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Where can the people learn more about your passion project and the dope work you are putting out into the world.
I'm the CEO of Cassaberry Consulting the number one corporate logistics consulting firm in the Bronx, and author of the For The Hustler book series.
You can find me and all my coaching and consulting and logistic assessment services at Cassaberry.com.
You can find my book at hustlerbooks.com
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What do you do for Full-time work?
I work in New York City in construction management. I'm a supervising construction Inspector, which pretty much means I'm one of the leads on a large team of construction inspectors
What is your passion project and how long has it been in existence?
My passion and purpose project is my business. Cassaberry Consulting, which is logistics consulting firm, where we help businesses find flaws in the present, you know, daily operations, and what do you call it? The daily operations and procedures and also help them avoid obstacles that will come in the future, you know, by optimizing everything they do now, and it's been, I started in May of 2017, a month after I found out my wife was
What is your project’s origin story: Why did you start this project; what was the passion behind the project.
Alright, so I'm from the Bronx, New York. Growing up, you know, just to put in perspective, I'm 652 150 pounds. So, so I always had intentions and plans on playing professional basketball overseas. Even in like middle school, I want to I didn't even care about the NBA as much I wanted to play overseas in Europe and stuff. Eventually, you know, I got to college and realized the talent in college was way stronger than high school. And by my senior year, I kind of realized, you know, basketball wasn't going to be, you know, a professional for me. And just to put the nail in the coffin, February of my senior year, I tore my my shoulder out about dislocated my shoulder playing basketball. You know, with with, with it being three months before graduation, I knew, you know, this is it. So, I sat down at night, because I don't like taking pain medication. And I was thinking to myself, alright, Trevor, you got $100,000 in student loan debt? How are you going to pay this off when you get out of here. And, you know, I knew when I graduated, I could make a decent amount of money because I got an electrical engineering degree. So I'm like, okay, you can make 60 70,000 maybe when you get out, but that's not gonna be enough to pay for student loan because your taxes and other stuff you got to pay. And then I'm like, you, you, you're not gonna make money playing basketball. And math tutor is the only other thing you've ever done to make money. And that's not going to do it. Somehow. Okay, Trevor, you have to learn about money. So literally, every day in a day, like without, you know, non stop, I've been studying money and investing and business straight. And, you know, that night, when I did, I was I remember, it was the all star weekend for the NBA I was watching NBA game, and I decided to write down what 10 things that I would change about the NBA. And, you know, they kept me up, I was intrigued. So every day in those last three months college, you know, because my shoulder was torn, I was literally going straight to class, and then come right back to my room add into that business plan added to that those changes I would make. So first It started off as 10 changes, then it was 20 changes, then it became a whole new professional league that I was started in the Bronx. And then, you know, it started mapping out from there. And, you know, it got to a point where I got I wrote down everything I would need, and I'm okay, Trevor, you know, at this point, you know, it's kind of dumb, because it's not like you have the money to do any of these things. So who cares? And then, you know, I don't know what came over me. I'm just like, you know, in trouble. Just pretend you're a billionaire. Something and money is not a not not an obstacle in what? And that thought right? There just opened up a whole new world in my head, because now I started doing the research now. Okay, How big does this gym need to be? What laws would I need to follow? And, you know,
things I will need to have in place in order to have a gym this big in New York City. How much would it cost, you know, to put a league together, you know, how does the league formulated So tonight, I'm doing research on how the, all the other professional leagues started. So figure it out, they all started as nonprofits and things like that, you know, pretty much every stream income that the business that the league could make, I had to understand how that industry works. I had to learn and study insurance and research, you know, media and advertising and all these different industries. And long story short at the end of it, I realized Even though I didn't have the money, the one way that all of this could come to fruition is at all the different things that we would have needed to pay for for the league to go. If one of the league owners or team owners owned that business, so what I realized was a lot of the team owners and NBA NFL style, they own a lot of the different corporations that they use to support and provide the labor for the league. So I'm like, if I could do that, for my own, that works. So you know, instead of us having to, you know, go out to get food for the players and people there, we just need a team owner that owns the restaurant. All right, instead of us needing to pay a laundromat. To clean the jerseys, we just need somebody that owns a laundromat, instead of paying a media company to come talk to the players after the game, we just need somebody that owns a media company, and it all came together. And at the end result, I realized, okay to cover pretty much every goal that you plan on having in your life going forward, you're not going to get there alone. Like it's not like graduating college, you will pretty much able to do that on your own. But all these aspirations you have for business and finances, and when to move out the country and things like that, you're gonna need a team around you. So from then, you know, as soon as I got back home from college, the only the main thing I was telling all my friends about was business and showing them this basketball league idea. I say, listen, the only way I could get here all Racing League is even a possibility. Here's a list of the different businesses we would need in order for it to work, you know, just pick one, and then I hope to start the business and this, that and that. And you know, it kind of went from there. So five years forward, or four years forward, now, you know, the league isn't really aspiration anymore, I really just have turned that, that interest in that experience of, you know, learning business and liking gay almost become a competitive, whether you like every plays basketball, and was able to monetize it by starting a logistics come to me.
Oh, yes. So, um, basically, as time went on with the business, um, you know, I started getting really good at what I was doing and getting, you know, more more qualified businesses as clientele. And because of that, I had to, you know, raise my prices, just because my, a lot more of my time was being taken up with the clientele. And it was kind of pricing out the people that I really came to serve, which was the people who did who were entrepreneurs yet and needed help starting businesses and information. But, you know, what, I didn't want to sell myself short by you know, under charging, and then at that point, I knew I would be, you know, upset, you know, taking on clients for low price, but I also didn't want to price out the people that you know, I knew were going to need my services at some point. So, what I figured was instead of having those people save money to pay me hundreds of dollars for beginner information, I'm going to put all the beginner information in a book, and at that point, they'll be able to get all that information for less than what they were even able to talk to me for because it's like you know, you don't necessarily need to talk to me about the the intro to business and what LLC is I can give you that in a book. But as long as I'm presenting it in a way that's digestible for the audience that is for you know, it works because I've never taken a business class or anything. I have like taken like little business exams in college like it'll be like one of my roommates who was a business major I used to take the quizzes just to see what I could get on it, just for regular knowledge. And believe it or not, I used to pass up but um, you know, a, my my books came together, say when my wife my wife owns a publishing consultant company. She used to work for a large magazine company, she got fired while she was pregnant. And she was essentially like my first client. So when she got fired, we pretty much decided, Okay, instead of you going out to find a job, let's sit down and have you start this, you know, put put your skills together and monetize them, she got an English degree, so she turned her senior comp into her first book. And from there self published it. So she, you know, learned the self publishing process. And with me developing a knack for business, you know, it all just came together, you know, like, like a perfect storm. And she was able to guide me through the publishing process, so, so I didn't actually have to put up most of the money that most authors would. And because of that, because it was a business book, and I knew the other books on the market, really were, you know, pretty boring. All I had to do was put my own twist and reality into the book. And at the end of the day, as long as the I made sure the book was always a way to market my business, it worked. So you know, once you see the book, the book is called further hustlers. You know, when you see it, you'll see my face and my hands and stuff like that, on the front cover, you'll see a picture of me inside and on the back, my Instagram and my hashtags and everything. But now it's become a series. So for the hustler Volume One was a pretty much how it's 50 quotes. Each one has a passage with it, that tells about my thoughts or stories are experienced, explained in the quote. And it's all about how to generate income by selling a product or service. And, you know, using identify your skill set to figure out what product or service you already have access to, to sell.
But the hustler Volume Two is all about how to generate income by investing. So the number one reason a lot of people fail, as investors is because they make either an educated decisions or very emotional decisions where they see the value of a stock for less or they sell out before they allow it to rise. But I see a property that's low cost, but they don't do enough homework about what you know, what is on the title, what a property and things of that nature can get screwed on the backup. So the book is all about how to develop your own investment, morals, that way, you can have a investment strategy that's custom to your situation. And it does it with the same style as book number one. But instead of 50 quotes and 50 passages, it's 50 questions and 50 passages, kind of giving you information to help you make a decision. So the the questions would be stuff like, you know, do you prioritize companies that have subsidiaries or not? And if obviously, if you prioritize companies with subsidiaries, that means when you go to investment stocks, you'll look for companies with subsidiaries, as opposed to companies that don't have and for those who don't know what that subsidiary is, that's a company that's owned by a larger company. So you know, if I was Casselberry consulting, and I owned a small watch company called cassiobury, watches, the cassiobury watches would be the subsidiary of cassiobury Consulting. So for hustler volumes, who explains how to, you know, put together your investment models, and be profitable, investing in stocks, investing in real estate and investing in equity. And right now, I'm working on for the hustler volume three, which should be out by the end of the year, which teaches how to increase your income by negotiation. So that we'll discuss how to do as an employee and negotiate a higher wage as a consumer to negotiate the best rate of pay as a merchants and negotiate the best sale. And as a closer to teach you how to one, bring two parties together to create a deal but also how to put in a product or some sort of viable piece yourself. So now you get paid, you know, in perpetuity, offer that deal, as opposed to just getting paid the one time, you know fee in the front end. So once for US law, volume three is out, you'll be able to buy all three, but for anyone interested in the first two, you can find them at hustlerbooks.com
Is there a point where you hesitated to start it? What got you over that hump?
Um, so believe it or not, so when I graduated in May of 2016. I graduated college in May of 2016. Um, I didn't think I didn't know when I was actually going to start a business. I still you know, was, you know, doing research every day. At that point. I was a little over. By the time I actually started my business. I was a little over a year into studying, you know, business and investing but I'm in turn As I started my business, the the one thing that made me do it was one, me and my wife got married and moved out on our own in May of 2017. So less than a year after I graduated, um, the following month, April 2017, we found out she was pregnant. So may 2017. I knew Okay, Trevor, you need to start something. Now. One, because you'll need the extra income at some point just in case something happens. And too, because you already have something growing for your child. And I remember the person and this was a video I saw online that kind of gave me the kick in the butt to go for it. And, you know, give me the confidence to say I have what it takes was Dr. Boyce Watkins. I don't know if you've ever seen one of his videos before. But um, he had a video called something like why the NCAA is like slavery or something like that. And the title just intrigued me and I clicked it. And, you know, he went on a rant that basically had nothing to do with the NCAA, but it was all about kind of telling the viewer, you got what it takes to start a business as long as you have X, Y, and Z. And I had X, Y, and Z. So I watched another one of his videos where he interviewed a guy named Andre hatchet, who, later on ended up becoming one of my business mentors. And he was pretty much talking about starting a mobile notary company. So at that point, I was really thinking about starting that mobile notary company, until some point in that in that interview, they said, what the number one fastest growing industry for small businesses is the consulting industry. And that, put the light bulb in my head like, Trevor, you can start the consulting industry tomorrow. I mean, you can start the consultant company tomorrow. And you know, I was sitting there and I'm okay, I'll just do it tomorrow. And literally right after they said that Andre hatchet in the video says something like, yeah, I always tell people, if you say you're going to start the business, you got to do something right now to go for it, like buy a domain name or something. And because he said that right then and there, that's what got me to do it. And, you know, once I spent my money, you know, I was at that point, you know, I didn't install. Um, the other part that I wish that I did stall it and was feeling confident enough to offer investment consultations, just because even though I was invested in the stock market, I didn't feel I knew a lot about it. But two things happened one, I, we started investing in the stock market heavily. Once we found out my wife was pregnant. So with that tax return, we started going in the stock market, and we made, you know, more more than what we put in back with it by the end of the year. So we knew we were doing something, right. But in October of 2017, I went to the bank, because the year before, when we were saving some move out, I created a small high yield savings account, just so you know, the money could rack up quicker. And when when I took the money out to get the apartment in March of 2017, there was like 11 $100 left, I was like, you know, I'll just leave that in for the rest of the year, just to see what what it'll do in the bank. And I went a year later, and I got to see that win with them having my 11 $100 in the bank for a whole year. I only made $3 profit. And now and that was when I was like, why did I ever leave this money sitting here for a year? I could have used this 1100s and make more in a day. Right? And I'm just like that that was the one time like cover up? Why did you ever take so long you do know how much how much interest you just missed out on. So because of that, I'm always like, that's it, you know, I'm, I'm going I'm going you know directly to what I say I'm going to do. If I say I'm gonna, you know, start offering investment consultations every day, I have to, you know, do something to help push that that purpose forward. So since that day, I've been you know, fully fully gone with the with the investing.
And sure enough, we cassiobury consultants, so every idea I have for what's going to happen in the future, like one idea is to be able to subcontract on the same construction management, kind of on the same construction management contracts that I work on, but subcontract with my business cassiobury consultants, so I'm technically still still working under my business full time, but on the same kind of projects. So I learned that whole back system of how the whole New York City project procurement, bidding process goes and everything so I put my business And I'm in the right place in the right position to do that, by getting my M wb certification or at least apply for it. Get in my New York City vendor license and all of that. I did that, you know, years ago, like in 2018, long before I could actually, you know, use it. And because I did that long ago, and now, before I even knew it would be ready, it benefited me while I was able to negotiate a large a large increase in my pay a couple years ago. So it's like, because I'm always making those next steps every single day, it's like, something always just pops up later on, that reminds me like, Trevor, you, you did a good job by doing what you did back then. So keep it up and keep going. So that's what keeps me from procrastinating.
One of the biggest challenges people face when it comes to starting passion projects is finding time in their already busy lives to do it. How did you find or make time for your project?
Um, so it really comes down to my background and engineering and logistics where I'm able to, you know, write out every single task that I have to do. And I literally just figure out which ones I can multitask together. So like, I want to be able to, you know, do my job, handle my business, play and teach my play with and teach my daughter and spend time with my wife and help out around the house right. One last year, the quarantine with you know, having anybody stay home, I was able to work from home with my construction management job. So that actually made it a lot easier of a transition, then if I was still you know, going in and out, back and forth. And I became a full time office employee, which really meant full time working from home. So that that was one thing that kind of opened up my mind to even thinking it was possible to when I work, I keep my daughter nearby. One so I can see what she's learned on TV. So there's been times, you know, I got tired of her watching certain shows, I just felt like they weren't teaching her much. So I just looked to see if that same show was online in Spanish. And it was and sure enough, I just started learning how to watch the shows in Spanish. And now she speaks she speaks Spanish. So small things like that I was able to pick up while I was working just because I worked in the same room that she was playing and working in. And other things I do like my wife has a business instead of both of us having to spend time separately working on our businesses, we make sure we try to put our businesses together as often as possible. So right now on Instagram, if you see our our marketing strategy, we're bouncing ideas off of each other where we're doing a 60 day 60 question challenge asking each other questions that show our expertise and our industry. Have you on our newsletter list, you'll see that our newsletters come together, it literally says castleberry consultant, and I'm a co CIO at the top of it. A lot of the podcasts that we reach out to both of us when they're reaching out to them, just because we know it's just easiest, and it works the best for our businesses, when we're together, even the views that we get on my content much higher when we're together, maybe she'll get 100 alone, I'll get 50 alone, because she's prettier than me. But when we're together, we'll get you know, 250. Um, and the last thing is really outsourcing. So I realized a lot of stuff on my business, even though I was able to do it. And you know, I had the mental capacity to do it, I didn't have the time to handle everything. So I had to hire a social media manager, I had to hire a virtual assistant, you know, I had to outsource my web design portion of the business, just so I was able to do the stuff that was going to bring in the big clients. And big, I didn't have the money ahead of time, I just had to spend the money and tell myself all right, Trevor, now that you spent the money, you gotta you gotta work twice as hard to make sure you get it back. And that's kind of what helps, you know, get it done. And in doing that, figure out what works and what doesn't. And from this, like, you know, when I spent the extra $1,000 for a month with the Social Media Manager and the virtual assistant, you know, I had to start going out and building a whole list of people to cold call people to you know, cold call in a DMZ protocol call by email, and then you know, circle back and do it all again. And eventually I figured out a strategy that worked. So now that's just part of our regular business. protocol because we still have to pay for that virtual assistant. So, you know, because I put the money up ahead of time, that's the only thing that gave me the creativity and the drive to come up with the solution. And now, you know, helps me expand my business. So, you know, putting together all those different collaboration ideas with outsourcing and is the only way to manage everything and, you know, some days, it still gets out of hand, and, you know, you just got to adjust when necessary.
Another big challenge faced is fatigue. You work 9-to-5, it takes up 95% of your energy. And we are not even talking about family and their needs yet. What can you share with the listeners about getting energy after all the demands of life?
Okay, so, um, one reason I really like, oh, and I really promote writing, um, you know, courses and stuff like that, as well, well, writing and publishing books, offering courses and things like that online and also consulting services is because you can do them anywhere and kind of anytime that you're available. So even like a consultation, you don't need nowadays, you don't even necessarily have to do it on a laptop, you can do it on a cell phone. So with my with my first job out of college, you know, the construction management contract I was working on was on the highways. And we were maintaining the cameras and and traffic signs on all the highways in New York City. So when the when we went out there and and look in the electricians are working on the camera and stuff like that, I was standing outside my car until they went up, you know, in the bucket truck and got up there. And at that point, I'm just like, all right, there's nothing I can do to help them while they're up there, you know, 40 feet in the air, I go right back in my car and start writing my business plan, I started writing out material for my course, oh, I started writing stuff for my book. My first my first and second book, I actually wrote him out what my first book, I wrote the entire thing out by hand first and then typed it out. The second book, it was half or half. And this third one, I'm also writing by him first, just because, you know, it's easier to you know, really fast while I'm sitting down somewhere waiting for you know, to get into a place to make an order or something like that I can just type on my phone or write in a notebook. So I spent all those little times to get work done. One thing my wife, you know, that we teach to her clients for writing is like, if you take the train, you know, to or from work, that's your time to write. If even if you drive to and from work, that's your time to speak, you know, you could you could use your phone to record yourself speaking actually speak while you're driving. And maybe it'll take your your thoughts of road rage, if you have that. I'm not sure. But But, you know, you, you really got to find those small, idle times and, you know, put in energy where you can because you know, you're awake then because the whole standard of lay in pulling all nighters, as much as a lot of entrepreneurs brag about it, and I've been one to do it, you know, it's not healthy, and it's not sustainable. You know, maybe you may have to pull an all nighter one day, just because you got a really big deal come in or a really big project that you have to complete by deadline, I get it. But you know, it's not you don't want it to become something where it's like you're on Fridays, I stay up till 3am because you're gonna crash, you know, by next Friday, especially if you keep it going, you know, that there's been people that I know that kept working like that for three, four weeks or a month at a time and when they finally crash is always terrible. So you want to make sure you're putting as much effort into reserving energy as you are and so using your energy and finding the right spots, you know, to use it.
I have heard about passion projects providing renewed confidence and new skills when it comes to people’s day jobs. How has your passion project impacted the way you show up at your day job?
Okay, positively impact the hospital. So one, it definitely makes me attentive. So when I realized that I could actually, you know, use my business to work in the same industry that I worked in from my day job. It made me want to learn everything I could. So I was I started out just as a construction inspector with an electrical background. But next thing you know, I was willing to learn all the extra you know, I became a master using Microsoft Excel. I became a man You know, writing technical reports and things that I nature, I became good at writing, the safety plans and things of that nature, which none of that stuff was really part of my job description, I would really just help out wherever I could, or, you know, if I finished one of my tasks early, I would go up to somebody else, like, what, like the other electrician we had in the office, that would be fixing stuff, and just start watching and asking questions, just because I knew, the more I knew about the job, the more types of contracts I could bid on with my business in the future. And, you know, strangely enough, you know, now I'm in a position, I can bid on so many different types of contracts, because, one, there's other people in the industry that know that I have an understanding of that work, too, I can write a bid and a proposal that that, you know, shows that I understand that, that work. And three, I put my, I put my business in position to do it. So, you know, I paid attention to how to how to write contract bids, I paid attention to the people who worked with him, you know, in construction management. So even if I needed to hire someone for a contract, I have a long list of people, I can go back and call just to see if they're, you know, on furlough or something. So, you know, the main thing is, it really only worked because I was able to find a way to connect my business to the job that I was working, if you're in a position where you can't do that at all, like, let's say you work, graveyard shift at a cemetery, but the business you want to start is, you know, a modeling business that maybe there's no way to put that together. But you know, for me, it was very easy to put together construction and consulting, because that, you know, the word consultant is literally in the, in the contract that I was on. So, once I was able to find that connection, it just made me say, Okay, I need I want to learn all of this, because all of these are different ways that I can actually monetize in my business. And, you know, it definitely paid us dividends, because I was even able to even listen in on conversations and see, okay, you know, this is where different companies and different individuals find leverage and things of that nature. And you know, now I'm able to use that to my advantage in business and as I write.
There is someone out there listening to this recording who has something they are passionate about but they are on-the-fence when it comes to starting. What bit of guidance would you provide to them?
something that any purpose, any purpose project, they should know, um, one, you're gonna need a team. And it's best when you have that team in the beginning. The only thing is, you don't want to have to, you don't want to be in a position where you're waiting for that team before you start. Because you're not going to be able to build that team until you until you're already playing. So an analogy for our compared to like, if you went to open gym or basketball court for a pickup game, it's like, you may not know anybody there. But because you're out there, as you get to play more and more, you'll get an idea of who the who the people are, you play with best that you would want on your team for later or for next time you come back. So you already have to start doing the work before you can identify your team. Because just because you think somebody works well on your team doesn't mean they they want to, you know, work with you. So you want to already be doing the work. And while you're doing the work, you want to make sure that you're putting a team together to support you, you know, going forward, and also that you can support going forward, because the more value you can bring to your team members, the more value they can bring back to you later on. That's number one. net, don't do it by yourself. But you know, you're definitely gonna have to start it on your own, you know, in order to build that team out.
Lastly, are there any particular books that you have found helpful along the passion project journey? Please share 1 to 3 of them if any come to mind.
All right. Well, I do go back and reread my own books specifically. guys in the photo has a little book series. Not only, you know, it's very much like reference reading, but you can always go back and revisit something that's in the book because you may not be in a position to digest it the same way when you first read it. So even sometimes I go back and reread it, if I forget, you know, this is my book, someone's like, I'm reading somebody else's thing. But um, but a hustle is great, because this space in it to write thoughts that spark in, you know, while you're reading it, so there's blank pages in the book. And going back and re rereading and filling out the book every year. definitely helps me progress my business in my in my plans and thoughts forward. The second book, I would definitely have to say, is a day a nice girl, that's a my wife second book, and her name is a coastal wetland city. And the reason that works is because you know, even though it's quite a nice girl, I know reality, and everyone says it is really great and for anybody, and it's really just teaching you how to use your daily relationships to your advantage. So you know, you may you may see the mailman every day and just say hello. But that same mailman, if you sit, you sit down and have a conversation with them, you never know, they may, you know, have access to something that's way greater for you, you know that or that you've been looking for all along. So those those every day, you know, relationships that you have, try to find the good in them, as opposed to you know, being turned off by anything negative, you may see off job. And the third book, I have to say is I would say the 10 next rule by Grant Cardone, simply because to two of the things that I said in the book that I really like that, you know, one thing I was already using was making sure I do something every day, that pushes my my passion project or my business forward. That way, I know that there's no time that I'm stagnant or moving backwards. And the second thing he talks about is, you know, scaling things big and looking forward to new problems. And it's like, as long as the problems you're going through are new, that means you're progressing, because if you're regressing, you're only gonna see old problems that you know, revisiting. And now every time I see a new problem, as scary as they used to be now, you know, I'm much more inviting, and it's almost like wow, and a new obstacle. I'm going to crush this one just like the last one, only because, you know, reading that book, and actually, that was the first audio book I ever listened to listening to the audio book actually, kind of is what helped me get over that. So further hustler books, theories, then I screw about postman answer T. And the next rule by Grant Cardone.