April 10, 2025 • 41 mins
Thinking about backyard chickens? Rent The Chicken makes it easy! They deliver a portable coop, egg-laying hens, feed, supplies, and instructions—no guesswork needed. Enjoy fresh, healthy eggs within days. Great for families, foodies, or anyone curious about chicken keeping. Seasonal rentals with the option to adopt. https://www.rentthechicken.com/
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:04):
And welcome in. This is the CEO's You Should Know podcast.
I'm your host, Johnny Hartwell, let's say hello to the
CEOs of Rented Chicken, Pill and Jen Tompkins. Thank you
for being with me. Happy to be here. So going
through my head all day long, I gotta know what
(00:25):
is rented Chicken.
Speaker 2 (00:26):
We give people a chance to try out having backyard
hens for fresh eggs without the long term commitment, and
if it's not a good fit, they can chicken out.
Speaker 1 (00:36):
Hold on, hold up, So how much what do you get?
Do you get the feed and you get the coop
and everything.
Speaker 2 (00:44):
Yeah, it's like a five to six month rental, usually
spring until fall. We provide a chicken coop that's portable
with the feed, two to four egg laying hens, and
instruction sheet, a book, and friends to call chicken friends
if you have any questions.
Speaker 1 (00:59):
Who does this? Who rents the chicken? Who are the
type of people who rent the chicken?
Speaker 2 (01:04):
It is so crazy. We thought, you know, we're in
the greater Pittsburgh area. We thought it was just going
to be like the tech guys from Google who wanted
to rent chickens. But actually it is a whole gamut
of people, mainly people who want.
Speaker 3 (01:17):
To have a food source that's closer to their table.
Speaker 2 (01:20):
But other people are doing it because their grandkids come
over a lot, or they're looking to do something else.
And during the COVID times, everyone was at home for
the same people, sorry, for the same reason. People were
adding decks and adding pools. They were getting chickens because
they wanted something else to do while they were at home.
Speaker 1 (01:38):
But do you have schools or maybe camps do this
as well.
Speaker 2 (01:41):
We do have some that participated in rent the chicken.
We also have a Hatch the Chicken program, which is spectacular.
It's a five week catching program where our renters have
an incubator that we provide. The commitment is minimal, adding
some water. They can look for signs of life with
this light that we provide, so it's like an ultrasound
on the eggs.
Speaker 1 (02:00):
And so you're the largest, You're the world's largest rent
a chicken facility, aren't you?
Speaker 3 (02:05):
Chicken rental service? We like to say we're most high tech.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
We are like the cleanex of chicken rentals, if you will,
because we're not like people talk about chicken rentals and
they just say rent the chicken just like you say,
could I have a cleanex no matter what the brand is.
Speaker 1 (02:19):
And you're you're not only nationwide, you're worldwide, you're international international.
Speaker 4 (02:24):
Yes, we've got affiliate farmers in Canada and Ontario, Alberta
and British Columbia right now. And we're always eggspanding.
Speaker 1 (02:33):
How many chicken puns do you guys know?
Speaker 3 (02:36):
Oh, ab a bazilla.
Speaker 1 (02:37):
I've this is gonna be painful.
Speaker 3 (02:42):
It's always cracking people up, all.
Speaker 1 (02:45):
Right, So where'd you come up with this idea? Who
came up with the idea? Oh?
Speaker 3 (02:50):
My goodness? This home Sead fills the visionary of the group.
Speaker 2 (02:52):
And we met when we lived outside of Baltimore, Maryland,
and wanted to move to the country. So from the
city to the country, were making that move, and we
were both working from home before it was cool and
I knew my job was coming to an end. And
I happened to have a degree in small business and
entrepreneurship from a long time ago, and so we were like, well,
(03:16):
we should start a business. Oh yeah, cause that sounds
like what you want to do, like on a Tuesday,
And so he was just like scrolling on his device
late at night and what did you search for?
Speaker 4 (03:26):
I was just laying in the bed scrolling on the phone,
and I searched for crazy business ideas, and of all places,
the SBA dot gov website. So talking about astration, that's right,
talked about a bunch of different crazy business ideas and
one of them was chicken rentals.
Speaker 2 (03:42):
So so then he looked at me and said, you
want to rent some chickens? And by that time, again
we'd already moved from the country to from the from
the city to the country. He wanted all these things
with homesteading, having backyard hens and having a big garden
and various I was like, you are crazy, I don't
think so we already had chickens by then, and I said, well,
(04:03):
I know how to work the power tools. I could
build some coops. We have some chickens.
Speaker 3 (04:07):
Sure, why not? And here we are. I was in
twenty thirteen, all right.
Speaker 1 (04:12):
To where was your and who was your first customer?
Speaker 3 (04:15):
Oh my goodness.
Speaker 2 (04:16):
So we before we even started the website, we asked,
do you know anyone who would do this? Do you
know I know five friends, I know everybody was I'm
so excited, excited, And then we built some prototype coops
had chickens paired up. We went back to those same people, Okay,
could someone do this, No, we're free, no please, research
and development, no one, no one. My mom's friend finally
(04:38):
said yes, and my mom might have paid her. I
don't know, probably, And so her name is Jody and
she was in Indiana County, Pennsylvania, and said she would
do it. We took her a summer portable chicken coop
with two hens. She named them Laverne and Shirley.
Speaker 3 (04:56):
Nice.
Speaker 2 (04:57):
Yeah, yeah, And so we quickly learned learned that she
was like, this coop isn't good for me to keep
the chickens. We just thought people were going to rent
them for this summer. We had no idea anyone who
was renting chickens would want to keep them in through
the way.
Speaker 4 (05:09):
You wanted to adopt at the end.
Speaker 1 (05:10):
Well, yeah, yeah, once you you know, be puplish. Yeah,
the family. We didn't realize that got name. You know,
you can't you can't have Laverne and not have Shirley.
Speaker 4 (05:19):
That was our research and development year, and we learned
a lot.
Speaker 2 (05:24):
So the local newspaper called and they said.
Speaker 3 (05:29):
I hear you're renting chickens. Where all do you have customers?
Speaker 4 (05:33):
Never had one. She didn't pay us Indiana County.
Speaker 3 (05:38):
I just said the whole Dan County, Indiana County.
Speaker 2 (05:41):
And so that that reporter met up with us at
Jodie's to meet Laverne and Shirley to meet us. We
we had a terrible coop sign that was very homemade
and handcrafted by yours truly, and we did not have
rented Chicken.
Speaker 4 (05:57):
Apparel or logo at that point.
Speaker 3 (05:59):
Right we it was.
Speaker 2 (06:02):
It was fantastic for what it was, but as we
look back on it, my goodness, we had a lot
to learn.
Speaker 1 (06:07):
Right, So where's the business now?
Speaker 2 (06:09):
Yeah, So we have partnered with affiliate charmers across the
United States and Canada. They do wear their rent the
Chicken shirts proud, They sticker their trucks, and they provide
deliveries locally. Both rent the Chicken deliveries and hatch the
Chicken deliveries. And we handle all of the calls and
the sales calls and the support calls at what we
(06:29):
now dubbed ourselves rent the Chicken Headquarters, which is really
just like me and my small home office on video
chat with my part timers.
Speaker 1 (06:38):
All Right, let's get down to the chicken feed. Okay,
So somebody says, all right, I'm interested. What's the process
of getting the chickens.
Speaker 3 (06:45):
Great question.
Speaker 2 (06:46):
We accept a deposit and then we get the coops
pruced up and pair up the chickens, make sure we
have the feed. We'll make a delivery for most areas,
we're planning on May delivery, but we deliver in April
and in we provide a chicken keeping book called Fresh
Eggs Daily by LESA Steal. That's the one we supply
in the United States. And then we set a date,
(07:09):
we come on out, we bring the chickens, We give
a tutorial, either on video tutorial or in person, answer
any questions and poof someone is an instant chicken farmer.
Speaker 1 (07:20):
That's fun.
Speaker 3 (07:21):
Chicken tender if you will.
Speaker 2 (07:22):
And.
Speaker 1 (07:24):
So you get to keep all the eggs that you get.
How many eggs does like one chicken hatcht anywhere like four.
Speaker 4 (07:30):
So each chicken that you have lays about an egg
a day, so they'll lay for six days and they'll
take the seventh day off. So two birds will give
you about a dozen eggs a week, four birds about
two dozen eggs a week.
Speaker 1 (07:41):
Really do they really take the day off?
Speaker 4 (07:43):
Yes?
Speaker 1 (07:43):
Really, yes, really, some of them just sometimes.
Speaker 4 (07:46):
They'll do like eight days in a row or nine
days in a row. But a chickens reproductive cycle is
about once every twenty eight to thirty two hours.
Speaker 1 (07:55):
And what's the difference between the eggs that your chickens
lay compared to maybe a the eggs that you buy
in the in the grocery store.
Speaker 3 (08:02):
Sure, so.
Speaker 2 (08:04):
Aside from most times color, But if if you were
to have a chicken the lad of white egg in
your backyard and a chicken the lad of brown egg
in your backyard, those eggs but taste the same, okay,
But the difference is how a chicken is raised and
ours have access to fresh air and bugs and grubs
and high quality feed and they're just living the rest life.
Speaker 3 (08:23):
So they those eggs are higher in I.
Speaker 2 (08:27):
Was said higher in cholesterol, but I flipped it around,
lower in cholesterol, higher in various vitamins. If you crack
a fresh egg into a skillet, the egg white for
a fresh egg is going to be stationary. It's not
going to run all over the skillet. The egg yolks
are more vibrant, and I don't know if you do
(08:48):
much baking. But I do, and it just makes like
a meringue more higher, like a higher meringue, or a
cookie more fluffy. It's so delicious. Like however, you can
have an egg. We could be like for scump over
here with how you're gonna have an egg, and it's
just delicious how you look at it.
Speaker 1 (09:03):
Okay, So Jen, you're a little girl, you're you're twelve
or thirteen years old. Did you ever envision that you
would be renting chickens for a living?
Speaker 2 (09:13):
Never in a million years, never, This is I mean,
I still can't believe it.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
And we're twelve years in Phil.
Speaker 4 (09:22):
No, not at all. In fact, I spent twenty years
in it. And for twenty years I could. I could
restore your entire email system, your your database, anything like that.
And then I was like, I'm done. This is too stressful.
I want something more relaxing. And then here comes rent
the chicken, and I get to play a chickens all
(09:43):
day long if I want.
Speaker 1 (09:44):
It's funny. So all right, let me piggyback that question.
So at twelve or thirteen, you couldn't imagine becoming a
chicken farmer. But what's the reaction of kids who are
twelve or thirteen, they have the opportunity to rent a chicken,
to actually have a chicken at something that they can
you know, what's their response.
Speaker 2 (10:04):
These kids go bananas. They have names for their chickens
when we get there. There's some kids that set up
like an obstacle course for their chickens to like jump
through hoops and hop on steps and various things, and
they just really take a lot of the children just
take the take to the chickens, and they don't know
why they didn't get to the chickens, like why did
(10:26):
we not get chickens before? Now we have one renter
in particular. And this was back when I was making deliveries,
and I don't make deliveries anymore. I'm very busy on
the phone and doing podcasts and stuff, you know. And
the mom gave me a heads up that her kiddoh
had autism and that she really wanted us to be
like a good learning experience for him to really connect
(10:48):
to something. And so I show up with the coop
and the chickens and give the tour around the coop.
And I started to say that you could just put
the clip in like part way. It's still very safe,
and she's like, no, no, fine motor skills. That clip
is going in all the way and he's gonna pull
it out. They named their chickens now I don't remember
everyone's chickens' names. They named those chickens Charlotte and Missus Feathers.
(11:11):
And while there, one of them was singing their egg song.
If you're not familiar, when a chicken is about the
lay an egg, lays an egg, or just laid an egg,
they do have a particular song. Bill could sing it
if you want. Sometimes it's loud, it's not as techno.
Speaker 1 (11:34):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (11:35):
So anyway, one of the chickens laid an egg, and
I had said too. I was like, hey, buddy, come
over here, you take a look. Let's just get in
here one more time. I want to see what's going
on in there. And he looked and saw the egg
and pulled the egg out and had appropriate emotions to
it all. And his mom I get so worked up
over this. His mom said, I've got I just got
(11:56):
my money's worth. You could actually take these chickens now
if you want. And that was years ago. They have
loads of chickens now. They still have chickens and big garden,
and then you.
Speaker 1 (12:05):
Start with two and then four and then chicken math.
Speaker 3 (12:07):
That's what it's called.
Speaker 1 (12:08):
What what do you mean? What do you mean math?
Speaker 3 (12:10):
Just like they're like potato chips. Can I've just won?
There's just like it's easy to just get more.
Speaker 1 (12:16):
Okay, well you know, yeah, well let me bounce off that.
So you know, obviously you can eat the eggs, but
hatch the egg you can actually have additional you're gonna
have baby chicks too.
Speaker 4 (12:27):
Yeah. So our hatching program is a five week program.
We do this at school's, daycare, senior care facilities, and libraries.
We bring an incubator with seven eggs. It takes three
weeks for them to incubate till they hatch, and we
provide a candling light that you shine up to the
eggs so you can see the baby chick moving and
growing and developing. And after it hatches, you move them
(12:48):
to a cage. You keep them in that cage for
two weeks. We provide the cage, the bedding, the food, feed, dish,
everything you need. We also provide a book. It's very educational.
Speaker 1 (12:59):
This is like real life and raising kids was this complicated?
Speaker 3 (13:02):
So we make it so easy.
Speaker 4 (13:04):
Oh, it is so easy. People that have never hatched
chickens before are successful the very first time with our program.
And this is how impactful this is. I was at
a senior care facility and I remember this this lady
that she must have been eighty or ninety years old,
and she said, I remember hatching chickens with my grandfather
(13:28):
when I was around ten years old. Now, this lady
probably doesn't even remember what she had for lunch that day,
but long term memory remembers. And she started naming off
the names of her chickens that she hatched and all
this stuff. Homestead ray Lee, who's our Nashville affiliate. She
she went into a facility, gave a presentation, talked about
(13:51):
the incubator and everything to twenty or thirty seniors there,
and this one lady kept on asking her specific questions
and talk to her and stuff like that. When Homestead
ray Lee was leaving that facility, one of the staff
members walked up to her and said, you know what
the lady that you were talking to. Oh, yeah, she
remembered she has been here for three months and this
(14:13):
was the first time that she spoke.
Speaker 1 (14:16):
Wow, because it goes back to the long term when
she was a child, yet impactful.
Speaker 4 (14:21):
And then and then with our kids, right, they're learning
so much. We do a good job as a society
to make sure that our animals are our spade and neutered,
so we don't really see the birth of anything, right,
And so for them to sit there and be able
to watch a baby chick come out of the egg
is just so special and they get to learn. We
(14:42):
have teachers that they go through this entire stem course, right,
the science portion of what's happening, the technology of the
incubator that we're using, even the math. Right. We have
teachers that are weighing the eggs every day and they're
having the kids record what they see. So this is
really a way of hands on education for these kids.
Speaker 3 (15:06):
And then what happens at the end of the five
week rentals.
Speaker 4 (15:08):
Everything comes backs to the farm, right, so that the
teacher doesn't have to figure out what do I do
with all these chicks? Right?
Speaker 1 (15:15):
Or sometimes the ones that people rent are generally their hens.
Speaker 4 (15:21):
Right, there's all.
Speaker 2 (15:21):
Two different programs. Rent the chicken, are hens, hatch the chicken.
It's like the what came first? Right, So with rented chicken,
the hens come first and then the eggs. With hatch
the chicken, the eggs come first, and then the chickens.
Speaker 1 (15:32):
What about roosters, because that's a whole different.
Speaker 2 (15:34):
We don't rent any roosters. It's not necessary. Roosters are
very necessary. They have their place, Like we couldn't do
hatch the chicken without their fertilization of the eggs. But
someone who has rent the chicken and has a couple hens,
they don't need a rooster. The hens are going to
lay the eggs whether there's a rooster around or not,
right right, Ye.
Speaker 1 (15:52):
Yeah. My sister had a farm in Glen Rock, PA,
which is just outside of Baltimore maybe you know where
that is. And they got a rooster and they thought
they had to put the rooster back in so they
would chase this rooster around the because they were renting.
If they were rental farmers, they had a farm, but
they started and so it was like and then the
(16:13):
actual farmer who lives next door, dang doong. The rooster
will go back into the roost when it's called a
roost for a reason. They that's right, Yeah, that's right. Yeah,
I don't know this.
Speaker 4 (16:23):
Is where our programs really fall in because so many
people start to have chickens and they don't know what
they're doing right. They might buy the wrong coop, they
might buy the wrong feed, they might buy the wrong
kind of chickens. There are different types of chickens. There
are some chickens that you can find at the farm
store that they are specifically made for meat, and if
you don't butcher them after sixteen weeks, they'll just die.
(16:46):
Oh wow, they'll have a heart attacker. So you have
to know what you're buying, and then you have to
go through the process. We make it so easy when
we roll this coop because this portable, it'scott wheels. We
roll this into your back yard. By the next day
you've got eggs. You don't have to think about what
breed of chickens to buy because there's so many breeds.
(17:08):
I have people all the time. They call up and
they say, what breeds do you have? And while that's
an important question, I usually asked the follow up question,
what breeds are you interested in? And most customers aren't.
They don't know what they do.
Speaker 1 (17:23):
They don't know, so then I.
Speaker 4 (17:25):
Start talking about the black Austro warps, the buff Orpington's
the well summers right, Oh, everybody knows them. They're only
good for the summer. No, I'm just I'm just I'm
cracking the yolks.
Speaker 3 (17:37):
Summery chickens.
Speaker 2 (17:39):
Well, when I when I get asked, I kind of
just say, oh, most of our chickens lay brown eggs.
Sometimes we have hens that lay a bluish green egg.
They're also just as delicious as the brown egg. They're
just beautiful in the egg carton. And I say, we
make sure we pair up chickens that get along. They're
friendly to humans, they're friendly to each other, and we
(18:01):
do our best to make sure you can tell them apart.
That's really what they need. That's what they want to know.
They don't know much about breeds. They just feel like, oh,
I should know about chicken breeds, you know. So we're
and we'll let them know what the breeds are when
we deliver.
Speaker 4 (18:12):
Yeah, we educate them on delivery what they have, and
they get they're so excited all day long.
Speaker 1 (18:19):
You gotta warm me. We have a chicken pun You
are you need you need to.
Speaker 4 (18:25):
Get you were not going to be in a foul
mood around me.
Speaker 1 (18:30):
Oh, God, All right, do you work with any charities?
Speaker 2 (18:34):
Oh, we have worked locally with a drug and alcohol
rehab center, and I think COVID times kind of broke
our relationship, not for any reason. Then life was complicated then,
but we for sure would donate a rental coup to
the to the facility so that the residents could have
(18:56):
a job.
Speaker 4 (18:57):
Okay, So we also have this program called called Chicken
Poop Bingo. So we bring out.
Speaker 1 (19:04):
This so it's like donkeys. It's like like donkey, they
have donkey bingo.
Speaker 4 (19:11):
Yes, so we we've got this this bingo card and
we put chickens in there.
Speaker 1 (19:16):
You could rent a chicken, some chickens or a chicken
for a day for a charity event.
Speaker 4 (19:22):
Yes, and and and in most cases we don't even charge.
But we we bring this this bingo card and they
with a poop on your number, you win, right. So
we did this for toys for Pittsburgh Tykes. Yeah, and
we raised over six hundred dollars on one bingo game.
Speaker 2 (19:39):
Now bingo card, it is four by four foot. It's
not like chickens need to have a space to you know.
Speaker 4 (19:46):
And we've also done this, we all do. We've also
done this for schools that are raising money for various events. Uh.
Speaker 2 (19:54):
And that's not posted on our website. It's just something
that we can.
Speaker 4 (19:57):
We just do it.
Speaker 2 (19:57):
If someone calls and can you come to our well,
this is These are some of the things we could do.
We did it at that Pittsburgh Home and Garden show recently,
not for a fundraiser, just for.
Speaker 1 (20:06):
Fun, just for fun, so people can see what it's like.
All right, So I asked you, do you remember your
first customer? And it ended up being your your mother's friend.
That's right. Do you remember your first affiliate?
Speaker 3 (20:17):
Oh, for sure. I would love to tell the story.
Speaker 4 (20:19):
Yes.
Speaker 2 (20:19):
So, so we live in a small rural community.
Speaker 3 (20:24):
We don't have a big, big farm.
Speaker 1 (20:25):
We have a little homestown, don't live downtown.
Speaker 2 (20:27):
We don't live downtown, but we live in We still
live in a community. And at the time it was
twenty fourteen, we had coops lined up, chickens are being trained,
making sure they're getting along and laying. And this teenager
walks by with some dogs and no, there's not a
lot of people who walk by. It is small and rural.
(20:47):
And he said, oh, I have some chickens. What are
you doing here? What do you have going on? So
I talk about, you know, my elevator pitch that we
don't We hadn't been in business even a year, but
I had I had it down.
Speaker 3 (21:00):
And he's like, oh, you that's interesting.
Speaker 1 (21:02):
You had it in your mind that it's going to expand.
Speaker 3 (21:06):
This random kid is like walked up.
Speaker 2 (21:08):
And so then same kid calls the next day and
he's like, you might not remember me.
Speaker 4 (21:13):
I'm brad, we remember you.
Speaker 3 (21:14):
I was walking the dogs yesterday. How many people? How
many people does he think?
Speaker 2 (21:20):
That's a young teenage kid walking by and talk to
me that I don't remember, you know? And he said,
I would like to make an appointment to come over
and talk more about your business. And I was like,
I don't think anyone has ever made an appointment with me.
What time is good for you? I think, I said.
So he came over with his legal pad. He was fifteen,
came over with his legal pad. His aunt lived up
(21:41):
the road from us. So he was walking from his
aunt's house.
Speaker 4 (21:44):
Just going for ard Jersey, okay.
Speaker 2 (21:46):
And he said I would like to do this. And
I said, I think we'd like to meet with you
and your parents. Yeah, And so his parents were on board,
and that's how the affiliate first.
Speaker 4 (21:57):
As was a fifteen year old from New Jersey and
the reason why we started saying that we answer all
the calls for all of our affiliates for sales and support.
The original reason for that was because we were worried
about a fifteen year old answering the phone with our
name right and our business. And also he's at school
(22:17):
during the day, right, so people call and say, hey,
can I talk with Homestead Brad And we'd be like, well,
he's busy right now, he has an appointment, isn't a meeting?
Speaker 5 (22:26):
It really was like in Matthie, he's in gym.
Speaker 2 (22:30):
I'm sorry because every one of our pages on our
website shows who is delivering home said really homestaid Brad
Home said Bertie, Like all of them shows.
Speaker 1 (22:41):
So that they think I'm still doing it.
Speaker 3 (22:43):
He is not. He graduated college by now, he lives
in Texas.
Speaker 2 (22:46):
He's doing great work. Like so I wrote him a
recommendation to get into call.
Speaker 1 (22:50):
Oh that's amazing, yeah, amazing. Yeah. So we want to
become part of the rent the Chicken family. Your your
family for life, that's right, your family.
Speaker 4 (22:59):
If you adopt your chickens. At the end of the season,
we say that we are your chicken friends for life.
It doesn't matter if you got chickens from somebody else,
you hashed your own where it came from. If you
have questions, you give us a call.
Speaker 1 (23:14):
You must have some crazy stories.
Speaker 3 (23:16):
Though, so many crazy stories.
Speaker 1 (23:18):
What's your go to what are some of selling your
go to stories?
Speaker 3 (23:21):
I don't know that you'll have to use that. What's
it called.
Speaker 2 (23:27):
Up?
Speaker 4 (23:28):
Yes? Which one do you want to talk about?
Speaker 2 (23:31):
Oh?
Speaker 3 (23:31):
I was going to talk about the one we're not
supposed to talk about.
Speaker 4 (23:33):
Oh, you can talk about that one now you have to.
So so.
Speaker 3 (23:41):
We have.
Speaker 4 (23:42):
We had a farmer at the time, Harry Homestead, Harry Stoddard.
He actually wrote a great book called Real Dirt If
you are really into soil and stuff like that, amazing stuff.
And so he became a one of our And so
(24:03):
a windstorm came through. Now he was up in Ontario.
Windstorm came through and he had an outbuilding that was
probably seventy five feet by two hunred feet. It got
lifted up by this wind and moved over three feet. Okay,
so this windstorm had just come through and adjuster was
coming out. In the meantime, we get a phone call.
This person that he had just delivered to maybe a
(24:23):
week ago, had a chicken that passed away. And that happens, right.
Sometimes chickens just die for no reason at all. We
don't know why. They could have had a heart attack.
I literally watched one have a stroke one time in
front of me, and I could tell it had one.
Speaker 2 (24:37):
Chickens also hide their illnesses, so it's real hard to
tell if they're really sick until.
Speaker 3 (24:42):
It's too late.
Speaker 1 (24:43):
Most men, you can't tell they're really sick.
Speaker 3 (24:47):
It's too late.
Speaker 4 (24:48):
So we get this phone call the chicken had passed
away and homestead Jen, what's your go to line for
when a chickens?
Speaker 3 (24:55):
I mean, I'm so sorry to hear. Did the children see?
Speaker 1 (24:58):
Like?
Speaker 2 (24:58):
I am compassionate because I know that it is a
tough tough thing, you know, to have this pet with
the name that pass and you won't expecting, like go
out and you don't expect it. So we don't have
like a lot of chickens that pass. But in this
case called they're devastated. They've had them a week. I'm
so sorry they've had them a week. The children I
(25:21):
don't think, did see? And then can someone come today
to take care of the chicken? Now we don't usually
like if the chicken passes, there are some steps you
can bury, can bury her if you'd like.
Speaker 3 (25:34):
No, you don't know why I died, Johnny, you don't
know why I died. You don't want to. And so
I was like, or you can put her curbside.
Speaker 4 (25:44):
A nice way of saying, put it in the garbage.
Speaker 2 (25:47):
Yeah, but in Ontario they have green bins, which is
for composting, like so that the chicken, Oh, my gosh,
very offended. I can't possibly put insert whatever her name
might depend.
Speaker 3 (26:02):
Yeah, at the curb. Oh, I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry.
Can someone please come?
Speaker 4 (26:08):
So you reached out to homestead Harry Hill.
Speaker 2 (26:10):
And meanwhile he's like, my outbuilding is like shifted off
the foundation.
Speaker 4 (26:14):
I'm a little busy.
Speaker 2 (26:15):
Yeah, And he said, listen, have her buy a shovel.
I'll send her ten bucks. And I was like, I'm
not offering the lady a shovel like at all, and
he and in jest he wasn't going to buy her
a shovel. He also said, just have her put in
a freezer. My wife will be there in a week.
(26:36):
He shall be in the staving of the week, because
he did contact a friend see if they could come.
It's just not something that we usually that we usually do,
like if.
Speaker 4 (26:46):
That windstorm hadn't come through. He absolutely you would have.
Speaker 2 (26:49):
Yeah, went and been compassionate and so so I you
are welcome to bury the chicken. That's no problem. I
know it was your pet. We will have a replacement
chicken for you soon, probably next week, and we're very sorry.
Speaker 4 (27:03):
This said, but the chicken needs for the burial, needs
needs something better than this.
Speaker 1 (27:09):
Oh.
Speaker 2 (27:10):
She is like, I'm not just gonna I'm not just
gonna put her in a box and put her on
the curb. Oh okay, So then she said, how about
I put her in the freezer till you get here. Listen,
that chicken died of I don't know what. I'm not
putting it next to like other chicken, you know what
I mean?
Speaker 5 (27:30):
Ye?
Speaker 3 (27:31):
So right she did.
Speaker 2 (27:33):
She wrapped it up, put in her freezer. Home, said,
Sylvia came by the next week and I was like,
for crying out loud, Sylvia, do not just take a box.
She is real offended. Where I suggest she put her
in a boxing. Yeah, bring a cooler, collect the chicken there.
We want to be compassionate and kind.
Speaker 1 (27:52):
You know, most people aren't this sensitive, right, I.
Speaker 3 (27:55):
Really try, really try to be and so I wanted
her to.
Speaker 2 (27:58):
Not do not just show up at the box. She
was real offended when I suggest that she put her
in a box.
Speaker 4 (28:03):
So she got the chicken put in the cooler. I
have no idea what happened afterwards.
Speaker 1 (28:09):
Yeah, there's no such thing as a chicken. Hearse, you're
not going to back.
Speaker 3 (28:13):
Up, So we we do.
Speaker 2 (28:16):
We don't want people to have chickens that die, you know,
but we do. We also Yeah, we also don't charge
enough to make multiple trips if something's happening, you know,
And so we we put it on the renter if
something happens that they take care of.
Speaker 1 (28:31):
Most of the people who are interested, what are they
They just do it for the summertime.
Speaker 2 (28:35):
Or yeah, it's so crazy. We thought people would just
do it for the summer. But people either adopt at
the end, or they can chicken out. Of course, but
they can adopt, or they can pay us to winter
their chickens and then they don't have to deal with
frozen water or going outside. It's more about the chicken tender.
The person doesn't want to be and they get their
chickens back.
Speaker 3 (28:55):
And they can rent them again. How do you know
which there's bad?
Speaker 4 (29:00):
Yeah, leg bands that have their color coded and they're numbered.
Speaker 1 (29:05):
And only chickens do you rent in any given summer?
Speaker 3 (29:10):
Too many a lot of.
Speaker 4 (29:11):
In the Pittsburgh area. It can be as many as
two hundred birds and just Pittsburgh. Now multiply that by
our thirty farmers throughout the United States and Canada, and
you can kind of do the chicken math there.
Speaker 2 (29:21):
And I want to say, one winter, we wintered like
seventy hens. Yes, that was a lot and doesn't like
to go outside in the winter, let alone chicken ten.
Speaker 4 (29:30):
Yeah, we have we have a deal that if they're wintered,
she has to take care of them the winter.
Speaker 1 (29:35):
That's you.
Speaker 3 (29:36):
I've become the winter chicken.
Speaker 4 (29:37):
I take care of them all summer. It's her job
for the winter.
Speaker 2 (29:41):
I also asked that he do the dishes because I'm
taking care of the chickens. But I'm not sure that
actually come.
Speaker 1 (29:46):
Through ever in your imagination that you would be doing this.
Speaker 4 (29:51):
No, not at all. Never, I never knew that we
were going to be the co founders of the largest
chicken rental company in the world.
Speaker 3 (29:58):
Rent the Chicken, I Rent the Chicken dot Com.
Speaker 1 (30:01):
Okay, all right, So is there anything else that we
didn't cover that you want people to know?
Speaker 2 (30:08):
Sure, I would like to just say we are always
looking to egg spand I didn't put my hand up
for you. Sorry, I didn't give you the heads up.
Speaker 1 (30:15):
And yeah, So if someone wants to become an affiliate,
what do they do?
Speaker 2 (30:20):
They'll go to rent chicken dot com. There's a link
that says become an affiliate. There's some parameters that we're
looking for. We are looking for someone that maybe is
entrepreneurial in spirit, has some chickens, and wants to have
an additional revenue stream outside of their hobby farm or
their regular job.
Speaker 4 (30:40):
And each of our farmers gets a fifty mile territory.
So like right now, we don't have anybody in like Orlando,
for instance, so Orlando, New Mexico, we don't have anybody
right now the Sacramento area, Seattle. So we're looking for
people to join us where we don't already have a location.
Speaker 2 (31:03):
And who makes the coops? Where do you get back Oh,
that's a great question. When we first started, we had
coop plans and the affiliates built their own. But we
we have partnered with our Amish friend Levi, who is
near Smicksburg, Pennsylvania, and he builds our coops. The three
of us Homestead Phil, myself, and Levi, who we don't
call homestead Levi because he's just Levi. And so we
(31:27):
designed the coop to ship flat in a box, and
so we could ship a palette of these coops to
our new affiliates so that they can get started with
coops right away without needing to. When we first started,
I built fifty four chicken coops under a canopy in
our front yard the first year, and I was actually
a manufacturing facility that rented out some chickens.
Speaker 4 (31:47):
We found out that if you were building coops, you
weren't marketing, and if you're marketing, you weren't building coops,
so we had to outsource that pretty quick.
Speaker 1 (31:54):
That is crazy.
Speaker 2 (31:55):
Yeah, So Levi has the ability to build these coops.
They can be shipped flat and then assemble than like
forty five minutes.
Speaker 4 (32:01):
That also gives us the ability to ship a coop
anywhere in the country. And we can even now get this.
We can ship you chickens. So if we don't have
a farmer in say North Dakota, we don't have abody there,
but you want chickens, we can drop ship you coop
and a week later we will drop ship you chickens.
Speaker 5 (32:21):
With the support of rent the chicken with so the chicken,
the males chickens, Yes, yes.
Speaker 4 (32:28):
Get out, yeah, the usps if it fits the ships.
Speaker 1 (32:34):
Do you guys love what you do?
Speaker 4 (32:36):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (32:38):
Yes, I was supposed to say yes, yes, absolutely. We
really enjoy helping people through the years. It has been overwhelming.
But to to offset that, we do subcontract like LEVI,
I don't build coops anymore. We have a driver for
hatch the chicken locally, so Phill's not driving. We have
a teenager who cleans the hatch chicken coop. So if
(33:01):
the first days were hard, there's a lot of blood,
sweat and tears and to rent the chicken, but the
payout's been wonderful. We get to really meet a lot
of great people. I have right now two part timers
that helped me on the phone, So that's why I'm
able to be here. And we have all of our
affiliate partners who are crushing at making dreams come true.
Speaker 4 (33:18):
When we first started our business, like any entrepreneur, you're
always trying to you're hustling, right. I actually, in twenty
fifteen drove Uber because we weren't making enough money with
our business and we wanted our business to keep doing
so I would work, we'd both work all day long,
and in the evening, I'd jump in the car do
(33:38):
some runs. I'd be like, Okay, tonight, I need to
make one hundred dollars in my pocket to make ends meet.
And I would go out and I would do that,
and then maybe the next week I'd have to do
the same thing. When we started our business and we
were building those fifty four chicken coops, well who also
was okay when she was building those and we needed supplies.
We would literally have to deliver those coops to get
(34:03):
capital to be able to go back to lows and
buy more materials to build more coops to make the
deliveries the next week.
Speaker 2 (34:11):
Man our truck was so small and croddy, and we
couldn't haul all of our supplies in one trip. We'd
have to make two trips, and then we didn't have
a saw that was good enough, so we'd have to
like swing by my mom's house. My stepdad would rip
those two by fours and half for me. Like it
was a it was a lot of steps to get
it done.
Speaker 4 (34:27):
I would literally deliver chickens and take that cash and
go to Low's and load up the truck.
Speaker 3 (34:32):
As much as we could without breaking that little pickup.
Speaker 4 (34:34):
Truck because we didn't have enough money to drive back
to Lows because of you know gas.
Speaker 5 (34:38):
Did you eat a lot of eggs that first year? Well,
we have since also eaten a lot of eggs.
Speaker 2 (34:45):
But at the same time, you know, we're doing this,
this outsourcing, We're working with these amazing affiliate partners. We
are invested, and we do love helping people. Even in
the early early times, I was Phil was still working
inn It part time. I was out making hatch chicken
(35:05):
deliveries in that little Creddy, little blue pickup truck. And
for scale, it was like a micro truck, but it's
a five speed and it kind of sat close to
the ground, but it fit.
Speaker 4 (35:17):
It was the model before the Tacoma. It was literally
the Toyota pickup pickup was the model. I think I
think some Japanese guy said to American what is this
and the American just said it's a pickup, So that's
what they named it.
Speaker 2 (35:28):
So I was out there and making doing all this stuff.
I'm answering the phone because I'm the phone support. I'm
accepting order. I pull over accept an order from Canada,
I remember. And then Phil calls and he's like, I
think I'd like to quit my job.
Speaker 3 (35:43):
Oh my gosh, that's like, what's helping us fund this
whole thing? You know, I don't think.
Speaker 2 (35:47):
And I was like, I'm gonna have to call you
back because I really needed like an employee.
Speaker 1 (35:53):
Yeah, you know.
Speaker 2 (35:54):
And I was like, Okay, if you're gonna do this,
I need you tomorrow to deliver five hatch that chickens
and give three presentations to fourth grade classrooms. Are you
in yeah, And he's like, if you need it, I'll
do it.
Speaker 3 (36:07):
Yes, I need.
Speaker 2 (36:08):
I need to be able to stay home and answer
the phone because it's hard to do all the things
at the same time, you know.
Speaker 1 (36:14):
So what's the future. What's the future? Just sell stock
and have you know, being on the dal Jones and
the rent the chickens.
Speaker 4 (36:21):
So I I whenever I tell my wife an idea.
I'll have one hundred ideas. I only tell her one
because it might be overwhelming.
Speaker 3 (36:32):
This last one is getting busy for twelve years.
Speaker 4 (36:37):
But my goal is to set up hatching centers in
third world countries to hatch chickens to support local missionaries
that are providing the gospel. So right now I have
incubator equipment in Panama and Costa Rica. My next stop
(36:58):
was actually going to be in Cuba and may just
delivering these larger incubators and setting up global hatcheries again
to support the local missionaries there that are spreading the gospel.
So that's that is one of the next steps. The
other thing that I want to do, and this is
overwhelming for her, I want to partner with someone in Europe.
(37:22):
Maybe they're in France, maybe they're in Hungary, maybe they're
in wherever, somewhere in the European Union, and I want
to duplicate what we've done here in the United States.
And I want to partner with that person to set
up a phone center that's multi lingual that is able
to have affiliate farmers all over Europe. Because that European market,
(37:48):
I mean there's over seven hundred and fifty million people there.
It's larger than the United States and Canada combined. So
let's let's also do that duplication there. Also want to
partner with somebody in Australia because I think I believe
that if we can get into the Sydney, if we
can get into those larger those larger areas, because they
(38:11):
speak English, we can also support them from the United States.
Might have to pick up another couple employees, but that's that.
That's kind of Spain.
Speaker 2 (38:23):
But the.
Speaker 4 (38:26):
Big vision here is to break out of the United
States and Canada and to continue to grow and to
also set up these global hatching centers in third world countries.
Speaker 2 (38:36):
And right now the global hatching centers are not rent
The Chicken affiliated. This that Phil had a vision of
being able to go and take an incubator the first
one you smuggled an incubator into Cuba, the first time
he decided to.
Speaker 4 (38:49):
Take twenty fifteen or twenty sixteen.
Speaker 2 (38:51):
Yeah, maybe, well maybe not that long ago, but at
any rate, he no joke, of all the places that
you want to smuggle sof into, you don't want to
do Cuba. I would think that's not like your jump
spot right.
Speaker 4 (39:05):
I made half the first time again.
Speaker 2 (39:07):
And the brilliance of it, and I didn't see the
vision necessarily. The brilliance of it is he's taking this
incubator so that there's better food securities in these areas
that don't have it, and it's creating jobs because they
are then raising more chickens to either lay eggs or
to eat and then or to lay fertile eggs and
put more eggs in the incubator, and then they're able
to sell these eggs or sell these chickens, or.
Speaker 4 (39:30):
Or raise these chickens and then give them to a
family that's in need for either egg or eggs or meat.
Speaker 2 (39:37):
Or to start their own little business of selling some
eggs too and so and so to be able to
have them in these areas. Again, it's not right now
associated with rented chicken. It's just homestead Phil who is
really passionate about helping people so that they can have
a business and have some food, some more food than
(39:59):
what they had previously. So that this is great. I
keep saying where are you going next? Like I just
can't keep up, you know, I'm sorry short, when are
you going? I just lose track.
Speaker 4 (40:09):
Sometimes on the schedules Cuba, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Brazil.
Speaker 1 (40:15):
What when sounds like a homestead Phil tour, It's busy Rwanda.
Speaker 3 (40:21):
I think that's like five of your plant. Is that
the that's not twenty twenty five? I don't know between.
Speaker 1 (40:29):
This has been absolutely a blast. Thank you so much
for spending time and telling us everything Rent the Chicken.
Speaker 2 (40:35):
Is there anything we left out Rent the Chicken dot
Com or all over the socials. Just search for Rent
the Chicken. I like to say that our middle name
is the not A, and we don't use any hyphens,
so we're really easy to find.
Speaker 1 (40:46):
Rent the Chicken, Jen, Phil, thank you so much. This
has been an absolute blast, Thank you, thank you. This
has been the CEOs you should Know podcast showcasing businesses
that are driving our regional economy, part of iHeartMedia's commitment
to the communities. Sir, I'm Johnny Heartwell, thank you so
much for listening. M
And welcome in. This is the CEO's You Should Know podcast.
I'm your host, Johnny Hartwell, let's say hello to the
CEOs of Rented Chicken, Pill and Jen Tompkins. Thank you
for being with me. Happy to be here. So going
through my head all day long, I gotta know what
(00:25):
is rented Chicken.
Speaker 2 (00:26):
We give people a chance to try out having backyard
hens for fresh eggs without the long term commitment, and
if it's not a good fit, they can chicken out.
Speaker 1 (00:36):
Hold on, hold up, So how much what do you get?
Do you get the feed and you get the coop
and everything.
Speaker 2 (00:44):
Yeah, it's like a five to six month rental, usually
spring until fall. We provide a chicken coop that's portable
with the feed, two to four egg laying hens, and
instruction sheet, a book, and friends to call chicken friends
if you have any questions.
Speaker 1 (00:59):
Who does this? Who rents the chicken? Who are the
type of people who rent the chicken?
Speaker 2 (01:04):
It is so crazy. We thought, you know, we're in
the greater Pittsburgh area. We thought it was just going
to be like the tech guys from Google who wanted
to rent chickens. But actually it is a whole gamut
of people, mainly people who want.
Speaker 3 (01:17):
To have a food source that's closer to their table.
Speaker 2 (01:20):
But other people are doing it because their grandkids come
over a lot, or they're looking to do something else.
And during the COVID times, everyone was at home for
the same people, sorry, for the same reason. People were
adding decks and adding pools. They were getting chickens because
they wanted something else to do while they were at home.
Speaker 1 (01:38):
But do you have schools or maybe camps do this
as well.
Speaker 2 (01:41):
We do have some that participated in rent the chicken.
We also have a Hatch the Chicken program, which is spectacular.
It's a five week catching program where our renters have
an incubator that we provide. The commitment is minimal, adding
some water. They can look for signs of life with
this light that we provide, so it's like an ultrasound
on the eggs.
Speaker 1 (02:00):
And so you're the largest, You're the world's largest rent
a chicken facility, aren't you?
Speaker 3 (02:05):
Chicken rental service? We like to say we're most high tech.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
We are like the cleanex of chicken rentals, if you will,
because we're not like people talk about chicken rentals and
they just say rent the chicken just like you say,
could I have a cleanex no matter what the brand is.
Speaker 1 (02:19):
And you're you're not only nationwide, you're worldwide, you're international international.
Speaker 4 (02:24):
Yes, we've got affiliate farmers in Canada and Ontario, Alberta
and British Columbia right now. And we're always eggspanding.
Speaker 1 (02:33):
How many chicken puns do you guys know?
Speaker 3 (02:36):
Oh, ab a bazilla.
Speaker 1 (02:37):
I've this is gonna be painful.
Speaker 3 (02:42):
It's always cracking people up, all.
Speaker 1 (02:45):
Right, So where'd you come up with this idea? Who
came up with the idea? Oh?
Speaker 3 (02:50):
My goodness? This home Sead fills the visionary of the group.
Speaker 2 (02:52):
And we met when we lived outside of Baltimore, Maryland,
and wanted to move to the country. So from the
city to the country, were making that move, and we
were both working from home before it was cool and
I knew my job was coming to an end. And
I happened to have a degree in small business and
entrepreneurship from a long time ago, and so we were like, well,
(03:16):
we should start a business. Oh yeah, cause that sounds
like what you want to do, like on a Tuesday,
And so he was just like scrolling on his device
late at night and what did you search for?
Speaker 4 (03:26):
I was just laying in the bed scrolling on the phone,
and I searched for crazy business ideas, and of all places,
the SBA dot gov website. So talking about astration, that's right,
talked about a bunch of different crazy business ideas and
one of them was chicken rentals.
Speaker 2 (03:42):
So so then he looked at me and said, you
want to rent some chickens? And by that time, again
we'd already moved from the country to from the from
the city to the country. He wanted all these things
with homesteading, having backyard hens and having a big garden
and various I was like, you are crazy, I don't
think so we already had chickens by then, and I said, well,
(04:03):
I know how to work the power tools. I could
build some coops. We have some chickens.
Speaker 3 (04:07):
Sure, why not? And here we are. I was in
twenty thirteen, all right.
Speaker 1 (04:12):
To where was your and who was your first customer?
Speaker 3 (04:15):
Oh my goodness.
Speaker 2 (04:16):
So we before we even started the website, we asked,
do you know anyone who would do this? Do you
know I know five friends, I know everybody was I'm
so excited, excited, And then we built some prototype coops
had chickens paired up. We went back to those same people, Okay,
could someone do this, No, we're free, no please, research
and development, no one, no one. My mom's friend finally
(04:38):
said yes, and my mom might have paid her. I
don't know, probably, And so her name is Jody and
she was in Indiana County, Pennsylvania, and said she would
do it. We took her a summer portable chicken coop
with two hens. She named them Laverne and Shirley.
Speaker 3 (04:56):
Nice.
Speaker 2 (04:57):
Yeah, yeah, And so we quickly learned learned that she
was like, this coop isn't good for me to keep
the chickens. We just thought people were going to rent
them for this summer. We had no idea anyone who
was renting chickens would want to keep them in through
the way.
Speaker 4 (05:09):
You wanted to adopt at the end.
Speaker 1 (05:10):
Well, yeah, yeah, once you you know, be puplish. Yeah,
the family. We didn't realize that got name. You know,
you can't you can't have Laverne and not have Shirley.
Speaker 4 (05:19):
That was our research and development year, and we learned
a lot.
Speaker 2 (05:24):
So the local newspaper called and they said.
Speaker 3 (05:29):
I hear you're renting chickens. Where all do you have customers?
Speaker 4 (05:33):
Never had one. She didn't pay us Indiana County.
Speaker 3 (05:38):
I just said the whole Dan County, Indiana County.
Speaker 2 (05:41):
And so that that reporter met up with us at
Jodie's to meet Laverne and Shirley to meet us. We
we had a terrible coop sign that was very homemade
and handcrafted by yours truly, and we did not have
rented Chicken.
Speaker 4 (05:57):
Apparel or logo at that point.
Speaker 3 (05:59):
Right we it was.
Speaker 2 (06:02):
It was fantastic for what it was, but as we
look back on it, my goodness, we had a lot
to learn.
Speaker 1 (06:07):
Right, So where's the business now?
Speaker 2 (06:09):
Yeah, So we have partnered with affiliate charmers across the
United States and Canada. They do wear their rent the
Chicken shirts proud, They sticker their trucks, and they provide
deliveries locally. Both rent the Chicken deliveries and hatch the
Chicken deliveries. And we handle all of the calls and
the sales calls and the support calls at what we
(06:29):
now dubbed ourselves rent the Chicken Headquarters, which is really
just like me and my small home office on video
chat with my part timers.
Speaker 1 (06:38):
All Right, let's get down to the chicken feed. Okay,
So somebody says, all right, I'm interested. What's the process
of getting the chickens.
Speaker 3 (06:45):
Great question.
Speaker 2 (06:46):
We accept a deposit and then we get the coops
pruced up and pair up the chickens, make sure we
have the feed. We'll make a delivery for most areas,
we're planning on May delivery, but we deliver in April
and in we provide a chicken keeping book called Fresh
Eggs Daily by LESA Steal. That's the one we supply
in the United States. And then we set a date,
(07:09):
we come on out, we bring the chickens, We give
a tutorial, either on video tutorial or in person, answer
any questions and poof someone is an instant chicken farmer.
Speaker 1 (07:20):
That's fun.
Speaker 3 (07:21):
Chicken tender if you will.
Speaker 2 (07:22):
And.
Speaker 1 (07:24):
So you get to keep all the eggs that you get.
How many eggs does like one chicken hatcht anywhere like four.
Speaker 4 (07:30):
So each chicken that you have lays about an egg
a day, so they'll lay for six days and they'll
take the seventh day off. So two birds will give
you about a dozen eggs a week, four birds about
two dozen eggs a week.
Speaker 1 (07:41):
Really do they really take the day off?
Speaker 4 (07:43):
Yes?
Speaker 1 (07:43):
Really, yes, really, some of them just sometimes.
Speaker 4 (07:46):
They'll do like eight days in a row or nine
days in a row. But a chickens reproductive cycle is
about once every twenty eight to thirty two hours.
Speaker 1 (07:55):
And what's the difference between the eggs that your chickens
lay compared to maybe a the eggs that you buy
in the in the grocery store.
Speaker 3 (08:02):
Sure, so.
Speaker 2 (08:04):
Aside from most times color, But if if you were
to have a chicken the lad of white egg in
your backyard and a chicken the lad of brown egg
in your backyard, those eggs but taste the same, okay,
But the difference is how a chicken is raised and
ours have access to fresh air and bugs and grubs
and high quality feed and they're just living the rest life.
Speaker 3 (08:23):
So they those eggs are higher in I.
Speaker 2 (08:27):
Was said higher in cholesterol, but I flipped it around,
lower in cholesterol, higher in various vitamins. If you crack
a fresh egg into a skillet, the egg white for
a fresh egg is going to be stationary. It's not
going to run all over the skillet. The egg yolks
are more vibrant, and I don't know if you do
(08:48):
much baking. But I do, and it just makes like
a meringue more higher, like a higher meringue, or a
cookie more fluffy. It's so delicious. Like however, you can
have an egg. We could be like for scump over
here with how you're gonna have an egg, and it's
just delicious how you look at it.
Speaker 1 (09:03):
Okay, So Jen, you're a little girl, you're you're twelve
or thirteen years old. Did you ever envision that you
would be renting chickens for a living?
Speaker 2 (09:13):
Never in a million years, never, This is I mean,
I still can't believe it.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
And we're twelve years in Phil.
Speaker 4 (09:22):
No, not at all. In fact, I spent twenty years
in it. And for twenty years I could. I could
restore your entire email system, your your database, anything like that.
And then I was like, I'm done. This is too stressful.
I want something more relaxing. And then here comes rent
the chicken, and I get to play a chickens all
(09:43):
day long if I want.
Speaker 1 (09:44):
It's funny. So all right, let me piggyback that question.
So at twelve or thirteen, you couldn't imagine becoming a
chicken farmer. But what's the reaction of kids who are
twelve or thirteen, they have the opportunity to rent a chicken,
to actually have a chicken at something that they can
you know, what's their response.
Speaker 2 (10:04):
These kids go bananas. They have names for their chickens
when we get there. There's some kids that set up
like an obstacle course for their chickens to like jump
through hoops and hop on steps and various things, and
they just really take a lot of the children just
take the take to the chickens, and they don't know
why they didn't get to the chickens, like why did
(10:26):
we not get chickens before? Now we have one renter
in particular. And this was back when I was making deliveries,
and I don't make deliveries anymore. I'm very busy on
the phone and doing podcasts and stuff, you know. And
the mom gave me a heads up that her kiddoh
had autism and that she really wanted us to be
like a good learning experience for him to really connect
(10:48):
to something. And so I show up with the coop
and the chickens and give the tour around the coop.
And I started to say that you could just put
the clip in like part way. It's still very safe,
and she's like, no, no, fine motor skills. That clip
is going in all the way and he's gonna pull
it out. They named their chickens now I don't remember
everyone's chickens' names. They named those chickens Charlotte and Missus Feathers.
(11:11):
And while there, one of them was singing their egg song.
If you're not familiar, when a chicken is about the
lay an egg, lays an egg, or just laid an egg,
they do have a particular song. Bill could sing it
if you want. Sometimes it's loud, it's not as techno.
Speaker 1 (11:34):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (11:35):
So anyway, one of the chickens laid an egg, and
I had said too. I was like, hey, buddy, come
over here, you take a look. Let's just get in
here one more time. I want to see what's going
on in there. And he looked and saw the egg
and pulled the egg out and had appropriate emotions to
it all. And his mom I get so worked up
over this. His mom said, I've got I just got
(11:56):
my money's worth. You could actually take these chickens now
if you want. And that was years ago. They have
loads of chickens now. They still have chickens and big garden,
and then you.
Speaker 1 (12:05):
Start with two and then four and then chicken math.
Speaker 3 (12:07):
That's what it's called.
Speaker 1 (12:08):
What what do you mean? What do you mean math?
Speaker 3 (12:10):
Just like they're like potato chips. Can I've just won?
There's just like it's easy to just get more.
Speaker 1 (12:16):
Okay, well you know, yeah, well let me bounce off that.
So you know, obviously you can eat the eggs, but
hatch the egg you can actually have additional you're gonna
have baby chicks too.
Speaker 4 (12:27):
Yeah. So our hatching program is a five week program.
We do this at school's, daycare, senior care facilities, and libraries.
We bring an incubator with seven eggs. It takes three
weeks for them to incubate till they hatch, and we
provide a candling light that you shine up to the
eggs so you can see the baby chick moving and
growing and developing. And after it hatches, you move them
(12:48):
to a cage. You keep them in that cage for
two weeks. We provide the cage, the bedding, the food, feed, dish,
everything you need. We also provide a book. It's very educational.
Speaker 1 (12:59):
This is like real life and raising kids was this complicated?
Speaker 3 (13:02):
So we make it so easy.
Speaker 4 (13:04):
Oh, it is so easy. People that have never hatched
chickens before are successful the very first time with our program.
And this is how impactful this is. I was at
a senior care facility and I remember this this lady
that she must have been eighty or ninety years old,
and she said, I remember hatching chickens with my grandfather
(13:28):
when I was around ten years old. Now, this lady
probably doesn't even remember what she had for lunch that day,
but long term memory remembers. And she started naming off
the names of her chickens that she hatched and all
this stuff. Homestead ray Lee, who's our Nashville affiliate. She
she went into a facility, gave a presentation, talked about
(13:51):
the incubator and everything to twenty or thirty seniors there,
and this one lady kept on asking her specific questions
and talk to her and stuff like that. When Homestead
ray Lee was leaving that facility, one of the staff
members walked up to her and said, you know what
the lady that you were talking to. Oh, yeah, she
remembered she has been here for three months and this
(14:13):
was the first time that she spoke.
Speaker 1 (14:16):
Wow, because it goes back to the long term when
she was a child, yet impactful.
Speaker 4 (14:21):
And then and then with our kids, right, they're learning
so much. We do a good job as a society
to make sure that our animals are our spade and neutered,
so we don't really see the birth of anything, right,
And so for them to sit there and be able
to watch a baby chick come out of the egg
is just so special and they get to learn. We
(14:42):
have teachers that they go through this entire stem course, right,
the science portion of what's happening, the technology of the
incubator that we're using, even the math. Right. We have
teachers that are weighing the eggs every day and they're
having the kids record what they see. So this is
really a way of hands on education for these kids.
Speaker 3 (15:06):
And then what happens at the end of the five
week rentals.
Speaker 4 (15:08):
Everything comes backs to the farm, right, so that the
teacher doesn't have to figure out what do I do
with all these chicks? Right?
Speaker 1 (15:15):
Or sometimes the ones that people rent are generally their hens.
Speaker 4 (15:21):
Right, there's all.
Speaker 2 (15:21):
Two different programs. Rent the chicken, are hens, hatch the chicken.
It's like the what came first? Right, So with rented chicken,
the hens come first and then the eggs. With hatch
the chicken, the eggs come first, and then the chickens.
Speaker 1 (15:32):
What about roosters, because that's a whole different.
Speaker 2 (15:34):
We don't rent any roosters. It's not necessary. Roosters are
very necessary. They have their place, Like we couldn't do
hatch the chicken without their fertilization of the eggs. But
someone who has rent the chicken and has a couple hens,
they don't need a rooster. The hens are going to
lay the eggs whether there's a rooster around or not,
right right, Ye.
Speaker 1 (15:52):
Yeah. My sister had a farm in Glen Rock, PA,
which is just outside of Baltimore maybe you know where
that is. And they got a rooster and they thought
they had to put the rooster back in so they
would chase this rooster around the because they were renting.
If they were rental farmers, they had a farm, but
they started and so it was like and then the
(16:13):
actual farmer who lives next door, dang doong. The rooster
will go back into the roost when it's called a
roost for a reason. They that's right, Yeah, that's right. Yeah,
I don't know this.
Speaker 4 (16:23):
Is where our programs really fall in because so many
people start to have chickens and they don't know what
they're doing right. They might buy the wrong coop, they
might buy the wrong feed, they might buy the wrong
kind of chickens. There are different types of chickens. There
are some chickens that you can find at the farm
store that they are specifically made for meat, and if
you don't butcher them after sixteen weeks, they'll just die.
(16:46):
Oh wow, they'll have a heart attacker. So you have
to know what you're buying, and then you have to
go through the process. We make it so easy when
we roll this coop because this portable, it'scott wheels. We
roll this into your back yard. By the next day
you've got eggs. You don't have to think about what
breed of chickens to buy because there's so many breeds.
(17:08):
I have people all the time. They call up and
they say, what breeds do you have? And while that's
an important question, I usually asked the follow up question,
what breeds are you interested in? And most customers aren't.
They don't know what they do.
Speaker 1 (17:23):
They don't know, so then I.
Speaker 4 (17:25):
Start talking about the black Austro warps, the buff Orpington's
the well summers right, Oh, everybody knows them. They're only
good for the summer. No, I'm just I'm just I'm
cracking the yolks.
Speaker 3 (17:37):
Summery chickens.
Speaker 2 (17:39):
Well, when I when I get asked, I kind of
just say, oh, most of our chickens lay brown eggs.
Sometimes we have hens that lay a bluish green egg.
They're also just as delicious as the brown egg. They're
just beautiful in the egg carton. And I say, we
make sure we pair up chickens that get along. They're
friendly to humans, they're friendly to each other, and we
(18:01):
do our best to make sure you can tell them apart.
That's really what they need. That's what they want to know.
They don't know much about breeds. They just feel like, oh,
I should know about chicken breeds, you know. So we're
and we'll let them know what the breeds are when
we deliver.
Speaker 4 (18:12):
Yeah, we educate them on delivery what they have, and
they get they're so excited all day long.
Speaker 1 (18:19):
You gotta warm me. We have a chicken pun You
are you need you need to.
Speaker 4 (18:25):
Get you were not going to be in a foul
mood around me.
Speaker 1 (18:30):
Oh, God, All right, do you work with any charities?
Speaker 2 (18:34):
Oh, we have worked locally with a drug and alcohol
rehab center, and I think COVID times kind of broke
our relationship, not for any reason. Then life was complicated then,
but we for sure would donate a rental coup to
the to the facility so that the residents could have
(18:56):
a job.
Speaker 4 (18:57):
Okay, So we also have this program called called Chicken
Poop Bingo. So we bring out.
Speaker 1 (19:04):
This so it's like donkeys. It's like like donkey, they
have donkey bingo.
Speaker 4 (19:11):
Yes, so we we've got this this bingo card and
we put chickens in there.
Speaker 1 (19:16):
You could rent a chicken, some chickens or a chicken
for a day for a charity event.
Speaker 4 (19:22):
Yes, and and and in most cases we don't even charge.
But we we bring this this bingo card and they
with a poop on your number, you win, right. So
we did this for toys for Pittsburgh Tykes. Yeah, and
we raised over six hundred dollars on one bingo game.
Speaker 2 (19:39):
Now bingo card, it is four by four foot. It's
not like chickens need to have a space to you know.
Speaker 4 (19:46):
And we've also done this, we all do. We've also
done this for schools that are raising money for various events. Uh.
Speaker 2 (19:54):
And that's not posted on our website. It's just something
that we can.
Speaker 4 (19:57):
We just do it.
Speaker 2 (19:57):
If someone calls and can you come to our well,
this is These are some of the things we could do.
We did it at that Pittsburgh Home and Garden show recently,
not for a fundraiser, just for.
Speaker 1 (20:06):
Fun, just for fun, so people can see what it's like.
All right, So I asked you, do you remember your
first customer? And it ended up being your your mother's friend.
That's right. Do you remember your first affiliate?
Speaker 3 (20:17):
Oh, for sure. I would love to tell the story.
Speaker 4 (20:19):
Yes.
Speaker 2 (20:19):
So, so we live in a small rural community.
Speaker 3 (20:24):
We don't have a big, big farm.
Speaker 1 (20:25):
We have a little homestown, don't live downtown.
Speaker 2 (20:27):
We don't live downtown, but we live in We still
live in a community. And at the time it was
twenty fourteen, we had coops lined up, chickens are being trained,
making sure they're getting along and laying. And this teenager
walks by with some dogs and no, there's not a
lot of people who walk by. It is small and rural.
(20:47):
And he said, oh, I have some chickens. What are
you doing here? What do you have going on? So
I talk about, you know, my elevator pitch that we
don't We hadn't been in business even a year, but
I had I had it down.
Speaker 3 (21:00):
And he's like, oh, you that's interesting.
Speaker 1 (21:02):
You had it in your mind that it's going to expand.
Speaker 3 (21:06):
This random kid is like walked up.
Speaker 2 (21:08):
And so then same kid calls the next day and
he's like, you might not remember me.
Speaker 4 (21:13):
I'm brad, we remember you.
Speaker 3 (21:14):
I was walking the dogs yesterday. How many people? How
many people does he think?
Speaker 2 (21:20):
That's a young teenage kid walking by and talk to
me that I don't remember, you know? And he said,
I would like to make an appointment to come over
and talk more about your business. And I was like,
I don't think anyone has ever made an appointment with me.
What time is good for you? I think, I said.
So he came over with his legal pad. He was fifteen,
came over with his legal pad. His aunt lived up
(21:41):
the road from us. So he was walking from his
aunt's house.
Speaker 4 (21:44):
Just going for ard Jersey, okay.
Speaker 2 (21:46):
And he said I would like to do this. And
I said, I think we'd like to meet with you
and your parents. Yeah, And so his parents were on board,
and that's how the affiliate first.
Speaker 4 (21:57):
As was a fifteen year old from New Jersey and
the reason why we started saying that we answer all
the calls for all of our affiliates for sales and support.
The original reason for that was because we were worried
about a fifteen year old answering the phone with our
name right and our business. And also he's at school
(22:17):
during the day, right, so people call and say, hey,
can I talk with Homestead Brad And we'd be like, well,
he's busy right now, he has an appointment, isn't a meeting?
Speaker 5 (22:26):
It really was like in Matthie, he's in gym.
Speaker 2 (22:30):
I'm sorry because every one of our pages on our
website shows who is delivering home said really homestaid Brad
Home said Bertie, Like all of them shows.
Speaker 1 (22:41):
So that they think I'm still doing it.
Speaker 3 (22:43):
He is not. He graduated college by now, he lives
in Texas.
Speaker 2 (22:46):
He's doing great work. Like so I wrote him a
recommendation to get into call.
Speaker 1 (22:50):
Oh that's amazing, yeah, amazing. Yeah. So we want to
become part of the rent the Chicken family. Your your
family for life, that's right, your family.
Speaker 4 (22:59):
If you adopt your chickens. At the end of the season,
we say that we are your chicken friends for life.
It doesn't matter if you got chickens from somebody else,
you hashed your own where it came from. If you
have questions, you give us a call.
Speaker 1 (23:14):
You must have some crazy stories.
Speaker 3 (23:16):
Though, so many crazy stories.
Speaker 1 (23:18):
What's your go to what are some of selling your
go to stories?
Speaker 3 (23:21):
I don't know that you'll have to use that. What's
it called.
Speaker 2 (23:27):
Up?
Speaker 4 (23:28):
Yes? Which one do you want to talk about?
Speaker 2 (23:31):
Oh?
Speaker 3 (23:31):
I was going to talk about the one we're not
supposed to talk about.
Speaker 4 (23:33):
Oh, you can talk about that one now you have to.
So so.
Speaker 3 (23:41):
We have.
Speaker 4 (23:42):
We had a farmer at the time, Harry Homestead, Harry Stoddard.
He actually wrote a great book called Real Dirt If
you are really into soil and stuff like that, amazing stuff.
And so he became a one of our And so
(24:03):
a windstorm came through. Now he was up in Ontario.
Windstorm came through and he had an outbuilding that was
probably seventy five feet by two hunred feet. It got
lifted up by this wind and moved over three feet. Okay,
so this windstorm had just come through and adjuster was
coming out. In the meantime, we get a phone call.
This person that he had just delivered to maybe a
(24:23):
week ago, had a chicken that passed away. And that happens, right.
Sometimes chickens just die for no reason at all. We
don't know why. They could have had a heart attack.
I literally watched one have a stroke one time in
front of me, and I could tell it had one.
Speaker 2 (24:37):
Chickens also hide their illnesses, so it's real hard to
tell if they're really sick until.
Speaker 3 (24:42):
It's too late.
Speaker 1 (24:43):
Most men, you can't tell they're really sick.
Speaker 3 (24:47):
It's too late.
Speaker 4 (24:48):
So we get this phone call the chicken had passed
away and homestead Jen, what's your go to line for
when a chickens?
Speaker 3 (24:55):
I mean, I'm so sorry to hear. Did the children see?
Speaker 1 (24:58):
Like?
Speaker 2 (24:58):
I am compassionate because I know that it is a
tough tough thing, you know, to have this pet with
the name that pass and you won't expecting, like go
out and you don't expect it. So we don't have
like a lot of chickens that pass. But in this
case called they're devastated. They've had them a week. I'm
so sorry they've had them a week. The children I
(25:21):
don't think, did see? And then can someone come today
to take care of the chicken? Now we don't usually
like if the chicken passes, there are some steps you
can bury, can bury her if you'd like.
Speaker 3 (25:34):
No, you don't know why I died, Johnny, you don't
know why I died. You don't want to. And so
I was like, or you can put her curbside.
Speaker 4 (25:44):
A nice way of saying, put it in the garbage.
Speaker 2 (25:47):
Yeah, but in Ontario they have green bins, which is
for composting, like so that the chicken, Oh, my gosh,
very offended. I can't possibly put insert whatever her name
might depend.
Speaker 3 (26:02):
Yeah, at the curb. Oh, I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry.
Can someone please come?
Speaker 4 (26:08):
So you reached out to homestead Harry Hill.
Speaker 2 (26:10):
And meanwhile he's like, my outbuilding is like shifted off
the foundation.
Speaker 4 (26:14):
I'm a little busy.
Speaker 2 (26:15):
Yeah, And he said, listen, have her buy a shovel.
I'll send her ten bucks. And I was like, I'm
not offering the lady a shovel like at all, and
he and in jest he wasn't going to buy her
a shovel. He also said, just have her put in
a freezer. My wife will be there in a week.
(26:36):
He shall be in the staving of the week, because
he did contact a friend see if they could come.
It's just not something that we usually that we usually do,
like if.
Speaker 4 (26:46):
That windstorm hadn't come through. He absolutely you would have.
Speaker 2 (26:49):
Yeah, went and been compassionate and so so I you
are welcome to bury the chicken. That's no problem. I
know it was your pet. We will have a replacement
chicken for you soon, probably next week, and we're very sorry.
Speaker 4 (27:03):
This said, but the chicken needs for the burial, needs
needs something better than this.
Speaker 1 (27:09):
Oh.
Speaker 2 (27:10):
She is like, I'm not just gonna I'm not just
gonna put her in a box and put her on
the curb. Oh okay, So then she said, how about
I put her in the freezer till you get here. Listen,
that chicken died of I don't know what. I'm not
putting it next to like other chicken, you know what
I mean?
Speaker 5 (27:30):
Ye?
Speaker 3 (27:31):
So right she did.
Speaker 2 (27:33):
She wrapped it up, put in her freezer. Home, said,
Sylvia came by the next week and I was like,
for crying out loud, Sylvia, do not just take a box.
She is real offended. Where I suggest she put her
in a boxing. Yeah, bring a cooler, collect the chicken there.
We want to be compassionate and kind.
Speaker 1 (27:52):
You know, most people aren't this sensitive, right, I.
Speaker 3 (27:55):
Really try, really try to be and so I wanted
her to.
Speaker 2 (27:58):
Not do not just show up at the box. She
was real offended when I suggest that she put her
in a box.
Speaker 4 (28:03):
So she got the chicken put in the cooler. I
have no idea what happened afterwards.
Speaker 1 (28:09):
Yeah, there's no such thing as a chicken. Hearse, you're
not going to back.
Speaker 3 (28:13):
Up, So we we do.
Speaker 2 (28:16):
We don't want people to have chickens that die, you know,
but we do. We also Yeah, we also don't charge
enough to make multiple trips if something's happening, you know,
And so we we put it on the renter if
something happens that they take care of.
Speaker 1 (28:31):
Most of the people who are interested, what are they
They just do it for the summertime.
Speaker 2 (28:35):
Or yeah, it's so crazy. We thought people would just
do it for the summer. But people either adopt at
the end, or they can chicken out. Of course, but
they can adopt, or they can pay us to winter
their chickens and then they don't have to deal with
frozen water or going outside. It's more about the chicken tender.
The person doesn't want to be and they get their
chickens back.
Speaker 3 (28:55):
And they can rent them again. How do you know
which there's bad?
Speaker 4 (29:00):
Yeah, leg bands that have their color coded and they're numbered.
Speaker 1 (29:05):
And only chickens do you rent in any given summer?
Speaker 3 (29:10):
Too many a lot of.
Speaker 4 (29:11):
In the Pittsburgh area. It can be as many as
two hundred birds and just Pittsburgh. Now multiply that by
our thirty farmers throughout the United States and Canada, and
you can kind of do the chicken math there.
Speaker 2 (29:21):
And I want to say, one winter, we wintered like
seventy hens. Yes, that was a lot and doesn't like
to go outside in the winter, let alone chicken ten.
Speaker 4 (29:30):
Yeah, we have we have a deal that if they're wintered,
she has to take care of them the winter.
Speaker 1 (29:35):
That's you.
Speaker 3 (29:36):
I've become the winter chicken.
Speaker 4 (29:37):
I take care of them all summer. It's her job
for the winter.
Speaker 2 (29:41):
I also asked that he do the dishes because I'm
taking care of the chickens. But I'm not sure that
actually come.
Speaker 1 (29:46):
Through ever in your imagination that you would be doing this.
Speaker 4 (29:51):
No, not at all. Never, I never knew that we
were going to be the co founders of the largest
chicken rental company in the world.
Speaker 3 (29:58):
Rent the Chicken, I Rent the Chicken dot Com.
Speaker 1 (30:01):
Okay, all right, So is there anything else that we
didn't cover that you want people to know?
Speaker 2 (30:08):
Sure, I would like to just say we are always
looking to egg spand I didn't put my hand up
for you. Sorry, I didn't give you the heads up.
Speaker 1 (30:15):
And yeah, So if someone wants to become an affiliate,
what do they do?
Speaker 2 (30:20):
They'll go to rent chicken dot com. There's a link
that says become an affiliate. There's some parameters that we're
looking for. We are looking for someone that maybe is
entrepreneurial in spirit, has some chickens, and wants to have
an additional revenue stream outside of their hobby farm or
their regular job.
Speaker 4 (30:40):
And each of our farmers gets a fifty mile territory.
So like right now, we don't have anybody in like Orlando,
for instance, so Orlando, New Mexico, we don't have anybody
right now the Sacramento area, Seattle. So we're looking for
people to join us where we don't already have a location.
Speaker 2 (31:03):
And who makes the coops? Where do you get back Oh,
that's a great question. When we first started, we had
coop plans and the affiliates built their own. But we
we have partnered with our Amish friend Levi, who is
near Smicksburg, Pennsylvania, and he builds our coops. The three
of us Homestead Phil, myself, and Levi, who we don't
call homestead Levi because he's just Levi. And so we
(31:27):
designed the coop to ship flat in a box, and
so we could ship a palette of these coops to
our new affiliates so that they can get started with
coops right away without needing to. When we first started,
I built fifty four chicken coops under a canopy in
our front yard the first year, and I was actually
a manufacturing facility that rented out some chickens.
Speaker 4 (31:47):
We found out that if you were building coops, you
weren't marketing, and if you're marketing, you weren't building coops,
so we had to outsource that pretty quick.
Speaker 1 (31:54):
That is crazy.
Speaker 2 (31:55):
Yeah, So Levi has the ability to build these coops.
They can be shipped flat and then assemble than like
forty five minutes.
Speaker 4 (32:01):
That also gives us the ability to ship a coop
anywhere in the country. And we can even now get this.
We can ship you chickens. So if we don't have
a farmer in say North Dakota, we don't have abody there,
but you want chickens, we can drop ship you coop
and a week later we will drop ship you chickens.
Speaker 5 (32:21):
With the support of rent the chicken with so the chicken,
the males chickens, Yes, yes.
Speaker 4 (32:28):
Get out, yeah, the usps if it fits the ships.
Speaker 1 (32:34):
Do you guys love what you do?
Speaker 4 (32:36):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (32:38):
Yes, I was supposed to say yes, yes, absolutely. We
really enjoy helping people through the years. It has been overwhelming.
But to to offset that, we do subcontract like LEVI,
I don't build coops anymore. We have a driver for
hatch the chicken locally, so Phill's not driving. We have
a teenager who cleans the hatch chicken coop. So if
(33:01):
the first days were hard, there's a lot of blood,
sweat and tears and to rent the chicken, but the
payout's been wonderful. We get to really meet a lot
of great people. I have right now two part timers
that helped me on the phone, So that's why I'm
able to be here. And we have all of our
affiliate partners who are crushing at making dreams come true.
Speaker 4 (33:18):
When we first started our business, like any entrepreneur, you're
always trying to you're hustling, right. I actually, in twenty
fifteen drove Uber because we weren't making enough money with
our business and we wanted our business to keep doing
so I would work, we'd both work all day long,
and in the evening, I'd jump in the car do
(33:38):
some runs. I'd be like, Okay, tonight, I need to
make one hundred dollars in my pocket to make ends meet.
And I would go out and I would do that,
and then maybe the next week I'd have to do
the same thing. When we started our business and we
were building those fifty four chicken coops, well who also
was okay when she was building those and we needed supplies.
We would literally have to deliver those coops to get
(34:03):
capital to be able to go back to lows and
buy more materials to build more coops to make the
deliveries the next week.
Speaker 2 (34:11):
Man our truck was so small and croddy, and we
couldn't haul all of our supplies in one trip. We'd
have to make two trips, and then we didn't have
a saw that was good enough, so we'd have to
like swing by my mom's house. My stepdad would rip
those two by fours and half for me. Like it
was a it was a lot of steps to get
it done.
Speaker 4 (34:27):
I would literally deliver chickens and take that cash and
go to Low's and load up the truck.
Speaker 3 (34:32):
As much as we could without breaking that little pickup.
Speaker 4 (34:34):
Truck because we didn't have enough money to drive back
to Lows because of you know gas.
Speaker 5 (34:38):
Did you eat a lot of eggs that first year? Well,
we have since also eaten a lot of eggs.
Speaker 2 (34:45):
But at the same time, you know, we're doing this,
this outsourcing, We're working with these amazing affiliate partners. We
are invested, and we do love helping people. Even in
the early early times, I was Phil was still working
inn It part time. I was out making hatch chicken
(35:05):
deliveries in that little Creddy, little blue pickup truck. And
for scale, it was like a micro truck, but it's
a five speed and it kind of sat close to
the ground, but it fit.
Speaker 4 (35:17):
It was the model before the Tacoma. It was literally
the Toyota pickup pickup was the model. I think I
think some Japanese guy said to American what is this
and the American just said it's a pickup, So that's
what they named it.
Speaker 2 (35:28):
So I was out there and making doing all this stuff.
I'm answering the phone because I'm the phone support. I'm
accepting order. I pull over accept an order from Canada,
I remember. And then Phil calls and he's like, I
think I'd like to quit my job.
Speaker 3 (35:43):
Oh my gosh, that's like, what's helping us fund this
whole thing? You know, I don't think.
Speaker 2 (35:47):
And I was like, I'm gonna have to call you
back because I really needed like an employee.
Speaker 1 (35:53):
Yeah, you know.
Speaker 2 (35:54):
And I was like, Okay, if you're gonna do this,
I need you tomorrow to deliver five hatch that chickens
and give three presentations to fourth grade classrooms. Are you
in yeah, And he's like, if you need it, I'll
do it.
Speaker 3 (36:07):
Yes, I need.
Speaker 2 (36:08):
I need to be able to stay home and answer
the phone because it's hard to do all the things
at the same time, you know.
Speaker 1 (36:14):
So what's the future. What's the future? Just sell stock
and have you know, being on the dal Jones and
the rent the chickens.
Speaker 4 (36:21):
So I I whenever I tell my wife an idea.
I'll have one hundred ideas. I only tell her one
because it might be overwhelming.
Speaker 3 (36:32):
This last one is getting busy for twelve years.
Speaker 4 (36:37):
But my goal is to set up hatching centers in
third world countries to hatch chickens to support local missionaries
that are providing the gospel. So right now I have
incubator equipment in Panama and Costa Rica. My next stop
(36:58):
was actually going to be in Cuba and may just
delivering these larger incubators and setting up global hatcheries again
to support the local missionaries there that are spreading the gospel.
So that's that is one of the next steps. The
other thing that I want to do, and this is
overwhelming for her, I want to partner with someone in Europe.
(37:22):
Maybe they're in France, maybe they're in Hungary, maybe they're
in wherever, somewhere in the European Union, and I want
to duplicate what we've done here in the United States.
And I want to partner with that person to set
up a phone center that's multi lingual that is able
to have affiliate farmers all over Europe. Because that European market,
(37:48):
I mean there's over seven hundred and fifty million people there.
It's larger than the United States and Canada combined. So
let's let's also do that duplication there. Also want to
partner with somebody in Australia because I think I believe
that if we can get into the Sydney, if we
can get into those larger those larger areas, because they
(38:11):
speak English, we can also support them from the United States.
Might have to pick up another couple employees, but that's that.
That's kind of Spain.
Speaker 2 (38:23):
But the.
Speaker 4 (38:26):
Big vision here is to break out of the United
States and Canada and to continue to grow and to
also set up these global hatching centers in third world countries.
Speaker 2 (38:36):
And right now the global hatching centers are not rent
The Chicken affiliated. This that Phil had a vision of
being able to go and take an incubator the first
one you smuggled an incubator into Cuba, the first time
he decided to.
Speaker 4 (38:49):
Take twenty fifteen or twenty sixteen.
Speaker 2 (38:51):
Yeah, maybe, well maybe not that long ago, but at
any rate, he no joke, of all the places that
you want to smuggle sof into, you don't want to
do Cuba. I would think that's not like your jump
spot right.
Speaker 4 (39:05):
I made half the first time again.
Speaker 2 (39:07):
And the brilliance of it, and I didn't see the
vision necessarily. The brilliance of it is he's taking this
incubator so that there's better food securities in these areas
that don't have it, and it's creating jobs because they
are then raising more chickens to either lay eggs or
to eat and then or to lay fertile eggs and
put more eggs in the incubator, and then they're able
to sell these eggs or sell these chickens, or.
Speaker 4 (39:30):
Or raise these chickens and then give them to a
family that's in need for either egg or eggs or meat.
Speaker 2 (39:37):
Or to start their own little business of selling some
eggs too and so and so to be able to
have them in these areas. Again, it's not right now
associated with rented chicken. It's just homestead Phil who is
really passionate about helping people so that they can have
a business and have some food, some more food than
(39:59):
what they had previously. So that this is great. I
keep saying where are you going next? Like I just
can't keep up, you know, I'm sorry short, when are
you going? I just lose track.
Speaker 4 (40:09):
Sometimes on the schedules Cuba, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Brazil.
Speaker 1 (40:15):
What when sounds like a homestead Phil tour, It's busy Rwanda.
Speaker 3 (40:21):
I think that's like five of your plant. Is that
the that's not twenty twenty five? I don't know between.
Speaker 1 (40:29):
This has been absolutely a blast. Thank you so much
for spending time and telling us everything Rent the Chicken.
Speaker 2 (40:35):
Is there anything we left out Rent the Chicken dot
Com or all over the socials. Just search for Rent
the Chicken. I like to say that our middle name
is the not A, and we don't use any hyphens,
so we're really easy to find.
Speaker 1 (40:46):
Rent the Chicken, Jen, Phil, thank you so much. This
has been an absolute blast, Thank you, thank you. This
has been the CEOs you should Know podcast showcasing businesses
that are driving our regional economy, part of iHeartMedia's commitment
to the communities. Sir, I'm Johnny Heartwell, thank you so
much for listening. M
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