Understanding Australia’s Solar Success Through Andy McCarthy’s Endeavors

The transcription of the video is below. 

The History of Andy McCarthy’s Gippsland Solar

Nico: Okay. So as we dig in here today, I am really excited, uh, despite the fact that for me, it is quite late in the evening for our guests, it’s early in the morning ish. I have rarely had the opportunity to actually interview for those of you who listened to a lot of Sunkast episodes, practically no one from the Australia market, despite the fact that we regularly discuss how the Australia market is a leader.

In solar penetration globally today’s guests helped build one of the top five Australia solar companies. We’re going to learn how that came about and I found out more about Andy McCarthy when he made a post that he was finally retiring from the company that he helped build, uh, what RACV solar. Uh, at the time it was, uh, when he founded it, it was called Gippsland Solar.

We’re going to learn more about how and why Gippsland Solar came about, uh, in just a few moments. Andy, welcome to Suncast. Thank you, Nico. Pleasure to be here. And uh, the pleasure, the pleasure truly is mine. Uh, I was really grateful that you accepted the invitation to tell us more about your story. You know, I haven’t been following you for a long time on LinkedIn, but I was moved by the post that you made when you.

Effectively retired from your post, uh, leading RACV solar. I want to dig in to the history that you helped create for the Australian solar market in general, since, uh, since you started the company back, uh, more than a decade ago. And, um, I want to learn more about your, uh, your roots. Could you tell us a bit for those who are unfamiliar, many are familiar with Sydney, even Melbourne, but where were you born in Australia and help us organize the, the geography for the listeners?

Andy: Sure thing. Uh, so, uh, as you pointed out, we founded a business called Gippsland Solar, which unsurprisingly was located in Gippsland. Uh, it was a very appropriate name. Uh, and we did solo. Uh, so we thought we were pretty clever with the name. Um, so we’re in Victoria, uh, which obviously Melbourne is the capital of Victoria.

Um, for the U. S. listeners out there, Victoria is around about the same size, uh, in area as Michigan. Uh, and Gippsland is about twice the size of New Jersey. Um, so, you know, at the time we thought calling it Gippsland Solar covering 40, 000 square kilometers was ambitious enough, uh, for, for our business. Uh, and, you know, we started the business in our, Um, in our spare garage, um, in a little town called Merbu North, population 2, 000 people, uh, in the Latrobe Valley.

Um, yeah, so, Humble Origins, I’ve, I’ve still got my first 6 invoice book that I got with a little carbon copy invoice book from the newsagent, and that was our first investment.

Nico: Amazing. Did you grow up in the Gippsland area?

Andy: No, I was a few hours away, uh, but I married a Gippsland girl, a very persuasive one who encouraged me that, uh, this was the place to move back to, to raise a family.

And so, you know, we love the Gippsland region. Um, it’s a wonderful place to raise a family. We live up in the hills in a beautiful part of the world near the beach. So I moved there for lifestyle, but clearly the Latrobe Valley, once we realized, um, we moved here, that it wasn’t the best place, uh, to live.

Start a renewable energy business. Um, it’s because, uh, in the Latrobe Valley, as some of your listeners may know, coal absolutely dominates the region as one of the largest employers and, you know, to, to understand the Latrobe Valley’s relationship with coal, you only need to look at the history of a town called Yallourn, which in, uh, 1960s, they actually moved the entire town.

Talking homes, businesses, parks, sporting clubs. They moved the entire town to access the coal resource underneath and everyone was completely fine with it. So Kohl’s had a tremendous, tremendously powerful social license down here for 60 or 70 years. And, um, fair to say that our attitude of, um, the world’s transitioning, whether you like it or not, was, uh, not very well received back in 2010.

From Idea to Entrepreneurship: Andy McCarthy’s ADHD-Powered Success Story

Nico: For those who are relatively unfamiliar, you know, Australia population tends to be, Uh, if you kind of overlay the United States map, it’d be from about Washington, D. C. down to Florida and sort of circling around through the Gulf of Mexico, kind of that whole area from Adelaide being sort of, uh, New Orleans down through Melbourne on the very southern sort of southeastern tip up to Brisbane, where there’s a big population, Gold Coast, um, big surf country kind of being what we would consider beginning of New England.

That is the, the big population center for, uh, Australia. I actually someday hope to visit Perth, uh, the most isolated big city in the world, all the way, uh, in the Western Australia territories. Um, it’s actually where our editor for, uh, Suncast for the last seven years or so. Is, uh, is hailing from, uh, so someday I hope to, to get to Australia and visit Perth.

I also really want to visit Melbourne because it’s got such great fame for being, um, a very walkable, a very, um, sort of sustainable minded city. I’m curious about the, the childhood you enjoyed, uh, growing up in Victoria. Did you come from a large family?

Andy: No, I didn’t. I had, uh, two sisters, so normal size by Australian standards.

It’s fair to say my childhood, uh, up until the point of 16 Uh, probably found myself in quite a lot of trouble and very directionless if I’m being honest, uh, and, um, you know, I think by the time, as I said, I 17, um, you know, it was pretty clear that my path, my life path was heading the wrong way and, um, I, I left school at 15, um, I jumped before they threw me, I think it’s fair to say, um, the school system didn’t suit me, um, you know, I got kicked out of home a lot, I found myself in trouble with the law and I, I’ve actually gone on to make a lot of presentations to schools in the Latrobe Valley area where there is a lot of entrenched, um, you know, struggle and a lot of challenges in the region.

And so I do a lot of work with kids around about that same age saying that, you know, for any of you 15 or 16 year olds in the room, no matter how bad your life is going, I guarantee you mine was going worse than yours. And so I really do credit Renewable Energy with giving me a sense of purpose that’s allowed me to be where I am today.

Fortunately, I think, you know, at that age in life, if, um, you told my parents I was going to end up on the news one day, it wouldn’t have been for good reasons. Um, but, but here we are.

Nico: Yeah. You’ve, you’ve said to me that you, uh, you not only were more or less directionless, but you sort of had this instinct, this internal.

Feeling that you’d always be, um, an entrepreneur, a business owner. Uh, what do you think, is there anything that you can point to that you owe that to early signs of entrepreneurial tendency or even personal heroes who instilled in you the idea that you could be the master of your own, uh, domain, so to speak.

Andy: Well, I guess the first thing I would probably credit with is being, um, is being diagnosed with ADHD. That certainly helps. I’ve met a lot of entrepreneurs along the way that also have ADHD. You know, it, gee, my first, my teenage years, it was a real challenge. I just couldn’t focus or concentrate. My mind was going in a million different directions and medication made me terribly sick.

You know, I was really just acting out because my mind was just going a million miles an hour. But as I’ve got older and learned to harness that, it really is a superpower. It even, you know, I remember when I started working from home and my wife saw me on the phone, uh, to a customer, I had my phone against my ear.

Uh, talking to a customer and I had my fingers on the keyboard typing an email and I got off the phone and she’s like, please tell me you weren’t having two different conversations at exactly the same time they’re on the phone and on your computer. I was like, yeah, that’s what’s wrong. What’s wrong with that?

She’s like, that’s, I said, that’s ADHD at work.

Nico: Exactly. Exactly. The, um, I guess. To, to, you know, to your point, the ability to, uh, I’ve thought about folks say to me like, how, how you’re prolific, how do you do so much? Um, how do you do so many interviews? Well, I’m often, uh, in the middle of the interview thinking about 2, 3, 4 different things like lines of conversation.

And I find myself a lot of the pre-interviews or on, um, zoom calls like everyone else. Most of the day I’m communicating with my team on WhatsApp. I’m communicating over email. I’m having a Zoom call where I’m focusing and taking notes. I do think that that is a classic, um, sort of tendency, but also superpower for those with ADHD.

Can you tell me about your first exposure then to solar power? How did the concept that you could harness sunlight and turn that somehow into a business first captivate your attention? Yeah, it’s

Andy: a great question. I mean, I, um, once I left school, I just had a relentless desire to start a business, to be a business person of some kind.

I’ll be really honest, I couldn’t have cared less about the environment at that stage. It wasn’t something that occurred in my consciousness. Um, it, it just didn’t factor into my thinking at all. Um, uh, so, you know, I found myself. Gee, by the time I was 21, I think I’d had over 20 different jobs. I’d washed out car wash bays, I’d handed out food samples on the main street of our town, um, for minimum wage, um, traveled around the world a little bit and, and tried to sell steak knives at one point in Ireland.

So I, even as a 12 or 13 year old, I think I remember, um, going around the street and I used to take orders for fresh scones and mum would buy the ingredients and I’d come back, cook the scones. Wrap them in foil and take them back with fresh jam and cream. Amazing. Yeah, I think it was six scones for 10.

It was pretty good value actually.

Nico: Learn, learn to employ your parents early on. That’s fantastic.

Andy: Oh, and mum paid for all the ingredients and the electricity. So I had zero startup costs. It was the highest margin business I ever ran.

From Job to Job, Building Skills, and Finding Purpose

Nico: I love it. My children are learning similar, uh, they’re leaning into similar, uh, Uh, exercises at the moment and we, and we just give them as much freedom to, to think and be creative as possible, even to think without the need for met worrying about our managing overhead, right?

Just the concept that you can in fact, have other people do work for you and you can have other people willingly do work for you and come alongside and help you realize your vision. And it’s, it’s a very important skill to be able to craft and communicate a vision. You know, you, you shared with me in our first conversation, how you discovered that, um, that you could buy solar panels and that there are other people who were able, willing and able to pay for those panels for more than what you’re able to buy them for.

Was that the, the initial spark that? Sort of gave you the opportunity to figure out how solar

Andy: worked. Yeah, it was, and I never actually got into solar, as I said, for the environmental reasons, it wasn’t something that was apparent to me, um, or something I was particularly passionate about, but I found myself, uh, of all places working for a battery company selling automotive batteries, deep cycle batteries.

And one day someone brought in a deep cycle battery and said that he needed to charge this battery to run an electric fence, which was miles from the shed. And, um, you know, he was looking at running a trench or putting power in and, you know, running off a PowerPoint. And so I started doing some research for him and I said, Oh, you could probably just buy an 80 watt solar panel and, um, a little charge controller.

And you could just. It would cost you a lot less than running cable all the way down, down the fence line. And you know, back in 2001, it sounds pretty obvious now, but I mean, back then, no one really thought about it. It was, it was such a nascent market that, you know, there was, it just wasn’t apparent to people.

So I did some research, got on to the wholesaler who made the solar panels in Sydney, Australia, and cost me 800 80 watt solar panel, and I think I sold it for 1, 200. And uh, and that, so the capitalist in me went, I can, I can get passionate about this. Um, and, and then I went out to help him do the installation.

And then, you know, I remember that moment where we connected everything up and then, you know, faced it towards the sun, little lights come on and the charge controller just came to life. You know, I just, I think it just lit something in me. And, um, Uh, from there, I just discovered this passion and I had this awareness that I could do something that was going to create a, uh, a career, um, and help me to run a successful business and make some money, but also, you know, not make the world a worse place in the meantime.

And, um, combination of those, those two, um, passions, I guess, has really, um, driven me since day one. Is, is there

Nico: anything when you think back on those early days, uh, when you were just trying to make a buck, you weren’t trying to be a scientist, you weren’t trying to figure out how solar energy worked per se, but rather who would buy it from you.

Is there anything that you feel you wish you’d have known about the sector that would have helped you? Um, better acclimate to the job. And I’m thinking about folks even now, you know, 20 years later who are considering getting into the sector and, um, and you know, was there, was there kind of a core fundamental element of the business that you probably should have learned, but you didn’t.

And, and you feel like you’d have been better off if you’d. Known if somebody told somebody like Andy had whispered in your ear like, Hey, you should probably go study this thing.

Andy: Oh, well, I, you know, I don’t have any qualifications or schooling or, um, anything behind me, but I, I, I do have, uh, a relentless sense of curiosity, uh mm-hmm.

So for me, every time I hit a. Roblox, I would just go and find the smartest person I knew and just badger them and just ask question after question. And some of the questions I asked in hindsight, that was so dumb. Embarrassingly, embarrassingly, um, uh, poor questions that I should have known, it should have been obvious, but I had no idea what I was doing.

I had, um, no ego. I was prepared to admit that I didn’t know the first thing about it. I just wanted to get involved. And I think that humility really helps when you, you know, you’re not afraid to admit what you don’t know. And you just, um. You know, for me, I think my whole career has just been a case of just, just hustling, just opening doors all the time, connecting with people, trying to learn.

That, that’s one thing I think we did well. One thing I would like to have known is what the size of the prize was going to be back in 2001 because Right. I mean, in Australia there was less than a thousand grid connected solar systems installed per year. Um, and I don’t think anyone had predicted that now in 2023, that we’d have over 3 million systems installed in Australia, the highest per capita rate in the world.

Yeah. So I would’ve made, made some different investments if I’d known where the industry was gonna go. That’s for sure.

Nico: Yeah, that’s for sure. Let’s talk about. You know, take me from 2001 to 2010, you decided to start Gippsland Solar. You followed a girl as so often happens, uh, out of, uh, your sort of your comfort zone in the more metropolitan areas of Victoria and Melbourne into the heart of coal country.

Talk about choosing La Trobe Valley, uh, which for those listeners who haven’t already made the connection is very, very similar as it were to, uh, Appalachia here in the United States, where. It was by and large driven by, uh, is coal country. It was driven by the coal industry. Um, but you saw an opportunity there.

You’d been selling solar in, uh, in fits and starts. I take it for almost a decade at that point, but talk about the, the idea to start this solar company and, and how that led from one thing to another.

Andy: Yeah, well, I think. You know, the time that I worked in the city, I used to go from job to job, and to be honest, I would kind of get into a job, I felt like I’d learned as much as I could possibly learn from that to give me the tools I needed to be, you know, a professional in my own right, and I’d quickly move on to the next opportunity.

So, it probably sounds a bit, um, you know, disloyal or a bit ruthless, but ultimately, for me, I knew what I wanted to do in my life, and I knew what I needed to, um, add to my repertoire to help me to get there. And, um, I don’t, I don’t have any shame about that. And I also welcome, uh, when employees of mine now branch out and go off on their own and try and take on the world and build their own businesses.

I say, well, that’s how I, that’s how I got started. And I wish you all the best. Right. Um, but, but you know, with no disrespect to any of the companies I worked for in that, um, period before 2010, uh, I probably learned more about how not to run a business than I did about how to run a business. Um, and you know, all of those self employed people out there in your.

And your listenership will know that, you know, when you are driven to run your own business, you get quite frustrated when being things aren’t being done the way that you think they should be done. Um, and you just crave that control to be able to do everything the way you think it should be done. Um, and so inevitably, I just found myself getting.

Itchy feet. And the only way that I could satisfy that urge was to start my own business and apply all those learnings I’d developed along the way. And by the time we moved to Latrobe Valley in 2010, I’d been an installer. I’d done the marketing. I’d done the sales, project management, you know, um, all the elements of a business and, and I think that’s all for

Nico: other solar companies that were, that were in the startup phase as well.

Andy: Yeah, absolutely. Because the whole industry was in a startup phase. 2007 or 8, um, you know, the government here announced an incredibly generous stimulus, which effectively meant you could install a one kilowatt system for zero cost upfront. Uh, eventually you were getting a one kilowatt system for nothing and you were getting a 1, 000 Visa gift card, um, which was just madness.

And you can imagine what that did to the market. Um, and you know, some of the issues that we ended up facing along the way with companies coming and going once the honey pot had dried up. So it was crazy times back then. And, um. You know, the thing that really struck me when I moved to the Latrobe Valley is, uh, you know, up until then, I’d lived in the inner green belt of Melbourne, where everyone, uh, did it because they love the environment, you, that was my, my wolf pack, um, and it was your badge of honour, and moved to the Latrobe Valley for lifestyle reasons, to, to follow a calendar, raise a family, and pretty quickly realised that Cole Raines King down here, and, uh, even people within the council, and more influential members of, um, of the local, um, area, they, you know, Hated me and everything I stood for.

It was a very, um, it was a very abrupt welcome to the Latrobe Valley. It’s for sure.

Resilience Redefined: Business Genesis

Nico: What were some of the early, early betts that you made that at the time might have seemed a little farfetched or even hair brain, um, and how did history do you feel, prove to you? Right. Well, I,

Andy: again, I, I tend to think through all the tro Valley lens because, uh, in, in 2010, uh, less than 1% of homes would’ve had a solar system on the roof.

Like I said, the council hated me. Um, you know, economic development, um, economic development department didn’t really believe that renewables were part of Latrobe Valley’s future going forward. Um, I mean, this is a region where, you know, I think, uh, coal was probably the second largest employer after education in the Latrobe Valley.

Had five power stations, uh, willfully polluting the atmosphere and shortening people’s life expectancy and nobody seemed to care because it was, you know, that was where the jobs were in, uh, in Morwell, which is in the middle of the Latrobe Valley. Unemployment was already at 21 percent before the first power station closed.

21. Wow. And that’s before the power station started closing, so people were scared. They were quite worried about their future and then you have some. Smarty pants come from the inner green matter Melbourne and saying the world’s transitioning whether you like it or not, you can come with us so you can get out of the way was not well received my approach was really wrong at the start to I was, um, I just I was far too belligerent and arrogant about the way I went about it.

So I believe strongly in the future for the Latrobe Valley, that renewable energy would be the dominant power source by, you know, 2020. The way I try to take it with me on the journey was, uh, completely. Did

Nico: you feel that there were more than cultural obstacles? In Latrobe Valley, uh, as you were growing the solar business, I mean, as an advisor and investor, uh, I’m sure myself and many others would have said to you, um, you know, you’re smart, you’re motivated, um, you’re supposed to go where the market is not where it’s the hardest.

And it seems like you went. Where it’s the hardest, um, how much of that do you feel ultimately concentrated your focus or success? I’m just curious about like the choice to be in cold country. I have a few friends here in the United States. Jeff Greenfield is one that I’ll, that I’ll mention who for 20 plus years ran their business in cold country finally had.

You know, successful growth and exits, but it was much, much more difficult for them than folks in California or New York.

Andy: Yeah, well, that, that really became our greatest asset, um, our location after a while. Um, you know, when I, um, when I moved down here in 2010, I just assumed I would find a job because I had a lot of experience in the, um, in the renewable energy industry.

There were rebates and incentives that were driving uptake. So, I really just moved to this town where I didn’t know anyone and just assumed I would find a job. Um, and I googled solar companies Latrobe Valley and there was a couple of results. I worked for one of them, uh, within a couple of months realized that our values did not align in any way, shape or form.

And I found myself basically out of a job and there was no prospect. At that stage, I think Kelly was maybe seven months pregnant with our first child and she was commuting three hours every, every day. Each way, uh, to try and, you know, keep a little bit of income coming in because I couldn’t find a job.

And then she came home one night and said, well, if there’s no competition, uh, why don’t you start your own solar business? And so, you know, we, we rolled the dice and we took about a 10, 000 loan off the mortgage and. Bought know a little, um, dual Cab Ute and, and some invoice books and a $50 logo off a website online.

And, uh, our first marketing, uh, investment was a $6 ad in a little paper called the Mobo North Times, uh, which I think reached about 80 people a week, . Um, and, and that was the, that was the origins of Gibson Solar. And, um, you know, uh, there were times along the way where I thought, well, there’s clearly a reason why nobody had started a renewable energy business down here, because it was a terrible idea.

Um, and in fact, after nine months, when it got into the first, uh, the depths of winter in 2011, I actually wound the business up and went and got a job building local secondary college because I got to the point where the phone stopped ringing. Winter in Gippsland’s a dark place and no one thinks about solar funnily enough.

You know, that we just weren’t getting any traction and I really, so nearly gave up. I, I, I did that job for three months. Occasionally, I was able to creep under the stairs and answer the phone if it would ring. I was lucky that a good mate of mine actually, um, got me the job there and lied us that I had 10 years experience as a, as a carpenter and got me into a very plumb job and protected me.

Um, and so, you know, for that three months period there, the business was basically on life support and I didn’t think it was going to succeed. So, um, um, obviously I’m very glad that we decided to fire it back up again once the sun came out. Yeah.

Nico: What a contrast, uh, if we fast forward from 2011 to 2018, where you, uh, successfully.

Um, exited the business the first time when you sold it to RACV, you know, if, uh, if you, if you had counseled your 2011 self, who was sneaking on the stairs to take calls and, um, had the business on life support, what do you think he would have responded, uh, of you saying, Hey, hang in there, you’re going to sell this business in six years time to, to one of the top five companies in the industry?

Andy: Well, I mean, I still pinch myself at where we’ve come from and where we ended up. I was trying to piece together the journey and work out the building blocks along the way. I’ve actually been just making some notes, which I may or may not put into a book. Might just be kept for posterity for my kids to read one day.

But I just think about the amount of challenges and the amount of resilience that we had to have in those early days. Like, it’s just… Setback after setback and, um, we couldn’t convince, you know, professional, really accomplished and skilled people to come and work in renewable energy in the Latrobe Valley back then.

They wouldn’t give up a comfortable job to come and work in what was a speculative industry. So, we couldn’t attract talent. The council wasn’t overly supportive of what we did. Solar was still far more expensive than buying coal fired electricity from the grid. And nobody seemed to care, um, for, you know, about the renewal energy transition.

So, um, it was just incremental, like little wins, just day after day, dust yourself off, go again, you know, build a little coalition of the willing in the Latrobe Valley. I think that was sort of all like minded because, you know, in 2010, if you took all the advocates for renewables in the Latrobe Valley and, and got together, you could probably all drive in the same car and you wouldn’t have needed a people mover.

I think once we learned to tell better stories and bring the community with us, then everyone started getting on board. Like, you know, when we employed our first apprentice and we told a story of this, you know, this 17 year old guy coming in and collecting his, his, um, high vis uniform for first day of a career in renewable energy.

I mean, everybody loves jobs. And at that stage, you know, the first coal fired power station was about to close suddenly and people were rocked by that. But I think, you know, at the time that we were starting to ramp up our, um, size of our workforce. When the coal fired power station started closing, people started making that connection that this is actually an energy business.

We are generating, you know, megawatt hours of energy, just like a coal fired power station is, and, you know, a lot of the skills are actually quite transferable, um, from the coal fired power sector into renewables, so it really started to gain some traction. And then once the council got on board and started promoting The work we were doing in the region, then, um, we really started to take off.

Nico: What are some of those skills that you’ve, that you identified and that you built stories around, specifically that you’ve found were transferable?

Andy: Well, I think clearly the, uh, you know, in the Alachua Valley, all the electoral infrastructure, you know, all roads lead to the valley. We had the poles and the wires and the infrastructure, um, for distribution and transmission.

Uh, and we had the workers that we used to, you know, building and maintaining those assets. So I think in a utility sense, you know, a lot of the, a lot of the work they’re doing is actually really from the same kind of family. It’s just coming from a different source. So I think, you know, a lot of that sort of, uh, those skills were transferable, but really it was more about, I think, identifying would people.

And just backing them in, like I think as a business, you know, we had to make big investments into building up a workforce because there was no trained, skilled workforce for renewable energy, um, you know, in the, in the mid 2010s. And that was really challenging because you have to make an 18 year old comes in for an opportunity and you have to spend 10 minutes, 10 minutes with them and then decide if you want to spend four years.

Uh, training and investing in this person, uh, if they’re going to, you know, be able to make it in this career, in this industry. So, you know, we took a lot of punts, you know, one of my, um, senior management team, who’s now heading up on the entire health, safety and well being, uh, division, uh, Mitch was a refractory worker at Hazelwood Power Station, just jackhammering concrete, you know, it was well paid, but it was awful work and it didn’t have a future.

And, and he got out just before Hazelwood Power Station closed. I saw something in him. There was a charisma about him. There was an energy that I just loved and I just invested so heavily into him, took him under my wing for four or five years and now he’s just flourishing. He reports to the board. He’s very well paid.

He hasn’t had to leave our small town to go and get those opportunities. And I think, you know, that, that story has become a microcosm for the transition in the Latrobe Valley that, you know, these jobs are sustainable long term jobs and, and you don’t have to move out of the region to find opportunity.

Andy’s Business Exit Strategy and the Challenges Faced

Nico: It’s not hard, not hard to imagine. With the struggle you no doubt faced in the five years, six years between 2011 and the ultimate success that you started to, to receive in the business that you encountered some obstacles along the way that were, uh, I imagine quite personal. Can you talk about what drove you?

To ultimately decide that it was time to, to sell the business, to build it in a way that it was acquirable and not just something that you ran into perpetuity that was, you know, cash cow for you and your family.

Andy: Yeah, absolutely. And, and to be honest, after we’d been running the business for about seven years, we hadn’t really given a thought.

At all to what would happen in terms of succession planning or exit strategies or any of that sort of thing. I just, all I wanted to do was build a really, really good business surrounded by an amazing team of people. I had enough challenges on my plate to try and get to that point without thinking about what would happen next.

All of a sudden we found ourself with 70 or 75 employees in, in 2000 and uh, end of 2017, start of 2018. the responsibility of growing the business exponentially and getting the workforce to that size, the decisions that you have to make every day and the people that rely on you to put food on the table and build houses and, and to, and to, um, you know, build their careers.

Um, the pressure just started to weigh on me really heavily and, um, that passion that had driven me, that relentless ambition to just keep growing and keep hustling. I found myself running faster and faster every year. And then it’s a bit like the proverbial elastic band that eventually snaps. And so the first time that I ever.

Took a deep breath and went away for a month and took the family with me and. Just did a full reset. I’ve never been happier in my life as I was at that point in time. I was so chilled out. I didn’t check my emails. Nothing was phasing me. And then, yeah, I remember the last night of holiday when we’re flying back from Europe and I started thinking about some of the things I’d have to deal with when I got back and the problems that I left in my intro that I hadn’t dealt with.

And yeah, all of a sudden, you know, my heart started beating and then I, my hands started shaking and I started sweating. Um, and next minute I was on my hands and knees on the floor and I was just shaking uncontrollably like I thought I was having a heart attack. Um, just, just to, well, I get a spine chill just thinking about that moment and where I was at that point in time and, and how scary it was because I thought I was dying and, um, I just ran and ran and ran till I just couldn’t run anymore and collapsed in a heap, full of sweat at two o’clock in the morning and just passed out from sheer exhaustion and, Yeah, I ignored the warning signs for years.

I just thought if I can keep running faster that, you know, my passion would get me through. Uh, pretty quickly found out that it, that it does eventually catch up with you. And yeah, it just triggered a whole wave of panic attacks when I got back to Australia. Just became relentless and found myself in a really dark place.

Um, I have to admit, um, my mind went to some pretty terrible places. Um, and so when I finally got the help that I needed and made some good decisions and started the road to recovery, um, which involved taking about four months out of work, I physically couldn’t be in that environment without breaking down again.

Finally got myself right and, and Kelly, my wife, said to me, you need to make a commitment here that you’re going to do something to make this business more sustainable without you because you, I don’t want you to be the richest person in the graveyard. Um, and we need, we need to build a business that’s more resilient, that can, that can survive without you in case this ever happens again.

And, um, and that was really when we started making the investments to get this business sale ready, because You know, it was just suffocating me, to be honest. What were some of the

Nico: first steps that you recall putting in place to extract yourself from the day to day operations such that it could be a self sustaining business that would attract the likes of an RACV?

Andy: Well, um, Like a lot of people that start their own business, I was a relentless micromanager. Um, I was absolutely terrible. I, I would rather just buy people a fish every day rather than teaching them how to fish. And at the times that I did try and hand over sales function or any elements of the business, and it wasn’t done well, and the customer experience suffered, uh, I would be like, you see, this is why I can’t, you know, I can’t let other people do this.

I need to do it myself. And it’s. It’s absolutely nonsense because I’m sure I would have made a lot of mistakes along the way. And, you know, you always think you can do it better, but ultimately you have to learn to empower people. Firstly, it’s the only way they’re going to develop as people and flourish, um, to know that they, they have the, um, autonomy to make decisions that you’ll back them in.

And secondly, if you build a business, it’s all about yourself. You can’t scale and you can’t exit. It just becomes, uh, almost like a prison that you just can’t get out of. And, um, uh, to be honest, I kind of did it because I was forced to. But it was a very valuable lesson, I think, in learning how to achieve scale without, uh, burning myself out.

Nico: Yeah. So you stopped micromanaging the functional elements of the business. Anything else that you identified that needed to, that you needed to stop or start doing?

Andy: Well, we did a bit of a root and branch review of the business once I. Recovered and, and pretty quickly came to the realization that it was in no way ready for sale.

And if the right offer came along tomorrow, that we were in no position to sell the business. Um, you couldn’t have done due diligence on our business because we had nothing to provide that the due diligence people. So, you know, we had no systems and processes and procedures, but it was a lot of fun coming into work every day.

We had a great time. And, um, that was all it was, was about being successful and having a lot of fun along the way. And we hadn’t really thought much beyond that, to be honest. The business of that size with 70 odd employees, you just cannot, you cannot run it like that, it has to mature and I associated some of that growth and maturity with maybe taking some of the fun out of the business and the joy, but it didn’t have to be that way, you can maintain that but still also have a mature.

Robust business that is, um, it’s operating efficiently and has good governance.

Building Success Through Acquisition

Nico: Do you have to hire people in who could teach you how to do that since it wasn’t clearly something that you had learned?

Andy: Yeah, I did. And this was another advantage for us in the, you know, the closure of the power stations is that was some seriously talented people, uh, in, in very high paid white collar roles that were suddenly looking for new opportunity.

And so, uh, there was a general manager that came out of one of the, um, businesses servicing the power industry. Um, he was made redundant after the closure of the Hazelwood Power Station in 2017. And it didn’t take him too long to realize that if he wanted to continue to work in the energy space and have a, you know, a professional, well paid, white collar job, that renewable energy was, was the place he needed to be.

And fortunately, uh, he’d also managed mergers and acquisitions in that role. So. He knew what it would take to build a big business and so his skills to bring in that sort of combination of organic growth, but also allowing us to explore acquisitions of other businesses and really build up a significant workforce, accelerating it by chasing inorganic growth.

Uh, that’s where we’re able to build quite a significant business in a short period of time and also have the business at a point where it was able to be acquired by the likes of an RECV.

Nico: Part of the strategy then was you went out and acquired other businesses.

Andy: We did. So eventually, um, it started with some pretty large acquisitions, but in the, in the beginning, it was really just, we’d be working with an electrical contractor who would be subcontracting their installations to us.

You know, the two business owners loved all the, uh, elements of running their own business, but they hated the paperwork and the, um, the work after hours that most people don’t see. And they started moving in different directions. So we offered to take on their team, purchase their infrastructure and acquire, uh, everything except the ABN and the business name itself.

You know, so they got a nice payday and we were able to accelerate our team without having to build that capability from the ground up. So, um, it worked really well. Yeah. Yep. Acquiring the talent. That’s really smart. Uh, what it made me realize quickly was that, uh, at the very heart of it, mergers and acquisitions are all about people.

You can look at balance sheets and P& L and cash flow analysis and market share and you can get data on data. Uh, but at the end of the day, uh, acquisitions are all about bringing the people on the journey because it’s very scary for everyone involved when they feel like you might be consolidating the org chart from two into one and they look across and see someone else that does a similar job to them and think, Oh, is this going to be a bit of a turf war between us?

You have to invest in the people and bring them with you on the journey. Otherwise, you don’t get the value of an acquisition. When did it become

Nico: clear to you, clear to you that an exit was imminent and that it could be our ACV talk and maybe set the stage for those of us who don’t know anything about the Australian market, how, uh, important a company like our ACV was, uh, who was the competition kind of where the, how did that all stack up and, and how’d that come together?

Yeah,

Andy: it’s a good question because the Australian market, uh, is quite unique in a number of ways. And there has been a lot of acquisitions by large organizations of small. Companies for capability and it’s been kind of waves like I think every three years as a wave of acquisitions in the industry, you know, even since 2011 or 12 when I first started seeing some of them going through and invariably what happened was the first couple of acquisitions of the new wave were quite successful.

And then the ones towards the end of that phase, uh, usually didn’t go well. And for us, uh, I think the biggest challenge we had is that the business had grown so quickly and we just, we couldn’t hold it back. It just, it just wanted to run off its own energy and it just wanted to grow and grow. And whether I was on board with it or not, it didn’t matter because the business was now its own identity with its own needs and wants and desires.

Um, so in the end, we just let it grow and we were concerned that when we got to a certain size, that there were very few organizations in Australia that could afford to acquire us that would have that level of ambition or appetite. And more to the point, the companies that could afford to acquire us were ones that Frankly, their values did not align at all with our own.

So, that was quite confronting for us because the business had got so big that I couldn’t physically deal with it anymore. It was just, um, it was just weighing me down and causing me to lose a lot of sleep. I didn’t want to sell to a large incumbent energy retailer who I thought had been part of the problem for decades and now suddenly wanted to pretend I’m part of the solution.

I wouldn’t have sold my team up the river. To a future like that. And RACV was just not on the landscape at all. I mean, for those who aren’t familiar with the, um, RACV story, it’s a, it’s actually a motoring body, um, and it’s, it’s, it’s, it’s heritage. It was established in 1903. There were 60 cars in Victoria and all 60 people were a member of the RACV, the Royal Automobile Club of Victoria.

So, you know, it’s traditionally had its origins in motoring, um, roadside assistance, car insurance, and then branched out into the home. Uh, about 10 years ago, Energy was never really on the radar until the last CEO, the current CEO took over in, in 2017 and said that. You know, this organization needs to think about where it’s going in the future.

It’s a massive organization and the revenues are over 5 billion and about 3, 000 employees. It’s just a monolithic organization. Um, it’s so many different elements to the business too. They own resorts all over the country, uh, that our ECB members stay at an incredible organization. But, um, I think they recognize that the motoring origins of the business were under threat by the rise of electric vehicles.

And then they also had a desire to be in the home and really own that, um, home relationship with their, with their members. And what better way to do that by using energy as the kind of, as the hook. Um, and that central point of, um, that central focus where they can bring everything together into an ecosystem.

And once, once our ACV decides they’re all in on something, they go absolutely all in. And they, they, um, have made. Half a dozen acquisitions so far and many more to come, I

Nico: believe for those who are unfamiliar and just to repeat what Andy just said, RACV, which perhaps you, you like me heard initially as RECV is, uh, the Royal Automobile Club of Victoria, RACV.

So Americans might think of AAA. Right? Uh, the American Automobile Association, an organization that services automobiles and motoring clubs and provides roadside assistance and insurance and travel assistance, things like that. Car loans, et cetera. Effectively, RACV is the equivalent of a AAA kind of organization, but for Australia.

So you can imagine. If knowing that’s true, the number of homes who have automobiles, an organization like AAA here in the United States could very easily and very well might expand into home services, right? In, we’ve seen in the United States. Uh, that a lot of the home security companies, Vivint, being probably the most successful.

ADT now acquired one of the fastest growing solar companies in the United States. Um, ADT was the largest home security company in the United States. We’re seeing a lot of this kind of activity now from old school, you know, trying and true, you know, it’s, it’s kind of the equivalent of like if Geico were to acquire a solar company here in the United States, that’s the equivalent of what?

RACV acquiring Gippsland Solar did for Andy and for opening up a book of business that I imagine was now going from sort of being externally, uh, available to intrinsically internal customers that you could reach out to. Um, is that, is that accurate?

Andy’s Perspective on the Australian Market

Andy: Yeah, absolutely. I mean, the population 6 million people.

And nearly two and a half million people have an RECV product or service. So once the acquisition was announced, a number of our competitors openly were quite terrified of the fact that we can now activate a database of two and a half million customers. Because, you know, they knew that Gippsland Solar was very good at what it did.

We’re very good at marketing, told, told a good story and, uh, RECV itself had tried to get into solar, you know, for a few years and, and clearly just weren’t able to do it as fast as they would have liked. One of my competitors actually said after he heard of the acquisition that he’d always told people that RECV was the sleeping giant of the, of the solar industry because if you can activate that database.

It’s extremely powerful in the market. Can you

Nico: talk about the fervor, the hunger for solar in Australia that I think differentiates it in a specific way from other markets in the world? I mean, we all kind of look at Australia as a postcard from the future. It is the place where. Solar has famously been driven to below a dollar a watt, uh, installed price, nearly 30 percent penetration of, of homes in the country.

Could you talk about what differentiates and distinguishes the Australian market?

Andy: Yeah, look, it’s… It’s interesting to hear that, you know, you see, uh, Australia as being such a great success story and a postcard from the future because, uh, we look at, we look at the, um, the journey that we’ve been on in Australia and we think, gee, we’ve got a lot of things wrong.

I mean, it’s that, that race to, to just, um, get below a dollar a watt installed. Um, like it’s great for uptake, but it’s created so much collateral damage. Um, the amount of companies coming and going and leaving a trail of destruction in their wake. I mean, you, you mentioned that over 3 million, um, households have rooftop solar, well, over a million of those are installed by a company that’s no longer in business now.

So those systems are, you know, orphaned for want of a better term. Yeah, absolutely. 30

Nico: percent of the market. Wow.

Andy: Yeah. Um, so, you know, often companies would sweep in and. Diversify out of roller shutters or selling telecommunications bundles or anything and trying to get into solar because they saw, um, they saw, you know, a fairly big honeypot there and they thought it would be, um, it’d be an easy way to sort of add some extra revenue to their business streams and then they pretty quickly realized that it wasn’t as easy as what they, um, what they had hoped and they exited quickly and just left a, left a trail of destruction.

So, yeah, we’re certainly proud of the uptake, but there’s been a lot of challenges. Yeah. So

Nico: reading between the, reading the tea leaves, right? Reading between the lines, then there’s a huge opportunity, but also problem with stranded solar assets, stranded systems, no longer under warranty, no maintenance plans, homeowners who have no one to turn to.

Did you attempt under the wing of RACV for the last five or so years that you ran the solar business to go after that market? And if so, what’d you learn?

Andy: Well, we actually did that back in 2015, uh, as Gipps saying solar. Um, So we started getting calls from people with these stranded assets who just wanted some support and I just had a, I had a thought one night, maybe we should start a solar maintenance business and, um, we founded a business called Solar Fix, Gippsland, and we created a website and a little animated cartoon of a little guy going around with a, um, a shifter and a, Uh, tape measure and, you know, um, checking out a customer’s solar system and fixing it.

Even in the video, there was a cheeky little reference to coal dust pumping ash all over the, uh, all over the solar panels and needing a clean. Uh, so, um, so, you know, we thought there would be a business model there. The problem is, Nico, is that when people have only paid 3, 000 for their 4 kilowatt system and you come along and tell them that to, uh, you know, rectify the system and put a new inverter on and bring it up to standards, it’s going to cost you 4, 000, they’re not going to spend that kind of money because to them, the system was only worth 3, 000.

Not

Nico: worth the equivalent of electrons they’d otherwise have to buy. They don’t think of it that way.

Andy: No, and the initial response from the customer was, well, I paid less than that for the entire system. And my response is, well, that’s the point. You bought cheap product at the time installed by a company that didn’t have, you know, long term prospects.

And now you’re in the position where you need to invest a bit more to fix it. We couldn’t find a way to monetize that and get that business model to the point where it was sustainable. So we mothballed it, uh, back in 2017. And it’s still, I feel like there’s still something there that would work, but it’s just, it’s extremely hard to find the customer base that’s prepared to pay for your services.

Nico: And I presume that the, the array they have still is sort of limping along. It’s not fully, you know, it’s not fully non performing. They just don’t realize that they had the opportunity. To have a deferred investment plan, right? A deferred investment plan instead of spending it all up front. They now need to sort of invest what they didn’t invest in the, in the initial tranche.

Yeah. So to maintain and keep it going.

Andy: Yeah, that’s correct. I mean, if they’d spent 6, 000 on that system in the first place, uh, that they wouldn’t be in the position that they’re in. And so you have these cheap, poorly installed systems that needs a lot of rectification work. Uh, in Australia, the standards for installation change every year or two, so then you have to bring it up to current code and you can pretty quickly sink a lot of money in and more often than not, it’s easier just to rip the old system off the roof and install a whole new system, which is really sad to see, uh, for an environmental perspective, but I think it’s one of the lessons that we’ve learned along the way.

Nico: Yeah, but certainly in the last 10 years. You’ve gone from, uh, you know, when I was, when I started my solar company, 2006, we were installing 170 watt solar panels. Now homeowners are installing nearly 500 watt and in some cases, 550 watt, almost 60 watt, 600 watt solar panels. The, the, the efficiency gains are in many cases.

Now, if the homeowners waited long enough, quite worth it to just go ahead and say, ah, tear the old one off. Right. You know, in on the one hand, that’s a negative from an environmental perspective, we’re still working out how exactly we are going to recycle all these, but on the other, it’s quite inspiring to recognize that homeowners can finally look at these as an appliance.

And they’re used to buying a refrigerator and replacing it in 10 years. They’re used to buying a roof and replacing it in 15 years. You know, despite. Uh, the, the reality that these solar products will generate, you know, up to 80 percent of their capacity for 20 or more years. In many cases, 30, 40 years, they will be seen as an appliance.

I think it means that there’s gonna be a huge opportunity also, uh, as, as we’re seeing in developing countries where these products can get resold, um, at a, at a drastically lower price, um, and reutilized in, uh, in places throughout Southeast Asia and Africa and in parts of Latin America. We’re seeing it now in the United States.

Thank you. Uh, I have a friend whose whole entire business is decommissioning, uh, utility scale, solar projects that were installed in the aughts and early teens and redeploying those solar panels down into projects in Mexico.

Andy: Right. Well, I believe it’s the same issue in Germany too. They had a lot of the old, um, early modules with, you know, PID issues and that sort of thing, which, you know, it actually makes financial sense to get there and replace those modules with new.

Uh, higher efficiency products. And obviously with the rise of electric vehicles and electrification, uh, there’s going to be a huge market to take off those 1. 5 kilowatt systems and get the maximum amount of kilowatts and kilowatt hours, uh, onto the roof space that you can fit.

Andy’s Vision for Industry Collaboration

Nico: I’m looking at your, uh, your t shirt, this, uh, solar cutters.

And it reminds me that we had a fun story. Um, in our first conversation about the nature of competition and coopetition in Australia, many of us are familiar with the rather both the, both the competitive nature of the market, but the jovial nature of Australians in general, very prone to, um, to friendliness and travel.

And, um, I’d love to hear more about. What solar cutters is, where the name come from, what does it mean for you all? And, uh, what can we learn from it?

Andy: Yeah, it’s, um, it’s, it’s been a lot of fun and I think it does, it does actually talk about, you know, Australians more broadly in the way that we see business, uh, is that, yeah, we want to be successful, but it has to be fun, you know, and especially working in the renewable energy industry.

I mean, we’re. We’re changing the world, we’re slinging sunshine every day, we’re, we’re making the world a better place. And so I think, you know, that’s where the solar cutters, um, movement really started from. It was just, you know, myself and a couple of mates, Jack and Costa. We’re sitting around talking about the fact that, you know, in a lot of ways, the solar industry is a little bit like a secret society.

You know, we have our little secret handshakes and our little, you know, we all compete with each other day to day, but it’s also like a movement of people all trying to achieve a common goal. Uh, and I made a flippant remark that it’s almost like the stone cutters, uh, on the Simpsons, uh, for those that are Simpsons fans, um, I said, maybe we should call it the solar cutters, um, and I didn’t think anything more of it.

Um, and then the next week they sent me a message and they’d already registered the business. They’d registered a trademark, but they were off and away with this solar cutters thing. I didn’t get any credit for it, um, other than, other than a little bit of naming, um, attribution. Um, but yeah, they, they started this movement called the Solar Cutters, which was really all about, you know, um, the industry coming together and realizing that, you know, ultimately there’s more that what unites us than what divides us.

Um, and so we started, we had a Solar Cutters networking event, uh, before one of the big conferences in Melbourne. I think we had about 250 people turn up and it was just a whole room full of people who I’d competed with. every week for 10 years and I didn’t know them as people. I had my opinions on them.

I might have had, I might not have looked favorably upon them, but I didn’t know the first thing about them. And once we all came together and started sharing some of our, you know, um, stories and common, um, sort of interests, I realized that these guys and girls, they’re just like me. They’re just a, they’re just a solar business owner going and they’re trying to change the world.

Hopefully employ an apprentice, maybe sponsor a local sporting club and made it really hard to hate some of these people and to compete wholeheartedly against them because they’re actually really good people. And so some of my greatest friendships have come from just catching up with my competitors at Solar Cutter Drinks and I think the first event, as I said, had about 250 people.

And then the manufacturers got on board and said, if you run this again next year, we’ll sponsor the events and we’ll have an open bar for three or four hours. And the next year we had 750 people turn up and it’s actually turned into a movement where people like myself can help those who are just starting to find their way in this industry with connections and networks and a bit of support.

Because ultimately, you know, I’ve always wanted to build a successful business and, and, um, you know, be successful enough to pay the wages of my staff and keep growing. But I think there is a realization that we also have an obligation to industry. Like the reason that we do this above all else is because we want to make the world a better place.

And we want to accelerate this energy transition. And it’s taken me a little while to get there. Nico will admit that I was very immature back in the early days. But I am in a place now where I, um, I think about all of my competitors out there somewhere in Australia now installing megawatts and megawatts of renewable energy and helping to accelerate this transition.

I think like that’s a good thing. It’s a really good thing. And I might have missed that on the odd job or they might have, you know, cast dispersions on me to try and help lead us to a project. But ultimately, we’re all out there trying to change the world. And this movement has really helped everyone to understand that greatest sense of purpose that we have in this industry.

Nico: I love that story. And I love the idea that not only is there room for co opetition, but, uh, as you said, we’re out changing the world, slinging sunshine every day. And this secret society of sorts that you all, uh, gave birth to called Solar Cutters humanizes the competition. It humanizes… Uh, every aspect of it, and it allows us to embrace the fact that a rising tide lifts all boats.

Right. And we can choose to have healthy competition, but we still have to keep our eye on and focus on the standards that we want for an industry so that it can be professional, so that it can be respectable, so that it can grow with approval from counsel, approval from. The, the stakeholders, um, in, in different parts of the country, you know, here in the United States, everyone has talked about the investment inflation reduction act, uh, otherwise known as the IRA.

And there is a strong component of it now that places incentives on apprenticeships. You’ve mentioned apprenticeships a couple of times here, and I know that. It was something that you all focused on at Gippsland and at RACV. What can you share about the value of apprenticeships and the focus and quality that brings and how through Gippsland and RACV, you have really helped to focus apprenticeships.

What can we learn here in the United States that you all have been able to set as standards in Australia? Well,

Andy: I think it all comes back for me that the, our business at its heart is all about its people. Like we, we exist to create opportunity and to invest in people and to see them flourish. Nothing gives me more joy and, um, ultimately, you know, business has to make money, but we’ll only do that as a by product of employing the best people, lifting them up and, and developing them into the future leaders of tomorrow.

So, um, I can’t think of a better example of that than an apprenticeship. It’s taking someone fresh out of school a lot of the time who, They don’t really have any requisite skills or experience, um, but, but they have a passion to get into renewables and to build a career in this industry. And, uh, to, to be able to identify these people, invest in them and just watch them grow and to become team leaders and then for their, their team to become team leaders and, you know, I refer to it as like the opportunity tree where those branches just continue to extend out.

And all of a sudden you look around, you think we’ve employed seven or 800 people, uh, over the last 10 And a lot of them are no longer with us, but they’ve gone on to make a significant impact on this industry somewhere, somehow. Once I start talking about my people, I get quite emotional about it because I just love, I love the journey they’ve been on.

And I just love the, all we did was plant a seed for them and then they’ve had to take that opportunity. Um, and ultimately growing a big business is just about being able to create more opportunities for great people, you

Nico: know, in the United States, as we have seen an acceleration of installations, we’ve experienced a decentralization of workforce and, um, and tasks as it were, meaning, um, as we’re familiar with in the construction industry, there’s kind of the general contractor and a bunch of subs.

You mentioned early on that one of your expansion strategies, your M& A strategy, was to essentially acquire your subs and integrate them into the business. And one of the things I know that you were known for at RACV was. not subbing out work, building in strong in house training program and investing in those apprenticeships.

Why do you believe that that resonates now in Australia and what might that say about the future for the United States industry and probably even other regions?

Fostering Trust: In-House Workforce Strategy

Andy: Well, I think it has always been incredibly important. Um, and we’ve always put our flag in the ground and said that In house workforce is, um, that’s our one wood.

That’s, that’s our unique selling proposition because, yeah, it’s easier to install systems through a subcontractor, um, and through the peaks and troughs of the solar industry, you can flex up and down, um, through contracted labor. I get that it makes sense on a business level, but I think there’s a message that it sends when you have the biggest in house workforce in Australia, which RECV Solar did.

It still does. Um, I think that sends a message that we’re here for the long term. So, you know, as we’ve spoken about, um, earlier, there’s a real trust deficit in Australia within the solar industry. And so we would really leverage that and we would say. If you want to know if a solar provider is serious about being around for the long term, have a look at the size of their in house workforce, because you can get rid of subbies today, you just don’t have to give them any work tomorrow.

But when you’ve invested years and built up a workforce in house, you’ve provided their training, you’ve subsidized their tools, you’ve put them in vehicles which you’ve sign written, and you’ve, you’ve built all of that concrete. That’s a sure sign that a business has a long term plan to be around for the life of a solar panel warranty, for example.

So, it really has resonated and I think it implies a level of trust that long after the installation is done, if you have a problem, you’re far more likely to get someone back if they’re, if they have an in house team because you pop it in their calendar for 7. 30 tomorrow morning and they’re going to turn up.

And when I ring a subbie who I might not have used for 12 months and say, we’ve got some work you need to rectify on one of your installations. Oh, there’s a bit of a blast from the past. You haven’t used me for over a year now. And you want me to come back and fix the job. I’ll, I’ll get there when I can, might take me a couple of weeks.

Uh, in the end, we just had to use in house electricians to rectify that work and protect the customer experience anyway. So we thought, well, what better way to invest in the future than to build an in house workforce? And, um, I’m really proud of some of the pathways that we’ve built to. Bring amazing men, women, indigenous apprentices, people from all walks of life into our team.

And it’s created a much richer culture as well.

Nico: Yeah. Yeah. I was, uh, you mentioned, um, Mitch and I’m sure there are dozens of, uh, of stories like Mitch that, um, that exemplify the effort made into hiring the right talent, into training them up. And, um, and giving them stable employment, right? Not considering them dispensable, um, as subs or, uh, or part time, uh, workers.

And that’s not to say that the industry, uh, won’t always have those. It probably will, certainly in the utility scale side where. Um, you have to staff up and then scale back, but, you know, as the resi and and in particular rooftop, uh, commercial. Solar industry expands both here and throughout the Americas.

Um, I expect that we can and will learn a lot from, uh, countries like Australia and Germany and how. Uh, who are ahead in many ways and I’ve learned the hard lessons. Uh, I encourage listeners to ask, you know, meet people like Andy, meet people who have built companies in these markets that have had a race to the bottom for price and, uh, and learned the mistakes that were made, the sort of realizations as we’ve heard over the last hour from Andy about how he.

Uh, decided to really create unique selling proposition and value proposition around training and building an in house team. Uh, I think that they are core to the success that led not only to Kip’s Len Solar selling to RACV, but you having a successful five year run as CEO of RACV Solar. And, uh, and now what’s next, Andy?

I mean, you you’ve handed the reins off. I, we’re having this conversation because you. Announced publicly that, uh, you’d completed your last day at RACV. What do you have to look forward to now?

Andy: Um, well, a little bit more time with the family, Nico, will be nice. Um, I mean, after, you know, 10 years building this business and then, um, three or four years as the CEO, you know, that takes a toll, um, not just on me, but also on the family.

I think it’s fair to say that my, my wife, Kel and our three boys have probably suffered a lot for the, the success that we’ve enjoyed. I guess I’m in a fortunate position in life where, you know, I’m 41 now and, um, we’ve, we’ve done the hard yards and we’ve sold our business and, and I was able to step down at, What I consider to be the top of the bell curve, all things are going really well, left on great terms and I’m not running away from anything.

I’m just running towards more time with my family. So, um, you know, for me, um, you know, it’s just time we’re going to take a six month sabbatical. Um, flying out in a couple of days, uh, taking, uh, five months on the road with the family, going to tick off a lot of bucket list items in Europe and the Middle East, um, and just repaying them for the, for the sacrifices they’ve made to allow me to grow this business because it’s, uh, you know, I’m at my prime working age, but my kids are also at a prime age to spend more time together as a family.

And, uh, I don’t want to lose those precious years and realize when it’s too late.

Nico: That’s fantastic. And, uh, you know, what a, what an honor. That, uh, now you get to take some time and while they’re still young to invest into them. I’m sure though, having spent time getting to know you that, uh, after a six month sabbatical, you’re going to be itching.

I would argue after a six week sabbatical, you’re going to be itching, you’re going to have, going to have grass growing under your feet. Not something you’re familiar with, you know, be looking to see how, how, and where. You lean in next one of the things I know that you like to lean in and do as you, uh, as you, like many leaders, um, really focused on building a strong team and that is mentoring others.

Um, I’m curious if there are any salient, uh, lessons or takeaways from mentors and leaders who’ve had a profound impact on you and how do you pass that along? To your team, or perhaps maybe even pass that along now to our Suncast audience.

Andy: Uh, yeah, it is something I’m very passionate about and it’s probably something I’ll look to get more involved in, uh, in the next stage of my career.

Um, you know, I’ve been in this industry since I was, uh, 19 years old. So about half my life. Uh, and I’ve been very fortunate to have some amazing mentors who are so selfless with their time. And quite often I thought that, you know, they were giving me all of their spare time to help develop my own career.

And then I found out they were actually doing the same thing for dozens of other people. They just, they just live to give. Um, I’m so grateful for those lessons that people have imparted on me along the way. And so to be at a stage in my life where I can pay that forward and to, um, really mentor that the up and coming generation is something I’m

I want to create a legacy. I didn’t always just want to run a successful business. I want to have an impact and I want to be a champion of industry in order to do that. Sometimes you, you know, you might do unpaid or volunteer work or you might take a particular interest in someone who’s got an amazing business that they’re trying to build out of their own garage in a little town in the hills.

And if I can give them the tools for success and help them learn. You know, from the mistakes that I made along the way, help them to avoid the sort of mental health challenges that I faced along my journey and that time that I had to spend digging myself out of a hole, that’s not necessary, just because you’re passionate doesn’t mean you have to find yourself in that position if you, um, if you look after yourself along the way, you can change the world, but you can also do so.

Um, with a happy head as well and, uh, and not, not find yourself in the position that I did. So those are the lessons I want to try and pay forward. Yeah.

Nico: Do you remember, thank you for that. And I certainly have, uh, have found a lot of, um, similarity in your story and others that I’ve interviewed on Suncast as well as my own, my own journey, struggling with health, trying to overcome, uh, the demons, uh, the demons that, that, uh, often.

We need to confront about whether we’re good enough, whether our business is going to survive, whether or not we can let go of perfection. I wonder if, uh, early on there were any pieces of advice that really served as foundational insight for you that in hindsight, you recognize as kind of keys to success, things that someone else unlocked for you that, that you often try to make sure you help folks, folks understand.

Advice From Andy For Those In The Renewable Energy Industry 

Well, I

Andy: think, you know, along the lines of looking after yourself. The best advice I ever had when I first engaged a business coach, um, was he, um, he imparted some wisdom upon me and he said that, you know, everything in life can be looked through the, the, um, prism of having 100 points of energy. So, you know, that’s the basis of my entire life, my business, uh, everything that I do is wrapped around 100 points of energy.

So. You can apply that to everything. It can be the, the getting the work life balance right. It can be in business if you go and chase a new stream, a new vertical, a new horizontal opportunity. In order to do that, it might take 20 points of energy and that energy has to come from somewhere else. My, my response in, uh, the early days would be say, well, I think I have more energy and more drive than the average person.

So I’ve got 150 points of energy. Uh, but he’s like, no, it, It doesn’t work that way. Think of it as a hundred points of energy and how you spend that energy every day. If I’d learnt those lessons earlier, I would have spent more time on my own health and well being, and I probably would have been more selective about opportunities that I chased, uh, at the expense of some of the things, the core parts of a business that we’re really good at.

Because with this renewable energy transition, the easiest thing in the world is to be busy. Everyone’s busy and, um, there’s opportunity coming every day and it’s what you say no to that defines whether you succeed or fail, uh, in your business because, um, you know, you can only really do 20 or 30 percent of everything that comes across your desk in business.

And you have to identify what’s the key, the key areas of focus that are going to give you the returns rather than just chasing things because they’re exciting. I

Nico: love that you, uh, that you brought it to a focus here around you would have spent time on health and well being and what you say no to defines your success or failure.

It’s so true. It’s something that we hear as euphemisms. We hear as, um, those who, who study sort of success oriented, um, coaching, as it were, you’re definitely confronted with the idea that what you say no to is more important because what you say yes to is a no to something else, right? Because a hundred points of energy need to be distributed.

I appreciate that model, that mental model to think about. And I hope that others will lean in and listen that it really is as important to know how to say no, to be able to distinguish between, between good and good for you. Um, yeah, I want to, I want to lean in as we, as we sort of circle around to the close here on how you think about, uh, nurturing yourself, right?

And you’re going to have some opportunity to do so here in the coming months. Do you consider yourself a reader and if so, are there any particular books that have left an indelible impact on the way that you approach life or business? Yeah, look,

Andy: I’m not really someone that reads a lot to be honest. I’m obsessed with podcasts and TED talks and I really focus on self improvement all the time.

Um, for me, I think, I think my most important skill or asset is, um, my self awareness, like I’m hyper aware of what I’m good at and when I’m not good at. And so I spend all of my time just trying to improve myself in the areas that are considered to be my blind spots. Um, and I think as a leader, being self aware of your strengths and weaknesses, not being too proud to admit them is the key to self.

Uh, development, uh, and growth. Um, so for me, like I’ve, you know, I’ve listened to a lot of the Brene Browns and the Simon Sineks of the world about, you know, organizational culture and leadership and connecting with people. And that’s probably where I get a lot of my energy from, but for me, it’s just this like constant desire.

I just want to, I just want to connect with everyone. All the time. You know, I’m obviously an extroverted person by nature and, uh, it’s just about opening doors constantly and not being afraid of, of failure or rejection. Yeah. Because if I look through my LinkedIn inbox at all of the maybe hundreds of messages I’ve sent on LinkedIn to people who I’ve had so much respect for, I’ve always looked up to and they never got back to me.

You know, you can tell yourself to shreds looking, focusing on those things, or you can just go, well, they’re not worth my time. Move on. Yeah. Can open up another connection and eventually you open enough doors and something appears behind one of them. So I think that’s the key to life and business is just to keep on building a network and just keep hustling and meeting everyone and hearing their stories and sharing your stories.

Nico: So Andy, you mentioned that you have, you want to connect with everyone all the time. Uh, I’d love to give folks the opportunity, um, since you will LinkedIn?

Yeah,

Andy: I think, uh, as, as a lot of people know, I’m quite prolific on LinkedIn. Um, I think it’s a very powerful tool as well. So I’m always happy to take, um, uh, connection requests and, and, um, have people reach out if there’s anything I can offer. Um, I find myself spending a lot of time with various, um, entrepreneurs and startups around the world and just helping them to maybe synthesize some of their good ideas and help them to, um, you know, just hone in on what they’re good at and what they should be focusing on.

I spend a lot more time now than what I did when I was, um, a very busy CEO. Um, and, and I think it’s something that I can do to help maybe, you know, foster the next generation of people who are going to go out there and change the world. So, uh. By all means, reach out if you think there’s some value I can offer, or if you want to share your story or something you’re working through, that’s challenging you, send me a message and I’ll be much more likely to get back to you these days now that I’ve got time on my hands.

Fantastic.

Nico: Well, Andy, let’s, uh, we’ll, we’ll, we’ll be sure to link to your LinkedIn. So folks can connect with you there as I did. And I can attest that Andy is very responsive. Let’s end today with what we call a bold prediction, but I’m going to modify it slightly given. That, uh, you know, you have already seen a market like Australia go through mega or hyper growth.

What do you feel might be the important or most important aspect of a solar business that CEOs here in America could learn from those markets like Australia and Germany that are ahead of us? How would you advise someone listening to, to really focus on how they grow their business? Over the coming years now in America with the tailwind of the IRA as, as we try to drive costs down and adoption up, what might be your part, your last piece of parting advice?

Andy: Well, I think that, you know, certainly in Australia, we’ve paid the price for spending too much time creating demand for solar, and we haven’t spent anywhere near enough time on the supply side. So something I’m very passionate now is creating more pathways, working with registered training organizations, getting skills and development, getting into our boys and girls in the schooling system who might identify, um, a passion for renewable energy.

We need to start building those skills because, um, in every state and territory in Australia, we have like some very bold and ambitious targets for renewable energy. But what we don’t have is the workforce to get us there. So, we need to find, uh, more, uh, dirty boots and, uh, and blue collar workforce to help to, to deliver these projects.

We need to find these rising stars who are, um, budding entrepreneurs that could do, go and do anything in their business career. We need to show them that renewable energy is the place that you need to focus your energy. We just need to find the next generation of people that are going to change the world and convince them that the way to do that is to get into the renewable energy sector because You know, I don’t spend a lot of time looking in the rearview mirror, uh, at what we’ve achieved.

I’m just so focused on, uh, what’s ahead and what we still need to do. And I think with electrification, uh, EVs, incentive things. You know, the next billionaire out there in the world is probably sitting in their garage right now, he or she’s trying to find smarter ways to move electrons around the world and they might not even own any infrastructure like an Airbnb or an Uber.

They might just be very tech savvy and create something that’s never been done before and they might be the next billion dollar company. So, um, you know, opportunity abounds everywhere. It’s, it’s, it’s incredibly exciting time. And I’ve got a longer time left in my career, but I also see people coming through into the industry now.

And I think, geez, you’ve got an amazing journey ahead of you. So just go and sink your teeth into it.

Nico: I love that call to arms here for us to really think about the pathways that help develop the skills, develop the schools and develop the opportunities for the workforce of the future. The workforce is going to build.

Upon the ambitious goals we’ve set out for the energy transition and who are going to help us connect the wires and the, and the steel and the electrons that will power our renewable future. Andy McCarthy is the founder and now past CEO of RACV Solar in Victoria, Australia. Andy, it has been such a joy to get to know more about you and hear your journey.

Thanks for sharing with us here. It’s been

Andy: great. Appreciate you having me, Nico. And, um, yeah, I look forward to hearing from your audience.