Episode #134 - Larry Upton, Founder of bambū werx - Stupid Questions with Seth Hill

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:02):
How's it going everybody? And welcome back to another
edition of the Stupid Questions podcast.
And then the pod going to be talking with Larry Upton.
He is the founder and CEO of Bamboo Works.
You may have seen them sprinkledabout the triathlon community
and they make really high quality bamboo socks, headbands,
hats, beanies, a number of otherthings.
Get to dive deep with Larry on that the last 30 minutes of the

(00:23):
episode. But for the first hour or so, we
dive into a lot of more of the philosophical conversations as
you guys know that I like havingaround marriage and family and
things like that. And Larry was really vulnerable
and really appreciate him takingthe time to be so honorable
vulnerable with me. Also, we record for an hour he
had to jump and then we get backon and record for an additional
30 minutes. That's why you may notice that I

(00:44):
have don't have a mustache rightnow.
I will when this video starts and then I won't by the time
ends again. So there's a little bit of a
time gap there. So sorry about that.
But really hope you enjoy this conversation with Larry.
Thank you for being here. Thank you, Larry.
And without further ado, this isLarry Upton.
Move to California man. When did we move here?
We officially got here like end of October, but then we went

(01:05):
back east for Thanksgiving, Christmas, we were over in New
Zealand for a month. So really it feels like we
haven't been here since, or we've only been here since about
January when we got back. And yeah, it's crazy.
It's already end of March, so it's gone by fast.
But yeah, it's pretty area though.
Where? Are you from originally?
I forget. So I was born and raised in the
East, in North Carolina was where I was born right now

(01:29):
outside of Asheville A. Little bit of an accent in
there. Yeah.
Oh, that's interesting. Most people say I don't have 1
and I growing up I was prided myself on not having it.
But. It's it, Well, put it this way,
you don't have a traditional Southern draw.
It's not really thick or for those of us who've spent
expensive, extensive time all over the South, I can still hear
a little bit in there. Yeah, that's awesome.

(01:49):
Yeah. Freaking gorgeous, or put it
this way, rush freaking gorgeous.
It's it's got some repairs to donow, so.
Yeah, it's wild. A lot of the places where I I
grew up around there in, in Brevard specifically, and
outside of Biltmore, yeah, it's crazy.
When I saw the videos, I was like, where did that water even
come from? Like there were small creeks
that came through those towns. But yeah, that was absolutely
devastating. Just absolutely wild.

(02:12):
I wish them well. So how do you want to get
rolling on this? Yeah, man.
So I mean, we're out of recording, so I'll just start
shooting off asking questions and we'll go from there.
But I guess the first thing I should say is just thanks so
much for taking the time. I know you're probably a busy
guy. I'd look forward to getting into
what all you do, but thank you. Thank you for for having me.
I appreciate it, Seth. Yeah, for sure.

(02:33):
So you are in Utah, correct? Correct.
I live in Saint George. We've been here for three years
now. Yeah, as I mentioned, we, my
wife and I, spent the bulk of our lives in Austin, TX.
Austin got super busy. Went from about 350,000 people
when I first moved there to about 2.2 million.
Wow, that's wow. Just.
Turned into what they now call Silicon Hills.

(02:56):
Yeah, you know, just changed the.
Ecosystem and went from being a real funky cool little music
town where the mantra was, you know, keep Austin weird.
Yeah. Basically Silicon Valley.
Yeah, a lot of Californians moved out there.
That's exactly right, yeah. No income tax, no personal
income tax made it real attractive.
Yeah. So we left in 2015, it's been a

(03:17):
couple of years up in the mountains of New Mexico as I
mentioned, and then moved to Boulder.
I was heavily involved in in thesport of triathlon.
Had begun working with an OG named Mark Allen in 2016.
Managed his affairs in 20/16/17 and 18.
Don't know if if you were activein the sport then, but it was

(03:39):
right when Wanda Dalian bought Ironman, OK, Mark and I were
spending quite a bit of time in China and you know, that was
going to be the the Wild West, anew frontier for all things
endurance sports. Yeah, for sure.
So we were over there I guess four or five times a year for
that three-year period trying tobuild out, you know, they were
host hosting 5 races at the time.

(04:00):
And then we were trying to buildout the Ironman university
infrastructure there in China. So that that, you know, gave me
an opportunity to really developmy network there, which is
everything in China. It everything revolves around a
term in Mandarin called Guangxi,which loosely translates to your
network of trust. And so you spend quite a bit of

(04:21):
time getting to know individuals, their families, you
know, visiting their town, eating with them, drinking
whiskey with them late at night.You just basically build up that
rapport. And then on the back of that
rapport, you can actually get business done.
So tail end of that, we'll started taking athletes from the
US to compete in local races in China.

(04:43):
I think we took 12 pros in 2018 and then 24 in 2019, many of
which you know, because a lot ofthese are on the RTS team now
and took them to what the Chinese called a small town.
It only had 12 million people, so many.
Massive cities in in China as well.
So we, you know, did some event management over there and then

(05:05):
as, as so I may have shared, my wife and I were preparing to
launch our little ecom company, Bamboo Works in 2020.
We had all of the product specs done.
We had the marketing plans ready.
We're going to launch on March 1st of 2020.
Well, you know what happened thethird week in February.
Yeah. That went well.
Yeah, it did. The world came to a grinding

(05:25):
halt, the doors shut, you couldn't go anywhere, much less
to China. So we had to put those plans on
hold for a while. Actually wound up pivoting Seth.
And instead of doing socks and headbands and cats, we did face
masks for a year and a half, which surprisingly went very
well because bamboo, being an antimicrobial material, was
ideal for face masks. So that's sustained the company

(05:47):
in the latter parts of 2020 and most of 2021.
And then we relocated to Saint George and 2022, which you know,
in retrospect, super happy we did.
We love Saint George. It's about the same size as
Boulder, about 100,000 strong. That's definitely a a different
climate. It's desert here.

(06:08):
So not quite as hot as as you'refamiliar with that in Arizona,
but certainly not certainly not cool by any stretch of the
imagination. I think we had 42 or 43 days
over 115° last summer. So it gets warm, yeah.
But yeah, we like it. Great, great environment and,
and also, as you may know, you know, increasingly triathletes

(06:28):
see Saint George as a great place to train just because it's
cost effective and they can bring their teams down for
camps. You know, sadly, it's going to
be the last instance of the Saint George 70.3 this May.
I know it's crazy. They're going to have to.
I wonder if they're going to move out that big statue.
Have you heard? You know they'd move it around
anyway. I.

(06:48):
Have a sneaky feeling it may last a year, maybe two years and
then yeah, it's going to go the way of the dodo.
So kind of sad. You know, I I thought it was you
hear all kinds of rumors. I, I heard it was originally
because Washington County, whichis you encompasses the greater
Saint George hurricane in Washington, did not like Hwy. 9
and Hwy. 7 being shut down out there by Sand Hollow because as

(07:12):
you know, it's only four lanes. So they have to shut down one
side of it. But then I later found out that
it's actually the guy who's now in charge of economic
development for Washington County.
The there's a big PGA golf tournament that's going on at
Black Desert. That's they asked Iron Man if
Iron Man would move the dates and Iron Man said no.

(07:33):
So they said, OK, that's your last year.
That's so weird that Iron Man wouldn't move the dates,
especially given the just the economic impact of how much
media how much mini racers that that.
This would have been there or this will be the 14th year.
So it's kind of sad. It's, you know, it's iconic.
So yeah. Yeah.
But still, we love living here, you know, love having athletes

(07:56):
down. You know, we've got to guest
rooms. So we, you know, at any time of
the year, we've got an athlete hanging their head here training
for four or five days. You know, we're all of three
miles from the entrance of Snow Canyon State Park.
So people will often just stop over here, you know, while
they're doing 8 loops of the Snow Canyon Loop.
So yeah, it's fun. We like living here.
Yeah, for sure. Well, I look forward to

(08:16):
hopefully coming to visit beforetoo long.
Just coming in, I know there's so many.
Slots for you. Yeah, there's so many, like,
people that I've met now and I was like, oh man, I've got
friends that, you know, span theglobe.
I need to like just set up six months once and go travel.
That would be awesome you. Could yeah, you could.
It's it's as you know, it's a fairly tight knit community.
It seems big, you know, 1.21.3 million triathletes, but kind of

(08:37):
the nucleus. We all know each other, you
know, and I'll have to qualify. I don't claim to be an athlete.
I'm a struggling slow AG, but I enjoy the sport and and I enjoy
all the camaraderie that that itaffords us.
So that's a heck of a lot of fun, so.
Yeah, for sure, man. Well, that's that gives me a lot
of avenues to dive down South. I'm glad you went through that.

(09:00):
Yeah, gave me some good notes. But the first thing I would love
to dive into, and I'll just preface this by saying I always
love interviewing the more seasoned people on this podcast,
just with the more years of experience it allows.
Thank you for you for that euphemistic term season.
There's a lot of Gray hair goingon here.
Yeah, you're still rocking it though, man, it looks good.

(09:21):
A couple of. Wrinkles around the eyes, Yeah,
I'm an OG. No, it does.
It brings a lot of depth and just ability to answer some of
these questions that I really love hearing.
You know, I'm relatively young still, so getting to kind of
grasp at what other people's experiences are, it means a lot
to me. So my question is, from your
perspective, who is Larry? Yeah, that's a good, that's a

(09:43):
good one. So, you know, off off the cuff,
I'm assuming you probably asked that question to, you know,
quite a few folks that you interview and I would have seen
probably a lot of them initiallyanswered, well, you know, I'm a,
I'm a husband or I'm a dad or, and I'm an I'm an entrepreneur.
I'm an endurance athlete. You know, in light of what's

(10:05):
going on in the world right now,Seth, and we won't get over into
politics, I want to say first, I'm a, I'm a human being.
I'm a citizen of the world, you know, male, female, red, black,
wack, you know, whatever color, whatever creed, whatever
religion, first, I'm a, I'm a citizen of the earth.
I'm a human being. Because I think that, you know,

(10:27):
in some sentence, we're startingto lose that perspective and
we're starting to see ourselves as, oh, I'm right of the liner.
I'm left of the liner. I'm, I'm a Dem or I'm a
Republican or I'm an independent.
You know, all of these things that are extraneous, you know,
they're not necessarily core to who we are.
So first I'm a human. And then, yeah, after that, I
would probably say, you know, I'm a husband, happily married

(10:47):
now for coming up on 16 years, second marriage.
But you know, this one, this onewas a good one.
I'm a dad. I have five children, two of my
own 3 stepchildren, incredibly close to all of them probably
say I'm an entrepreneur. After that, you know, I'm 34
years in the tech business, mostof it in software.
Had three companies of my own. Probably last on the list would

(11:12):
be an endurance athlete, although I do.
I love endurance sports, triathlon in particular.
And you know that it's probably relevant just because of my age.
I just turned 58 last month and you used to be a more of a
hardcore runner, you know, in mysense, 6070 miles a week had had

(11:33):
had some knee work done and the doc said you can't keep running
that type of mileage. He goes, you're not going to be
walking for long. So dialed it back, wound up
getting into cycling and later got into triathlon and and I
love triathlon because, you know, it afford just a bit of
balance in some respects, you know, swim, bike, run, swim,
bike, run. So you're not pounding, just
your knees, just your hips, justyour shoulders.

(11:54):
So, yeah, citizen of the world, human being.
After that husband, then a dad, then an entrepreneur, and then
athlete. Good answer.
Just a question. Yeah, it does answer your
question. There's no right or wrong
answer. I'm curious, given just the
order that you gave those piecesof identity when I was younger

(12:17):
and even now still, I think partof my motivation is like, oh, I
want to become something or I'm kind of shooting for something
or leave my mark in the world for for lack of a better term.
And then, you know, after being married going on 8 years,
there's a sense of purpose in that.
Thank you very much. There's a sense of purpose in
that. And you know, I can only imagine
after I have children, it'll change again.

(12:38):
So for you at the point of life and then the season of life that
you're in now, where do you drawyour sense of motivation and
purpose? Great, great question.
That's a you, you, you get to the heart of the matter pretty
well there, Mr. Hill. Thank you.
You know, again, reflecting on how we as guys, and this is just

(12:58):
stereotypical, we as guys often define ourselves.
It's just what you said in termsof success and, and, and so
often that success is correlatedto our career, you know, how
much money we make, what is our title, you know, to what level
in our, in our industry have we aspired and reached?
But you know, I'm, I consider myself kind of in the, the 3rd

(13:21):
and final stage of this earth journey.
You know, I kind of look at it like, you know, your first 25
years, you know, you're just growing up, starting to, you
know, starting to figure out what the world is and how you
fit into it. 25 years in the middle, you're, it's kind of,
you're productive. So when you're making money,
getting married, having kids, buying a home, you know,
traveling, kind of planting yourroots.

(13:43):
And then that last 25 years, hopefully maybe in a little
longer is when we start looking back and saying, OK, what have I
done? What have I not done?
And in these last 20-30 years, what, what do I hope to
accomplish? And, and I'll tell you very
little that has to do with moneyfor me or even titles, rankings

(14:03):
as far as, you know, career and how I compare to my peers or how
I've done in sports. A lot more of it focuses on what
impact have I made or more more acutely, what have I not done,
what impact could I still have? And a lot of that then goes back
to people, you know, I'm sure you've heard it, You know,
people talking about, you know, what did somebody say on their

(14:24):
deathbed? Very few people say, God, I wish
I'd spent more time in the office, or God, I wish I'd made
more money, or God, I wish I hada bigger house.
It's typically I wish I'd spent more time with my loved ones or
I wish I'd told them I loved them.
And because I'm not on my deathbed, and hopefully not
anytime soon, planned to be. I want to start focusing.
On that now so you know, my bestfriend he's he's wise and in

(14:49):
many respects and he looks at mycareer because I've not made an
enormous amount of money. I don't live in a 6000 square
foot home and have, you know, $8million in my retirement
account, but I do count myself afriend to quite a few people.
And he says Larry goes, you're one of the richest souls I know
in that respect because you havea lot of people that you love
and a lot of people that love you.

(15:09):
And so I guess to to answer yourquestion, Seth, I want to, I
want to maximize the opportunitythat's left for me in these next
2025, thirty years to really enrich those relationships and
invest in the people that I careabout and hopefully care about
me and see, you know, what legacy I can leave, You know,
when I'm gone done and dusted, what are they going to think

(15:30):
about me? Oh, Larry made my life richer.
Larry made my life more vivid, more real, more impactful that
that would be my hope. So.
Great answer. When you were growing up was
that set of values on family andkindness and building
friendships? Were those things that were
nurtured into your existence as a young age or is this more of

(15:53):
your? Own man, I wish you'd prep me on
these things, but I kind of likeit.
They're coming off the cuff, so I'll say yes and no.
You know, I grew up first elevenyears of my life I spent in a
very rural, agrarian, small townSouth Mississippi environment
and my mom was a country girl, my dad was a city boy.

(16:15):
My dad came from a long line of entrepreneurs, so he was all
about business and his kind of success metrics were a little
more black and white. He was also a coach, so got us
involved in sports from a very early age.
And so it was all about, hey, did you put in those reps today?
Did you throw that football? How many times through the tire

(16:36):
did you get in? How many sprints?
And then, you know, what are your grades looking like?
You know, I don't want to see anything below AB Plus, you
know, I mean, it was, it was KPI's, corporate, you know, how
do you measure up? My mom was pretty much polar
opposite. She came from a large family.
She had eight siblings. Her father is and was and is my

(16:59):
hero, my grandfather. He died at age 9089, penniless.
You know, he'd done fine as a farmer.
He put all nine through university, five of which got
their master's degrees, 3 which got their doctorates, all in the
back of his wage as a farmer. Really big believer in
education, beloved in our small community and instilled in his

(17:24):
family the idea or the the ethosthat nothing was more important
than your family. So I can remember many a Sunday
afternoon spent at his house with my cousins and my aunts and
my uncles after, you know, a Sunday lunch and I was playing
touch football or kickball out in the in the pasture.
So in that sense, my mom and her.
Side of the. Family engendered in me an

(17:46):
appreciation for family. So, you know, I guess looking
back, hopefully there were some balance there.
My dad was all about the drive, the success, the metrics.
What have you achieved and what are you aiming for?
And my mom was all about, hey, this is your family, you know,
where do you fit into this and how how focused on family are
you and giving back into the family?

(18:06):
So it was, it was a little. Bit of a balance, but you know,
I've got kind of grown up and hopefully carried over some of
that to how we've raised our children so.
Would you consider yourself a 5050 split of your mom and your
dad, or do you lean one way or the other a little bit more?
Let's just say extrinsically, probably a little more like my

(18:30):
dad. It's hard as a guy not to look
at ourselves and, and measure ourselves by what we've
accomplished either in our careers, in our bank accounts,
in our sports, you know, or, or athletic pursuits.
It's pretty hard not to size ourselves up if we're honest and
say, how do I stack up? You know, you know, it's, it's,

(18:53):
let's just say I, I don't stack up very well.
You know, I'm no Elon Musk, no Bill Gates.
You know, I'm not even where many of my peers are in the tech
industry. You know, some of them have
spent years working at these companies and make gazillions of
dollars. You know, I've owned three
companies of my own. So my, my career has kind of
been up and down. You know, the life of an
entrepreneur certainly don't stack up when it comes to

(19:15):
triathlon. You know, I'm a I'm a 640 half
guy looking to do my first full,you know, this November.
So nobody's going to like, you know, be blowing horns from my
accomplishment in athletics. So I would say extrinsically,
yeah, I tend to measure myself just like a lot of other guys do
Intrinsically, No, I view myselfthrough the eyes of the lens of

(19:36):
family and and friends. And if given a choice where I'm
going to focus the bulk of my time, and it's probably one of
the reasons why I've not been that successful as an
entrepreneur, is I tend to put people first in the equation
rather than the the bottom line,the PNL and the balance sheet.
So, yeah, yeah. Inner self people.

(19:57):
Family, outer self, like a lot of guys, you know, rankings.
How did that be? Yeah, Yeah.
There's a measurement there thatwe all, I think draw and it's
interesting you say intrinsically like families.
Number one, I would have I was actually before this
conversation would have guessed that family was extrinsically
also the predominant because just based on, you know, I mean,

(20:18):
now 20 minutes of conversation, but also checking out anything
that I could find on the Internet Internet about you.
I think the thing that stuck with me the most were your top
three pinned posts on Instagram.Two were with your wife, 1
celebrating 15 years of marriage.
The other one, her supporting you through the athletic
pursuits that you've had and then your mother, I believe out
to eat. So like that's a.

(20:40):
Yeah, you're, you're good. You got a second as API.
But yeah, you're, you're right. You know, probably
subconsciously, you know, I don't, I don't know that
everyone went through a conscious thought process.
Maybe I did. You know what's important to me?
Yeah. Those.
Yeah. My wife, my kids, and my family
#1. You feel like your dad's proud
of you or was proud of you. Is your dad still alive?

(21:01):
Oh, yeah, he is. Thank you for asking.
He just got out of surgery this morning.
He had the first of two knee replacements done.
So this is a, this is a tender area.
I might tear up a little bit. That's OK.
Photo My dad was a hard ass early on, borderline asshole
because his dad was an even bigger asshole and his

(21:24):
grandfather was king asshole. All in caps.
So, you know, it took me a long time to understand, you know, as
we often do as men, we, we mature, we grow up, we start to
see our fathers as human rather than just our dad.
And so if things go well, we start to afford them a little
grace. So it was in my late teens,

(21:44):
early 20s that I went through that.
And my dad and I have since, I mean, it's not like we were ever
estranged or anything. It's just, it was always he he
just had a real high bar set, you know, It was always.
Yeah, that's good. But if you'd just done this, I
mean, I can remember that refrain from the time I was knee
high to a grasshopper till about18.

(22:04):
And I can remember when it changed.
I came home after my sophomore year in college, was laying in
bed and I had some work I had toget done.
And my dad came in early and first time ever I can remember
he rubbed my back. It sounds time to wake up.
We got work to do. I'd heard it soon.
It's time to wake up. Work to do since I.
Was like, you know? Five.
But the fact that he reached out, rubbed my back.

(22:26):
It was kind of a sea change, said something had been he'd had
some some challenging circumstances in his own life
about that time, which kind of helped him reshape his
priorities. And I have to give him credit,
from that point forward, he madea conscious effort to focus less
on his career, less on his achievements and more on us as
his kids and on his wife and then later on my kids, which are

(22:48):
now his grandkids. He's an incredible grandfather.
He and I are incredibly close now.
I mean, we can talk about anything and everything.
So yeah, the latter latter 2/3 of my life so far, incredibly
close to my dad. But yeah, that that first 18
years was semi formative or actually more than it was

(23:10):
formative, you know, greatly impacted who I became as an
individual. But yeah.
Very, very thankful. That things have changed and now
we're incredibly close. Thank you first of all for
sharing that. I hope that he continues to heal
physically. Oh, yeah, that's, it's all good
now. In fact, I've got to give him a
call here once he's out of his anesthesia in the next hour or
so. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Give him some shit telling me that he's can't keep on the golf

(23:32):
course now. Yeah.
Well, that's first of all, I guess I just admire that you're
able to be that in touch with the emotion involved with that
father son relationship because a lot of people, myself included
in the past, like it's been harder to come to.
It's like whenever you get relatively close to that circle
of emotion, when you feel like anything could start to well up,
it's like, I don't know, I'm going to stay away from that.

(23:53):
But you were able to tap into that pretty pretty quickly,
which I would say is a sign of like, at least from my own
experience, just like a sign of positive mental health and
building relationships. And I think any good
relationship that's worth havinghas to go through some level of
adversity to like have a deeper meaning.
Because you, I mean, it's just like in marriage now after eight

(24:13):
years, like we've been around the circle a few times and
there's a level of confidence that's built of making it
through those times. But yeah, I guess all I'm saying
is like, that's. You know, I'll, I'll throw in
there on top of that going through a divorce and some
counselling around that, going through a, a 12 step program for

(24:34):
2 1/2 years. You know that the duress of, of
those, you know, kind of life changing events will shape you,
It'll stretch you. And, you know, some folks break,
some folks don't allow themselves to stretch and they
stayed scarred forever as a result.
Whereas others, you know, hopefully make it through and in
that stretching process get to better know themselves and and

(24:54):
who they are and how they want to fit into the world.
And then to your point, you know, become a little more aware
as a result. Yeah, I'm always fascinated too
with the relationships of different people, probably more
so with people who I would deem like successful.
And I, I, I aim and the view of success a little bit different
probably than most. I mean, I do have the people

(25:15):
I've looked up to such as like Elon Musk and Steve Jobs with
the older I've gotten, I've beenlike, you know, what did they
have a successful family? Like if you can underpin that,
then like I think that's when they both like, that's when
someone you can truly look up to.
Not to say that you would throw up the baby out with the
bathwater and that you can't admire some of the more earthly
pursuits that they had in the success, success that they have.

(25:38):
But the the torment that a lot of those men seemingly have to
live with. Like Elon Musk, I don't know a
whole lot, but like he was, it sounds like pretty badly abused
by his own father. And a lot of these men who are
quote UN quote successful in theworld usually have some kind of
a strange relationship with their dad.
It's pretty crazy. Something that served as an

(25:58):
impetus or that burning fire that, you know, I mean, I forget
with whom I was talking, but this was just earlier this week.
You know, when you start to lookat the pinnacle of success,
those guys being in tech, but from all accounts, Tiger Woods
isn't that nice of a person. Michael Jordan, not that nice of

(26:18):
a person. I mean, you can even look at,
you know, the public accounts oftheir behavior and you kind of
size them up for your own. And this is not to denigrate
them or say that they're not good people.
It makes you wonder how much of that is causal and how much is
coincident. You know, did you have to be
that absolute a hole in your personal lives to be able to
push everything else aside for that pure, singular focus on

(26:41):
being the best of all time? Makes you wonder, you know,
Because I don't know that I could look at the absolute
pinnacle in any sport and say that guy's a really good guy as
well. Don't know.
Yeah. Well, actually, I take it back.
I know Mark Allen very well and he is that good of a guy.
Yeah, he's a good guy. He.
Really is. Yeah.

(27:03):
So I guess I'll. I'll give him that one.
He is, you know, probably, you know, many folks would argue
he's no longer the GOAT after Yan's accomplishments.
But hey, it's kind of like saying LeBron and Michael, you
know, different eras. Different eras, yeah, different
bases too. That will go to back.
Yeah, different environment, yeah.
So a little bit earlier in our conversation you were mentioning

(27:25):
anyway, it may have just been kind of a phrase, not
necessarily a deeper meaning. But I'm curious, you said like
you know, like this earth on this earthly journey.
Do you believe in a post earth journey?
I love your question, Seth. Yeah.
So, you know, I'll give you a little bit of background.
I grew up again, rural Southern Mississippi, Protestant,

(27:50):
Southern Baptist. Got a little more involved in
the church in my teen years, kind of started moving over into
what's kind of more evangelical or fundamental Christian.
Wound up going to a religious school, Oral Roberts University
for three years. Didn't finish there just because
I didn't necessarily care for what that ministry was doing.

(28:13):
It was kind of a televangelism based thing and they were just
doing some wacky things. So for the longest time I would
have defined myself as a as a mainline evangelical Christian.
As I got into my 20s and began traveling around the world and,
you know, had my eyes opened up to other belief systems.
Spend a lot of time in Asia, sometime in in Western and and

(28:37):
then Eastern Europe. You start to realize that just
because you've been raised a certain way doesn't necessarily,
you know, imply that you've got a lock on the truth or the sole
definition. So I guess over time, my views
have shifted, Seth, to the pointwhere I still believe there's,
there's something in us that's eternal, you know, and I kind of
like to categorize that as an energy, you know, you know,

(29:00):
traditional religion, you would call it your spirit.
But I just, I think we're, we, we, we're comprised of energy.
That's the eternal part of us that, you know, matter never
goes away, just changes. And so I think that spirit, that
energy in US is is. Going to be.
Eternal. And I think it's that which
connects us. I think that's, you know, that's
sixth sense, that preternatural knowing, you know, some call it

(29:22):
psychic, some call it ESP or, you know, whatever you want to
attribute. I think, you know, even
scientists shown us that we don't utilize like what 80% of
our brain, 85% of our brain. But I do think there's something
that connects us, that energy. And I think it's it's part of a
bigger energy as well, you know,kind of like the Force in the
Star Wars or, you know, Nirvana from a Hindu perspective.

(29:42):
I think there's something biggerthat connects us.
I think we possess a soul, whichin in the way I view it is our
intellect, our emotions, our character, kind of who what
defines us and, and, and how we interact with others.
I don't know that that's eternalkind of hope.
It is. It'd be nice, you know, 200

(30:03):
years from now, remember these cool questions that Seth Hill.
Pose to me. You know, but I don't know if
that last, this part, the earth suit, No, I don't think that
lasts. I think that goes away.
I think, you know, when we die, it goes back to the earth and
hopefully feed some plants and maybe some cows down the road.
But yeah, I think we are a spirit, think we possess a soul,

(30:25):
our intellect, our emotions, ourcharacter.
And then I think we live in an earth suit.
So you've had a lot of perspective from your travels.
You have these set of values andbeliefs.
How did those affect how you raise your children?
You said you have two of your biologically three others and I

(30:48):
don't know when you were introduced to their lives, but
how did that take a part to play?
That's a great question too. And I'll quit saying that's a
great question because all of them are great.
You're fine. It was.
It was. Interesting because first
marriage my ex-wife was Catholicso we were at least somewhat on
the same page. We chose to go to a Catholic

(31:10):
Church when the kids were smile just because that was where she
was more comfortable and her family was more comfortable so I
was fine with that. My wife now would not describe
herself as a believer, nor did she raise her kids when they
were young to necessarily believe in an afterlife or a God
or anything, you know, from a deity standpoint.
So when we got together, the kids were all in middle school.

(31:32):
And it's not like we spent a lotof time kind of qualifying, you
know, how we were going to raisethe kids in that respect.
My wife's name is Cynthia. We just, we, we get along well
together. We're able to talk about things
and even ad Lib and off the cuffadjust.
And so kind of the way it evolved as they were in middle
school and then high school, wasshe allowed me to share from my

(31:54):
own beliefs with them. You know, we even practice
things like we would pray beforeour meal, but it wasn't a
traditional Christian prayer. Where it would be, you know.
Full of God the Father, the HolySpirit, Jesus Christ the Son.
It was more just, hey God, thankyou for life.
Thank you for this food on the table.
Thank you for our help. You know, when and where

(32:15):
possible, help us find a way to share what we've been given with
others. That was kind of how it, it
went. And I guess since then, as the
kids have matured, they've come back to me at times and they've
said, hey, what, what do you think about this?
You know, I'm, I'm exploring this or I'm exploring that or
somebody told me this. And so I'll freely share with

(32:37):
them from my own beliefs, but we've never been very strict or
very dogmatic and saying, hey, this is the truth and this is
how it is, and this is how you have to believe.
You know, my father and mother were very good about that.
Even growing up in rural southern Mississippi, I can
remember for a period of time westudied with the Mormons.
For a period of time we studied with the Jehovah's Witnesses.

(32:58):
You know, when I got out and wastravelling around the world,
they encouraged me to study Buddhism and Hinduism and
Taoism. I mean, they were, they were all
about exploring and opening up our minds to alternate ways of
thinking. And then, you know, as we take a
bite of something, chewing on itand deciding whether we liked it
or not before we swallowed. So that's kind of the same

(33:20):
philosophy we've taken with our kids.
And as a result, they, they feltvery free.
We have fantastic dinner table discussions, but everything from
religion to politics to sex to money to careers.
I mean, it's it's an open forum.That's really neat.
So one more question on the family topic and then I'll move
on from it a little bit. But so something that has also

(33:42):
intrigued me as I've gotten older is like you said earlier,
you know, as you got older, you began to see your father as a
human rather than just like, youknow, this above me figure.
And so like, that changes how you're able to relate to that
individual. So like, now that you have kids,
and especially as they've gottena little bit older, do you feel

(34:04):
that your children are proud of you?
I don't know if I would describeit as proud of.
I think out of the. Five, of course, have a
different relationship with eachof them.
We have 3 voids, one of which ismy own, two of which are my

(34:24):
stepsons, 2 girls, 1 of which ismy own, one which is my
stepdaughter. I would say they probably more
consider me a friend, not a peer.
I'm still dad or lair bear or pops, but more of a friend for
which they're thankful. You know, for normal dad, things

(34:48):
like making those phone calls tosay, hey, my kids looking for a
job, would you, would you sit down and chat with them to Dad,
I've wrecked the car, can you come get me to Dad?
I'm in jail, you know, had one too many beers.
Can you come get me? I mean, I think it's more one of
those things where they're thankful or appreciative of me

(35:08):
as a dad or a stepfather than necessarily proud of me.
I think if they were going to beproud of anything, Seth, it
would probably be the success that I now enjoy.
And I'm not saying I attribute that to myself, but they would
be proud of the success that my wife and I enjoy in our
marriage. You know, we're, we're pretty

(35:30):
damn happily married after 15 years and both having been
through rough marriages initially.
I think the kids would say, yeah, I'm proud of my dad or I'm
proud of my stepfather because he's a good husband and because,
you know, he's done a good job of trying to raise us and
provide for us, help us with college, help us with cars, help
us get jobs. I think they would say they're

(35:50):
proud of that, but not necessarily of me and or and or
of my accomplishments. I'm glad you brought that up.
I don't think that there's many things that can attribute and
afford children a greater sense of confidence and motivation
than to seeing their parents happily married.
Completely agree, and that's notin any way to diminish those who

(36:10):
aren't in a happy marriage or their.
Efforts to be good. Parents but I completely agree I
got to see it first hand you know my parents have been
married now for 58 years, no 59 years and they.
They're not always happy becauseit's damned.
Hard to be happy in a relationship for, you know, that
many years. But I got to see first hand how

(36:33):
they work through things. I can remember one of the
conversations got heated. They would excuse themselves to
the bedroom and shut the door. And there was never any yelling
or screaming or shit flying around the room.
But they respected us enough andrespected each other enough to
say, hey, this is something we're going to address in
private. And then when they came back
out, they were a unified front. So I got to see them hashing

(36:54):
things out. You know, my dad had his own ups
and downs in a career, sometimesextreme ups and downs, and I saw
my mom stand by him. Never give up on him.
Some tears at times. A little bit of.
Anxiety at times, some I can remember some super skinny
Christmases or, you know, all wegot was, you know, pack of socks
and AT shirt and maybe a toothbrush and some toothpaste.

(37:17):
But you know, we made it throughand I saw my parents, you know,
constantly focusing on and I guess that that's actually
really interesting though. They loved us.
I have always sensed, and to this today still agree, they are
the most important to each other.
Now somebody put a gun to their kids heads.

(37:39):
My mom would probably say OK, Lavelle, been nice knowing you,
my dad. But in general, their
relationship, their marriage wasalways more important than their
position as a father, as a mother.
And in a weird, kind of ironic way, that was reassuring to us
as kids. Even though you don't want to.
What's that? I was just going to say I

(38:01):
recognize even in my own self being in a younger age, like
counting it joy almost internally whenever my mom or
dad stood up for each other in my own demise, even though I'm
proclaiming very profusely the opposite out like outside, Yeah.
It's a little bit of quiet confidence.
You're right. It almost infuses you as a

(38:24):
member of a family that you know, and we could take that to
a much extrapolate to a much bigger perspective.
You know, when the leadership ofan organization or company or
our country is solid and they'reall on the same page and things
are moving in lockstep, even though you disagree with some of
the decisions being made, you kind of feel reassured, hey,
things are going to be all right.

(38:44):
It's when there's confusion and there's discord and there's
chaos. At that leadership.
Level that you know the troops don't do well.
I'm trying to think I asked thisquestion.
You like you're in a hat, You'rehappily married now.
You've been married for 15 years.
What are some of the things, if you don't mind sharing, that you

(39:07):
learned in the presence of like you know, when you were deciding
like this isn't going to work out, However that happened?
What are some of the things thatlike you really carried forward
that you found were absolutely fundamental to the success of a
relationship? Sure.
And now these are my own personal views, of course.
Not even views that I would necessarily endorse or advocate

(39:29):
or espouse to others. Just what I've learned.
I think like matters more than love.
I think he can love somebody andabsolutely can't stand being
around them, living with them. So like matters more in the long
term. I like being around Cynthia.
She likes being around me, lovedmy first wife.

(39:51):
I think she probably loved me, but there wasn't as much like
there. We just didn't have as much in
common things that, you know, were our mutual goals or things
that we both loved. So that that didn't work.
So likes more than love. Second, I think we we have a
kind of a way of reaching agreement and in our marriage

(40:11):
where the no always wins. So at the end of the day, we're
talking about a restaurant and neither of us cares.
OK, we'll pick one and go talking about, you know, going
on a trip somewhere neither of us cares.
We'll just pick it and go. But you know, like when moving
or considering a move from Boulder to Saint George, we were

(40:33):
looking at other places. I wanted to look at the the West
Coast of Florida, you know, downaround Coral Gables and you
know, Naples area. And when I brought that up, my
wife listened and then she said,Larry, that's a no for me.
She said, I'm a Canadian and I don't do hurricanes.

(40:54):
No, didn't no further discussion, Seth.
I just said, OK, because we've always said we we levy the nose
very judiciously. But when a no card gets played,
you don't even debate it. You don't discuss that.
It just it's the Trump part. So like before, like more than
love or like last more than love, The no always wins.

(41:16):
And I think the probably the last thing is I've learned and
I'm not saying. This is true for all.
Couples. But I've learned that men and
women are different and at the end of the day, personally, I
have found that I need respect more than love.

(41:38):
I I need to know deep inside of myself that my wife respects me
even more than that she loves mebecause that respect makes me
feel like she's got my back, that I can go conquer the world.
That even if she disagrees with the decision, if she respects me
and my decision, in a weird way,it's going to kind of like make
me want to do more of what she wants to do.

(42:01):
It's that judo move that respectmoves me and I think conversely,
love moves her. You know, even when, you know,
we're in the midst of some friction about something or, you
know, butting heads about something.
At the end of that, if I'll justsay, you know what, honey, I
disagree with you, but I love you so much.
Let's go with what you want to do.

(42:22):
That just melts Herman and and and I think at the.
End of the day, I think probablya lot of men and women are
wildlife that I'm not saying all, but I'm saying I think that
we as men, something in US really craves, needs and thrives
off of respect. And I think women crave, need
and thrive off of just pure baselove because then from love

(42:43):
comes safety and security and from respect comes, you know,
approval and affirmation. There's a lot of branches on the
tree, but I think respect and love really, really matter in a
marriage, so. Yeah, thanks for the feedback.
I think that's really valuable within this marriage.
So how many years have you been an entrepreneur?

(43:06):
Because we're talking about three companies here and I'm
wanting to make a slight shift started.
My career in 1991, So I've been involved in tech pretty much
kind of an entrepreneur the whole time because I've only
worked for startups. I've never ever worked for an
established firm that wasn't like, you know, there was no
publicly held firms, nobody thatwas, you know, over 500 people.

(43:28):
They were always smaller startups.
I've had three companies of my own, launched the first in 2006
and then launched another in 2011 and then launched this last
one in, you know, was supposed to have been 2020, but more like
2021. Yeah.
So you have entrepreneur, I guess.
So what would that be 19 out of those 34 years?

(43:52):
Yeah. For each one of these, as you've
gone through the starting of it comes your baby and then I guess
either the selling or the death of it.
How has that, how have those experiences been, and how did it
lead up to where we currently are today with starting a bamboo
works? Sure.
So the first one you know, and I'm sure that you know, term,

(44:14):
you know, hindsight's always 2020.
We launched in 2006, we launcheda mobile language learning tool.
So it was basically an app that you could download on what at
the time were feature phones. There were no smartphones yet.
So back then we had the MotorolaRazor flip phone and we had the
Nokia 6100, the Nokia 9500, we had the BlackBerry, but those

(44:37):
were all feature phones where you could download a ringtone.
Or you could. Download a screensaver for, you
know, $0.99. Well, I was living in Austin at
the time, noticed that, you know, because we had a very good
relationship with Mexico at that.2 and a half, 2.6 million
Latino laborers coming across the border every year, working,
sending money home, going back to be with their family.

(44:59):
Just a great relationship, especially there in Texas as a
border state. But I noticed that the bulk of
these folks were not college educated.
They were typically day laborers, typically lower on the
socio economic ladder. The first thing they did?
When they got to the US was theywent to Cricket or they went to
Boost or they went to Sprint AT Verizon and got a cell phone

(45:20):
phone because they wanted to be able to call home and talk to
their family. And so we thought that it might
be one other thing typically notpredisposed to taking English
courses. So they're not going to go down
to the local JUCO or they're notgoing to buy a fancy Berlitz
Rosetta Stone, you know, language CD, DVD course.

(45:41):
These guys just spoke pigeon English.
They could get around, make themselves understood.
So all of that to say, that confluence of observations LED
us to create a mobile language learning app called Edioma.
Idioma means language in Spanish.
So Idioma was an educational tool.
We launched it in 2007. We're very successful, did a
little over 800K in annual recurring revenue.

(46:05):
We secured agreements with ATT, with 711, with monster.com, with
Manpower Inc. We had a great first year, but
then 2008 happened. Yeah, all financial service
crisis, All four of our contracts came to us and said,
hey, the Hispanic market is a nice to have, not a got to have.
So we're backing out of our contract.

(46:28):
I'm too small. What am I going to sue
Coca-Cola? I'm going to sue, you know, 7-11
monster.com. So after about six months of,
pardon me, six weeks of cancel contract, one after another, the
VC who had all funded the bulk of our initial round came to me
and said, hey, you got 30 days to fix this?

(46:50):
I'm like, dude, do you know who the Lehman Brothers is?
Do you know who countrywide? Is these are.
Billion dollar firms going underright now.
How? Am I going to turn this around
in 30 days and he goes, I don't care.
You got 30 days. So net, net I got fired as ACEO
of my own company, still own 38%of it cost my family, you know,
my family, our family doctor, our family attorney family, you

(47:14):
know, insurance got about $600,000 in family money.
Very, very painful lesson aroundor not giving away that extra
board seat. I should have kept the majority.
I gave it away to an independentwho happened to side with the
institutional investors and lostmy job.
They promptly drove it into the ground.
So it cost me a lot of time and money, but very valuable lessons

(47:37):
started up. The second company after two
years of consulting. These were four young system
architects who worked for a verylarge telco provider in Europe
called Vodafone. And they had developed for
internal use what was for all effective purposes A predecessor
to Slack. It was an internal
communications tool where you could communicate exchange

(47:59):
files, get questions answered, basically, you know, partner on
projects. It was, it was, it was Slack.
But for an internal company likeVodafone, they got a an
agreement from Vodafone to spin it out as a stand alone and
brought me on board as AVP of biz dev.
We scored a couple of pilot projects pretty early on with
Apple and with Deloitte. They liked that, said, hey, will

(48:21):
you run the shop for us? So I became their CEO.
We went out and raised a little over a million and seed funding
grew that grew, that grew that through some pivots, some ups
and downs, as you can imagine, over an 8 year, nine year
period. Wound up selling that and
February of 2020 didn't make a killing, Barely got some of
their money back. COVID had just dropped.

(48:44):
The world was upside down. They wanted out earlier than I
think was wise, but you know, itwound up.
Wound up again being a very, very valuable lesson.
And then from there. Spent two years.
Consulting and then started up Bamboo Works in 2020 and we're

(49:06):
slow growing that you know, we're not like minting money
really, you know, knocking it out of the park.
But you know, we're growing. We had good growth. 2022 on AD
to C basis, direct to consumer. 2023 we started doing quite a
bit of work with teams, so making custom caps, custom
socks, beanies, headbands, things of that nature. 2024 we

(49:30):
started delving over into eventsand got into some smaller
triathlons, some smaller runningraces.
We've now gotten in some larger events.
We're we're doing a whole bunch of stuff for the Wildflower
experience. It's happening in May.
So we're doing their backpacks, we're doing their their caps,
we're doing their socks. So just slow growing that one.

(49:50):
But yeah, learned the hard way on a crash and burned.
Learned a little more on one that was an exit, but not
necessarily successful exit. This one, we're taking it slow,
you know, we've, I think, you know, we maybe paid ourselves 3
grand, 4 grand last year out of Bamboo Works.
We just invested everything right back into it, so.
Yeah. So I used to really fall over my

(50:14):
heels for kind of the Silicon Valley tech startup scene.
So I started my first small business when I was in college
and it was a physical product, textile product.
However, like I really wanted todo the tech scene and you know,
I was following the Reid Hoffman's of the world and all
of all their books and the how Ibuilt this podcast and all this
stuff. And as I've gotten older, I've

(50:36):
really aligned more with kind ofwhat you're talking about now is
like growing slow. It's like the oak trees that are
5 and 600 years old are the real, real behemoths.
Like it's Silicon Valley. I mean, there are unicorns and
there's a lot of shady stuff that happens too.
But like you can make a weed grow and look big real fast.
But the first sign of like true hardship when you don't have
somebody who you know, on the inside to kind of push you

(50:58):
through to the next round of funding or whatever.
It's like that just it can blow up so easily.
And that's that's a hard place to be because, you know,
entrepreneurs became rock stars and the rock stars are the ones
that go out and have an idea on a napkin.
Then they raise 500 million nextweek.
It's like that doesn't even makeany sense.
You know, I'm going to lose money for 20 years.
But if you're here for here for year 21, then you're going to

(51:19):
make a killing, which it can work, I guess, but it's like
you. See it?
You see it? Time and time again, but to your
point set that's it's those unicorns which are the 1% of the
1% that everybody reads about. It's the other 99% that didn't
necessarily come out and explosive growth or make it in
four years, or, you know, the ones that took 20 years.

(51:40):
Yeah, it's, it's, you know, there's, it's, it's a, it's a
bell curve. You know, there's all different
shades, forms and fashions of companies.
But this last one we see as being something we want to do
for a while. You know, as I mentioned, I'm
58, my wife's 63. You know, it's not like we ever
want to retire. You know, I'm fine doing this
for another 1520 years. We'd like to get it to a point.

(52:02):
So it's throwing off a little mailbox money, you know, that,
you know, could be maybe an annual trip or, you know, major
house repair or need to buy a new car in 10 years.
You know, that's where we'd likeit to be.
I don't ever see it making, well, I don't know, sure, I'd
love for it to become a Bombas or a, you know, a, a Defeat or a
Swift Wick or, you know, a Melonor somebody like that.

(52:23):
But yeah. We're going to keep.
Investing in it. Yeah, You seem relatively fluid
and open to whatever pivot you need to make to continue the
business aside from like you struck me, someone who like you
really into quality and making sure that that that is
paramount. So with that in mind, I mean,
you kind of answered this question just now with, like you

(52:44):
said, a house repair or maybe anannual trip, but in your, in
your wildest dreams, like what would you want bamboo works to
become? Sure.
You know, and again, this kind of goes back to one of your
first questions, Seth, how do you define success or how do you

(53:05):
define yourself and success in your life?
I'd like Bamboo Works to be a sustainable growing entity so
that it's, you know, profitable.And I'm not saying immensely
profitable, you know, not like 6070 points to the bottom line,
but you know, just the basics ofbusiness.
I'd like it to grow 1520% year over year.

(53:25):
I'd like to bring 15 to 20 points to the bottom line.
I'd like to see it get up to youknow, maybe 2020, five $30,000 a
month in recurring revenue. So you know, throw out four or
five grand a month. You know, I'd like to see, I'd
like to grow it to that point. What I've learned is to give to
get a business much beyond that.Requires one of two.

(53:48):
Things either a hell of a lot oftime and money invested, either
your own or somebody else's, or you've got to, I don't want to
say get lucky, but you've got to.
You've got to land that big opportunity.
You know, that big race or that big retail chain, somebody
that's really going to put you on a map.
So in that sense, I'd like it to.

(54:10):
To. Continue growing consistently
slowly, but then should it pop and should we, you know, start
to, you know, really accelerate our growth, then I could see
8/10/12 years from now possibly,you know, selling it, You know,
if somebody wants a sustainable line of endurance sports

(54:32):
apparel, you know, and I don't need to throw any names out
there, but there are folks who are already in that space.
It's sustainability might becomeimportant to them.
But yeah, it could be I guess two different forms of success
or exit. Either we slow grow this and you
know, in 20 years I handed over to to my kids, you know, and
we're not doing it anymore. Or you know, we work really
hard, work really smart, get lucky and eight, 1012 years from

(54:56):
now, you know, we're part of a bigger organization and I go off
and do something else. I'm going to stop working.
Yeah. What?
So with this current endeavor, what's taking up the most mental
bandwidth for you right now? Like, what's something that
you're thinking a lot about thatyou're trying to figure out how
to work through? You know how to go lateral.
You know, we've, you know, we'vebeen primarily triathlon.

(55:16):
For our first three years. Only because that was my sphere
of influence, you know, living in Boulder, working with a lot
of triathletes, getting to know that space.
But as you well know, it's, it's, it's a very, I call
triathlon an inch wide and a mile deep.
You know, depending on who you talk to.
USAT says it, but 1.21.3 milliontriathletes in the United

(55:36):
States, but very deep. I mean, they're, they're, you
don't Dick around when you get into triathlon, you tend to jump
in with both feet, you know, and, and they spend money.
They're tend to be fairly educated, you know, get to know
the sport. Very data-driven.
So it's it's a deep sector, but it's only about that wide.
To really start to grow we need to go a little bit lateral.

(55:59):
So we're starting to move into running, starting to move into
Rd. races. Really starting to see some
traction in ultra and in trail because that's where
sustainability and eco friendly fabrics really matter.
They care a little more about the earth and so they're willing
to spend a little 1015% externalpair of socks.
It's made out of bamboo and recycled nylon.

(56:21):
And then, you know, I think you've worn some of our socks.
We wish I could say we were genius enough to have come up
with a formulation for our, our fabric mix, but it, it was just
pure luck, pure dumb luck. But where it's really played out
is that unique fabric mix has has made for what is arguably A0
blister sock. I can't tell you the number of

(56:43):
Ultra. Runners who bought a pair of
socks didn't necessarily announce themselves as I'm
buying this to go run an ultra. But have later either given us a
review or have actually written in and said, guys, I don't know
what you did, but this is the first sock I have ever worn that
by mile 36 I wasn't bleeding outin my shoes or that I didn't

(57:04):
have to change 6 pairs of socks over the course of that.
You know 60K, you know we've. Gotten really good reports
there. So yeah, we're trying to expand
laterally into running May toward the end of this year.
Looking at spring of 2026, may actually be thinking about some
apparel. You know, some run singlets,
some shorts. But that's a big jump just

(57:26):
because taste and sizes and styles, you have to carry a lot
of skews. It's so much easier to come up
with, you know, 3 or 4 caps and 10 or 12 sock patterns.
It's just easier. To manage those than it is when
you get into apparel. Sizing is just.
That's a possible. Growth area for us and then
where we're really excited is we're just starting to see some
retail interest mostly from LBS's local bike shops who.

(57:50):
Would like to develop their own line of custom socks but have
previously, you know, been precluded from doing so by big
Moqs. Minimum order quantities.
You know, somebody tell them, ohI'll do socks for you, but you
got to order 500 or your local obs didn't didn't know what they
don't know. Maybe they can't afford or don't
want to take a risk on 500 pairsof socks.
So you know, our little 50 unit MOQ is a little more palatable.

(58:14):
So we're starting to see some interest there.
So yeah, a lot of lot of areas in which.
We could expand over the next coming months so.
If you don't mind me asking, what drives the majority of
revenue right now? Is it the direct to consumer
buying directly from the brand of Bamboo Works or the
partnerships that you create to offer that?
Let's change first. You know, 2022 is mostly direct
to consumer. 2023 about 60% D toC, 40% teams. 2024 was about 40%

(58:41):
D to C, about 40% teams and about 20% events.
First, what is it 60-70 days of 2025?
I'm going to say it's about 30% D to C and it's about 30% teams
and it's about 40% events. So it's, it's shifting and I
don't know that that's going to continue, but I think, oh, it's

(59:04):
just, you know, you start to saturate the the, the relatively
narrow segment of something liketriathlon and let's be real.
The triathletes only need so many caps, they only need so
many pairs of socks. And you've already ordered three
or four of our socks. They don't wear out in, you
know, six weeks. So while they may love us,
they're like, dude, I don't, I don't need a 6th and a seventh
pair of socks. So we've got to find areas to

(59:27):
expand and whereas events and teams, because I'm giving you a
custom sock that's no more appealing so.
And with Seth, I've got to pause.
Yeah, no worries. I've got a conference call for.
About the next 15 minutes. I didn't realize we were going
to go for over an hour. Yeah, I have to get running, but
we can pause here and we can definitely do another episode.

(59:50):
OK, yeah, I didn't know if you had to get running as well.
I mean, I've been enjoying chatting, yeah.
Yeah. Only.
Earmarked an hour for us. Yeah, I know.
It's totally fine. We're.
Right in the midst of things andit's like, shit, I hate stopping
right now. It's kind of like a lurching
stop where I didn't intend it. Yeah.
No, no, it's OK. It's totally fine.
We can, we can set up another time here in the next week or
two and and continue the conversation.

(01:00:12):
So it's all good. I would love to, yeah.
Yeah, yeah, I would love to. I've I've so enjoyed it and.
I'm I'm a little frankly, oh, I.Don't want to fluff your skirt
too greatly, but. Don't do it.
I'm impressed, Seth, with the the probing, the depth and the
courtesy with which you you approach some of these things,
sensitive intro, sensitive topics like.

(01:00:34):
Relationships with my father, myfamily, children, divorce,
business failure, successes. You, you have a very genteel or
respectful, courteous way about you.
So I, I love that and it just makes me, honestly, it makes me
want to share more with you. So that's very conducive to good
conversation. Yeah, for sure, man.
Well, I appreciate you saying that.

(01:00:54):
That does mean a lot. And I really enjoy it, getting
to hear the stories and the perspectives.
If there's one thing I've learned that there's a lot of
season for life that I can add to my own experience if I allow
the those who I'm talking with with to speak.
So I, I judge each conversation other than the quality of the
content of, of what people have said.
I look at the split between how much I talked and how much the

(01:01:16):
guest talked. And as long as there's like at
least a three to 1, then I'm like, OK, I'm doing OK, good.
Man, you're doing the right job as a podcast, guys.
For sure. Man, let me know.
I'd love to reconvene at some point, yeah.
We'll make it happen. Thank you so much.
Talk to you about it. See you.
I heart sweet I heart at all yeah it looks like it's similar
day and time but I'll just say really quick for everybody
listening so we we had kind of in things relatively quickly

(01:01:41):
last time so we're hopping back on a little bit time later but
the episode hasn't aired yet so it'll work out perfectly sounds.
Good. Sounds good.
Yeah. And had I done my proper job, I
would have looked at exactly what the last question was.
But I think the next thing I hadon my list was to talk about
China. I know me and you have a little

(01:02:03):
bit different view maybe than the popular opinion through
first hand experience, just the culture of the people and a lot
of those things surrounding. So I won't say too much, but I'd
love to hear like what is your experience and with the people
and in the country of China? Sure.
So as mentioned earlier in the episode, I first traveled to

(01:02:23):
China in 2015 while working withMark Allen was managing his
business affairs at the time. Mark, as you well know is a an
ongoing ambassador for Iron Man.He's also one of the original
master coaches for Iron Man University and as I began to
work with him and began to interact with the team there at

(01:02:45):
Iron Man down in Tampa, got veryclose to them and was given some
inside information as to their plans to be acquired by Wanda.
Simply because that was going topredetermine how Iron Man
University laid out their coursecurriculum for 20/16/2017 and
then any ensuing of. Duties and our obligations that

(01:03:06):
were relegated to more so we began traveling to China, began
setting up the construct for what would be Armin University
China. I attended a couple of their
events. They first had 570 point.
Three races. I think the first event I went
to is in Xiamen, which is a coastal city down in Guangdong.
Of course, I connected through amajor city of being Shanghai.

(01:03:28):
To the point of your question, Seth, it's a little bit mind
blowing. Even as much international
travel as I'd done to that date,I still think I had these
preconceptions, these stereotypes in my mind of maybe
like, you know, students in Maoist Gray uniforms and
marching in lockstep in Tiananmen Square, Shanghai was

(01:03:48):
just like L. AI mean?
The Pudong airport is, you know,one of the largest, busiest in
the world. Caught a shuttle?
Right downtown, met my counterparts.
We immediately went out for Thaifood.
You know, probably 3/4 of the people I saw on the street,
we're not even of Chinese origin.
They were all expats. You heard it's just like walking

(01:04:09):
around London or New York, you're 10 different languages.
It was a mind altering experience for the 1st 2448
hours and then on subsequent trips I started going back three
to four times a year, began to build out my network or what I
prefer to. And earlier as Guangxi, which is
your network of trust and Mandarin, you find the Chinese

(01:04:29):
are just like us. And, and much like today, you
know, depending on whether you're on the right or the left,
you're damn or you're Republican, you either agree or
disagree with your government, but that doesn't change who you
are as an individual. Or as a person, the.
Human. Yeah.
And it was much the same workingwith my Chinese colleagues.
The overwhelming majority of them don't like their own
government. They don't like the
restrictions, I mean. From a philosophical.

(01:04:52):
Standpoint down to and includingyou can't access Google services
in China, can't log on to Gmail unless you've got AVPN, can't
access Facebook, can't access anything to do with Meta.
You know it's all highly restricted.
You have to assume that anythingand everything you do on your
phone is being monitored. Because it is.
It's just a different environment, but suffice it to

(01:05:14):
say, I was pleasantly surprised.And then over the course of the
next, you know, three years, four years of working hand in
hand, both in triathlon and withIronman and then subsequently
with manufacturers down in, you know, Southern Province, just
developed some lifelong friendships.
I actually plan to go back in September and re single some of

(01:05:34):
these I've not been since 2019. So I'm quite excited to see
everybody. Yeah.
Same for me, yeah. Yeah.
So, yeah, I, I, I love China, vehemently disagree with their
government, agree in many senseswith what we're doing as an
administration. I think the trade imbalance has
has been out of whack for some time.

(01:05:55):
Don't necessarily agree with howit's been rectified, but I do
think there's a problem. And I think, you know, in the
long term, hopefully these things are going to reach an
equilibrium. Yeah, Regardless of whether it's
US, the EU, China, Canada, Mexico, maybe reach an
equilibrium because I like doingbusiness with my partners there,
so, yeah. 100%, yeah. And just to piggyback off what

(01:06:15):
you were saying really quick, because I don't get to talk
about this as much, but I, I really when I first started my
own small business here in the US tried finding manufacturing
in the US anywhere I could, preferably in the East Coast,
obviously because that's where Iwas from.
But after talking with several, several different contract
manufacturers who had done even business with, you know,

(01:06:38):
companies like Under Armour, I ended up settling on one company
I was going to work with that was based in Dunlop, Tennessee.
Precision Aerodynamics, I think was the name of the company and
they made high end parachuting equipment and parachute
backpacks and systems for the American military and the Saudi
Arabian military. And I thought, well, surely this

(01:06:58):
would be, you know, able to be figured out because it's a lot
of parachute nylon, similar, similar fabrics and zippers.
And you know, anything else you might need webbing.
And I don't know, I guess that that business was just on the
way down. But Long story short, I ended up
having to completely rid myself of that relationship because I
gave them enough materials to make 6 units, 3 of each type,

(01:07:20):
and they had how to Kickstarter and I already had people's money
at that point. I was like, I need to make these
things. And I showed up one day hoping
to pick up the golden sample andlike say, hey, this is the
production ready version, we're going to go with it.
And then they had destroyed someof our materials with their
laser machines. And then they were like refusing
to give me my stuff back. And I had to get a lawyer
involved and ended up similar. Like I was like, well, these

(01:07:42):
guys in Asia had been reaching out to me in China.
And I was like, I guess I calledhim up and I was like, hey,
yeah, like, let's give it a shot.
I'm going to buy some plane tickets and I'm going to go see
several different factories. And from the moment I stepped
out of the plane, someone came to pick me up and they drove me
to their factory with their family, put me up and we ate

(01:08:04):
like, and I we drove it to Hefei, China, which was like
more of a more of a country at ish town.
And as we were riding in this Volkswagen, you know, out into
the middle of nowhere, I was like, well, if, if they want to
take my phone and completely kidnapped me, like I remember
thinking like, I am so exhausted.
I don't know this person from Adam.
And if they want to hold me for ransom, it's going to be really

(01:08:25):
easy to do it and no one's goingto know how to get to me.
But I ended up being like one ofthe most profoundly life
changing experiences ever just because of like you're talking
about that Guangxi, the the friendship, the long term
mindset that they had really blew me away because I wasn't
going to bring them a lot of commercial success, at least not
for a very long time and ended up not, but they still are my
friends to this day. And work with me in other

(01:08:47):
projects and are just, yeah, just long term visioned in a way
that I'd never experienced before.
And just the beauty of the people, the beauty of the
country itself. Topographically, it was just an
amazing experience. So yeah.
And I'll just say one last thingthat blew me away was finding
skilled labor in the US and finding skilled labor.

(01:09:08):
Really. Anywhere else is really.
It's difficult to do in the US versus anywhere else because
just a lot of the techniques, ifyou push, if you're just sewing
a simple lines of fabric, you know, you do that 100,000 times
whatever the level of skill there versus what exists over
here. And the speed is just like night
and day. So yeah, I love the Chinese,

(01:09:31):
don't love a lot of the obviously the governmental
regulations, but. People are people, yeah.
Same with me and and you know, just to to not pile on but or
overly elaborate. You touched on a point there,
Seth, that I actually first learned when.
Dealing with the. Japanese in the 90s, I can
remember the software company for whom I was working.

(01:09:52):
We were setting up distribution relationships and, you know,
they were, you know, very hierarchical society, more in
Japan than in China, where it's more of, you know.
A. Plateau, but it was really
interesting as we were talking about our companies and you know
the history of our companies. I think I was either meeting

(01:10:12):
with Nikon or Fujitsu or Olympus, somebody like that, you
know, and our company at the time was like 8 years old.
Their company was like 340 something years old and and we
were talking about our three-year business plan and
they got this funny smile on their face and and I said, you
know Shing say son, what, why are you smiling?

(01:10:33):
And you're very demure, very polite.
But they said, Larry, we don't think in terms of three-year
plans. We think in terms of 100 year
business plans. And I've had similar
conversations in China where they're like, Larry, we're a
4000 year old society, we can't afford to only plan for three
years. We.
Have to plan for decades, if notfor centuries.
And and interestingly, that filters down into how they do

(01:10:56):
business. They really do focus on the long
term and you have to work to build that initial trust.
But once you've got it and you work to maintain it, it bears
fruit. And and so to your point, I love
doing business with the Chinese.Never mind the fact that, you
know, the majority of the world's bamboo viscous fiber is
made in, in China. It would make no sense for me to

(01:11:17):
go to India or Pakistan or even Vietnam, much less the United
States and try to work with a bamboo fabric provider.
It just. It wouldn't make sense business
wise so. Yeah, yeah, it's a beautiful
relationship. So talk to me a little bit then
or a lot of bit about how you decided that Bamboo works with
something that you were going tojump into and the company that
you're now running now today, yeah.

(01:11:39):
Sure. So I'll give you the the back
story, I'll give you, you know, the initial early stages and
I'll give you kind of where we're at today.
So as discussed started making some of these manufacturing
relationships in in Guangdong, which is the southern province
of China. Many of you may have heard of
Shenzhen, which is, you know, one of the larger tax free
manufacturing zones. Well, all along.

(01:11:59):
That coastal belt there are a variety of different zones.
The one where the most enduranceapparel made is in Xiao Man,
which is a coastal city. Met 3 or 4 manufacturers there.
Our initial goal back in 2019 was to actually develop an eco
friendly kit, triathlon kit because I was employed by a

(01:12:20):
nutrition firm in Boulder calledBase Performance.
You may know them, they do salt.They were the official on course
salt provider for Ironman for years and years and years.
Matt Miller and his wife Laura Lee did an incredible job of
building that company. I was charged with helping them,
well kind of, you know, their operations, finances, things of
that nature. So I was given insight into all
lines of their business. What many people may not know is

(01:12:41):
outside of nutrition base manufacturers quite a number of
custom kits for other triathlonsteams.
I think at our peak we did kit for a little over 140, maybe 145
teams. So I've got to see all of the
sausage making that went into designing, producing and
distributing custom triathlon kits.
Well, to my chagrin, what I quickly learned after a year of

(01:13:04):
doing that is that every year asa team's sponsors change, their
logos change, maybe even their color, their branding, their,
their, their, their identity, corporate identity changes, they
have to do a new kit. Well, those kits are made out of
latex, spandex, nylon, elastane,things that are not
biodegradable. And so literally 10s if not

(01:13:25):
hundreds if not millions of pieces of man made material are
going in landfills every year. And that made me sick.
I'm just, I'm green behind the ears.
My kids call me a recycle Nazi. I just can't stand the idea of
stuff going into the landfill. So our original goal was to
develop an eco from the kit. However, in researching it, what
we quickly found out was that natural fibers, cotton, wool,

(01:13:48):
bamboo, silk, you cannot sublimate onto those.
And for those of you who don't know what sublimation is, every
piece of custom endurance apparel that you buy that's got
a fancy design or multi colors is likely sublimated.
It starts out as white fabric. They then print out these
massive sheets of, you know, multi colored gradient colored

(01:14:09):
fancy design patterns. They're then overlaid on top of
the white fabric. They go through a heat press at
over 670°. The man made fibers expand.
The ink sits in when it cools, it's now permafast so the ink
will not fade or or leach out. They're then cut with lasers.
They're then put through those massive sewing processes that

(01:14:31):
you mentioned earlier and on theother end, comes out of jersey
or comes out of cycling or a triathlon bib or comes out of
one piece or comes out a runningsink, let you know whatever it
is that you're wearing is a perathlete runner cyclist was
probably sublimated. You can't do that with natural
fabric. And as we then got into, you
know, natural fabrics quickly discovered that while wool, silk

(01:14:53):
and cotton are highly esteemed for their quote UN quote organic
properties, they're really not that eco friendly.
Cotton requires an enormous amount of water to grow and I
don't care what organic label they slap on it, 99% of it
requires pesticide. It's just not cost efficient to
do it otherwise. So it's kind of a greenwashed.

(01:15:16):
It's the term in the industry they use when it ordered to be
sustainable and eco friendly, but it's really not.
Well, along the way, as we beganto work with these
manufacturers, one of them suggested bamboo.
I knew very little about bamboo other than that people have
sheets and towels made out of bamboo.
I didn't know why, but bamboo possesses 3 very interesting
qualities. One, it's basically a weed.

(01:15:37):
Any of you who've lived along the South, southeastern or even
parts of the southwestern California coast, you get bamboo
in your yard and you know it's practically get rid, impossible
to get rid of. It's a it's a weed.
It requires very little water togrow.
It has a natural substance in the bark called Kuhn Kuhn, which
is like a natural pesticide so that bugs don't eat the bamboo

(01:15:58):
stalks. Well, in the manufacturing
process, if you process the viscous fiber correctly, it
maintains those same antimicrobial properties, which
in a sense prevents bacteria from growing within bamboo.
I see you're wearing a sweatshirt you've got on the
cap. You're an endurance athlete.
We all know what a funky smelling shirt smells like, what

(01:16:19):
a nasty ass cap smells like, what a bad pair of socks smells
like. That's not because you're
necessarily unhygienic. It's because when you sweat, our
body secrets a substance called sebum, which is that oily
substance which after you've done a hard run, you wipe your
forehead. It's not just wet, it feels
oily. That's sebum.
Well, bacteria eats sebum. So when sebum gets into your

(01:16:41):
cotton shirt or your man made fiber shirt, bacteria starts
eating it. And as gross as it sounds, when
they poop, that's what you smell.
It's just like yeast in homemadebread or beer.
And just like with yeast, you can go down to the store and you
can buy dry powdered yeast, which is basically inactive.
As soon as it gets warm and has moisture applied, it comes back
to life. Same thing with bacteria.

(01:17:04):
So you can wash that shirt in ashot of water as you want.
You can bleach it if it's white.You're not going to kill that
bacteria. You're basically going to put it
in the stasis. You pop that shirt on, you work
out in it, they come back to life and it starts stinking.
Bamboo won't do that because of its antimicrobial nature.
The second benefit is it it's naturally hypoallergenic.
So for those who possess skin problems like eczema or maybe

(01:17:28):
they have a sensitivity to man made materials, bamboo is
fantastic. That's when we use it in our cap
liners, we use it in our headbands, we use it in our
beanies. We even have a young lady off
the West Coast who is a going tobe a future Olympian.
She's a badass track athlete, but she has massive problems
with eczema, so ours are the only socks that she can wear.
So Long story short, we found bamboo wonder fabric, decided to

(01:17:52):
start producing things, had a business plan, had all of our
manufacturing lined up, had our tech packs.
You know what a tech pack is. Having done backpacks, had our
tech packs in place, we were allset to go.
We were going to launch on March1st of 2020.
Well you and I both know what happened. 2020 COVID hit it.
Was roaring through China even before then.

(01:18:12):
Yep. Yep, it shut the gates.
We could no longer get product out of China.
Nobody was training, nobody was racing, so nobody wanted socks
or headbands or beanies or caps.So we sat on our heels and kind
of bitched and moaned for three or four months.
And then my best friend, who's avery bright business guy said,
Larry, let's make some lemon lemonade out of these limits.

(01:18:35):
If bamboo really is the the wonder fabric that you say it
is, it's antimicrobial, it's hypoallergenic.
Why don't we make face masks? So we got a tech pack designer
to put together a face mask template, got it over to our
manufacturers. They banged out some samples.
Within six months, we were shipping face masks.
So we shipped face masks for theentire second-half of 2020, all
of 2021. Actually had a great little

(01:18:57):
business going until the mask mandate dropped.
Quickly round up with about $30,000 worth of unused mask
inventory, which is a whole nother story.
Yeah, I've. Been there, but.
In April of 2021, when the gatesopened back up, we were able to
start shipping headbands and then we started shipping socks,
caps, beanies, buffs, so on and so on.

(01:19:20):
So most of 2021, latter half of 2021-2022, we served the market
on AD to C basis, a direct consumer basis, onesie twosies.
An athlete found out about us said I want to try your socks,
bought a pair of socks, I boughta cap, bought a beanie, bought a
headband. During that time, you may recall
from earlier, we moved to Saint George, moved our business along

(01:19:42):
with us latter part of 2022, early 2023, we had teams start
reaching out to us. I think one of the first teams
that ever reached out to us was Julie Dibbens crew, JD Crew.
Katie, who manages their team, said, hey, one of my athletes
went up with a pair of your socks.
She really likes them. Could you do a custom run of
socks for us at JD Crew? We did.

(01:20:03):
And then I think from there we did a run of socks for base
performance and then we did a run of socks for Morni.
Try Morni, Morni Symbol. She runs a fantastic crew out of
Carolinas. And then it just grew and it
grew and it grew. So a lot of 2023 was spent
focusing on team sales. 2024 We began to get increase from event

(01:20:25):
directors. Hey, I'm hosting a little Sprint
triathlon. I'm doing a little Olympic in
six weeks, or hey, I've got a 5KI'm doing.
Could you do a run of custom ankle socks for us?
Or could you do a bunch of headbands for my foundation?
So 2024 we started moving into the event space when we wrapped
up. 2024, just looking at the picture on the whole for Bamboo

(01:20:45):
Works, about 35, 40% of our sales were still on a direct to
consumer basis. Another 30% or so were teams and
then another 25% were events. As we're moving into 2025, we're
seeing those statistics pretty much hold true. 3035% direct
consumer, pretty much equally split between teams and events.

(01:21:08):
And here in the last three weeks, we've actually begun
reaching out to both running stores and local bike shops
because many of them would love a run of custom socks for
themselves. But they're often chagrined to
find out that a lot of the MO Q's, the minimum order
quantities are anywhere from 300to 500 units.
Well, you're running a small bike shop or a small mom and pop

(01:21:30):
run shop. Probably can't afford to drop.
Coin on 500 pairs of socks, that's that socks enough for
three years. So we've only got a 50 unit MOQ.
We give them Keystone pricing, which is half off of our $18.00
custom stock price. So we're starting to see some
early traction with LBS is in with local run shops.
So knock on wood, hopefully 2025will be for the advent of retail

(01:21:52):
and then heaven knows what 2026 will look like.
Yeah, for sure. So what is from this business
perspective like what is taking the most mental bandwidth for
you and a lot of the attention and focus right now?
I love your question, Seth. Mental bandwidth.
The bulk of that is spent on howto acquire new eyeballs.

(01:22:14):
You know, you go back to marketing one O 1 from our
college days, the three PS product prize promotion.
We just know after 3 1/2 years of business, we got a Dang good
product. Our socks may not be Rafa level,
but they're Dang good. Our caps may not say melon on
the side, but they're Dang good.Our beanies may not say
Patagonia or North Face or Lululemon, but they're Dang

(01:22:36):
good. We'll put our headbands up
against anybody. We kick everybody's ass.
My wife likes loves them a lot, by the way.
Actually, she's been using a couple of them.
They really rock. I mean the bamboo inner layer,
clinical outer layer, they just rock.
So I know we got a good product.I've done all the elasticity
modeling around pricing. I know we're competitively
priced. We're anywhere from 20,
sometimes 25% less expensive than the category later.

(01:22:58):
You know, Rafa sells socks for 24, we sell ours for 16.
North Face Patagonia, they sell beanies for 48, we sell ours for
26. So I know we're competitively
priced. We're I'm spending a lot of
mental cycles right now and you know, 2:33 AM type research
stuff is around promotion. How do we get our products in

(01:23:19):
front of more eyeballs? You know, we've tried
traditional advertising, we've tried Google Adwords, we've
tried Meta, Facebook, Instagram ads.
Candidly, we can't outspend Bombas, we can't outspend Defeat
or Belaga. I mean, those are $100 million,
three, $100 million strong companies.
They're always going to outspendus for, you know, ad views.

(01:23:40):
So we can't really compete there.
E-mail marketing is pretty effective, but when you've only
got a limited database of peoplewho bought.
From you in the past, you know. 8586 hundred.
You can only go back to the tillso often.
You know, I, I feel like our folks are saying, Larry, shit, I
already have 3 pairs of your socks.
I don't, I don't need 456. So bottom line, we got to find a

(01:24:02):
way to get in front of more eyeballs.
So, you know, we're, we're coming up with some pretty
innovative campaigns. Give you a little sneak peek
here. In about 3 weeks, we're going to
introduce a gift sock campaign where for $10 you can send a
pair of our socks to a friend, family member, fellow runner,
fellow triathlete, fellow cyclist.
That'll include not only the sock, but the shipping.

(01:24:24):
And we're going to just like Amazon, we're going to include
the little ability to put in a little gift message.
Hey, Seth, thought you would like these socks.
Hope you like them. Love Larry.
And it's just going to show up on Seth's doorstep.
It's going to have a nice littlenote from Larry.
Hopefully they'll like the sock.And if they like it, there'll be
a little QR code on there. Maybe they'll come back and buy
some more socks from us. So you're using this as a like a
marketing tool then instead of necessarily spending ads?

(01:24:45):
It's like just it's more guerrilla marketing.
Yeah, I like it. And I don't mind telling you we,
we will lose on each one of those $10 pairs of socks, we'll
lose somewhere around 40 cents, $0.45, maybe 50.
When you look at the cost of oursocks, you know they landed.
And I'll just be transparent. I love transparent modeling
apparel socks. By the time it gets to US,

(01:25:06):
designed, produced, shipped customs, paid.
By the time it gets to us, depending on whether it's an
ankle sock or a crew sock, cost us somewhere around 6 bucks,
62625. You know, we sell them for 16.
The old model is multiply your cost by three.
So we should be selling them fora little over 18, but I just

(01:25:27):
don't think the market will bear18.
So we sell them for 16, which leaves us about $10 to market,
keep our light bills on, pay ourown cost.
So yeah, to ship out a pair of socks, because our shipping cost
anywhere from 4 to $6 depending on where you're at in the
country. So we're going to lose 40-50
cents for every gift pair of socks, but we think that's a

(01:25:49):
worthwhile expenditure to get infront of a new set of eyeballs.
Yeah, for sure. Super interesting.
So when you're going to China inSeptember, what are your goals
for going other than? I mean, I mean, it's a big goal
to connect relationally, but do you have other goals as well for
going? Yeah, we are are again love your
questions. Three goals in mind.
One, we want to connect with some of our new manufacturers

(01:26:10):
folks that we've not actually physically met and or spent time
with. So we've got three or four days
planned in Shanghai, then we're going to travel bullet train
down to Shenzhen manufacturers there.
Oh yeah, I love, love it. And then secondly, I've got
some, just some really good friends in both Shanghai and
Shenzhen. Gunning Peter Volkovitz is

(01:26:32):
arguably the fastest age grouperin China.
Peter's like 3435. He's thrown down an 850
something in Kona. He's wickedly fast.
And then my business partner in China lives in Shenzhen, Guy
named Rocky, It's Rocky with whom I've worked on a bunch of
events, taking the pros over in 2018-2019.
So just grab dinner with those guys, maybe put back a whiskey

(01:26:52):
or two with Rocky. He likes to drink.
And then third goal will be to actually we've got some meetings
with some folks who may want to help us launch Bamboo Works
China, you know, being as the products are already made there.
It's a massive market too. It is, and they're more and more
seem to be getting into the outdoor athleisure space.
Exactly. So we're going to, we're just

(01:27:13):
going to, you know, make some initial context, just get the
dialogue going. You know, as you know, those
things take 6/12/18 months to kind of foment and and germinate
or just 8. But that's that's going to be
we're going to be laying the. Groundwork for that in
September, yeah. So let me ask you this then on
the innovation front, bamboo is obviously the fiber that you are
are most attracted to. Are there any other new and up

(01:27:36):
and coming innovative fiber technologies that you are
looking at that you may be interested in?
Yes and no. The kind of the next step for us
will probably be alternate uses of bamboo.
One of the products we're working at is, is a bamboo micro
fiber towel. You know, and for lack of a

(01:27:56):
better description, we're going to call it the transition towel.
So you know, basically you get out of the swim, got to dry your
body off real quick, dry your feet up before you throw in your
cycling cleats. It'll be a little 24 by 36 towel
that you can use for that. It'll dual purpose for when
you're on your trainer, you knowyou're doing your swift ride,
you know got 3 hours on the trainer, you're sweating like a
pig that. That towel will work.

(01:28:18):
For that and then if we set it up right, it will be such that
we can logo them up with team logos.
So you know, we'll probably get some really basic colors like a
charcoal Gray, you know, maybe a, you know, some type of light
earth tone. So they don't go with a variety
of team or event color. So that'll be another
opportunity for us. The only other fabric we thought

(01:28:39):
about is a it's a fabric called tinsel, which is also a
derivative of a natural or fiber, natural plant fiber.
It while it doesn't possess the antimicrobial capabilities of
bamboo, it does possess the samehypoallergenics.
So we're actually looking at anddon't hold me to this, but
probably end of Q2, first of Q3,we're looking at maybe expanding

(01:29:02):
into some run apparel. We might do like a little run
singlet, maybe even some run shorts and shorts are tough
because they all shapes and sizes.
Singlets will be easier, but we're going to start.
Looking at some run apparel, just because as a triathlete,
you know you're not always wearing your kit, you know
you're not always wearing your swimsuit, you're out doing a
run. So we're going to try to move
into that because we think bamboo and or possibly tinsel

(01:29:24):
would play well in that as. Yeah, that's a super exciting, I
am not to say too much in the podcast, but I've been looking
at doing some contract work hererecently and it may take me to
hopefully getting back over to China and Italy in some of these
places. So I've, I've been geeking out
about it. I've been removed from the
industry for a number of years and, you know, just trying to
get familiar, remind myself all of all the terms with fabric

(01:29:46):
denier and warp and WEF counts and all this different stuff.
And I'm like, I mean, I got to get back into this game and I'm
I'm excited to get over there because I want to figure out
who's the crazies doing experiments on different types
of nano tube fabric or whatever it is.
Like just figuring out the newest of the new stuff and try
to push the boundaries. That's what I'm excited about
South. Be cool to see how you continue
to grow in that innovative spaceas well.

(01:30:08):
Yeah. Well, we'll do a dump when I get
back in September and I'll give you not only a list of anything
you have discovered, but my contacts and I don't know, I'm
assuming are you on WeChat or? Yeah, yeah, it's crazy.
I can't get any of my friends onWeChat now, at least the last
time I tried. It's like impossible, so I'll
send. You my my QR code and my ID, so
we'll connect over that and thatway I can just facilitate

(01:30:29):
introductions. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Oh, likewise, man. Yeah, it'd be super cool.
Yeah. I look forward to going back.
My my visa was a 10 year visa and the first time I went, I
think it was in 2017. So I've got a few more years
left with. Me as far as the end of
27/20/27. We got to, we got to meet up
over there, then go check it out.
There's some we got to go. I want to go over there just to
do some like training at some point because there's so many
beautiful different types of places to go and visit that are

(01:30:52):
just absolutely gorgeous that don't get ready.
Let me know and I'll, I will hook you up with with three or
four folks that will show you the nooks and crannies of pretty
much this. This guy, Peter, he's lived in
China for 11 years. He's fluent in Mandarin, you
know, blonde haired, blue eyed guy.
It's literally it's, it's hilarious to get into a taxi
with him because most taxes are when they see two Caucasians get

(01:31:16):
in, they expect us to whip out our phone with like Google
Translate or something. Well, Peter just starts talking
to him in Chinese and it literally does not register on
their face. They it's like the wheels.
And. Then their their eyes get really
wide because his Chinese is really good.
And. Then when he starts joking with

(01:31:36):
them, he hears their accent. He knows from what part of China
they are, and then he starts making a colloquial joke.
Then they go crazy. Yeah.
Yeah, yeah, I'm sure. Hold.
Up. We got to get to our
destination. Long for a short.
I'll introduce you to Peter. He's raced everywhere, you know,
Tibet, Nepal, China, Kazakhstan.He'll hook you up.
Yeah, that's awesome, man. Well, I appreciate it for sure.

(01:31:59):
Well, sweet man. Well, thanks for taking another
30 minutes to kind of wrap up and and hear a little bit more
about what's going on. I'd love to have you on again.
But yeah, what you're doing is is neat.
I guess I'll just because we already kind of worked this out,
we're going to have some stupid questions socks made and
appreciate you working with me on that.
Yeah. So it'll be fun to push those
out and hopefully give you some more customers.
That sounds great, Seth. Thank you so much for the time,

(01:32:20):
man. I've enjoyed it, and sorry that
I tend to dominate our ramble onand on.
Now that's the point of this. I measure the success of each
podcast by the infrequency of mytalking.
So. Yeah, you did a great job.
Good. Thanks, man.
I appreciate it. Thank you so much to Larry for
coming on the pod and sharing from such a vulnerable and
beautiful place. Really appreciate the time that
we got to spend together and diving into a lot of overlap and

(01:32:44):
values and the manufacturing experiences that we both have
had in Asia was a special thing as well because I love the
Chinese as you guys know. So thank you so much to Larry
for coming on and sharing in theway that he did.
If you want to check out any of their products, you can do so at
the link of the description. Also, like I said, we're going
to be releasing some socks here soon.

(01:33:04):
If those come by the time we release this podcast, I will
link that in the show notes as well, but it may be a few weeks
after that. If you made to this point the
podcast, thank you so much. Really appreciate you being
here. If you are watching or listening
on YouTube, if you could like comment, subscribe, hit the
notification bell. That helps to continue to grow
this podcast. And if you are listening on
Spotify or Apple Podcasts, if you could also like review,
comment, leave any of that feedback that really does

(01:33:27):
continue to help grow this podcast.
Check out the show notes for allthe stuffs if you want to sign
up for the newsletter. And yeah, thank you guys for
being here. We'll catch you in the next one.
Peace.

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Episode #134 - Larry Upton, Founder of bambū werx

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Episode #134 - Larry Upton, Founder of bambū werx