July 10, 2025 • 48 mins
#168 - "Collect moments, not things." It's a philosophy that sounds simple but runs counter to our consumer-driven culture. Cody Sudmeier, founder of Spur Experiences, joins the show to explore why shared adventures create more meaningful connections and lasting happiness than material possessions.
After leaving a successful consulting career that felt increasingly unfulfilling, Cody found himself at a wedding shopping for last-minute registry gifts. The only item left? A $120 set of salt and pepper shakers for a couple who had traveled the world. This disconnect sparked the creation of Spur Experiences—a company that allows people to gift memorable adventures rather than forgettable things.
Scientific research backs his approach. Studies show experiences create happiness at three distinct points: anticipation before the event, enjoyment during the activity, and lasting memories afterward. While material purchases create a brief dopamine spike that quickly fades, experiences continue generating joy years later through shared stories and connections.
What began as a wedding registry alternative has expanded into a platform offering over 7,000 experiences across 80 countries—from wine tastings and spa days to helicopter tours and once-in-a-lifetime adventures. Through personal stories about rappelling down waterfalls, exploring Antarctica, and surviving the challenges of COVID, Cody demonstrates how prioritizing experiences has transformed his own life.
For anyone feeling stuck in routine or unsure about what truly matters, this conversation offers a compelling reminder: fill up your calendar, not your cabinets. Your future self will thank you for the memories.
To learn more about Cody and Spur Experiences check out www.spurexperiences.com and be sure to follow them on Instagram @spurexperiences.
Want to be a guest on Journey with Jake? Send me a message on PodMatch, here: https://www.podmatch.com/hostdetailpreview/journeywithjake
Visit LandPirate.com to get your gear that has you, the adventurer, in mind. Use the code "Journey with Jake" to get an additional 15% off at check out.
Visit geneticinsights.co and use the code "DISCOVER25" to enjoy a sweet 25% off your first purchase.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
What if the best gift you could give wasn't a thing
at all?
Today on the show, I'm joinedby Cody Sudmeier, founder of
Spur Experiences, to explore whymemories matter more than
material stuff.
From hot air balloon rides toonce-in-a-lifetime adventures,
Cody is on a mission to help uslive fully through meaningful
experiences.
Let's dive in.
Welcome to Journey with Jake.
(00:21):
This is a podcast aboutadventure and how, through our
adventures, we can overcome thechallenges of life that come our
way.
While I expect you will learnsome things about different
adventures, this show willentertain you.
Each episode will featuredifferent guests or guests as
they share experiences andstories from the different
adventures they have been on.
Not only will you beentertained, but you will also
(00:42):
hear the failures and trialseach guest faces and what they
have done or are doing toovercome the hardships that come
their way.
My goal is to take each of uson a journey through the
experiences of my guests, withthe hope that you'll be
entertained and inspired toovercome your day-to-day
challenges.
After all, it's not all aboutthe destination, as it is about
(01:07):
the journey.
Welcome to Journey with Jake.
I'm your host, Jake Bushman,and whether you're a longtime
listener or tuning in for thefirst time.
Thank you for being here.
Don't forget you can listen tothe show on YouTube and follow
(01:29):
along on Instagram atjourneywithjakepodcast.
You can also check us out onthe PodMatch podcast network at
podmatchcom forward slashnetwork.
Today I'm excited to introduceyou to Cody Sudmeier, the
founder of Spur Experiences.
Cody left behind thetraditional path to build a
company centered on something weoften overlook the power of
(01:50):
shared real-world experiences.
We'll talk about how choosingadventure over accumulation can
completely reshape how we liveand give.
If this conversation resonateswith you, be sure to check out
episode 152 with Jorge SalasGuevara, where we dive into a
similar message about livingfully through intentional
experiences.
(02:11):
All right, let's get into it.
Here's my conversation withCody Sudmeyer, All right?
Well, I'm excited today.
I have Cody Sudmeyer on thecall with me today.
Cody, welcome to Journey withJake.
Speaker 2 (02:21):
Thank you, jake, it's good to be here.
Speaker 1 (02:23):
Yeah, this is awesome .
Looked at your story, looked atwho you are, I love what you're
doing.
You're all about experiencesversus things, and I think
that's important.
That's what Journey with Jakeis about.
Really.
It's about people's experiencesand what they're doing.
So I want to hear all aboutthat, what you got going on with
your business and your ownexperiences and your own
experiences.
Before we do that, like Ialways do on the show, I want to
(02:43):
know a little bit about who youare, kind of your background,
where you're from, where yougrew up, that sort of thing.
Speaker 2 (02:47):
Great.
Yeah, I grew up in Colorado, sonot far from you, just in a
suburb of Denver, Grew up hereand then ended up I thought I
was going to get intoarchitecture, so I went to
Kansas State University.
As soon as I got out to KansasState I decided, actually before
even enrolling in a singlearchitecture class, that it
wasn't for me, Went straightinto finance and got a business
(03:10):
degree at K-State.
Yeah, I think the biggestthings that dissuaded me from
architecture is I get out thereand for one it's a top program
in the country.
You get into the building andit's like the building itself
you think would be nice, butactually not to talk too much
stuff about my alma mater butthe building itself wasn't as
nice as the business buildingwhich I was like how does that
(03:31):
happen?
The architecture.
Speaker 1 (03:33):
The architecture building.
Yeah, yeah, I know.
Speaker 2 (03:36):
I think they were, at least at the time.
They were getting paid lessthan business majors and it was
like a seven to one guy to girlratio.
And so 18 year old version ofme was just like Nope, we're
gonna go do business.
So yeah, I love Kansas State,graduated from there.
Funny not funny, serious, butcoincidental tidbit is I got a
handful of offers out of college, but the two that I narrowed it
(03:58):
down to was Arthur Anderson togo into consulting.
The other one was to go doinvestment banking with Lehman
Brothers, and so I graduated inMay 2001, narrowly chose Arthur
Anderson, coming back to Denverover Lehman Brothers up in New
York City.
Six months later, 9-11 happens,and literally I would have been
(04:19):
in the World Trade Center had Iaccepted that job with.
Speaker 1 (04:21):
Lehman.
Speaker 2 (04:22):
Brothers.
Yeah, so kind of a trippy.
Just a little side note.
But yeah, I got into consultingand it's been quite a ride
since then.
But that's kind of where it allstarted.
Speaker 1 (04:32):
Excellent, Okay, so you're a consultant guy.
Arthur Anderson, big consultingfirm Were you like?
Where were you based out ofwith them?
Were you based in Denver?
Speaker 2 (04:41):
Yeah, I was, I was based in, and another just kind
of funny anecdote then.
So they were the auditors.
I wasn't in the audit side, Iwas on the consulting side, but
they were the auditors for Enronand that all shook out in, I
believe, 2002.
So it was like I was there forless than a year and they're
telling you, hey, no, worries,this Enron thing isn't going to
(05:02):
be a very big deal.
And then you like turn on thenews and some of our leaders are
being like hauled off inhandcuffs.
And so, arthur Anderson, itonly lasted a year.
While I was there, this companythat had been around as one of
the big five firms for a hundredyears, was it pretty much went
away and was the differentpieces went to different buyers,
and so my portion of thebusiness went to another
(05:23):
consultancy that they kind offounded, but it was called
Proactivity, and I was there forlike three more years.
Speaker 1 (05:30):
And while you're growing up, are you a only child
?
Do you have any brothers orsisters?
What was that like?
Speaker 2 (05:35):
Oh, good question.
I have one brother, youngerbrother, joey, definitely fought
a lot as kids, but we arealmost red flag close these days
.
We bought condos in the samehigh-rise building in Denver for
like 10 years.
He lived two doors down from meand he recently got married and
had a kid, so I'm newly anuncle, but we're still talking
(05:57):
today A lot of the adventuresthat we do.
Joey's awesome, so he works fora company called Natural
Habitat Adventures so kind of anexperiences and travel business
as well and they specialize inlike conservation and adventure
travel and all these cool places, and one of the perks is he
gets to personally go on a lotof these trips.
But he also gets discountedtrips for family members.
(06:20):
So I've been on two of thesewith him big time trips and the
third one we're about to go onin a few weeks down to Galapagos
and one of these eco lodges inthe Amazon in Ecuador.
So it's great perks of havinghim as a brother.
Speaker 1 (06:34):
Yeah, how close are you guys in age?
Speaker 2 (06:37):
Oh man.
I say he's three years youngerthan me.
He says he's four years.
Somewhere in between those two.
He's, uh, three and a halfyears younger than me.
Speaker 1 (06:45):
We'll say okay very good somewhere there.
Awesome good.
So you have a younger brother,he's close to you, sounds like
you guys still do things all allthe time, which is awesome, so
that's great.
Yep, how did you go from mrconsultant, business guy, to
owning your own business?
Spur experiences.
How did this kind?
What's the path you took?
How did you get there?
Speaker 2 (07:06):
Oh man, it might take a minute to get the full.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
We got a few minutes.
That's fine, let's do it.
Speaker 2 (07:12):
I was in consulting again about four years into my
career with now this companycalled productivity, and what I
specialized in was dataanalytics, which this is back in
2005, when it was still reallya new industry and we didn't
have all the, you know, ai toolsthat you've got today.
And so I just kind of taughtmyself.
I got a degree in finance but Itaught myself how to code data
(07:34):
analytics like SQL programming.
All this and we would go to bigbusinesses, mostly in the
telecom industry, where they'vegot.
Telecom is an interestingindustry where one company is
billing the next telecom companyfor some services they're
providing but they're alsocustomers of theirs and their
competitors and all this datagoing back and forth and it's
(07:55):
complex.
And I mean all of us have hadthe case where one of these
companies messes up your cellphone bill or whatever it might
be.
So we would go in, learn theirbusiness, write a bunch of code,
do this data analytics stuffand help them find money.
They were losing either wherethey were not billing customers
but they should be, or they wereoverspending on whatever their
(08:16):
vendor expenses and then wewould take a cut at what we
found.
So I like this, because so manyconsultants just bill a couple
hundred bucks an hour and thereturn on the investment is
questionable at best.
I like that.
It was the success-based model.
I was doing a lot of work.
I was managing one of ourbiggest clients in Denver and I
got to a point where I was fouryears out of college and it was
(08:39):
typical in consulting that youwould get promoted to manager
five years out.
So I was like a year early butobjectively I was doing a lot of
what a manager would be doing.
I was kind of selling the work,managing the work, doing a lot
of the work.
We had a class above me, sopeople that had been there a
year longer, that wasn't thestrongest class and so
(08:59):
comparatively I thought surelyif any of us is going to get
promoted here, it's going to beme.
It's one of those things inconsulting too often people just
promote based on the clock, soit's kind of up or out, like if
you're staying around, you'rejust going to get promoted once
a year and then the next yearand the next year, and I
appreciate an environment that'smuch more merit-based.
I go into work and find out theyannounced the promotions and I
(09:23):
wasn't included or evencommunicated with or anything
like that.
And it really, you know, someof this is being a 26 year old
guy.
That is just a little egodriven, but it really upset me.
I ended up going home and justkind of sulking.
I remember busting open abottle of Jack Daniels and just
pouring myself a drink after adrink and somewhere that night I
(09:44):
just said, screw it, I am goingto leave my consulting firm and
I'm going to go try to landsome of these big Fortune 500
clients and keep in mind, at 26,I probably looked like I was 17
.
So it was a challenge and Iwent into work the next day and
I had my Jerry Maguire momentwhere I just said I'm leaving,
(10:04):
taking the goldfish she wascoming with me, kind of thing.
One person my co-founder of ourconsulting firm, which was
Agility Solutions, his name'sSammy.
He was looking for somewhat ofan adventure and so he's like,
yeah, let's do it.
And we grew the company over.
I was a co-owner of that fornine years.
We grew it into a 50-personconsultancy.
(10:28):
We were recognized as Denver'sfastest growing private company
two years in a row.
So we did a lot of really goodthings with that.
It just got to a point.
I mean just honestly consultingin corporate America in the
telecom industry is justcombined, it's a lot of soul
crushing work and I just I wasover it.
And so we went through a kindof a breakup process with me and
(10:51):
my co-founder and he ended upbuying me out of the business.
I took that and basicallyrolled it over into starting
this business, spur experiences.
Speaker 1 (11:00):
Wow, okay.
So I see a couple of things.
So, first of all, being passedover never feels good and
sometimes it takes somethinglike that to be like okay, maybe
this isn't the place for me,maybe I should do something else
.
I saw that happen to you and,yeah, you said you had your
Jerry Maguire moment, which Idon't know what you said, maybe
it's a little toned down, Idon't know but you had your
moment and you brought him overwith you, started your own
consulting and, wow, you weresuccessful.
(11:20):
I mean't know, but, but you hadyour moment and you you brought
him over with you, started yourown consulting and, wow, you
did, you were successful.
I mean, nine years, it's not youwere successful, you were, you
did great.
But then you had a moment there, too, where you were just like
and I've noticed that a lot withpeople who like to be
adventurous and entrepreneurs,people like you, what is it
(11:41):
about that?
That, what, what is it thatlike?
You get to a point where youjust you've had enough, and how
do you just change on a dime anddo something else?
Speaker 2 (11:48):
No, that's a great question.
I I've heard this theory and Idon't know if it's totally
accurate, but it says like lifehappens in seven, seven year
cycles, and so a lot of people,though you'll find that they
want change at like 28, 35, 42,when they go through these
different cycles.
I don't know if that's true ornot, but that hit me when I
think I was 35.
And I think different peopleflourish, especially
(12:09):
entrepreneurs.
They flourish in the differentparts of the entrepreneurial
cycle, like some people doreally well when it's brand new
and it's really fast moving, butjust really kind of messy.
Where I thrive the most in iswhere it's further down the road
, where you're getting some goodwins and you're really growing
fast and you have enough successthat you're no longer like
(12:31):
embarrassed about what you'vegot out there your website, your
product or whatever it might be.
But like that's when I tend todo really well and you you've
had enough success that you canreinvest those assets, you can
hire some people, so you're not,you know, having to do all the
like low level work yourself.
So I do really well in thatphase.
Once it gets like a little bittoo developed, a little too
(12:57):
mature, it just gets a littleboring for me, and then I want
to start something new, and so Idon't know that I'm all the way
there yet, but with spur we'rekind of getting closer to that
more mature phase.
Speaker 1 (13:07):
Spur, let's talk about spur experiences.
I love the fact that it's aboutexperiences.
That's what it's all about.
I think it started off, if Iread right, it started off with
mostly weddings, Like, was itfor like gifts, giving
experiences as wedding gifts orfor honeymoon that sort of thing
?
And then it developed into justexperiences in general.
How did you go from being abusiness consultant, telecom,
(13:28):
that sort of thing to adventuresand experiences, things that
people love to do?
Speaker 2 (13:35):
Well, some of it was just fatigue from corporate
America and just going into theoffice every day and just
thinking it sounds funny to saybut I'm here to help mostly rich
old white people make moremoney is what I'm doing, and it
just there wasn't a lot of likepassionate.
I certainly wasn't passionateabout telecom, you just kind of
(13:55):
did it because it was anopportunity.
I remember what reallytriggered the idea at the time
with this idea of a weddingregistry for experiences is I
went to two weddings the samesummer.
The first one super cool set offriends that had, like, lived
around the world.
They were adventurous and I was, you know, typically late to
buying a gift.
(14:16):
Literally, I think, I was likedriving to their wedding and
when I did, I got to Crate andBarrel the only place that I
could find that they wereregistered on and one of the
last things that was stillavailable for their wedding
registry was this set of like$120 salt and pepper shakers and
I was just like you've got tobe kidding me, Like this couple
that's so cool and this is whatwe're gifting $120 salt and
(14:40):
pepper shakers, and this is likeover 10 years ago.
So who knows what that wouldtranslate to today.
So that was the firstexperience.
And then, later that same summer, I went to another wedding, and
these people seem to kind ofget it right, or maybe kind of
plant.
That thought in my head is.
They said we're registering forexperiences, and so one of the
things that they registered forwas swimming with dolphins on
(15:03):
their honeymoon.
And I said, oh, that's, this iswhat I'm talking about, this is
cool.
Well, when I went to check out,so to speak, it turns out it's
just like a PayPal, PayPaltransaction and you're not
really buying them an experience.
And so, anyway, they go onhoneymoon.
They come back and I'm like, oh, I'm dying to hear how was
swimming with the dolphins.
(15:23):
And they said, oh, you know,weddings are expensive and we
just put the money towards thewedding, yeah, and it kind of
felt to me I'm like, okay,giving cash, it feels like
you're paying admission to awedding.
And so for me, I was like, nah,there's gotta be a way to do
this.
That's, you can giftexperiences and couples can
(15:43):
register for experiences.
Either you know the honeymoonsthat are going on for these like
near-term super cool adventureexperiences, or even just like
filling the first year or two oftheir marriage with cool date
nights or overnight adventures.
Speaker 1 (15:56):
Yeah, we can get away , or a spa night or whatever, I
that's the kind of things thatcome to my mind at least.
Speaker 2 (16:02):
Yeah, like one of our main tagline is collect moments
, not things, but one of theones we use as well is what is
it?
Fill up your calendar, not yourcabinets, and it's that kind of
idea.
Like so many people get thesegifts and they never use them
again.
And more recently, there's alot of studies out there that
show both gift givers andrecipients very much like to the
(16:22):
tune of 85, 90% on most ofthese surveys prefer gifting or
receiving experiences, but ifyou look at what the percentage
of gifts actually given are,it's like sub 5%.
To us, that represents this bigopportunity where the market is
collecting what the actualdesire is.
Speaker 1 (16:39):
Yeah, I mean, I sit and look at myself and I think
about you know, I got marriedand it was 20 plus years ago,
but I remember getting a lot ofthings that sat in the garage,
something you know, and we endedup getting you know, give them
away or whatever the case was.
Yeah, I would have much rather.
You know, hey, here's a skipass or here, whatever the case
may be, you know, and justthere's something about that and
(17:02):
what I mean, what have youlearned at doing this?
And we can stick on the wedding, but I know you're, you've
evolved it more, but what knowyou're?
Speaker 2 (17:15):
you've evolved it more.
But what have you discoveredfrom people who take advantage
of this?
Why is why are experiences soimportant to people versus
things?
Oh man, that's, that's a greatquestion.
So there is a professor that'sout of Cornell and his name's Dr
Gilovich, and so this guy hasdone a multi-decade long study
on people spending their moneyon experiences instead of things
, and what he finds is theretends to be, when people buy
(17:35):
stuff, there tends to be like adopamine or whatever it is spike
, and almost you come down toactually below your baseline
after the purchase, where youget a little bit of like the
guilt of you know spending moneyon something, but there's no
prolonged happiness of buyingstuff.
When it comes to experiences,and they do this measurement,
these studies, by sending outsurveys how do you feel a week
(18:00):
before the purchase, on thepurchase, a week after, now that
we're talking about it, how doyou rank your happiness?
So they do a bunch of theresearch that way, but what they
found with experiences is wereceive or we feel a bump in our
happiness, our mood, whateverit might be, at three different
points.
The first is the anticipation.
So if you're going, if you haveany upcoming travel, or you're
going to the big game orwhatever it might be, you get
(18:22):
excited and you actually connectwith people just with the
anticipation.
You know, hey, aren't youexcited?
We're going to the concerttonight.
This is going to be amazing.
Let's put on the music you get.
The second phase is theexperience itself.
So we just kind of say, in themoment, of course, while you're,
you know, enjoying your rafting, you're, you know, getting that
adrenaline rush, you'reenjoying it then.
But the third is the memory ofit afterward.
(18:45):
That's something that is, youknow, you're kind of collecting
those memories.
It's something you share,typically with somebody else, so
that just really, you know,leads to, you know, deeper
connections between people.
So that's what the expert says.
Anyway, I trust his word for it.
Speaker 1 (19:00):
Man, you're speaking my language here because I 100%
agree with that.
It's funny because, as you'retalking about that, I'm thinking
about it tomorrow.
So I'm heading to Californiatomorrow, heading to San
Francisco to meet some customers, and I'm going to go to a ball
game, go into a baseball game.
I don't really, you know, I'mnot a Giants fan, I'm not a
Padres fan or whatever, but mycustomer is, and so I call them
(19:21):
today just to say, hey, are weready for tomorrow?
And I have fun, like I had alittle bit of rush of dopamine,
whatever you want to call itjust talking to him about, you
know, the anticipation part thatyou mentioned.
And then I know we'll have funtomorrow.
And we went to a game last yearand we still talk about it
because the weather was superhot, we got sunburn, you know,
we still.
It's amazing it does.
It carries on longer thanthings do.
(19:43):
Even though you think a thingcan be there forever, I feel
like it carries a lot more forme.
Speaker 2 (19:49):
Yeah, and it's.
I mean you bring up a reallygood point that it's
relationship building.
I mean that's something thatyou and your client or your
sales target we're actually.
You had said about theevolution of Spur, but yeah,
we're not just weddings.
We have experiential gifts forreally any occasion.
Father's Day is coming up youcould, you would give tickets to
a ball game or whatever itmight be.
(20:10):
But one of the areas we'vegotten some good traction in
right now is corporate rewards.
So there's these differentplatforms that manage a lot of
this.
You reward your employees witha plaque or a watch or whatever
it might be.
We've started to become theexperiences kind of category for
these guys and there have beencertain studies that have come
(20:31):
out that said gifting anemployee an experience creates
better longevity you know,retention than even just giving
them cash, because you get cashnice to have in the bank but you
don't really you don't havesomething to like anchor your
memory into just receiving thatcash payment.
So, yeah, you're absolutelyright, like what you're
experiencing with your client isis 100% backed by the data that
(20:54):
says, yeah, this is, this isrelationship building.
Speaker 1 (20:57):
How far into the whole, you know, wedding part of
it.
Did you decide, hey, let's justexpand this to anybody who
wants to have experiences andI'm guessing I could go to your
website or whatever and I couldjust get my own experience, but
it's also a platform to gift itto people.
Speaker 2 (21:14):
Yeah, both, both gifting and and just kind of
book for yourself.
We had an interesting path onthis one too, and you had talked
about like were you?
You know, for us we got.
I got to the I don't knowpinnacle is the right word, but
whatever it was for us with theconsulting firm, and then I kind
of hit the reset button and youknow, glutton for punishment,
you decide to start anotherbusiness.
We got to a point so that wefounded this like 2015.
(21:35):
I say we, I've got a businesspartner, jamie, who's awesome,
and she.
I've founded four businesses.
Two have been successful andthe only two that are successful
are the ones that I've workedon with Jamie.
So that should tell you she'sthe key ingredient.
I think we got five years in andwe were hitting 2019.
(21:56):
We had negotiated a partnershipwith Bed, bath and Beyond at
the time, which was the biggestwedding registry in terms of
sales, and so we were reallyexcited.
We were going to be thisexperiences category for them.
We were going live, we wentlive I believe it was November
actually of 28, 28, 2019.
Whenever the first case ofCOVID hit was when we went live
(22:19):
with this partnership.
Yeah, and so when you'reprimarily in the wedding
industry and there's no weddingsfor two years.
It was everything I could dojust to keep the business afloat
, and Bed Bath Beyond ended upgoing out of business, large
part due to everything fromCOVID that pretty much reset our
revenue to zero and we justlost this big distribution
(22:41):
channel that we were going tohave.
That really made us say we needto stop being so industry
dependent on weddings whensomething like that happens.
So we started expanding intoyou can book for yourself, you
can buy gifts for any occasion,for experiences.
There's really no reason tojust limit it to weddings.
But weddings is a very goodexample of the contrast between
how people gift People do yourblenders and your linens and all
(23:05):
that stuff still versus how weall know people want to receive
gifts with experiences.
So it provides a good contrast.
But yeah, we've expanded wellbeyond weddings for experiences
for any occasion.
Speaker 1 (23:16):
Is wedding still kind of your bread and butter, then?
Or is there another categorythat's?
You said corporate's beencreeping up?
Speaker 2 (23:23):
We're fortunate enough to land most of the big
wedding websites, so most peopleplan something like 70% of us.
Couples use one of threewedding websites to plan their
wedding.
I'm not sure if you hadmentioned getting getting
married maybe 20 years ago.
I'm not sure if you'd remember.
No, it's been 26 years, so nohonestly, when you talk to men,
(23:47):
most of the time they're like Idon't even know what we used
when we got married last year.
The big ones are the Knot, theKnot okay.
Zola.
So the Knot, like tie the knot,the Knot, zola, and a newer one
called Joy Great weddingwebsites for planning your
wedding and it's where peoplecan figure out, like travel
plans and schedule of events andbook a bunch of vendors and all
this.
They all have their own weddingregistry and we're the most
(24:12):
major partner on every one ofthese sites for providing
experiences.
So we get a lot of sales frompeople that are registered on
the Knot or on Joy or on Zolaand they receive one of the
gifts from Spur but through oneof those sites.
So, yeah, the majority of ourrevenue still comes from the
wedding sites, but our fastestgrowing part of our business is
all these other channels thatwe're really focused on these
(24:34):
days.
Speaker 1 (24:35):
Walk me through somebody who's thinking okay, I
want to get something, let's say, for my, my parents, you know,
and they go to and it's spurexperiencescom.
Right, is that where you Okay,so someone you know, like maybe
it's my parents 50th anniversaryand I want to get them just a
nice experience, somethingsimple, you know.
It doesn't have to be a crate,and that's the thing I love
(24:55):
about adventure.
I talk to people aboutadventures.
It doesn't have to berappelling down waterfalls.
I think that's a big one thatyou've done that you like.
Yeah, that kind of thingdoesn't have to be that, but it
can be something simple.
What, how would I do?
Is it broken down by categories?
Kind of give me just the basicsof someone like new going to
your website and trying to picksomething.
Speaker 2 (25:13):
In one of your previous guests with the bucket
match.
He said it really well.
He said, you know, with a lotof these bucket list items, that
can include some travel aroundthe world stuff, but it can also
include just kind of anyexperience that you want to do.
Or I think to some extent,anything that is expansive for
you broadens your horizons.
Yeah, so we have some thingsthat are super basic.
(25:34):
You know a winery tasting kindof thing.
Other stuff that's much, muchmore involved.
You know flying planes and thatkind of thing.
But on our site, like people cansearch every.
We have over 7,000 uniqueexperiences in 80 countries and
we classify them all by locationso you can always search,
filter by whatever locationyou're looking in, or they also
(25:56):
have a filter by category, soyou can look up very
specifically.
I want to look at helicoptertours in New York City and we
also have it just more generallylike gifts for adrenaline
junkies or gifts for foodies,just kind of these different
personas that people tend tohave.
So a lot of good ways to lookit up and then, yeah, you can
complete the checkout and what'sgreat is none of our vouchers
(26:18):
ever expire.
Some sites do.
We want people to use these sothey never expire and you can
always exchange one for the next.
So, especially with weddings,you get some people that get
really ambitious and we're goingto do all this on our honeymoon
or or whatever it might be, andthen we hear from them later ah
, we didn't get to on ourhoneymoon that bungee jumping,
and now we're pregnant, so maybewe shouldn't do that.
(26:38):
So, yeah, we try to be asflexible and it's just easy to
use, non-restrictive as wepossibly can be.
Speaker 1 (26:43):
This is great.
What have you?
What's it done for you?
When you see some of thesepeople have you, do you have any
particular, maybe an example ofsomebody who's taking advantage
of your, your services and kindof what they're what they had,
what they got out of it andmaybe what it's done for them?
Speaker 2 (26:58):
oh yeah, I mean that's one of the great things
is like we get couples or justcustomers in general, that what
we're really trying to push isfor them just to kind of share
their own adventure on theirsocial media where we can share
it as well.
But it is super rewardingseeing just that you had like
one sliver of happinessdelivered on their honeymoon or
(27:21):
just in their relationship ingeneral.
We had one of the most funcouples is this one named Ryan
and Kate, and they discovered uson the Knot.
They registered for someexperiences.
I believe they were in CentralAmerica.
Maybe they love the concept.
They love the experiences thatthey went on so much that once
they got back they both appliedfor jobs with Spur.
(27:41):
They said we're passionateabout this and they're now
employees of Spur and they'redoing some really cool things
with the company.
But we obviously love that.
Anybody that like believes inwhat we're doing and has
experienced it firsthand whatit's like to be a customer that
that's one of my favorite ones,for sure.
Speaker 1 (27:57):
I love that.
You're an adventurous guyyourself.
Like I said, I mentioned therappelling off the waterfalls, I
think.
Oh yeah, I love your websitetoo, because you had the little
part about your staff, and allyour staff has like what their
favorite experiences so that'swhat yours was Any others for
you?
In particular?
That because I'm sure you'vebeen able to like now that you
(28:18):
see this, you see how manyexperiences are out there you
kind of be like I'm going to doand I know you're going to the
Galapagos here in a little bit,so you're you're doing all kinds
of stuff, but any particularexperience that has meant a lot
to you, for whatever reason.
Speaker 2 (28:28):
Oh, yeah, I mean that's one of the great perks.
Or we joke around, the spurtsof the uh of the job is just uh.
Our product testing is goingout on these experiences, some
even close to us.
I have really enjoyed it andI'm I am adventurous, but I'm
also a foodie, so I love justdoing some of that kind of stuff
.
One that's pretty simple aroundus about 30 minutes west of
(28:50):
Denver is like one of the bestriver rafting in the country.
Over, I think it's from one ofour providers, liquid Descent
Love just doing that.
Another one in Colorado I loveis we have a hot springs resort
called Iron Mountain Hot Springsand it's like 15 individual
kind of pools, hot tubs, righton the river.
In Glenwood Springs there's abigger hot springs that's more
(29:11):
famous across the way but that'skind of like a bunch of kids
are jumping around and climbingon you and all this.
Iron Mountain is much more likecouples focused.
You can order drinks right tothe hot tub area and all this
beautiful scene.
So I really like it all.
I like different kinds of spaofferings that we've got as well
.
I'm totally into any kind ofspa experience and then just
kind of personally beyond that,yeah, as I mentioned my brother
(29:34):
working for this adventuretravel company, I got to go.
What was it?
Two years ago, we got to go ona four-week expedition with
National Geographic toAntarctica.
Speaker 1 (29:46):
Oh, wow.
Speaker 2 (29:47):
Yeah, so that was incredible.
Less than a year later, we gotto go on a safari in Africa.
Neither of these werespecifically sold on Spur, but
gives you a sense of kind of myadventurous side.
And then, yeah, same same thing.
We're about to go to Galapagoshere, in a few weeks too.
Speaker 1 (30:00):
Wow, it's amazing.
I wanted to ask about, maybe,people who've impacted you.
You mentioned Jamie as someonewho's really kind of been there,
but, yeah, who's someone inyour life.
Maybe that's shaped your senseof adventure or appreciation for
those moments of adventure.
Man, that's a good question.
Speaker 2 (30:16):
One person that has been a major influence on me,
both business and with a senseof adventure, is a mentor of
mine named Michael Kanick.
And Michael, he's written abook on strategic management and
so there's's written a book onstrategic management and so
there's like a part of himthat's like very diligent.
(30:37):
He still advises our businessstrategically to this day.
He's really helped us navigatesome difficult periods.
He's also one of the moreadventurous people that I've
ever met and I think they justgot back from some tropical
vacation.
They make sure to carve off, Ibelieve, to him and his wife.
Man, I think he's like pushing70, but is still like out there
(30:57):
doing these technical hikes.
That's something that's supermotivating for me is how we
choose to advance in age, how wechoose to continue to push
ourselves, to develop, toexperience new things as we get
older.
And he's had just a profoundimpact, just kind of observing
him.
But then also when I was goingthrough the idea to sell the
(31:18):
business, that was a lot of himjust kind of guiding me on that
and getting me from, you know,walking away from the consulting
firm and starting Spur.
So a lot, both adventure andbusiness, I owe to this mentor,
michael Kanick.
Speaker 1 (31:30):
You mentioned you kind of talked about some of the
difficult times.
What are some of the challengesyou face, not only with spur,
but just in your daily life?
Speaker 2 (31:37):
Oh, man my therapist could weigh in on this one.
Lots of things.
The COVID thing was reallyprobably my low point in life.
You go through some tough timesas an entrepreneur, especially
when you're self-funding yourbusinesses.
It's one thing, I think, whenyou take on other investors, and
(31:59):
it's probably a different levelof stress where you're worried
about losing, especially if youget money from, like, friends
and family oh my gosh, my uncleand aunt.
I took this much money to mybusiness and it fails.
That's a level of stress that Ihaven't had to face.
But what I have is I had enoughsuccess selling the consulting
(32:19):
firm that I if I tighten thebelt a little bit I never really
had to work again, but that Iwould have been bored.
I took that and I risked it onthis business, right.
And so it's like you get thischunk of change and you could
just put your feet up and neverdo anything, or you could light
it on fire day by day and try toget this business off the
ground, and that just creates somuch stress.
(32:40):
And when COVID hit, I had tosell two of my properties just
to keep paying my people.
That was tough because thosewere properties that I bought
almost as a sign of success withmy previous company and so it
almost felt like I was losing myprevious success.
But even on the personal levellike I mean everything, we all
went through everybodyexperienced COVID in different
(33:00):
ways and the loneliness and theloss and it was a tough time it
was.
I had had a four-yearrelationship and my girlfriend
and I broke up.
Right around then my dog died.
Right around then.
I'm losing hundreds ofthousands of dollars and it was
really starting over within thesame company and so all these
(33:22):
things kind of circling.
It was really a low point forme.
I try to manage it the best Ican, just with physical activity
and relationships and diet andsleep and all those things, but
it gets stressful.
Speaker 1 (33:34):
And when you're in it .
I like to ask this questionbecause COVID was a rough time
for me as well.
I mean, I'm in the live eventsindustry, I do trade shows,
conventions, and all of a suddenit's not happening anymore.
So that was tough and that justit made me realize, man, this
is all I, I don't know.
Anyway, it was tough.
When you're going through itand you're dealing with that,
those tough times, and you're itsounds like you're you know,
(33:54):
dealing with some depression andstruggling.
Besides, you know the, theexercise, the diet was there
anything particular?
Or how do you, how do you getover it?
I guess is what I'm getting at,cause I know when you're in it
it's so hard to see a way out.
Speaker 2 (34:06):
Yeah, yeah it's.
It's kind of the boiling frogthing, right.
Like you, you get a little bitmore depressed, it's not like it
hits you all at once.
I don't know that.
I got the best answer for it,frankly, like I think you just
try to.
I went through the exercise.
I see a therapist every everytwo weeks.
I had my therapy sessionearlier today and I know there's
like a stigma with men anddoing that, but to me that's
(34:27):
just it's a good building blockfor navigating life.
And we went through an exercisethat we just simply laid out
what are the activities or therelationships that bring me joy.
Let's track how much time I'mactually spending on those
things versus things that reallydon't get that feedback loop.
Am I doing it enough?
Are those really the thingsthat are bringing me joy?
(34:50):
What things can I cut out?
And I've always been a bigbeliever of like health and
wellness, so I'm typically in abad mood if I miss like more
than a day of exercise.
That's a big thing.
Diet and people don't talkenough about sleep.
There's a really good book whywe Sleep Matthew something I
can't remember the guy's name.
It just goes into all thedifferent things that happen in
(35:11):
your sleep cycle and why it'seven more of a foundational
layer before you even get todiet.
Those components are reallyimportant for me, but I mean it
hits you sometimes especially.
I'm 46 years old and unmarriedand no kids, so you can get
lonely for sure.
Speaker 1 (35:26):
Yeah, no, no doubt we're both juggling those
mid-40s together there, buddy.
So I'm 47, so I'm right therewith you.
Speaker 2 (35:34):
It gets tough, doesn't it Like just the aging
thing?
Speaker 1 (35:36):
I think oh, yeah, yeah, for sure.
Speaker 2 (35:39):
Not what I once was.
Speaker 1 (35:40):
For sure, and it's awesome now, though.
You're an uncle now, so that'sgreat, so you got that going so
very cool.
One of the top things on thatlist of bringing me you go love
it yeah I'm gonna go back to youtalked about it earlier and I
love the whole idea of you knowwhy experiences are are so
important versus things, and howyou know you got the
anticipation and you got themoment and then you got the
(36:01):
reflection and the memories.
Yep, in today's world, I meanin today's world, nuts, you know
you had covid, you knowpolitical, and you said you're a
political guy and we're notgoing to talk politics this is
not politics show, but there's,but there's chaos there.
I mean there's just there'schaos everywhere.
Why do you think it is?
I mean, to me it seems likepeople are craving experiences
in today's world.
Why do you think that is?
Speaker 2 (36:21):
Well, I think it really does connect with just
kind of our more organic beings,like there's something just
that's kind of primal aboutexperiencing things and getting
out there and doing it.
I think there's a layer ofthere was some pent up demand
for experiences and travel andyou know, for a while there was
you couldn't go see concerts orgames or anything like that.
So you get you get a bit of apent up demand.
(36:42):
But I think a lot of peoplealso were just kind of left in
their homes with all the stuffthey ever bought and they're
still feeling like that didn'tcreate happiness for them.
There's some really good datathat's put out by the government
that shows there is a long-termtrend going back to the 60s and
projecting forward, where thepercentage of our consumer spend
(37:03):
on experiences relative toproducts continues to go up on
experiences continues to go downthe relative spend on products.
So I think that's just we'regetting more in line with who,
who we are, what brings us joy,like almost at, like I said, at
a sub cultural level even.
Yeah, I don't know if I otherthan leaning on that, professor,
(37:24):
I don't know if I got a wholelot of other answers I can
provide on that one.
Speaker 1 (37:27):
No, that's good though, you know, I think I.
It just seems to me people arecraving it.
Maybe it's because I do thispodcast and so that's.
I'm talking to people aboutexperiences all the time, so
maybe it's in the forefront ofmy mind and that's what the
algorithm's pushing towards meon social media and everything,
so maybe it's.
It seems like people are justall over it, but I love it.
I feel like it's important.
Speaker 2 (37:46):
Yeah, and it's interesting to like look at the.
When we came out, we thought,generationally, we know there's
a lot of millennials, like allthe data says, oh, there are
more about experiences andtravel and all this and even
like not that it's a healthydynamic.
But you think about this likekeeping up with the Joneses
dynamic that used to be myneighbors got this new car or
this whatever in their house.
(38:07):
Now it's like that Instagramculture of you're like seeing
the keeping up with the Jonesesdynamic that is, oh my gosh,
this person's at the concert orthis person's traveling or
whatever it might be.
And so I think there's justmore exposure to experiences,
and I don't love that idea oflike comparing yourself,
especially in a social mediaenvironment where people are
only putting in like theabsolute most filtered, best
(38:29):
versions.
But it's real People aregetting exposed to the
experiences available to themmore now than in the past, and I
think what was the big surprisefor us is we knew it would be
big with millennials, but it'sbeen really consistently growing
with all these differentgenerational types, and I think
you and I might be experiencingthe same thing, which is like
(38:49):
probably have more years behindus than in front of us Like,
let's, let's get after it, let'sgo do these things we wanted to
do.
Speaker 1 (38:55):
All right.
Where do you see spur going?
What's kind of the future looklike?
What are you hoping for?
Speaker 2 (39:01):
You know one thing that we're focused on right now.
That's really exciting isinfluencer marketing is huge and
people don't do enough.
There's a lot of companies thatdon't invest enough in this.
I saw a study that said forpeople aged 21 to 35 years old,
tiktok is a bigger buyerreferral platform than Google.
(39:22):
Yeah, so whereas you or me oranybody within a decade of us is
using Google to find whateverthey're buying, 21 to 35 year
olds are using TikTok to find it.
Well, so many of thesecompanies are being run by CMOs
or whoever it might be thataren't personally on TikTok, so
they kind of lose sight of, like, what is winning that business.
Now, there's a lot of bigbusinesses that aren't even on
(39:44):
it yet.
So we recently launched this,where we're trying to connect
with travel influencers that arelooking to go on cool
experiences and effectively, inexchange for comping their
experiences, they do videocontent for us and they blast it
out to their audience.
But it's kind of like our bigstrategy for marketing our
(40:04):
business and getting people thatothers are already following to
do it.
Our vision is we want to be thepremier experiences gifting and
book for yourself website inexistence.
That's what we're going to do.
We want to keep refining it,making it better and better.
I think another example of whatwe're trying to do is we really
want a strong feedback loop.
(40:25):
We talk about remembering theexperience afterward.
Well, if you were to givesomebody an experience, if they
go on it and if they're able toreally quickly load a video Jake
thanks so much for the ticketsto the Giants game we're here
right now Send and then you getthat feedback loop where they're
actually on the experience,that's like a really powerful
thing, encourages both sides tocontinue to buy experiences as
(40:48):
gifts.
We're ambitious, we think we'rein the right industry and we've
got some really cool thingscoming out.
Speaker 1 (40:53):
I love it.
It's fantastic.
All right.
Money's not an option.
Don't think of money.
But if you could gift any kindof experience to somebody, again
money's no option.
What would you give to somebodyif you had the opportunity?
Speaker 2 (41:06):
Well, definitely, they're so personal that that's
I'm going to.
I'm going to use an example.
So my buddy, Michael Canick, mymentor, who I mentioned earlier
, since he's already come up I,when I went on that trip to
Antarctica, there's this placethat not a lot of people know a
lot about, called South GeorgiaIsland.
It's a thousand miles roughlyNorth of Antarctica and it's one
(41:28):
of the most beautiful storiesin that, basically bouncing back
from tragedy.
So it used to be a whalingvillage, like in the early 1900s
, where they were just, you know, basically hunting whales for
their oil.
It was.
They were so aggressive with it, they killed off so many whales
that it was no longer lucrativefor them to do this.
They were also hunting sealsfor their seal fur, and so this
(41:52):
is like one of the sites wherethere was like all of this kind
of like animal killing whichsounds awful, and it was they
left because, again, they'dkilled off so much.
Well, now, if you go there today, it's one of the biggest bounce
back sites and one of thegreatest examples of humans
actually doing something goodfor animals.
So something like 90 percent ofthe seal for uh fur seals in
(42:13):
the world are around this Island.
You walk around and there'sbaby seals that are just like
chirping away at you.
Whales have come back there's.
I saw a colony of 200,000penguins when I was there.
It's like this hidden gem.
And so my buddy, Michael Canik,he's uh, he's never been down
there and he's got thatadventurous side and I think
like that wild, like a wildlifeanimal lover kind of thing as
(42:35):
well.
So good example of somethingthat I would give to him
personally.
Speaker 1 (42:40):
I love that and you're right, it is personal.
You know a crazy wild you knowthing to Antarctica for somebody
, maybe something totallydifferent.
For somebody else, maybe aquiet weekend getaway or
something.
So yeah, it's absolutely ispersonal.
I love it.
Wow, this is amazing.
Tell everybody again the nameof the website where people can
get information, kind of give usthe whole spiel, if you don't
(43:01):
mind, where we can, because thisis awesome.
I think you've got a greatthing going.
Speaker 2 (43:04):
Well, thank you again .
Appreciate the opportunity toplug the business.
Business is Spur like Spur ofthe moment.
Spur Experiences websitespurexperiencescom.
Still working on trying to landthat spurcom, but it's been a
challenge, especially with theSan Antonio Spurs.
Anyway, it's spur the moment.
So sorry.
It's spur experiencescom,probably our biggest place to
(43:25):
follow us for people that are onTikTok.
We have a good following there.
A lot of influencers posting onus on TikTok and I think that's
spurexperiences.
You should be able to find usby a company name pretty easily
as well.
But yeah there's differentFather's Days coming up.
This is probably going to airafter that, but a lot of
weddings this summer.
If you think somebody mightprefer an experience, we have a
(43:47):
lot of great options for that.
Speaker 1 (43:49):
Excellent.
Appreciate that All right.
One of my favorite questions Ilike to ask on this show is what
does adventure mean to you?
Speaker 2 (43:56):
Adventure to me.
I think it anything that itleaves you feeling any bit
uncertain, that it's somethingthat is drawing you out of your
comfort zone, something new that, like I haven't done this
before, I'm going to have tojust lean on some, you know,
trusting my myself that I canmake it through this.
But yeah, something that's justexpansive and it can be really
(44:17):
in any area of life.
It could be with relationships,it could be, you know, with
something that's more travelfocused or anything like that.
But I think that's probablywhat it is Something that
expands and grows the personthat you are through experience.
I love it.
Speaker 1 (44:32):
And you can find that through spur experiencescom you
can find adventures.
For sure, love it.
Thank you so much, cody, forcoming on journey with Jake.
Speaker 2 (44:41):
Jake, it's been a pleasure.
I'm really happy to connectwith you.
Speaker 1 (44:43):
What an awesome reminder from Cody Sedmeyer
about the value of experiencesover things, whether it's
skydiving, cooking classes or asimple weekend getaway.
These are the moments thattruly stick with us, and Cody's
work with Spur Experiences ishelping make those moments
happen for more people.
Thank you so much, Cody.
Be sure to check outspurexperiencescom to see what
(45:06):
they're all about, and, if youenjoyed this episode, I'd love
it if you shared it with afriend who might need a little
push to say yes to adventure.
Thanks again for being part ofthe Journey with Jake community.
Don't forget to follow along onInstagram at
journeywithjakepodcast andsubscribe wherever you listen so
you don't miss a thing.
Next week, I'll be chattingwith Michelle Coulson, founder
(45:27):
of Remote Rebellion, about howworking remotely can unlock a
life of freedom, travel andintentional living.
You won't want to miss it.
Until then, just remember it'snot always about the destination
as it is about the journey.
Take care, everybody.
What if the best gift you could give wasn't a thing
at all?
Today on the show, I'm joinedby Cody Sudmeier, founder of
Spur Experiences, to explore whymemories matter more than
material stuff.
From hot air balloon rides toonce-in-a-lifetime adventures,
Cody is on a mission to help uslive fully through meaningful
experiences.
Let's dive in.
Welcome to Journey with Jake.
(00:21):
This is a podcast aboutadventure and how, through our
adventures, we can overcome thechallenges of life that come our
way.
While I expect you will learnsome things about different
adventures, this show willentertain you.
Each episode will featuredifferent guests or guests as
they share experiences andstories from the different
adventures they have been on.
Not only will you beentertained, but you will also
(00:42):
hear the failures and trialseach guest faces and what they
have done or are doing toovercome the hardships that come
their way.
My goal is to take each of uson a journey through the
experiences of my guests, withthe hope that you'll be
entertained and inspired toovercome your day-to-day
challenges.
After all, it's not all aboutthe destination, as it is about
(01:07):
the journey.
Welcome to Journey with Jake.
I'm your host, Jake Bushman,and whether you're a longtime
listener or tuning in for thefirst time.
Thank you for being here.
Don't forget you can listen tothe show on YouTube and follow
(01:29):
along on Instagram atjourneywithjakepodcast.
You can also check us out onthe PodMatch podcast network at
podmatchcom forward slashnetwork.
Today I'm excited to introduceyou to Cody Sudmeier, the
founder of Spur Experiences.
Cody left behind thetraditional path to build a
company centered on something weoften overlook the power of
(01:50):
shared real-world experiences.
We'll talk about how choosingadventure over accumulation can
completely reshape how we liveand give.
If this conversation resonateswith you, be sure to check out
episode 152 with Jorge SalasGuevara, where we dive into a
similar message about livingfully through intentional
experiences.
(02:11):
All right, let's get into it.
Here's my conversation withCody Sudmeyer, All right?
Well, I'm excited today.
I have Cody Sudmeyer on thecall with me today.
Cody, welcome to Journey withJake.
Speaker 2 (02:21):
Thank you, jake, it's good to be here.
Speaker 1 (02:23):
Yeah, this is awesome .
Looked at your story, looked atwho you are, I love what you're
doing.
You're all about experiencesversus things, and I think
that's important.
That's what Journey with Jakeis about.
Really.
It's about people's experiencesand what they're doing.
So I want to hear all aboutthat, what you got going on with
your business and your ownexperiences and your own
experiences.
Before we do that, like Ialways do on the show, I want to
(02:43):
know a little bit about who youare, kind of your background,
where you're from, where yougrew up, that sort of thing.
Speaker 2 (02:47):
Great.
Yeah, I grew up in Colorado, sonot far from you, just in a
suburb of Denver, Grew up hereand then ended up I thought I
was going to get intoarchitecture, so I went to
Kansas State University.
As soon as I got out to KansasState I decided, actually before
even enrolling in a singlearchitecture class, that it
wasn't for me, Went straightinto finance and got a business
(03:10):
degree at K-State.
Yeah, I think the biggestthings that dissuaded me from
architecture is I get out thereand for one it's a top program
in the country.
You get into the building andit's like the building itself
you think would be nice, butactually not to talk too much
stuff about my alma mater butthe building itself wasn't as
nice as the business buildingwhich I was like how does that
(03:31):
happen?
The architecture.
Speaker 1 (03:33):
The architecture building.
Yeah, yeah, I know.
Speaker 2 (03:36):
I think they were, at least at the time.
They were getting paid lessthan business majors and it was
like a seven to one guy to girlratio.
And so 18 year old version ofme was just like Nope, we're
gonna go do business.
So yeah, I love Kansas State,graduated from there.
Funny not funny, serious, butcoincidental tidbit is I got a
handful of offers out of college, but the two that I narrowed it
(03:58):
down to was Arthur Anderson togo into consulting.
The other one was to go doinvestment banking with Lehman
Brothers, and so I graduated inMay 2001, narrowly chose Arthur
Anderson, coming back to Denverover Lehman Brothers up in New
York City.
Six months later, 9-11 happens,and literally I would have been
(04:19):
in the World Trade Center had Iaccepted that job with.
Speaker 1 (04:21):
Lehman.
Speaker 2 (04:22):
Brothers.
Yeah, so kind of a trippy.
Just a little side note.
But yeah, I got into consultingand it's been quite a ride
since then.
But that's kind of where it allstarted.
Speaker 1 (04:32):
Excellent, Okay, so you're a consultant guy.
Arthur Anderson, big consultingfirm Were you like?
Where were you based out ofwith them?
Were you based in Denver?
Speaker 2 (04:41):
Yeah, I was, I was based in, and another just kind
of funny anecdote then.
So they were the auditors.
I wasn't in the audit side, Iwas on the consulting side, but
they were the auditors for Enronand that all shook out in, I
believe, 2002.
So it was like I was there forless than a year and they're
telling you, hey, no, worries,this Enron thing isn't going to
(05:02):
be a very big deal.
And then you like turn on thenews and some of our leaders are
being like hauled off inhandcuffs.
And so, arthur Anderson, itonly lasted a year.
While I was there, this companythat had been around as one of
the big five firms for a hundredyears, was it pretty much went
away and was the differentpieces went to different buyers,
and so my portion of thebusiness went to another
(05:23):
consultancy that they kind offounded, but it was called
Proactivity, and I was there forlike three more years.
Speaker 1 (05:30):
And while you're growing up, are you a only child
?
Do you have any brothers orsisters?
What was that like?
Speaker 2 (05:35):
Oh, good question.
I have one brother, youngerbrother, joey, definitely fought
a lot as kids, but we arealmost red flag close these days
.
We bought condos in the samehigh-rise building in Denver for
like 10 years.
He lived two doors down from meand he recently got married and
had a kid, so I'm newly anuncle, but we're still talking
(05:57):
today A lot of the adventuresthat we do.
Joey's awesome, so he works fora company called Natural
Habitat Adventures so kind of anexperiences and travel business
as well and they specialize inlike conservation and adventure
travel and all these cool places, and one of the perks is he
gets to personally go on a lotof these trips.
But he also gets discountedtrips for family members.
(06:20):
So I've been on two of thesewith him big time trips and the
third one we're about to go onin a few weeks down to Galapagos
and one of these eco lodges inthe Amazon in Ecuador.
So it's great perks of havinghim as a brother.
Speaker 1 (06:34):
Yeah, how close are you guys in age?
Speaker 2 (06:37):
Oh man.
I say he's three years youngerthan me.
He says he's four years.
Somewhere in between those two.
He's, uh, three and a halfyears younger than me.
Speaker 1 (06:45):
We'll say okay very good somewhere there.
Awesome good.
So you have a younger brother,he's close to you, sounds like
you guys still do things all allthe time, which is awesome, so
that's great.
Yep, how did you go from mrconsultant, business guy, to
owning your own business?
Spur experiences.
How did this kind?
What's the path you took?
How did you get there?
Speaker 2 (07:06):
Oh man, it might take a minute to get the full.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
We got a few minutes.
That's fine, let's do it.
Speaker 2 (07:12):
I was in consulting again about four years into my
career with now this companycalled productivity, and what I
specialized in was dataanalytics, which this is back in
2005, when it was still reallya new industry and we didn't
have all the, you know, ai toolsthat you've got today.
And so I just kind of taughtmyself.
I got a degree in finance but Itaught myself how to code data
(07:34):
analytics like SQL programming.
All this and we would go to bigbusinesses, mostly in the
telecom industry, where they'vegot.
Telecom is an interestingindustry where one company is
billing the next telecom companyfor some services they're
providing but they're alsocustomers of theirs and their
competitors and all this datagoing back and forth and it's
(07:55):
complex.
And I mean all of us have hadthe case where one of these
companies messes up your cellphone bill or whatever it might
be.
So we would go in, learn theirbusiness, write a bunch of code,
do this data analytics stuffand help them find money.
They were losing either wherethey were not billing customers
but they should be, or they wereoverspending on whatever their
(08:16):
vendor expenses and then wewould take a cut at what we
found.
So I like this, because so manyconsultants just bill a couple
hundred bucks an hour and thereturn on the investment is
questionable at best.
I like that.
It was the success-based model.
I was doing a lot of work.
I was managing one of ourbiggest clients in Denver and I
got to a point where I was fouryears out of college and it was
(08:39):
typical in consulting that youwould get promoted to manager
five years out.
So I was like a year early butobjectively I was doing a lot of
what a manager would be doing.
I was kind of selling the work,managing the work, doing a lot
of the work.
We had a class above me, sopeople that had been there a
year longer, that wasn't thestrongest class and so
(08:59):
comparatively I thought surelyif any of us is going to get
promoted here, it's going to beme.
It's one of those things inconsulting too often people just
promote based on the clock, soit's kind of up or out, like if
you're staying around, you'rejust going to get promoted once
a year and then the next yearand the next year, and I
appreciate an environment that'smuch more merit-based.
I go into work and find out theyannounced the promotions and I
(09:23):
wasn't included or evencommunicated with or anything
like that.
And it really, you know, someof this is being a 26 year old
guy.
That is just a little egodriven, but it really upset me.
I ended up going home and justkind of sulking.
I remember busting open abottle of Jack Daniels and just
pouring myself a drink after adrink and somewhere that night I
(09:44):
just said, screw it, I am goingto leave my consulting firm and
I'm going to go try to landsome of these big Fortune 500
clients and keep in mind, at 26,I probably looked like I was 17
.
So it was a challenge and Iwent into work the next day and
I had my Jerry Maguire momentwhere I just said I'm leaving,
(10:04):
taking the goldfish she wascoming with me, kind of thing.
One person my co-founder of ourconsulting firm, which was
Agility Solutions, his name'sSammy.
He was looking for somewhat ofan adventure and so he's like,
yeah, let's do it.
And we grew the company over.
I was a co-owner of that fornine years.
We grew it into a 50-personconsultancy.
(10:28):
We were recognized as Denver'sfastest growing private company
two years in a row.
So we did a lot of really goodthings with that.
It just got to a point.
I mean just honestly consultingin corporate America in the
telecom industry is justcombined, it's a lot of soul
crushing work and I just I wasover it.
And so we went through a kindof a breakup process with me and
(10:51):
my co-founder and he ended upbuying me out of the business.
I took that and basicallyrolled it over into starting
this business, spur experiences.
Speaker 1 (11:00):
Wow, okay.
So I see a couple of things.
So, first of all, being passedover never feels good and
sometimes it takes somethinglike that to be like okay, maybe
this isn't the place for me,maybe I should do something else
.
I saw that happen to you and,yeah, you said you had your
Jerry Maguire moment, which Idon't know what you said, maybe
it's a little toned down, Idon't know but you had your
moment and you brought him overwith you, started your own
consulting and, wow, you weresuccessful.
(11:20):
I mean't know, but, but you hadyour moment and you you brought
him over with you, started yourown consulting and, wow, you
did, you were successful.
I mean, nine years, it's not youwere successful, you were, you
did great.
But then you had a moment there, too, where you were just like
and I've noticed that a lot withpeople who like to be
adventurous and entrepreneurs,people like you, what is it
(11:41):
about that?
That, what, what is it thatlike?
You get to a point where youjust you've had enough, and how
do you just change on a dime anddo something else?
Speaker 2 (11:48):
No, that's a great question.
I I've heard this theory and Idon't know if it's totally
accurate, but it says like lifehappens in seven, seven year
cycles, and so a lot of people,though you'll find that they
want change at like 28, 35, 42,when they go through these
different cycles.
I don't know if that's true ornot, but that hit me when I
think I was 35.
And I think different peopleflourish, especially
(12:09):
entrepreneurs.
They flourish in the differentparts of the entrepreneurial
cycle, like some people doreally well when it's brand new
and it's really fast moving, butjust really kind of messy.
Where I thrive the most in iswhere it's further down the road
, where you're getting some goodwins and you're really growing
fast and you have enough successthat you're no longer like
(12:31):
embarrassed about what you'vegot out there your website, your
product or whatever it might be.
But like that's when I tend todo really well and you you've
had enough success that you canreinvest those assets, you can
hire some people, so you're not,you know, having to do all the
like low level work yourself.
So I do really well in thatphase.
Once it gets like a little bittoo developed, a little too
(12:57):
mature, it just gets a littleboring for me, and then I want
to start something new, and so Idon't know that I'm all the way
there yet, but with spur we'rekind of getting closer to that
more mature phase.
Speaker 1 (13:07):
Spur, let's talk about spur experiences.
I love the fact that it's aboutexperiences.
That's what it's all about.
I think it started off, if Iread right, it started off with
mostly weddings, Like, was itfor like gifts, giving
experiences as wedding gifts orfor honeymoon that sort of thing
?
And then it developed into justexperiences in general.
How did you go from being abusiness consultant, telecom,
(13:28):
that sort of thing to adventuresand experiences, things that
people love to do?
Speaker 2 (13:35):
Well, some of it was just fatigue from corporate
America and just going into theoffice every day and just
thinking it sounds funny to saybut I'm here to help mostly rich
old white people make moremoney is what I'm doing, and it
just there wasn't a lot of likepassionate.
I certainly wasn't passionateabout telecom, you just kind of
(13:55):
did it because it was anopportunity.
I remember what reallytriggered the idea at the time
with this idea of a weddingregistry for experiences is I
went to two weddings the samesummer.
The first one super cool set offriends that had, like, lived
around the world.
They were adventurous and I was, you know, typically late to
buying a gift.
(14:16):
Literally, I think, I was likedriving to their wedding and
when I did, I got to Crate andBarrel the only place that I
could find that they wereregistered on and one of the
last things that was stillavailable for their wedding
registry was this set of like$120 salt and pepper shakers and
I was just like you've got tobe kidding me, Like this couple
that's so cool and this is whatwe're gifting $120 salt and
(14:40):
pepper shakers, and this is likeover 10 years ago.
So who knows what that wouldtranslate to today.
So that was the firstexperience.
And then, later that same summer, I went to another wedding, and
these people seem to kind ofget it right, or maybe kind of
plant.
That thought in my head is.
They said we're registering forexperiences, and so one of the
things that they registered forwas swimming with dolphins on
(15:03):
their honeymoon.
And I said, oh, that's, this iswhat I'm talking about, this is
cool.
Well, when I went to check out,so to speak, it turns out it's
just like a PayPal, PayPaltransaction and you're not
really buying them an experience.
And so, anyway, they go onhoneymoon.
They come back and I'm like, oh, I'm dying to hear how was
swimming with the dolphins.
(15:23):
And they said, oh, you know,weddings are expensive and we
just put the money towards thewedding, yeah, and it kind of
felt to me I'm like, okay,giving cash, it feels like
you're paying admission to awedding.
And so for me, I was like, nah,there's gotta be a way to do
this.
That's, you can giftexperiences and couples can
(15:43):
register for experiences.
Either you know the honeymoonsthat are going on for these like
near-term super cool adventureexperiences, or even just like
filling the first year or two oftheir marriage with cool date
nights or overnight adventures.
Speaker 1 (15:56):
Yeah, we can get away , or a spa night or whatever, I
that's the kind of things thatcome to my mind at least.
Speaker 2 (16:02):
Yeah, like one of our main tagline is collect moments
, not things, but one of theones we use as well is what is
it?
Fill up your calendar, not yourcabinets, and it's that kind of
idea.
Like so many people get thesegifts and they never use them
again.
And more recently, there's alot of studies out there that
show both gift givers andrecipients very much like to the
(16:22):
tune of 85, 90% on most ofthese surveys prefer gifting or
receiving experiences, but ifyou look at what the percentage
of gifts actually given are,it's like sub 5%.
To us, that represents this bigopportunity where the market is
collecting what the actualdesire is.
Speaker 1 (16:39):
Yeah, I mean, I sit and look at myself and I think
about you know, I got marriedand it was 20 plus years ago,
but I remember getting a lot ofthings that sat in the garage,
something you know, and we endedup getting you know, give them
away or whatever the case was.
Yeah, I would have much rather.
You know, hey, here's a skipass or here, whatever the case
may be, you know, and justthere's something about that and
(17:02):
what I mean, what have youlearned at doing this?
And we can stick on the wedding, but I know you're, you've
evolved it more, but what knowyou're?
Speaker 2 (17:15):
you've evolved it more.
But what have you discoveredfrom people who take advantage
of this?
Why is why are experiences soimportant to people versus
things?
Oh man, that's, that's a greatquestion.
So there is a professor that'sout of Cornell and his name's Dr
Gilovich, and so this guy hasdone a multi-decade long study
on people spending their moneyon experiences instead of things
, and what he finds is theretends to be, when people buy
(17:35):
stuff, there tends to be like adopamine or whatever it is spike
, and almost you come down toactually below your baseline
after the purchase, where youget a little bit of like the
guilt of you know spending moneyon something, but there's no
prolonged happiness of buyingstuff.
When it comes to experiences,and they do this measurement,
these studies, by sending outsurveys how do you feel a week
(18:00):
before the purchase, on thepurchase, a week after, now that
we're talking about it, how doyou rank your happiness?
So they do a bunch of theresearch that way, but what they
found with experiences is wereceive or we feel a bump in our
happiness, our mood, whateverit might be, at three different
points.
The first is the anticipation.
So if you're going, if you haveany upcoming travel, or you're
going to the big game orwhatever it might be, you get
(18:22):
excited and you actually connectwith people just with the
anticipation.
You know, hey, aren't youexcited?
We're going to the concerttonight.
This is going to be amazing.
Let's put on the music you get.
The second phase is theexperience itself.
So we just kind of say, in themoment, of course, while you're,
you know, enjoying your rafting, you're, you know, getting that
adrenaline rush, you'reenjoying it then.
But the third is the memory ofit afterward.
(18:45):
That's something that is, youknow, you're kind of collecting
those memories.
It's something you share,typically with somebody else, so
that just really, you know,leads to, you know, deeper
connections between people.
So that's what the expert says.
Anyway, I trust his word for it.
Speaker 1 (19:00):
Man, you're speaking my language here because I 100%
agree with that.
It's funny because, as you'retalking about that, I'm thinking
about it tomorrow.
So I'm heading to Californiatomorrow, heading to San
Francisco to meet some customers, and I'm going to go to a ball
game, go into a baseball game.
I don't really, you know, I'mnot a Giants fan, I'm not a
Padres fan or whatever, but mycustomer is, and so I call them
(19:21):
today just to say, hey, are weready for tomorrow?
And I have fun, like I had alittle bit of rush of dopamine,
whatever you want to call itjust talking to him about, you
know, the anticipation part thatyou mentioned.
And then I know we'll have funtomorrow.
And we went to a game last yearand we still talk about it
because the weather was superhot, we got sunburn, you know,
we still.
It's amazing it does.
It carries on longer thanthings do.
(19:43):
Even though you think a thingcan be there forever, I feel
like it carries a lot more forme.
Speaker 2 (19:49):
Yeah, and it's.
I mean you bring up a reallygood point that it's
relationship building.
I mean that's something thatyou and your client or your
sales target we're actually.
You had said about theevolution of Spur, but yeah,
we're not just weddings.
We have experiential gifts forreally any occasion.
Father's Day is coming up youcould, you would give tickets to
a ball game or whatever itmight be.
(20:10):
But one of the areas we'vegotten some good traction in
right now is corporate rewards.
So there's these differentplatforms that manage a lot of
this.
You reward your employees witha plaque or a watch or whatever
it might be.
We've started to become theexperiences kind of category for
these guys and there have beencertain studies that have come
(20:31):
out that said gifting anemployee an experience creates
better longevity you know,retention than even just giving
them cash, because you get cashnice to have in the bank but you
don't really you don't havesomething to like anchor your
memory into just receiving thatcash payment.
So, yeah, you're absolutelyright, like what you're
experiencing with your client isis 100% backed by the data that
(20:54):
says, yeah, this is, this isrelationship building.
Speaker 1 (20:57):
How far into the whole, you know, wedding part of
it.
Did you decide, hey, let's justexpand this to anybody who
wants to have experiences andI'm guessing I could go to your
website or whatever and I couldjust get my own experience, but
it's also a platform to gift itto people.
Speaker 2 (21:14):
Yeah, both, both gifting and and just kind of
book for yourself.
We had an interesting path onthis one too, and you had talked
about like were you?
You know, for us we got.
I got to the I don't knowpinnacle is the right word, but
whatever it was for us with theconsulting firm, and then I kind
of hit the reset button and youknow, glutton for punishment,
you decide to start anotherbusiness.
We got to a point so that wefounded this like 2015.
(21:35):
I say we, I've got a businesspartner, jamie, who's awesome,
and she.
I've founded four businesses.
Two have been successful andthe only two that are successful
are the ones that I've workedon with Jamie.
So that should tell you she'sthe key ingredient.
I think we got five years in andwe were hitting 2019.
(21:56):
We had negotiated a partnershipwith Bed, bath and Beyond at
the time, which was the biggestwedding registry in terms of
sales, and so we were reallyexcited.
We were going to be thisexperiences category for them.
We were going live, we wentlive I believe it was November
actually of 28, 28, 2019.
Whenever the first case ofCOVID hit was when we went live
(22:19):
with this partnership.
Yeah, and so when you'reprimarily in the wedding
industry and there's no weddingsfor two years.
It was everything I could dojust to keep the business afloat
, and Bed Bath Beyond ended upgoing out of business, large
part due to everything fromCOVID that pretty much reset our
revenue to zero and we justlost this big distribution
(22:41):
channel that we were going tohave.
That really made us say we needto stop being so industry
dependent on weddings whensomething like that happens.
So we started expanding intoyou can book for yourself, you
can buy gifts for any occasion,for experiences.
There's really no reason tojust limit it to weddings.
But weddings is a very goodexample of the contrast between
how people gift People do yourblenders and your linens and all
(23:05):
that stuff still versus how weall know people want to receive
gifts with experiences.
So it provides a good contrast.
But yeah, we've expanded wellbeyond weddings for experiences
for any occasion.
Speaker 1 (23:16):
Is wedding still kind of your bread and butter, then?
Or is there another categorythat's?
You said corporate's beencreeping up?
Speaker 2 (23:23):
We're fortunate enough to land most of the big
wedding websites, so most peopleplan something like 70% of us.
Couples use one of threewedding websites to plan their
wedding.
I'm not sure if you hadmentioned getting getting
married maybe 20 years ago.
I'm not sure if you'd remember.
No, it's been 26 years, so nohonestly, when you talk to men,
(23:47):
most of the time they're like Idon't even know what we used
when we got married last year.
The big ones are the Knot, theKnot okay.
Zola.
So the Knot, like tie the knot,the Knot, zola, and a newer one
called Joy Great weddingwebsites for planning your
wedding and it's where peoplecan figure out, like travel
plans and schedule of events andbook a bunch of vendors and all
this.
They all have their own weddingregistry and we're the most
(24:12):
major partner on every one ofthese sites for providing
experiences.
So we get a lot of sales frompeople that are registered on
the Knot or on Joy or on Zolaand they receive one of the
gifts from Spur but through oneof those sites.
So, yeah, the majority of ourrevenue still comes from the
wedding sites, but our fastestgrowing part of our business is
all these other channels thatwe're really focused on these
(24:34):
days.
Speaker 1 (24:35):
Walk me through somebody who's thinking okay, I
want to get something, let's say, for my, my parents, you know,
and they go to and it's spurexperiencescom.
Right, is that where you Okay,so someone you know, like maybe
it's my parents 50th anniversaryand I want to get them just a
nice experience, somethingsimple, you know.
It doesn't have to be a crate,and that's the thing I love
(24:55):
about adventure.
I talk to people aboutadventures.
It doesn't have to berappelling down waterfalls.
I think that's a big one thatyou've done that you like.
Yeah, that kind of thingdoesn't have to be that, but it
can be something simple.
What, how would I do?
Is it broken down by categories?
Kind of give me just the basicsof someone like new going to
your website and trying to picksomething.
Speaker 2 (25:13):
In one of your previous guests with the bucket
match.
He said it really well.
He said, you know, with a lotof these bucket list items, that
can include some travel aroundthe world stuff, but it can also
include just kind of anyexperience that you want to do.
Or I think to some extent,anything that is expansive for
you broadens your horizons.
Yeah, so we have some thingsthat are super basic.
(25:34):
You know a winery tasting kindof thing.
Other stuff that's much, muchmore involved.
You know flying planes and thatkind of thing.
But on our site, like people cansearch every.
We have over 7,000 uniqueexperiences in 80 countries and
we classify them all by locationso you can always search,
filter by whatever locationyou're looking in, or they also
(25:56):
have a filter by category, soyou can look up very
specifically.
I want to look at helicoptertours in New York City and we
also have it just more generallylike gifts for adrenaline
junkies or gifts for foodies,just kind of these different
personas that people tend tohave.
So a lot of good ways to lookit up and then, yeah, you can
complete the checkout and what'sgreat is none of our vouchers
(26:18):
ever expire.
Some sites do.
We want people to use these sothey never expire and you can
always exchange one for the next.
So, especially with weddings,you get some people that get
really ambitious and we're goingto do all this on our honeymoon
or or whatever it might be, andthen we hear from them later ah
, we didn't get to on ourhoneymoon that bungee jumping,
and now we're pregnant, so maybewe shouldn't do that.
(26:38):
So, yeah, we try to be asflexible and it's just easy to
use, non-restrictive as wepossibly can be.
Speaker 1 (26:43):
This is great.
What have you?
What's it done for you?
When you see some of thesepeople have you, do you have any
particular, maybe an example ofsomebody who's taking advantage
of your, your services and kindof what they're what they had,
what they got out of it andmaybe what it's done for them?
Speaker 2 (26:58):
oh yeah, I mean that's one of the great things
is like we get couples or justcustomers in general, that what
we're really trying to push isfor them just to kind of share
their own adventure on theirsocial media where we can share
it as well.
But it is super rewardingseeing just that you had like
one sliver of happinessdelivered on their honeymoon or
(27:21):
just in their relationship ingeneral.
We had one of the most funcouples is this one named Ryan
and Kate, and they discovered uson the Knot.
They registered for someexperiences.
I believe they were in CentralAmerica.
Maybe they love the concept.
They love the experiences thatthey went on so much that once
they got back they both appliedfor jobs with Spur.
(27:41):
They said we're passionateabout this and they're now
employees of Spur and they'redoing some really cool things
with the company.
But we obviously love that.
Anybody that like believes inwhat we're doing and has
experienced it firsthand whatit's like to be a customer that
that's one of my favorite ones,for sure.
Speaker 1 (27:57):
I love that.
You're an adventurous guyyourself.
Like I said, I mentioned therappelling off the waterfalls, I
think.
Oh yeah, I love your websitetoo, because you had the little
part about your staff, and allyour staff has like what their
favorite experiences so that'swhat yours was Any others for
you?
In particular?
That because I'm sure you'vebeen able to like now that you
(28:18):
see this, you see how manyexperiences are out there you
kind of be like I'm going to doand I know you're going to the
Galapagos here in a little bit,so you're you're doing all kinds
of stuff, but any particularexperience that has meant a lot
to you, for whatever reason.
Speaker 2 (28:28):
Oh, yeah, I mean that's one of the great perks.
Or we joke around, the spurtsof the uh of the job is just uh.
Our product testing is goingout on these experiences, some
even close to us.
I have really enjoyed it andI'm I am adventurous, but I'm
also a foodie, so I love justdoing some of that kind of stuff
.
One that's pretty simple aroundus about 30 minutes west of
(28:50):
Denver is like one of the bestriver rafting in the country.
Over, I think it's from one ofour providers, liquid Descent
Love just doing that.
Another one in Colorado I loveis we have a hot springs resort
called Iron Mountain Hot Springsand it's like 15 individual
kind of pools, hot tubs, righton the river.
In Glenwood Springs there's abigger hot springs that's more
(29:11):
famous across the way but that'skind of like a bunch of kids
are jumping around and climbingon you and all this.
Iron Mountain is much more likecouples focused.
You can order drinks right tothe hot tub area and all this
beautiful scene.
So I really like it all.
I like different kinds of spaofferings that we've got as well
.
I'm totally into any kind ofspa experience and then just
kind of personally beyond that,yeah, as I mentioned my brother
(29:34):
working for this adventuretravel company, I got to go.
What was it?
Two years ago, we got to go ona four-week expedition with
National Geographic toAntarctica.
Speaker 1 (29:46):
Oh, wow.
Speaker 2 (29:47):
Yeah, so that was incredible.
Less than a year later, we gotto go on a safari in Africa.
Neither of these werespecifically sold on Spur, but
gives you a sense of kind of myadventurous side.
And then, yeah, same same thing.
We're about to go to Galapagoshere, in a few weeks too.
Speaker 1 (30:00):
Wow, it's amazing.
I wanted to ask about, maybe,people who've impacted you.
You mentioned Jamie as someonewho's really kind of been there,
but, yeah, who's someone inyour life.
Maybe that's shaped your senseof adventure or appreciation for
those moments of adventure.
Man, that's a good question.
Speaker 2 (30:16):
One person that has been a major influence on me,
both business and with a senseof adventure, is a mentor of
mine named Michael Kanick.
And Michael, he's written abook on strategic management and
so there's's written a book onstrategic management and so
there's like a part of himthat's like very diligent.
(30:37):
He still advises our businessstrategically to this day.
He's really helped us navigatesome difficult periods.
He's also one of the moreadventurous people that I've
ever met and I think they justgot back from some tropical
vacation.
They make sure to carve off, Ibelieve, to him and his wife.
Man, I think he's like pushing70, but is still like out there
(30:57):
doing these technical hikes.
That's something that's supermotivating for me is how we
choose to advance in age, how wechoose to continue to push
ourselves, to develop, toexperience new things as we get
older.
And he's had just a profoundimpact, just kind of observing
him.
But then also when I was goingthrough the idea to sell the
(31:18):
business, that was a lot of himjust kind of guiding me on that
and getting me from, you know,walking away from the consulting
firm and starting Spur.
So a lot, both adventure andbusiness, I owe to this mentor,
michael Kanick.
Speaker 1 (31:30):
You mentioned you kind of talked about some of the
difficult times.
What are some of the challengesyou face, not only with spur,
but just in your daily life?
Speaker 2 (31:37):
Oh, man my therapist could weigh in on this one.
Lots of things.
The COVID thing was reallyprobably my low point in life.
You go through some tough timesas an entrepreneur, especially
when you're self-funding yourbusinesses.
It's one thing, I think, whenyou take on other investors, and
(31:59):
it's probably a different levelof stress where you're worried
about losing, especially if youget money from, like, friends
and family oh my gosh, my uncleand aunt.
I took this much money to mybusiness and it fails.
That's a level of stress that Ihaven't had to face.
But what I have is I had enoughsuccess selling the consulting
(32:19):
firm that I if I tighten thebelt a little bit I never really
had to work again, but that Iwould have been bored.
I took that and I risked it onthis business, right.
And so it's like you get thischunk of change and you could
just put your feet up and neverdo anything, or you could light
it on fire day by day and try toget this business off the
ground, and that just creates somuch stress.
(32:40):
And when COVID hit, I had tosell two of my properties just
to keep paying my people.
That was tough because thosewere properties that I bought
almost as a sign of success withmy previous company and so it
almost felt like I was losing myprevious success.
But even on the personal levellike I mean everything, we all
went through everybodyexperienced COVID in different
(33:00):
ways and the loneliness and theloss and it was a tough time it
was.
I had had a four-yearrelationship and my girlfriend
and I broke up.
Right around then my dog died.
Right around then.
I'm losing hundreds ofthousands of dollars and it was
really starting over within thesame company and so all these
(33:22):
things kind of circling.
It was really a low point forme.
I try to manage it the best Ican, just with physical activity
and relationships and diet andsleep and all those things, but
it gets stressful.
Speaker 1 (33:34):
And when you're in it .
I like to ask this questionbecause COVID was a rough time
for me as well.
I mean, I'm in the live eventsindustry, I do trade shows,
conventions, and all of a suddenit's not happening anymore.
So that was tough and that justit made me realize, man, this
is all I, I don't know.
Anyway, it was tough.
When you're going through itand you're dealing with that,
those tough times, and you're itsounds like you're you know,
(33:54):
dealing with some depression andstruggling.
Besides, you know the, theexercise, the diet was there
anything particular?
Or how do you, how do you getover it?
I guess is what I'm getting at,cause I know when you're in it
it's so hard to see a way out.
Speaker 2 (34:06):
Yeah, yeah it's.
It's kind of the boiling frogthing, right.
Like you, you get a little bitmore depressed, it's not like it
hits you all at once.
I don't know that.
I got the best answer for it,frankly, like I think you just
try to.
I went through the exercise.
I see a therapist every everytwo weeks.
I had my therapy sessionearlier today and I know there's
like a stigma with men anddoing that, but to me that's
(34:27):
just it's a good building blockfor navigating life.
And we went through an exercisethat we just simply laid out
what are the activities or therelationships that bring me joy.
Let's track how much time I'mactually spending on those
things versus things that reallydon't get that feedback loop.
Am I doing it enough?
Are those really the thingsthat are bringing me joy?
(34:50):
What things can I cut out?
And I've always been a bigbeliever of like health and
wellness, so I'm typically in abad mood if I miss like more
than a day of exercise.
That's a big thing.
Diet and people don't talkenough about sleep.
There's a really good book whywe Sleep Matthew something I
can't remember the guy's name.
It just goes into all thedifferent things that happen in
(35:11):
your sleep cycle and why it'seven more of a foundational
layer before you even get todiet.
Those components are reallyimportant for me, but I mean it
hits you sometimes especially.
I'm 46 years old and unmarriedand no kids, so you can get
lonely for sure.
Speaker 1 (35:26):
Yeah, no, no doubt we're both juggling those
mid-40s together there, buddy.
So I'm 47, so I'm right therewith you.
Speaker 2 (35:34):
It gets tough, doesn't it Like just the aging
thing?
Speaker 1 (35:36):
I think oh, yeah, yeah, for sure.
Speaker 2 (35:39):
Not what I once was.
Speaker 1 (35:40):
For sure, and it's awesome now, though.
You're an uncle now, so that'sgreat, so you got that going so
very cool.
One of the top things on thatlist of bringing me you go love
it yeah I'm gonna go back to youtalked about it earlier and I
love the whole idea of you knowwhy experiences are are so
important versus things, and howyou know you got the
anticipation and you got themoment and then you got the
(36:01):
reflection and the memories.
Yep, in today's world, I meanin today's world, nuts, you know
you had covid, you knowpolitical, and you said you're a
political guy and we're notgoing to talk politics this is
not politics show, but there's,but there's chaos there.
I mean there's just there'schaos everywhere.
Why do you think it is?
I mean, to me it seems likepeople are craving experiences
in today's world.
Why do you think that is?
Speaker 2 (36:21):
Well, I think it really does connect with just
kind of our more organic beings,like there's something just
that's kind of primal aboutexperiencing things and getting
out there and doing it.
I think there's a layer ofthere was some pent up demand
for experiences and travel andyou know, for a while there was
you couldn't go see concerts orgames or anything like that.
So you get you get a bit of apent up demand.
(36:42):
But I think a lot of peoplealso were just kind of left in
their homes with all the stuffthey ever bought and they're
still feeling like that didn'tcreate happiness for them.
There's some really good datathat's put out by the government
that shows there is a long-termtrend going back to the 60s and
projecting forward, where thepercentage of our consumer spend
(37:03):
on experiences relative toproducts continues to go up on
experiences continues to go downthe relative spend on products.
So I think that's just we'regetting more in line with who,
who we are, what brings us joy,like almost at, like I said, at
a sub cultural level even.
Yeah, I don't know if I otherthan leaning on that, professor,
(37:24):
I don't know if I got a wholelot of other answers I can
provide on that one.
Speaker 1 (37:27):
No, that's good though, you know, I think I.
It just seems to me people arecraving it.
Maybe it's because I do thispodcast and so that's.
I'm talking to people aboutexperiences all the time, so
maybe it's in the forefront ofmy mind and that's what the
algorithm's pushing towards meon social media and everything,
so maybe it's.
It seems like people are justall over it, but I love it.
I feel like it's important.
Speaker 2 (37:46):
Yeah, and it's interesting to like look at the.
When we came out, we thought,generationally, we know there's
a lot of millennials, like allthe data says, oh, there are
more about experiences andtravel and all this and even
like not that it's a healthydynamic.
But you think about this likekeeping up with the Joneses
dynamic that used to be myneighbors got this new car or
this whatever in their house.
(38:07):
Now it's like that Instagramculture of you're like seeing
the keeping up with the Jonesesdynamic that is, oh my gosh,
this person's at the concert orthis person's traveling or
whatever it might be.
And so I think there's justmore exposure to experiences,
and I don't love that idea oflike comparing yourself,
especially in a social mediaenvironment where people are
only putting in like theabsolute most filtered, best
(38:29):
versions.
But it's real People aregetting exposed to the
experiences available to themmore now than in the past, and I
think what was the big surprisefor us is we knew it would be
big with millennials, but it'sbeen really consistently growing
with all these differentgenerational types, and I think
you and I might be experiencingthe same thing, which is like
(38:49):
probably have more years behindus than in front of us Like,
let's, let's get after it, let'sgo do these things we wanted to
do.
Speaker 1 (38:55):
All right.
Where do you see spur going?
What's kind of the future looklike?
What are you hoping for?
Speaker 2 (39:01):
You know one thing that we're focused on right now.
That's really exciting isinfluencer marketing is huge and
people don't do enough.
There's a lot of companies thatdon't invest enough in this.
I saw a study that said forpeople aged 21 to 35 years old,
tiktok is a bigger buyerreferral platform than Google.
(39:22):
Yeah, so whereas you or me oranybody within a decade of us is
using Google to find whateverthey're buying, 21 to 35 year
olds are using TikTok to find it.
Well, so many of thesecompanies are being run by CMOs
or whoever it might be thataren't personally on TikTok, so
they kind of lose sight of, like, what is winning that business.
Now, there's a lot of bigbusinesses that aren't even on
(39:44):
it yet.
So we recently launched this,where we're trying to connect
with travel influencers that arelooking to go on cool
experiences and effectively, inexchange for comping their
experiences, they do videocontent for us and they blast it
out to their audience.
But it's kind of like our bigstrategy for marketing our
(40:04):
business and getting people thatothers are already following to
do it.
Our vision is we want to be thepremier experiences gifting and
book for yourself website inexistence.
That's what we're going to do.
We want to keep refining it,making it better and better.
I think another example of whatwe're trying to do is we really
want a strong feedback loop.
(40:25):
We talk about remembering theexperience afterward.
Well, if you were to givesomebody an experience, if they
go on it and if they're able toreally quickly load a video Jake
thanks so much for the ticketsto the Giants game we're here
right now Send and then you getthat feedback loop where they're
actually on the experience,that's like a really powerful
thing, encourages both sides tocontinue to buy experiences as
(40:48):
gifts.
We're ambitious, we think we'rein the right industry and we've
got some really cool thingscoming out.
Speaker 1 (40:53):
I love it.
It's fantastic.
All right.
Money's not an option.
Don't think of money.
But if you could gift any kindof experience to somebody, again
money's no option.
What would you give to somebodyif you had the opportunity?
Speaker 2 (41:06):
Well, definitely, they're so personal that that's
I'm going to.
I'm going to use an example.
So my buddy, Michael Canick, mymentor, who I mentioned earlier
, since he's already come up I,when I went on that trip to
Antarctica, there's this placethat not a lot of people know a
lot about, called South GeorgiaIsland.
It's a thousand miles roughlyNorth of Antarctica and it's one
(41:28):
of the most beautiful storiesin that, basically bouncing back
from tragedy.
So it used to be a whalingvillage, like in the early 1900s
, where they were just, you know, basically hunting whales for
their oil.
It was.
They were so aggressive with it, they killed off so many whales
that it was no longer lucrativefor them to do this.
They were also hunting sealsfor their seal fur, and so this
(41:52):
is like one of the sites wherethere was like all of this kind
of like animal killing whichsounds awful, and it was they
left because, again, they'dkilled off so much.
Well, now, if you go there today, it's one of the biggest bounce
back sites and one of thegreatest examples of humans
actually doing something goodfor animals.
So something like 90 percent ofthe seal for uh fur seals in
(42:13):
the world are around this Island.
You walk around and there'sbaby seals that are just like
chirping away at you.
Whales have come back there's.
I saw a colony of 200,000penguins when I was there.
It's like this hidden gem.
And so my buddy, Michael Canik,he's uh, he's never been down
there and he's got thatadventurous side and I think
like that wild, like a wildlifeanimal lover kind of thing as
(42:35):
well.
So good example of somethingthat I would give to him
personally.
Speaker 1 (42:40):
I love that and you're right, it is personal.
You know a crazy wild you knowthing to Antarctica for somebody
, maybe something totallydifferent.
For somebody else, maybe aquiet weekend getaway or
something.
So yeah, it's absolutely ispersonal.
I love it.
Wow, this is amazing.
Tell everybody again the nameof the website where people can
get information, kind of give usthe whole spiel, if you don't
(43:01):
mind, where we can, because thisis awesome.
I think you've got a greatthing going.
Speaker 2 (43:04):
Well, thank you again .
Appreciate the opportunity toplug the business.
Business is Spur like Spur ofthe moment.
Spur Experiences websitespurexperiencescom.
Still working on trying to landthat spurcom, but it's been a
challenge, especially with theSan Antonio Spurs.
Anyway, it's spur the moment.
So sorry.
It's spur experiencescom,probably our biggest place to
(43:25):
follow us for people that are onTikTok.
We have a good following there.
A lot of influencers posting onus on TikTok and I think that's
spurexperiences.
You should be able to find usby a company name pretty easily
as well.
But yeah there's differentFather's Days coming up.
This is probably going to airafter that, but a lot of
weddings this summer.
If you think somebody mightprefer an experience, we have a
(43:47):
lot of great options for that.
Speaker 1 (43:49):
Excellent.
Appreciate that All right.
One of my favorite questions Ilike to ask on this show is what
does adventure mean to you?
Speaker 2 (43:56):
Adventure to me.
I think it anything that itleaves you feeling any bit
uncertain, that it's somethingthat is drawing you out of your
comfort zone, something new that, like I haven't done this
before, I'm going to have tojust lean on some, you know,
trusting my myself that I canmake it through this.
But yeah, something that's justexpansive and it can be really
(44:17):
in any area of life.
It could be with relationships,it could be, you know, with
something that's more travelfocused or anything like that.
But I think that's probablywhat it is Something that
expands and grows the personthat you are through experience.
I love it.
Speaker 1 (44:32):
And you can find that through spur experiencescom you
can find adventures.
For sure, love it.
Thank you so much, cody, forcoming on journey with Jake.
Speaker 2 (44:41):
Jake, it's been a pleasure.
I'm really happy to connectwith you.
Speaker 1 (44:43):
What an awesome reminder from Cody Sedmeyer
about the value of experiencesover things, whether it's
skydiving, cooking classes or asimple weekend getaway.
These are the moments thattruly stick with us, and Cody's
work with Spur Experiences ishelping make those moments
happen for more people.
Thank you so much, Cody.
Be sure to check outspurexperiencescom to see what
(45:06):
they're all about, and, if youenjoyed this episode, I'd love
it if you shared it with afriend who might need a little
push to say yes to adventure.
Thanks again for being part ofthe Journey with Jake community.
Don't forget to follow along onInstagram at
journeywithjakepodcast andsubscribe wherever you listen so
you don't miss a thing.
Next week, I'll be chattingwith Michelle Coulson, founder
(45:27):
of Remote Rebellion, about howworking remotely can unlock a
life of freedom, travel andintentional living.
You won't want to miss it.
Until then, just remember it'snot always about the destination
as it is about the journey.
Take care, everybody.
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