Inside HOKIE SPORTS | Vol. 10 No. 5 | May 2018

inside.hokiesports.com 15 Hearp Financial, LLC Strategies By Tech Fans, For Tech Fans, and more Todd F. Hearp is a Registered Representative and Investment Adviser Representative of, and securities and investment advisory services offered solely by Equity Services Inc. Member FINRA/SIPC, 4401 Starkey Road, Roanoke, VA 24018, (540) 989-4600. Hearp Financial, LLC. and Eddie Hearp are independent of Equity Services, Inc. TC91033(07/16)P 4401 Starkey Road, Roanoke, VA 24018 www.nfservicesinc.com • Hearp_Todd@nlvmail.com Strategies For Seeking a Safe Retirement Dawn & Eddie Hearp 46-Year Hokie Club Members Proud to Support Virginia Tech Athletics (540) 989-4600 Hearp Financial, LLC is based in Roanoke, VA and our representatives have been helping families and businesses address their financial concerns for many years. Our clients receive the benefit of working with an entire team. Each team member has a specific area of expertise, which allows our clients to access the talents and experience of each of our specialists. • Financial Planning • Investment Services • Insurance Services • Wealth Management • Estate Planning Strategies Not sure when or how to make his next move, he happened to touch base with former Tech linebacker and good friend Alex Markogiannakis, who was working for a company called Plan-It Granite and Marble, a Northern Virginia-based company that offered different types of granite stone for kitchens and bathrooms to various builders, designers and remodeling customers. He told Krebs that the company needed sales reps, so Krebs jumped at the opportunity. Within a year, he became the company’s No. 1 sales rep. A private equity group in Charlotte wound up buying the company, which ultimately became heavily leveraged, but in the summer of 2008, the real estate market plunged, and the group decided to close the doors of Plan-It Granite and Marble. Krebs decided to bet on himself. He formed an LLC and took his clients with him, servicing them in the way that he knew how and keeping overhead costs low to manage the process and receivables—and make money while doing it. In 2010, a group, seeing value in that company, bought him out. He quickly jumped back into the fray, starting NOVUS Building Services in March of 2011. The company, based in Sterling, Virginia, sells and installs countertops, tile flooring and backsplashes for both new buildings and remodeling projects. The company, with 60 employees, is doing quite well, with projects up and down the East Coast. “You become an expert in what you do if it’s going to become your base of operations, or you have to make logical decisions based on historical data and then you invest in people and not necessarily just in the product,” Krebs said. “I had to learn some really tough lessons. I’ve been in the checkered line with Vanna White, Wayne Newton, and Pamela Anderson, and then I’ve slept in abandoned houses, too. I’ve done it all, and pretty much everything in between. So it’s given me a base of logic that I use not only in my personal life, but in my business.” Krebs credits his success to what he learned at Virginia Tech, both in the classroom and from his experiences on the Tech football team. He still remembers things that head coach Frank Beamer, defensive coordinator Bud Foster and position coach Jim Cavanaugh told him and other players. He particularly focuses on the little things with his employees because he knows, as Beamer often said, everything else falls into place if one takes care of the little things. In essence, that is why he gives back, as a way of thanking not just the athletics department and football staff, but the entire university for everything he learned during his time at Virginia Tech. He felt that calling to pay it forward. “I think it’s imperative, and it’s a privilege,” Krebs said of former players giving back. “The net effect was that I have people that will corner me for hours and talk about the 1999 season and what it was like. I have people that will break off a conversation … these are guys that are powerful, and I don’t mean just money. I mean, power people that say, ‘I can remember what I was doing when you guys did this.’ Or ‘What was Vick like? What was DeAngelo Hall like? What was Beamer like? What did you learn from him?’ These were executives, powerhouses. We’re talking billionaires here. That’s the net effect that I get to participate in even as a non-starter [on the football team]. “I got to participate in that, and the lessons learned at that level … it’s like getting a doctorate in metaphysical and process and procedure. You learn how to work … You learn how to work through pain. You learn how to work through adversity. You learn how to logically step through solving a problem. You can apply the same lessons to business or to a poor personal marriage or to your children’s growth. It all equates, and in order to ensure that the future athletes, male or female, get that opportunity, I feel like I’m expected and I’m willing, and I feel like it’s a privilege to help contribute to that growth.” Krebs plans to return to Blacksburg in October to see the Hokies take on Notre Dame—back to the place that got him to where he resides today. Back to the place that he and so many others call “home.” IHS extra