Episode Transcript
Don Mock 0:20
Alright, everybody, Episode 48. We’re back. We’re getting closer to 50. I know we teased it last time, but we got to figure out what we’re doing for the Big 5-0. But we’re not there yet.
Rob Broadfoot 0:28
I have a few ideas. But I will not reveal them now. It’ll be a suprise.
Don Mock 0:31
Yeah, that’s a nice tease for a couple episodes from now. All right. 48. Wanted to shift gears for a minute here and talk about the concept of building something from nothing. We do a lot of advertising branding design. That’s what we do. We work with a lot of startups, historically, over the last 15 years or so, like, incubated little medical device companies out of Georgia Tech, or wherever the case may be. Or just clients that have crazy ideas come to us. And it’s like, hey, I need a little bit of everything. I need the logo. I might even need the name. Here’s this idea. What do we name this thing? What do we call this thing? How do we design this thing? What does it look like? What does it feel like? How do we approach people with it? What’s the strategy? They just need a little bit of everything. I love working with those types of companies. I want to say about 10 years or so ago-
Rob Broadfoot 0:33
It was 2010.
Don Mock 1:08
It was 2010. So a little bit more than 10 years ago. I draw pictures for a living. We took the plunge and built something from nothing on our own. Right?
Rob Broadfoot 1:34
Yeah.
Don Mock 1:36
I don’t even know how to begin to tell this story.
Rob Broadfoot 1:38
I was gonna say out of thin air, but it wasn’t out of thin air. It was out of lake water.
Don Mock 1:43
Correct.
Rob Broadfoot 1:43
How about that?
Don Mock 1:44
Correct.
Rob Broadfoot 1:45
So the story kind of goes like this. How do I even tell the story? Well, so the another fella that we ended up partnering up with in the business came up with this idea. Floating around at the lake, maybe a few beers, and whatever else, came up with this sort of idea to create a flotation device. Yeah. A recreational flotation device, that would somehow balance you sitting up. So you could enjoy your beverage just kind of sitting up and floating in a way.
Don Mock 2:19
Absolutely, absolutely. So if you’re a lake person or a boat person, there is that common convention. Let’s call it what it is, of flipping your lifejacket upside down, putting your legs through the arms and the lifejacket, and kind of hanging out in the water. That’s been a thing that people have done for a number of years. The idea, the convention wasn’t the idea. But the idea was, why is no one really built this actual product, right? Because life jackets are expensive. It kind of destroys the structural integrity of a life jacket, shoving your legs through where they’re not supposed to go. There are noodles, there’s other floaty devices. There’s all sorts of things. But why has no one really designed a comfortable way to sit in the water? And sit there and drink a bevy or 12 or whatever the case may be.
Rob Broadfoot 3:05
So the idea came up one night drinking a bunch of beers. Then the next morning, it was like, Oh, my gosh, Did we just decide to start a company and build a thing?
Don Mock 3:15
Yeah.
Rob Broadfoot 3:15
And the answer was a slightly hungover, “Yeah, I think so.” That set us on a journey to figure out, how in the world to bring this thing to life, to manufacture something and to build it. We had zero experience doing that. There was three of us involved.
Don Mock 3:33
Yes.
Rob Broadfoot 3:34
Three partners involved. And none of us had any manufacturing experience, distribution experience. No, nothing like that. Product design experience, none of that. So we got to work. We started sketching up ideas and starting to think about it, did the research and found a product designer out of Asheville, North Carolina.
Don Mock 3:54
Correct. Yes.
Rob Broadfoot 3:55
Started to work with him to begin to prototype this redesign of an upside-down lifejacket.
Don Mock 4:02
Now, he worked in life jackets, right?
Rob Broadfoot 4:05
Yeah, he worked in life jackets. He did shoes and life jackets.
Don Mock 4:09
Yeah. Now before we go in too far about everything moving forward… What was the most exciting part of for you, Rob, at the beginning of this journey? What was like, “oh, yeah, like, let’s do this.” You just went through, hey, we kind of didn’t know what we didn’t know. Right?
Rob Broadfoot 4:24
I think for me, it was the challenge of trying to figure it out. Could we actually do it?
Correct.
Then, you know, we learned by doing and learned by messing up and learned by figuring it out. Sort of those challenges. So I think was that. I think it was just the idea of like, “Can we actually do this? Can we figure it out?”
Don Mock 4:42
Yeah, for me, it was the same thing. A lot of times, as I mentioned in the beginning of this episode, we help companies and individuals and whatever with only one part of the process. We’re not really involved in procurement or material design or manufacturing, brokering, off shores relations, all that. We sort of stick in the creative land. I think, for me, it was super exciting to go, “Hey, let’s, let’s jump on the other side of the fence” and kind of be our own clients, and do what clients do every single day, and learn that whole other side of the business, that we don’t necessarily touch day-to-day in our in our day job. In the advertising side of life.
Right. Before we got even to any of the design communication stuff, it was all just product design. Manufacturing. What do we do? So fast forward, we came up with a design. All prototypes made. There’s a funny story about going and testing out the prototypes
Up in Ashville?
Rob Broadfoot 5:38
Up in Ashville…(laughing)
Don Mock 5:41
What’s the funny story of yours?
Rob Broadfoot 5:42
Well, it was this. We were in this guy’s… He was a friend of the family. He had this sort of little, I don’t wanna say compound. It was this property up in Ashville, and he had a pond in the back. And that was our testing pond. So we would test in the pond. Well, at one point, there was a snake.
Don Mock 5:59
You remember what kind of snake it was?
Rob Broadfoot 6:00
Was it copperhead?
Don Mock 6:01
It was a Copperhead.
Rob Broadfoot 6:01
Yes, it was a Copperhead, writhing around and this guy… Oh, and mind you, I think we had all done a shot of, whatcha call it?
Don Mock 6:10
Oh, God.
Rob Broadfoot 6:11
Moonshine.
Don Mock 6:14
It was, “Hey, great to meet you. Drink this.”
Rob Broadfoot 6:15
Yeah, we were gonna go up for the day and float around and test the thing out. Nice to meet you. Have a splash of moonshine, so we did. And then all of a sudden this Copperhead shows up out of nowhere, and the guy who owned the property comes running down with a gun.
Don Mock 6:28
Yeah. He had a big old shotguney rifle thing. Yeah.
Rob Broadfoot 6:31
And he just to blew that to smithereens.
Don Mock 6:35
I didn’t know what was going on.
Rob Broadfoot 6:36
Then it was one of those in hindsight, “What in the world did we just do?” We have a few of those moments. Maybe that’s a good another topic, too. This What in the world? moments. How did we get here?moments, but that was one of them. And so we tested the prototypes, killed the sake, drank some moonshine all in a day and came up with the final design.
Don Mock 6:56
Yeah, exactly. We hired the designer, and he had designed all sorts of stuff. But he also was very familiar with the materials, of which we weren’t. We learned more about close-cell PE and open cell foam, all these different types of flotational foam and all that sort of stuff. Right? Yeah. Fascinating stuff. Right. Yeah. Yeah. So we designed a bunch of different things. Who actually sewed all that stuff up? Because, I mean, we were selling stuff here down in Atlanta. Do you recall who? Did he do all that?
Rob Broadfoot 7:22
You mean the prototypes?
Don Mock 7:23
Yeah, the very first prototypes?
Rob Broadfoot 7:24
I think he did all the prototypes.
Don Mock 7:25
I think he did, too.
Rob Broadfoot 7:26
I think he did all the prototypes. Then we landed on the final design, and then we were going to manufacture in the US, remember that?
Don Mock 7:35
Yeah. Yeah.
Rob Broadfoot 7:36
It was super expensive.
Don Mock 7:37
Well, we hired a broker, did we not?
Rob Broadfoot 7:38
Yeah, we hired a broker.
Don Mock 7:39
We hired a broker to determine, should we manufacture in the US, overseas in the Far East? Or should we try southern hemisphere, but stay in our timezone? So South America, basically. And from what I recall, correct me if I’m wrong here, the US manufacturing at the time, unbelievably expensive.
Rob Broadfoot 7:56
Way too expensive.
Don Mock 7:56
Because of labor and materials, right? Because the materials had to be shipped, obviously, from China over here. So it was kind of a double cost of materials. South America was the cheapest in regards to, I believe, labor. However, you had to ship the materials there as well. It was the same problem we had in the US. We wanted the Cadillac at the beginning, we wanted that closed-cell PE foam. That had to be shipped. So it was like, man, it just made sense to manufacture in China.
Yeah, it came down to the numbers. At the price point that we figured we had to sell it, or could sell it, there was no way to build in a margin to have it make any sense.
Absolutely.
Rob Broadfoot 8:35
So we did that. We figured out our manufacturing over there. I remember, we got the first batch sent here to Atlanta.
Don Mock 8:41
DHL, remember that?
Rob Broadfoot 8:43
The truck shows up.
Don Mock 8:45
Are you talking about the full truck?
Rob Broadfoot 8:47
I’m talking about the full truck.
Don Mock 8:48
Oh, you’re going all the way to the full truck?
Rob Broadfoot 8:49
I’m going to the full truck. Full truck shows up and you have never seen so many boxes in your life.
Don Mock 8:54
Yeah, I mean, it was a 40-foot shipping container.
Rob Broadfoot 8:56
Yeah, a full container.
Don Mock 8:58
Yeah, people see that on the back of a trains and stuff or semis or whatever. It was a full semi-
Rob Broadfoot 9:02
And that was the container that was messed up.
Don Mock 9:05
It was messed up. It was messed up. But Rob, we’ve already jumped past the-
Rob Broadfoot 9:09
Well, I’m trying to be conscientious of time…
Don Mock 9:11
When did we name this thing? And we haven’t even done that.
Rob Broadfoot 9:15
Oh, well go ahead.
Don Mock 9:15
Well, I don’t even remember where the name came from, cecause I’m a horrible storyteller.
Rob Broadfoot 9:20
The name actually came from a fourth partner at the very beginning. And he came up with the name.
Don Mock 9:27
Really?
Rob Broadfoot 9:28
Yep.
Don Mock 9:28
Okay. All right.
Rob Broadfoot 9:31
Names have been changed to protect the innocent. We’ll call him Bob.
Don Mock 9:34
Yeah, so the name of the product is Bum Float.
Rob Broadfoot 9:38
Right. Right.
Don Mock 9:38
We named it the Bum Float. Right, floating around in your bum. Obviously. We had a fantastic designer at the time, Kenny, who helped us with the logo.
Rob Broadfoot 9:47
That’s right.
Don Mock 9:47
We designed this fun little otter, who was holding a beer can, or holding a nebulous can,floating around in the water. Everybody can go to bumfloat.com. I’m sure it’s still up. We named the product, helped design what the product looked like. And then, obviously, did all of the launch materials, the initial website 1.0. Even the hang tags, I mean, there was merchandising, all sorts of different things, right. By the time that 40-foot truck, or that container came, obviously, the product was manufactured. I mean, it was made, we had the name on the product, we had the tags, all the different things. How many… we ordered, were there 5000 of those things?
Rob Broadfoot 10:27
That might be right.
Don Mock 10:28
Yeah, something like that. Right.
Rob Broadfoot 10:29
It was a lot of items. So they shipped, the product shows up.
Don Mock 10:34
It was crazy day, man.
Rob Broadfoot 10:40
We didn’t have quality control over in China, as we should have. Again, this is sort of lesson learned as you go.
Don Mock 10:45
Absolutely.
Rob Broadfoot 10:46
We didn’t have the right QC in place. They get over here, and they’re not quite right. The sewing is not right. So we had to we had to find a place here. Then as we sold them, we would just run through this sewing facility and drop them off and go pick them up.
Don Mock 11:03
Absolutely.
Rob Broadfoot 11:03
It was a total pain. But again, leverage learning. And they started to sell. Crazy. Crazy. They started to sell. It was cool. And I remember that was super cool. Just that feeling of like, wow. Here’s the thing. Yeah, we made a thing.
Don Mock 11:18
Yeah, we literally made something out of nothing.
Rob Broadfoot 11:20
We made a widget, an actual thing.
Don Mock 11:21
Well, yeah, the idea came, then we actually designed it. Then we, I mean, we skipped over the legal aspect. But obviously, we did all the lawyering. Lawyers gotta lawyer. But then there was design patents. There was different things that were done. I mean, like a real company, Rob. Then there was naming, then there was all of the outside of the industrial design of the product itself, then there’s all the manufacturing, and then shipping and insurance. All the crazy other side of the business that our clients do, that we don’t really play in that sandbox very often. Then they came here and then yeah, boom. I mean, we’re selling on Amazon, we’re selling on our own website. I think some of the most fun we had actually was, we got ourselves a tradeshow booth. Just like clients do.
Rob Broadfoot 11:23
It was amazing, we made the booth.
Don Mock 11:28
Yeah, we made a booth. Right. Oh, God, with all that pressure-treated lumber remember that?. I mean, my word.
Rob Broadfoot 12:07
Leverage learning.
Don Mock 12:08
So we made a booth. Then all three partners, all three of us, and our and our wives and kids and everything, we worked the Atlanta Boat Show.
Rob Broadfoot 12:26
Which is one of the largest boat shows in the country. For people who don’t know,
Don Mock 12:30
I mean, that was nuts. We’re taking credit cards, we’re taking cash, we’re running shifts, we’re doing things- all of this on the weekend, right? Or maybe it was like a Thursday, Friday. I mean, it was multi-
Rob Broadfoot 12:40
It was Friday, Saturday, Sunday.
Don Mock 12:42
Yeah. Then there were other trade shows. I primarily just stuck with the Atlanta one. I know you traveled up to Nashville.
Rob Broadfoot 12:48
I did Nashville.
Don Mock 12:48
Maybe Clemson or something. There were all sorts of other festivals.
Rob Broadfoot 12:51
Yeah Clemson’s a big one. So we started hitting that circuit. We found that we would sell at the boat show. It was crazy.
Don Mock 12:59
Yeah, that was fun.
Rob Broadfoot 13:00
You couldn’t hold onto them, you’d sell a ton of them.
Don Mock 13:02
Yeah, then we ended up hiring people to work at the boat shows. I mean, it was nuts.
Rob Broadfoot 13:06
So that went on for years and years and years. I think we were in Walmart, maybe online, Just online retailers. It was all online, right? Yeah. We never we never really crossed the bridge into physical retail.
Don Mock 13:21
Yeah, a few marinas here and there.
Rob Broadfoot 13:22
Yeah, small mom-and-pop marinas, but never any of the big.
Don Mock 13:25
Yeah, not in Costco or any of that kind of stuff. Mostly boat shows.
Rob Broadfoot 13:29
Boat shows was the driver because, those are the best margins we could get. Amazon, God bless them. They help you with the volume. But yeah, it was that was a really cool experience. I think, you know, a few years back, we sold out of it. We sold our portion of the company. We kind of got out of it. For a long time we ran the all the marketing for it and the site and did all the kinds of things. We’ve since relinquished that. But it was a really cool experience. It was one of those things that I think I’ll always look back on and go “wow, remember that time where we made a thing?” Like an actual thing?
Don Mock 14:04
Yeah, it was pretty nuts.
Rob Broadfoot 14:05
And I think it help now to understand, when we talk to clients, what it’s like, and kind of have a better perspective on manufacturing, distribution. On a much smaller scale of course. All of those things… It’s great knowledge to have, in the arsenal.
Don Mock 14:26
Well, I think, having gone through it ourselves, and really understanding, Wow, lead times. And 90 days on the water from another country and all that sort of stuff. When we consult or when we powwow with a with a startup… a team of engineers that created this awesome thing, we do have that knowledge to be able to say “hey you guys, it seems like it’s 18 months away, but you really need to start focusing on this, that and whatever.” Having gone through that experience ourselves. It sneaks up on you before you realize it would sneak up on you. And sometimes that feedback is appreciated by clients.
Rob Broadfoot 15:04
I think that I’ve said this always, in almost everything. This applies, in my opinion, to our business and what we do. It certainly applies to the Bum Float story. The ideas are the easy part. Ideas are easy. We can crank those out all day long.
Don Mock 15:19
Absolutely.
Rob Broadfoot 15:19
It’s the actual bringing that to life. And that’s, to me is-
Don Mock 15:25
That’s the hard part, right.?
Rob Broadfoot 15:26
It’s true in everything. I mean, I can come up with an idea for a musical. Putting together a musical is a whole… that’s the work.
Don Mock 15:35
We do know the guy that writes musicals, though.
Rob Broadfoot 15:37
Yeah, we absolutely do. Shout out to Haddon Klein.
Don Mock 15:40
Absolutely. So funny. Funny, you should pick on that. The doing is the hardest part. I think that’s why they say, write it down. I mean, talking about product invention. It’s, dreams are just that until you write it down and it becomes an action step.
Rob Broadfoot 15:55
Yep.
Don Mock 15:55
Right. I’m kind of bastardizing some quote or whatever.
Rob Broadfoot 15:58
It’s true. It’s true. So hey, we forgot to mention, the product is awesome.
Don Mock 16:04
Oh, yeah, totally. Totally.
Rob Broadfoot 16:06
We have several of them. We keep them we use them. They’re great. The kids love them. It’s a great product.
Don Mock 16:11
Yeah, for sure. For sure. We went through the version one, version two, version three. Just like all normal products do, went through that process? So yeah, we did our decade and then sold to our third partner, and are comfortably out of the business now. But I do echo what you said, in that great experience.
Rob Broadfoot 16:32
Yep.
Don Mock 16:32
Great leverage-learnings that we can pass along to existing clients, potential clients. And and a fun thing to do.
Rob Broadfoot 16:39
Super fun. Yeah. Great project. Anyway, that’s the story of Bum Float. Absolutely, they’re still around. You can go buy them now. It’s great.
Don Mock 16:48
Yeah, yeah, for sure.
Rob Broadfoot 16:49
On Amazon or go to bumfloat.com. You can check them out. I think that’s the Bum Float story.
Don Mock 16:55
Yep. All right. Where can people find us, Mr. Rob?
Rob Broadfoot 16:57
The people can find us at mocktheagency.com on the interwebs, of course. Then on the socials @mocktheagency. Drop us a line, drop us a note. Give us topics, feedback, love ,appreciation. All good things.
Don Mock 17:12
Five star reviews, all the way.
Rob Broadfoot 17:13
Five stars. We love them.
Don Mock 17:13
All right. Thanks, everybody.
Rob Broadfoot 17:15
Talk to you next time.
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