“The Horse’s Mouth with Tom McManus” is a unique talk show offering opinions and facts that come straight from the source. No gossip, no hearsay, no agendas; just topics straight from the Horse’s Mouth! His guests include top of the line, high profile figures in sports, news, entertainment, business and leaders in the community. He will tackle the hard subjects in society over a beer and laughs. Today our host, Tom McManus spoke with Major Harding, Marc Hassan, Graziela Fusaro, and Frank Wallmeyer
Transcript:
Opening
From studio three of buzz TV. It’s the Horse’s Mouth with Tom McManus.
Tom McManus
All right. Welcome into the horse’s mouth. Here, Tommy Max. Of course, at my bar, where everybody’s welcome to have a seat and get a chance to tell what they’re doing out there. Brought to our good friends at the Foodies Care organization and right here at the Daily News Network. Great show lined up for you this time around. Major Hardy is here because it’s biz Champion’s time on the show.
Tom McManus
And, he’s a big part of client focused media. He’s brought a couple guests, and we’re going to get into that little real estate, little players championship, little investment banking and feed and seed. How about that? We’re going to get into all of that right here at the bar. So let’s welcome in the panel. Major Hardy is up for same H.
Tom McManus
Hey how are you. But I’m great. Good to see you. Good to see you back at the headquarters. So you’re all back CFM no doubt about it. How you been? How’s, work going for clients? How’s your 2012 six going?
Major Harding
You know, lucky to have Mark in here today. And, you know, we’re just hit the ground running in 2026. Yeah. And, we got a lot of, potential clients that we’re we’re talking to and interviewing and see if there’s a mix of things, you know, kind of sync up.
Tom McManus
And, we’re raising money for people to raise a lot of philanthropic work.
Major Harding
Yep. In fact, we’re taking a group to Costa Rica and two weeks. Nice. We’ve got 14 or 16 people going with us. We’re doing mission work. We’re going to, put bunk beds and in houses with dirt floors, we’re going to, get the kids off the dirt floor.
Tom McManus
Okay, cool.
Major Harding
We’re feeding about 800 meals a week right now. Yeah, to the hotels and the the force of the for children. Yep. So, it’s all good. We’re just trying to get people aware of what we’re doing. Yeah, in Costa Rica.
Tom McManus
That’s great. Great to have you on the show. As usual, my friend Mark Hansen’s here. Hey, Mark. Spectrum Realty Services and the new incoming chairman at the Players Championship. Right, Gratulations. Thank you. That’s a big job, man.
Marc Hassan
It it is a I know, a full time job.
Tom McManus
We have, mutual friends at that position. I know that takes a lot of a lot of work.
Marc Hassan
It is, but it’s a labor of love.
Tom McManus
I bet you it is. I bet you we’ll talk about spectrum. We’ll start with that. So let’s make sure.
Marc Hassan
Spectrum Realty Services is a property management firm. Okay. Opened it basically out of necessity after oh eight. They got stuck with some development projects that we couldn’t sell.
Tom McManus
Okay.
Marc Hassan
Started renting those, units out, and then we had other people say, hey, can you help me? Because I can’t sell mine either. Right. Okay. So, kind of like the recurring income between development projects. Yep. I just kind of blew it up from there.
Tom McManus
So property management all, like, multifamily. What are we talking.
Marc Hassan
Yeah. So we do multifamily, single family associations, commercial property. Okay. Pretty much cover all bases.
Tom McManus
Are those, you know, the groups that were buying up residential for a while, right? Are they still as strong as ever? They have they sold most of those or are they still growing them there? Some portfolios are still around.
Marc Hassan
I’ve seen some headlines. They’re trying to put an end to investors buying.
Tom McManus
I saw.
Marc Hassan
Properties. So we’ll see where that goes.
Tom McManus
The single family home ones. Right? Right. Yeah yeah yeah.
Marc Hassan
Yeah.
Tom McManus
Yeah. Bringing them into the portfolio that time. Yeah. So what’s the base, the foundation of how you, you property manager, what would you say that is?
Marc Hassan
The foundation, I’d say, you know, basically it’s it’s a team run organization. I don’t do property management. I manage my team. There you go. And I gotta have a good team and good systems. Yeah. So we have, we’ve built out processes and task management systems to where we know at any given time where in the life cycle, a property is in the lease, and we know what needs to be done that does.
Marc Hassan
Nice, nice. Otherwise things slip through the cracks.
Tom McManus
Beautiful. All right. So you’ve been as far as the chairman, the incoming chairman. You’ve been working for a long time, right. You got named. And then you tell me the big words coming up, right?
Marc Hassan
Absolutely.
Tom McManus
And now you just we set off here that Ludacris is going to be the Tuesday.
Marc Hassan
Ludacris is the concert act for military appreciation day. Appreciation day. She’s way to go. Yeah.
Tom McManus
Did you play a part in that? How did you.
Marc Hassan
Know I didn’t? I found out about it about a week ago. They keep it pretty top secret. Yeah. But they love it. They, you know, we have a new CEO for PGA. He comes from NFL. Okay. And so I don’t know this, but I’m wondering if he’s decided to raise the act just like a halftime show.
Marc Hassan
Let’s go alone. It’s going to be good.
Tom McManus
Cool. Great to have you on the show. All right. Gratz yellow for sorrow is here. Hey. From Belvedere I be advisors attachment bank.
Graziela Fusaro
Yes, yes.
Tom McManus
How long have you been involved in investment?
Graziela Fusaro
Well, now you’re going to see my age. Are you? Are you crazy? Over 35 years. Okay, a long time. I went out for a bit, was a business school, and then came back straight to live.
Tom McManus
Okay. What’s for dinner?
Graziela Fusaro
Long Island University, New York. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Tom McManus
Very cool. And then you came back. You got right back into it.
Graziela Fusaro
Exactly. I always had a very close contact with Belvedere. I was in their advisory board, and then I decided to move to Florida from New York to Florida, and then went back into what?
Tom McManus
What what’s the most exciting, you know, like companies trying to go public, you know, trying to acquire bunch what?
Graziela Fusaro
So we pretty much focus on small and mid-cap companies. So they’re not in the IPO side. Gotcha. But so we do a lot of capital raising actually I have to talk to Mark because we do a lot of real estate. So we do a lot of capital raising and margins and acquisitions. Okay. We also have a strong focus on cross-border transactions.
Graziela Fusaro
Okay. Well, I’m from Brazil. We have an office in Brazil. We also have a person that covers Europe and one that covers China. So we do a lot of cross-border transactions. Wow. Yeah.
Tom McManus
That’s awesome. Much like what you do.
Graziela Fusaro
I love it. That’s what.
Tom McManus
You are. You deal junkie. Well, maybe not now.
Graziela Fusaro
Well, I think at one point I was, but I think honestly today what I like the most is to see companies growing like, especially because the niche there we are. We’re talking to companies that have an owner. Right, right. They’re not public yet. So yeah, right. Helping their owner to grow their business I think it’s pretty cool.
Tom McManus
And as you know, like, private equity, they gobble up it seems like everything these days. Yeah. You know, friend of mine is up pair Danish business. Got that. Bought by private equity.
Graziela Fusaro
Like that’s a big move. No no. Yeah.
Tom McManus
Right. Yeah.
Graziela Fusaro
Yeah. Regarding cash flow right.
Tom McManus
Yeah.
Graziela Fusaro
Exactly. But Florida is very strong in real estate. So like when I was in New York wasn’t like that. But Florida is very real estate focused also. But you know there’s many industries.
Tom McManus
Yeah those are fun. I am so sorry. You know Frank.
Graziela Fusaro
Walmart like oh all right.
Tom McManus
Well this guy here.
Frank Wallmeyer
Is there a pause button.
Tom McManus
I know this guy used to go to.
Marc Hassan
South Side Business Men’s Club and.
Tom McManus
They would have.
Marc Hassan
Auction items to raise money for.
Tom McManus
Charity. And every.
Marc Hassan
Week he would bring an ice scraper.
Tom McManus
To auction off for charity in.
Graziela Fusaro
Florida. What? A small group. No.
Tom McManus
No one else was giving those away.
Graziela Fusaro
No pens, coffee mugs.
Tom McManus
Who needs that right now? I’m sorry. We’re doing well. Oh. Thank you. And now you’re in. Thank you. Repeat and see.
Frank Wallmeyer
Center for you. See? Yeah. I feel totally inadequate right now.
Tom McManus
Experts say why. Yeah.
Frank Wallmeyer
Yeah. Oh I sell. Oh, yeah. Like.
Graziela Fusaro
Oh, man.
Tom McManus
So you own it. You’ve owned it for eight years standard. You haven’t eight years now.
Frank Wallmeyer
So, April 1st will be 80 years at the business has been in Jacksonville.
Tom McManus
Yeah. How far out is that distribution from where you.
Frank Wallmeyer
Guys basically 25 miles. 25.
Tom McManus
So we’ll, we’ll.
Frank Wallmeyer
We do deliveries. So we’ll deliver within a 25 mile radius of the store. But I mean we have people that come from Georgia, come from Starke, come from all all over. Yeah. Yeah.
Tom McManus
Same thing. How big is your must have a pretty large.
Frank Wallmeyer
16,000ft².
Tom McManus
Of square feet. Well, it must be a lot of logistics.
Frank Wallmeyer
It’s we’re more of a retail store than what you traditionally think of as a feed and seed store. So we’re more like a pet store in a garden.
Tom McManus
Some people walking in and.
Frank Wallmeyer
Walking in, and it’s people like, you know, people that, you know, 80 acres and you know, tractors.
Major Harding
Chickens, baby turkeys.
Tom McManus
Yeah. Right. Yeah. Right. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, yeah. Just like home usage or whatever, that type of thing. Yeah. Not necessarily on a pig farm.
Frank Wallmeyer
Yeah, yeah yeah yeah. I get you. Totally.
Tom McManus
And what’s this? Bingo. You were talking.
Frank Wallmeyer
Chicken poop. Bingo. Yeah. So we have a 4×4 board broken into 64 equal squares, and we have a rooster, and we’ll drop them on the board and people.
Tom McManus
Put money down. Yeah.
Frank Wallmeyer
So you buy a square by.
Tom McManus
Square like a Super Bowl. Yeah. Right.
Frank Wallmeyer
Yeah, yeah. You buy a square one through 64. So you buy your squares and then, half the money will go to the winner. The other half will go to charity. We always do it as a charity fundraiser.
Tom McManus
And as a with one rooster.
Frank Wallmeyer
Well so yeah. So it’s typically one rooster okay. And it can go anywhere from 30s to 45 minutes. So yeah people always ask, well how long is this going to. It’s not up to me, right?
Tom McManus
I got no a little yeah.
Frank Wallmeyer
Yeah people try and scare that out of him. But yeah.
Tom McManus
So you were in promotional products before then and then got into this. Yeah. What’s the best part of of owning standard feed and see for you.
Frank Wallmeyer
Oh it is, it’s it’s just a cool business. It’s been there for a long time. It’s just got a great clientele. I mean, every, every, every walk of life comes in there and it truly is really neat that you can see all these different people from, again, every kind of background that you could ever imagine. Yeah, we get a lot of, we get a lot of immigrants that come in there and okay, so you got to get out the Google translator and but it’s it’s very cool to just to see the demographic, every demographic of humanity that I never got to see before because when I was, you know, beat doing B2B sales.
Frank Wallmeyer
Yeah, I was dealing with small business owners and, you know, it’s. Yeah, kind of a not as diverse or broad of a group as what you see here because you see everything.
Tom McManus
Yeah, everything. Well being retail and walk ups and all that. Right. Oh yeah. Oh yeah that’s great.
Frank Wallmeyer
Oh yeah. Yeah that’s wonderful downtown business.
Tom McManus
Yeah I love it. Great. Here’s a show my friend. Thank you Reggie Ellis. You’re back. So what do you like about Jacksonville the most.
Graziela Fusaro
Oh I love Jacksonville to be honest. You do immediately when I moved here I made such a large friendship group. Yeah. So people are very welcome in Florida. Yeah. Nothing against New York, but Florida is damn right I know. I know.
Tom McManus
I spent time.
Graziela Fusaro
Okay. Yeah. So friendly down here. Very friendly. And the CD is just so easy to walk, to walk around in the beach. Amazing. So yeah, the whole package to be honest. Yeah.
Tom McManus
How are the beaches compared to Brazil and and Jacksonville.
Graziela Fusaro
They’re pretty nice. I think Brazil is like crowded in the beach and, you know, there’s a lot going on. Yeah. Bars and, you know, like bars and that kind. Yeah, yeah I should I think very unexplored. There’s a lot to explore in terms of restaurants and activities around the beach area. Yeah.
Tom McManus
But that’s also very nice. Great to have you on the show.
Graziela Fusaro
Thank you.
Tom McManus
All right Mark, how about you, man? I mean, you get the real estate TPC. You got it all, man. You got a lot.
Marc Hassan
Got it all. It’s busy times right now.
Tom McManus
Yeah. Good times.
Marc Hassan
It’s good times. Yeah I’ve been doing the volunteering for about 15 years okay. And when they interviewed me to be, vice chair, which leads to a chairman. Right. That’s when things really stepped up.
Tom McManus
So that when you become a red quarter, is it after.
Marc Hassan
So I’ve got five vice chairman. So they’re they’re blue codes. Okay. Got your six year. As long as you make it, you do a good job. You, you become the Red Co.
Tom McManus
That is great. Well, I tell you guys never disappoint out there. The players is one of the best run events and one of the best events every single year.
Marc Hassan
It’s the best week. Yeah. Jacksonville.
Tom McManus
And you guys give a ton back to charity that we don’t you.
Marc Hassan
That’s really why we do it. Yeah yeah. So our our team works with the PGA. But we’re really responsible for overseeing the 2000 plus volunteers. And that’s how the PGA and the players specifically can get back to Northeast Florida.
Tom McManus
It’s awesome. Great to have you on the show. Great to have you on the show. Really appreciate it. Thanks, John. Always a pleasure, my friend. All right. That’ll do it for us this time around. Make sure you check out these, great profiles, this conversation and so many other good Daily News network.com. You can read their profiles, find a way to get in touch with them, and, see if there’s a fit for business for you out there as well.
Tom McManus
And remember, everybody’s welcome to have a seat right here. Tommy Mack’s on the horse’s mouth. So till next time, y’all stay safe. Y’all be cool out there. We’ll see you right here on the horse rum. Cheers. Cheers. Cheers.
