Hello friends, so we have a little bit of a problem. My reading so far this year has been going pretty well. I feel like in terms of writing we're on the up, in terms of how many books I'm reading, we're on the up. But we have a little bit of a problem and that is not a lot of the books I've read so far this year have come from my TBR. A lot of books I've read this year I have had to buy for videos, be that reading the Goodreads winners, be that reading books for your recs videos. A lot of the books I've read so far this year I've had to buy specifically for videos. And that means my physical TBR has not gone down at all. Here is what I started the year on, here is what I've ended the year on. So in today's video I really wanna try and make some progress in getting my physical TBR down. And we're gonna do that by giving myself an incentive because also barring last week when I had to buy two books cause I was sad that I went to the Waterstones cafe and it was closed. I have not bought any books that weren't for specific videos. I've not done any book shopping on a whim. I've only bought stuff because I had to read it. So today we're gonna read 10 books off of my physical TBR to get that number down. And then at the end of the video I can buy myself a book as a treat. It's the goal. Me at the end of this video. So that's what we're gonna be doing. So in terms of the books we're gonna be reading this video I'm obviously picking quite short books cause we're gonna be reading 10 books in this video which is like perhaps the most I've ever read in a video. But I've also prioritized a lot of series. So we've got a lot of series we're either making progress in or a few that we are finishing. So shall we get into it? I'm gonna tell you the 10 books I've selected and then we're gonna go through and read them. I'm very excited. So this first one is not part of a series. This is a book I've almost read for a few different videos so far this year. And it is a book that I think will be a quick read but it is probably the longest that we've got on this list. And that is Shark Car by Emily Habeck. I'll tell you the plots of all of these properly when we read them cause otherwise we'll be here forever. But this is about a couple where the guy turns into a shark and I've heard it's very emotional. So I think I'm gonna start with this today because also I haven't told you we're leaving Wales. This is the end of our Wales journey. We're finished here. So we are moving tomorrow. So my aim is to finish this whilst we're packing up and cleaning with flat. We're leaving late tomorrow afternoon. So my goal is to finish this by then and then maybe read a few of these on the journey home cause the journey home is like four or five hours. So yeah, I'm gonna start this one today. I'm very excited.  I think it's gonna be a quick read because there's quite a lot of pages that are just a paragraph or two and I'm expecting great things. So that's our first book. We're gonna be reading Into the Riverlands and Mounted at the Gate by Nevoe. These are the next two in the singing hill cycle. Another one's coming out this year but I wanna make progress in the series cause I love it so much and I have not made progress for ages. So I'm very excited to read both of these. I think I'm gonna try and read them back to back. We are also gonna read Before We Say Goodbye by Toshikazu Kawaguchi. This is the next in the Before the Coffee Gets Cold series and it's also gonna be my last one I believe unless this one like blows out of the water. I just feel like my enjoyment has gone down throughout the series and I'm just happy to leave it at four books. Do you know what I mean? Like I feel like I've read enough of it. I've enjoyed it but I don't think I'm gonna cause I think there's loads more that haven't been translated yet. I think I'm gonna end it here. So this will be for the sugar series. Oh my God, what's actually here? One that isn't part of the series but is very short is Thorn Hedge by T. King Fisher. This is a fantasy that whenever I try and read the snops I don't understand what it is.  We have a character called Toadling who gives a blessing to a child or there's a knight who wants to stop it. It's only about 125 pages. It's very short. So I figured this would be a good pick. A graphic novel that we're gonna be reading. Can't stop a volume five. I am so excited. I'm probably gonna have to read this one soon cause I just cannot. Oh, I can't wait. Oh, I can't wait. I'm so excited. So this is making progress on series. This will get us up to date in a series and yeah, this is volume five, Nick and Charlie. They're in love but they go go uni and how do they do that? What's going on? It's a very, it's a tale of all the time. It's a trouble of all the time. My approach to this was just to make Tom come to the same university as me and make him live with me the whole way through uni. So that's an option but I don't know if they're gonna take it off. Another series I'm so excited to make progress in. Rotten to the Core, the next in the Lady Hardcastle Mystery series. I don't know what number this is. I always try and tell you how far I am in the series because I think you should be proud of me. One, two, three, four. This is number eight in the Lady Hardcastle Mystery series and I just cannot wait to make progress and to go back with Lady Hardcastle made flow. So this will be a good audiobook one. And maybe this will be like one that I read when I'm unpacking when I get home or something like that. I need a good audiobook for that. Another series we're gonna be finishing is the Forgotten Women series. I have been reading this for so long, so long. This is basically nonfiction about women throughout history and oh, I'm not finding any good ones. They all have beautiful illustrations in them as well as kind of text about these women. And I've loved the first two that I've read. So we've got the scientists and the artists. So I'm gonna try and space these out in the vlog. I don't think I wanna read these quite back to back but I want to finish this series. I think that would be a good one to finish. And then our final book is not a series one but it's another short one, kind of a graphic novel. We've got The Island of Whispers by Francis Harding. I'm gonna be honest, I don't super know the plot but I think it's kind of middle gradey and it's got illustrations and I loved Skinful Shadows by Francis Harding and I've been meaning to pick another one up. So that is our, so whistle stops the door through our TBR. I'll tell you more about each book as we read them but that is our 10 books that we're gonna be reading in this vlog to get my physical TBR number down and then we get to buy a book as a treat. I am gonna start Shark Hut today. I don't know, I probably for most of these books will just tell you what I think when I finish them. I may check in half way with you for this one because it's a little bit longer but who knows, I may just check in and you guys finish. Otherwise this vlog would be 10 years long if I checked in half, partway through all of them. So yeah, I'm gonna start Shark Hut today. I'm very excited to see what I think and yeah, I'll let you know when either I'm halfway through, I finished it. One day later. Okay, I tried to make myself like a little bit less of a mess.  We're literally leaving in half an hour but I wanted to check in with you because I am halfway through Shark Hut. I did wanna finish this before we left but alas, I did not. I'm halfway through. I just cried a lot. I just cried a lot. I'm sorry and it was just really beautiful.  Oh, okay, so it was just, oh, so amazing. So essentially, I think I told you all you need to know going into this, it's a couple who just got married and the guy finds out he's turning into a great white shark and it's like this known, I think in this world and there's like magical realism, it's our world but like, you know, it's a magical realism book. People can have deformities where they transform into, where is Tom going? What is he doing? He just left because I was filming but I'm not sure what he's actually doing. So I decided to go and investigate it. Oh, he's getting sound off his shoes. Just walked down the hill and he's, clever and sound off his shoes. Anyways, he's turning into a great white shark and people have these things where they turn into animals.  I have loved following these characters. I've loved following their love story. This is written in a very, very beautiful way. I'm really enjoying the writing style. I'm really enjoying the writing kind of format with just like short paragraphs at some points. There are pages that are like longer but I'm really, really enjoying it. It makes me wanna keep turning the page. I feel like I'm propulsively reading it. I'm reading it without an audiobook which again, it's not me dunking on audiobooks. I'm gonna be reading many throughout this vlog but it's just proving to myself I can read without an audiobook for a while there. Oh my God, sure. Yeah, I am loving it. I think it's beautiful. I think the allegory of what, oh bro, it hit me, it hit me here. Like what it means to love someone and what it means to let them go. It's everything you think it's gonna be but I think for a debut, the writing in this is very, very strong. It's a little bit like writing that knows it's beautiful. Do you know what I mean? Like it kind of, it's aware. It's aware, it's aware of it's style and what it's trying to do to you but I am just loving it and I got, I never thought I'd get so emotional about a guy turning into a great white shark and just what she does for him and how she must be. Oh. Tom was on a call. Tom was on like a very important work call and I was sitting next to him like sobbing and I was like, okay, now I've gotta go upstairs so I can sob in peace. I mean, I'm halfway through. I don't have a ton of thoughts because I feel like once you correct that it kind of is like a catharsis of letting all those emotions out but I am really enjoying it but I am nervous about what route it's gonna take in the second half where there's kind of following a different story. I don't know if the magic of it is really contained in that first part of the story for me but it might not be because it kind of continues its format so I can understand why some people had problems with it but I'm just really letting myself be taken along for the ride and letting my heart be stamped on and crushed underfoot. I'm really enjoying it. So I'll see you when we're home. We're gonna go home now.  I'm really excited to see my cats. Not my family, no joking. So yeah, we'll be going there. We'll be there tonight. And I will read, I'll probably read the whole rest of this in the car journey. So I'm gonna try not to cry too much. Otherwise, yeah, I'll be like crying on the road. I always need to read books. I remember a very vivid memory of crying, sobbing, reading Daisy Jones in the six when we were driving back to uni one time. Like I'm sitting in the front. My dad's driving. He's like, you're okay. I'm like, no. It was over Camilla and Billy. It was one of their scenes just really got me when I first read it. Anyways, I'll see you later when we get home. And yeah, hopefully I will finish this today. I'll let you know what I thought, either tonight or from two time. I'll let you know first thing tomorrow. Don't know, if I finish that, I might start reading something else on the way home. We shall see. We shall see what I see. But yeah, I'll see you later with cats. So as you guys would have just seen in the last clip, as soon as I got home, I could not wait to be reunited with my serious light. I have missed this so much while I've been in Wales. And serious light are very kindly sponsoring this video, but I cannot tell you guys how much I missed it. I generally think my reading suffered from not having this with me. I think it's because of the way I read it. I think it's because of the way I read it. I think it's because of the way I read it. I think it's because of the way I read it. I think it's because of the way I read it. Having this with me in Wales, I adore this reading light. I cannot tell you how much I adore this reading light. I really find it makes such a big difference to the amount I read, how much I'm looking forward to reading, how easy I find reading. And although now it's spring, I find that spring, we have bright moments, but then we have very dark moments when those storm clouds roll in. So I think it makes the importance of really good indoor light more important. And I just, look at this. I think one of the best things about the serious light is the technology behind it. It has something called daylight wavelength technology where it replicates the daylight spectrum as closely as possible. So our lights maybe have more blue light, but this light is perfectly formulated so that when we use it, our eyes and our brain reacts in the same way that it does to daylight. So I find it very gentle on the eyes. I find it very easy to read with, but I also find that if I read with it late at night, it doesn't make me like stay awake because my eyes have been like messed up by blue light or whatever. I adore this reading light. I have missed it so much. My reading has really, I think, suffered. I've gotten so used to the benefits that this gives me that I think my reading really suffered when I was without it. So I cannot recommend it enough, guys. I really think this is revolutionary to readers all around the world. I love it so much. So I have got a code which is very exciting. I've got a code which is SR515 and that will get you a hundred pounds off a high definition light, which is the model that I have, and free delivery. It's an incredible deal. Go check it out down below. I've got a link down below. But yeah, you can get a hundred pounds off it. That's like an incredible saving, a hundred pounds, guys. I am so happy to be reunited with it. I feel like my reading is gonna be rejuvenated now because I'm back with my serious light. I have missed it so dearly. So yeah, I recommend it so much. Go check it out down below. The benefits are incredible. I think the technology behind it is incredible. I cannot recommend it enough. So yeah, I love it so much. Let's now go find out what I thought of Shark Heart. Hello, friends. I'm home. I'm so happy to be home. We got home very late last night. The cats, I'll show you the cats at some point, but I'm about to go out for a walk. But yeah, we got home very late last night. I have not unpacked anything. I don't know if you can see any of the mess, but there's quite a lot of mess. I haven't unpacked anything. So that's mostly what I'm doing today. But last night when I got home, I did finish Shark Heart by Emily Hubeck, and I'm giving it five stars. Oh my God, Jesus Christ. Check out the label. They've blessed me. I absolutely adored this. I loved, I can't discourage you how much I love this. I adored the way this was written. It's got such a unique writing style, got such a unique cadence, got such a unique way of storytelling. And I think it was how different that felt that really made me fall in love with it. It felt like someone was taking my hand and like leading me on this journey, but I had, you know, it was like an exciting journey, but I had the comfort of someone with me the entire time. This makes no sense, but I absolutely loved it. I am broken and never be healed. And I think it's a really beautiful portrayal of lots of different types of love. And, you know, like I said, the main story that like the synopsis that I kind of tell you and like you'll hear is the first half of the book. And then it kind of goes off in some different directions. And I just adored the entire, this is such a good debut. I absolutely loved this. I absolutely loved it. I had such a wonderful time reading this book. This is only my third five star of the year. So I'm very happy to have found it. I think we're gonna find probably at least one more in this video. The characters we met, they felt fragile. They felt like I was holding them in the palm of my hand. Like it was so beautiful. I can't explain to you how beautiful and eloquent and just, oh, this book is incredible. I cannot recommend enough. Quite a few of you have said like you're waiting to see what I thought. And I can understand why some people don't like this. I could easily envisage someone having a very similar reading taste to me and giving this like a two star. This is the kind of book that a lot hinges on how you find the way that it's told. Like the writing style, the short paragraphs, like how you react to that is really gonna determine your enjoyment in this book. And you could very easily not react to it well. You know what I mean? But I did really, I loved it. So I cannot recommend enough. What a great start to this vlog. And yeah, so today I'm basically just unpacking. It's kind of my main plans. I'm gonna go out for a walk with my dad now and then we'll come back and I'll start unpacking and sorting my life out. The books, oh God, I don't even wanna talk about the books. It's a bit of a state. It's a bit of a mess. My plans are why I'm gonna start next. I do wanna start the singing hills cycle. I think the audio book for this is what I'm gonna listen to whilst I unpack. I'm undecided whether I wanna read these back to back or whether I should space them out a bit. I don't know. Maybe I shouldn't read them back to back because then I always get confused when I read series back to back. So maybe I'll just start in three lines now and then I'll pick up something else. But yeah, this is the third in the singing hills cycle. But all of these books, I mean, I haven't read them in a long time but I'll tell you what I think when I've read it. But I do feel like these kind of can be read as stand-alones or they're just the kind of self-contained stories where we're following Chi, the cleric, as they go around and speak to people and find out stories. So I am so excited. I think these books have both been at least a 4.5, the first two books, or at least definitely at least a four, the first two in the series. So I'm really, really excited to make progress in this series. So yeah, I'm gonna start the audio book for this now and it's very short. I don't have a lot of plans.  Oh my God, I'm so excited. I'm gonna use a bath bomb. I'm gonna get it so warm. Oh my God, I'm so excited to have a bath. You don't even understand. Cannot wait. So that's my plan. So other than that, I'm gonna be doing quite a bit of reading. So yeah, I'll see you when I have finished The Riverlands by Nevo. Okay, hello. Hi, why is unpacking so tiring? Can someone tell me please? And can you focus on me? Thank you. The hair's gone crazy again. My hair keeps going a little bit crazy. I'm not sure. I don't think the water in Wales agreed with it. So I'm very excited. But I think I've already told you that I'm so excited. Anyways, I'm finishing The Riverlands. We're gonna keep this very short and sweet because I just did not enjoy this as much as I have enjoyed all the others in the series. I'm gonna put a pause on my mess at the gate or read that later because I just don't think, I think this is on me. I think this is on me. I just didn't connect to this story at all. Clarke Chee and the Bird. Almost brilliant. The Bird is called.  And here's the thing. I think, I need to keep this, I need to talk about this very carefully because I don't want to spoil anything. I think the magic of this particular installment in the series is how it all wraps up at the end. And because of how it all wraps up at the end, certain characters throughout the book, I kept very much at a distance and that just meant that the reading experience for me was difficult because I was like, who are these people? Like what? What is going on? I felt it hard to remember them. I kept getting some characters confused. I did not grow attached to them at all and like that makes sense with how the book wraps up. However, it did not make if a good reading experience for me. Does that make sense? So I'm giving this three stars which you know, the writing is still magnificent. The writing is still beautiful but I just never got into the story. I think it's hard with the novella as well. It's so short. I never like settle in the story. I was always like playing catch up with it a little bit. So I don't want to talk about anymore because it's sad and we're just gonna move on. We are going to pretend we didn't hear that. Pretend this doesn't happen. Hopefully I'll enjoy members at the gate more but I think we're gonna go into another series now. Where I'm so deep into the series that I know the characters like the back of my head and I'm just looking for something a bit comforting this afternoon, this evening. We're probably only gonna read this is one of the longer books. I think actually like audiobook length wise this is the longest book that we've got on this TBR. So we're probably only aimed to read the rest of this tonight or the whole of this. I haven't started yet. That is run to the core the next in the Lady Hardcast Mystery series. So yeah, I'm very, very, very excited to make progress in this.  How camp? I love it. So yeah, we'll move on from Nevo. We're gonna come back to that series later on in the video but for now let's make some progress and read for on to the core. I've unpacked for lead. The only thing I haven't done is sorted out my books. So I'm gonna sort out my books. I feel like it's daunting but I'll actually be a much quicker exercise and I'm fearing. So we're gonna sort out books and then we will, I'm gonna do a dance workout and then have my bath. I'm so excited. I'll probably see you late in this evening once I have finished reading. ["You and Me What's Wrong?" by Tia Kenzie plays in the background.] Hi cuties, how are we doing? Apologies, I mentioned in my last video that my neighbors are having work done. They're playing, the bill doesn't play music outside. Apologies, you can hear it but there's nowhere I can really film that would get you away from the sound, basically. But I have finished Rockin' to the Core by Tia Kenzie, the eighth in the Lady Hardcast mystery series. Here's the thing, these books are now a five-star reading experience for me every single time. I love these characters so much. I love the audio generator so much. I love the writing style so much. I love the town so much. Basically, today there is a murder at like a local apple orchard and it's to do these, like they're all linked to like the apple orchard or like there's all these secret, it's not secret, there's like this little group of men, like a little society of men that it's all linked to as well. And I loved how in this one it's much more focused on the town. My favorite ones are the ones that are set in the town.  I really like the town and the pubs and the village green and the people who live in the town and the characters. Like that is my favorite place for the books to be set. However, there were a lot of new characters in this book with this whole like society of men and like the murders were related to that. There's a lot of new characters. I could not remember one of them. I hate to say it. I hope I don't sound ridiculous. I don't know who this man is. I mean, he could be walking down the street. I wouldn't know a thing. Sorry to this man. There was like different couples and different, there's like five different groups of couples or men on their own. And I was just like, who are these people? I couldn't remember who the people were. I needed like a character at the beginning. So I want to give it five stars because like I kind of didn't care. I kind of just had fun and went along for the ride but by the end I was looking for scenes that the, you know, who'd done it had been in. I was like, when did I meet them? When did, who are you? So I think for that reason I've got to give it a 4.5. I'm gonna give it 4.5. I love these books. I love them. I love them. I love them. I love them forever. I've now got two more that are already out. And then I think another one comes out in the first half of this year. So three, three more to read that out so far. I just, I, you guys understand how much I love. If you're looking for a cozy mystery historical series, this will be my number one recommendation. Like I don't want to, this series, like you do go into it. You have to imagine it's a palette cleanser. It's like a little break from the world. You know, it's not as high concept as other books. If you know what to expect, if you've read other cozy mysteries, and I'm talking cozy mysteries, right? But I think these always have a great mystery. And I love the characters. I love Lady Hardcastle and Flow's relationship and the humor in these books and all the different characters that we now know so well. I love the setting. I just think it's perfect. I think these books feel like a little tea break. I don't know, like a little cookie.  It's not substantial. Like I say like Babel by R.F. Kwong is like a lasagna. Like it's like that meal's gonna leave you feeling full. Like it's like, there's a lot to it. Layers, you know, oh, the analogy is really working out. But this is like a little cookie. It's like a little biscuit.  Cheers you up, get your going, you know? But it's not, it's not like the greatest piece of fiction you've ever read. Like it doesn't leave you feeling satiated necessarily, but it leaves you feeling satisfied. Wow, what a good, and that is so right. Anyways, I love these characters. Love them, I love them, I love them. I can't wait to read more. The next one is an act of foul play where I think there's murders within like the like local drama group or something. Oh, it's just written for me. Now we've read that and chart card, what are your biggest books? Today, we're gonna try and read a lot. I'm aiming to read at least two, if not three more books today. I know that sounds crazy. I'm basically just editing this video and reading for this video today. I wanna get as much of it done as I can today because it's Friday, this video's jumped on Sunday and I wanna have a weekend, some semblance of a weekend. So, I think next, because I wanted to break these up, I'm gonna pick up one of the Forgotten Women books and I'll probably read one of the graphic novels, either Island of Whispers or Heartstopper after this. Maybe Heartstopper, I feel like I'm in the mood for Heartstopper this afternoon. But I'm gonna pick up one of these because I wanna break these up throughout the video and then we'll finish a series. I think I'm gonna read the artists. I'm interested in the artists. What are the four categories we've got in this one? Because they're always broken up into like mini groupings. We have got abstract figurative, performance and conceptual craft photography and design. How exciting. And like I said, it is just nonfiction. Each woman has like two to three pages and they're beautiful illustrations with them as well about all these women that have been forgotten throughout history. So, I am going to go ahead and read this now and edit it and I'm also on a live stream with my patrons doing some reading sprints. So, I'll probably see you this afternoon. I wanna go see the cats. I'm loving being back with the cats. Yes, my family as well. But I just keep going and just look, I just stare at the cats like 10 minutes and they just rejuvenate me. So, I'll go see the cats because otherwise we haven't seen them again in this video yet. Cause like life has been so crazy. I mean, I've been seeing them a lot but you haven't seen them yet. And then I will check in with you once I have finished this a little bit later. Curved me. Good evening friends. I have finished Forgotten Room and the artists and I absolutely loved this. Perhaps my favorite in the series so far. I'm gonna give it, whoa, can we unpinkify please? Whoa, that one's very thick. Perhaps my favorite in the series so far. I loved the experience reading this but I think it is because of the way that I read this book. So like I said, we're following different art, different women who are artists throughout history. It's an incredibly, like all these books are incredibly diverse in terms of women's ethnicity, women's time period, women's country. And I loved this because for every woman that came up with this book, I looked up their art. I looked up their art. Excuse me. I'm a genius. Look. The illustrations that are in this book kind of often mimic their art style and do give you a flavor of what it's like. But I loved looking up every single time these women and looking at their art, looking at, oh, some of the photography but some of the best photography I've ever seen. It was so inspiring. I would love to like go on a deep dive about all of these women and find out more of them. I found them absolutely enchanting. So yeah, it's a 4.5 star. I cannot recommend this series enough. We're going to be reading another one in a second later in the video, but I cannot recommend these books enough. They are some of the least rated books on my shelves. I think they often have like a hundred ratings. Like that is nothing on Goodreads. And I just can't recommend this to you guys enough. It's like a little flavor of all these women who have had such often instrumental impacts on our history but have been forgotten. And it's just so, it feels so wonderful to finally hear their stories. I was thinking about why this one worked so much for me and why the writers didn't. And I think the writers was difficult because for every woman, they'd be like a short extract of some of their writing. And part of that was a little bit jarring because we were moving from woman to woman. There's like three pages usually on each one. And so there'd be like a paragraph of each of their writing. And so you were constantly kind of being exposed to different writing styles, but only fleetingly. But also I think those quotes were perhaps chosen as something that was impactful for someone who had read a lot of their work. And in isolation, they didn't always work and weren't always hitting for me. But because this is visual and often, you know, this is a wonderful reading experience because of the way I read it and the reading experience that I had of me, like Googling their imagery in tandem with reading it. But I, I loved it. I loved it. I cannot recommend this series enough. I absolutely loved it. If any of you went to, this is like a very niche, but if any of you went to RF Kwong's talk in London with Waterstones for not bad, or Yellow Face for Yellow Face, Zing Sing was the interviewer and it was incredible. I took all my forgotten women copies for her to sign, but she left before she like walked straight out after the talk. I was like, oh, I bought all these heavy books for that next, okay. But yeah, I loved this. I found hearing about these women's stories so fascinating. I thought it was particularly interesting how a lot of these women, particularly like the more subversive artists in this, were women who began their art journey after having a marriage and kids and were often in the later stages of their lives. And it just got me thinking about women's room for creativity if you're also trying to create a family and how that often comes at the expense of that and how do you hold both things in tandem. I just think it's interesting. So yeah, I'm not going to read Heartstopper tonight like I promised you. I think I'm gonna start the audiobook for Thorn Hedge. Now I'm fancing something a bit fantastical. Teaking Fisher's writing is something that I really know I enjoy. I think I'm gonna save Heartstopper for the weekend. So I'm gonna start the audiobook for Thorn Hedge. I won't see you again tonight, but hopefully I will see you at some point in the morning with my thoughts on Thorn Hedge. ["Thorn Hedge"] Okey-dokey, I finished Thorn Hedge. This one's a tricky one to rate because my instinct is to give it a four. I really enjoyed it. But like, I don't know if it's got quite enough. I don't know, how am I gonna give this? I'm torn between a 3.5 and a four. I think I'm just gonna give it a 3.5. No, I'm gonna give it a four. It's a 10 to a four. It's like a 3.8 if you had to tell me to. No, I really do enjoy this. So this is basically, I don't wanna tell you much because it's a super short, it's like 120 pages novella. But this is basically a sleeping-duty retelling and we're following Toadling who's like this little fairy and she has been protecting this keep, it seems, for many, many years and one day a night comes across her path and notices her when she hasn't been noticed for many years. And that's kind of all you need to know. And I did really enjoy this. Teaking Fisher's writing is absolutely lovely. I will say I think now I've read two of her fantasy and two of her horror. I think I prefer her horror style. That's why I'm a bit tempted to give it a four because this was lovely, right? I loved the journey this went on. I think it was really well-paced for a novella. I liked what the book, I'm trying to really talk in riddles because I think this is a very vague synopsis so I don't think you should necessarily know too much before going into it. But I liked what it was saying around childhood and belonging and all these things, right? But I feel like with her fantasy, it's very safe. You better f***ing take that back right now. You better f***ing stop right now. I don't know, but in some ways that's nice, right? It's a very like, it feels familiar. It feels familiar with the tropes and the storylines that we know from fairy tales but she also twists stuff, like twists, you know, the maiden and the tower trope or, you know, all these different things. So it feels safe and familiar but also the tropes that we know are constantly being twisted. But I like a horror. I like how weird her horror is. Her fantasy is focused on like, yeah, like twisting tropes whereas the horror is like weird and I love her horror. So I really did enjoy this. I don't think it's something everyone has to read. I would maybe recommend picking up the audiobook. I enjoyed it. I enjoyed it. I think it's a nice little story but like, am I gonna, is this gonna be, you know, in like 10 years am I probably gonna remember this back? Maybe not, you know what I mean? So yeah, that is now five books completed. In terms of what I'm gonna read next, I'm not entirely sure. I'm leaning towards one of these two because I have the audiobooks for them. One of these two will be what we're reading next but I'll check them with you once I've read something else. But we're making good progress. Hello friends. It's been days. When did I last check in with you? Probably Saturday. It is now Wednesday. I've not been reading because I have not really felt incentivized to pick this up. I have just finished it and I'm gonna give it a three star. I don't think the series is bad, right? I think the writing is great. I loved the first in the series but the rest of the series just haven't hit the same for me. In some ways I feel like the series could be read as stand-alones and you could kind of read any of them as stand-alones because, oh my God guys, they're so repetitive. I can't get over how repetitive these books are. So the premise, I don't even want to tell you the premise because I've heard it 10,000 times. I'm hearing the same conversation over and over and over again. The premise is there's this cafe where you can travel back in time but you have to finish the coffee before the coffee gets cold and you can't change what happens in the past at all. So it's kind of very specific reasons why people would want to go back and each book has kind of four short stories in it. And I swear to God, they explain the rules every single short story.  There's like loads of rules. I've just kind of distilled it for you but there's loads of like aspects to it and they go through it every short story.  I'm fed up. It's very repetitive and I really don't feel like a lot of these stories are saying anything new. I feel like that first book had some really interesting dynamics and it's some really interesting storylines. I cried at two of them. Two of them made me cry in that original book and I haven't cried any of the other ones because they just feel so derivative of everything I've read from before. I think if you're doing this, each short story needs to be about a new kind of relationship or new reasoning and it just feels like, oh my God, I've read this, I've read this 10,000 times. There was one in this one about a dog and that one was my favorite because we haven't had a pet one yet, I don't think. And so I appreciated that. That one was good. That one was like probably a full star but the rest of them, I was so bored and I had no inclination to pick this book up at all. So this is the end of the series to me. There probably will be more published into English but this is the end. So I finished a series, which is pretty good. I mean, we're gonna finish another one at some point in this video and get up to date with a few more. Yeah, this is the end of the road for me with this series. I would just recommend the first one. I think the first one is magnificent and then I think if for any reason you don't wanna read the first one, you could probably read any of the other ones. I don't know. I just feel like if it's gonna go on this long then you need to give me something different. So anyways, I don't know what I'm gonna read next. It depends whether I pick something up tonight. If I don't, I'll probably read Heartstopper tomorrow. If I do pick something up tonight, I will probably listen to Mamma's at the gate whilst I'm cooking but I'm feeling like getting through this was enough. Maybe it's even a bit less. I don't think it's less than a three star because the quality is there. The writing, the storytelling somewhat is there. It's just like I've had enough. You know what I mean? So yeah, I don't know if I'm gonna pick others up next but you'll see in the next clip what I've picked up. We're getting there guys, only four books left to go. I've been working on this for five weeks. I'm already planning what book I'm gonna buy. I'm like, hmm, it's so hard. I don't know what book to get. I'm like, what book do I want for my reward? Anyways, I'll see you a little bit later with whatever I've picked up next. Heartstopper Volume Five didn't take long. I'm giving it five stars. Do I think it's my favorite in the series, no but I also think I'm growing up and like when I started this series I was reading a lot more YA than I am now. However, it's sort of five star. I absolutely adored this. So obviously it's the fifth in the series. However, I feel like this series now because of the TV show and like, just let me show you the cover. You gotta know, you know, some things that happen at least. Nick and Charlie fall in love in this series. We all know that's what it's about. Do you want spoilers? But this one is about Nick is in year 12. He's a school year older than Charlie and so he's having to start to think about universities and how they're gonna deal with that and their relationship and it's also them talking about having sex for the first time. And I just think Alice O's men again and again and again manages to like really hone in on what it's like being in a teenage relationship. I always said reading the first one viscerally reminded me of like me and Tom falling in love because we met at school and like that kind of teenage nervousness and like all the feelings that come with a teenage relationship that I don't think come with a mature one. Like of course people get nervous but there's just different dynamics to it when you're at school. You know what I mean? Oh my God, it's like, it takes me back. It's insane. And so I feel like Alice O's men touches on these subjects so well and I just think these books would be absolutely wonderful for young people to read. They are YA that I can really see the value in young people reading them and seeing themselves in it or seeing questions that they have answered. I absolutely loved it. I loved, I always say the facial expressions that Alice O's men does in the body language is so expressive without being over the top. Like it's subtle but you feel so much about it. I love these books. I love them so much. So yeah, Nick does go on a university road trip with Tara and Elle and they're visiting different universities and there's like, you know, obviously it's all drawn and one of the universities they visit is University of Leeds which was where I, me and Tom went to uni and it was so crazy. Alice O's men have obviously done such a good job of researching the actual locations. It wasn't just like, oh, here's, you know, standard university buildings. They were spot on. I had so much fun like, oh my God, that's the Roger Stevens building, throwback. Yeah, it was really interesting seeing those places come to life in this book. So I really enjoyed that aspect of it. I loved it. I loved it. I loved it. I loved it. And this volume five was originally supposed to be the last book in the series but there's now going to be one more. And of course I always say like, I'm so sad that it's ending. However, I'm glad it's not ending with this one because I feel like there's a few things that feel unfinished and I think it would have been very rushed trying to fit all into one volume but it does feel like their story is coming to a lovely close. Do you know what I mean? Like you don't want something so wonderful. You don't wanna go on forever and ever and ever and ever. You do want it to have an entire arc and like feel like it comes full circle and I really do feel like the stars. I just loved it. I loved it. I loved it. It's gonna be sad to let them go. It's gonna be sad to say goodbye when the last volume comes out but it does feel like Alice Eisenman is doing it with a lot of care and like making it feel like, okay, this is a really good ending to their story. So I loved it. It's so much fun to really get. I'm now gonna pick up tonight Mamma's at the gate by Nevo. I'm gonna try and finish it tonight. Again, these are very short. This is only how many pages? I think this one's a little bit longer than it's interval. This is 118 pages so it's very short. So I don't know if I'll check in with you tonight but the aim is definitely to finish this tonight. So we will see how that goes. But yeah, I'm very much enjoying myself and we're almost there. We're almost able to buy a book. Woo! How exciting. Good morning, friends. How are we doing? Let's chat about Mamma's at the gate whilst I do my skincare. Where can I put it so that you can see it there? You gotta really see that. There. Yeah, that'll do. So I finished Mamma's at the gate this morning. So this one is about clergy going back to their home kind of. It's like where all the clerics live. It is their home. Where all the clerics live and where like the birds live. They're not birds, they have another name but I can't remember what it is. We're almost brilliant lives and almost brilliant has become a mother. And yeah, clergy has gone back there and someone who was a very important part of their life has died. And there's these mammoths at the gate with these other people who there's a bit of tension between them and them. I don't want to spoil anything. These books are so difficult to describe to you or even talk about because I find the magic of them is just reading them. Like I kind of don't ever want to say anything to about the singing hill cycle. Cause I'm like, you just have to experience Nevo's writing and what these, sorry, what these books are saying, you know? Like I don't want, I don't want to tell you anything but I really enjoyed this one. I gave, I'm giving this one four stars. I feel a little bit worried that I'm not enjoying this series as much as I used to. I don't know. I don't know. I've just become a lot pickier though in terms of my ratings since, I mean, I read the first two ages ago, like years ago. So I think I've just become a lot pickier in terms of my rating. But this book is a really beautiful look at grief and loss and, you know, the way that people can live on in the stories that we tell after they're gone. And I mean, I really, really, really, really enjoyed this. I really enjoyed the setting of this one. I think my problem with the last one was I felt like there wasn't a strong setting. Like the previous book is kind of just told like on a road, like we're just walking along on a road. Whereas this one, we're at the, I wanna call it like an abbey, is there a word? Yes, the abbey. It just feels like a very nice, calm setting that there wasn't a ton of world building. It wasn't a ton of description, but you kind of like have an idea of this place just from the descriptions of it. And I really enjoyed it. I had a lot of fun when reading this. You know, I love Niveau's writing. I would really recommend these. These are great like audiobooks if you're wanting to catch up on your reading goal. They're all on ever and I believe. Yeah, I really, I really enjoyed it. I know that's not the most insightful thing, but I find them very difficult to talk about because I just think they're so short. They're like a hundred pages and you kind of just have to experience it on your own. So, hang on, I need to finish rubbing my wish on cream in. So we have two books I've to read. I'm gonna do some editing of this vlog now and then get ready. We have got The Scientist and Island of Whispers. I think I'm gonna pick Island of Whispers up next. I'm really excited to read this one. It's a middle grade. It's by Francis Harding who I've been meaning to read more from and then we'll finish on The Scientist. I just want to say now guys, by the end of this video, I'm going to have finished two series, got up to date with two series. So then this brings me up to date with the singing hill cycle or be it for only two months, but it counts. And made progress on another series. This video has been great for series girls. Anyways, I'm gonna pick up Island of Whispers now or once I've edited for a little bit and I'll let you know what I think when I finished it. But I think this could be a magical reading experience. I'm very much excited to pick this up. 🎵 The sound of rain leaves my feet 🎵 🎵 I close my eyes, they're home of bees 🎵 Hello cuties, Miss Laura is a snorer right now. She's on my bed sleeping right there. So we're trying not to speak to her, aren't they? Maybe I'll just have to like do the... I don't know, that's enjoyable. I am very uncomfortable with the energy that we've created in the studio today. Let's stop that there. But I finished Island of Whispers by Francis Harding and I think this is gonna end up being like a three point her tail something. She's not happy I'm talking. Let's pick this up. I think it's gonna be a three point five. I enjoyed this. This is playing up on the classic tale of a ferryman taking the souls of the dead to like their afterlife. Basically it's the story of this. So following Milo, whose dad is the ferryman and he is thrust into the role suddenly. And I enjoyed this but it's very short. It's so short. Like it's 115 pages but a lot of those pages are taken up by the illustrations which I really did like a lot of the illustrations. I thought they were really beautiful. This is like less than an hour's worth of reading. It was very, very fast. Probably like the quickest book we've read so far. And I just didn't feel like we really got into the depth of everything. Now, this is a middle grade, right? This is for kids. I am not the target audience of this.  So I'm saying for my personal enjoyment it's a three point five but I think this is a great story for kids. Do you know what I mean? I would really recommend this to kids in my life in terms of like understanding kindness and caring and feeling empathy for other people's lives and other people's stories and coming to times with difficult things, perhaps a loss of a loved one, et cetera. I think this is wonderful things and I really enjoyed as always Frances Harding's writing. I cannot wait to pick up more. I own so many Frances Harding's. I think this was Frances Harding. Definitely when I owned, when this was still unread was like the most books on my TBR by a single author. I own Unraveler, The Lie Tree and I feel like I own another one. It's just a little lot there. So yeah, I did enjoy this. I thought it was lovely.  But I would recommend this especially to like children. I think it's a lovely book. I think it's been a lovely gift to someone. Like the book feels very nice to hold and to read. It's like an interesting shape. I don't know, those are all important things. The shape of a book is very important. And you know, I liked how it played upon this classic story. But yeah, I just don't, I don't know how to say it. It was fine. I enjoyed it. We're gonna get into our final book now and then I get to buy a book. I'm gonna go ahead and read Forgotten Women Scientists. My opinions of this will probably be pretty similar to they were of the artist, but I will read it anyways and let you know what my thoughts are. But yeah, I'm intrigued to read about scientists that time has forgotten. So let's get into this. Okay, so I finished our final book Forgotten Women Scientists. I don't really have a lot to say about this one but I haven't already said to you about the other one. If I'm honest with you, I enjoyed this. I'm gonna give it a 3.5, which is like crazy that I am giving one book in the series 4.5 and one 3.5 when they are essentially the same thing. They're exactly the same thing. You're what? I'm you. This series concept as a whole is a five-star concept. Like going through history, finding these women, telling their stories is absolutely a five-star concept. I'm just rating it based on my personal enjoyment and I'm just not that much of a science gal, you know? I'm not into science. And if you're into science, into mathematics, I think you would absolutely love this. It was very interesting because all the books in this series really aimed to highlight women from across time, race, country, whatever. But at the beginning of this one, it says like this one is gonna be particularly like Western, modern, white to focus because those are the people who have had the money and the access to education to learn sciences. So I just found that very interesting how this one was a little bit different in that regard to the rest in the series, but I still enjoyed it. I would recommend this series. I think it is grossly, grossly underrated. I just like, you know, I don't really care about science. The artist's reading experience was so fun because I was looking up all of their art, but this one was just like, you know, it was okay. It was okay. So now with that, we have read 10 books. We've read the 10 books that we needed to read in order to buy one as a little treat. So let's head over to my laptop and let's buy a book, shall we? Oh my God, I'm so excited. I can't believe I'm getting to buy a book. What's going on? I'm actually so proud of myself for doing this video. Like I read 10 books. That's gonna get my physical TVR down so much and really the series focus in this video was so good. Like finishing two series, getting up to another two, making progress in another one. Like we really did that. We really made series progress. So we now got to decide what book to buy and I know I want to buy a 2024 release. I haven't read any 2024 releases yet this year. I don't want to talk about it. I don't want to talk about it. That's really bad. But I don't actually own a ton. So this is my anticipate releases part of my spreadsheet. I use Ali from Hardbite called a spreadsheet. I cannot recommend it enough. So this is my spreadsheet and the ones are highlighted in the color, orange or yellow, the ones that I own, orange ones I was sent by the publisher, yellow ones I got myself or was sent by like one of you. Green ones I've read and I've only read one it was one I read last year and it was on my worst books of 2023. I read an argument last year. So we don't want to talk about that. That's not a great start to my 2024 reading. So everything that's out is up until here. I just got last murdered into the world the other day. So it's anything here. It's anything on this list here that I'm interested in getting really. And I think I've decided what I'm getting. I want to get how to solve your own murder by Kristen Perrin. Let's go find it. I really like the UK cover. I know not everyone likes it. I feel like the US covers very nice as well. So it's a little bit controversial but I really like this cut. Oh my God, it's a series though. That's fine, that's fine. I'm making so much good progress in series. That's fine.  She's murdered and I think it's her great niece arrives from London and discovers that her worst fears come true and she is trying to solve the mystery. It's picture fans of Richard Osman and Janice Haller. We need to look no further. So I think I'm gonna get this. Add it to my basket. Oh, extra spicy sauce. That's gonna strain my basket. I'm very excited. I'm very, very excited. I think this is gonna be a great read. I also, I really do like the style of the cover. I think it's a really good style cover. So this is the book I'm gonna buy as my little treat but yeah, that's the end of the video. I hope you guys enjoyed this video. I had a lot of fun making it. We've had a lot of books. This is gonna be good for my yearly reading goal progress as well because I was getting a little bit behind on terms of aiming to read 150. I set my goodies goal at 100 but really I'm aiming for 150 and we were behind. So this is gonna have helped with that as well. So thank you guys so much for watching. Let me know if you try this out yourself. Reading 10 books and buying one. This has been a thing on Instagram for like forever but it was really fun to try it out and I'm very excited to get my hands on little book as a little treat. It feels like a reward. So yeah, I'll see you guys soon in another video. Bye.


Hey, good afternoon everybody, Tom Stewart here. I am with Liz Trotter and an army of other people today We've got Caleb Pierce. We got Robin Stevenson. We have PM Clyde We have Patricia Myers and we're going to be talking about pay types today as part of our accounting and finance Series for the month of November for smart business moves Boy, I'm exhausted No, it's a lot Tom. Yeah, so we're we're kind of done for the day here. I'll just kick back and let you guys go from here We haven't done this in a while have way No, we have it Do we have somebody else I don't think I don't think we do oh Denise. Okay. She's Denet, how come you're not here? They have they both have questions Tom, but the people here today on our panel also have questions and so I thought we could do kind of a hybrid of Questions and just answers between Everybody who's who's doing what who's tried what what's worked what really hasn't worked and for what reasons and that kind of stuff Yeah, that's that's awesome Pay is is a big deal. It's always been a big deal I think it's even a bigger deal now because you know We're paying more for who'd have thought we'd be paying this much for labor two years ago, right? nobody Nobody so we have more reason than ever to try to get that right. Do we want to talk about what we were doing last week? Any anything special happened last week? We were rocking it out in Vegas, weren't we? I think that was a week ago We have Tara hang Tara. How are you? Hi, good. How are you? You're doing great. You're doing great We were just talking about the vacation we took last week out in Las Vegas Sounds like quite a vacation Except Tom And uh, Liz Liz and tom are quite the speakers as well Oh I think I failed the game though He's gonna try it out. Do you Liz? Yeah, he went to give him a turkey hat And for the holidays and I know He was going to wear it last week I'm sure on Wednesday, but I wasn't on I don't have one to put on how about you guys was it Wednesday? Do we do something last week Wednesday or was it Monday? Oh my god I told you Tom Tom turkey Wow Denet uh, Denet hooked me up for a lot of holidays here. So I'm I'm good to go She sent me this one too, which I thought was really amazing, but man I don't care It's gonna be hard to talk about this with Tom. We're in this is turkey hat so Didn't you didn't you guys have a show last week with Dan? We were in Las Vegas and no we didn't we didn't uh We did some live streams, but we didn't do a formal hour session of of of smart business modes Oh, I I didn't realize My week's confused. Yeah, we were back last week. I stand corrected. I guess we did we did it all monday. I forget I thought you guys did on a monday because that was my first day back and I was not up for anything Yeah You're right damplad and uh, we uh, we we kind of geeked out on accounting stuff last monday Yeah what well Did how did how'd that go? I had fun You always have fun talking about finances. Tom. That's right. We'll talk numbers all day long Well As far as today goes We're gonna talk about paid plans. I'm interested that we have kala and tara Because I like to hear from perspectives from them, you know, they they definitely come at Situations from different perspective And I'm guessing that's part of what makes things work with you guys. Yeah You guys always have both both sides Of a view. Oh, there's linda So Where do we want to start with this? Do we want to just talk generally? Hey linda, how are you? Linda's my linda's my foundation's buddy. She basically got me through foundations 11 I loved it. Yeah, I think For sure. Hey kelly We have our our thanksgiving attire on So Is there one particular we was talking about paid types we're talking about hourly or Some type of split hourly type pay or maybe commission or You know being paid on a loud hours. I guess there's and there's variations and tweets on all of those Is there one best? Pay type to to to use or are there pros and cons to to all of them? Yeah Yeah, I think there's pros and cons to all of them. I've tried pretty much everything over my 14 years, honestly tom And first I tried hourly and there was no incentive for people to Really move through that home and an efficient manner really, right? If I didn't have eight hours of work for them, it was to their benefit to drag out their time So then I tried at least limiting their time and doing basically job ticket hours, which was helpful And then I heard of another pay type that was based on the hours that they work in a week Or that I was able to assign them and I tried that for a while as well But what I found was if I didn't have enough work for them that week It wasn't you know, it wasn't their fault, right that they couldn't earn my top tier pay So I felt bad about that and there wasn't a good way to monitor that So now what I'm doing is I do have tiered pay, but it's based on quality And it's by far the best for me and my company at this point We do have job ticket hour limits. So it's a three hour house four hour house, whatever But the amount that they get paid to do each house Totally depends on their quality that week And it's working very well for us Okay, so it's kind of what you call job ticket hour. We call allowed hours pay but the amount of paper allowed hour That is as awarded as contingent of own quality. Is that the quality score of that one job or is it an average over It's over the week. So every week they have the opportunity to earn a different pay grade But I'll tell you most people out of training get to our middle pay grade pretty quickly And then get to the top tier pay After that usually about a month or two in they can get to top tier Most people stay there, but sometimes we'll have somebody who will drop down and start to get some complaints And they'll drop down a tier in pay But of course our goal is to work with them and help them get back up to the top tier okay So I have a question Pam. Um, because I love that idea, but what about, um When we talked about earlier today like when you have Like right now I'm hourly But if I send someone to do a job that I calculated for six hours, but they're done in four hours So obviously my timing isn't correct Um, so my profit is larger. Have you I mean like do you have anything? That keeps that from happening or are you pretty good about like? Have you gotten to that point where your hours like you know what it takes it? For a job to get done. Yeah, we pretty much know I have a whole chart on that There are a few variations and of course for the deeper claims That's that's harder to monitor because the first time clean you don't know what you're walking into necessarily So I'm a little bit more lenient there But as far as the you know bi-weekly weekly and monthly amounts of time per square footage range Varying some sort of extraordinary circumstance. We can we pretty much nail that and we know Pam do you pay then? Um, when you're talking about job ticket hour, is it like a A dollar per per job ticket hour? Is it yeah, do you mind sharing your your pay? Yeah, absolutely. So ours is uh for poor quality. It's 18 per job ticket hour For for good quality. It is 19 per job ticket hour and for excellent quality. It is 20 dollars per job ticket hour Hmm How do you measure the quality? A little bit of both, of course we count on customer feedback. We do some spot checks If we're not getting any customer feedback Then we definitely send a qc person out to start spot checking some homes because that can be an indicator Or we'll pick up the phone and and try to find out Or they just not wanting to get the cleaner in trouble by not reporting anything because If you go a whole week in my company anyway If you go a whole week and you're not getting in we're not getting any customer feedback. That's a red flag Yeah Sure, definitely All right That's great. That's great to get us started Pam. I'm sure we're gonna have more questions about back to Um, Robin you want to share how you pay? Yeah, we use a split hourly Format where we pay a higher for we pay a higher hourly cleaning rate Well, the technicians are in the home, but when they are Driving from the office to the first client's home and in between homes and back to the office We pay it Basically minimum wage and the idea there is to encourage them To be in homes longer being efficient and thorough in the house rather than driving around in cars trying to I wouldn't say pat their their Their paycheck but But it just encourages them I think to be more thorough and do a better better clean in someone's home rather than Driving around in a car What is your minimum wage robin? The minimum wage is 7.25. So it's Is certainly a significant For them to just stay in a home cleaning versus jumping in a car The when they're in the car the windshield time is is strictly an expense to the company And it's not really benefiting them greatly, but they're still getting getting paid while they're going from job to job I have a lot of questions about that too Let's let's keep going on with everybody in see what everybody's pays are um Oh one more one question real quick robin have is that the pay you've Always used or have you have you switched? um, well Way back in the beginning about six years ago. We were at a commission based structure Um, but we changed that and went to hourly because it was easier to track Uh and in the market and for the cleaners. So we went to that but now I'm considering looking at commission again or some type of job ticket hour uh with some focus on Some quality but maybe more so on volume So if they're in the house, they're efficient. They're very productive They can get in a home in and in and out quickly but maintain the quality Then I want to be able to to pay be able to pay them more if they're being efficient with their time So I'm you know, I want to look at look at other options. So I can pay pay the technicians more but also improve profitability as well Cool. Thank you. That's helpful. Although Tom, can you give just a quick? um definition Of efficiency and productivity that the way we define them here. Sure. So everybody knows Efficiency is how much of the work day is actually spent cleaning a home generating revenue Um an example would be if I was cleaning Two homes in a day and each home took me six hours I mean three hours rather that would be six hours of cleaning time And if I were on the clock eight hours, it would be six divided by eight or 75 percent Whereas productivity is how quickly am I cleaning the home relative to the allowed hours So if I was doing a three hour home and it took me Four hours to clean it then my productivity would be 75 percent because you know Took me an hour longer than what it was supposed to So you want to see productivity at or greater than 100 percent and efficiency as close to 100 percent as possible so for With robin's example, you'd want that high efficiency That the paying that low drive time rate helps with that efficiency to get them get into that next job Where they're starting money again The thing that you have to manage with that split hourly approach is the productivity though because i'm making more money per hour while i'm in the home And if i'm not managing that my cleaning professionals might not move as quickly as they should because financially They have no incentive to clean the home any faster. They just have incentive to minimize the drive time yeah Okay, awesome. Thanks tom Caleb can you kind of run us through what you and Tara do either what you do now or what you've done in the past or yeah, so um For a while there we were doing paper deem which means that We would track The problem of this one is that yet when you track it you have to report it. It was a lot to do But track who did like the kitchen who did the bathrooms so that way percentage wise on the homes we could say, okay Sally's going quicker than jill or whatever And you know each person be getting a different pay per hour based upon the productivity That was the pro in it So that way, you know, you know, if someone went slower it didn't bother the other person Because they were slower About a year and a half ago. We did switch away from that style and we went too straight hourly Just because we were at a transition point In the company and we were able to do that in an effective mannerism I think you know, there's an internal debate that As we go so if we ever went solo You know about going back to an hourly rate Rather than tracking who did the bathroom who did the kitchen solo means, you know that this person did the entire home And so it's good having these different conversations right now about kind of like the pay for better quality And you know because we want to reward people for going efficiently and having great quality And that's really the biggest thing that I think really that's the biggest thing we're about is rewarding efficiency and great quality And whatever system kind of works out for that to be It sounds awesome. Uh our drive time is the same hourly rate as the clean time Every now and then I think once a week we're going through their time logs With made central it reports it very easily Who when is the drive time versus how much time is spent in the homes? So we can look through and say hmm It took them an hour to get between those two homes, but it was a 15 minute drive You know, obviously they took a 45 minute break or Was there an accident? Something right definitely a conversation that needs to be had though Tara do you have anything you want to add to that? Um, just straight or straight now to correct Just uh, I'm gonna move this just quickly Explaining what he was talking about what we used to do was we would have say we wanted to pay out like 34 of the home We would break it up into job Per per task pretty much which worked out great, but it's a lot to track and and I don't feel like doing that anymore. Um With the hourly I like it uh because once again, it's not as much to track But I feel like you have to watch things like the time in between the homes and things that we maybe don't want to have to deal with Um So but I don't know how to go about doing regular commission Um when there's a team That's the main question here is how do you how do you work that out when you have quicker people and slower people? That's all Okay, it's a good question We're gonna go around and we'll get everybody's questions in in just a couple of minutes too Don't forget no and Tara. I know that that's a question that a lot of people have so You want to make sure we get that one good? Um linda How about you? um I currently pay commission When I bought the business 16 years ago the existing owner was paying by the hour so for three months I did by the hour and I just thought I was throwing money out the window It just seemed like they were taking a very long time to clean homes And when I went to commission I realized four hour houses were now two hour houses and So I kind of like that With trainees their first five days of training They earn an hourly wage But then after they're out of the five days they go into a their 30 day training program So they get a certain percent and then when they're done with that their percent goes up and then if they become The supervisor their percent goes up. So the opportunity there's opportunities to keep going up until you feel supervisor um, we were running teams of two Now we're running because of covet. We are running a lot of solo work and they make 42 percent If it was a team of two they would split that 42 percent And a team of two consists of a team supervisor and a partner Supervisor always makes them more than the partner They're making sure everything is done properly. They walk around Clean for show making sure everything's done. We haven't left equipment behind Um, if there's communication with a client, they're the ones who do that um And then if there's a problem in the house I go straight to them first and it and they work with me to fix that kind of problem If for some reason it doesn't happen often, but if we have to do a re-do cleaning They don't learn anything So that's an incentive for them to Um do the job right the first time so they don't have to go back and redo for nothing um So the percent covers them from the minute they sign in till the minute they sign out at the end of the day And they come to the office in the morning and in the afternoon Um, they earn monthly bonuses based on quality and attendance and That's that's pretty much it in a nutshell And depending on their position they earn other little benefits like Uh, Costco membership or triple-a membership. So there's other perks besides pay Okay, I know a lot of people are gonna have a lot of questions for that For linda. So I hope you guys are making notes of the different questions you want to ask of everybody um But before We move on to trisha I just want to point out for anybody that's listening to this later When linda said that she doesn't pay them for reduced She didn't mean that they don't get paid for that time that they're cleaning and Doing that re redoing the house what she meant is no additional money goes to them But she guarantees does make sure that they're still making at least minimum wage For the times that they're working so So they wait mainly way more than minimum wage been in wage here is like 9 50 an hour So, yeah, it's important as a good point that it's important to account for those hours and make sure that those hours are included in number of hours worked for that week and to do the calculation to make sure that The pay gross pay for the week divided by those hours at least meets the the minimum wage calculation Yeah, just I just want to make sure in case I know that a lot of people will see this later So if there's someone new to business and if that's true here linda say that On commission or percentage that you don't have to pay people for reduce. That's not And once again, it's very rare that we have a redo because they know the policy There's always going to be reduced now and again. That's that's the nature of the beast You know Just making sure how we do it Okay Go ahead cheshire So we pay hourly and then I pay five dollars for So I pay the same wage, um, whether they're driving or cleaning and then I pay five dollars per uh location they go to and then um I had intended to implement like a quality in attendance Um bonus monthly, but because I considered switching to job ticket. I haven't done that so I wanted to like completely decide what I was going to do and go with So that's sorry. Mia was walking in so Perfectly, okay. It happens to all of us. I know she has to come in and hang out with me So you've been on the show enough to know that we either have pets or baby Yeah Trisha, can you I just I'm not sure I understand about the five dollars. Is that additional instead of doing mileage Instead of doing mileage. I pay five dollars per location So like it kind of evens out. Um I I try to think it evens out. So like I have a huge service area So if they're driving whether they're driving five minutes away from the next location Or 30 minutes the next location. They only get five dollars per location So they drive their own vehicle, correct? Okay Okay So that five dollars is like how you account for like mileage Yes, because I didn't want to keep track of mileage And I really would like to um like I don't know if anybody does this But I would like to go away from the whole mileage and keeping track and even paying five dollars the location if I could Change the way we pay And they would get a higher pay to include that. So I didn't have to track that either because currently Laura is like counting them when she runs the the uh payroll Counting houses Yeah, so like when it payroll comes up on customer factor And I don't know if this is since we're switching to made central But and we don't have a lot of employees, right? So that works right now But so when it comes up, it'll just give her a list of what those hours include It'll show which customers there are and so she can track it that way very easily Like she can easily see if it's five or eight But I don't know how that will work. Could we go to made central like if that will be possible one and two What happens when we grow larger like I don't know that that would work very well if I had 15 cleaners 450 Yeah, yeah, could be 50. I'll take 50. I'll take 50 Hopefully Yeah, so I just think that that's going to be more of a headache going forward one of the one of the things that As we move forward as an industry I think payroll really needs to be kind of a byproduct of the normal workflow rather than A major activity that you're spending hours and hours doing I mean with the technology that's out there today, it's 2021 for goodness sakes you know the idea of building spreadsheets and counting stuff and going through all of the The work that I know in years past that that some of us have done to implement payroll, especially Instead of pay such as you know commission or or allowed hours pay um, the tools are out there now where Really a click of a button here in there should it should get you to to where you want to go without creating a job for somebody to do all of that and It's really easy to just do a mileage reimbursement based on the number of miles driven over the week or You can just give somebody a higher, you know wage regardless of what your compensation is and explain that, you know This is in part to to account for You know the you driving your own car. I mean there's several different ways you can approach it Not all states kind of treat, you know driving and The you know reimbursement for your your your your vehicle the same way So it's always a good idea to talk to You know a labor attorney in your particular state to make sure that you know what you're doing in that regard is is correct Reimbursing mileage though is something that's generally accepted as part of the federal regulation and when you reimburse mileage To the maximum extent you're allowed to and I forget what that is. I think it actually varies from various parts of the country to the other they've gotten that specific now that if there's a Different well, no those four per diem reimbursement for hotels and so forth So it's probably the same number across the country But if you reimburse for mileage You don't have to pay all the employer payroll taxes on that nor do your Employees have to pay tax on that either. It's treated as a reimbursement rather than income. So there is some tax advantage to Actually breaking that out and saying this is the money that we're giving you as reimbursement for you driving your automobile would be kind of cool if if I know like on customer factor, which we're going away from If because they do gps if we could if that could just be automated, right? Like it takes the gps and says this is how many miles they drove that would be like a dream come true yeah, or You know the way the way that we do it is we let google tell us how many miles they drove that day Yeah And that's what we reimburse on Yeah Patricia my current software Does the routing and tells the exact number of miles? So I pay 25 cents a mile To the driver because they use their own vehicles Okay Like you i'm going away from it. I'm going to make central So and I don't know made central well enough yet to comment on that. I know but I am excited Yeah, I'm excited for the reports Me too Okay, so also for anybody watching this episode later This is not a made central pay Episode And I hesitated to bring it up and I wanted to mention it But just go into dental that So many people talking about that here today All right, they changed that for for for the record the federal mileage reimbursement rate for this year is 56 cents a mile So you can reimburse up to that point Um You know there's a lot of reasons that you might not want to do that but You know if you can negotiate a compensation plan where you know, maybe I'll pay a quarter less an hour But I'll give you more for mileage or something like that where it washes out You do save a little bit in taxes when you're You're maxing out on on the allowed mileage rate Hey tom, do they need to turn in their mileage in order for it to be reimbursable? You need to have some mechanism where you're you're tracking it. I mean if somebody says hey, I drove 500 miles this week That's not good enough. You have to be able to Show something where and it has to be reasonable. That's the other thing a kind of a reasonability test Um, if there's a piece of paper that they said that you know, these are the homes and this is how far we drove That's fine. If your information systems are tracking that then then you can use that information Um But there has to be some record if you don't have something that you can go back Either digitally or or on paper and show This is why I reimbursed 56 cents a mile for you know 62 miles that week Then you you could get yourself in trouble if you We're we're going through an uh a tax audit So but we can I guess I'm just kind of thinking through this On the five dollar a house Thing for example, we could list that just as an extra expense or extra Not reimbursement, but extra pay whatever Is it treated as taxable? Is it treated as income as long as it's taxed? Yeah, it would be treated as income not reimbursement because if you're if you're if you're paying like you're the employer portion Of taxes on that and if they're paying your employees are paying tax on it like income Then I think you're good That's what I actually switched to especially after I talked to you and found out that we really should have been tracking all of that Um in order for that to be reimbursable and I wasn't asking my cleaners to track that for me Um, I could go back and track it for them and I guess I need to do that But I did shift it from being a reimbursement to just an additional earning Yeah, I think mine is just an additional earning because we're not tracking it Tom is there a way for In a central for it to be um for us to be able to find that number and use it We we we track mileage. So that's that's kind of a byproduct of people just doing their work So if you want if you want to increase your hourly pay Would you go ahead and not reimburs include the drive the mileage expense As part of their income I prefer to Make it a reimbursable expense For tax purposes. You're doing both them and yourself a favor Okay, you know, I'm all about paying all the taxes. I'm supposed to but at the same time You know using the the the roles that are presented to us to you know Not pay more taxes than we should and it's a legitimate expense reimbursment And so It's not like it They actually increase their net worth by that amount for driving that week because depreciation on the car gas and other stuff net net You know, it's it's a wash. So it's this is a legit Reimbursement as opposed to additional income. So it's not fair for your employees to be paying taxes on it It really isn't for you to be paying tax on it either I say And tom so if I understand this right Since my people have the supplies with them, they leave from their home go to the first job Go to the second job and then go back home The only mileage if I was going to reimburse mileage the only mileage that's reimbursable is the amount from Job one to job two. Is that correct? As a rule, that's the way it works pretty much without exception I would check that whatever state you're doing business in just to make sure you're 100 on that but Check your head as As a rule, that's true They recently changed that in seattle and in denver. Oh, really absolutely That you're checking that And that's another reason to be checking with your labor attorney from time to time that whatever Is the rule today might not be the rule tomorrow true We can expect we're going to be seeing a bunch of new things going into the new year All right, if you were if you were looking to To change your compensation to more pay for performance What what direction would you go? Maybe some of the pros and cons between commission or the Job ticket hour Anybody want to take that question Sorry, sorry Go you go fam I personally have have trouble or have have had trouble in the past using the word commission I feel like if my team is going to hear You know, oh, I'm only getting 40 of the job. They're thinking. Well, what happened to the other 60? I did all the work, right? And it's also harder for them to understand that And then if I'm under charging for a job or overcharging here or there It just complicates things in my mind. So that's why I went to the actual dollar per job ticket hour instead of using the term commission Commission the word commission does Leave for a lot of misunderstanding because You know people can kind of go to a place where they think it's a multi-level marketing type thing And I have to buy inventory and I'm not making any money unless I sell stuff. So Calling it commission is is really bad branding We we we present it as like a productivity bonus program and we guarantee a minimum hourly wage Which is quite a bit higher than the mandated minimum wage But do it in a way where if they're making, you know, reasonable numbers They're making more off of the revenue share than what they would if they were just, you know, working hourly And we show them the math and say you're going to make at least say $15 an hour But if you've got reasonable productivity, you'll be getting a percentage of revenue share off the revenue generated that will exceed that and revenue share and productivity bonus is You know more more positive than commission and I really like it talking about it in terms of Your base pay is here and then you have opportunity to earn this additional Pay on top of that so that it's always Opportunity to be earning more money. Not less Is a good selling point too Is that based on uh primarily production? Productivity Well, it's it's basically how they're they're they're using their entire day. It would include efficiency as well Okay That's the end of the day the revenue per hour that one makes for the entire week is their gross revenue time Are divided by rather all of the hours that we're on the clock so that drive time and As always Supply work Meeting time. So if you guarantee a base pay and plus a percent If they happen to work overtime, how does that relate Do you have to guarantee their base pay an hour or one and a half times? Not necessarily their their their their base pay Um, that's a that's a really wonderful question because you there's two tests that the department of labor Will want you to to be able to demonstrate that you can pass and Again, I'm going to couch this that you all need to be checking with labor attorneys in your own markets because different parts of the country do things a little bit different but As a rule you take somebody's gross pay for the entire work week And divide it by the total numbers worked for that work week. That is their hourly pay for that week and if you're paying some type of incentive pay like Job ticket hour or you know allowed hours or You know what we what we call what we don't want to call commission what we would call you know, uh productivity bonus What you would do is take 50 percent of their hourly rate Calculated on what we just described times the number of hours that they worked over 40 so If I worked 45 hours that week and if I had an average hourly pay of 20 dollars an hour I would get an extra 10 dollars an hour times five Over time hours and if you add that in that's the same as paying time and a half for the hours that they worked over 40 So I I hope I hope you got there Linda that so they would actually be almost always getting more than than I think it's safe to say and in in the u.s. If somebody works more than 40 hours They would get more than their their normal calculated pay And again, it's 2021 and we live in a world that you shouldn't be doing a lot of manual calculations for that you need to Expect to have technology that's doing this for you I don't call our pay a commission pay because I don't like that word either. I have been calling it percent pay Uh, I feel more comfortable with that. I feel it kind of changes. Um, someone's way of thinking Um, because I'm I'm the one that's doing all the work and getting the client and um determining the fee so They're doing the manual work And they just get a I don't know a percent of that to me is different mindset than commission So tom, I'm going to challenge you over there at made central to come up with a new Pay type that has a new moniker. It's not commission not percentage But that encompasses percentage pay but with a base pay Because there there is no name for that in our industry currently and as you can see We we struggle another lexicon assignment. Yes I know how much you love that um I'm happy to throw out a couple of options But I definitely think our industry needs a a a paint type that is percentage but paid Above base pay Included base pay, you know, we're just going to have to hire somebody and make them like director of Lexiconology or something Lexicology tom lexicology. Okay If we just knew someone who loved to read a dictionary What is um, can you explain to me what pay per job ticket hour is? Exactly Who who who does job So, yeah, so each home is assigned with an hour limit So whether that's three hours three and a half hours four hours four and a half whatever it is based on the square footage of the home Um, and it's a couple of other factors, right? And so we assign that and each cleaner knows how many hours that we've assigned to that job job ticket hour A lot of hour allowed hour whatever you want to call that And then they get paid x number of dollars based on their quality And I know this may be may as i'm explaining it may sound complicated But in my mind, it's simple to understand. So this is what works for me Rather than having these bonuses and all these different things. I prefer to have it structured in three different quality groups poor good and and best um Times the number of job ticket hours for that house and that's how they get paid So I think this is where tera is is stuck. So tera normally let's say you have a job that You charge $150 for Okay, how how many hours? Do you think that job should take to clean? About two and a half Okay, so in pams pay system that would be called a two and a half hour job And so she would pay them for two and a half hours of cleaning time It's just you make less per hour that way right a cleaner just average They make more right Job ticket hours are the same as allowed hours is the amount of time that you would expect it would take to clean the job If you remember the example We gave earlier where if I spend six hours of my day cleaning a home and two hours like driving around in the meetings and so forth Six divide six job hours divided by eight clock hours gives me an efficiency of 75 percent If as a like company wide let's assume that on average my company efficiency is 75 percent And if I want to have a target hourly rate of $15 an hour of of clock time So if I work eight hours in a day, I'll make eight times 15 What I would do is I take that $15 an hour and I divide it by my company efficiency factor of 75 percent That would give me 20 dollars an hour. So you would pay $20 per allowed hour and that would be the same as paying $15 per clock hour That makes sense So what do you do when there's a team in there and say one of them is a quicker more efficient cleaner and the other slower Would they would they be upset that their job is not getting done as quickly? You know, but they're still getting paid that you know allowed them out Anybody want to take a shot at that? Yeah, they definitely that definitely bothers them. Um, and so that that's why both We from the office standpoint the trainers and that team lead that they're partnered with On that particular job is really it behooves them to work with that cleaner and help them be more productive Per you know job ticket hour per hour that they're in that home Because what you don't want to hear is why did 70 percent of the home and she only did 30 right? That seems unfair and that can create a lot of problems within The company or that team So what I'm going to tell you Tara is You you're going to have that problem no matter how you pay That is true Even if you have paid hourly The people that feel like they clean more of the houses and the other person cleaned less They feel like it's not fair. You're going to have that So I ideally you want people who clean to the same Speed quality et cetera working together if you if you can But that that actually goes to your question that you were asking earlier. I think a little bit Um You wanted to know if you have teams of two Yeah, how do you how do you split the pay which is a little bit In line with the question that I had for Linda Which is When you you said that if you you have a percentage like 42 percent And then you have a team of two but then How do you decide You said one person will make more and the other person makes less the team Captain or coach or lead or whatever will make more but how do you know how much each Person makes and I think this kind kind of ties into terrorist question as well for teams So you're you're asking me the question. Okay A person has been promoted to team supervisor. So no matter who she works with or he They make a set percent and they are the team supervisor No matter where they are whoever works with them And then the person who works with them as a partner who makes Say 20 and if she works with another team supervisor, she continues to make 20 percent So if you have two So a team supervisor, for example, will make 22 by themselves or in a team and if they work Alone, will they then make 44 percent? Yes, okay, and then if I have two team Supervisors working together would they each make 22 percent? No, then it drops down to 21 percent each Because neither one of them is supervising the other person Right But right now we're going so much to solo That's becoming less of a concern. I only have one team. That's a team of two Because I actually have some clients who want a team of two And the partner on that team does not want to be a supervisor And she does not want to work by herself. So it kind of works out And and there's exceptions to all the rules like if it's a first time clean like pam it said It's kind of hard to really know what they're walking into. So for first time cleans I give a range of prices a low end price and a high end price to the client I don't charge by the hour But I also pay the team a total of 50 percent for a first time clean because of what they're walking into Um Move in and cleans move out cleans. I pay 50 percent for the whole team. So if you're working by yourself, you're making bank You're working hard Definitely definitely feel better about making more money about that doing that job Oh, um Robin You had asked a question that I don't think we completely answered A loud hours versus Whatever this percentage slash commission pay like what are the kind of the The highs and the lows the good things and the bad things about them one one of the things that we didn't mention is with a loud hours you're in charge of giving your team members raises So you can you you are responsible for giving them paying increases but with the other type of pay whatever tom's going to call it over there is um Their their pay increases are kind of baked in they get paying increases as you raise rates for your clients Depending on how often you raise the rates. So on the one hand, it's good for Painting And on the other hand, it's also good for a painting. I know that one of the things that One of my one of the people I know that uses this well is chris will it he really loves a loud hours And one of the things that he really loves about a loud hours is that When he raises prices He's bringing in all that extra money initially until and then he decides how he wants to How he wants to distribute that money In a loud hours when you give somebody a raise it feels like it's a raise because they really see it Making, you know more per hour more more per job hour um On the job type formally known as commission you would um You're in alignment with your cleaning professionals on making sure that you're charging the right amount Because if the cleaning professional doesn't feel like that they're being compensated fairly They're going to come to you and say you need to charge mrs. Jones more Whereas if you're doing job ticket hour or what we call a loud hours pay They're going to come to you and say that you need to tack more time More more loud hours to this job in which case that could drive your payroll to revenue Which you don't want to do so There's pros and cons to each there is no no perfect perfect one it's a matter of Figuring out which one best fits your business model and which one best addresses the the issues that that that are most important to you One of the things I did too tom was Um, I realized after talking to some of my cleaners that have been with me a while And that are a lead they felt like if they've produced excellent quality But maybe a newbie produced excellent quality should they both be earning 20 per job ticket hour? And so I looked at that and I ended up giving my leads a little bit more a dollar or two more per job ticket hour As a reward for them. So they felt like that was more fair and that seems to be working well Okay Well, we are pretty much at the top of the hour we've got another minute or so here any uh Go ahead Okay, um, one of the questions that we get a lot is how do you train? How do you pay your trainers?  Do you guys mind all just going around real quick and talking about how You pay your trainer for the time that they're training Yeah, we pay a daily rate Of 20 dollars per day to train That's what we do as well They still are in their job ticket hours for the houses even though they have a helper They might finish early, but they also get an extra 20 dollars a day for training days There are they able to take on more jobs pan because I'm thinking with yours They have one one person. Maybe they're training on two houses But then they could eventually get up to four houses in a day So they could be getting double their pay And then also 20 dollars. Is that correct for us? We don't give them any more work because we really want them to focus on that training And we don't want her to miss something along the way So we still keep them at the two houses a day for however long the trainee is in training And that training period for us lasts anywhere from two to three weeks I don't Um for the person who's training or the team who's training they get an extra two percent And then I pay the trainee by the hour So if the team is earning 42 percent they would earn 44 percent Okay Not that much in the beginning, but then you pile on the work So at the at the end of a week Or the end of two weeks however long your training is they're making more than double their pay Okay I currently don't pay extra for training because rod does all the training And then the few times that someone has to help someone I just have it But I like that. I love the 20 dollars a day. I love that So I'll probably use that Not to rod them. You don't get extra I'm sorry rod Caleb rods my husband. Just so you know, I'm not mistreating anyone over here I might accept your husband. It doesn't count right terra Well tom we actually have another meeting that we have to get to right now two minutes ago, so We're good for today, but we'll be back wednesday five o'clock eastern. Hey guys Thank you all this was fun. Appreciate your help Thank you guys for better list