AI strategy. Translated for operators.
The distillation layer between bleeding-edge AI thinkers and the people who actually run service businesses. One episode every weekday. No jargon. No hype. No fluff.
Recent episodes
View all episodes → Where to Bet on AI Tools (And Where Not To)
Most AI tools you're being sold today will get squeezed out of existence in 18 months. Here's the filter I use with my own clients to separate real leverage from tourist traps.
What an HVAC Owner Actually Needs to Know About AI
Skipping the hype. Three real jobs an HVAC company in Windsor used AI for last month — what worked, what flopped, and what the phone-answering bot cost them.
Fifty Specializations Collapse Into One Skill
What happens to a 15-person service company when the things you used to hire five specialists for become one person with good judgment? The math is better than you think.
The Owner Moat vs. The Tool Moat
Your moat was never the software you bought. It was the decisions you made with it. Why the AI era rewards operators who already think in systems.
AI Won't Replace You. It Will Reshape Your Team.
Stop asking 'will this replace my people?' Start asking 'what would my team do if every one of them had a full-time research assistant?' That's the right frame.
Flex: I Built a Quoting Bot in 27 Minutes
Not pretty. Not production. But a working quote-intake flow for a roofer, built in under half an hour. Here's the raw recording and what I'd fix next.
The five lanes
Every episode lives in one of five lanes. Pick the ones that match how you learn.
Translated Strategy
A big idea from someone smart, translated into Monday-morning language.
The Shift
What's changing this week in AI and why you should care (or shouldn't).
Borrowed Lenses
Frameworks from adjacent fields applied to your service business.
Field Notes
Raw reports from actual AI implementations in real operating companies.
Flex
A quick build, a live demo, a look under the hood.
I'm Reu. I run an AI company in a town of 32,000 people .
Before Local Nerds, I spent 25 years in marketing leadership — including serving as fractional CMO to 8 operating companies simultaneously for a PE firm in home services. That role forced me to think in systems. AI in Crayon is where I translate what the smartest people in AI are saying into what it actually means for your business on Monday.
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