In The Loop With Andy Andrews

On this week’s episode, I’m talking about the importance of having a child start their own business and how it opens them up to communication as a teenager.   I had a conversation the other day with Joe Bullard and his son Ty who run an auto dealership “empire.” Joe took over his dad’s Oldsmobile dealership, and now Ty has recently taken the reins. I asked Ty what the smartest thing his dad ever did was, and he said it was taking a step back from City Council and other things so that he could spend time with his son. It occurred to Joe as he looked long-term that the best thing he could do to continue to expand the business for generations was to invest time in the person who would likely take it over.   I have had a lot of parents of teenagers say, “My teen won’t talk to me,” and the typical response is, “Well, that’s just a teenager.” One of the huge benefits of prompting Austin to have his own business was we put him in a position that he had to talk to us. Since age 12, he knew we weren’t buying him a