Coffee, Chaos, & Cashflow
☕️ Coffee, Chaos & Cashflow 🎙️
Fueling your business journey with real talk, laughs, and a dash of caffeine! Join Eric Griffin, Aram Street & Yemi Ogunbase as they share wins, missteps, and candid advice on turning chaos into cashflow. Real stories, real lessons—entrepreneurship, unfiltered. 🎧
Coffee, Chaos, & Cashflow
004 Meet a Founder - Yemi Ogunbase
Picture this: a party in Lexington changes everything. Yemi Ogunbase joins us to recount his incredible journey from California's sun-soaked beaches to the charming hills of Kentucky. You'll hear how a Facebook friendship blossomed into a lifelong partnership and how a chance meeting at a game night led to fulfilling work with CleanSpace.
Yemi also opens up about his path of self-discovery, shaped by early life challenges like losing a parent and marrying young. This episode is a testament to the serendipity of life, where a single event can lead to both personal and professional transformation.
all right, everybody welcome back, we are welcome welcome.
Speaker 1:Good pals ready to lock and load another podcast. We're going to be talking to our man, yemi oganbashi. So you've heard eric's story leading up to now. You've heard a little bit from me. Uh, I was joking earlier that we the man, the myth and the legend one of us, the man, one's a myth, one's a legend. We're not sure who's who, but either way, we're talking to yemi. Uh, third person in this trio here, so pretty excited about that. Yemi, give me a snapshot of kind of your. I know you're from california originally, right, so, like people may or may not know about, just give me a little high speed starting now. Grew up in california. Bam, you're axington kentucky. I know how you got here and that's kind of a funny story. So you know you can give us some detail on that.
Speaker 3:But catch us up to speed and then we'll talk a little bit more about the here and the now you know, I uh grew up in san diego, um, and about 2005, 2006, um, we decided to move to texas, and I lived in texas for close to a decade and then went back to california and then uh made my way to lexington. As a result of uh came for a party Okay, and never left.
Speaker 1:The never ending party. Yes, that's usually what happens. People come to Lexington for a party and then just like man, it's just so good, yep, just decided to you know, it's bourbon country and all.
Speaker 3:It's the.
Speaker 1:Lexington origin story. Yes, it's awesome.
Speaker 3:But yeah, I will say the only thing I really miss about california, I miss the beach, you know I miss the ocean I miss being able to go put my feet in the water on christmas day.
Speaker 1:You know, so you can technically still do that I, I mean it's.
Speaker 3:You know it's not the same.
Speaker 1:You know how to man.
Speaker 3:You can probably find a find a pond somewhere that might be frozen over A little creek down the way.
Speaker 3:That's great. But yeah, came here in 2018 actually, and it was to attend a party. At the time, my best friend in the world was working for a roofing company here in town and they were having a large party you know a big, you know fancy shindig to celebrate a business milestone they'd hit and she needed a plus one. And I was like, well, you know. Then she said, oh, if you come to the party, my boss needs some marketing help, so maybe you could sign him as a client. And I was like, oh well, I'm coming to the party and meet everybody.
Speaker 3:Meet my friend and, like we've been friends for five years and it never actually met, we became friends on Facebook. Met in the comment section of Pastor Mark Driscoll on his Facebook fan page.
Speaker 1:For those of you who are familiar with Driscoll, there's a whole podcast about Driscoll now too, so that's what's so funny about this, yeah.
Speaker 3:So we met in the comments section, became friends and really shared a lot of things, just very close, very, very good friends and everything. You know, she called me on my, on my junk, when I was acting a fool sometimes and she usually didn't act a fool, so I didn't get to call her out much, but whatever anyway. So I'm here, I go to this party and I'm in the middle of you know, I'm close. I closed the deal and I was like well, you know what? I'm gonna rent an apartment here in lexington, you know. So I'm moving into my apartment and I'm getting my kitchen situated and I go into. You know what was going to be like my room, my bedroom, and my friend had made my bed with some sheets and it was just like it was no big deal. But at the same time it was just this super kind gesture. And you guys know how it is when you have your moment, you meet the wife you just know you're like man and I just looked at her.
Speaker 3:I was like this is the best woman I know. Wow, I want to marry her like it was that and so within three weeks of getting to kentucky, I'm standing in front of her father and I'm asking his blessing to to marry, to marry her. And so I married my best friend. And it was so funny because on facebook we actually had each other listed as brother and sister you know, because we were close like that.
Speaker 3:So then it was like yeah, we had to uncivil each other other on Facebook and like wait a couple of weeks before, like going into a relationship, because then it's just going to be like oh, he moved to Kentucky, mary was a consumer. Oh, snap, so oh snap, but yeah, so that's yikes. That is that is why I stayed, and I love it here. It's good stuff.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:So you it here. It's good stuff. Yeah, so you're, you're, so you're you're. Obviously you're working with clean space on a number of different roles. That's how I mean we've we've done a few different projects, uh over the years since I've been able to meet you, but obviously your background?
Speaker 2:how did you learn about clean space?
Speaker 1:how did you learn about clay?
Speaker 3:I was at aaron's house for game night and you said I remember eric was over and, like we had talked a few times I've been over there for game night and you were talking about this, this idea that you had or whatever, and at the time I had some stuff going on and and everything. I thought this would be really cool and I just kind of like I don't know if any of you guys have like those kind of throwaway prayers where you're like God, it'd be really cool to work on this. You know, be really cool to be part of this, and then you just move on with your life, toss it out there. Yeah, Just toss it out there. And so about a year after that, um, Aaron actually asked me about doing some stuff within sales in May of last year, 2023. And I was like, no, I got some other things going on. And then again in August, he asked and I was like, yeah, let's do it. Well, then, come to find out. I later found out. Eric said you know?
Speaker 3:that it was the Lord who told me to hire you. So I'm looking at that and I was like, dude, that's a really great job reference, that's a phenomenal reference. Burned as a freelancer for a lot of money and it put us in a financial hole. And I just said in the next thing that I do, I want to work with people of high integrity. That was like, and so, within like a day of saying that out, like again one of those just throw away, throw away prayers. Within a day of that, like Eric, you know, you and Aaron made the offer to you, know, to come on board and join the team and everything, and I'm just, I'm thankful to, to be part of it. Like I'm excited about the mission and what you know, what we're doing, how we're impacting people, but also just like I like you guys, like as people with you.
Speaker 1:So yeah, we like you too. Yeah, I mean yeah, good guy to have around Appreciate that. I'm in trouble too. It's been, it's been fun. I think you referenced me as Eric's partner in crime. We definitely have a have a crime partnership going, I think, between the three of us at this point. So Aaron's running a crime syndicate, I'm the three of us at this point. So aaron's running a crime syndicate, I'm, I'm running. That's just a joke for everybody on the airwaves.
Speaker 3:No, like anyone who knows, you knows that's not even like close to the case. So that's right?
Speaker 1:yeah, that's right, not even close. Okay, so tell me a little about your, uh, your professional background, because what you're doing here with clean space, you've done a number of different things right, but heavily in marketing, copywriting, that type of thing. So how did you get into that initially, like in your early career, the marketing? Was that something you always wanted to do? Did you have a design? I'm always curious how people get motivated for what kind of ends up being a lot of their life moving forward. Was there something that you saw? It was like, oh, this is so cool, I want to do that. You know, like I watched the moon landing, I want to be an astronaut. Like, was there some epiphany? Was it just kind of natural? How did how did it come about?
Speaker 3:So I, I'd been in sales my entire career, got career Got started in, you know, in the 1900s, the late 1900s, got into sales and that just came about on a whim. It was someone I went to high school with. He was cold calling businesses and he was just like dude, you should just get into sales Like you talk to people and they listen to you. You should just sell stuff. I'm like, okay, you know it sounds cool, you know whatever. So I had a variety of sales experience. I have not sold cars, I have not sold real estate, haven't done mortgage loans, but I've sold a lot of other things. Well, the marketing came about because I had a. I got divorced in 2013. And it's probably the most, like one of the most emotionally violent things I've been to been through and looking at it now I can say that it was like my fault. I was not like I was not a great husband, like like if I had been her big brother, I probably would have fought me, just saying you know, and I can admit that but my confidence was absolutely shattered, like my identity of who I, who I had been, and I could not sell anything Like I, just I, I, I didn't have it. And so I was drinking with a friend and we were talking about mad men and he's like, dude, you should be a copywriter. And I was like like don draper. He's like, yeah, bro, you should like. When we work together, your emails always revive dead leads. You should be a copywriter. So thankful, you know google the copywriting and discovered, you know, the late gary halbert and gary has been a big inspiration into just how I approach copy and everything. And then he said gary halbert had a, he had a 30-day program. He said that would turn you into a copywriter. It was better than like 70, 80 of the people that were out there read these books, copy these sales letters by hand every day and you should be good.
Speaker 3:Well, I realized that I had been responding to positive copywriting for years, like Frank Kern. Um, for years I was on Frank Kern's email list and enjoyed every second. It was like it was just a dude who was like, hey, I'm talking about this and getting ready to go surfing or whatever. Like it was just Frank was the Frank's. You know Frank's email popped up you, you opened it, you wanted to read it. What was he going to talk about next? And so got in, you know, got into copywriting and everything and really, just, you know, followed what Gary said and just started started doing it like, got into that, and copywriting allowed me to be able to afford the therapy to work through the issues so that I could start selling again Because I could sell copy jobs and everything no problem, like sell my services. But in terms of being consistent in sales and everything like that, I just didn't have the fire to have the mojo.
Speaker 1:That's a really interesting development cycle there, yeah. Development cycle there, yeah, because you normally don't hear about people that are, you know, that have done sales, that have done well, that have bottoms out and then come back. You know, like that's quite a cycle that you experienced on that front and it's really interesting.
Speaker 2:What's what is like one thing that you've learned from bottoming out?
Speaker 3:Hmm, you know, truth be told, I was not. I got married when I was 20. I just wasn't emotionally ready for it. Um, my dad had died when I was 11 and there were just a lot of issues that I hadn't worked through and just really should not have been, shouldn't have been a husband, you know, definitely should not have been a father. Um, just made a lot of mistakes in you know, acting through pain, being self-centered, and I think that bottoming out, really just it helped me look around and say you know, yemi, is this what you want? Like, do you still want to be dealing with this? You know, like, on your deathbed, do you still want to be feeling this way? Do you still want to be dealing with this stuff? Do you still want to hold this anger that you carried, you know, from childhood and everything? Do you want to have this way of relating to people that you do? Do you like this person, who you are, right?
Speaker 3:now, so thank a lot of self, a lot of self-reflection and everything, and that's that's some of the hardest work that you'll do. Like and a lot of it has like you can't, a lot of times you can't control what happens to you when you're a child, but when you become an adult, you're responsible for what you do, the choices that you make, and a lot of times you don't think that this one decision can completely alter the course of your life. Yeah, one of my favorite movies is the movie Vanilla Sky. Tom Cruise, yeah, tom Cruise, yeah, tom Cruise. I think it's his best film, his absolute best picture. Mission Impossible is cool, top Gun is cool. He's done some other stuff, but Vanilla Sky, I feel like, is his best work. I'm not going to spoil it for the people who are watching this, because that's just.
Speaker 1:I don't spoil movies, but you know it came out like 20 something years ago it came out.
Speaker 3:It was like yeah, 2002, I think 2001.
Speaker 1:You haven't seen it yet, gosh.
Speaker 3:And so it's just one of those, like I don't know, if somebody wants to drop me, you know, send me an email or whatever. I will happily discuss Vanilla Sky with you over a cup of coffee.
Speaker 2:Okay, Okay. So what is your clean space exit strategy? What does that look like for you? Say clean space exits, you know X amount. What does that like to you? What does that look like? How does your life look after that?
Speaker 3:One of the things that. So there was a movie that came out called office space, and he said that he would do nothing, and for me I've been.
Speaker 3:I've been working in some form or fashion since I was 13, you, know actually actually, even before that I was, I got a job cleaning my apartment complexes laundry room and I was like nine or 10. So always been doing some kind of work and what I want to do is be able to just and I won't do this for long because I just can't stay busy but at least for like a week or two, just wake up, go to the massage therapist, the chiropractor, you know, yeah and you know, but but also I want to. You know there's other things I want to do. Um, my mom has always wanted a porch, that you know, a house with a porch that wraps all the way around it and a lexus sc430.
Speaker 3:So I probably get my mom, you know, get that for my mom yeah um, make my siblings and children like, debt free, you know, and really, I just want to help people reach the ultimate versions of themselves, and so, whatever it is that requires them to do that, whether that's, you know, an investment in their dream. Whether that's an investment in helping them improve their health. Whether that's an investment in helping them improve their health, whether that's an investment in like, hey, dude, I need some therapy. Like, yeah, you know, whatever that is, I want to help people reach the ultimate versions of themselves, because I know a lot of people have invested in and believed in me, you know, including you guys.
Speaker 2:Yeah, well, I think we're all investing into each other too you know that, you see, you see that.
Speaker 3:You see. You see what makes that person them. You see the ultimate potential that person has. You're like, if this person is as good as I think they are, they'll be unstoppable. And I just want to cultivate that and help people believe that about themselves. So yeah, it would be a positivity tour. I call it like the Barnabas Project, just encouraging people.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the Barnabas Project, that's awesome. It's good stuff. Well, all right, you and I talk a lot about food and beverage and many things. I don't know if we're connoisseurs, but we definitely highly appreciate that realm. What's your number one go-to dish? If you could have any type of food prepared and you already know who it is or what the restaurant is, what would that be?
Speaker 3:I've got to say some of the best. One of like this is probably the best steak I've ever had in my life. There's a restaurant in san diego called pacifica del mar. I don't know if they still have it on their menu, but they did it. They had the house cured ribeye and this thing was absolutely just delicious. And then you know you have to forgive me because in my younger days, my ignorance I ate steaks, medium Well yeah, you'll have to start somewhere but it was that good Medium. Well, that's pretty good.
Speaker 1:I'm going to go and say this to my Google. You said Pacifica Del Mar. Pacifica Del Mar, that's pretty good. I'm gonna go and say this to my google record. You said pacifica del mar pacifica del mar okay, I'm just gonna go ahead and lock that in next time I'm out in uh, california. Yes, it's good to know.
Speaker 3:Good to know del mar they made a house cured ribeye. But there's also this place well, the place doesn't exist anymore, but it was called ruddle's smokehouse and it was in a beach town called cayucas, california. They had smoked albacore tacos, okay with this apple slaw. That was just part of it and they were. They didn't serve any drinks, but they were right around the corner from a liquor store so you could could go get a beer, whatever you wanted.
Speaker 3:I got a beer that day and I went and sat and just watched the ocean roll in as I'm eating this taco that was probably sent from heaven Cause it was that good that's awesome yeah.
Speaker 1:It's just like one of those great memories that you, just, you're never going to forget.
Speaker 3:I feel like everyone gets to experience what I call perfect moments, where you just have this snapshot of life, where it's like I'm glad that I that my life didn't end before I experienced this moment, and obviously like it's. You know, of course, you have your perfect moments of like. You know you get married, you have your children, everything. But there are other moments that are just like it's. You know, of course, you have your perfect moments of like. You know you get married, you have your children, everything. But there are other moments that are just like it's. You and god man, y'all you guys are just having a moment. We're just we're vibing, we're chilling and that's what's, that's what's going on, like you know, you made the tuna for this and the apples for this and you put it all together and you gave it, gave this person the idea for it. So, thank you, let's hang.
Speaker 1:That's right, that's awesome. Well, I look forward to visiting Del Mar with you someday and taking a trip to Pacifica and having a good house whereby. So we'll have to put that on the docket.
Speaker 3:Absolutely, actually, whenever we have our exit, that's on me.
Speaker 1:OK, we'll take a plane ride out to Del Mar. Yes, we're flying private, love it. Well, yeah, mate, it has been awesome getting to chat with you a bit here. We are both very thankful to have you as part of the team, and I'm personally very glad to have known you these past several years, and I look forward to many great things to come as we continue an exciting friendship and a business partnership. So till till then. Till then, appreciate it. All right Cheers guys Ciao.
