The most interesting things I’ve ever done — the best conversations, the best podcasts, the best calls — they all required me to be confident enough to move forward, when the results were far from certain. Today I’m going to tell you something I just learned that can get that confidence up when you need it most. (Bl...

The Chicago Cubs’ season begins today in the Windy City on a gusty day. For me, it is New Year’s Day.It is a day of prayer for me. A day I did not think I would reach, after a heart attack with a 9.5 out of 10 lethality rate, prostate cancer, seven retina detachments, and a litany of maladies. But I’m here.The Cubs ...

You’ve been slogging along for 40 years and the cement floor bites harder every day. You are wondering if it is time to sell the company, but you have no idea what it is worth or if anybody would want it.I’ve been helping folks buy and sell machining businesses for quite a while. This blog is a primer on what to con...

When Donald Trump announced his grandiose plan for trade tariffs on April 2, 2025 some people cringed, others cheered, and a few called their lawyers.One of those was Rick Woldenberg, the CEO of a family-owned company in Vernon Hills, Illinois a suburb of Chicago. His firm, Learning Resources, outsources the majorit...

At 12, he was cutting metal in northern Italy. By 21, he was teaching DMG’s own technicians how to use their machines. At 47, he owns the whole company he first walked into just to set up a machine.Federico Veneziano is the owner of BoldX Industries and an old friend of mine. His story requires two episodes. This is...

The last six months I’ve been using AI to help me with everything from business negotiations to dealing with my kid’s pneumonia. It’s become a daily part of how I operate—at work and at home. The big difference between it and just googling is that you have a conversation with it.Check out the video I made for my You...

Last week another machinery dealer mentioned that being a family business was part of why she wanted to work with us at Graff-Pinkert. I don’t know if that was the deciding factor, but it reminded me that persuasion often happens before you say a word.This concept of convincing someone before you even start making y...

Today I’m going to tell you how to get lucky.It seems like some people are always in the right place at the right time getting all the lucky breaks, while the rest of us watch from the sidelines. I often feel like I’m in that sideline category too. But as used machinery dealers, our business is fueled by luck, or as...

Noah Graff recently interviewed Miles Free, the Precision Machined Products Association’s Director of Industry Research and Technology. He’s a guru of machining industry world politics and one of the world’s foremost experts on the steel trade.In March when President Trump tweeted his intentions to implement a 25% t...

Sometimes great conversations just happen. But what I’ve learned after 14 years selling used machines, and almost 250 podcast interviews, is that most conversations, even great ones, could be guided to be even better. Recently, I heard a podcast with journalist Polina Pompliano that reinforced techniques I’ve been u...