Now we have another legend, man. The myth, the legend. My man,
James Sofar. I told your brother. Yes. Your,
your last name and your name is a household name in art in our, in my house. Oh,
yes. Yeah.
Well, uh, I have to talk about your name. Uh,
I saw you on the morning news and I'm sitting there with my family and all of a
sudden Johnny Fernandez pops up on its Channel seven,
and I couldn't have been more excited for you. I went to text you,
but I don't wanna bother. I knew you were,
You should have texted me next time you do a text Me. I don't. All right.
So for those that don't know you, what's your name? And, uh, well,
I know your name, but what's your name and who are you with?
I am James Sal Farco. I am the managing partner at Horizon Funding Group. And,
uh, we've been there since 2009, so,
So no, it's like over a decade. Yep. How crazy is that?
Yeah. So, uh, I mean, a lot of the guys that started that long ago,
we came up together, you know, I started in oh six, uh,
with a lot of the guys in this room, and then oh nine, you know,
a lot of us went out, out on our own and just been chugging along since, man.
So, listen, you, you are a veteran all right. In this industry. Yes.
And the importance of making sure that you stay afloat and that you don't close
your business and that you adjust and that, you know,
you kind of stay up to date with everything that's going on. Yeah.
How do you do that?
I think it starts with reputation. Um, you know,
it takes a lifetime to build and a second to lose. Um,
you gotta be able to put your reputation on the line every single day and, uh,
stand by your work. And that's what we do,
whether it's with a merchant or with a partner,
you have to just always maintain that, you know, reputation. I think.
So there's a lot of different topics that are being discussed today just
regarding I,
the way I would say it's like it's maneuvering this industry because there's so
much change going on. What topic are you most interested today?
Uh, well, I think that there's a ton of new banks and I,
you see a lot of brokers, you know, new brokers in the industry,
just signing up with so many banks and, you know,
getting a lot of iso agreements and signing up, signing up.
I think really just working on a couple of relationships and getting stronger
relationships with the banks that you're comfortable with is very important.
Talking to 'em about bonuses and talking to 'em about changes and bad debt, uh,
just fortifying those relationships, I think is very important today. And,
and just meeting with your main partners. That's,
that's what I've been spending the day doing.
So overall, I mean, is there,
is there anyone here that you're looking forward to meeting?
Is there anything that you're, like, any topic that you're looking forward to,
like hearing what, what's your thought process? I,
I, you know, there's a lot of, uh, rumbling in the room about E R C E R T C,
and, uh, you know, I, I, I, I'd like to see what other people are doing with it.
Um, John and I, we, we brought an accountant in in-house and we,
we started doing it in-house. Uh,
I know that a lot of people are outsourcing that, that kind of work.
So I'm curious to see what other brokers are doing with that,
because our merchants are asking us about it,
so we have to be able to service it, uh, so they don't go somewhere else. So,
um, servicing E R c, uh, is something that I'm gonna keep my ear to the ground.
Awesome.
All right. Well thank you so much for your time, brother. Appreciate it.
Go ahead and enjoy the day. Go ahead and enjoy what we have to.