Sam Walker's MEA Installer Of the Year Nominee video

Samuel Walker 22 years since I graduated mobile Dynamics number of years at your current location here three yep biggest accomplishment in the last year is I would say coming into our third year in business opening up a shop in a town I've never been in um uh as far as like installation goes eight hours away from where I spent 3 six years of my life uh and we're still going strong after three years in July July was our third year so celebrating three years of being in business had to happen influence the team and store culture casual Fridays is always fun as you can see I didn't participate today I already knew that I had to do some welding in the back for an amp rack so I didn't want to burn up any of my nice casual clothes um but I tried to be a team player you know even though technically own the shop you know try to have more of like team mentality try to take what others say or how what others ideas are use those um as far as what customers say about me uh Word of Mouth go gets around pretty quick so I'm assuming they're not saying bad things um what they're saying I'm not entirely sure CU I don't ask a customer hey how do you feel about me do they tell you I think our Google reviews would describe our customers talking about you as an awesome guy who likes to help and that they are amazed with the quality of work and the customer service in our shop think yep description of your installation specialty and philosophy installation specialty is probably if I were to uh Harley day we we'll go there we we'll start with that so I spend a lot of time R&D stuff with manufacturers and and other industry friends and family and we do a lot of motorcycle uh figuring out I guess You' say uh that's what I like to spend a lot of my time on I'm in the motorcycle industry uh I'm in the motorcycle uh Community out here where we live uh I ride most of my family rides you know so it's it's kind of a big deal for me um I got thrown into it uh by my old shop manager at the Tacoma car toys Shane R he rest in peace uh he uh he he didn't do much with motorcycles and and we had a customer that had a bike that was done at that shop and the installer was longer there so me being the motorcycle rider of the the install Bay Shan was like Hey so like you ride motorcycles right I was like yeah he's like you should be able to look at this right like I don't really know what I'm supposed to be looking at and I don't know that was about 13 years ago 12 years ago now and it kind of took off from there uh spent a lot of time working with that guy whose bike came in he wanted some of the craziest stuff done like things that people weren't doing you know 12 13 years ago and so we just kind of built this thing with the company I worked for car toys at the time we started doing shows uh installs out on the road um you know having a lot of fun doing it and I still have a lot of fun doing it installation philosophy I want customers to remember that I listened to their needs and their wants and at the end of the day we were able to give them what they needed out of their audio system radio speakers and then you know at the end of the day also what they wanted you know like there's always something more than just the needs when it comes to this industry in my opinion um there's always a want behind it you know they might need a new stereo but they want the apple carplay or the Android auto also make them smile about getting what they want and what they needed at the same time that's that's what I feel like they remember before name industry professionals I had influence on my career um I mentioned Shane man earlier um he was my install manager at the Tacoma shop and while I'd been and a lead SL install manager before for the company um I had moved from the Seattle store down to the Tacoma store and at that time I was still living the young kid life show up to work 5 minutes after you're supposed to be there you know and I'd come there as a assistant install manager I remember Shane asking me one day why was it so hard for me to get to work on time and I didn't have an answer like I like I always have an answer for just about any question that's ever been asked to me I've always got an answer but that was one time I didn't have an answer and I just looked at Shane I said you know what dude you're absolutely right so Shane had a huge impact on on me over the years you know uh since I've moved on from from car toys and started my own shop um knowledge Fest has been a huge thing for for me um going out and getting trained and and going to trainings whether it be um you know Brian Mitchell doing a DSP training and getting to learn you know from from somebody that is world renowned uh with DSP stuff um you know or or Justin Kush you know working with JK over at the Tacoma shop with Shane and all those guys for a couple years um helping him a little bit through his career you know if he was scared to make a jump uh you know I just backed up my boy you know and you know seeing Justin and where he's at is a huge huge thing for me you know there's there's so many people over the years uh Ryan Klein with Diamond Audio uh Jason cranix with v Vegas hardbags I work very closely with those guys all the time just so many people and not enough time to really name them all why should I be the top 50 partially because I'm able to adapt quickly um something happened we lost power the whole street lost power we ain't got no lights but we can open up a door right so quick thinking um the want to learn more and adapt to the industry uh as the industry changes um I feel is is a good reason um Integrity has always been something that I've held high uh with my personal beliefs and with customers and and everything else like if I tell you I'm going to do something then I'm going to do it you know I'm not going to tell you oh yeah Mr customer we we'll get that taken care of and then fall short like that's not that's not me so now we have to provide a video walkthrough of your work area and tools used to perform your profession um here's my work area um got some doors for a SEMA project that just got dropped off so they're sitting there for now for the most part still your basic tools wire cutters triers panel poppers the Walt 20 volt stuff dim RTA probably one of my most favorite tools which I wasn't even known about this tool if it wasn't for going to knowledge Fest and and really getting into this stuff but um my TPI 440 which is you know your standard digital multimeter but as an osilloscope built in so that way you can actually do it and then I've got all my test tones and whatnot on the USB so I can just plug it in and and do what I need to do as far as you know tuning the system correctly everybody's favorite boning skin wedge which they call all sorts of stuff now is it all the things all the things for