Entrepreneurs Over 40 Episode 10 with Travis Rosbach

 [00:00:00] Greg Mills: [00:00:00] Our guest today has spent the last 30 years studying his entrepreneurial skills throughout the previous 10 years. He's been proud to introduce sourcing, advising, consulting, public speaking, and business coaching to his expertise. His clients include a wide range of industries, celebrities, individuals, and even countries not only shares his Tradecraft with others, but also practices in the mini startups in which he is currently involved is the founder of Hydroflask and several others, highly successful business endeavors.

Besides entrepreneurship he has been a  scuba dive, master an instructor, a us merchant Marine boat captain, commercial, airline pilot, and my personal favorite, long-standing world Explorer. Without further ado, Travis Rosbach.

Travis Rosbach: [00:00:45] Hey, Greg, thank you so much for having me. This is great.

Greg Mills: [00:00:48] Oh, thank you. Thank you for being on here. Can you bring it, take a few moments and fill in the gaps from that intro. Bring us up to speed with where you're at now. What's going on in your world.

[00:01:00] Travis Rosbach: [00:00:59] Boy. I got a lot basically, Yeah.

after Hydroflask I tried very successfully to just kinda be retired and just kinda stay away from business for a while. And that lasted about, oh, probably about two years or so. And I had a lot of people just asking for help with their businesses or trying to start a start up and trying to start sourcing products from other countries and even here domestically.

And I realized that I just, I missed business too much and I was having too much fun. So I started the Tumalo Group and started helping people in any and all phases of their business. Just a design concept on the back of an envelope to, the highly successful fortune 500 companies that are looking to expand their product lines.

And so I do that fair bit. And then the rest of the time I've got some property and I've got a four-year-old daughter and like this week we just bought a swimming [00:02:00] pool. So we're trying to learn how to set up swimming pools.

Greg Mills: [00:02:03] Awesome. I'm sure you'll be successful.

Travis Rosbach: [00:02:06] Oh, thank you. I hope so. It's a little challenging actually. Yeah.

Greg Mills: [00:02:10] Yeah. I think if I remember, if it's an above ground, it seems like you've got to have multiple people at different ends of the pool, to get it stabilized.

Travis Rosbach: [00:02:20] Yeah, I can imagine. Yeah. I'm thinking I actually, I want to bury it and put these huge cinder concrete blocks all around it and then build a deck. But I don't know, that might be a bit too ambitious for this weekend.

Greg Mills: [00:02:35] Yeah. Depends on what you want. What kind of equipment you've got. If you've got a backhoe your golden.

Travis Rosbach: [00:02:40] That is exactly what I found. It really comes down to having the right equipment and without the right equipment, it is challenging. With the right equipment, it's quick and easy and a lot of fun.

Greg Mills: [00:02:54] But you get, sometimes you get better stories when you don't have the right equipment.

Travis Rosbach: [00:02:58] Exactly. That's [00:03:00] exactly right. Yes. Yeah. A lot more memories.

Greg Mills: [00:03:03] Okay. And I've done some research on you, but I want to ask this anyway, do you come from an entrepreneurial background? Did anyone in your family have their own business as you were growing up? I know you had indicated that your dad did.

Travis Rosbach: [00:03:17] Oh, Okay.

Yeah, I did not meet my dad until I was 14 and I flew down to the us Virgin islands from Salem, Oregon to go and meet with him and stay with him for a little while he had a couple, few dive shops that I got a really. Learn the insides and outs of running businesses fairly well and fairly poorly at the same time, it was a very diverse economy in the, in St.

Croix. And so we got to see.

the good, the bad and the, a lot of the ugly. And then when I was probably about 16 or so, maybe 15, my mom started a daycare out back. We had a very large building out back [00:04:00] that she turned into a daycare and she did her best to run that business. And yet I remember a lot of times her not getting paid from the clients or, she had let the children stay well after dinner hour and, she would bend over backwards to take care of her customers or clients.

And so I kinda, I got to learn from that too, that, a point at which, enough is enough and you have to say no, but also you want to take care of your customers. And so those were kinda my two entrepreneurial in the family businesses. I also. Was very fortunate enough to have it was fortunate for me.

Unfortunately, my, my neighbor died when I was about 12 and I got to go in the w his sister was having a an estate sale and she said, you can have whatever you like in here. And I saw this big bookshelf, and I was like, I didn't know what it was there. I didn't know what the books were, but I, for some reason, I just had to have that [00:05:00] bookshelf and it turned out to have a lot of the great business leaders of the eighties and nineties, Brian Tracy, Zig Ziglar, Jim Roan, Dale Carnegie on and on a lot of those books.

And so the rainy winners in Salem, I would just pour through these books and just absorb as much entrepreneurial insight from the masters as I could possibly stand. And then when I was 18, I moved down to the U S VI to live full time and started running the dive shops. My dad just took off and handed me the keys in the money bag.

So that's kinda how I got into it. Yeah. And the shot gun too. And that was the other thing I needed to know where it was. Yeah.

Greg Mills: [00:05:42] I think you had indicated at one point that you got robbed while you were down there.

Travis Rosbach: [00:05:46] Yeah, we, the dive shop would get robbed quite a bit. Luckily not while I was physically there I've been shot at a couple of times down there. And we ha we, we walked in many mornings where the alarm, for [00:06:00] whatever reason did not go off and we'd been robbed. A lot of times around hurricanes we'd have to, stay 24 7 on the premises and keep intruders at bay.

My dad just about got shot. It literally grazed right past his ear one day. That was scary. But yeah, it was wild west,

Greg Mills: [00:06:18] Well was things that you don't think about, when you're pondering, going to the Virgin islands or St. Croix and just would have wouldn't have thought that was going on.

Travis Rosbach: [00:06:28] And I hate to deter people from going down there because for tourists, for the most part, depending on the time of the year and how the economy is doing, it can be a very fun, safe place. Obviously you have to keep your wits about you. But unfortunately the downside is that when there's no real tourism, no real industry, the, the people go out and they need to eat.

So they do what they need to do.

Greg Mills: [00:06:53] I read a story or heard a story that you negotiated your way out of high school. [00:07:00] Let's talk about that because if anybody is on this call, I should have been the one doing that.

Travis Rosbach: [00:07:08] Yeah, I I, wasn't a real big fan of school. I knew very early on that I wanted to be down in the Virgin islands and I wanted to be, under the water and on top of the water and up and flying in the sky. And I did not really want to spend a lot of time in the Salem Keizer public school district.

And my grades reflected that I spent very little time at high school, especially my junior and senior year. And so when they finally said, Travis graduations in June, and you're not going to be there I basically let them know that wasn't the best solution for either them nor myself and that we needed to figure something else out.

And about three weeks later, we, we figured it out and I snuck by with just a quarter of a credit or just the very, very minimal, 0.1 credit over the line just enough to get me out. So that.

was probably the [00:08:00] biggest, greatest negotiation of my life. Really. I did not want to go back and do that again.

Greg Mills: [00:08:05] It's probably a good thing that we did not know each other. We could have

Travis Rosbach: [00:08:10] Could've been. a lot of trouble,

Greg Mills: [00:08:12] Yes. Switching gears just a little bit. How'd you get into the aviation and becoming a pilot.

Travis Rosbach: [00:08:18] It was a strange thing. I, a lot of times I say that it just hits me in the back of the head and it comes out my mouth. What, whatever's going to come next, I'll just say it. Yeah. Oh, shoot Travis. What'd you just say, and who, who heard you because you're going to, somebody and I that's kinda how aviation was.

I was a boat captain and I just, I loved being up on top of the water and reading my books. And then I'd go be a dive instructor for awhile or a dive master for a while and go under the water. And I was kinda playing those three roles for awhile and, but I kept seeing the sea planes fly in and they would land in the Harbor and then they'd take off and they'd fly off to an undone destination.

And I just thought, wow, how cool is [00:09:00] that? And I'd been working on a yacht. I was the first mate on a yacht. And I didn't like the captain and yet the captain wanted me to take over and be the next captain. And I said, no, I quit. The money was off. But I just, wasn't my heart wasn't into it.

I just didn't want to work with him and I didn't really want to do that anymore. So I was walking off to the, down the dock and I thought, dammit, what did I just do? I just passed up six figure income at the age of 22 or so. And what have I done? What am I going to do next? And then I a sea plane flew over and I said, I'm going to go be a pilot.

And my girlfriend at the time, she laughed and then, wrote it off as yeah, Travis, whatever. And sure enough, six months later I was up in Oregon and I was in flight school and nine 11 happened and we got shut down. But I was a pilot and so I, [00:10:00] begged, borrowed and borrowed some more to go become a pilot.

Greg Mills: [00:10:05] That's awesome. What was your first actual business? Was it Hydroflask or was it something before.

Travis Rosbach: [00:10:11] I had a, yeah, I had a part in Florida that we started it was a real estate investment company. It was right. Before probably around 2004, 2005, when the housing market was doing really well and people were making money overnight. Unfortunately, and the other half of the people were losing their houses and they were losing money overnight.

And so we started a real estate investment company to go in and help buy those houses before.

they would go into foreclosure and help their credit hopefully, and give them some cash to go stand on their feet again. And it wasn't real successful. We didn't do very well. And I didn't like the idea of having, it felt kind of predatory.

It felt kinda Hey, your house is worth 200. Let me give you an 80, like I [00:11:00] just, it, it just didn't feel right to me. So we didn't do that very long, decided to move back home, to bend Oregon and moved back. And started a fence company. There was a guy building a fence in the backyard at one of the rentals I was in.

And I went out and started talking to him and I just became interested in how this, how do you dig a hole and rock and putting the metal post and then put up this beautiful fans, and next thing I knew we had one of the largest fence companies in central Oregon.

Greg Mills: [00:11:31] Wow.

Travis Rosbach: [00:11:32] yeah.

Greg Mills: [00:11:33] Okay. So how did you, how'd you learn about that? Did you, was this a Google type thing or.

Travis Rosbach: [00:11:39] No, we didn't have much Google back then. And if we did I just wasn't real privy to it. This is probably about 2005, 2006, so I, Google was out. It just wasn't, on my phone.

Greg Mills: [00:11:52] HotBot or Altavista then.

Travis Rosbach: [00:11:54] Exactly right. Yeah. Yep. Yeah. So th what happened? What I, so I was talking to this [00:12:00] guy who was putting in the fence and it was just beautiful. There was no knots, it was clear Cedar. And I said are you doing all these subdivisions that are going in? And they said, no, we're just doing one house at a time.

And real small company. I said why don't you do the big subdivisions? And he said the owner just doesn't want to do that. He likes to keep it small and, real niche. I said how hard could it be? I think I'll go do that. And so famous last words went up to Portland and found a fence supply store and just walked in and we just sold a house in Florida.

So we had a little bit of cash, not a lot, but a little bit. And we said, what do we need to start a fence company? Just go get your stuff and come up and ring it up, we'll ring you out. And I said no, I don't know what I need. I need you to tell me and teach me. And so they, they couldn't believe it, but we walked out of there with a bunch of A bunch of fence stuff and came home [00:13:00] and got on Craig's list and said, Hey, we're looking to help, higher fence builders, really experienced fence builders and found a few guys.

And one in particular was really well-experienced at work at the competitions the con the competitor for quite a while. And he was supposed to be really good. And so we were really excited to hire him. And the day before our first job, he got arrested again and went back to prison. And we went down to the homeless shelter and picked up some homeless guys, went to the library, got some VHS cassettes on how to build a fence, went to the pawn shop and bought a a VHS cassette tape player, or, the VHS players.

And we sat in the living room with three homeless guys watching how to build fences. And that's unfortunately we learned how to build wooden fences. Our first job was a metal fence. I [00:14:00] just, I kept calling the guy in Portland and saying, Hey, what do I do? And he says just, wrap that around there and bend it once I said, Okay.

bend it once or twice.

Cause it in the picture, it looks like twice. No, just do it. So yeah, we just taught ourselves. And then luckily I started finding more people who had more experience and we kept hiring better and better experienced people. That guy got out of jail. And of course we brought him on and he taught me quite a bit and then he went back to jail and never saw him again.

But yeah, it was a lot of hard work, but it was it was good work. It was good outdoor, healthy, digging into the rocks and dirt and it was good. In my twenties. I wouldn't do that now but then it was really good.

Greg Mills: [00:14:42] So how did this kind of prepare you for starting Hydroflask or, or did it.

Travis Rosbach: [00:14:46] Yeah. All of the businesses, we went from that over to Oahu and had a sign and screen printing, a company that we learned a lot about about agencies. We worked with reprinted for a lot of [00:15:00] agencies and graphic designers. And so all of the other business experience that, that had. Yeah, not to mention the whole library of books that I'd read.

I think the whole thing just accumulated into Hydroflask. It. go into the chamber of commerce type meetings, and how to hobnob and rub shoulders and elbows or whatever the phrase insane is. But, doing all of that with defense company was very helpful learning how to do contracts and negotiate sales and deal with happy clients and very unhappy clients.

And then this is the sign company in a wall who stepped up another little bit of a notch. And now we were dealing with, pretty big corporations that we were printing for. And so all of it just kinda, I don't think you can ever be too ready or too prepared for, the big time, everything that I'd learned that far had helped. Yeah.

Greg Mills: [00:15:53] So  walk us through the moment that you came up with the idea for Hydroflask and how [00:16:00] you executed it .

Travis Rosbach: [00:16:00] The first the first time that it really hit me was Okay.

I back up a little bit, there, there was a mold, it was multiple pronged. Like it, it came to me in different segments. The first time it came was out the sign company. I got a magazine that was advertising a cylindrical screen printer.

So a printer that could do a full wrap around a aluminum bottle was how it was advertised. And you can do one at a time. It was very slow and tedious. But when I saw the picture of it, the ad, something just went off in my head that. I don't, I can't explain, but something just told me there's something here.

So I told my brother, he was in a law who at the time as well, I said, Hey, Jeff, Hey, here's a great idea. Maybe you should start a water bottle company. And he was too busy with his girlfriend and their sailboat and, chasing dolphins and going snorkeling and stuff. And so he, he said no, and I [00:17:00] forgot all about it.

And then one day I was thirsty. I was downtown Honolulu dropping off some supplies. And I went into the sporting goods store to buy a water bottle. And there was this huge big wall where the bottles were and they were gone. There was only about two or three left. And I said, what happened to all these bottles?

And they guys said there's this thing, we're not really sure what it is. The owners are French. And they saw an article that came out in Europe about this stuff. We don't know what it's called, but it's in plastic, later we found out BPA not real safe, not real good. So as a preliminary precautionary precautionary, what's the next word that I have to actually use after the word precautionary tell they're not tell cautionary.

That's a precaution, I guess that's probably the more accurate precaution, sorry. We've taken all these bottles off and I said who's going to replace this wall of bottles. And the guy said, nobody, there's nobody else to do to make water bottles. And [00:18:00] again, it hit me in the back of the head right here and it came out my mouth and I said, I will I'll do that.

And he laughed at me. And the amount of time in between me saying it and him laughing at me, I saw the future, which was amazing. It was it was wild. Like I saw myself talking 10 years later about these water bottles at a university or a campus. And and so I went back to the dive or to the sign shop and I said, Hey, tell me about water bottles.

I asked the employees and the first one said there's this aluminum brand. You need to get it. It's the best in the world. So I went out and bought it and it Was awful. It, for a multitude of reasons and it had BPA in it and so on and so forth. I talked to my brother.

Greg Mills: [00:18:47] Was that the mythical snow creature?

Travis Rosbach: [00:18:49] It was, I know it w it was it was Swedish brand called SIG and they've since, pretty much gone by the wayside, but they [00:19:00] were the best on the market at the time I talked to my my brother in, in bend and he said no, you got to get this single wall. Stainless steel, one called KK brand.

And okay, great. So I got one of those and tried it out and it got real hot and I, we'd go surf and I would pick up my bottle and take a swig and it would just be too hot to drink, which kind of defeated the purpose of bringing water with, and so I thought there's gotta be a better way.

And then about a year and a half later figured out how to do Hydroflask it, it took quite a while.

Greg Mills: [00:19:34] I can imagine now. Yeah. How did you know that you would come up with the right idea at the time or didn't go off and focus on something else?

Travis Rosbach: [00:19:46] That's a good question. Greg. I think that I wanted it. I wanted to see if it was possible and I wanted it for myself and I kinda, it's not that I didn't care if anybody bought him or not, but I thought even if I could just [00:20:00] make a couple for myself and my friends and family, that'd be cool.

And when we got the samples, we got the first couple of prototypes. We drove around the island, taking a lot of photos. And everybody who held them or, posed for the photos was just blown away. They. Instantly recognized that was something that they would use and want. But then yeah, when we went to market and we would start getting a lot of fan mail and people would come up to me at the fairs or street, events that we would do and give their praise for the product, it felt really good.

And it gave us a lot of incentive to keep going.

Greg Mills: [00:20:39] Let's talk about some of the earlier early challenges you had, because at one time I know that you had three employees and they were called actually for Travis, me, myself, and I.

Travis Rosbach: [00:20:50] That happened quite a few times, actually that the four of us would hang out. Yeah. There were, it was one of those classic. We didn't [00:21:00] have much money to pay employees. And so the money that we did have we got that sort of employee, like from the fence days, I wasn't really honestly accustomed to go into the homeless shelter and picking up, strong, hardworking men that we can give them cash and they could do it, honest day's labor for us and with Hydroflask.

I still had that sort of kind of mentality. So we found some pretty interesting people in the early days. And it, it was, a multitude of challenges from China and shipping and logistics. My partner kept it would get too difficult for her, so she would leave and she would, abandoned ship and take off.

And, we got 40,000 rusted and potentially rusted, non insulated water bottles. And yeah it, on and on. Yeah.

Greg Mills: [00:21:49] Imagine the float alone could be a little bit of a nightmare. You got bailed out at one point, and by a friend that I believe it was a friend that had had gave you [00:22:00] a significant cash infusion.

Travis Rosbach: [00:22:01] Yeah. We started out with friends and family and it was friends, family, and a lot of credit cards and a lot of personal loans and loans against the vehicles that we were leasing, and like any way that we could get money to buy more bottles we would. And that was something that I didn't ever really prepare for or think about.

It was nothing that Brian Tracy ever talked about or anything I'd ever read in any of my books. You can become too successful and too successful too quickly as well. And, at that time, as it is by and large still today, but at that time with China, you needed to put up 50% deposit at the beginning of the order to make the order.

And then 50% just before it ships. And the bottles at that time were, and there's still about $4 and 25 cents to $5 a bottle. But you times that by 10,000 it adds up you times it by [00:23:00] 40,000, which is a 40 foot container and it gets pretty expensive pretty quick. And then when they sell it.

They go out to the retail locations usually have about a net 30, some had net 60. And so we wouldn't see cash coming in for 90 to 120 days after we'd have to pay for it. And when we started doing 40,000 bottles a month, it was just ridiculous. And we also had a very high caliber workforce and employees at that time taken, we built a little family around the brand and of course they always got paid first and foremost.

And a lot of them that were there in those early days are still there with the company, which is great, But yeah, we would we'd have to pay, then we'd have to pay China and they would have to pay the employees and the lease and end. And yeah, one day we got down to zero basically, and it was a Wednesday afternoon and we had no more money and we [00:24:00] had some bottles in the back, but not enough to really propel us forward.

And which was really unfortunate because we just opened up a lot of predominantly outdoor industry retail stores. And I wrote up the sorta, I'm sorry. We're, I'm going to have to let you guys go. We've run out of money. And I was literally drafting the letter and I was probably crying my eyes out and the woman up front at the front desk called and said, Travis, there's a man here to see you.

And I said what's he here for? She said, he just says that he needs to meet you right now. And I said if he's a debt collector, just send them away. I don't have any money. Let them go, please. She called back and said, no, there's something about this guy who, he just, he says, he's got to meet you.

He wants to work here. I said, oh, okay. In that case, just tell him no, we're not hiring. And I thought that was it. And she called back the third time and said, he's persistent. He wants to. With you, Travis, the founder of [00:25:00] Hydroflask. I said, all right, fine. And I came forward and his name was Charlie and he came in and we sat down and he tells me what a great sales person he is and how he wants to work at the company.

And, he lives in bend and this and that and the other. And I said, you know what, I'm sorry, we're just not hiring. 15, 20 minutes later back and forth. I'm telling him, no, Charlie, no, finally he says why will you not hire me? I said I'm going to tell you the honest truth. I'm closing the doors on Friday.

And this was Wednesday. And he said, why? I said because we don't have any money. You don't have enough money to pay for the next round of bottles. And he says how much do you need? I said a million dollars. says so if I got you a million dollars by Friday, could I start on Monday?

Hello. I just was like, Okay.

I gotta get this guy out of here. Yes, sure. Charlie, you go get us a million dollars and you can go ahead and start on Monday. And so he left. I was like, oh, thank God. I got him out of my, out of my office. Cause that was a little scary. The guy was, maybe a little crazy [00:26:00] Friday morning I get a call.

Just as I'm rehearsing my speech to go tell everybody I get a call that somebody else was there to come and see me and I, same thing. I don't want to see anybody right now. No, thank you. He says, he's got a meeting with you this morning. I thought shoot, maybe I missed something. Okay.

Fine. Went and sat down with him. And he said, Yeah.

Charlie told me that you guys are looking for an investor. I said I, I don't really know what that means, but I know we need bottles and he says how much do you need? And I said 800 or I, it was like I think we needed like 88,475 bottles or something like that too.

Or just over two shipping containers. And he says, okay, what's that financially a million bucks. He says, okay. We went over a few little things and, but he wrote a check right then and there. And I still kept thinking, no, this is just not real. This is not how real life works. I don't believe this.

So I went down on my lunch break before I told everybody that were fired. I went down to the bank [00:27:00] and gave her the check, expecting her to laugh. And she says, okay, it's cleared. I said, what does that mean? It cleared. And she goes, the money's in your account. I said but what does that mean?

Like how much money? She says the full million it's in your account. We went from there. $400 to a million bucks just that quick. And I went back and shredded the ladder and Monday Charlie started and he's still there with the company.

Greg Mills: [00:27:26] That's amazing. Did your employees ever know how close you were to closing?

Travis Rosbach: [00:27:31] No I withheld all of that, those early days. There were so many rollercoasters. I literally had my garbage can repossessed because I personally was out of money, but they were, being paid and we were ordering bottles, so I withheld most, all of the hardships from them or at least I tried to.

Yeah.

Greg Mills: [00:27:55] How long did it take before you started getting knocked off?

[00:28:00] Travis Rosbach: [00:27:59] Unfortunately, it was actually pretty quick. I, it was actually was just an interesting story. I was down at REI and I would do these kind of like recon trips to sporting goods stores that we wanted to be in and I'd walk in and say, Hey, do you have Hydroflask? And I'd go and ask as many people as possible.

And they'd say, no, we've never heard of it. And so you've never heard of Hydroflask. Huh? Okay. I guess I'll go across town to your competition. And then eventually that store would call me and say, Hey, we need to get Hydroflask everybody's asking for it. So I was on one of my afternoon trips to REI to do that.

And the woman who was helping me, she said, she says, no, we don't have them, but I have one. And I just absolutely love it. It's the best product I own not just water bottle, but product. It's my favorite thing I own, I said, oh great. Where did you buy it? And she said, oh, my screen printer gave it. I said, oh who's your screen printer?

And she said the guy's name, his name's Nicholas. And I [00:29:00] said, huh. Okay that's strange. And I had a cell phone, so I called the office and I said, I, do we have an account with Nicholas at this printing company? They said no he does our printing, but he doesn't have an account to sell them.

And I said, and so I asked her, I'm like what does your bottle say on it? She says it has my other, she had a company. She says as my company name on it and he screwed up on our t-shirts. And so he gave us a bunch of free bottles with our logo on it. I said, oh, okay, great. And I didn't tell her, but I left and I walked straight into Nicholas, his office or his his place of business.

It was literally two doors down from us. And I walked in, walked behind the counter and he had basically stole a bunch of bottles from us. We'd given him a key, so he could come in the back door and pick up bottles. We trusted them. He said he was a good guy and we thought he was a good guy and very naive, but Yeah.

He knocked us off and not only at first, he started stealing the hydro flasks. [00:30:00] And when I caught him that day, I told him, know on certain terms that, that wasn't going to be happening anymore. And then about two weeks later it came out or maybe not two weeks. I don't really know time.

Maybe two months later he came out with his own brand that was identical knockoff. And so with that, we were able to send the attorneys over to, to deal with him. And so that was the first, that was the first time. And then it went on from there all the way up to big knockoffs. The guy who walked into a Costco actually had a Hydroflask and he put a piece of duct tape over it.

Yeah. To go into his meeting with hydro or with Costco and said, Hey, look, I got this great bottle. I'll sell it to you cheaper than our Hydroflask will. And Costco said, okay. And so that's how his knockoff company started and they're still going strong. They changed the name, but they're still knocking them off.

So yeah.

Greg Mills: [00:30:56] Now I can only imagine how [00:31:00] furious you and amazed you must have been that not only were you getting knocked off? It was by somebody that you did business with, and that was two doors down from you.

Travis Rosbach: [00:31:08] And he was one of those guys who, I won't say the religion, but he hid behind his dog by and he said, Hey, I'm one of these good people, and I'm a good guy. And I met his dad and, his wife and all their kids and everything. And man, it just was a kick to the gut.

I tell you, it was really hard. And I think that because it was so close to home and it was so early on that sort of every other knockoff was less of a gut punch. It was easier to deal with. And of course, watching the attorneys deal with it, which is not what I wanted to do. I did not want to have to pay attorneys to go have to do this sort of thing.

And that wrapped up a lot of free cash that we would have been otherwise better spending towards bottles. But yeah, not letting the attorneys deal with. It was one way for me to separate church and state [00:32:00] from myself. Whereas like Travis, this is not your job anymore. This is now theirs.

They are dealing with that aspect. You deal with all of the other things you do. So that's how I, was okay with it was able to sleep.

Greg Mills: [00:32:14] Yeah, that's probably smart. How are they getting around the patents though? Didn't

Travis Rosbach: [00:32:17] They just flat out weren't they were just battle Ram and right through the front door and just going right out. And they're in, and what's interesting is that now that we're we're over a decade on. There, and I absolutely positively do not want to speak for Helen of Troy, the new owner, but there are ways that Helen of Troy is, they're they just, this week, they just broke $2 billion in sales and they know what they're doing, and they have a longterm game plan in mind and I've seen them be very successful with some of the would be competitor knockoffs.

But a lot of the patents, unfortunately, at least at that time were design patents and [00:33:00] design patents. I'm no attorney, but it's about 30% different and you can do it on your own. You take something, you tweak it a little bit taller, a little bit wider, a little bit shorter, a little bit more, a little bit less.

30% is not a lot. And now you can get your own.

Greg Mills: [00:33:17] Yeah, I think I've heard that from Steven Key.

Travis Rosbach: [00:33:21] Yes. Yeah. Stephen's isn't he great? Yeah, He

Greg Mills: [00:33:24] he is. Yeah. Just from the marketing angle? How did you grow? Hydroflask.

Travis Rosbach: [00:33:31] It was a lot of guerrilla marketing and at that time, I, and we grew Hydroflask isn't necessarily the same way that I am and we are growing businesses today. But back then it was a lot of trade shows. It was a lot of gorilla marketing, meaning hats, stickers, t-shirts banners. A lot of the things I learned at the the sign company in a law, there was a lot of t-shirt companies [00:34:00] in Oahu, and they were all trying to be the best and the biggest and the greatest and the, make the biggest mark on, on society.

So I picked up a lot of guerilla marketing techniques in  Oahu and I would literally, we'd show up at a trade show and I would get all of the security Hydroflask t-shirts. And I would give them four free t-shirts for four days of trade show and they would wear them. In fact we got to the point where we would print security on the front and Hydroflask on the shoulder and then Hydroflask and security on the back.

And they would wear them, and so everybody thought were sponsoring the, the event. And then also in, in giving out free water bottles. That was one of the best ways to market because they literally were selling themselves. Nobody had ever seen such a thing before, and it only took a day or two of drinking water.

Before people would start feeling much better, [00:35:00] physically, mentally, emotionally, every other way. And so after two or three days, they would be hooked and they'd come back for more for themselves or their families. And we would always say that they were the number one most stolen product in most people's homes because, a spouse or a sibling would steal one somebody else's, and then come to us and they would tell us their story of how their sister or their brother or their husband stole their bottle.

Now they needed their own, and and word of mouth. I really felt if we can get bend Oregon, which was a very small. Quiet town back then. If we could get binned to drink out of Hydroflask.

maybe we could get Oregon and if we get Oregon, perhaps we could get the Northwest.

And if we get the Northwest possibly the west coast, and what we found was that the sales reps were also a very big part of our growth as well. The sales reps all around the world, we had sales reps in, in the far reaches of the planet and we would get [00:36:00] them t-shirts and hats and stickers and.

They would get more orders and we would get them more free bottles for samples, for owners of businesses and we'd get more orders. And so it was, we had a really good product and we were just good people doing good things. And lifetime warranty was another thing that was a big help. For whatever reason, if you weren't happy with the product, bring it back in and we'll get you a new one or send it in.

And a lot of people told me I was crazy and I don't know that they really do that anymore. At least not how we used to do it. But people thought if they're just going to buy one and then they'll never buy a second one, they'll just get it for free. That proved to not be quite accurate.

People would come back and buy 10 or 15 more.

Greg Mills: [00:36:46] yeah, because  they were evangelizing basically, and they're just such a great idea. So what are some of the mistakes that you wish you could've avoided?

Travis Rosbach: [00:36:56] I would say, I try not to really dwell on my [00:37:00] mistakes. I know I've made a lot of mistakes over the past. I know I've made a lot. I just don't really retain them very much. Greg, I don't, I think, there's a part of me that thinks I could have maybe stayed on another four years and and waited until the Helen of Troy exit, which would have been big earth.

But at the same time, I don't know that I had another four years in me. I was burnt out and the season was over. And so I don't really dwell on that much. I think maybe not keeping in contact with some of the employees. We were really a close, tight knit family until the day I announced I was selling and then literally the very next day I was not there and I never saw them again.

And that, that it hurts actually is all of the friends that I'd had there and in the industry and all over the country on Wednesday. And then on Friday, that was all cut off and gone. So I think that might be one of the biggest ones.

[00:38:00] Greg Mills: [00:37:59] I'm sure they would still love to hear from you though.

Travis Rosbach: [00:38:03] I don't know, I have mixed emotions. I don't know. I know what they think or I don't, I, part of me thinks yes. And part of me thinks why haven't they reached out? So I don't know it's alienating and it's isolating and it's also, cause I was the boss, I was the owner, I was the man in charge.

And we'd have Christmas parties and I couldn't quite partake, like I would, if I wasn't the boss, and I couldn't quite get as close to them if I wasn't the owner, and so yeah, in kind of one of those bittersweet pills,

Greg Mills: [00:38:33] Okay. I was going to ask what prompted you or how you knew it was time to sell Hydroflask, but it sounded like you were just there was an offer and you were it was just the right time to take it. You were a little bit burnt out. Is that fair to say?

Travis Rosbach: [00:38:46] Yeah, pretty close. I had my brother had just died. There was quite a few frivolous lawsuits flying around. That was another thing that I didn't realize. I didn't really read in any of my books that the bigger you get, the [00:39:00] more people want to throw rocks at you, and people will want to Sue for a multitude of reasons, whether it's legit or not.

And so I was going through all that. My brother had just died. I had just gotten married and I was on my honeymoon and or a honeymoon, a second marriage type thing. My wife was British. And so you're out in Europe. And we were in, in the Louvre in Paris and I saw a hydro flask and that was always one of the, one of the early days.

When we, before we had even a hundred bottles sold, we always said that it'd be really neat to find a bottle out in the wild somewhere. And that would be when we knew that we were, we had made it, we were established and we were a legit brand. And so when I saw that bottle in Paris at the loop I was, I, it was like the whole thing just came to it together.

And it was like, okay, I now have closure. I feel like this chapter is wrapping up here fairly quickly. [00:40:00] And I got home and just more, growth related, stupid stuff and difficult stuff. And it just, it got a little bit mundane. I, I had an office job and I was sitting in the office, quite a bit, 60 to 80 hours a week.

And I was ready to just go do something else that the season had ended.

Greg Mills: [00:40:21] I can understand that. So you've you, you exited, you took a little bit of time off and I imagine you probably thought you'd stay retired. What kind of prompted you to start the Tumalo Group?

Travis Rosbach: [00:40:35] It was a multitude of reasons. Part of it was I wanted to help people. That's really the biggest part that I really enjoy growing businesses. I enjoy watching. A little something grow into a really huge, massive something. And I wanted to get back into it, but not necessarily do it on my own.

And I didn't really want to start my own brand and have to, [00:41:00] have a bunch of employees and attorneys and all that goes, parking spots and, 401ks and HR people, and all that goes into having the business. But I wanted to still be in the, that realm or that arena. And so with the Tumalo Group, that's exactly what I've been able to do.

I've been able to enjoy the growth and help propel growth for a lot of companies, but I don't have to sign paychecks and I don't have to deal with HR and I don't have to deal with, the, employment tax. So yeah.

Greg Mills: [00:41:33] So y'all were basic. This is probably a poor analogy, but it's kinda it's kinda being shark tank, but without, ownership.

Travis Rosbach: [00:41:41] Yeah, yeah. And sometimes it does happen where one of my clients and I will, we'll get along real well and they'll say, Hey, why don't you come in and come a little closer and we'll give you a little bit more and we'll figure something out. But for the most part, it's four month contracts.

And at the end of the four months, we're [00:42:00] good friends and they call me all the time and we chit chat. At the end of four months it's a new day. So yeah.

Greg Mills: [00:42:08] So the four months is that covers it, the invent source manufacturer profit phase.

Travis Rosbach: [00:42:15] Pretty, yeah, pretty much. Yes.

Greg Mills: [00:42:17] So you, somebody can have it. A prototype basically, and B be selling on Amazon and in four months time.

Travis Rosbach: [00:42:28] Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Yes. Yeah, people come to us at the Tumalo Group with ideas. Literally drawn out on a napkin and we've got industrial, we've got really good industrial designers and people to draw up those ideas. And then we can take it into the design for manufacturing stage at a factory.

So we find factories that are the best fit, and we find a good minimum order, quantity, MOQ at a good price and a good turnaround time. And we can take a [00:43:00] product and get it into the machine. Getting made. Typically the molds take about 30 to 45 days. Some take 60, depending on how big the mold is. The mold is basically what you poured metal or plastic or anything into even clothing has a mold sometimes that it needs.

So once that's made we're about two months in and then about a month for production and about a month on the water. And about four months later, we can get products into the fulfillment centers and out to the client and customers.

Greg Mills: [00:43:30] Okay. So how does the client finance doing that? Do they offer a percentage of the profits potential ownership or is it a straight fixed fee?

Travis Rosbach: [00:43:42] Typically it's a straight fixed fee?

with the Tumalo Group. Every once in a while, I may do some equity here and there for help. But as far as financing, the actual widgets or products, I try not to get too much involved into that. I don't really [00:44:00] I just found it. It's a church and state separation thing that I like to keep where I personally don't finance the products or the manufacturing, every once in a while, there might be a reason why I'll kick in a little bit, but for the most part, they need to be self-funded, angels, friends, family, whatever stage they are.

A lot of clients will come in and they'll get the prototypes made. They'll find out the costing, they'll find out the minimum order, quantity, things like that. And then they will use that information to go out to like Kickstarter or crowdfunding GoFund me pages. And we'll give them enough to go out, to go raise enough to buy the minimum order quantity.

And then from that minimum order quantity, typically the sales off of that are enough to fund, get the ball rolling.

Greg Mills: [00:44:49] gotcha. Okay. But backing up just a little bit, assuming that the client is willing to  fund, their own manufacturing and the shipping, et cetera. [00:45:00] Do they contract?

They contract through the Tumalo Group.

Travis Rosbach: [00:45:06] Yes. Yeah. We say that it's, I like I've always not always, but the last probably five years or so, it's been quite accurate that it's about 75 to a hundred thousand dollars to get a brand or a business going. And I've talked to a number of people who, we were in the same boat and we find that's about a pretty accurate, fair number by the time you have shipping and marketing and logistics and sales and Andy, and it adds up pretty much.

It can be fairly expensive, they can be 30, $40,000 for molds, depending on how many you need and how big they are. And then so yeah, that's it's not all up front at once. And again, a lot of people have started for a lot less than that. We have some people who've started for, 10 or 15,000 because all they're doing is getting a sample made and they're taking that sample out to go make, $400,000 and then they come back and then they've got to get a [00:46:00] good ROI on that.

Greg Mills: [00:46:02] Okay. So a lot of times they may not even have a prototype. They're just got a napkin drawing or a concept.

Travis Rosbach: [00:46:09] Correct. Yeah. Most of the time my clients do not have a prototype and we help to get them a prototype. And it depends, it's not always possible to do a prototype. Sometimes you have to build the molds in order to have the actual prototype. But other times we can 3d print a fairly fair dinkum rendition that is close enough for a, TV to go on the internet and go out and raise some capital.

A lot of people use those prototypes to raise money. It's a lot easier to raise capital with a prototype. Even a looks like prototype. It doesn't necessarily have to be, it looks like acts like, but even just to looks sometimes can be enough to help raise cash.

Greg Mills: [00:46:51] Okay. Now, do you all over just get some, somebody that is convinced that their idea is a hundred [00:47:00] percent, it'll sell and you just have to tell them that I'm sorry, this is not the right one.

Travis Rosbach: [00:47:06] Yeah I do. I do sometimes, which is not something I enjoy and it's really not like I don't know why it's even my place to do that, but I do have a lot of people who come to me with ideas and a lot of them are really good ideas. A lot of them are going to take. Several million dollars to launch.

Some of them are really good ideas, but they probably are about five, 10 years too early. They need to wait maybe a second. We're just not quite prepared yet. And then unfortunately, a very small few. In fact, I have one, I can really remember. She came and she was on her last, last leg. And she was a very, she was a bit hopeless.

And the only hope that she had was on her widget being the best widget on the market. And unfortunately she compared herself to some celebrity who was doing a similar product and she thought her product was better than the celebrities. And so therefore [00:48:00] rationale was if the celebrity is making those many billions, I should be able to make at least that many, if not more because my products better, and that, that was tough.

It's really hard when people say that they, they don't have any money and they don't have anything left except hope in a product. And that product is possibly probably not going to be their savings. Grace

Greg Mills: [00:48:21] Yeah, I can imagine that would not be a fun conversation, so

Travis Rosbach: [00:48:26] it's it's. I, it's one of those things where I remember exactly where I was sitting when I was talking to, and I remember hanging up and I remember looking at the window thinking like, I didn't sign up for that. That's not something I wanted to do. But it comes with the territory, I've learned, I gotta take the good with the bad.

So if that's the bad, then, I'm doing okay. And hopefully she went on to go get a job and do something completely different. And maybe he has a new idea. Now, I don't know.

Greg Mills: [00:48:53] Yeah. What industries does the Tumalo Group support or target? That the customers go to.

[00:49:00] Travis Rosbach: [00:49:00] It is a wide array, Greg. I have a client right now. Who's doing wooden boxes for a wine company called box. So we're making wood boxes. I have another company who's making a mouse pad. Another company who's

Greg Mills: [00:49:15] Those are still a thing.

Travis Rosbach: [00:49:16] It's and this was my question too. It's really, and I don't want to give away too many secrets cause we're under NDA and it hasn't launched yet, but it's a way that it's not an actual mouse pad, but it's a way that it's a wrist pad, which is for a mouse, which is it's for the gaming industry.

And so it's a new product that I hadn't, I don't do gaming, so I didn't know anything about it, but it's taken off like wildfire and w who else do we work with? Obviously I have a lot of bottle companies that they still come to me and want my advice and opinion on things, and sometimes I can help. And other times it's too close to NDAs that I have with others.

I can't really go there. Who else? How about a guy [00:50:00] who is doing a light meter? So you can see where plants get the most optimal light so you can grow better plants. And on and on, I've had a waffle maker. I've had a blender I mean on a blender, I'm sorry, a coffee maker. All just all kinds of crazy things that people are coming up with that are better than the rest.

And so therefore,

Greg Mills: [00:50:23] Okay. So do you ever advise somebody to not do it themselves and to pursue a licensing degree? Wow.

Travis Rosbach: [00:50:30] That's another thing that a lot of people who find me, either find me through Stephen Key and his program I was on one of those podcast or video logs, they do go hand in hand. I have there's a client actually right now who has a really neat, a widget that he's a student of Stephen ke.

And he is torn between licensing and doing it himself. And so with that what we [00:51:00] do is we really compliment the licensing as well. Getting a sample prototype, finding a factory, finding out what it costs and what the minimum order quantities are. That's a lot of knowledge that potential license he could go to the license or with.

And so if you go into negotiate and you say here's my product. When you please buy it and they say, no, it's going to cost us $50 to make it. We won't make any money. We don't want your idea. We'll give you a dollar each and you can sit there and say, no, actually there's a Chinese factory. And I know exactly where it is and they're going to do it for $37.

And so therefore, if you guys are paying 50, I can get you a $37 factory. That's that's very powerful and I've heard a number of times where that kind of information will be enough to take to the signature around.

Greg Mills: [00:51:54] Okay. That was something I had not considered before. So you

Travis Rosbach: [00:51:59] and [00:52:00] licensing has a lot of a lot of potential. I think it's a great idea. And I think there are those who do it really well. I think it's just like any other business you need to really study and learn and know that, there's, if there's a hundred people, not all hundred are gonna make it.

There's the Pareto principle where 80 are probably gonna fail in 20 are gonna make it. But if you're one of those 20, it could be a good deal. I had another guy who he was ahead.

of his time. This is a good story. Great. This guy came to me and 2019, just mid to late 2019.

And he had a product for a hoodie that had a mask on it to keep you warm, was the idea to keep your face warm. And companies were telling him. Left and right. And left and right. Nobody needed that. And that was a stupid idea. 20, 20 rolled around. And guess what happened? Everybody wanted a hoodie with a mask on and boom.

He just took right off. So that was a lot of fun.

Greg Mills: [00:52:58] Yeah, I think I remember watching [00:53:00] shark tank and there was a lady that was presenting personalized masks surgical masks, and she didn't get a deal. And she was too early.

Travis Rosbach: [00:53:09] Ah, yeah.

Greg Mills: [00:53:10] 20, 20 17 who knew.

Travis Rosbach: [00:53:13] that something, yeah. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah.

Greg Mills: [00:53:16] So you mentioned box what have been some of the the other successes for the Tumalo Group?

Travis Rosbach: [00:53:21] Bonks was a big one is a big one. We've got others that I just, I kinda keep a little quiet on because not all of them want to. Give credit where credit is due. They want to keep it inside. But I've worked with a number of very large brands and companies helping to find new product factories behind the scenes type of stuff.

And that's where a lot of a lot of I shouldn't say a lot, I'd say a portion of our businesses is just helping businesses transition from their factory over to our factory and keeping it as quiet and below the radar as possible. Because anytime you have a [00:54:00] disruption in your supply chain your customers and your clients may get a little bit hesitant to reluctant, as the quality gonna be the same as it could be worse quality.

Am I not going to be able to get my products for a while? And so we keep it a little bit cool.

Greg Mills: [00:54:14] Okay. Now this country basically gave away manufacturing in the eighties and was, where I'm from. We see a lot of, old mills, that are just eliminated, not in use. Do you, you ever see any of that coming back? Do you know with some of the stuff going on with China?

Travis Rosbach: [00:54:37] you know, not to get too political, but I think we were really on our way up until January. I think that reversed and we're now going leaning more back towards China which is, it is what it is. I think that, even before China, we had Korea, we had Japan, we had Taiwan, we had Mexico and as a capitalistic free [00:55:00] nation that we're in, we're going to go to where it's cheapest to manufacture.

And so we, we've been doing that, whether it's, I live in this town, but I manufacturing that town we've been doing that forever. It, we just so happen to be with China right now. But again, before China, we had Korea and Japan and Mexico and everywhere else. China does a really good job of manufacturing.

They have their manufacturing dialed so well and they do an exceptional. Brilliant job. Most of the time, there are times where at least the factories we work with, I don't work with the running, the male Ali-Baba factories. And I do not recommend people use those because you're going to get what you pay for and you're going, it's just like anything else, if you don't know who you're working with and you don't know what you're paying for, you don't know what you're going to get.

That's not a good success formula. I think that it would be wonderful if we can [00:56:00] start bringing manufacturing back home to the states and we were so damn close. We were, it felt like we were just minutes away from having American made products once again. And then it changed in about January.

And when it changed in January we went right back across the pond. And now it's, like I just to tell a personal story, I went down to buy a trailer and there were no trailers. I said where all the trailers and the guy said they're not, I why they can't get the metal or what, why mark the Hancock in the supply chain.

And he says, it's the humans. The humans are sitting on the couch, watching Netflix, collecting unemployment, and they don't want to go to work. They don't want to make trailers anymore. I said I know a factory in China. That's going to make me trailers all day long cause they want to work. And he said, Yeah, honestly, that's the best thing to do right now is to go to China because you're not going to get one from America, [00:57:00] not anytime soon.

And it's so frustrating because like I said, I was. We were close. We were so darn close to opening up factories all across the country with so many different things going on. Cause those tariffs, 25% tariff on steel that really made people stop and think do I want to move to Thailand or do I want to move to, X, Y Zed country?

Or do I want to just bring it in house charge 20, 30% more and say, yep, we're an American made company and people were ready to bring it in house. And I think we got set back a bit on that.

Greg Mills: [00:57:35] Yeah, I think we did too. The China's just the current bad guy, but the real ultimate, the ultimate bad guy, it was NAFTA. Gosh, the jobs, right out of the out of America.

Travis Rosbach: [00:57:50] It did it, did, and I don't blame China in the least bit. They're taking advantage of the opportunity, just like anybody else would. And I really do. And I've seen this [00:58:00] for years when I first started going to China, American needs and I'll say America, but, and I won't speak for any other country, but we need a bad guy.

We need a villain. We need somebody who we can throw rocks out and say, oh, it's not us. It's them. Oh no, it wasn't me. I didn't do that. They did that. And China is that country right now. Who's going to be next. I don't know. It might be, we might move over to Africa. We might move to Detroit.

Who knows, but it might be south America. But for right now, man, they've got their labor force and they've got their robots and they've got their quality control and they've got their shipping and logistics dial, unlike anybody else on this planet does. And it, and just the infrastructure, having the highways to transport from the factory to the port is huge.

You can have the best factory in the whole country, but if you don't have the roads to get out and the roads are impassable six months a year, or if the power goes off every third day for five [00:59:00] hours, you just can't have a, an established, production facility in some of these countries just yet.

There's still too far behind.

Greg Mills: [00:59:08] I guess it almost takes us to, wrapping it up. Do you ever plan on retiring?

Travis Rosbach: [00:59:14] No, gosh, no, I would. I know I have too much fun. I have way too much fun. I take my retirement in increments, honestly, and this is, I found when I was fresh out of high school, I was 18 and working in the Virgin islands. It was very busy throughout the winter time. And in the summertime it was so low and there was no money.

The crime rate would go up. There was no food, no water, no money. And that's when I would travel and I'd go and spend my money from the winter time. And so I've gone in these. No, anywhere from four months to four years, cycles of work real hard and then take a lot of time off and then work real hard to take time off.

And now I've, I found a way to, [01:00:00] work real hard, probably anywhere from two to four hours a day. And then I had the rest of the day off to play with my daughter and go build swimming pools.

Greg Mills: [01:00:07] Nice.

Travis Rosbach: [01:00:08] Hopefully. Nice. It can't, I don't want to jinx it, but how hard can it be, but

Greg Mills: [01:00:13] Oh man. Yeah, you've jinxed it.

Travis Rosbach: [01:00:16] I totally have, yeah, I'm going to have to hire somebody now.

Greg Mills: [01:00:20] I understand getting it level is a very big deal.

Travis Rosbach: [01:00:24] Oh, I bet. Yeah. Oh yeah. I didn't even think about that. I had a hole dug for a trampoline when going to sink a trampoline down and I think I'm going to, I'm going to sink the swimming pool too, and then I'll let those guys be in charge of the level. Yeah.

Greg Mills: [01:00:37] There you go. What's the number one piece of advice that you can give for our listeners.

Travis Rosbach: [01:00:43] I would say, please just go out and do it. The world needs entrepreneurs. We need people to stand up and try. We need people to save this planet and make our lives easier. And we needed to make our lives better. In a lot of ways we can do that is [01:01:00] with entrepreneurial help. I really firmly believe that tomorrow's inventions are out there today, listening to this right now.

And we need people to just stand up and take a risk. It's not easy. It's not fun all the time and it's not for everybody. But if you have a calling to be an entrepreneur, please by all means, stand up. We need.

Greg Mills: [01:01:25] Okay. What's the best way for people to check you out and get in touch with.

Travis Rosbach: [01:01:29] Usually just sending me an email, travis@tumalogroup.com is about the best way. I'm also on LinkedIn. Although my LinkedIn box gets really full, a lot of well-wishers and a lot of people looking for help and advice and business. And unfortunately that gets a little bit, so I'd say just a direct email and we can take it from there.

Greg Mills: [01:01:52] All right, that's a wrap. Thank you, Travis, for being a guest on entrepreneurs over 40. [01:02:00]