This is the full transcript for Episode #300 of the Wild Business Growth podcast – the Episode 300 Special. You can listen to the interview and learn more here. Please note: this transcript is not 100% accurate.
Krystal Proffitt 0:00
Alrighty then
Max Branstetter 0:17
Welcome, welcome, welcome, welcome, welcome 300 times to the episode, 300 special of the wild Business Growth podcasts. This intro is exactly 300 words and 300 characters and 300
breaths. I’m sorry I’m your host, Max Branstetter, and this is your place, typically, to hear a new entrepreneur every single Wednesday morning who’s turning Wild ideas into Wild growth. And for this episode 300 special, you’re going to hear many, many wild entrepreneurs from the previous 99 episodes, including returning wild entrepreneurs, fan favorite snippets from the past 99 and some bloopers that range from weird voices to voice cracks and everything in between and outside of that. Before we kick off, I just want to extend the warmest wildest thank you to all you Wild Listeners out there for making this all possible. 300 is like a serious pinch me moment, and feels like we just got started. And this first episode was in August 2018 and this podcast would not be possible without your support. Some cool things that have taken place over the past 100 episodes, we’ve interviewed more and more guests from around the world than ever before, and we’ve featured more wild listener questions, questions that you’ve sent in and submitted that I actually asked to the guests than ever before. We finally got on the wild bandwagon and launched full video episodes on YouTube, and we launched the podcasting to the max newsletter. So just throwing all sorts of things at you, and I think we’ve set a record for for amount of puns in each episode as well. Also within this time frame, I hit a major goal of speaking at Podcast Movement, still blown away by the turnout and everything there, and not to mention Dana and I got married over the past couple of years. So that makes it seem like we did it multiple times over the course of the past 100 episodes, Dana and I got married, and we did our honeymoon to Italy. We did another awesome international trip to Spain and Portugal. All in all, it’s been an absolutely incredible 100 episodes couple years. And I absolutely love doing this podcast. I absolutely am endlessly fascinated as a weird words to string together like that, but absolutely, endlessly fascinated by connecting with so many amazing, wild entrepreneurs around the world, hearing how they turn their business ideas into actual businesses, how they’ve grown their businesses, I still can’t believe this is like a thing that’s taken on a life of its loan. So thank you. Thank you. Thank you, and I hope you enjoy tuning in as much as I do creating it. Speaking of creating it, shout out my guy, Jeff Koslofsky, who has been a huge and huge help with MaxPodcasting and has been a huge help in making the video versions possible for the Wild Business Growth podcast as well. Without further ado, let’s get to the first batch we got coming up here we have a interview with returning guest, Thor Pedersen, who, if you remember, traveled all the way around the world, to every country in the world without taking a single flight. Then we have a fan favorite segment with Melinda Emerson, who talks where to keep your focus as a small business owner. And finally, an incredibly weird and spectacular voice from Jamie Montz.
Enjoyyyyyy the showwwwwww!
Oh rady, we are back back back back, but back back, back, back back, with a very, very special returning guest for Episode 300 wild Business Growth podcast. Thor Peterson, who, just like everyone else I’ve interviewed, has been around the world without a single flight. Thor, thank you so much for coming back on when we did the full interview your episode, which, again, one of the all time favorites. It was episode 256 october 2023, and here we are, almost a year later, and I think you’re still traveling. How you doing? Thor,
Thor Pedersen 4:28
I’m good. And first of all, congratulations. 300 episodes. Man, that’s a major mind. So you must be so happy.
Max Branstetter 4:36
Thank you. Thank you. Well, I’m exhausted. I’ve just been traveling from container ship to container ship now, now that no it means a lot. It’s really, really cool and special and extra cool to reconnect with awesome people like yourself. Well, thank you. You know, back on the interview with you, like, we had some amazing questions from wild listeners. Like, I was blown away by how many people submitted questions for you, and I. So many great questions, everything about, you know, your favorite food to, what country was the scariest to, you know, how did you, like, manage to pay for all this crazy travels that you did? But I just wanted to check in, like, has your perspective on travel changed at all? You know, almost a year after you return home, or over a year after, well,
Thor Pedersen 5:20
I don’t know, I don’t think it has really changed, but I’m enjoying traveling so much more now that the overall project is over, because something that most people miss is that I was caught within some really strict rules within that project, and I felt that I had some self imposed shackles on, you know, caught within my own ambition. So when I finally did return back to Denmark, I was free. And now I travel wherever I want, whenever I want, and I stay as long as I want. You know, it’s a completely different way to travel, and I really enjoy that.
Max Branstetter 5:54
And do you go on flights? Now I do. But who am I talking to?
Thor Pedersen 6:01
Yeah, I tried to weigh out if it makes sense to go with a flight or not. Like I’m I’m a part of the extraordinary travel festival in Bangkok this year, so I will be flying to Bangkok, but I was invited to go and meet the Secretary General of the International Federation of the Red Cross, the IFRC in Geneva and I went by train, even though that’s kind of a long by train. I do a lot of motorcycling these days and kayaking and running, so I’m still underground.
Max Branstetter 6:33
Well, Bangkok, that’s that’s a good one. That one probably, now that you have the option again, makes more sense to fly to versus like a three month extravaganza on water to get there, or however you would get
Thor Pedersen 6:46
I’ll tell you what, though I am looking into riding a motorcycle from Denmark to Hong Kong, so, but that’s probably next year.
Max Branstetter 6:56
Not a bother. You could just probably do it this weekend. Why? Not? Sure, awesome. Well, excited to keep in touch with that adventure too. You know, you mentioned that you’ve been doing some speaking, like, I’ve been following you on social media, and it’s just amazing, like, the appearances you’ve made and what you’ve done since then. How often are you doing, like, speaking, or, you know, public appearances these days, since, since you completed your saga?
Thor Pedersen 7:19
I guess I do probably average about two speaking gigs a month. I’ve been on a speaking tour in the early months of this year, and then over the summer, I’m kind of on a break from the tour. And then come October, November, I’m on the tour again, and that’s exclusively in Denmark, and it’s in Danish. And then corporates and organizations, they reach out and ask me to come. Some of them have been in Denmark. Some of them have been abroad. It’s been
Max Branstetter 7:46
really cool. It has and I think you’re even before you started this whole travel journey, like you’re an interesting guy, like anybody would have a great conversation with you. And now on top of that, people probably have millions and millions and millions and millions of questions for you and travel records like we my wife, Dana and I just from, like, the trips that we do always get hit up for trip records. I can only imagine the outpour you get from like, oh my god, Bangkok Overall, though, I’m curious what is the most common question that you get from people about your journey?
Thor Pedersen 8:19
Well, I mean, it depends a little bit, because it becomes quite topical these days. A lot of people are asking about what my visit was like in Ukraine, or what I think about Russia. I still get the Why did you do it? And I actually think the most interesting question that I get because I can’t really answer. The most common question is, how come I never gave up? Like, what was the source that kept me going for all of those years? And I don’t, I do not have a good answer for it. I really don’t know where it came from.
Max Branstetter 8:59
So you’re always like, that is an amazing question. I will get back to you.
Thor Pedersen 9:05
No, at this point, I have different answers for it, but I know that all the answers I give are not the answer, like I’m still searching for the answer.
Max Branstetter 9:14
Well, Thor so awesome to catch up. You are. You are my travel spirit animal. So thanks for all you do and sharing your lessons and journeys and stories with everybody I know, if people want to to learn more about your journey and everything about the big journey, but also maybe about this motorcycle journey coming up. Instagram is once upon a saga, and then your website is Thor Peterson. That’s Peterson, ending in s, e n, dot, D, K, last thing, just one single, random travel tip, a one liner. It could be literally about anything as small as you want. Send us home. Thor,
Thor Pedersen 9:49
okay, you should always bring a pen, because you need to fill out forms all the time, and you’re always asking for a pen, plus you meet people and you want to write down their. Address or their email address or detail. So you want to draw something for someone, so bring a pen. You’re
Melinda Emerson 10:07
not going to be able to hire people and train people if you don’t have a documented system. How will they know how your T shirt goes in the box with the tissue paper and two pieces of candy and the sticker over top of the tissue paper to go in the in the shipping How do your shipping labels look on the outside of your packages? Nobody will know that if it’s in your head, right? You gotta document it. You gotta write it down, and it’s painful to do, especially if you’ve been winging it every day. But that it doesn’t work like that, I promise you, when you get hired at Old Navy, they show you how to fold the shirts and make them look rice neat in the stack. How do they fold the shirts at your business, right? Like, where’s your training? Where’s your tool? I mean, a lot of the biggest mistake that I see business owners make is they hire people and they basically throw them the keys and say, good luck. There’s no onboarding, there’s not a lot of training. We expect people to perform at a high level with no training, which is madness, right? You know. So you need to make sure that you even your interns, what is it that you want them to do? What are their deliverables? What are their what is their execution steps, right? You know, so you want to make sure that you have processes and systems to take work off of you. Like the reason why you want to document stuff is because, as the business owner, you need to be focused on your most high valued activities. And let me tell you, your most high valued activity is customer acquisition and customer retention. That’s it. That’s what you need to be spending your time doing. The rest of this stuff is minutia, and you need to hire some people to handle minutia, right? But your job is to get customers and keep customers. That’s your job as a business owner,
Jamie Montz 12:03
and I also make this other weird noise through my mouth. I don’t know if do you want me to make the noise?
Max Branstetter 12:07
I do you shouldn’t have brought that up. Yes, okay, all
Jamie Montz 12:10
right, here goes. Talking about awkward. You hear it very well. I
Max Branstetter 12:18
don’t know what that was, but yes, I don’t know if I have dreamed for nightmares about that, but that’s great. That’s awesome. What do you call that?
Jamie Montz 12:27
I don’t even know what that’s called. I don’t know, but yeah, I do that to my kids at night when they’re not behaving. Scare them a little
Max Branstetter 12:33
bit. Holy cow. All right. Next we have returning guests, Shannah Game from Everyone’s Talkin’ Money. We have a look back at how the original Theragun For Therabody was created by Dr. Jason Wersland, and a little bit of whistling while you work, if you will, from Dr Brian Sutterer.
Oh, righty, we are back back back for a very, very special episode. 300 wild interview with Shannah Game of everyone’s talking money and everyone’s talking about this, you know, five minute interview already. I can just feel it. But Shauna, so excited to have you back. Thank you so much for making time out of your busy book writing process to do this. How in the world are you doing today?
Shannah Game 13:26
Today, I’m doing pretty good. I mean, I look forward to any time I get to talk to you and hear some corny jokes and put it puts a smile on my face. Perfect.
Max Branstetter 13:35
Perfect. That’s I’m here for. I usually just put frowns on people’s faces. So this is a nice change of pace for me as well. But I was looking back, you know, as prep for this, you know, talking to the award winning host you are. I listened back to the interview, like the full interview you did on wild business growth. And so this was episode 270 back in January of 2024 of course, awesome interview and, like, awesome to reconnect after we met at Podcast Movement, originally, but it was really cool listening back, because, like, I listened to some of the lessons that you shared in that episode, and I’m like, Wow. I like, I really applied some of Shauna lessons from that one about, like, being smart, about, you know, planning ahead for your travels, and making sure that, you know, you can swing big travel, like we’ve since have done, and come back from our Spain and Portugal trip, which was awesome, and we didn’t stress about the budget too much, like you talked to that, but we also, you know, we used travel credit card to our advantage. We made sure that, like, you know, we planned everything out well in advance, so we worked into, like, our planning for the year. Of like, All right, we’re gonna make this trip happen. And I think the other lesson that I really took away from what you talked about was like managing your relationship with money and managing your stress levels as it’s tied to it, and I think that’s never been more important as an entrepreneur. So So I just wanted to invite you back on to say thank you. I’ve taken a lot of it from that. But I think the lessons on money and stress and travel like, like, never get all,
Shannah Game 15:06
yeah, you know, I talk about, obviously, relationship with money and stress and anxiety and fear around money, and sometimes it makes people’s head tilt a little bit, because it’s a different way that they’ve even thought about money, even though they know this exists for them. And so, you know, we just, if you can look at the stats, I mean, let alone entrepreneurs, the amount of money stress that people feel, it’s, you know, an exorbitant amount, and it’s only getting worse and worse. So, you know, I love that you took some of these tips and were like, oh, yeah, these actually, these actually work. I’m actually gonna apply these, because I think that we don’t realize that so much of our relationship with money is felt internally inside of us. And so, you know, if we could work on that practice and just at least have some sort of understanding of what’s going on inside of us, then we can work on creating the outside changes with money that we really want to make.
Max Branstetter 16:03
And recently, you You’ve not only have you know your relationship with money, but you have your relationship with writing a book, which I’m sure is, you know, equally, if not even more stressful. So first of all, congrats on like everything, and how far you’ve gone on it so far, I know that this is your your first ever book that you’ve written, and I’m sure it’s been a long time coming and really excited for it to come out, but before that happens, I know you need to finish it up. I know that there’s a lot of pieces in the process, but for anybody out there who who aspires to write a book one day, which is kind of funny, because it’s always like on the Maslow’s hierarchy, when they talk about self actualization. The example, they’re always like writing a book, writing a novel, whatever. What’s a tip you can share for anybody to finally get over the hump and finally, like, write a book and heading towards getting it out there to the world.
Shannah Game 16:54
I think the biggest tip I have is to write the book that you want to write when you’re out pitching your book, and you’re trying to get agents and publishers, so many of them will try to tweak your message to fit in their agenda. And there’s always a publisher out there. You may have to just search a little bit, but there’s a publisher who will allow you to write the book you want to write, not to say that, you know, it doesn’t need to be edited and concise and all of that, but I think really staying true to your expertise, your story, what you want to share, and not tweaking that too much to fit under somebody else’s agenda. Overall.
Max Branstetter 17:35
Do you think there’s been more editing work for your book or your catalog of 1200 podcast episodes,
Shannah Game 17:42
really, I was stunned when I got the book notes back from the copy editor. And she was like, you know, it’s pretty much just grammatical things, like, you wrote a really tight book. And I was like, All right, you know, I feel pretty good about that. So I would say definitely the podcast 12 under episodes is, you know, taking a lot more editing expertise, shockingly. So
Max Branstetter 18:05
I just have to say that, you know, episode 300 I’m honored to get to like, a quarter of the catalog that you have. Do you have any advice out there for anybody to keep going and get to like, the hundreds or even past 1000 episodes? Wow. I
Shannah Game 18:20
mean, I’m pretty crazy. I’m almost 10 years in doing this podcast, and sometimes I think, like, Should I continue? Should I do a new podcast? Like it’s, you know, I’m constantly having that thought, but I think, you know, the more episodes you do, the better you get, the tighter your show gets. And for me, it probably just like yourself, you talk to more and more interesting people, and you start to have this, like collection of friends and almost like a black book that you can call upon, you know, when you need different things. And so I think, you know, there’s so much power in podcasting and just continuing to do the thing helps you get better and better. And, you know, it’s such a different world of podcasting than when I started in 2015 but I think more than ever, there’s a great place for, like, an independent podcaster who’s got a business or a book or, you know, something that they want to entrepreneurial get out into the world. The podcast is like, such a great stage to bring that all to life. Just keep doing it.
Max Branstetter 19:24
Well, I’ve listened to all 1200 of your episodes, and I think you’ve got please tell me it gets worse and worse and it’s just terrible, and I don’t know why. No, it’s really one of those skills. It’s spot on. Like, the more you do it, you get better and better at it. And I guess us meeting is like an example of this, of like, how much it improves just overall your communication skills, like in life as well, in the real world, not just the podcast world, but you’re absolutely like an inspiration and a masterclass and everything in this space and beyond. So last thing so to wrap up here in the original episode. Where you were the guest. I don’t know why I said it like that. That sounded really weird, but I’m gonna keep that in we wrapped up with asking you for some Asheville wreckers. And since those wreckos, where you recommended going to baby bowl for burgers in Asheville, my wife, Dana, and I, as well as my brother and Andrew, my brother and Andrew, my brother, Andrew, we went to Asheville a few months after that. And actually, Dana and I our last day, got a burger at baby bowl, which was fantastic. It was as good as you were saying. I’m just going to trouble you for what is one more Asheville food reco that is like a must do or must eat spot in ash, Vegas, as they say,
Shannah Game 20:41
I mean, if you have kids, it’s probably like picking your favorite kid, because there are so many amazing restaurants here, it is absolutely insane. I would say Chai panei if you if you love interesting Indian food and something that will just like, leave your taste buds thirsting for more. That would definitely be one of those on the top of my list. Perfect
Max Branstetter 21:06
i, and I’m gonna say the name, because I will mess it up. John, thank you so much. I know that you can learn more at everyone’s talkingmoney.com at the time of this recording, you’re putting the finishing touches on the book. But can you share? When will the book come out? Like, when should people expect that? And if there’s a place to to check for that, my
Shannah Game 21:25
book is called unraveling your relationship with money, and it will be out in February, so I will be shouting from the rooftops everywhere I can to try and get that book in as many people’s hands, because I think it’s really a resource that’s going to help so many people. And you can continue to follow me on the podcast, everyone’s talking money, or on my website, everyone’s talking money.com and there’ll be all the latest there. I promise.
Max Branstetter 21:49
Perfect. Well, super excited for it. Thanks so much, Shauna, and I’m gonna hit you up for a third Asheville Food Record soon. So we’ll talk soon. Thank you.
Dr. Jason Wersland 22:00
What if I had something that bounced back and forth? And then I was like, oh my god, I can make that. So I went to my garage, and I grabbed a jigsaw. I brought the jigsaw in, I had a long blade on it, and I bent the blade, just rolled the blade down, wrapped a dish towel around it, made a little ball, and then I wrapped electrical tape around the disk towel. So now I’m using this thing, and I’m against my body, and now it’s doing what I wanted it to do. It’s like it’s coming up and down off the body. The jigsaw that I had at the time had a dial on the top. There was a speed dial, so I was just experimenting with the speed. So I’m back and forth, and I’m watching what’s going on. And as I’m doing this, I make note that my pain is not coming back. So that that first experience, I was like, wait a minute, what happened? Like, this is really doing what I’m thinking it’s going to do. So I set it down, and I just kind of let the pain come back because it always did. I’m in such inflammation. I grabbed the Thera that that machine again, I just started using it on my body, and I thought I’d have to go right in the area where the pain was. So I’d hold, try and hold it up there. And then I just kind of came down on my arm, and I put on my legs, and I realized, as long as I had that on my body, moving it around at a certain speed, I could tolerate the pain like I could breathe, I could eat, and it would give me these windows of opportunity, give me, like, eight to 1012, minutes where the pain wasn’t so bad. If I got up and had to shower or make some breakfast or something like, I could do that without being in such pain. So I just started experimenting, and then I just realized, like, holy crap, this thing is like, working, and there had to be something like this in the world, you know, like, there’s no way I’m the first one that thought of this.
Dr. Brian Sutterer 23:45
I’m really good at whistling.
Max Branstetter 23:47
Oh yeah. Can you give us an example, like a two second whistle?
Dr. Brian Sutterer 23:51
Oh, man, you’re gonna put me on the spot, like it’s gonna mess up your microphone. There you go. Maybe it’s just because my wife can’t whistle, so I feel like I can whistle really well.
Max Branstetter 24:11
All right. Next up, we have returning guests, Robert forto, the wildly fantastic entrepreneur from Alaska. We have a look back at the early days and versatility of The Onion from founder Scott Dikkers, and we have a custom song from Tamara and Sean Turman,
alrighty, We are back, back, back, back, back, back, back, back, as Chris Berman Boomer says to episode 300 of the wild Business Growth podcast with you, very, very special. Robert forto dog musher as well as founder of Alaska dog works first paw media, some other exciting stuff that we’ll talk about in a bit. But. It. Robert, so excited to have you back on. I stand by my claim that you are one of the most interesting men and people in the world. Thank you so much for joining. How you doing today.
Robert Forto 25:09
I am great. Max, thanks for having me on. And congrats on the milestone episode.
Max Branstetter 25:16
Thank you. Thank you. I’m just trying to chase you and your sled dogs. So you’re good inspiration here, but no super exciting and I was looking back and prep for this. I listened back to your original interview on the show, and so you were episode 253, back in September of 2023 just about a month after we actually met at Podcast Movement in Denver, which was an awesome, awesome time. But I think what I love so much about that interview was just learning tons about your world and your move to Alaska. The story that you got there, how you got there to begin with, is mind blowing, as well as how you met your wife and all that. Like you have some of the most fascinating stories ever. But on top of that, I think it kind of put everything in perspective after that is like, whenever I felt like I was a little bit tired or needed more of a break or needed some extra motivation, I thought about you standing outside in negative 30 degree weather, and thought, You know what? Robert can do this. We can do this for
Robert Forto 26:14
sure. Hey, as long as you have good gear, it’s never too cold.
Max Branstetter 26:17
Yeah, yeah, exactly, exactly, which is, uh, which is why I wear Speedo everywhere. No, I’m just going. But so, so in addition to all the, all the you know, your typical day to day, week to week, 24/7, stuff you do in the in the dog mushing world, about two or three months after we recorded that interview, you and your wife Michelle actually bought mushing magazine. So congrats on that. We’ll still call it hot off the press, but really, really cool getting into the magazine space and just further expands your your mushing empire. Can you share a little bit about like, how this came up and how you decided to get into this magazine world? Well,
Robert Forto 26:56
the magazine has been around since 1988 it’s really the publication for our sport and our industry. And a guy contacted me last June. He said, Hey, are you interested in buying the magazine? I said, Sure. Why not? Flew up to Nome, Alaska, pretty much in the middle of nowhere, and sat down with him, and he said, You’re the first choice for this purchase. And I said, why is that? He said, I have listened to every episode you’ve ever done of your podcast, so you were an fit. So podcasting and print world still, still is alive and well,
Max Branstetter 27:30
absolutely all the peas. No, that’s one of my favorite parts about podcasting, is that when you’re when you’re listening to a show or watching a show, but especially when you have that, it creates that connection with the host, where you feel, even if you haven’t met them in person, you feel like you know them, and you never know what that can turn into. I what I always tell clients is that start a podcast and you might end up buying a mushroom magazine. That’s pretty much what I say. So I say, first off,
Robert Forto 27:58
it’s conceivably possible we have published two issues now getting ready to do our third so it is a long, long process to do a print magazine, but when you’re the only guy in the space, I think it’s important to keep it
Max Branstetter 28:11
up. Oh, totally, totally. And you’ve carved out your niche, your niche there. I’m mad at myself because I made that joke so many times, and now it’s included in episode 300 Here we go. How would you characterize like the print magazine space compared to everything you’ve been doing digitally? Well, the most important
Robert Forto 28:28
part of it, I think, is the history. So we have 200 issues in our catalog, which is probably 30 stories per issue. So we have a hell of a lot of content that we can republish and repurpose and all of that. And you know, that’s what it’s all about, is being able to tell those stories to people that have never heard them before.
Max Branstetter 28:48
Oh my god. So you’re like, You’re the king of, like, back catalogs and back catalogs, you got so many great stories there, and audio form and print form and all that. What’s a tip that you’ve learned so far? Two issues, plus deep of curating so many awesome stories and doing it in like an efficient manner, make sure the product’s still
Robert Forto 29:08
awesome. Get out and meet people in all areas. We’ve met graphics people and publishing people and printing people and everything. It’s just the connections you make are so important. And you mentioned us meeting a Podcast Movement a year ago. Here I am on your podcast for the second time. So hey, relationships grow by meeting people in person. I
Max Branstetter 29:29
think that’s very important still. I think so. I think so as well. And actually, you know, going forward, after this episode, you’ve agreed to take over as host of The Wild Business Growth podcast for every episode. So thank you for that. No, I’m just kidding. You never know. All right, so that one of the other things that I loved about your interview on this show going back, was that you and your wife have the tradition of doing the rock and roller a rock and roller coasters tour. And I. Think that’s the most awesome thing ever. First of all, I think you inspired me, because I don’t know what I can’t point to, anything else except our conversation. Over the past calendar year, I’ve listened to and re listened to more rock and more of my favorite rock bands than I have in any recent years, probably going back since like high school or college. So it’s I was long overdue of re listening to, oh my god. So I started with Queens of the Stone Age, and did the whole Palm Desert scene. And then I did the whole grunge scene and all the Seattle bands and great ones there, and, you know, STP out of San Diego. Anyway, it’s an amazing time just bounce around on Spotify. But anyway, you’ve probably seen most of those bands. So what is the concert that you have upcoming up that either you have tickets for, or just a band that you’d really love to see sometime in the next year? Well, we
Robert Forto 30:49
are kicking off the summer leg of the rock and roller tour in just a couple of weeks. We’re heading down to Portland, Oregon, and it starts with Foo Fighters there, traveling over to the East Coast, to DC to go to Podcast Movement and several roller coaster parks there in the nation’s capital, and ending up in Seattle to see Metallica for a two day show there on Labor Day weekend. So two big heavy hitter concerts in the middle of our tour there.
Max Branstetter 31:17
Oh, you’re fighting the foo and you’re metaling the ICA so good on you there. And then, of course, have to ask, what is the roller coaster that you are most excited to hit next?
Robert Forto 31:30
Well, we’re
going to the amusement park right outside of Washington DC, called Six Flags America. I believe I’ve never been there. I lived in DC when I was in high school, and that was before my roller coaster craze. So I’m excited to get out there. I don’t get out to the east coast as much as I should. So it’s time to check that one off the list.
Max Branstetter 31:52
Perfect. Checking it off rocking, you know, head banging. The entire thing you’re probably, you might be the only head banger I did a rod potential racer combo. Who knows Robert? Thank you so much. This blast having you back on I know that if anybody wants to learn more about you, they can do so at Robert forto on social media. And what is the best place if they want to check out mushing magazine. Mushing.com
Robert Forto 32:18
is the spot I
Scott Dikkers 32:22
wanted the onion to be available in every media possible. So we immediately moved into media that was available to us. The first one we moved into was radio, super easy. We partnered with local radio station, started doing like a little Onion News bit, and then we started producing it our on our own, and syndicating it to stations all over the country. I know Howard Stern played it for a long time, and that was a great way for us to build the onions awareness, you know, awareness of the onion was to get that radio skid everywhere. It was super funny too. It was like, just like the super square sounding am newscaster doing these really brief one minute onion things, and they sounded like real news, you know. And then we did a the website. We did, I think we did a TV pilot first, we’re trying to get on TV. We did a comedy CD, and the internet was just like, one of our designers came to me and said, hey, you know we could, we could put this on the computer, and people could type in an address, and they would find the onion. And I was like, Okay, let’s do it. And it cost us $400 to get the domain the onion.com because they were just $400 my partner didn’t want to spend the money, which is pretty funny. And then we did a book, and then we did we started doing online video, we did a podcast, we did a movie, we did everything we could possibly do to get the word out. And it was always a matter of rethinking what the onion was. We learned a lot of lessons from the TV pilots, those early pilots and the early comedy CDs. We learned that we got to do what people expect from us. We got to be in our voice, and we have to totally change what we do to suit the rules of the new medium. You can’t just take, for example, the newspaper and just put it on the radio. It’s not going to work. You got you got. You have to make it sound like a radio show, same with all the other media.
Max Branstetter 34:27
Tamara, what is your favorite song to sing to your dogs?
Tamara Turman 34:31
I told you, I make song up. So,
Max Branstetter 34:35
oh, my God, wait, wait, wait, so, so then how do you So, can you give us example? Like, how do you make songs up? Like that?
Tamara Turman 34:42
This is so embarrassing right now, I told you, I’m the only one that knows that I can sing.
Max Branstetter 34:49
You don’t have to sing if you don’t want. Of course, if you do, if you know, if you do want, you’re welcome
Tamara Turman 34:53
to It’s called My doggies. So it’s my doggies. My doggy. He’s. If it’s morning time I go into the morning about how it’s a great day. Is this the evening time I go into the evening about, it’s a song that I make up on the spur of the moment, but I’m singing to
Max Branstetter 35:16
I like it. It’s got a ring to it.
Beautiful. It’s just so beautiful. All right, next up, we have Liz Giorgi coming back to talk about some acquisitions for soona. We have the Chief Executive Octopus of goodr, Stephen Lease, in a snippet, talking about the incredibly creative and energetic culture of goodr. And then we have a false start that any bat using echolocation or Batman, I would say, would be proud of, with David Sauers of Royal Restrooms, aka the toilet king.
Oh, righty, we are back, but back, back back, try to say it different every time with a very special episode, 300 of wild business growth. Special returning guest interview, we have Liz Georgie of Suna. He super cool, co founder and CEO in Master of alliteration and s sounds, of course, but Liz, we had you on back in episode 276, which was right before Leap Day, actually, 2024 time flies. But yeah, thank you so much for joining. How you been? How’s your how’s your year been? My year
Liz Giorgi 36:32
has been really wonderful. We’re having a great year here at Sunna, and I’ve really, you know, personally and professionally, been making the most of 2024
Max Branstetter 36:41
Yeah, yeah, exactly. And so leap days are in the air, and you’re taking leaps with your business. So we’re gonna see how corny we can get here. But I was listening back to that interview is prep for this. And I think one of the things that really stood out to me about what you talked about, that really inspired me was like, obviously you were very busy, and like, your team is very busy on the day to day, but one of the things that you were really focusing on at the time was like, what does the next generation of suna look like? And like, who, even if I stumble over my words when I say that, you know, what does it look like in the future? And like, what can we do to like, make soon a better and better for our customers, and add new features and products and things like that? And then, sure enough, not too long after that interview, I found out that you actually made some acquisitions with your company. So there was trend the UGC aspect of that specialization, and then mocker focus on AI, which, of course, you’ve always had an interest focus on AI as well. So first of all, congrats on the acquisitions and in the growing suna umbrella, if you will. But what inspired you to expand through the acquisition route?
Liz Giorgi 37:45
The inspiration for expansion through acquisition was really our own strategic planning process. In 2023 we started looking at, you know, how was content changing? And there was this question that kept coming up, which is, what do we think e commerce and buying products is going to look like in the next five years, and everybody, kind of around the table on my executive team, kept thinking to each other or regurgitating sort of a version of this sentence, which is, well, actually we think that buying things on just the.com is maybe going to go away And people will continue to buy things across a much more distributed internet. And what I mean by that is, when you think about, you know, where do you buy your groceries now? Well, a lot of us are buying them on Instacart. Where do you buy some of your more frivolous purchases? A lot of us are buying them natively on Tiktok. Where do you buy your gifts? Well, a lot of us are downloading apps that are gifting apps, and we’re buying through these other facilitators. And it’s interesting, because I think for a lot of years, the Holy Grail and direct to consumer was, how do we just get people to go to our website? How do we get people to go to our website and buy things? And my business, sooner, we were in the business of, let’s make all the content that makes that website look great and make people want to buy products. But in the future, we thought, wow, you know, we think purchasing is actually going to change. We think the purchasing journey is much different than it’s been over the last few years. And so it’s fascinating, because the chance that we had then was to say, Well, okay, with that in mind, how does suna need to change if we believe e commerce is going to change, how is soon are going to change? The discovery we had in that process was, Well, soon it needs to become a much broader content company. We need to be experts in all types of content that sells your products online, not just the content that lands on your PDP or your product display page. That was what was the initial impetus. And when we started having that strategic vision of, okay, we’re broadening suna to be the content company for all of commerce. It became immediately clear that we had some gaps in our product. And the the first gap that we identified was user generated content, and being able to create videos and photos that go on places like Instagram or Tiktok to get people excited to buy your product in those places. And so we started looking at some of the different user generated. Content platforms, and immediately found a true alignment with trend. Trend had an ethos like we did, really believed in affordability, really believed in access, and, of course, quality. How do we make the best quality for the dollar that our brands are paying? And also we just thought that the team was really exceptional, and so made that acquisition, and are really excited to say it’s been a very successful acquisition. Our customers are loving trend, and I think trend customers are really loving access to Suna. So that’s been really positive. If you think about AI then, okay, well, how else does content changing in this sort of next generation of how we shop online? Well, one of the things that became clear to us was that personalization and optimization of images that you already have is going to be a really important part of expanding the value of your content, but also just iterating on it, making different versions, making different options so that different consumers have a different experience. And when we looked at the AI tools on the market, the one that we kept coming back to was mocker. The reason we kept coming back to it is they just had a totally novel approach. So many of these companies are really focused on what I would call making net new images, or reinventing images. But marker’s approach was no we actually love your product image as it is. We want to retain that product image. We want your product to look its best, but we want AI to expand your optionality through AI editing. So being able to do things like add props and generate props with AI, or add different scenes or settings and and have aI generate those things, and that kind of expansion of creativity really resonated with us on the product side of the business, we thought, wow, you know, imagine this huge library. We have 20 million images in our sooner databases that we’ve created with customers over the last five years. Imagine how much more optionality they’re going to have by having an AI editor that really works with them in companion with their existing content. And so that made the mocker acquisition just make a tremendous amount of sense for us. And you know, not to say we’re done acquiring, we’re still thinking about acquisitions in the future, but I have to say these two first acquisitions have been a really big success for us.
Max Branstetter 42:06
Yeah, well, congrats on that. The word is overused like crazy, but like the synergies and compliments there are,
Liz Giorgi 42:13
I try really hard not to use that word synergy. Yeah, exactly.
Max Branstetter 42:17
I thought I’d throw it in there for you. No, no, but it makes a lot of sense, and it’s just a beautiful, natural growth and synergistic now I can’t resist now you got me going of suna, but kind of one piece of party advice here? What? What advice would you say for any fellow founder out there that wishes to go the acquisition route?
Liz Giorgi 42:38
I have such an interesting point of view on this, because I’ve sat both in the seat of the person selling their company. So I sold my first company in 2019 and now I’ve sat in the seat of someone who is helping shape the decision making and ultimately acquiring companies. And what I can tell you is that I think so differently now about how I should have positioned my company for sale, now that I’ve been on the acquisition side of the table, and what I can tell you is that there’s really three things you should be thinking about. First, you really need to make sure that your business is in a place where it is applicable to a larger industry or category. Think a lot of founders sometimes are trying to solve a very small problem, because that’s how you actually find product market fit. But when you’re starting to think about selling your company, you’ve got to figure out, Okay, I’ve got product market fit, but how does that expand? How does that grow? What are the cross, sell, up, sell opportunities that might exist for an acquirer if they were able to apply our product to a new domain or a new industry, and if you can’t articulate that, you’re actually then requiring your, you know, potential acquirers to imagine that don’t make them work that hard. They’re going to give you bonus points. They’re going to value you higher, if you can help paint that picture for them. The second thing that I would say is, you know, be really conscientious about who is going to be required to make this acquisition successful on on both sides of the table. And what I mean by that is, I think sometimes when companies are selling their business, they’ll say, Oh, here’s the primary team you’re going to need to run this business as it is today. And that’s actually not why someone would buy your company. What they want to do is they want to buy your business and evolve it for their business. And so think about the people on your team, whether that’s in engineering or in marketing or sales, who are the most adaptable, the most creative and really the most capable of expanding their mindset, so that if you sell your your company to a new acquirer, they’re able to use those teammates to leverage their knowledge, leverage their background expertise, but then apply it in new and novel ways, and that’s what’s going to ultimately lead to a really successful acquisition for everyone involved. And I think critically, you know, it can be scary for employees to change hands, to go from, you know, a world that they knew and understood with their existing employer, to a new world when they’re acquired and actually involving. Them making sure they understand the role that they play and how they should play that role, can ensure that they feel more comfortable with that transition and just more excited about it overall. You want there to be excitement about that at the end of the day. And so those are the things that I would focus on if you’re thinking about trying to sell your company someday. Well,
Max Branstetter 45:17
synergy is the golden work. No. Thank you so much. Liz, this has been fantastic. So great catching up with you, and congrats on all the growth and and the more and more new life into Suna. I know if somebody wants to connect with you, they can learn that’s s double o, n, a, dot, C, O, as well as at Liz, Georgie, G, I, O, R G, i and r g. I’m going to stop spelling things because I’m exhausted from it, as well as at your favorite bar in Dinkytown. So thanks so much. Liz, Oh,
Liz Giorgi 45:46
of course. And congratulations on 300 episodes. Thank
Max Branstetter 45:50
you. Thank you. Means it done. Can you share some of kind of, like, your guiding principles, or like, what, what makes good or unique from a culture sense that’s allowed you to grow this way?
Stephen Lease 46:02
Yeah. I mean, our two core values are fun and authenticity. And we define fun as celebrating the work over the results, and we define authenticity as liking who you are as part of this brand. And we have hundreds of actual supporting and slippery behaviors for each race. We’re very explicit about what this means. They’re not just like bullshit words. And I think at the core, if you kind of unpack those two things, you need to love the work here good. Or we’re not a party brand. We’re a fun brand, and we think fun is celebrating the work of the results. And so gutter is actually not an easy place to work. I think that if you like work, you like challenging if you like solving hard problems, you look changing very, very quickly. It could be the best job you ever had in your life. But if you don’t, you’re gonna be miserable here. And so I think that’s important. You just have to love doing work, be driven with patience and then from an authenticity side, liking who you are as part of this brand. Man, I don’t want anybody ever to be have the Sunday scaries or be miserable. I think it’s okay to have five or 10% of your job you can be annoyed by because you’re like, Well, this is just bullshit. I have to do. That’s fine. But I think anything over that, I don’t talk about this reason, it’s coming to me, if 20% of your job you find miserable, you got to find a new job, because that’s one day a week you’re miserable. That’s that is not sustainable. And so I think if you those two things.
Max Branstetter 47:26
Oh, Brady, we are here with, oh, wait, sorry, hold on. I’m hearing a little echo. Let me work that out first, David Sauers, the number one man and the number two business, as he says. All right, next we have a returning interview with Thomas Dambo, also of Denmark, who is the Troll King. He sees trolls all around the world, and he’s been up to just a few trolls since he was last on the podcast. We also have Sheryl McLean of McLean & Tircuit. My voice might have just cracked. They’re one of my favorite business names to say, Tircuit. We talking about her day of inspiration and creativity. There and then Nicole Zeno of Clever Cow Media with dad jokes on dad jokes, sure to make you roflcopter back, but back, back, back, back with a very, very special guest for Episode 300 of the wild Business Growth podcast, Thomas dambo, the sculpture I butcher that the sculptor and recycled artist who you’ve probably seen his giant troll creations all over the world. Thomas, so excited to have you back on you were actually way back in episode 220, back in January 2023, so really cool to catch back up. And most importantly, the time of this recording, you just got married. So congratulations on that.
Thomas Dambo 49:00
Thank you. Thank you so much, and thank you for having me back. It’s been a busy year. I’m sure you’ve been busy too.
Max Branstetter 49:06
Yeah, no, I’ve just been sitting and admiring your trolls. So thank you. You’re you’re working very hard, but life moments as well as professional moments as well, one of the things I want to catch up back with you on is the fact that you haven’t exactly just been sitting around relaxing since we last spoke. You’ve been building more and more trolls. And I think the who we were, Chad and trying to tally it up beforehand, I think it’s over 30 trolls that you and team have built since we last spoke. What’s one of the projects that you were are, like, really, really excited about how it turned
Thomas Dambo 49:41
out. Yeah, it’s been super busy. I almost built two a month since we spoke together last year. The best one always tends to be the the most recent one. The most recent one I made was in France, in a city called one. And so it’s like a troll hiding in this big forest. And then it’s kind of like sitting and taking care of it together with like, kind of like a little hideaway city 30 small like makeshift children houses in like, that’s like in a little circle. I spent a lot of time going around and scrapping different things, from scrapyards and city signs and the hood of a car and all different things, and a lot of recycled wooden building like this. And then we had like, 20 kids that were, like, in a program for kids who had a little bit of, like, a rough time at home. And then they helped us build all these small houses, like, into each other, you know, with, like, with a little city gate and a little tower and a little old, different, wonky, funky houses like, you know, with all this the city signs and stuff like that, as roofs, and that was really, really special, because it’s like, it just gives you that feeling like, What the heck is this when you find it, you know, like, because you feel like you found the place Robin Hood is hiding out, or where the books live In Star Wars or something like that. It feels like that, you know. And then there’s this giant troll that’s sitting together with it. And it was just so nice. And all the kids there just were so happy to to help build it, you know. And then, like, Can this be a job, you know? Does somebody have this as a job to just dumpster dive and build this weird stuff out in the forest, you know? But then it was just, like, a good moment. I think
Max Branstetter 51:24
you’re opening doors for all generations, but I think that’s, that’s what’s so brilliant about your creations, is that, that ability to, like, discover them, and then the mystery about them, and I know you’ve been kind of hidden on the exact locations of a lot of them, just, you know, going back to the original interview with you, like, the amount of people that reached out and are like, Hey, I know those trolls, or I’ve seen them around the world, or, like, I’ve seen them in Denmark or wherever, and since then, even, like my cousin shadow Alec and his wife Casey in Indiana, posted pictures from a troll in Indiana. And I’m so I’m like, I’m sure growing up in Denmark, Indiana was like, number one on your list for trolls. But it’s amazing. Has anything changed about your process? Like now, how you build trolls compared to the early days?
Thomas Dambo 52:09
Like, the number one thing that’s changed is that the process have went from everything being something that was dependent on me, so I had to be able to afford it. I had to be able to lift it. I had to be able to build it. I had to be able to crawl on top of it like so everything was designed for my mind and my body. That’s what birthed the project and made it so crazy, because I’m a crazy individual that dares to do stuff like that, you know, now I can design it for other people who can build it, people who’s actually better at building than I am, so that have made it so that now, all of a sudden, that I have so many people who can help me, I can dream up even crazier stuff, you know. And it took me some time to learn this, but now I’m like, Let’s build a troll that’s like standing on one lake on a giant boulder. Or like, let’s buy 6000 uh, rocks and then place them in a fairy tale loop around the hospital and then build 10 different sculptures that tells a story. Or, like, right now we just, like, I told my assistant, like, build a model of a caterpillar excavator in the scale, and so it fits to my body as for a troll. So we can take photos of me wrestling with the excavator, so that then when we’re going to build the troll wrestling excavator, then we can have be inspired by this model session we did with me. And if you’re just standing alone in your workshop, then you’ll be super lazy, and then you don’t have the time to build all that stuff and like that, but to have such a big team and start starting to understand the power of that team and dare to use the team that have changed everything. So now it’s now I can just do really sick stuff. And
Max Branstetter 53:56
speaking of things that start with T like teamwork, you’ve also since launched the book trash trolls and treasure hunts. So shout out the alliteration there. But a really, really cool book. If you’ve seen anything about it online, you just know that it’s part of the book. There are just beautiful, beautiful pictures of so many of your creations out there. How does it feel personally to have some of your creations now captured, not only online, but in actual print form as well.
Thomas Dambo 54:24
I think it’s for me, it’s the same feeling as when I used to be a rapper, you know. So when I made my first CD, you know, it was like, and then the cover, and then, of course, I decided to cover also, you know, there was a rabbit album, and then, like, the shout out to all the home bars, and then I wanted that photo in it, and we need the perfect logo. And, you know, like, all of it because, you know, like, like, because I remember when I got the first public enemy CD, and I would sit on the on the carpet in my teenage room and listen to it on my big speakers. And, you know, so then you grow up, and then you make that CD yourself. And then. You want it to be perfect for because it’s, that’s the feeling of accomplishment, you know. And I remember going to the museum with my mom and looking in these big coffee table art books with, like, different artists who would do different stuff, and photographers and like that, you know. So, so to be able to make that book for myself, you know, I really, really, I took the time to make it really nice, because I made it for myself, you know, I didn’t care if I would sell any. I just, I made it for my parents, for my wife, and for my crew, and for myself. That’s who I made it for. And so we would have it for ourself after that. Then I make it so I can put it on the table when I have a meeting with the next client. Boom, there it is. I made 100 of these sculptures. You know, this is like the ultimate cloud that you can have as an artist. It is to have accomplished it and done it, you know. So it’s like, it’s also a ticket that you buy into for the next level of your career, in some, some sense, right? Like now I have made that book. So for a long time, I was like working towards being able to make the book. And for many years I wanted to make the book when I didn’t have enough content to put in the book, you know. And then all of a sudden, I got so, so busy. I wanted to make it when I had made 50 trolls, but then I didn’t have the time to do it. And then it was like, let’s do it for 60 and 70 and 80 and 90. And then finally it got there when we made 100
Max Branstetter 56:19
Well, Thomas, you are the ultimate troll in the best way. So thank you so much for all that you create. And I know if anybody wants to learn more, check out some pictures or find out where to find them. They can go to thomasdambo.com you got links there to the book, your Instagram, YouTube, all those things. You know, if any listeners do go and actually stumble upon one of your trolls, what do you want them to do? Like, should they tag in a picture? Should they send it to you? Like, what’s the what’s your preferred way? Well,
Thomas Dambo 56:47
I would prefer if they would make sure that if somebody had littered around the troll and please pick it up and then bring it to a trash can, because a lot of my work is out in nature, and not all humans, they remember to not litter. And a lot of us, we also just lose stuff out of our pocket when we take the phone or something like that, you know. So please just heal cleaning up after everybody so the next people can also enjoy it. Have a good time. Check out the sculpture and go around and see what else you can find in nature. It’s a great spot.
Max Branstetter 57:17
What things have you done on these the said day of inspiration that have got you most inspired and creative, creatively energized.
Sheryl McLean 57:27
This is going to sound really corny, but when Beyonce came to town, I had the ability to be in the one of the suites. And with the bold Collective, we had gotten a suite, and everybody was there for Beyonce, and I wasn’t. I was there because I was just about to jump into a project that’s going to have some a little hip hop in it. I call it hip hop, which means I’m going to be dealing with a lot of color, a lot of current conversations, and when I was looking at Beyonce, of whom, you know, I’m no no different than anybody else. I loved her. Was I looking at what she was wearing? Yes, but for a very different reason, you know, I’m looking at the colors, I’m looking at the mood, I’m looking at the people. I’m taking it in. Because whatever that energy is, is the energy I wanted to take with me into this other project. So that was one that was kind of unusual. You go to Beyonce concerts, concert for inspiration, but that’s what I did. You know, I have some done something as simply as go to the beach and take my journal and just sit out there and do nothing, because I needed a blank space. I needed to just kind of free myself from all the craziness just to create some clarity about what is it that I’m going to do with this project, so it just they’re all different, is the point I’m making.
Nicole Zeno 58:51
Why’d the chicken go to the seance? How are we
Max Branstetter 58:54
going to try God, to get to the other side? Yeah. That is the
Nicole Zeno 59:03
reaction. Why do I get that reaction? Why did the Scarecrow get an award?
Max Branstetter 59:09
Oh,
I just made a scarecrow joke in my newsletter. Does that have something about hay or being stuffed? No, probably not. Go ahead,
Nicole Zeno 59:15
because he was outstanding in his field. Wow. Anyway, with that note,
Max Branstetter 59:23
bravo. That’s really good.
Still, some of the best and corniest and musical to my ears dad jokes I’ve ever heard. All right, we are in the home stretch. We have first up, Krystal Proffitt, returning guest, where we’re talking all things, some things that I’m grateful for, but a little bit of fun at the end of this interview as well. And I surprised her by throwing in a weird talent voice that she does. I don’t even know how to describe it. After that, we have Joe Pellettieri, fellow Hoosier, which. With the Big Mouth Billy Bass story. And finally, the moment you’ve all been waiting for the medley of voice cracks. My
my prize moment from from way too many interviews. Enjoy. Alrighty, we are back. I’m trying to set a record for a number of times I say back with a very, very special returning guest for Episode 300 special wild Business Growth podcast, Crystal profit, real name, no gimmicks, as Eminem says, But crystal, so excited to have you back on Crystal. For anybody who’s not familiar, I don’t know how is the content strategist, coach that came out as like, coast coat, coast whatever coach, and I’ll just call you multi, multi time podcast hosts. You’ve done, you know, 1000s of episodes. But I was looking back crystal, and you were on way back. You almost missed the cut for this. You were back in episode 203 and that was in August of 2022 and now you have 10 children. No,
Krystal Proffitt 20:01:17
I’ve added multiple F’s and multiple more tease to my name, yeah, made it all more complicated,
Max Branstetter 20:01:24
exactly. But what’s what’s new in your world? How’s everything shaken since you know, you bared that terribly corny interview last time?
Krystal Proffitt 20:01:32
Oh my gosh. Well, I have to say, as soon as you said, alrighty, like Ace, Ventura immediately popped into my head, and I was just like, Oh, he’s going with it, like Jim Carrey shtick today. So this is so great. Yeah, I’m actually doing some really fun stuff behind the scenes Max, I haven’t told you this, so this is, like, hot off the presses, like, this is the first time I’m putting it out into the universe. But I am developing a brand new tool, a brand new piece of software for creators, and we are in the very, very early stages, very, like, barely have a name for this. And I’m so excited. My husband and I are doing this together, and I just so much more to come. I can’t wait. So, like, the next one, we can’t wait for the next 100 episodes, but we’ll have to, like, share some updates, because I think it’s going to be something fun for creators to use in their business to help them track their metrics a lot easier.
Max Branstetter 20:02:27
Perfect. Well, congrats on that. And I think we could just name it right now. We’ll just call it east Ventura to stick with,
Krystal Proffitt 20:02:35
all righty, then,
Max Branstetter 20:02:38
wow, that’s, uh, yeah, you know, it’s funny. I do that at the start of every interview, and now I fully should be sued by Jim Carrey, or I just call me the pet whisperer. But so that’s really cool. Congrats on that. One of the big reasons I want to invite you back on as just, just to thank you again. Because, I mean, I mean, you know, but I think a lot of people don’t know, you know, one of the biggest, like, personal or professional milestones that that I checked off over the course of the past 100 episodes of this podcast. You know, the time that aligns with that was speaking at Podcast Movement, and you know, it’s my favorite podcast conference. It’s absolute blast for anybody who’s ever been or aspires to, to learn more in the podcasting space. And so speaking in Denver, like it just the session went awesome, and the feedback was amazing. And I reached out to a few people, awesome people, and you were one of those leading up to it, just for some advice of people I know had spoken at Podcast Movement before. And I was thinking, like, maybe you’d give me, like, a tip or two. You’re like, hey, let’s schedule a zoom. We talked for like, 30 or 40 minutes, you gave me this whole framework of, like, how to structure a presentation, how to prepare for it, and everything. So I have to just thank you again for that, because it went awesome. But on top of that, I think, or within that, underneath that, I think one of the biggest things that I took away from talking with you is that, hey, like, you know, there’s two ways to go about things. You can try to memorize it, or you can just practice and practice until you really know it, and it kind of comes from the heart and naturally. And I went the latter route. And you also gave me the advice, like, leading up to your you’re like, This is the best speech I ever did, and I practice it 12 days in a row leading up to it. So I’m like, All right, perfect. I’m going to do the same. I rehearse mine 12 days in a row. And when you do something 12 plus times, you really do know the content, so that that’s just what I what I took away from that. So that’s, that’s gold advice there from Crystal profit
Krystal Proffitt 20:04:35
well, and I mean, it does a few things like it actually like you are so sick of it. Also, by the time, you’re just like, oh my gosh, let me just get on stage and do this thing right. Like you’re so you’re not in your head about it. If you practice it once, and you don’t like, you’re just reading it off of a script or your outline, and you’re like, you’re kind of mouthing the words to yourself, like, yeah, that’s one thing, and you can absolutely do. That if you’re a really, really good speaker, right off the cuff, but I need all the help that I can get, and I need all the practice, and in doing it that many days in a row, you get all those weird things that you may like word flub and say stupidly and like you say it by yourself in your office or, you know, at your kitchen table, instead of hundreds of people, and you just feel a lot more confident about it. So yeah, that’s actually, I’m so proud of you max. And I actually I want to take a step back, because you did something that helped yourself in this whole process, and you asked for help. Like, I think anybody listening like, that’s step number one is reach out to people, because I know there’s more people just like me that are out there that want to say, yes, like, let me show you what I did, or here’s how this helped me, whether it is a framework or a process or whatever. But ask for help. I know it’s not always easy, but man, it really pays off when you ask the right people.
Max Branstetter 20:05:58
Thank you. That means a ton. And I think for anybody who wants my advice now, I think my best advice is to you know when you’re on stage, and for example, not specifically me, but if you’re referencing your wife, Dana, who is taking pictures in video view throughout the session, if you keep referencing her, everybody in the audience will turn and look at her every time you say her name. So that’s something I learned so very, very, very relevant, but it’s always funny how the audience react. You never know what people are gonna laugh to and what they’re gonna roll their eyes to, or when they’re gonna look at your wife. So there we go. But you know, Crystal, when I think about you and your interview, I look back and I think you have some of the best fun facts of all time you that comes from your experience, podcast hosting, podcast guesting, but you have it packaged really nicely on your website, where, like, if anybody’s doing research on you, there’s, like, some really cool fun facts about your background. So we talked about that back in, you know, when I interviewed you. But in the spirit of that, I want to wrap up this mini interview with two truths and a lie, and this isn’t about you, this is about me, so I’m putting you on the hot seat. You ready for it? Okay? All right, so I’m going to read off two truths and a lie, and then you’re going to have to guess which one is the lie. And I’m not going to tell you, just because that’s how it works. I don’t know I even added that in. All right, so first one is I got a tooth knocked out while playing basketball in high school. So that’s the first one. Second one is I’m named after a pro athlete. And third one is I have a bullet wound.
Krystal Proffitt 20:07:40
Oh,
okay, yeah. So basketball tooth, pro athlete,
Max Branstetter 20:07:51
kids movie, basketball tooth, a SpongeBob.
Krystal Proffitt 20:07:55
Oh my gosh. So I think that the first one could easily be true. I think that that one’s true. I think that the bullet wound just feels so out of left field, but it’s also like, Okay, this is this was an accident. It happened, and it’s true, but I’m gonna go with the first two are true and the last one’s a lie.
Max Branstetter 20:08:17
Wow, you are incorrect. I’m sorry, very close. Yeah, you got one of them, right? So here’s, here’s the background from each of them named after a pro athlete. That is true. And that’s, it’s kind of an asterisk, because my middle name is Aaron, and my dad’s favorite baseball player was Hank Aaron. So that’s where the Aaron comes from. So it’s middle name, but that I’m concerning that true, the bullet wound, you guessed, was false, but it’s technically true, because shout out, like, good family friend, mentor, Howard, when I did like, senior project with him in high school, just for, like, a fun thing after, like, he took me to a shooting range, and towards the end of it, while I was shooting at the target, a bullet shell flew out of like it flew out of the gun and bounced off the side barrier and then bounced back at me and got, like, wedged temporarily in between my protective glasses and my, gosh, my forehead, and it stayed there. And I, like, this is not safe at all. But I literally, like, dropped. I put the gun down because it was so hot that, like, I freaked out. And I don’t know, you probably have to look really close to see if there’s actually a scar there these days. But I like to tell people, I gotta pull in one. So that’s, that’s that. So I’m bending the rules for all this there. So both, so both those are true tricks. And
Krystal Proffitt 20:09:39
like, all kinds of like, parentheses and like, maybe, like, exactly that’s so, yeah, that’s so interesting, though, the
Max Branstetter 20:09:46
last one. So this is crazy, getting a tooth knocked out by elbow playing basketball. So I was actually on the flip side of this. We were playing basketball freshman year of high school and gym class, and I went up for a rebound and accidentally. I elbowed my friend Adam Rosenberg in the mouth, and, like, it knocked his teeth back. And it was, it was a whole thing, his teeth, he got it repaired. It was, it was, like, totally fine after but I felt so bad for the longest time. So that one was true, but in the opposite sense. So that’s the false one
Krystal Proffitt 20:10:15
here. Yeah,
Adam’s like, you know, still shaking his fist at you like that. Max
Max Branstetter 20:10:22
exactly so. So thank you for bearing with that 10 minute explanation, but, but you did great, Crystal, this is just such a blast catching up. Big fan of you, obviously, if we haven’t talked about enough and all you’re doing, and congrats and everything else, uh, new coming. But, um, I know if anybody wants to learn more, they can learn more at Crystal profit.com and just for fun, can you spell profit for us one more time? Yes,
Krystal Proffitt 20:10:44
so it’s crystal with a k, and then profit has two F’s and two T’s and Max. I am so excited for you. Congrats on 300 episodes. Like, what an accomplishment. I hope you find a really fun way to celebrate with your wife. Like, do something crazy, because, I mean, it’s, it really is an accomplishment. So congrats. Thank
Max Branstetter 20:11:05
you. I appreciate it. I’m gonna go play basketball and watch a Major League Baseball. So there we go. All right, thank you, Crystal. What is a weird talent or party trick you have that doesn’t impact your business, but you’re just really good at Oh,
Krystal Proffitt 20:11:21
I can talk with my mouth closed. I sound I can say it’s really creepy. And my husband’s like, please don’t do that. But if I’ll scream, Help me. Get me out of here. Get me out of here. Because it sounds like I swallowed a little girl and she’s screaming, and it makes me think of like poltergeist back in the day, like Carol Ann would scream out of the TV. We’re getting really dark. This took a turn Max. I wasn’t prepared for this today. Yeah, typically
Max Branstetter 20:11:50
does with rapid fire
Krystal Proffitt 20:11:55
without laughing. Okay. Okay,
Max Branstetter 20:12:07
oh, my God, that’s insane. Wow, that’s I’m glad I asked.
Krystal Proffitt 20:12:12
Oh my gosh, you
Max Branstetter 20:12:14
can say no, but please let me keep that in for multiple episodes.
Krystal Proffitt 20:12:17
It’s totally fine. I covered my face. I hope that’s your new sting that you use on all your
Speaker 1 20:12:26
Okay, so when I, when I, when I went to Jimmy, I was, my title was, like, Director of retail development, or some BS title. I mean, I just want to get in the door and make toys, you know, that’s, that was my goal, you know. So when I went there, I would, you know, someone left like the person did the music left. I said, I’ll do that. Licensed bird loud, do that. And I started doing everything. And I was involved in all the the product development meetings. I remember one time I sent an email with, like, 10 items, you know, just 10 different ideas. And I still have that email, because if I look back on it, like seven of those items became big hits for us. It was like, the first 10 ideas I threw out there, and so I started working on them. And number seven on that list was big mouth, Billy Bass. I mean, it was, it wasn’t my initial idea. My wife and I were driving. We saw Bass Pro, and we’re thinking, you know, brainstorming, what can we do? What kind of items can we do? She goes, Well, how about a fish on a plaque? Singing, that’s a good idea. So I kind of put it down. It became one of those 10 items. It’s just It took back a year to get that thing done. I mean, it was, it was horrible. It was like a clown fish. It just wiggled on the plaque. And it we probably would have sold some, but it had been horrible. So I, I just, I decided there’s something there. And so I remember, I was in in Hong Kong, like I would go a week before all the salespeople Go me and the creative director, and we would like set up the showroom. I would my part. I would go into China and work, get, make sure all the products get out of China into Hong Kong, and he would set them up in the Hong Kong showroom. Well, my last day, I went to the Hong Kong showroom, and I saw the fish for the first time done. I mean, it just took, it took a year, and it just, it was very slow. No one wanted to do it. And it was up on the wall, put up on the wall. I looked at it for like, 10 minutes, and then I just took it down off the wall. I took a train back into China. I was going back home the next day, so I had to get back to Hong Kong and everything. But I just said, can you make the head turn and and that’s, that’s that kind of did it. And once, once the head turn, it became an item. I mean, the people just it took them by so much by surprise, and that was, that was the hook that head turning,
Max Branstetter 20:14:29
yes, Razor as in Razor scooter. Yet, objects or foods or drinks that could, you know, come in handy when you’re out of the water, out of the nice little voice crack there, out on the water, or like, alrighty. We are here with Justin kittred, who my voice crack saying your name. So sorry, Justin. Let me say it again. This is why I edit tour. Late to be talking right until next time, let your business
likes thank you well before I say thank you, you’re welcome for the voice cracks, but thank you so much to all you wild listeners out there, to all you wild entrepreneurs, wild guests, alums out there, current, past, future, everything. You all make this show possible. And I’m seriously pinching myself in the most wild way that Episode 300 it’s here. It’s almost over, actually, but episode 300 seriously pinchable moment. So grateful for everything, and super excited for 301 and 302 at that, and yeah, a few more as well. If you love the Wild Business Growth podcast, make sure, if you’re not already, that you are subscribed or or follow the Wild Business Growth podcast on your favorite podcast platform, it’s usually a button that says, Follow. You can you can click it some platforms. It says, Subscribe. Speaking of that, for the video versions, which, again, is a newer development over the past 100 episodes, you can subscribe on YouTube. That YouTube channel is @MaxBranstetter so make sure to hit the Subscribe button there, and you will be seeing more and more video versions of these awesome interviews that still give me chills and still make me cringe, mostly myself. I’m cringing
like, like right now it would be a cringeable moment for any help with podcast production. You can learn more at MaxPodcasting.com and for the newsletter that you are sure to like if you like this podcast, the Podcasting to the Max newsletter, it is where podcasting meets entrepreneurship meets the worst puns known to humans. And the sad part is, I still think they’re pretty good to sign up for the Podcasting to the Max newsletter, you can sign up at MaxPodcasting.com/Newsletter until next time. I’m laughing because Dana is trying to not make any noise in the back. Until next time. Thanks again, and let your business Run Wild…Bring on the bongos!!
