August 29, 2025 • 27 mins
In this episode of Touchstone Talks, we sit down with Cosmo to explore his journey transitioning out of his business, 4All Promos. With Touchstone’s guidance, Cosmo found the right partnership to grow his company while giving him the freedom to move into what he calls “pretirement.” The conversation dives into lessons learned as a business owner, the challenges of letting go, and the exciting opportunities that come with redefining retirement.
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(00:00):
and they're utilizing some AI technology.
I know that's an overused.
It is it is used a lot these days.
I don't want to overuse it,but I do think, well,
you guys were kind of on the crux of thatanyway.
We were using the latest technology,and it was funny because when we closed,
it seemed like that's when I exploded.
(00:20):
That's true.
It was almost exactly right after.
That's true.
So in one way, we're happybecause you didn't have to do that.
Got one level of technology.
But but everyone is using it,I don't know.
Yeah, we see it.
Results.
You now have the AI the wholethe whole. Yep.
They summarized all the search. Yeah.
It's getting better every day,
(00:45):
but it's probably not perfect rightnow. And I sort of
had some results where I scratch my headand said, this doesn't work.
Why is this here?
Yeah.
But, but yeah.
So that's a very good.
That's good.
Everything seems to be going well.
Excellent, excellent. Okay.
So if you're just joining us, we'resitting here with, Cosmo, who is joining
Touchstone Talks today to talk abouthis Experian exiting, for our promos.
(01:18):
He's a client with touchstone,
and we worked with himto find a partnership to take his business
to the next leveland let him head off to retirement.
I still hate that word.
So I heard a great word.
And you tell me if you likethis one better.
It's called pre-retirement.
(01:38):
Okay.
So younger. It is. It does.
The idea is that it's not
sitting on your couch all day. It's.
It's before that, it's the.
What did I not get to do thatI want to do now?
Marty.
And that was my one of my concerns.
(01:58):
We're going to see if we're going to befree to do whatever we wanted every day.
And in the first week or two, I'll tellanyone is just chaotic.
You're nervous, you don't know what to do.
So just just go with it and stay busy.
But eventually the dust settlesand you kind of find
a rhythm, and it's a different rhythmthan working every day.
But you find what that rhythm needs to be.
(02:18):
And I agree,you need to have stuff to do. Yeah.
It can't just be getting up,doing exercises
and then maybe reading a bookand yeah, made a point not to read
too many books because I could go 3or 4 hours a day with the book.
Okay. And sitting out on a couch.
So, you know, I tried not to do that,at least not during the day.
(02:39):
Okay, okay. That's a good circle.
Yeah, I
was sitting at a,
showcase, and there was a panel, and,the gentleman that was speaking
was, retirement coach, and he goes,I don't like the word retirement.
And I'm like,
I don't like the word retirement either.
So. So.
Right, right.
(03:01):
Well, I think about,
you know, long walks on the beachand twiddling your thumbs, right?
Like, that's that's what hits my head.
So many times.
Exactly, exactly.
And I think volunteeringis a big part of it and.
Your time with your family and traveling.
Yeah.
Those are all the kind of thingsthat we've tried to
do as we have more free time.
(03:22):
Yeah I get that, I get that the the panelists that were there,
one of them was in Divinity school
and one of them had
started a nonprofit,and one of them had written three books.
So considerations for Other Waysto include Books.
I was like, that is not my definition.
That is, that is a more realistic view on
(03:43):
what would likely happenif I were to exit my job.
I, I don't think you'd want to readany books that I write.
I'm not.
I'm not a writer, but I have.
My wife is terrific at it.
But but for me, I would always sort ofjoke my would you are all bullet points.
Very clear, very concise,but technical writing
is an entire field, honestly.
(04:07):
So so if you ever get really important,
you can gowrite some instruction manuals for us.
But it's good to have a list.
So. So that's, you know, that's.
I guess that's important.
If you only honestly took a couple weeksto get a new rhythm, I think you did it
quite well.
Yeah.Maybe it's more like a month or two.
(04:28):
I think what I like,and I always tell the story,
I think a week or two after we soldin the dust, it kind of started to settle,
and we weren't going to the officethat much is what I sort of
would come down and say, okay,what am I going to do today?
So I, I need to fill my day.
So my, my wife has, a theaterproduction company, and she had a website
(04:48):
that's been sitting there for ten years.
And I said, oh,it's time to give her a new website.
So I spent the next month.
There you go.
Working on a new website,including some video
from past performances and and every dayI'd go down there like a job.
Yeah.
And so once I got that out of my system,I could sort of let go and sort of,
you know, ease into it. Yeah.
(05:09):
That was your retirement plan.
I would say check the box.
Exactly.
Excellent.
Well, let's rewind time a little bit.
A lot of our viewersare going to be business owners
who are going to be in the same spotthat you were.
Worried aboutwhat does retirement look like?
But still going.
Okay, well, but maybe I do want to exit.
(05:32):
So what made youdecide it was time to exit?
So I think it's a process.
I don't think it's any one data point.
And and,
I own four hour promos with the, partnerTim Raymond.
And Tim,
had a clearer mindabout wanting to retire,
(05:54):
and I teased him a lot about itahead of a tease.
Well, we teased him during it and we.
Exactly.
But it was helpful for me.
I think I needed that little nudge okay.
So that it was timeand we started early as you remember.
Yep. Pre-COVID.
(06:16):
Right.
Had initial conversationswith with with you and Jeff
Ridge and
once Covid hit we had to sort ofput it on the back burner.
Right.
So we have had a lot of timeto sort of process it.
And I think for me,
along with Tim's help,I came to the realization
(06:36):
that there's certainlya lot of growth left in for our promos.
But I didn't have thethe fire in the belly
as they used to seemto want to bring it there.
Okay.
And once I realized that,I knew it was in the best interest
of everybody to step asideand have someone else do it.
And and so,
(06:58):
a year and a half later, sitting here,it's very clear to me going through it.
It's not at all. It's fuzzy.
Okay.
Where your second guessing, dayswhere you want to backtrack.
But but I think overall, the factthat I knew I didn't
have the same desire that I had ten yearsearlier.
Made it clear that, you know,I had to step aside and that was a good.
(07:20):
Yeah. Well, and you guys
bought the company
which is something elsethat, you know, we work with people on.
That's kind of an unusual situation.
How did that process.
So that was probably closeto 20 years ago, right
when we found ourselves, wanting to run another business
and we stumbledupon the e-commerce sector.
(07:45):
And so that's probably 2004, 2005.
It's still relatively new.
Google is still Google,but it's not the Google that it is today.
And so we kept looking for e-commercecompanies and,
and we eventually stumbled on one,within the promotional products industry.
We knew nothing about the productsindustry, but we liked e-commerce
(08:08):
and so we bought a smallwe sort of say a show of a company.
It wasn't named for all promos.
It had a website that was very clunkyand we really got into the
innards of it.
It really wasn't e-commerce,
but that was okay with usbecause it gave us the, the framework.
(08:28):
The network of suppliers.
Right.
We immediately got introducedinto the industry.
That probably would have taken a couple ofyears for us to figure out on their own.
And then within a year, about a year,
we launched for all promos and
started on pay per click
and that's, that's another sort of,
(08:50):
yeah, story that was somewhat random,
not planned out, but,you know, pay per click was random for us.
Really, we started for our promos thinkingthat we were going to, have a catalog,
full 20 page catalog and do direct mail.
Okay.
And so we were workingon developing the catalog at the same time
(09:14):
that we started pay per click,because we were certainly aware of it. And
over time.
And not a long period of timemaybe a couple of months.
We realized the economics of paper
were so much better than, than catalogmailings,
printing, mailing postage,the response rates, the lack of control.
(09:35):
So we never even got the first catalogoff the ground.
We just shelved it.
Oh okay.
Pay per click.
And I can remember the first monthwhere it was,
all in on pay per click, I forget exactly.
I do know how much we spent,but the results were disastrous.
Oh. Oh, no.
(09:56):
No. Okay. Trial and error.
You know, as the months unfolded,we got smarter and better, and.
And we just stuck to it.
You know, and I think that's for me,I think if I can give anyone any advice,
if you're starting a company orif you're in an entrepreneurial situation,
just never give up.
Just keep you know, don't listento other people if you think you're right.
(10:16):
Make your changes.
But just keep at it.
Just just never give up.
That's that's excellent. Yeah.
So that's how it started.
Yeah.
And and, you know, we had a lot of,
input, both requestedand not requested for us.
The in the industry 20 years ago.
(10:39):
There was a lot of talkabout the e-commerce companies,
of which we were one,
just not not sustainable,
the industrynot sustainable because the industry,
some folks within the industry,20 years ago, thought that,
you had to meet with your customersface to face.
(10:59):
You had to show them the merchandise and,
touch, feel and feel and,and the e-commerce
sectorwas just never going to be successful.
We said, okay, but we stayed on our way.
We did.
And then once we were,
we got our feet on the ground and we were,we saw some success.
(11:20):
We heard from everyone in the e-commercespace.
Don't build your companyjust on pay per click.
You know build it onmultiple fact factors.
It makes perfect sense right.
Right. Diversification.
It's everybody's right.Everybody wants you to diversify.
And and ultimately we got there.
But we took a lot longer than I thinkanyone would have recommended
(11:43):
we takebecause we were in complete control of it.
Yeah.
We could decide how much to spend.
And we got results every day.
And we were able to reacton those results.
And, and for us in those early days
where cash wasn't in abundance.
We had to be sure that whatever we weregoing to invest in, we needed to pay back.
(12:06):
And when we looked at our organic traffic,
it's a much more long term view.
Okay. So we didn't have the luxury.
No. You need somebody ready to buy.
Yes. So?
So initially wewe stuck with pay per click.
We did not diversify.
But then over the years.
Yeah.
(12:27):
Well, I remember we'd already startedtalking when you started doing the email.
Email?
Yeah. Email marketing. You were.
That was relatively new.
And you were talking to new companies.
And that was which I guessis kind of an important thing
to think about, that I don't know thatall of our owners think about.
Right.
Even though you're planning to sell,and it doesn't mean you stop growing.
(12:52):
Right.
Like you can't just I'm going to sell now.
So now I can, you know,not worry about those anymore.
You have to. Correct.
Correct.
We we felt it when Tim and Iwould be sitting there in the middle.
And knowing that,you know, the year before we went out into
the marketwas the, everyone's going to look at
(13:12):
and suddenly we lookTim and I looked at each item.
So for 15 years
you know we didn't worry about itas much as we're worrying about it now.
Yeah.
Because if we missed,
it was just Tim and I missing and we said,okay, we'll do better next year.
But now it was important to us. Yeah.
And and so yeah.
No absolutely I thinkand unfortunately it's going
to be the most stressful as yougo just before you go.
(13:36):
Right.
I mean oh absolutely.
Every month. Where's your team.
What does he Tim. Now.
What's our team forecast. Yeah.
Was good.
And then you worry.
At least we did.
We were very conscious of what we saidbecause we didn't want to.
We don't want to over promise.And we didn't want to.
We wanted to be as realistic as possible,without hurting ourselves.
(13:59):
Right? Right.
It is a balance through.
And as you may recall, we were goingthrough tremendous growth in that year.
Yeah.
Selling, which was great.
On the front end.
But we've had a lot of it's right.
Couldn't handle all the orders coming in.
(14:20):
And then we couldn'tget back to the customers.
Something that was always so importantto us was making sure
that the customer was happyand that you got the answers right away.
Suddenly we were we were in this situationwhere we couldn't
sustain the customer levelsthat we wanted to.
And so yeah, but that wasthat was a reality.
And we owned up to it.
Oh yeah. No, it was a bubble.
(14:41):
And we had a they you know, partof diligence is they review everything.
So they were on your Google reviewsand they were spot.
Why is this review say this.What happened here.
So we we we would just open about.
Yeah. This is the way it is.
And so, you know, in some respectsit was an opportunity because,
because they, they could do a lot betterin a year or two.
(15:04):
And so yeah, unfortunately
I wish I could say it's, it's an easy it'syou made it as easy as possible.
But it was it's a it's stressful.
It is a stressful process.
But so was operating the company.
Yeah. Right.
Like, entrepreneurshipdoesn't come without stress.
(15:26):
So people that have startedand operated a business, I think are
are a very
precise human being and persistent. Yes.
I think it that's a key is and,
in the early yearsit was extremely stressful.
Because one mistakecould be the end of the company.
(15:49):
Right.
And Tim and I realizedthat we didn't always we, we,
we tried to shelter the employees from itbecause that wasn't their problem.
Their problem was to do their job.
Was our problemto make sure that you could pay them.
So you could pay themto do their job. Yep.
And it was years laterbefore we sold that.
One of the employees who have been with us
(16:09):
for almost in the beginningsaid to me, well, you just you know,
you're not is more easygoingthan you were a few years ago.
I say, well, yeah, because I was worriedthat we weren't going to be surviving.
And so it was, it wasit was nice to hear that.
At least I wasn't.
As stressed as I was in the early years.
(16:30):
And, and they,they sort of perceived that.
But it was important to Tim and I that wedidn't share all the, all the weakness.
Yeah.
Because it's not their problem.
No problem.
And that's a good a good attitude for it.
And creates a healthy work environment.
Which you guys were very focused on, likeyour employees were so important to you?
(16:53):
You know, wewe always said we all we all needed a job.
We all needed to work.
But we can try to make itas pleasant as possible.
There are some days where it was stressfulfor everybody.
And of course, when things got really busyand there were backlogs.
But, you know, generally we tried to treat them
(17:15):
the way we treated everyonein the way they wanted to be treated.
And so,
you know, we, we,
we ran a flat organization. Right.
Have a whole bunch of layers.
We didn't have a whole bunch of titles,and that was by design.
And we just wanted everyone.
We wanted to empowereveryone to be able to do their job
so that they didn't need to come tosomebody else too.
(17:38):
Directions or feedback and,and and that worked great for us.
It but when you go you're closeto 50 employees towards the end.
Right.
It was time to create an organization,some structure, some structure.
And yeah, that was another reason.
We knew that it was time. Yeah.
That's that's we had leftthe big corporate world decades earlier.
(17:59):
And so we didn't want to go backto an organization
that was structured like that.
And, and, but it was needed.
And I and I know since the acquisition,
more is in place and it's
well to grow to the sizethat they're projecting to grow now.
There's got to be a hierarchy.
Everybody cannot come to Cosmo.
(18:20):
No, you can probably have,you know, the last year
that we were there,we probably needed a little bit more.
We had,
but people get comfortable
with what they are inand change is not easy.
And if we were pushing youout of your comfort to exit,
then pushing you into a structureat the same time could disrupt everything.
(18:45):
Right. Right.
Because we did we talked about it, right?
Should we should we be looking at a GM?
Should we get anothera management level in here?
And and should we promote people too?
Right. Right.
And and we, we all sort of collectivelyagreed that it would be too artificial.
Would be. Yeah.
(19:05):
Forced.
And soI don't think you had the right people,
like that wanted that.
And that's kind of an important decision.
You can't just.
I promote you and expect them to achieve.
Well, I promote you, but I don't reallywant to be the person to train you.
Right?
You want this new, right?
(19:26):
So it's a self-help.
Correct. Setting it up for that.
So I'm glad that we didn't do that.
It was an easy decision. I mean, you guys.Yeah, right there with us.
Yeah, absolutely.
Conversationsthat it just didn't make sense.
Yeah.
Do anythingother than what we had done. Yeah.
And there were plenty of ownersthat we work with that were like,
you know, he's actuallymostly in charge already.
(19:48):
We could change his title and his hisyou know,
his optics are mostly that title.
Anyway.
But that just wasn't the case with youguys.
You didn't have that.
We had just in in each of the functions.
We didn't have a general manager.
Right. So.
Yeah.
Yeah. That was.
(20:09):
It was clear to the organization,I think. Yeah.
Absolutely. Yeah.
But the exit has been goodfor the employees as well, right?
It has,and we touch base with them occasionally.
And, a year and a half later,
everyone that I've talked to in the sense
that I get is that they're happy.
(20:32):
They continue to be treated fairly,
and they're given opportunitiesas the organization grows.
There is opportunity for them.
And that's one of the things thatwe talked about with the employees once.
It was widely known in the weeksleading up to the to the transaction
that it would be different.
But there's the opportunityin that. Right.
That's one of the positivesthat could come out of it.
(20:54):
And it did.
So that I know that makes Timand I very happy.
That's good.
It's it's worked outthe way that it did good.
And we see oftenwhat happened with you guys.
You guys were both given a board seat.
For the growth.
So what does that involvement look like?
I mean, it's obviouslynot filling your day to day
because that's not the goal.
(21:14):
Our involvement nowis, is is solely as an investor.
Okay. Investor.
And we do attendthe quarterly board meetings.
And it's nice to get the informationand see where the things are going.
And occasionally maybethere's a question or two that that will
Catherine or Patrick might reach outto, to to get a quick answer.
(21:36):
But but other than that, youthat's that's our that's about it.
And it's it'snice to see that it's continuing to grow.
Yeah.
From having created for our programs.
Yeah.
Almost 20 years ago to to being oneof the top distributors in the industry.
Is it makes us proud?
(21:56):
Absolutely.
When you have your commercialrunning next to for imprints,
you'll be able to say,I did that at least at the beginning.
Yeah. Yeah.
We came up with that name. Yeah. Yeah.
So excellent.
Excellent.
But yeah, but the,
you know, the organizationnow is thriving.
It's got good management team that Patrickat the helm is doing a terrific job.
(22:19):
Catherine who?
Yeah.
We brought in from Hadley.
Exactly the right person.
Good, good.
And and so Iand and the employees are echoing that.
Good, good, good.
Well, and we thoughtthat was very important when we met her.
And we met her during the diligenceprocess, which is a big help.
(22:41):
Doesn't always happen, but happens oftenthat you want to meet the
the kind of the personthat's going to take over and advance.
Yeah.
And I think we picked up on it right away.
She had that right balance. Yeah.
You know,
she certainly knew what she was doingand was very confident, but she hadn't.
She had compassion. Right.
Part of the equationin terms of the moving forward, how do you
(23:06):
and treating employees we talked about.
Compassion, understanding, empathy.
You know, being where their head is atand when they're going through and,
and and accommodating that to this.
Okay. Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah.
What was the worst thing about diligence.
And you can't say me.
Yeah I won't say that.
They were just there.
(23:28):
Got to a pointwhere there were so many documents
and then versions of documentsthat we couldn't keep.
We couldn't keep some of itstraight in terms of
where are we looking at the latest versionor is there a version after it that was.
Yeah.
And, just the volume of data
that got transferred for a company
(23:51):
that didn't have a lot of organizationin terms of the structure,
and we weren't really big on, holdingboth meetings or having,
right, you know, documentation.
We certainly created a ton of it.
Yes. And,
and the questions just kept on coming.
They just they just didn't stop.
(24:13):
Yeah. Good question.
You questions.
But they just kept coming.
And then I the, towards the endwhen we thought we were done, only
come to realize, you know, we had to dothe whole technical review, right?
I understand why they're doing it.
You know, no complaints there.
But, you know, you mentally said, okay,
we're done with diligence and surprise,you're not.
(24:36):
Maybe talk through it.
That was one that was the,
disappointing in the moment.
But we did it and it was. Yeah. Yeah.
It was actually fairly painlessas technical goes.
Oh yes.
We've had worse.
I'm sure.
And I think the person on their end
(24:57):
Jake.
Did a good job.
He did was you know, he was professionalyou know, and to the extent
he could be compassionate,he was but he understood.
You know all the dynamics. Yeah. So
but diligence gets tricky.
How much to say when how much to show now.
What puts you at danger for overexposure.
(25:17):
And it's goodto kind of increase that gradually.
But I think that's right.
You know probably very good advicebecause it
you have to get to know each other.
And and I don't think hardly ever did thisduring the process.
You don't want to hold back
too much or hold back. Right.
(25:38):
And things that you're thinking ofand they certainly know are very open.
But I can see,
you're doing it steps.
Right because you've
become an overwhelmingif you've got if it happened towards.
Oh, yeah. A flood gate. Yeah. Yeah.
That.
So, Yeah, that that's.
Yeah.
(25:59):
Excellent. Well, we we're about done.
So I have one signature question for you.
If you had not done e-commerceand you had not done for our promo,
and, you know, certainlyyou had plenty of options
because you're a traditional finance profrom back in the day.
So what else would you have done?
So, you know, my knee jerk answerand I guess I can't give,
(26:22):
but I was 12 years old.
I wanted to be a professionalbasketball player.
Oh, sure,you're too slow and not coordinated.
So I gave up on that early on.
But I, you know, there
we always had parties at four of them,sort of,
picnics and whatever, and there was.
And we always played trivia gameswe made up.
And there was just one time,many years ago, where,
(26:45):
the employees asked Tim and I a question,and one of the questions was,
if you weren't in your position hereat For All from us, what position
would you want to be?And so my answer was obvious.
I said, I want to be a graphic artist.
And I say that because
I'm always in awe of anyone
who can draw a beautiful picture,sing a beautiful song.
(27:09):
Act any kind of
artistic flair to meis because I'm so far from it.
I have no ability to do it at all,but I'm always in awe of it.
So if I that come back again,I want to have some artistic flair.
Okay.
So so website design is actually
a good a good hobby for you then.
That's why the theater. Exactly.
Website was good to get close enough to itwithout doing any damage.
(27:34):
Yeah.
Not artistic myself, so I understand
the appreciation, but
I think that's my answer.
Good. That's an excellent hint.Thank you for sharing.
Well,thank you very much for your time today.
And it's always great to catch up.
And, Well, thank you.
I always enjoyed talking to you.
Thank you very much.You're welcome. You're welcome.
and they're utilizing some AI technology.
I know that's an overused.
It is it is used a lot these days.
I don't want to overuse it,but I do think, well,
you guys were kind of on the crux of thatanyway.
We were using the latest technology,and it was funny because when we closed,
it seemed like that's when I exploded.
(00:20):
That's true.
It was almost exactly right after.
That's true.
So in one way, we're happybecause you didn't have to do that.
Got one level of technology.
But but everyone is using it,I don't know.
Yeah, we see it.
Results.
You now have the AI the wholethe whole. Yep.
They summarized all the search. Yeah.
It's getting better every day,
(00:45):
but it's probably not perfect rightnow. And I sort of
had some results where I scratch my headand said, this doesn't work.
Why is this here?
Yeah.
But, but yeah.
So that's a very good.
That's good.
Everything seems to be going well.
Excellent, excellent. Okay.
So if you're just joining us, we'resitting here with, Cosmo, who is joining
Touchstone Talks today to talk abouthis Experian exiting, for our promos.
(01:18):
He's a client with touchstone,
and we worked with himto find a partnership to take his business
to the next leveland let him head off to retirement.
I still hate that word.
So I heard a great word.
And you tell me if you likethis one better.
It's called pre-retirement.
(01:38):
Okay.
So younger. It is. It does.
The idea is that it's not
sitting on your couch all day. It's.
It's before that, it's the.
What did I not get to do thatI want to do now?
Marty.
And that was my one of my concerns.
(01:58):
We're going to see if we're going to befree to do whatever we wanted every day.
And in the first week or two, I'll tellanyone is just chaotic.
You're nervous, you don't know what to do.
So just just go with it and stay busy.
But eventually the dust settlesand you kind of find
a rhythm, and it's a different rhythmthan working every day.
But you find what that rhythm needs to be.
(02:18):
And I agree,you need to have stuff to do. Yeah.
It can't just be getting up,doing exercises
and then maybe reading a bookand yeah, made a point not to read
too many books because I could go 3or 4 hours a day with the book.
Okay. And sitting out on a couch.
So, you know, I tried not to do that,at least not during the day.
(02:39):
Okay, okay. That's a good circle.
Yeah, I
was sitting at a,
showcase, and there was a panel, and,the gentleman that was speaking
was, retirement coach, and he goes,I don't like the word retirement.
And I'm like,
I don't like the word retirement either.
So. So.
Right, right.
(03:01):
Well, I think about,
you know, long walks on the beachand twiddling your thumbs, right?
Like, that's that's what hits my head.
So many times.
Exactly, exactly.
And I think volunteeringis a big part of it and.
Your time with your family and traveling.
Yeah.
Those are all the kind of thingsthat we've tried to
do as we have more free time.
(03:22):
Yeah I get that, I get that the the panelists that were there,
one of them was in Divinity school
and one of them had
started a nonprofit,and one of them had written three books.
So considerations for Other Waysto include Books.
I was like, that is not my definition.
That is, that is a more realistic view on
(03:43):
what would likely happenif I were to exit my job.
I, I don't think you'd want to readany books that I write.
I'm not.
I'm not a writer, but I have.
My wife is terrific at it.
But but for me, I would always sort ofjoke my would you are all bullet points.
Very clear, very concise,but technical writing
is an entire field, honestly.
(04:07):
So so if you ever get really important,
you can gowrite some instruction manuals for us.
But it's good to have a list.
So. So that's, you know, that's.
I guess that's important.
If you only honestly took a couple weeksto get a new rhythm, I think you did it
quite well.
Yeah.Maybe it's more like a month or two.
(04:28):
I think what I like,and I always tell the story,
I think a week or two after we soldin the dust, it kind of started to settle,
and we weren't going to the officethat much is what I sort of
would come down and say, okay,what am I going to do today?
So I, I need to fill my day.
So my, my wife has, a theaterproduction company, and she had a website
(04:48):
that's been sitting there for ten years.
And I said, oh,it's time to give her a new website.
So I spent the next month.
There you go.
Working on a new website,including some video
from past performances and and every dayI'd go down there like a job.
Yeah.
And so once I got that out of my system,I could sort of let go and sort of,
you know, ease into it. Yeah.
(05:09):
That was your retirement plan.
I would say check the box.
Exactly.
Excellent.
Well, let's rewind time a little bit.
A lot of our viewersare going to be business owners
who are going to be in the same spotthat you were.
Worried aboutwhat does retirement look like?
But still going.
Okay, well, but maybe I do want to exit.
(05:32):
So what made youdecide it was time to exit?
So I think it's a process.
I don't think it's any one data point.
And and,
I own four hour promos with the, partnerTim Raymond.
And Tim,
had a clearer mindabout wanting to retire,
(05:54):
and I teased him a lot about itahead of a tease.
Well, we teased him during it and we.
Exactly.
But it was helpful for me.
I think I needed that little nudge okay.
So that it was timeand we started early as you remember.
Yep. Pre-COVID.
(06:16):
Right.
Had initial conversationswith with with you and Jeff
Ridge and
once Covid hit we had to sort ofput it on the back burner.
Right.
So we have had a lot of timeto sort of process it.
And I think for me,
along with Tim's help,I came to the realization
(06:36):
that there's certainlya lot of growth left in for our promos.
But I didn't have thethe fire in the belly
as they used to seemto want to bring it there.
Okay.
And once I realized that,I knew it was in the best interest
of everybody to step asideand have someone else do it.
And and so,
(06:58):
a year and a half later, sitting here,it's very clear to me going through it.
It's not at all. It's fuzzy.
Okay.
Where your second guessing, dayswhere you want to backtrack.
But but I think overall, the factthat I knew I didn't
have the same desire that I had ten yearsearlier.
Made it clear that, you know,I had to step aside and that was a good.
(07:20):
Yeah. Well, and you guys
bought the company
which is something elsethat, you know, we work with people on.
That's kind of an unusual situation.
How did that process.
So that was probably closeto 20 years ago, right
when we found ourselves, wanting to run another business
and we stumbledupon the e-commerce sector.
(07:45):
And so that's probably 2004, 2005.
It's still relatively new.
Google is still Google,but it's not the Google that it is today.
And so we kept looking for e-commercecompanies and,
and we eventually stumbled on one,within the promotional products industry.
We knew nothing about the productsindustry, but we liked e-commerce
(08:08):
and so we bought a smallwe sort of say a show of a company.
It wasn't named for all promos.
It had a website that was very clunkyand we really got into the
innards of it.
It really wasn't e-commerce,
but that was okay with usbecause it gave us the, the framework.
(08:28):
The network of suppliers.
Right.
We immediately got introducedinto the industry.
That probably would have taken a couple ofyears for us to figure out on their own.
And then within a year, about a year,
we launched for all promos and
started on pay per click
and that's, that's another sort of,
(08:50):
yeah, story that was somewhat random,
not planned out, but,you know, pay per click was random for us.
Really, we started for our promos thinkingthat we were going to, have a catalog,
full 20 page catalog and do direct mail.
Okay.
And so we were workingon developing the catalog at the same time
(09:14):
that we started pay per click,because we were certainly aware of it. And
over time.
And not a long period of timemaybe a couple of months.
We realized the economics of paper
were so much better than, than catalogmailings,
printing, mailing postage,the response rates, the lack of control.
(09:35):
So we never even got the first catalogoff the ground.
We just shelved it.
Oh okay.
Pay per click.
And I can remember the first monthwhere it was,
all in on pay per click, I forget exactly.
I do know how much we spent,but the results were disastrous.
Oh. Oh, no.
(09:56):
No. Okay. Trial and error.
You know, as the months unfolded,we got smarter and better, and.
And we just stuck to it.
You know, and I think that's for me,I think if I can give anyone any advice,
if you're starting a company orif you're in an entrepreneurial situation,
just never give up.
Just keep you know, don't listento other people if you think you're right.
(10:16):
Make your changes.
But just keep at it.
Just just never give up.
That's that's excellent. Yeah.
So that's how it started.
Yeah.
And and, you know, we had a lot of,
input, both requestedand not requested for us.
The in the industry 20 years ago.
(10:39):
There was a lot of talkabout the e-commerce companies,
of which we were one,
just not not sustainable,
the industrynot sustainable because the industry,
some folks within the industry,20 years ago, thought that,
you had to meet with your customersface to face.
(10:59):
You had to show them the merchandise and,
touch, feel and feel and,and the e-commerce
sectorwas just never going to be successful.
We said, okay, but we stayed on our way.
We did.
And then once we were,
we got our feet on the ground and we were,we saw some success.
(11:20):
We heard from everyone in the e-commercespace.
Don't build your companyjust on pay per click.
You know build it onmultiple fact factors.
It makes perfect sense right.
Right. Diversification.
It's everybody's right.Everybody wants you to diversify.
And and ultimately we got there.
But we took a lot longer than I thinkanyone would have recommended
(11:43):
we takebecause we were in complete control of it.
Yeah.
We could decide how much to spend.
And we got results every day.
And we were able to reacton those results.
And, and for us in those early days
where cash wasn't in abundance.
We had to be sure that whatever we weregoing to invest in, we needed to pay back.
(12:06):
And when we looked at our organic traffic,
it's a much more long term view.
Okay. So we didn't have the luxury.
No. You need somebody ready to buy.
Yes. So?
So initially wewe stuck with pay per click.
We did not diversify.
But then over the years.
Yeah.
(12:27):
Well, I remember we'd already startedtalking when you started doing the email.
Email?
Yeah. Email marketing. You were.
That was relatively new.
And you were talking to new companies.
And that was which I guessis kind of an important thing
to think about, that I don't know thatall of our owners think about.
Right.
Even though you're planning to sell,and it doesn't mean you stop growing.
(12:52):
Right.
Like you can't just I'm going to sell now.
So now I can, you know,not worry about those anymore.
You have to. Correct.
Correct.
We we felt it when Tim and Iwould be sitting there in the middle.
And knowing that,you know, the year before we went out into
the marketwas the, everyone's going to look at
(13:12):
and suddenly we lookTim and I looked at each item.
So for 15 years
you know we didn't worry about itas much as we're worrying about it now.
Yeah.
Because if we missed,
it was just Tim and I missing and we said,okay, we'll do better next year.
But now it was important to us. Yeah.
And and so yeah.
No absolutely I thinkand unfortunately it's going
to be the most stressful as yougo just before you go.
(13:36):
Right.
I mean oh absolutely.
Every month. Where's your team.
What does he Tim. Now.
What's our team forecast. Yeah.
Was good.
And then you worry.
At least we did.
We were very conscious of what we saidbecause we didn't want to.
We don't want to over promise.And we didn't want to.
We wanted to be as realistic as possible,without hurting ourselves.
(13:59):
Right? Right.
It is a balance through.
And as you may recall, we were goingthrough tremendous growth in that year.
Yeah.
Selling, which was great.
On the front end.
But we've had a lot of it's right.
Couldn't handle all the orders coming in.
(14:20):
And then we couldn'tget back to the customers.
Something that was always so importantto us was making sure
that the customer was happyand that you got the answers right away.
Suddenly we were we were in this situationwhere we couldn't
sustain the customer levelsthat we wanted to.
And so yeah, but that wasthat was a reality.
And we owned up to it.
Oh yeah. No, it was a bubble.
(14:41):
And we had a they you know, partof diligence is they review everything.
So they were on your Google reviewsand they were spot.
Why is this review say this.What happened here.
So we we we would just open about.
Yeah. This is the way it is.
And so, you know, in some respectsit was an opportunity because,
because they, they could do a lot betterin a year or two.
(15:04):
And so yeah, unfortunately
I wish I could say it's, it's an easy it'syou made it as easy as possible.
But it was it's a it's stressful.
It is a stressful process.
But so was operating the company.
Yeah. Right.
Like, entrepreneurshipdoesn't come without stress.
(15:26):
So people that have startedand operated a business, I think are
are a very
precise human being and persistent. Yes.
I think it that's a key is and,
in the early yearsit was extremely stressful.
Because one mistakecould be the end of the company.
(15:49):
Right.
And Tim and I realizedthat we didn't always we, we,
we tried to shelter the employees from itbecause that wasn't their problem.
Their problem was to do their job.
Was our problemto make sure that you could pay them.
So you could pay themto do their job. Yep.
And it was years laterbefore we sold that.
One of the employees who have been with us
(16:09):
for almost in the beginningsaid to me, well, you just you know,
you're not is more easygoingthan you were a few years ago.
I say, well, yeah, because I was worriedthat we weren't going to be surviving.
And so it was, it wasit was nice to hear that.
At least I wasn't.
As stressed as I was in the early years.
(16:30):
And, and they,they sort of perceived that.
But it was important to Tim and I that wedidn't share all the, all the weakness.
Yeah.
Because it's not their problem.
No problem.
And that's a good a good attitude for it.
And creates a healthy work environment.
Which you guys were very focused on, likeyour employees were so important to you?
(16:53):
You know, wewe always said we all we all needed a job.
We all needed to work.
But we can try to make itas pleasant as possible.
There are some days where it was stressfulfor everybody.
And of course, when things got really busyand there were backlogs.
But, you know, generally we tried to treat them
(17:15):
the way we treated everyonein the way they wanted to be treated.
And so,
you know, we, we,
we ran a flat organization. Right.
Have a whole bunch of layers.
We didn't have a whole bunch of titles,and that was by design.
And we just wanted everyone.
We wanted to empowereveryone to be able to do their job
so that they didn't need to come tosomebody else too.
(17:38):
Directions or feedback and,and and that worked great for us.
It but when you go you're closeto 50 employees towards the end.
Right.
It was time to create an organization,some structure, some structure.
And yeah, that was another reason.
We knew that it was time. Yeah.
That's that's we had leftthe big corporate world decades earlier.
(17:59):
And so we didn't want to go backto an organization
that was structured like that.
And, and, but it was needed.
And I and I know since the acquisition,
more is in place and it's
well to grow to the sizethat they're projecting to grow now.
There's got to be a hierarchy.
Everybody cannot come to Cosmo.
(18:20):
No, you can probably have,you know, the last year
that we were there,we probably needed a little bit more.
We had,
but people get comfortable
with what they are inand change is not easy.
And if we were pushing youout of your comfort to exit,
then pushing you into a structureat the same time could disrupt everything.
(18:45):
Right. Right.
Because we did we talked about it, right?
Should we should we be looking at a GM?
Should we get anothera management level in here?
And and should we promote people too?
Right. Right.
And and we, we all sort of collectivelyagreed that it would be too artificial.
Would be. Yeah.
(19:05):
Forced.
And soI don't think you had the right people,
like that wanted that.
And that's kind of an important decision.
You can't just.
I promote you and expect them to achieve.
Well, I promote you, but I don't reallywant to be the person to train you.
Right?
You want this new, right?
(19:26):
So it's a self-help.
Correct. Setting it up for that.
So I'm glad that we didn't do that.
It was an easy decision. I mean, you guys.Yeah, right there with us.
Yeah, absolutely.
Conversationsthat it just didn't make sense.
Yeah.
Do anythingother than what we had done. Yeah.
And there were plenty of ownersthat we work with that were like,
you know, he's actuallymostly in charge already.
(19:48):
We could change his title and his hisyou know,
his optics are mostly that title.
Anyway.
But that just wasn't the case with youguys.
You didn't have that.
We had just in in each of the functions.
We didn't have a general manager.
Right. So.
Yeah.
Yeah. That was.
(20:09):
It was clear to the organization,I think. Yeah.
Absolutely. Yeah.
But the exit has been goodfor the employees as well, right?
It has,and we touch base with them occasionally.
And, a year and a half later,
everyone that I've talked to in the sense
that I get is that they're happy.
(20:32):
They continue to be treated fairly,
and they're given opportunitiesas the organization grows.
There is opportunity for them.
And that's one of the things thatwe talked about with the employees once.
It was widely known in the weeksleading up to the to the transaction
that it would be different.
But there's the opportunityin that. Right.
That's one of the positivesthat could come out of it.
(20:54):
And it did.
So that I know that makes Timand I very happy.
That's good.
It's it's worked outthe way that it did good.
And we see oftenwhat happened with you guys.
You guys were both given a board seat.
For the growth.
So what does that involvement look like?
I mean, it's obviouslynot filling your day to day
because that's not the goal.
(21:14):
Our involvement nowis, is is solely as an investor.
Okay. Investor.
And we do attendthe quarterly board meetings.
And it's nice to get the informationand see where the things are going.
And occasionally maybethere's a question or two that that will
Catherine or Patrick might reach outto, to to get a quick answer.
(21:36):
But but other than that, youthat's that's our that's about it.
And it's it'snice to see that it's continuing to grow.
Yeah.
From having created for our programs.
Yeah.
Almost 20 years ago to to being oneof the top distributors in the industry.
Is it makes us proud?
(21:56):
Absolutely.
When you have your commercialrunning next to for imprints,
you'll be able to say,I did that at least at the beginning.
Yeah. Yeah.
We came up with that name. Yeah. Yeah.
So excellent.
Excellent.
But yeah, but the,
you know, the organizationnow is thriving.
It's got good management team that Patrickat the helm is doing a terrific job.
(22:19):
Catherine who?
Yeah.
We brought in from Hadley.
Exactly the right person.
Good, good.
And and so Iand and the employees are echoing that.
Good, good, good.
Well, and we thoughtthat was very important when we met her.
And we met her during the diligenceprocess, which is a big help.
(22:41):
Doesn't always happen, but happens oftenthat you want to meet the
the kind of the personthat's going to take over and advance.
Yeah.
And I think we picked up on it right away.
She had that right balance. Yeah.
You know,
she certainly knew what she was doingand was very confident, but she hadn't.
She had compassion. Right.
Part of the equationin terms of the moving forward, how do you
(23:06):
and treating employees we talked about.
Compassion, understanding, empathy.
You know, being where their head is atand when they're going through and,
and and accommodating that to this.
Okay. Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah.
What was the worst thing about diligence.
And you can't say me.
Yeah I won't say that.
They were just there.
(23:28):
Got to a pointwhere there were so many documents
and then versions of documentsthat we couldn't keep.
We couldn't keep some of itstraight in terms of
where are we looking at the latest versionor is there a version after it that was.
Yeah.
And, just the volume of data
that got transferred for a company
(23:51):
that didn't have a lot of organizationin terms of the structure,
and we weren't really big on, holdingboth meetings or having,
right, you know, documentation.
We certainly created a ton of it.
Yes. And,
and the questions just kept on coming.
They just they just didn't stop.
(24:13):
Yeah. Good question.
You questions.
But they just kept coming.
And then I the, towards the endwhen we thought we were done, only
come to realize, you know, we had to dothe whole technical review, right?
I understand why they're doing it.
You know, no complaints there.
But, you know, you mentally said, okay,
we're done with diligence and surprise,you're not.
(24:36):
Maybe talk through it.
That was one that was the,
disappointing in the moment.
But we did it and it was. Yeah. Yeah.
It was actually fairly painlessas technical goes.
Oh yes.
We've had worse.
I'm sure.
And I think the person on their end
(24:57):
Jake.
Did a good job.
He did was you know, he was professionalyou know, and to the extent
he could be compassionate,he was but he understood.
You know all the dynamics. Yeah. So
but diligence gets tricky.
How much to say when how much to show now.
What puts you at danger for overexposure.
(25:17):
And it's goodto kind of increase that gradually.
But I think that's right.
You know probably very good advicebecause it
you have to get to know each other.
And and I don't think hardly ever did thisduring the process.
You don't want to hold back
too much or hold back. Right.
(25:38):
And things that you're thinking ofand they certainly know are very open.
But I can see,
you're doing it steps.
Right because you've
become an overwhelmingif you've got if it happened towards.
Oh, yeah. A flood gate. Yeah. Yeah.
That.
So, Yeah, that that's.
Yeah.
(25:59):
Excellent. Well, we we're about done.
So I have one signature question for you.
If you had not done e-commerceand you had not done for our promo,
and, you know, certainlyyou had plenty of options
because you're a traditional finance profrom back in the day.
So what else would you have done?
So, you know, my knee jerk answerand I guess I can't give,
(26:22):
but I was 12 years old.
I wanted to be a professionalbasketball player.
Oh, sure,you're too slow and not coordinated.
So I gave up on that early on.
But I, you know, there
we always had parties at four of them,sort of,
picnics and whatever, and there was.
And we always played trivia gameswe made up.
And there was just one time,many years ago, where,
(26:45):
the employees asked Tim and I a question,and one of the questions was,
if you weren't in your position hereat For All from us, what position
would you want to be?And so my answer was obvious.
I said, I want to be a graphic artist.
And I say that because
I'm always in awe of anyone
who can draw a beautiful picture,sing a beautiful song.
(27:09):
Act any kind of
artistic flair to meis because I'm so far from it.
I have no ability to do it at all,but I'm always in awe of it.
So if I that come back again,I want to have some artistic flair.
Okay.
So so website design is actually
a good a good hobby for you then.
That's why the theater. Exactly.
Website was good to get close enough to itwithout doing any damage.
(27:34):
Yeah.
Not artistic myself, so I understand
the appreciation, but
I think that's my answer.
Good. That's an excellent hint.Thank you for sharing.
Well,thank you very much for your time today.
And it's always great to catch up.
And, Well, thank you.
I always enjoyed talking to you.
Thank you very much.You're welcome. You're welcome.
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