep him outside. Lemonis selling. Josh no, not selling. Like, installations. Kristen just doing the work. Lemonis why did everybody say no to you selling . Josh i think a lot of people see him as being overbearing. Kristen yeah. Anthony too much . Kristen hes overwhelming. Anthony i am not. Josh hes a hundred miles an hour. Kristen hes loud. Lemonis so who does sales around here . Anthony us three. Josh yeah, pretty much. Lemonis theyre kind of not including you in that sales loop. Kristen the two of us are always in the office. Most of the time, hes not in the office. Anthony we have a couple salesmen, and this crew right here that i have is phenomenal. Lemonis then how do you guys get paid . You get a salary out of the business . Anthony yeah, i just started taking a salary maybe a month ago, two months ago, now that Bank Accounts starting to fill up. And me and her kristen i dont get paid. Anthony well, she gets paid through my salary. If she needs money, i give it to her. Lemonis uh, let me see if i understand that again. She doesnt get paid. And if she needs something, youll give it to her . Anthony whatever she wants. Thats correct. Lemonis [ scoffs ] its surprising to me that kristen is okay leaving anthony in charge of her personal finances. Shes helping anthony run the company and shes not even getting a check. Anthony well, i just started taking a salary, too. I suffered for a long time, as well. Thank god my father helped me out with a decent amount of stuff. Lemonis is your father in the sign business . Anthony he was a long time ago. Lemonis right. Anthony and he just retired and gave up on it and just sold everything off. Lemonis oh, okay. You know, can we actually look at some of the machinery . Anthony sure, lets go up front. Lemonis anthonys got a great setup. There are machines that can blow up photographs. That can cut letters out of stainless steel. And hes got people that can work with the latest lighting technology. With all this inhouse manufacturing, anthony has to be generating some serious gross profit. Anthony done. Lemonis man, that would take hours to do it the other way. Anthony see, theres no bubbles in it . Lemonis theres nothing. Anthony its 450 bucks. Done. Lemonis whats this cost . Anthony what, 45, maybe . Kristen maybe 45 of labor. Anthony tremendous markup on this. Lemonis okay. If the sign costs 45 to make, and it sells for 450, the margin is 90 . Because anthony makes the signage in house, hes able to retain all of the margin. Seeing numbers like this makes investing in this industry a lot more attractive to me. And so, how does the chain of command here work . Anthony we all try to work very well together. Lemonis whos the boss . Anthony im the boss. I like to be and i hate to say it, i like to say, hey, im the boss, lets just do it the way i want to do it. cause at the end of the day, if i make the mistake, i cant yell at them. Lemonis youre laughing cause you want to say something. Anthony its true. Josh oh, me . Oh, yeah, hes just very stubborn. Hell get upset or frustrated when we say, cant do it that way, man. Anthony i do listen to all parties. Josh he does. But there is a finite line. Okay, im sick of talking about it. Lemonis should be interesting. I still dont quite understand asls process how they generate business and how those orders are executed. So i walked the floor to talk to some of the employees. Man sir, how are you . Lemonis nice to meet you. J. R. how you doing . Lemonis j. R. . Nice to meet you guys. J. R. nice to meet you. Lemonis how do you know where the jobs are . Man 2 we do all the work, so we pretty much know where everythings at. These signs here, i think, came in lemonis so, when these signs come in, do you know what salesperson they belong to . Man 2 no. Man 3 no. Man 2 that we dont know. Lemonis okay. The shop seems very disorganized, so i wanted to talk to the sales team to find out how these jobs come in. Do you know how to follow up on a lead, or. . Edmond i call back. Like, all of these that are here are people that ive talked to that said, call me in a few weeks, call me in this time. Lemonis i feel like 1985 called, and they want their sales prices back. Edmond i know. Mmhmm. Woman its definitely not 100 accurate. Lemonis maybe anthonys father, louis, can shed some light about how anthony runs things around here. Lemonis how much money do you have in here . Louis about 220,000, 225,000. Somewhere. Lemonis for real . Louis yeah. Lemonis he hasnt paid you anything back . Louis no, he has not. Lemonis oh, my gosh. Is there anything that i should know about him, be honest, that would drive me crazy that drives you crazy . Louis im from the old school. Im the old man. So, sometimes he thinks he knows it all, and you have to straighten him out, say, no, you dont know it all. When i was younger, hey, i thought i knew it all, too. Lemonis yeah. Its a terrible sign that anthony doesnt take advice from his father, especially since his father is his banker. I wonder how hes gonna take advice from an outside party . Todd how you doing today . Josh good. How are you . Todd pretty good. I need a sign refurbished. Do you do that . Josh we can do it all, pretty much. What kind of a sign are we talking about . Pirateland resort . Todd main sign out front. Josh okay. Todd so, are you the owner . Josh no. Anthony no, im the owner. Todd whats your name . Anthony anthony. Todd anthony. Todd. How are you . Anthony this is my card, too. Lemonis you would never do that. Todd is your private cellphone on here . Anthony i can put it on there. Kris, do you have a marker, please . Lemonis how do you get the guy to want to come in, other than just giving him a Business Card . Anthony i can offer some, you know, free Business Cards if he signs a sign with us. Thats one of the things lemonis no, no, no, no. Like, he came in to get what . Anthony a reface on a sign. Lemonis okay, so, what could you do right now that would get the guy to realize youre serious . Anthony im thinking. I dont know. Lemonis his business is a mile down the road. Kristen i would go there. Lemonis why are you not going there . Anthony i dont know, marcus. Lemonis this isnt a test. Anthony no, i know. We usually would follow it up tomorrow or the next day. Lemonis i wasnt asking you to change your process, i was asking you to tell me what your process was. Anthony i think we have a good system. Kristen i think he doesnt know what to do. Lemonis i see a customer walk in, i see potential business, and anthonys not doing anything to hustle the sale. Id like to go over the financials with you. Kristen this is the Financial Statements through 12 to 13. Lemonis oh, okay. Lets start with that. How much cash is in the bank right now . Kristen right now, id say about 75,000. Lemonis thats pretty good. Kristen yes. Lemonis and how much in receivables . Kristen in receivables, we have 60,000. Lemonis so, 135,000 in assets. And then how much do you owe people . Credit cards, bank loans . Kristen about 25,000. Lemonis okay. Theres 135,000 on the books between cash and receivables, and theres only 25,000 in debt. For a new business, theyre actually doing pretty good. Any other debt on the books . Kristen just our debt with lou. Lemonis anthonys dad . Kristen anthonys dad, yes. Lemonis okay. And how much is that . Kristen roughly about 200,000. Lemonis and so, i dont see that on the balance sheet. Is that not on your books, but its in reality, or. . Kristen yeah, its not listed within the company. Lemonis okay, so its not a company asset, and its not a company debt. Kristen right. Lemonis so, what im noticing is, pretty good increase in sales. 2012, 105,000. 2013, 278,000. Where are you at year to date now . Kristen right now, were at 441,000. Lemonis okay. And what would you say youre gonna finish at . Kristen im hoping, you know, between 600,000 and 700,000. Lemonis thats pretty good growth. Really good growth, actually. How much is the rent here a month . Kristen 2,000 a month. Lemonis okay. And you guys pay that . Kristen lou gives us 1,000. Lemonis he pays half the rent . Kristen yeah. Lemonis i mean, thank god hes here. I mean, you couldnt have started this business. Kristen no way. Lemonis . Without him. Kristen nope. Lemonis and does he own any shares in the business . Kristen no. Lemonis you and anthony own the equity . Kristen anthony does. Lemonis not you . Kristen no. Lemonis okay. Looks like youre involved in pretty much everything. And youre not getting paid. Kristen right. Lemonis everybody else thinks that theyre just owed something, and you seem to just want to just put your head down and work for it. Kristen yes. Lemonis i dont get that same sense from anthony. Kristen i can only say hell always work as hard as i do. Lemonis yeah. No, no, no. I know him and you are very different. Kristen hes rare. And he loves to have fun. You know, hes not trying to be rude all the time, its just sometimes it comes off that way. But hes really just trying to have fun. Lemonis the problem is, peoples demeanor rub anybody the wrong way, its a problem. His dad had said that hes a knowitall. Kristen mmhmm. Lemonis that can really affect the business. This is a healthy business, and its got real potential to grow and to grow quickly. And with any partner, i need to be comfortable. And i have to be honest, with anthony, i have some real reservations. You guys have done a great job. Anthony thank you. Kristen thank you. Lemonis i mean, think about it. Its a 500,000plus business in 36 months. Anthony yeah, very short period of time. Lemonis youve got money in the bank. Anthony, whyd you call me here . Anthony i called you here because im looking for that next step in my business. I want to deal with a lot of national companies. I dont want to deal with momandpops anymore. With as many businesses that you own and all the people that you know, that you can bring that. Lemonis but for you to say, i want to be your partner because you can bring me all your businesses, we could just have a relationship and you could earn my business. Anthony right. Lemonis we dont have to be partners for us to do that. I dont see a need for me. I dont think youre gonna listen. I think you think you know it all, and so, thats gonna be a challenge for me. Anthony no. You dont know me that much well. Lemonis well, i dont know you that much. But everybody else, including your father, told me youre a knowitall. Anthony well, you shouldnt listen to what everybody else. Like you said, you should listen to what you feel. Lemonis well, i feel that way, too. Yeah, i mean, look, i think you have a bright future. And youre gonna be fine whether im in the deal or not. Youre gonna be fantastic. Youre gonna be in first place. Anthony eventually. Lemonis what is this time thing for you . Anthony im a now type of guy. Lemonis but its a marathon and not a sprint. I want to be in the sign business because i believe that every Single Person needs a sign. So im getting in the sign business. Question is, am i getting in the sign business with you . Lemonis im getting in the sign business. Question is, am i getting in the sign business with you . Anthony you will be. Im gonna prove to you. Lemonis how do i overcome you not being the most process, structureoriented guy . How do i overcome you thinking youre right more often than you are . How do i overcome all that . Anthony well, if youre willing to take a gamble, im willing to prove that to you. Lemonis i dont want to gamble. Thats the wrong closing line. I like to bet on people that i know i can count on. I like you as people. I like your product. I just dont know if i could change the process, cause im not sure youre willing to let that happen. And so, i havent done this. Im not prepared to write a check tonight. Im willing to dedicate time, roll up our sleeves, look at the process, and fix things. And at some point, im either gonna write a check. Anthony or youre not. Lemonis . Or im not. So im gonna put my checkbook away. Anthony mmhmm. Lemonis . But im not walking away. Anthony thats fine. And i respect that. Lemonis okay . All right. Ill see you in the morning. Josh how did it go last night . Kristen it was interesting. Josh like, what kind of interesting . Kristen i guess hes having a hard time with thinking he can do business with anthony, and he thinks hes a knowitall. Josh did he make an offer . Kristen no. Josh i cant believe that he didnt write a check. Anthony he didnt want to write a check, so i think. Louis well, hopefully youll clear up any issues he might have. Anthony you want me to be honest with you . I dont want his money. I dont want his check. I want the business that he can bring. Louis well, if he can bring you the business anthony i can always make money. I can always make more money. At the end of the day, if i dont have the business, i dont have the business, whether hes my partner or not. Louis thats true. Anthony i want him to figure out im a gogetter. Im a gogo guy. Theres no you know, theres only one speed with me. Its just go. Louis well, tell him how you feel. Anthony and if hes willing to give me 1. 5 million a year in what he says he has, keep the money. Louis okay. Hopefully i can anthony im not begging him. I just want the business. Louis well, let me clean this floor. Anthony yeah, get to work. Im overpaying you. All righty. Louis oh, boy. Lemonis im not ready to do a deal with anthony. Not yet at least. But im willing to start working on the process to improve the experience for customers. First impressions are everything. If im a customer and im pulling up, i loo