650 Employees, 46 Lawyers, One Case Type: Inside Angel Reyes & Associates

Welcome to episode 61 of The Earley Show, hosted by personal injury attorney Christopher Earley! For this conversation, Chris is joined by Angel Reyes, founder of Angel Reyes & Associates in Dallas, Texas.

Check out the episode below. You can also enjoy it on YouTube, Spotify and Apple Podcasts.

Angel and Chris go deep on how a Wall Street associate ended up building one of the largest personal injury firms in Texas. Angel covers the 1994 policy-limits fee he put into Univision instead of new cars, the conference room meeting where he told a dozen lawyers the firm would never do another mass tort, and the 2019 decision to shut off every TV ad, billboard and bus wrap and go 100% digital. He also explains his rule that "if you can't measure it, don't spend it," why every hire at his firm takes the Wonderlic, why his nearshore teams exist to serve clients rather than to save money, and why he calls himself "an overpaid watcher of watchers."

About our guest:

Angel Reyes is the founder of Angel Reyes & Associates, a Dallas-based personal injury firm focused exclusively on auto cases. He was born in Hawaii to a Puerto Rican family, lived in Puerto Rico until age 11, and finished high school and college in Kansas City before attending the University of Michigan Law School. He began his career in corporate securities and finance at a Wall Street firm, then moved to Texas in the early 1990s and soon hung his own shingle. More than 30 years later, the firm employs roughly 650 people, including 46 lawyers and more than 400 nearshore team members, and has secured more than 550 jury verdicts in Texas.

Connect with David:

Visit the Angel Reyes & Associates website

Email Angel at [email protected]

Topics covered

-Growing up between Hawaii, Puerto Rico and Kansas City

-Michigan Law, Wall Street big law and the 73-degree visit that led to Texas

-Taking a third bar exam and hanging a shingle in Dallas

-How Dallas's Hispanic population shaped the firm's early market

-The 1994 policy-limits case and the $50,000 Univision bet

-Why the firm filed lawsuits when most firms were settling pre-lit

-Dropping mass torts and everything else to focus only on car wrecks

-The three criteria that make a case worth taking: fault, coverage and a willing client

-"A sardine factory" and the occasional bluefin

-The only three jobs of a CEO: vision, talent and paying the bills

-Building a training academy, and why your best people shouldn't be your trainers

-Case cost financing, phantom income tax and keeping case costs in a separate account

-Interviewing the person, not the resume

-Why every hire takes the Wonderlic, and what NFL scores reveal

-Google paid search, attribution and competitor keyword bidding

-Pulling the Band-Aid off legacy media in 2019

-"If you can't measure it, don't spend it," and taking ego out of the marketing budget

-Migrating from Needles to Litify on Salesforce

-The 2021 Univision test that showed no lift, and what lead generators taught him about brand

-Nearshore staffing as a client service decision, not a cost decision

-Always-on Zoom rooms, ActivTrak, Power BI and productivity analysts

-Training as a permanent discipline, not an onboarding step

-A day in the life at a 650-person firm and "watching the watchers"

People and resources mentioned

-Angel Reyes & Associates — reyeslaw.com

-Univision

-Glen Lerner — referenced in connection with Ninth Circuit keyword-bidding litigation

-Mike Morse — Fireproof

-Traction (EOS)

-The E-Myth

-Wonderlic

-Litify, Salesforce, Needles, RingCentral, Invoca, Power BI, ActivTrak

-University of Michigan Law School

-Latham, Kirkland & Ellis, Milbank, Skadden Arps, Shearman & Sterling, Morrison & Foerster, Foley

-practicetipoftheweek.com — Chris Earley's free weekly email list for lawyers

Learn more about Chris' practice, the Earley Law Group, here!

Check out Chris' book "Scaling The Wall" here!

The Earley Show is a part of the Answering Legal Podcast Network.

Interested in learning more about Answering Legal? Book an appointment to speak with us here!

You can also give us a call at 631-866-0801.

Episode Transcript:

CHRIS EARLEY [00:00]: The Earley Show is brought to you by our friends at Answering Legal. For more than a decade, attorneys have trusted Answering Legal's 24/7 virtual receptionist service to keep their phones covered and their clients cared for. Now, they're raising the bar with an AI-powered intake chatbot, live translation services in over 180 languages, and 76 seamless tech integrations. Answering Legal's goal: make running a law practice simpler while helping you capture every new client opportunity. And don't worry, the receptionist team is still the best in the business at turning first-time callers into loyal clients. Find out what's possible by visiting answeringlegal.com. You'll find a link to the site in the description of this episode. Now, let's get to the show.

CHRIS EARLEY [00:52]: Hi everyone, welcome to another episode of the Earley Show sponsored by our friends over at Answering Legal. I'm your host Chris Earley and as you know on this podcast we always bring you the very best and brightest in the legal industry. We have today Angel Reyes. He is a guy who has really had huge success. Um, this — he's a guy who signs up a ton of cases but he didn't start that way. He started from scratch. So he's got a lot of lessons for us. I'm really, uh, excited to geek out with him. We're going to learn a lot. So, as always, make sure you sharpen your pencils. We'll have plenty of writer-downers in this episode of the Earley Show. Angel, thank you for joining us. How are you, man?

ANGEL REYES [01:26]: I'm good. Thanks. I, uh, I'm impressed you got a a sponsor. Holy [expletive]. You know, that's uh that that that kind of — oh my gosh, he's got a sponsor for this one. I hope — I hope I do your sponsor right, u, you know, with with this uh engagement. But no, thanks for having me on and uh yeah, sure. Let's trade some more stories. I've been a lawyer for 35 years. I've been in this business for 33. So, uh I have uh I've seen — I've seen a few things. Haven't seen it all. I wasn't going to say that, but no, I haven't seen it all, but I've seen a lot. So, you know, let's uh let's just go from there.

CHRIS EARLEY [02:00]: Awesome. All right. So, you're obviously in Texas. Did you grow up in Texas?

ANGEL REYES [02:04]: I did not. No, I was actually born in in Hawaii, but um that was just a an artifact, if you will. My my mom and dad were um passing through. My family's from Puerto Rico originally and so uh was on the island until I was 11. Then when I was 11, my parents divorced and this was the 70s and so I'm aging myself. Yes. And then I am uh I — you know, sixes — sixes is where my my memory starts. You know, my my mom, sister and I, we left the island, um, moved to Kansas City. I finished high school in Kansas City, went to college there and then went to un— then lived in Ann Arbor, went to University of Michigan Law School and spent three years in Ann Arbor and uh and then after that I took a job uh at a firm in New York City. Um, you know, that's the whole like Wall Street uh genesis. Getting to Texas was kind of an accident, frankly. Um, happy accident but an accident nonetheless.

CHRIS EARLEY [03:00]: That's awesome. I don't know a lot of PI lawyers that start on Wall Street. Right. That that truly truly interesting. What it seems like it wasn't lighting you up — girls you would have stayed there. Why did you move away from Wall Street?

ANGEL REYES [03:13]: Yeah. So you know it's a combination of things. Like first of all at my law school everybody — you know, you were essentially you were you were courted uh by big law. Everybody I knew had a what would now be considered big law. This was 19, you know, '88, freaking '89. But everybody went off and got summer internships at, you know, Latham and and Kirkland and Ellis and you know Milbank uh, Skadden Arps, Shearman & Sterling, and many of them have changed their names but they're all global, analog, like hundred— u, mostly. And so I really didn't know any better. Some LA firms — Morrison & Foerster, I worked there one summer. Um, that's actually a San Francisco firm but I worked in the Southern California office. And so the next summer I was like, ah, time in [New] York. Um, and uh, I did. And then, u, I said, "Well, why not?" You know, what do you — what what harm is it going to be to have, you know, the address at the time of this law firm was actually 2 Wall Street. I swear to God, kitty-corner from the stock exchange. Like, wow. Boom.

ANGEL REYES [04:20]: And, uh, what the hell? I also had a — I was very interested in in uh securities and finance work. I had the good fortune of being able to take some classes [at the] school of business at the University of Michigan and uh I I loved them like as much as any law classes, right? I took a job in their corporate securities and finance department. I — that's what they told me I was doing. Um, just to be clear, I'm not sure what I was doing. It was mostly giant red line. This is back before like computers, folks. Redlining a document now is all electronic. Back then it was actually [expletive] red. And uh you know the binders were gigantic, man, and you had to like move — oh my gosh, it was painful work. But you know I had a a good friend — my best friend from law school was working at a law firm that is now Foley. Uh, at the time it was like the biggest law firm in in Texas, right? But he got absorbed over the years by Foley. And, u, he's like, "Man, you should—" I was bitching about the winter. I know you're up from, you know, the Midwest, but I was like, man, these winters, they can be a pain in the ass. Oh yeah, man. He goes, man — because he had spent, you know, obviously three years in Ann Arbor with me. He's like, "Yeah, screw that, man." He was one of the rare guys that left and went to what I would call midmarket. You know, like most people were in Chicago, DC, Seattle, New York, uh, LA, San Francisco here. He was in Texas, right?

ANGEL REYES [05:47]: And so I, uh, I said, "Let me come visit." It was late, late March or April. So I came visit. It's like 73, sunny and nice as [expletive] down here. And he's like, "You know, I bet you that they'll give me — give you a job if you if you want to interview." And I thought, let me think about it. I still had a lease in New York. Um, so I went back to the city and uh I kept working. It was slushy all the way through April. In, you know, May was cold. So I'm like, let me try. I talked to him. They're like, "Yeah, come come." I'm like, "Well, I got to take the bar." This is back before you could waive into bars. You wanted another state, you'll take that bar. So, I have uh — I'm taking three. I said, "Well, all right. Let me take the bar." Took the bar. Came down here like August 5th. It was 106 degrees, a 70-ish% humidity. And um, like a a sweatfest. And I was like, "Whoa, this was not like that weekend I spent a couple months ago here." And uh I stayed. And anyway so I took that job. And then about five months later, my dearest friend Jim and I were like, "Yeah, let's just — let's just go do our own thing." Year from — year after that, we did our own thing, hung our own shingle. Um, year after that, he left for North Carolina to get married. We stayed. And so I just stayed here like hanging on the bar for the last 33 years. And uh you know, it's been — it's been good. It's been good to me. There — there's pros and cons about Texas. No doubt about it. Uh, especially, you know, if you don't grow up here, it's kind of interesting. Um, so, but I've stayed. And uh yeah, the winter — the winters are not great. Yeah, the um summers aren't great, but you know, there's a few good months. One of them is April for sure. That's a good month. October real good.

ANGEL REYES [07:37]: Uh and so anyway, we uh you know, the firm has been through lots of different iterations. Uh, you know, started out really doing — not strategically but just almost accidentally — but because I speak Spanish we started representing what was, unbeknownst to us, going to be a transformation of not just this city but the county and the surrounding communities, Houston, Central Texas, etc. You know, by '94, the immigration wave is really coming. The city of Dallas in 1990 census, I think, was 8% Hispanic. And in the 20— uh, 2020 uh census, I think it crested 42%.

CHRIS EARLEY [08:25]: Wow.

ANGEL REYES [08:25]: Um, so this is a — this is a massive change, right?

CHRIS EARLEY [08:29]: Wow.

ANGEL REYES [08:29]: And of course the state in the south had always kind of historically been, you know, Hispanic, Mexican. Um, but with all the growth of these mega towns, mega— megalopolises, um, you know, who built it? Immigrants. And most of them from Mexico, also Central America.

CHRIS EARLEY [08:49]: Yeah.

ANGEL REYES [08:49]: And uh so I met that market and uh that's really how the firm got started.

CHRIS EARLEY [08:52]: So you were — you were in a good spot.

ANGEL REYES [08:56]: Eventually moved up, moved out of — didn't just do, you know, Spanish TV, moved on to English TV as well. But that's kind of where we got our our real sort of boost. First clues.

CHRIS EARLEY [09:08]: Well, it sounds like you were at a good — you were the right spot at the right time, right?

ANGEL REYES [09:11]: Very much so.

CHRIS EARLEY [09:13]: For this industry or — or frankly for for many industries, I would say. But let me ask you this, just fast forward to today because I want to get back to the start before I do it. How big — how big is your firm today?

ANGEL REYES [09:23]: Well, today, um, as far as like headcount or case count?

CHRIS EARLEY [09:28]: Kicking heads.

ANGEL REYES [09:30]: Yeah, we've got — we've got about 650 folks. 400 and — more than 400, 425-ish are um, or what we call nearshore, mostly Central America. Um, call it offshore, I guess, because they're just not in Texas. The rest are in Texas. Um, 90% of those that are in Texas are in Dallas because that's — it's where we do all of our work. We have some physical offices other places in Texas, but like as far as like the, you know, the wheelhouse, it's it's really here. That's why we live — it's here in Dallas. And uh we do utilize a bunch of nearshore labor and uh you know it it's uh it's been — it's been effective. We haven't always done that. That's just now. We started six years ago. So,

CHRIS EARLEY [10:20]: well, that's like

ANGEL REYES [10:21]: right when the pandemic hit.

CHRIS EARLEY [10:23]: 650 is like a small town. So, here

ANGEL REYES [10:26]: Yeah. In Texas, it probably qualified maybe as midsize rural town, right?

CHRIS EARLEY [10:32]: Right. I'm really glad you — you got started. You had no cases. I I heard you on a podcast. You sold a case, I think, for like 100 grand. It was like life-changing.

ANGEL REYES [10:41]: Oh, that was — yeah, but that was '94. Um. Yeah. So, you got—

CHRIS EARLEY [10:45]: Take us back there. Like, how'd you get going? What were you doing to grow? How'd you — how'd you do it?

ANGEL REYES [10:50]: Yeah. So, in in '94, that that first case, um, it was like it was like a policy limits case. Both my — Jim and I were 28, you know, we could have taken that fee and like he bought new cars or whatever.

CHRIS EARLEY [11:05]: Yeah.

ANGEL REYES [11:05]: And I convinced him to let me put 50 grand on Univision, which is a Spanish language [network]. Um, and it had just come to Texas or to to Dallas. This was like its 12th or maybe it was the 15th. It was somewhere around there as far as their market across the United States. And uh, he's like, "Yeah, yeah, let's do it." And I kid you not. So, we broke it up. It wasn't all 50 grand one month. We did it over three months. I remember the third month we were getting like 150 clients for — I want to say around 14 grand.

CHRIS EARLEY [11:39]: And it was like

ANGEL REYES [11:41]: keep going, pedal to the metal. Um, and so you know before we knew it we did have, you know, a dozen employees. And you know from there it has had — you know, we we've kind of gone like this over the decades but the last six years has been pretty steady, remarkable growth. And I would — I would say that the reason for that is that we — we focus. We stopped doing anything that we weren't excellent at. And that meant no more mass torts, no more distractions. Um, in Texas there's no work comp, there's no premise — there's a one out of a thousand premise cases might stick here. Otherwise, we just don't bother. Um, so what we're good at, we do car wrecks. As of today, we're north of 550 jury verdicts in Texas. Um, since '96 — '96 is when we really started filing lawsuits. And, you know, you have to go to trial and hang and you get your teeth kicked in 30, 40% of the time, right? You know, we've got a string of uh of not just uh — or just seven figure, but we got a — we got a — we have some eight figure uh results, both verdict, settlements. Uh and you know, but that took time. That took decades. That took three decades. And early on it was just like, you know, we don't want to take 12 grand, pay us 18, you know, we go file a damn — we go file a damn lawsuit. And before we knew it, they're like trying us and son of a gun. They no-negas on a rear end, like. But that was the 90s, you know, that was [a] time when most firms were doing like what I call pre-lits. Early on, we s— we said, you know what, we're going to be the people that file. Uh, I — we learned some — we learned some hard lessons, you know. You got — you can't file every case, but we're — we're damn — we're damn close.

CHRIS EARLEY [13:33]: So, you start out — you you obviously hit pay dirt with with spend— with Univision. You realize — you realize you had a winner. So, you kept — you kept feeding that sucker, right? Just kept feeding and feeding and feeding. But you were doing other things that you weren't — you were doing so much more. You had to hire like crazy, I bet, to keep up. You're completely—

ANGEL REYES [13:49]: We did. Um, luckily the the growth of Univision was um sort of parallel with the growth of the firm, you know, right? There was always more people and believe it or not always more bilingual people. Most of the young people that were in the Dallas school district, their parents were immigrants and so they spoke — they may not be able to write it or or, you know, super high level, but they could speak Spanish. And so we never really struggled to find or hire folks that could help in that regard. But by — before 2000, we were spending, you know, 10 million on English TV and two million on Spanish TV-ish. Um, you know, from from '94 to 2018, couple hundred million, you know, in in the Texas legacy media markets, bus wraps, billboards, um, you know, we did all that. We did all that. But you know it was — it started to get hard to measure, you know, 2012-ish. You know, eventually moved to to 100% digital strategy that includes of course radio. What I mean by digital is — was this — this is where we meet our clients. This is where you hear you and clear.

CHRIS EARLEY [15:03]: I think that's brilliant. So, um, but I would imagine you're running out of space in the 90s, you keep — so much, you know. How do you keep — keeping up infrastructure, you know, all — I know there's a lot of people there. But still, it's like that must have been kind of crazy, though.

ANGEL REYES [15:15]: I never did it totally alone, right? Um, I uh I always — always had some some folks whose oar was in the water. Um, they weren't — they weren't lawyers. Um, the lawyers are fickle and uh you know, it's hard. I mean, I don't know — to anyone that has built a firm, it's really — I think it's challenging. Um, especially when you're young, you know, to get other lawyers to sort of buy in, because essentially it's — it's tough. It was tough for me. Uh, and uh, you know, so I had some pretty, like, recall operations folks and they were super helpful. They would, you know, when we had a new lease or something, they'd go run off, show me to a different place, pick a place, because we had offices in all those other cities. And this was way before like what we're doing now. You had a video call. You know, this was when, you know, you had to really actually pick up a phone and talk to somebody. You had to mail stuff or FedEx. Um, and you know, times were — times were different. This was time back then. I'm pretty sure parts were still using uh fax machines. Yeah. And whatnot. So, you know, times have changed. No doubt. Things have really—

CHRIS EARLEY [16:26]: no question.

ANGEL REYES [16:26]: Pace of change has been ongoing. It never stops. My — I figured my role was to try to find the best talent I could, um, make sure the bills got paid, and then, you know, have a a vision. And and early on the vision was we'll be the biggest uh firm serving Spanish-speaking clients in the state. And I think we got there. And then after that it was, oh, let's be a firm that can service anyone in Texas. And and we got there too. I've been distracted by some mass torts, never hit that home run, frankly. Just never did. U, but definitely got distracted by them. But not anymore. We don't do anything but — but auto cases. We we literally — we're disciplined about saying no to anything.

CHRIS EARLEY [17:10]: That's good. That's good. So, did you take a trial identity early on in your firm or did it evolve later?

ANGEL REYES [17:16]: Yeah, I — you know, I did. I did — I did the litig— I did the litigation early on. You know, I've — I've taken, you know, depositions. I've been in trial. Actually within three years, um, I'd hired a couple folks that are eager as hell to not just try cases but actually get at it. Yeah. And so I was like, "Okay." I was spread pretty thin. So I let him. And since then, you know, I've been involved in a couple, but honestly since 20— maybe early 2007-ish. Um, if — if I'm at the courthouse, it's to meet somebody. It's — it's not to be, you know, standing there representing someone. Um, but I've got a lot of talented folks that that enjoy that and they can focus on it. Um, you know, I feel like again my job is to get some business and sales marketing, sales marketing, sales marketing. Um, find good talent and make sure the bills get paid. And, you know, I think to the extent that, you know, call me a CEO if you want. Uh, I think that's the only three things that really matter for a CEO, that's what they got to do. You know, put a vision out there, find some good talent, and then make sure that their bills get paid.

CHRIS EARLEY [18:24]: Yeah, that's — that's the trouble. So, let me let me ask you this. So, you're obviously you're getting a — you're getting a [expletive] ton of work. There's a — there's plenty of people out in the community that, you know, that that want to work for you. What are some of your operational challenges to keep up with?

ANGEL REYES [18:38]: But people are always a part of that operation, right? Um, you know, it's — it's not like — it's not like that's easy. You know, building processes was like a little bit helter-skelter for probably half of the last 30 years. But you know, this — the more recent half. Um, you know, it's more disciplined. It's more structured. Um, meaning we're, you know, we are training, uh, you know, academy — that's what we call it. It's definitely not one that, you know, feel free to send your resume, but um it's a — it's an, you know, we call it our academy, you know, but it's — it's — it's blocks of training stuff that that we put together, right? Early on didn't have that. So, that was — it was always hard, right? You know, doing doing what I called bad — bad operations back back then. And I can remember, like, take for instance, some people like, oh, take your best [trial] leader and have them — what, train the newbie? Well then you're — you're wrecking yourself, right? So we don't have good people train anybody. You're good, you do your work. We have trainers that train people, right? But man, that was not the case 25 years ago. You know, that's the case now, but back then, yeah, I would, you know, I'd grab whoever was best at it and say, "Come on, help this person learn how to do it." And I — it took me a little while but I I finally came around the understanding that that was not the best use of the most talented people.

CHRIS EARLEY [20:04]: So, well, I know you mentioned 2018 things shifted — before 2019 where you had that sort of shift in your marketing sort of approach or strategy. Could you talk about resilience and just having to like just deal with all the — because I'm sure the blows got harder and harder, the punches got harder and faster as you grow. Could you — could you talk about, um, resilience, how they played a factor in your success and just being gritty? A lot of people use the word, you know, you got to have some grit.

ANGEL REYES [20:29]: And you — I think that like fair enough. Yeah, you do. Um, on the other hand, you know, I made a reference earlier about like being that kid out in the in the, you know, playground and holding on to the monkey bars, um, for as long as you can and uh something good will happen, you know, especially if you — it's the same one, right? And that's kind of where I was in personal injury. Luckily, I never walked away from single event auto, truck stuff. And fortunately, because of the approach we took, we — we were not like the picky firm. We were not like, "Oh, that one, you know, doesn't have enough property damage," or "that one doesn't, you know, have this or that or the other." We would pretty much take any case that met the following: somebody else was at fault. There was insurance coverage, even if they only paid 700 bucks to paint a bumper. And the client, um, was willing to have a proper evaluation. And for us, you know, that kind of means like no MRI, no case, you know. Um, and so yeah, if you — you know, those three things and we're — call it a case good enough. Um, a lot of firms would probably push that stuff back into the water.

CHRIS EARLEY [21:40]: Yeah.

ANGEL REYES [21:40]: So we became like a sardine factory, if you will. And every once in a while we'll carve up a little bluefin in the back rooms.

CHRIS EARLEY [21:50]: Yeah. No, for sure. So, so it sounds like you — you've hired a ton of people that I would assume were good at — thinkers, were good at things that you're not good at. What are you really good at? Like what is your, like, highest level skill that's enabled you to to get here?

ANGEL REYES [22:06]: So, it's hard sometimes to self-evaluate, but I — I think I've got a pretty good nose for for like hiring. Um, I still get involved. I would be exaggerating to say that I've interviewed every single lawyer that's currently at this firm, but I bet it's 90% that have ever been here. And you know, that's hundreds over the last 30-plus years. And uh you know, we've got some lawyers that have been here 25 years and uh

CHRIS EARLEY [22:33]: Wow.

ANGEL REYES [22:33]: some 10, eight, all the above. And so I — I feel like that was a pretty big contribution on — and I'm I'm okay with the the finance piece. Um, I — I've always enjoyed it. Um, in fact, what I was told, we were the second firm in the United States to take advantage of case cost financing where, you know, you borrow for like a deposition rather than — because otherwise you're supposed to advertise it. There's a lot of firms, if they're small, they they tend to just treat — treat those case costs like an ordinary business expense, but the truth of the matter is the IRS doesn't. And so rather than run an audit risk, you know, we — we immediately separated those accounts. Like our — yeah, our case cost account is — it's its own account and our operating account is separate and then — and the two never meet. Early on I was like, "Oh, that's a great idea to avoid phantom income tax. Just borrow the money." And so we jumped on on that bandwagon way back when and as a result I got more and more into the sort of finance part. Um, I've always had a controller, CFO. Um, now it's a pretty robust team, but I still every week, you know, hold the finance meeting and that's what we talk about. You know, where are we at with our case cost line? Um, we don't really borrow to grow. Um, we have borrowed to to go chase a mass tort here and there. Like I said, we never — never hit that home run. I'm glad that some firms have, but we just have that luck.

CHRIS EARLEY [23:58]: Yeah. But but but credit to you for isolating auto is where we're going to live. That's — where it is.

ANGEL REYES [24:10]: Yeah, it was — it was a funny conversation. I I'll never forget I came in and I had — we had dozen lawyers. I brought everybody in the conference room. I said, "Hey, um, I need to tell everybody something." You know, they weren't like super like — everybody had their lane, you know, everybody kind of did their thing. And they're like, "Oh man, what is it?" I said, "We're never again going to do a mass tort." And I could just see four or five people go, "Well, [expletive], where's that put me?" You know, and I I literally said, "Look, all you got to do if you don't — if you've never done auto and truck—" because, you know, another another 10 folks, that's all they did, right? I said, "You can learn. This is a great place to learn. This is what we've really done. This is the only reason we even have a job. These mass [torts] haven't paid a [expletive]."

CHRIS EARLEY [24:53]: Yeah. Yeah. No.

ANGEL REYES [24:54]: And so we uh — we, you know, that was — that was kind of how that happened.

CHRIS EARLEY [24:58]: And that's — that was a scary pivot, but you — you followed—

ANGEL REYES [25:01]: It was — it was an important pivot for us. It was — it was huge with the focus and then — and then came discipline. U, we — we ended up doing the EOS Traction stuff, which is uh very much worthwhile. Yeah, you got to stay with it. You got to be, you know, you got to stay with it. But once you get the cadence and once those meetings are happening and and once there's no like continuous violation of the times and the days and all that, um, man, people — people should take a look at that. There's — there's other iterations. You know, my friend Mike Morse has Fireproof. Yeah. And it's really good, too. And and EOS Traction is not the first book out there, you know. I think there's like one called The E-Myth, Entrepreneurial Myth, that because you're good at something you can open [a] business and then the business will be good. No, no, no. You have to be working on your business, not in it.

CHRIS EARLEY [25:51]: 100%.

ANGEL REYES [25:51]: Um, that's hard, especially for people that want to be trial lawyers. Um, but also don't want to work for someone else. Like how do you bridge that? It's really hard. Um, and that's why early on I decided, you know, I'm more — I should be a guy working on it than in it. That's what I've been doing for years.

CHRIS EARLEY [26:10]: Hey everyone, it's Chris. If you ever have a personal injury case here in Massachusetts that you can't take on or just want to refer out to a trusted firm, my team and I would love to work with you. Since 2004, I've only practiced personal injury law. My team and I pride ourselves on handling referrals with transparency, good communication, and care for your client. And if you're not already getting it, head on over to practicetipoftheday.com — practicetipoftheday.com — to join my free email list. It goes out to hundreds and hundreds of lawyers each and every week with actionable marketing and practicing tips. Thanks for listening. Look forward to collaborating with you.

CHRIS EARLEY [26:52]: So, my ears kind of perked up when you said you have a good nose for hiring. So, let me ask you a couple questions here. How many lawyers do you have right now? Just ballpark.

ANGEL REYES [27:00]: Right now, I think it's 46.

CHRIS EARLEY [27:02]: 46. Did you have a hand in talking to each of them at some point before they were hired?

ANGEL REYES [27:06]: All — all but maybe two. All but maybe two. Yeah.

CHRIS EARLEY [27:08]: What do you — why do you have a good nose? What do you look for? What are you trying to sniff out with lawyers?

ANGEL REYES [27:13]: Some of it is, I would confess, intuition. Yeah. Sure. Um, there are some studies out there that say like within 30 seconds, you know, if you're simpatico with someone, you know, I know there are studies out there that say that that's true.

CHRIS EARLEY [27:27]: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

ANGEL REYES [27:28]: Um, and I — I think that for me I — I generally can, you know, click, right? I'm looking for essentially — obviously look, a lot of people that say they raise their hand, they come in, they say, "I want to be a trial lawyer," and truth is I don't want to talk about that. You know why? Because if you don't have years of experience and just saying you want to be a trial lawyer — I don't even talk to people about their resumes. Like, no, let's just — let's just shove that, right? Let's just have a conversation.

CHRIS EARLEY [27:54]: Same. Y—

ANGEL REYES [27:55]: And uh in that conversation, I'm — I'm trying to evaluate intelligence, you know, which — which sometimes, at least my bias is like processing speed.

CHRIS EARLEY [28:04]: Yeah.

ANGEL REYES [28:04]: You know, how quick are they grasping concepts? We do something really kind of kind of kooky. Um, I think you'll get a kick out of this, Chris. Um, and this isn't just for lawyers. It's for, u, every non-lawyer, [too]. You know what the Wonderlic is?

CHRIS EARLEY [28:19]: Sure.

ANGEL REYES [28:19]: Yeah. Yeah.

CHRIS EARLEY [28:20]: Yeah. It's what they do in the NFL. They give every player—

ANGEL REYES [28:25]: And so just if you don't know much about the test, I'll tell you a little bit. It's 50 questions and you have 12 minutes, um, to to to do it. And it is not a proxy for IQ. Um, but it is pretty good about finding out, like, you know, one, your processing speed, two, your analytic ability, you know, and your verbal. So, it kind of does across, because it's got questions that require some verbal dexterity, and then some questions that require some semi-powerful mental math stuff, right? I think the median is is around 20. Perfect score would be 50. And no one's — no one's ever scored a perfect, but anything above 35 is probably top — top one or two% of the actually distribution. So, um, you know, well, we'll take anybody with 20 plus, you know, 20 or more. You under the median, it's pretty tough. But, so I always have a little bit of information about, you know, just from that, you know, you take that test, that kind of — that kind of stuff. So I — I'll try to engage them on a different level rather than — rather than interview a resume. I try to interview the person. And uh that's been pretty effective. You know, I've missed a few times. Um, of course, but I can tell you that a few times when I just said, "Okay, I'm not going to veto." Um, I was kind of right, but it took a year or two, you know, for other folks to come around. Like, all right, I am — I am fallible for sure.

CHRIS EARLEY [29:53]: Well, that's the Wonder— like that's fascinating. I know a lot of NFL quarterbacks, they all take it. I don't know if all NFL players — perhaps they do, but you give everyone that.

ANGEL REYES [30:00]: Every NFL player. Yeah.

CHRIS EARLEY [30:01]: Yeah. But you give—

ANGEL REYES [30:02]: The highest me— the highest median for position is offensive line and the median is 26.

CHRIS EARLEY [30:08]: Okay. Wow.

ANGEL REYES [30:09]: That puts him in the top, I want to say, 15% of the distribution curve. Yeah. Of — of like IQ. Again, it's not a proxy. It's not an IQ test. My god, it's 12 minutes long.

CHRIS EARLEY [30:20]: Yeah.

ANGEL REYES [30:21]: But it's—

CHRIS EARLEY [30:22]: You can see a lot from that, I guess. Right. You can—

ANGEL REYES [30:24]: Well, you can see something, you know. It's better than nothing.

CHRIS EARLEY [30:27]: Totally. Totally.

ANGEL REYES [30:28]: You know, so anyway.

CHRIS EARLEY [30:29]: Yeah. No, it's helpful. All right. So 2018 rolls around, you wake up one day and you're like, "I'm going to stop my broadcast media. I'm going to go—" Why?

ANGEL REYES [30:38]: It was not — it was not a rash decision.

CHRIS EARLEY [30:41]: Okay.

ANGEL REYES [30:41]: Like again, the beginning of 2012, we started doing Google paid. Obviously, everybody had websites, you know, there was SEO happening. It still happens today. Still very important. It's foundation. Um, and you'll never end SEO. It'll just keep going. We started picking up cases and we really had terrific, fine, granular attribution. What campaign, where, when, you know, how much does it spend, what did it cost? It was so much more powerful than the television attribution or the billboard, bus wraps and stuff, that by 2014, we had moved millions to digital, which at the time was really Google. Yahoo was an option, but we just kept on Google, stayed with Google. 2014 started doing like competitor keyword bidding. Got in some skirmishes with competitors about that. Um, you know, for what it's worth, the Fifth and Ninth Circuits have come down favorably uh to to my side of that table, and that is that, you know, short of a misrepresentation, um, it's fair game. I mean, hotels do it, car rental companies do it, car manufacturers do it. Every — every vertical, business, industry, whatever, on the internet bids on competitors' trademarks, names, brands, all that. Um, the lawyers were the last to do [it]. Uh, I don't know if there's still lawsuits out there. There are probably, but the law was pretty settled. Fifth Circuit, I took it all the way. In the Ninth Circuit, my good friend Glen Lerner had been saying — but he was on the — he was on the other side. He was kind of on the essentially the — I don't want to say losing side, but he was on the side that, no, you're — people can bid on your brand, on your trademarks, uh, say. And so, um, you know, that happens. But we're slowly but surely getting pretty good at digital and slowly but surely we're seeing, man, three to — three to one as far as cost. Like we get — for the same dollar we get, you know, 3x versus TV. And so it started kind of sort of moving the money around a little bit and finally I said, you know what, let's just pull the Band-Aid off. Stop, stop, stop all the legacy. Done. And and that was in 2019.

CHRIS EARLEY [32:56]: But that's when you said things moved like a hockey stick. Is that right?

ANGEL REYES [33:01]: Yeah. Because it wasn't a starting firm in 2019. It was — it was already a fairly mature firm with thousands of cases in inventory. And and now we were getting essentially three times as much new business. So that hockey stick really took off. I mean, we — we have probably 5x the matter count today than we did in 2022.

CHRIS EARLEY [33:27]: Wow.

ANGEL REYES [33:28]: Yeah. Yeah. Probably 5x. Yeah. At least 5x.

CHRIS EARLEY [33:31]: Yep. I'm doing the math right now. So, yeah. Strictly digital. You will not spend on billboards, TV.

ANGEL REYES [33:37]: We — we — we're not going to, because we — we've come to the — we've come to believe this. And by the way, others believe differently, but we've come to believe in really big markets — Dallas, Houston, Central Texas, which is Austin, San Antonio — if you can't measure it, don't spend it. Um, a lot of people say, and I — and I get the argument that, well, brand is so important, brand matters. And I think that it matters on the margins. I mean, look, man, I used to walk into restaurants and people treated me like I was a [expletive] Dallas Cowboy, you know, just because of these TV ads I've been running year after year after year. Um, people knew my name, etc. Um, you know, every waiter, every valet parker, my gosh, it was, you know, interesting to say the least. Um, but, you know, I didn't want my ego to be making decisions about where we spent our money. You know, as we started measuring it, it just — we became convinced [if] we couldn't measure it, we shouldn't spend it. And by staying disciplined in that regard, we've 5x'd our case count since uh five and a half years.

CHRIS EARLEY [34:43]: Yeah. You — you said something just now I really like. You said you took your ego out of it, right? You've talked about discipline, right? You — you removed your ego. You were rolling with the numbers, where the math is taking [you], and you didn't resist that. You embraced it.

ANGEL REYES [34:53]: Yeah.

CHRIS EARLEY [34:54]: I love that. That's smart. And that changed your whole career. I mean, you're obviously really doing well, but this — like you said, 3x. I would — I would — I would say absolutely accurate.

ANGEL REYES [35:04]: One other important decision — because these were sort of concurrent — and this is not an advertisement for a CRM platform, but, you know, if you do this work — I mean, you do, Chris — if you don't have a CRM, if you don't have a, uh, database, you're going to be in trouble real quick. In 2019, um, we turned them — we — we took on the task of relieving [ourselves of] Needles, which I'm sure a lot of people that are old enough are familiar with. Um, and we migrated to the cloud, right? Um, and how do we do it? Well, we we chose Litify, which is built on Salesforce. And so it was a combination of like data. We were already doing some cool stuff with like tools like uh RingCentral, Invoca, you know. And all of a sudden now we have Litify and we started working on it and all these years later, it — it really was those two decisions. Because then you could really start measuring data. And as we did it — because we went back and did a test. 2021, went back and said, "Oh, let's just see. Let's see if we spent a couple million bucks in a year on Univision," whether we have like a lift, you know, like more website visits, uh, you know, lots of other proxies for, you know, true — true measurement. And and listen, Chris, we had — and this goes all the way back in the 90s — for every ad on every channel, for every show, a unique telephone number.

CHRIS EARLEY [36:36]: Okay.

ANGEL REYES [36:36]: So, we were trying to measure it back when it was not easy to do. And uh, and so we did it again at '21. I think we spent two and a half million bucks in like 10 months and had absolutely no appreciable rise and — you know, in in like awareness, visits. And mind you, we'd only been off the air for a couple of years, you know. Um, and and another thing at that same time occurred to me: lead generators were getting business and they weren't doing it like unethically or illegally. I know a lot of people say they do, but they don't. What's — what's in it for them to do that? I mean, they'd be out of business. And some of them were so good, I was like, "Okay, if brand mattered, why did that client hire them and not some, you know, me or some other competitor that does so much branding?" And I just thought, man, it's because the phone — you know, the the phone is is such a quick, fast — if you're there when they're looking,

CHRIS EARLEY [37:32]: Yeah.

ANGEL REYES [37:33]: you got a great shot. Um, even if they search a competitor name, you got just as — you might — may have a lesser chance, but damn, they still got a good chance. Yes. Of — if they called you, you know, and and you say, "We do car wrecks too. Have a look." Boom. They might just stay on the phone and hire you.

CHRIS EARLEY [37:50]: Yeah.

ANGEL REYES [37:50]: And so all those things were kind of percolating, you know. We decided, "Yeah, okay. Let's just follow our instincts on [it]." That's what we did.

CHRIS EARLEY [37:57]: I love it. That's really cool. Um, no, really, I think that's wonderful that that—

ANGEL REYES [38:02]: We got the scars to prove it.

CHRIS EARLEY [38:03]: Yeah. I — I don't doubt that. I I literally don't doubt that one iota. What's your biggest challenge now at this level?

ANGEL REYES [38:10]: Maybe we're slow learners, but I still think training hasn't — we — I don't think it's called practicing law for a reason, you know, like there's no like, "Oh, I am now a," you know, like, I don't know, "I'm done." Like class is over, you know, you keep doing it, right?

CHRIS EARLEY [38:28]: Oh, yeah.

ANGEL REYES [38:29]: Um, and I think the same thing kind of goes for the business side of it. Um, and — and training is so important, especially when you've got, you know, significant overseas folks — not even overseas, but nearshore, whatever, just not in your office.

CHRIS EARLEY [38:45]: Yeah.

ANGEL REYES [38:45]: Far away. Far enough away that, you know, the mice are probably playing. Um, and that's okay. Yeah, that's totally okay. Like, we get it. Not even your best people are not like grinding. I mean, they may be there 10 hours a day, but you're not getting focused, high quality work out of everybody that many hours a day, right? We figure we get a handful — four. Um, and that goes for here, there, or anywhere. The training piece is critical and we keep working on it, iterating it, iterating it, because to get to decent client service and satisfaction, you know, there's no silver bullet, but training — training the folks and continuously training can get you pretty far — pretty far down the client satisfaction route. Um, because — he look, we have automations, text every two weeks, you know, blah blah blah. And you know, still we have people that get pissed, one-star reviews, and I'm sure everybody out there has had that happen, you know. Um, and look, you're never going to stop the grumpiest person from being grumpy, but, you know, if — if your folks have that muscle memory that, you know, they're going to call back that day, um, versus two days from now, they're going to certainly text and say, "Got your message. When's a good time," whatever. We use every tool we can to communicate with clients. But I'd say that this is a client-f— facing, tough, uh, tough customer, if you will. You know, our clients don't always come with a bushel full of life skills. Sometimes they show up with a thimble full. And you know, you got to meet them where they're at. And so by training our folks and continuously training and then when we bring new people on making sure that they get not just trained but trained for a couple months has has made a difference. You know, we we think we've seen a difference. Is it — is it perfect? That's what — I'm not — you asked about the challenge. It's like still a challenge. Um, you know, we ever going to get it perfect? No. But we're going to get it more right. So that's caused me to think about it differently, because I always thought like, "Really, just train well just because that's a smart idea." No, it's train well because it'll benefit the client. They'll be happy. I never look at relationship directly. You know, I'm not going to say that that's the only way to look at it, but it's another way and it's part of how we look.

CHRIS EARLEY [41:09]: Sure. No, 100%. That's what matters. Happy clients. I mean, happy team members because they're well trained. So, everyone's getting happier.

ANGEL REYES [41:16]: You know, it's — it's so funny. We — we've got, uh, you know, so for every — for every eight folks that are not like on the ground in, say, Dallas — every eight folks, they have a lead or sometimes a manager, depends on the department. Um, and and that person typically is in in either Dallas or Houston. The other team — the other team members, even if they're — even if one or two are actually here, everybody's on a Zoom room, camera on, um, for their entire shift.

CHRIS EARLEY [41:43]: Oh really?

ANGEL REYES [41:44]: Even if — even if they walk away, it's totally okay. Just know that, you know, we've got Power BI running in the background and, you know, if you're gone for four hours, we might say, "Hey, where were you on Tuesday?" You know, but but for the most part, people like it because it allows them to chat as if — without having to get your ass out of your chair, right? You got your — you got some of your team right there, right, on on the Zoom — in a Zoom room. And uh we found it kind of created some camaraderie, as as counterintuitive as that might sound.

CHRIS EARLEY [42:17]: Okay.

ANGEL REYES [42:17]: Yeah.

CHRIS EARLEY [42:18]: Okay.

ANGEL REYES [42:18]: And and that's, you know — that — I don't know, I throw that out there because, you know, that was a little counterintuitive at first. I was like, "Oh boy, everybody's thinking big brother."

CHRIS EARLEY [42:27]: Right. Right.

ANGEL REYES [42:28]: I mean, they've already got ActivTrak and they're like, you know, "Why — why am I being key— why are my keystrokes being freaking measured?" Um, and you know, we said, "Well, let's just — let's try it." And uh it's been — it's been pretty cool. It's been pretty cool. Um, yeah, now, not, you know, not every person at every role is on camera all day every day, but critical client-facing ones, yeah, they are.

CHRIS EARLEY [42:51]: Oh, okay. Yeah, um, I've been on the fence about ActivTrak, but I've heard, you know, really good things. When did you start with ActivTrak?

ANGEL REYES [42:58]: By — by 2020.

CHRIS EARLEY [42:59]: Okay.

ANGEL REYES [43:00]: Because that's when we really — so during — right when that pand— when the pandemic hit

CHRIS EARLEY [43:05]: Yeah. Sure. Sure.

ANGEL REYES [43:05]: We said, "All right," it was pretty hard to hire folks. Um, yes, there was massive unemployment, but there's also a little bit of resistance to come to the office, right? And it might still be somehow there, but I read just the other day that 87% of US employers fully expect what they — what — what the acronym RTO, return to office. Um, we were always kind of in office. If you're not here, you know, you're not really going to be part of our team. But in 2020, we had to kind of rethink it. And that's when we started really trying to figure out the offshore stuff. And the offshore stuff, again, counterintuitively, was not to save money. It was to service clients. And the good news is for every three or four offshore folks, that's about what one onshore person would cost you, right? Yeah. And so we'd rather have a whole bunch more folks than too few, you know, for sure. Because client service will improve the more people you got, especially to train, old guard. And that's how we kind of figured that piece out. I didn't — it wasn't like I read it in the book. It takes — it takes a little bit, uh, you know, a little bumping and grinding to get to the — to get to that "oh, let's try it."

CHRIS EARLEY [44:20]: So let me ask you this. What's your day-to-day look like? Like, are you looking at data all day? You know, meeting with your department heads? Like what does your day look like?

ANGEL REYES [44:27]: Yeah. Yeah. Not all day. I meet with some of the department heads sort of — look, I meet with them with, you know, for legit hour here, there, all week, right? Various department[s] — we have like eight departments. And so I try to for sure touch base with every department head. Um, some of them have like a hundred people under them. They have — they have leads and man, they're managing managers. So I'm just trying to keep my finger on that pulse. Um, you know, we — we, you know, we got to pay a lot of bills. Um, I mean, a lot.

CHRIS EARLEY [45:02]: You do, man.

ANGEL REYES [45:03]: Yeah. I mean, I look — yeah, just the — oh my gosh. Yeah. So, I had to keep those bills paid. And so, I'm always kind of interacting with, you know, maybe not — maybe not always our CFO, but

CHRIS EARLEY [45:14]: yeah,

ANGEL REYES [45:14]: definitely like our controller, you know, I'm checking in on cash balances, stuff like that,

CHRIS EARLEY [45:19]: of course.

ANGEL REYES [45:19]: Um, and you know, look, I've been coming to an office for 35 years. I, you know, I get here early. Day starts 7 o'clock. I'm here. And uh you know, make it out of here by five. I do. But you know, I've been doing that for decades. Am I fully focused doing kick-ass work all day every day? No. Right. I'm talking to you right now, Chris. I'm not sure what — I'm not sure where that fits in the, you know, "am I [expletive] crushing it right now." I must be, I'm talking to you, Chris. You know, but uh so you know, any given day, that the majority of the time is spent, um, you know, just checking in on the — on the people that are doing the the checking in.

CHRIS EARLEY [46:02]: Yeah.

ANGEL REYES [46:03]: We — we call it watching the watchers.

CHRIS EARLEY [46:05]: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I love it. I love it.

ANGEL REYES [46:07]: Which is — which is ludicrous, but I — I found — I learned that uh, we were — gosh, years ago, um, back in the like 2010s, whatever you want to call [it]. Uh, uh, somehow we — we got distracted by some uh some offshoring work and I was in India. I would go there like two weeks a year. And in India, I don't know if it's a really a joke or maybe it's serious, but you know, I I heard people talking about people who watch the watchers, right? And I thought that was just funny as [expletive]. Well, it turns out that I'm an overpaid watcher of watchers. Yeah, no doubt. Right. Uh, you know, there's some of that going on. And uh, and then, you know, look, I've got a a terrific COO. He's my — my — my best friend from law school. U, he's been with us since 2020. We'll huddle up because he'll hear things, I'll hear things. We'll huddle up, see if we can fix things. Uh, there's a lot of technology here. I'm not a technologist, but I'm — I'm a fan. You know, I'm not — I'm like, well, I'm not like a power user, but I'm definitely a fan. And you know, I can put some dots together. So can he. And then our CTO — well, he's got a team of developers, you know. And this — this Litify Salesforce [stack is] quite powerful. Uh, again, this is not an ad for them, um, but you know, with all the APIs, all the data, it's pretty profound. We got—

CHRIS EARLEY [47:32]: sure

ANGEL REYES [47:32]: we got data analyst[s] — we call them productivity analysts — that, you know, they pop in on on these these Zoom rooms just to check and make sure, "Hey, is everything cool? I haven't — you know," they'll — they'll talk directly to someone, "Hey, haven't seen you really — you doing much? Is everything okay?" I mean, I'm serious right now. You know, we've got maybe, I don't know, 10 of those people, but it's across hundreds of employees, you know? Um, and uh yeah, I mean, that's just kind of our system. And and by the way, that's our system for now.

CHRIS EARLEY [48:01]: Yeah.

ANGEL REYES [48:01]: Doesn't mean it'll be our system [in] five.

CHRIS EARLEY [48:03]: Yeah, I doubt it will. You're evolving.

ANGEL REYES [48:05]: That's a — that's a, you know, and it'll — it'll evolve, you know.

CHRIS EARLEY [48:10]: Yeah, it will. It's inevitable. Well, I appreciate your time. Thank you very much. How can people get in touch with you?

ANGEL REYES [48:16]: There's only really one easy way. Don't call me. I never answer my phone. Ever.

CHRIS EARLEY [48:21]: Same. Same.

ANGEL REYES [48:22]: Um, and and texting is like maybe I'll [expletive] get back. But the absolute easiest way that I won't ignore and I always reply is my email. Yeah. Um, that's been going on since '93. [email protected]. I don't even have a Gmail one. I don't have a personal. That is my personal and my business one. I was about to say professional, but then I was like, that sounds a little like — well, maybe over the top, right? Like, you know, now that — now that you've caught me, you know, screwing around on a Friday afternoon in my office with — with you, no less. [email protected] is absolutely an easy way to find me and I I will reply. I'm not the — I'm not the kind of guy that just deletes. No, you do—

CHRIS EARLEY [49:02]: Not if it's from a lawyer or somebody looking for help.

ANGEL REYES [49:05]: We're always — we're always sharing.

CHRIS EARLEY [49:07]: I love it. You know, I love that.

ANGEL REYES [49:09]: And sharing is caring and that's how we met.

CHRIS EARLEY [49:09]: Yeah, man. No, I appreciate it. You know, like, you know, I I I'm a big fan of all the success. You're you're — you know, you've — you've developed a big firm. I mean, these numbers are pretty dizzying, the size of your—

ANGEL REYES [49:20]: Didn't do it by myself.

CHRIS EARLEY [49:21]: No, I appreciate that. Yeah, you had a lot of help.

ANGEL REYES [49:24]: But congrats on the tetrahedron now.

CHRIS EARLEY [49:28]: Well, I appreciate your time and sharing with us, you know, how you've — how you've done this, but all continued success to you. Um, keep kicking ass. Appreciate you. Likewise, setting the standard on, you know, how — how big a firm can get. If you want to get there, it's very possible, right?

ANGEL REYES [49:42]: Yeah. I I'd be remiss to anyone that's listening. Um, read Chris's weekly uh, you know, sort of missives.

CHRIS EARLEY [49:50]: Thank you, brother.

ANGEL REYES [49:51]: I have — I've grown into — I've gotten into the habit and I'm like, super cool. Because sometimes it's — man, he's — you get reminded of fundamentals sometimes, right? And every one of us can benefit by sometimes being reminded of something that we think is sort of obvious, but hey, have I even thought about it in a long time. So, it's really cool. Keep doing what you're doing.

CHRIS EARLEY [50:14]: Well, that's a big compliment. I really appreciate it. So, yeah, sign up, guys. practicetipoftheday.com. practicetipoftheday.com. No, Angel, I appreciate that. Thank you.

ANGEL REYES [50:22]: Yeah, man.

CHRIS EARLEY [50:23]: Nice to hear. At least one person in New York is reading it.

ANGEL REYES [50:26]: Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. No, I know it says something like — yeah, I don't remember the exact verbiage, but um I do actually.

CHRIS EARLEY [50:32]: Thank you, brother. I appreciate it.

ANGEL REYES [50:34]: Keep it up.

CHRIS EARLEY [50:35]: Thanks, Angel. All right, that's it. That's it for this episode of the Earley Show. Be sure to check out more episodes of our show on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, the Answering Legal YouTube channel.