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Slash with AmEx. Hello and welcome to the advice line on how I built this lab.
I'm Guy Razz. This is the place where we help try to solve your business challenges.
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All right, let's get to it.
My guest today is Tony Lam, the founder of Kona Ice.
It's a franchise of shaved ice trucks that started out not in Hawaii but in northern Kentucky.
Tony, welcome to the show.
Hey, Guy. Glad to be here.
The shaved ice capital of the world, northern Kentucky.
It's so great to have you back on the show.
We had you back on last year and we told the story of about how your kids went to buy popsicles from a kind of a CD looking ice cream truck and their popsicles are freezer burned and they're gross.
And then you start to think, well, what if you could kind of redo the ice cream truck and then you kind of had this kind of revelation, maybe a road to Damascus moment where you realize that shaved ice could be the thing.
And then you eventually built out a truck and you worked it for a while and then you turn into a franchise model, a business where people now buy, can buy a Kona Ice, shaved ice truck and run a small business.
And you've got, how many of these do you have around the United States today?
We have 1,850 Kona trucks along with about 700 ancillary pieces of equipment, but about 150 coffee trucks too.
So cool. And... Right, coffee business too, which is called the...
Traveling Tom's. Traveling Tom's, yeah.
Named after my dad. Named after your dad.
I just saw a Kona Ice truck up in Sonoma County in California the day and I thought of you.
A lot of the, and I suspect a lot of people calling in today are going to ask about visibility, growing your brand, how do you get people to be aware of what you're doing.
And so much of this revolves around digital media, social media advertising.
But really a lot of it is just, it hasn't really changed in terms of getting the word out.
And in your episode you talked about, at one point you were driving trucks with advertising and you were doing all kinds of your Obama and McCain and whoever pay you to drive the truck with the sign on it.
And now essentially Kona Ice, I mean that's a moving billboard, right?
Or Traveling Tom is just driving around and you see it.
So when it comes to things like building awareness and advertising, I mean, how do you think about doing that with your businesses?
Well, I mean, I'm listening to your advice line and I've loved several of the episodes, almost every episode I just have loved.
I just think your guest, your returning guest are so caring and gentle and loving.
And I don't tend to be that way.
So I'm hoping that I can channel some of that.
But no, but you think about like Tarte makeup.
Yeah, and Marine Kelly.
Yeah, Marine Kelly and her early stories of just grinding it through.
And then the Cliffbar guy, what was his name?
Gary Erickson. Yeah, Gary Erickson.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And he was amazing.
He's talking about going to the writers and going out and just handing out, you know, and he actually cut bars in two.
So he's giving out chunks of stuff.
That is that tenacity that, you know, everyone now wants to figure out how to go viral and just sit back on their computer and type some things out.
And yeah, there's a place for that.
Don't get me wrong because it's a heck of a lot easier if you can figure out that magic formula.
But still, don't ever discount that grind to me.
And that out there, like you were saying, I was out there in a truck driving around my neighborhoods, my friends laughing at me and I'm like, oh God, I hope I'm right.
I hope I'm right. Tony, what are you doing driving an ice cream truck?
You used to drive a nice car.
We're a nice suit. I'm like, I swear to God, this is going to work.
Well, here you go. Almost 2000 trucks later and you have the last laugh.
Tony, why don't we take our first caller?
Excellent. Okay. Caller, let's bring our first caller and hello.
You are online. Hey, guy.
Hey, Tony. Welcome. Please tell us your name, where you're calling from and just a little bit about your business.
Yeah. My name is Dylan Richter.
I'm the co-founder with my wife, Katie, of the Sweet Spot in the small rural town of Hillsborough, Illinois.
We are a good old fashioned brick and mortar candy retail shop.
Everything that a sweet tooth would desire, we have ice cream, candies, craft sodas, all of the above.
Amazing. And what's your question for us today, Dylan?
My question's around expansion.
So we are about to have our one year anniversary, but the store's been super successful.
It's been super fun and it is a format that I think could work in small towns all over the country.
So we are about to open our second location about 40 minutes away, but my question is, what metrics and milestones should we be looking at to see if this concept is indeed viable across the country?
Okay. We'll get your question in a sec.
I've got some questions for you, Dylan.
So Hillsborough is not, it's in Illinois, but it's like in central Illinois.
Like you're closer to St.
Louis than you are to Chicago, right?
Little over an hour away from St.
Louis. That's right. And how big is the town of Hillsborough?
About 5,000 people. Wow.
Okay. So tell me, so you opened the store last year, right?
The candy store, the sweets bar?
That's right. That's right.
Tell me, what were you doing before that?
How did that happen? Were you in the candy business?
Not at all. And this was not part of the plan.
So the fun is exciting and happy as a candy store is.
The origin story is unfortunately not quite the same.
So if I rewind a couple of years, my wife and I were living in Chicago.
I have worked since 2014 for DoorDash and had a fantastic time seeing that company grow.
My wife is a scientist. She is definitely the brains of the family.
But if we get to around COVID, unfortunately, we got a phone call and my father-in-law was diagnosed with terminal brain cancer.
So as soon as we got that news, we packed up our bags.
We moved to Hillsborough to spend time and help out with the caretaking.
And to be honest, that was a very difficult couple of years.
And going through that experience, this is going to sound cliche, but it was one of those things where you kind of realize how valuable time is.
And through that experience kind of came to the conclusion that I want to have more agency over my time.
I've always wanted to start something of my own.
We thought it would be, frankly, just a lot of fun to start a business in the small town, kind of get back to the community that showed us a lot of support.
And next thing you know, we decided to open a candy store.
Wow. Okay. So you guys opened a candy store?
It presumably is on the Main Street.
It is. We are literally on Main Street.
It's a small, probably like 40 retail storefronts.
And it was one of those experiences where we're coming from a big city.
We've only ever lived in quote, unquote, big cities.
And through moving there after a couple of years felt small town USA overlooked underserved.
I did a little research and candy, not the most expensive thing, kind of a routine habitual type of experience.
So if you can invest in a good experience for the people in the town, give back to the community and it can work in a small town like Hillsboro, I thought that that was bones that could potentially work in many other places.
I've driven through many small towns in rural Illinois, but I know that same concept applies elsewhere.
It's interesting, candy is probably a little bit like, I mean, it's shelf stable.
It doesn't go bad that quickly.
It's probably relatively inexpensive.
And then the margins are probably pretty good, right?
Absolutely. All of that is true.
Yeah. So Tony, I mean, we can get to Dylan's question in a second, but I'm assuming you've got some, you probably have some questions for him as well.
No. I love. I love the idea.
I mean, it's just, it's nostalgic.
You picture the small town, you're going in and it's experiential.
Dylan, are you and your wife working the store every day?
Is that who's in the store?
I'm there 100% of the time, the first six months I was behind the counter just because I've never done this before.
It's the best way to learn how to do it.
My wife's aunt is now at the counter all day, every day with us.
And then my mother-in-law is going to be joining us when she retires from the high school in a couple months.
So these are small towns, these are OGs from that town?
Exactly. Everybody knows everybody, pluses and minuses to that I have learned, but there's definitely a very strong community feel.
Tell me a little bit about your customers that walk in.
These families that walk in, is it, is a, I picture a grandpa bringing their granddaughter in, is it, tell me about that a little bit.
What does that look like?
It is, it is exactly what you picture.
It is grandma and grandpa bringing the kids in during the day in the summer when the parents are working.
It's kids in the high school coming after school and getting a snack.
I had someone in there two weeks ago buying candy to use as potty training for their kids.
So the use cases. I did that.
Yep. Did that work? Totally worked.
Bribery. So right now you're expanding and the question you're sort of asking is what do, what kind of metrics, what are our KPIs?
What do we need to be thinking about to turn this into something scalable?
Before I answer that question, let me ask you this.
What do you want to be? I mean, you're talking to Tony, he turned Kona Ice into a national franchise.
What do you think that you'd like to be if you thought about that?
Yeah, 100%. Look at the end of the day, going through the experience that we went through, I would say I and we, we're optimizing for creating as much joy as possible.
And that might sound like a cheesy answer, but it's, it's the honest truth.
So if I can bottle up this concept and hand it off to someone else to run, I not only think that brings a tremendous amount of, of happiness and joy to the people in those communities, but also a pretty good job, a pretty enjoyable and rewarding career for a family who wants to invest back in their hometown.
All right, so you're open to some kind of franchise model.
In my head, that's the way that this works best.
But yeah. All right, Tony, what do you, Tony, you're looking at this with me.
You successfully launched two franchise models with, with coffee and shave ice.
What are your thoughts on that?
You know, you got to ask yourself, Dylan, and listen, let me say this, you're merchandising the idea.
I'm looking at your website, whoever's doing your merchandising.
And I'm assuming that you are in your scientist wife, but, but you are, it is looked, it looks fabulous.
It really does look fabulous.
I have to ask myself first.
So, so here was a question I asked myself when I'm driving around the first trucker in the neighborhoods and I was doing well and I was like, is this all me?
Cause I'm from Northern Kentucky and I'm, I mean, I've been there 20 years and I'm calling the school teachers and I'm, I'm just busting into everywhere.
But I thought, how much am I a part of this success and can the success be garnered by someone who's, you know, not from small town Illinois.
And you're going to find out a lot when you open up 40 miles away and I would definitely hire somebody from that small town, probably a school teacher that's beloved and put her in that store.
I smile because that's exactly what we're, we're planning to do.
Yeah. That's, that's brilliant in that, in that respect.
So if you're wanting to franchise, listen, and let me back up just a second Dylan, because you said you were looking for, you know, you just lost your father in law and you're kind of going through this process and, and what that shows you about life and it's, it's, it's brevity and how much you wanted to be happy and how much you wanted to enjoy.
And I want to say this as constructively as I can, I say this to my own franchisees.
There is a sweet spot in Kona ice with a couple franchises and maybe an ancillary or two and you can make plenty of money.
You can really have a great life, but, but everyone kind of gets into this and they're like, Hey, how do I conquer the world?
Um, my wife, my wife kind of jokes.
She said, you know, Tony quit his job to do Kona so he could spend more time with his kids and all he did was just make a business big enough so he can employ all of his kids and get free labor.
So brings new challenges.
But no, I do want to, I do want to kind of put that into your ethos is like, it's not always about trying to take over the world in candy stores.
Dylan, what, what do you mind telling us?
What is, what is your revenue more or less?
We'll do about 400 in our first 12 months.
That's amazing for a candy store in a small town.
Almost did a spit take there.
I just drink a bottle of water and almost spit all over the computer.
This is 400,000 for the first year.
My projection was 62. So I think that's more of a reflection on my poor modeling skills than anything else.
I mean, I mean, that kind of revenue, right?
It's amazing. It really, you've proved out this, this concept and, but I think that to do it in a way where you can actually sell a franchise, there has to be a couple of tweaks in the stores that make this totally unique, you know, like, right?
You know, you talk about joy and I think a lot of that joy comes from seeing children come in with a grownup, right?
And candy stores just amazing.
Like, I remember when I was a kid, we had a teacher and she had a paper mache tree on one of the walls of the room and she would tape with masking tape, Tootsie Pops on that tree and once a day, one kid who was the student of the day could go and grab one off that tree.
And I mean, that was magical.
It was a lollipop tree, you know?
And if you can kind of create an experience even beyond just the candy, like I remember when I was a kid, there was a store called Imaginarium and some shopping malls and they had two doors.
They had the big door to go and then they had a small little door that kids could walk through into the store and it was so cool that I always wanted to go to that store and walk to that little door.
Love that. And so to me, like a couple of cool tweaks like that and you can really experiment with your second store, that, that kind of allows you to build out that proof of concept where you can say, okay, now we've got this model and now we can maybe go to a third store, maybe we can talk to somebody else who wants to open that third store.
Does that make sense? Makes perfect sense.
I love it. We're, we're heading that direction.
We have miniature shopping carts that little kids take around and put way too much candy in.
So I think there's a lot more we can and should do in that realm, but that advice is fantastic.
I appreciate it. The store is called The Sweet Spot.
Dylan Richter, good luck.
Thanks for calling in. Thank you guys very much.
We're going to start with this first store.
If it goes well and we want to expand, Guy, it may take us a little bit of time to get to San Francisco, but Tony, Parkersburg, West Virginia, Northern Kentucky, Florence, I think we can get there and see.
All right. I got first dibs on the San Francisco franchise.
Thank you guys very much.
It's been great. Thanks so much.
Thanks so much. Those are crazy numbers.
Those are some... I mean, you're the guy that, that figured out you can make money selling shaved ice and, and the margins on that must be pretty good, right?
Because it's ice and syrup and, you know, and there's gas.
gasoline and stuff, obviously, but, but man, candy.
And man, I just hope it's not...
I had a buddy that opened up a bar and his first three months, he was doing numbers that you couldn't even get your mind around.
And I had another friend that said, yeah, those are your honeymoon numbers.
Let's see if he's got what it takes to keep that going.
And lo and behold, he didn't.
I mean, because there's a lot of places out there, there's a lot of competition for your dollars when it comes to stuff like that.
So, but maybe not in a small town.
So maybe that's, he's tapped into something there and there's not competition for your, I know, I know we sell a lot of Kona franchises in small rural America.
And my franchisees have said to me, you know, you go to a small town and you're like Santa Claus coming to town, you know, people just lose their mind because they don't have all the options.
So maybe he's, he's really tapping into something there.
I'm, I'm hopeful. All right, Tony, we're going to take a quick break.
But when we come back, a Wall Street trader trying to popularize needle felting.
And if you don't know what needle felting is, well, that's part of the problem.
Stay with us. I'm Guy Riz and you're listening to the advice line right here on how I built this lab.
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Welcome back to the advice line on how I built this lab.
My guest today taking your calls with me is Tony Lamb, the founder of Kona Ice, a franchise of shaved ice trucks.
All right, let's bring in another caller.
Hello, caller, are you with us?
Hi, guy. Hi, Tony. It's great to talk with you.
Welcome, please. Tell us your name and where you're calling from and a little bit about your business.
Yeah. My name is Zach Deets.
I'm from Northampton, Massachusetts.
And my business is called Just Fuzz.
So we make and sell Learn to Needle Felt kits.
Amazing. Okay, tell us what question you brought for us.
Of course, yeah. So we're really focusing on online selling.
And we just launched recently.
We're two months into the business.
So my question is given that not a lot of people know what needle felting is, how should we market on social media to sell a product most people are unaware exists?
All right, we're going to get to your question a sec.
And I have a lot of questions about needle felting.
So just a kit you can buy and it gives you a needle and the felt and it teaches you how to needle felt or to sew, I guess, whatever the term is.
Yeah. So these kits make felted creatures out of sheep's wool.
So it's a process that takes about three hours and you create a cute little creature.
Right now we have a penguin and a panda for sale.
And you know, friends come to your apartment and they say, wow, that is, that's a really cute thing.
You're like, I actually made that myself.
I needle pointed at myself.
How did you get, tell me a little bit about the background?
How did you get to this act?
Right. So it all stems from I was working a job in finance, so very unrelated.
And I got laid off from that job and decided to take that as an opportunity to do some traveling.
So I convinced my girlfriend to quit her job and join me in travel in Asia.
And we were in Taiwan and we were at a craft fair.
And I'm not a really crafty guy, but when I saw this stand of all these felted creatures and I saw that they actually were selling kits to do it, I went up to the booth and I bought some kits and I asked, do you guys sell outside of Taiwan?
And they didn't. And I was like, why have I never seen this in the US?
So I tried the kits and I actually, you know, really enjoyed the experience.
And I was like, I think artsy people in the US might like trying this as well.
So that was kind of the genesis.
So you are basically betting on this idea that because it's, I mean, you know, it's unusual, right?
Like you're, I think you would admit yourself like you're, you were not a guy who'd be like, you know what, I really want to get into needle point or whatever.
Like you stumbled on it and then you tried it and you loved it.
And there was something about the experience of like putting this thing together that turned into a little creature that you've just thought was really satisfying or fun.
I don't know. It must have been something that captured your imagination in some way.
Right. Exactly. I think as we become adults and I'm only 26 years old, but I've already found this, we kind of lose our creativity and lose the ability to learn a new hobby.
So that's kind of what I'm trying to bottle up in this kit.
And what, what is the sort of like, just started this?
And so presumably, you know, trying to figure out how to get the word out so you can sell them, but what do you think the market size is and what was something like this?
Yeah. So you might think it's, it's pretty tiny.
And what really kind of shaped my opinion is this learned to crochet company called the Wubbles.
I don't know their current numbers, but I think it's five plus million dollars revenue a year.
And I was just in Walmart the other day and saw, saw their kits there.
So part of why I thought this could be a good idea is because I have friends who have done these learn to crochet kits and they say, actually, it's, it's still quite intimidating.
But with needle felting, you literally start with fluffy sheep's wool and you get a needle and you just start poking it and you just keep poking and it just condenses down into the shape.
So it's really doesn't, it doesn't take much instruction, although we do provide, you know, detailed step by step instruction, but it's, it's approachable.
Wow. Tony, any thoughts?
I have tons of thoughts.
You took me, Zach, you took me into a wormhole of needle felting and I, oh my gosh, the cat faces that I think I saw online and, and some of the, some of the things are beautiful.
And, but listen, I mean, obviously, you know, you're, you're a hill that you're climbing.
You, not only do you have to get market share, but you have to develop the market, which is probably the most challenging things there is to do out there because it's, it's so two fold.
Ironically enough, guy, I sat behind a lady on a cross country flight that was crocheting and she completely did this handbag and I was like, that was amazing.
I started talking to her a little bit as she were getting off the plane and I was like, she goes, oh yeah, I just look for opportunities to spend three or four hours doing this.
And I was like, I think it looks medicinal in a lot of ways.
Yeah. And I was like, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know,
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know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know,
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know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know,
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know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know,
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know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know,
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know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know,
I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, keep us posted.
Okay, thank you guys. Alright, now I'm thinking about this now.
I'm thinking about the meditative quality of this stuff.
I think this is really exciting because if you can learn how to do this and like, you know, my attention span, do you have a good attention span?
Are you willing to sit down for hours to learn something at this point in your life?
Probably not, I'm being honest.
I probably, I do like the medicinal, I do a lot of stretching and yoga and things like that.
I do like that serenity in your life when your life gets a little chaotic.
So I think there's something really cool here, but again, developing and introducing an entire concept is really, really challenging.
Alright, Tony, let's go ahead and take another quick break, but when we come back, is it possible to build a brand of Instagram-worthy products without paying big bucks?
To Instagram influencers?
That's coming up in just a moment.
Stay with us. I'm Guy Razz and you're listening to the Advice Line right here on How I Built This Lab.
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Welcome back to the advice line on how I built this lab.
And today, I'm joined by Kona Ice founder Tony Lam.
And Tony, let's get to it.
Let's bring in our last caller.
Hello, caller. I believe it's Jennifer.
Jennifer, are you on line?
Yeah, hi guy. Hi, Tony. Hello, Jennifer.
Welcome. Welcome. Welcome.
Jennifer, tell us your first and last name, where you're calling from, and a little bit about your business.
Sure. My name is Jennifer Braidwood.
I'm the founder and owner of Braid and Wood Design Studio.
We're based in San Diego, California, and we're a small product design firm that specializes in modern home decor products for people who want to bring more life into their home.
So think like plant stands, plant hangers, plant shelves, vessels, all sorts of stuff like that.
Nice. And you design them all?
I do. I do. They're all my own designs.
Cool. Tell us the question that you have for us today.
Yeah. My question is, we do really well with paid ads on Facebook, and we've got some great micro influencer campaigns.
But I'm curious, what other strategies could we use to grow our e-commerce sales and our brand awareness without having to spend like tens of thousands of dollars?
I obviously am working off a grassroots budget.
Is it even possible to compete in a space without having those big marketing dollars?
Yeah. All right. We'll get to that in a moment, but tell us a little bit about the business.
So how did you get into this world at all?
Sure. So I spent the majority of my professional career in marketing, social media management, branding, web and graphic design, those types of things.
But ever since I can remember, I've always loved making things.
Definitely a designer at heart spent a lot of time doing other side hustles while I was working full time.
I started like a pillow shop on Etsy.
I did a custom artwork service.
I did interior design projects.
And about five years ago, my husband and I decided to make a huge lifestyle switch.
We were both so stressed out at our jobs.
We were miserable. And we were in our mid 30s and we just decided to make a major lifestyle switch.
We sold our home. We both quit our jobs.
We moved into an apartment and I was kind of free to sort of figure out, okay, what do I want to do?
What's my next step? And I've always been really entrepreneurial.
So I was like, okay, I'm going to start my own thing, see what I can do.
And so I originally thought Braden Wood would be an interior design firm, but I was creating these DIY home decor planters and they sort of started catching a little bit of traction on social media.
And I had a couple of retailers reach out to me and say, we love this beautiful modern plant hanger that you're making.
Can we buy some of those for me?
We want to sell them. And we, you know, do you do wholesale?
And I was like, yeah, sure, I do wholesale.
Let's do wholesale. And so I, the business was sort of, was sort of born.
And over the last few years, you know, we've obviously grown and we have overseas manufacturing partners now and third party logistics fulfillment and all of that.
And yeah, it's been a wild five years.
So that's sort of the story.
Wow. Your website is absolutely gorgeous.
It looks incredible. It looks, um, Thank you.
And the designs are, well, the designs are truly amazing.
I forwarded this as soon as I saw it.
I just forwarded it to my wife.
So I know you've got another customer coming.
There you go. She seems to have no budget.
So Jennifer, I'm excited for you.
Thank you. Send me all the customers please.
And, and, and like some of these, I mean, I, you know, I love air plants because we've got a couple of them.
They're super fun. And the way that you've designed these plants, it's like they're, you can put them right on the wall.
They can, they mount to the wall like, like framed pictures, but they're obviously, yeah.
Yeah. They're meant to be like, they're meant to look like home decor, like a beautiful decor accent, but then it just has that touch of life that you can add to it.
That's really different.
Where are your customers coming from now?
I mean, you're direct to consumer.
You don't have a storefront, right?
Correct. We are all e-commerce based and the majority of our, our customers are finding us through social media.
And then of course our paid ad strategy that does pretty well for us.
So the question is, how do you increase awareness, right?
How do you get the word out about this brand without having a huge budget?
And I, and the first, the first thing I, I wonder, Tony, you might be able to speak to this is, are there ways to think about this beyond just through digital advertising?
So for example, is there a world where you partner at least at the beginning locally with like event spaces or, you know, party planners or even home stages where they can use some of your products, you know, where they can borrow them, but you can clearly advertise where they come from.
Have you ever done anything like that?
You know, we were, we partnered with a small home staging company a few years ago.
And as people were coming to the open houses and looking at them, people could actually buy the products that were in the staged home.
So it was a really cool, unique concept, but I don't think they ever really got it together enough.
But I love the idea of like partnering with other businesses in San Diego to do brand giveaways or, you know, raise awareness in that way.
What's the, what's the dream, Jennifer?
I mean, you said you had some relationships with some larger companies, the, the, I'm assuming kind of the West Elms of the world.
So, yeah, we did have some success early on with some wholesale relationships with West Elm and Magnolia Market on common goods, but we were very young and it was almost too soon.
And our price point was a little bit too high.
And so we had issues with sell through and we really worked the last two years bringing those costs of goods down, finding the right manufacturers to make the product.
But to answer your question as far as like, what's the big dream is, is really to be, to be a brand where people who are looking for unique products to decorate and style their homes with it, that they think of Braydenwood as, as the brand.
Like I want to bring life into my home, but I just don't want like the same boring plant stand that's on Amazon.
So I think growing a, a large and, and well known direct to consumer home goods brand is, is the goal.
So you don't, you're not, so the goal is not to partner back up with those companies for large distribution.
I would, I would consider that I would definitely be open to that possibility again.
We've, we've learned so much in the last few years that I think we could, we could do it.
Yeah. I mean, if you're positioning yourself as, I mean, your, your designs are so unique and they look so good.
I was surprised to hear you say that, you know, the price point was a little high.
I was like, I was actually thinking, I think you could sell, sell it for more because it's just so unique.
I mean, that's, what do I know?
I'm a 55 year old driving an ice cream truck.
I don't know much about, but I mean, I like that you like it though.
That's good. No, it's just, I mean, I don't see anything like it.
So probably trying to establish yourself as the higher end of, of, you know, this kind of home decor and then maybe approaching back into the, the mass distributors.
Because if the, if the big goal is, I mean, obviously I think easily the big goal is to be self sustaining, you know, to, to have all the money that you ever wanted in your life and to reign money upon you and, and bring it to me.
Yeah. I mean, I know you said you don't have the massive budget, but I want to encourage you to take the big swings.
I don't know what the, what the latest, who the latest person is.
I'm going to say Kardashian's, but it's probably going to date me or whatever, but who's the big person?
It's, it's obviously the, the magnolias down there and, and Chip and Joanna Gaines and, and I know that's, and I don't even know if that's it, but it's, it's about those big swings.
You're just sending those products, sending it in some different way, having to take a couple swings.
It doesn't, you're going to strike out a bunch, but you're already, you're already there, man.
You're already starting over.
And so, so going for whatever that big win would be, I think you got to take some swings for that.
I really do. I would add to that.
I mean, there's something I noticed on, on, on your site, which is you have a blog, right?
And your blog is super cool.
The thing that I love about your blog is that it's basically content marketing, right?
You're, you're writing about things that are very value add and it's free.
It's like, here's how to take care of plant, air plants.
Here's how to style like a designer.
And I feel like you, I haven't seen a whole lot of new blog posts.
So it seems like they kind of tapered off last year.
And I wonder whether you consider really ramping that up, even if you feel like you're repeating some of the old ideas, because over time, that's going to start to hit search engines.
And you can use some of the blog posts for paid ads.
Like instead of just advertising the, you know, the plant hangers or the plant shelves, you would, you basically pay to promote the blog post, which then links back to what you're selling.
Because the cool thing about the blog posts is you're giving away information for free.
I would really lean into that and try and lean into pushing some of those blog posts, even spending, you know, a couple hundred bucks on some targeted social media ads, but using the blog posts as a way to bring people into the door.
Yeah, I think, I think that's a great idea is like kind of piggybacking on what you said.
A lot of people just don't know how to style, you know, their homes or I've got this blank wall in my bedroom I've been looking at forever.
Like what do I even put on it and giving that content and that education in a blog post, I think is really valuable.
People are hungry for that type of information.
And so, yeah, and we have taken a break a bit on the content writing because I didn't really know if it was serving us well.
But to revisit that, I think is really smart.
And it's hard. I mean, we're doing a newsletter every week.
It's a lot of work. Yeah, it is.
And sometimes I ask myself, God, is this worth it?
Are people reading it? By the way, if you are listening, please do sign up for our newsletter at GuyRoz.com.
But, you know, it is critical over time.
There's an aggregate effect and the people really appreciate it, even if it might just be a thousand people or 500 people.
Those are your force multipliers.
Those are the people who are really going to lean into what you're selling and tell other people about it.
It'll just come up, you know, in an offhand way.
Oh, I just saw this really cool blog post exactly about where to place your plants.
What was that place called?
Yeah. Braden Wood. Yeah, go check that out.
That's great. Yeah, that's a really good idea.
The business is called Braden Wood Design Studio and the founders Jennifer Bradwood.
Jennifer, congrats. Thanks so much for calling in.
Good luck. Thank you so much, Guy.
And I just wanted to say too.
I listen to the podcast every day.
I'm in my warehouse working and it is so inspiring to hear other founders, especially female founders who are out there and doing it and taking the big swings.
Like you said, Tony, it keeps me going every day.
Awesome. So thanks for what you do.
It's incredible. Thank you.
Thank you for saying that.
Thank you so much. Good luck, Jennifer.
Thanks a lot. I appreciate it.
Nice meeting you both. Thank you.
Thanks. I just want to point a couple of times today in our chats with people and it reminded me of, because you were like a top vacuum cleaner salesman, like for many years in a row and you were crushing it and you were just, and you know, like most of us, you were motivated to make more money because you wanted to have more money to have more freedom to do things.
But the thing that I just struck me today is this idea that you seem to be suggesting, which is, are you happy with where you are now?
Are you making a good living that sustains your life?
And if so, do you really want the trade off for maybe marginally more income, but like exponentially more problems?
And I can expand on that a little bit because I think that's a really important point that you raised.
I'm just watching it happen a lot in life, not just in Kona, but I mean, I've got franchisees that come in, they get a truck.
They do really well. They hate saying no, the bookings become more than what their equipment can handle.
They buy more equipment.
They get to this point where they have to, if they buy one more piece of equipment, then they're going to have to hire a manager.
And then if you get a couple more after that, you're going to have to hire an event coordinator.
And then before you know it, you've got 25, 30, 35 employees.
And it's meetings, it's Biroc.
I'm not getting on that.
It's a bad thing, but there's a lot of moving parts at that point.
Yeah. And there's a law of diminishing returns to some degree.
I mean, it's just, and not just with money, but also with happiness and joy.
And so I really want to preach that because so many of my franchisees, and I mean, an overwhelming majority, I talk to every single one of them and they'll say something like, I'm just tired of the rat race.
I'm tired of corporate America.
I'm tired of this. I'm tired of that.
I want to do my own thing.
And I'm like, sometimes, you know, sometimes you're not the best boss in the world.
And people have to understand that.
Not everybody's an entrepreneur.
And, and, but there's a lot of people that can be good, small business owners.
And that's what we try to curate is, is follow the recipe, be a good, small business owner, make a great living, enjoy your life.
I'll, I'll never forget, I was talking to a franchisee down in Florida and she was very much of an introvert.
And she said something to me and she was a one truck operator.
She'd been a one truck operator for 10 years.
And she said, Tony, I work seven or eight months a year.
I make $100,000, you know, a year.
I never thought I'd be a small business owner and I'm happier than I've ever been in my life.
And I thought, wasn't that the goal?
Yeah. Wasn't that the goal is to be happy.
And so I was, I was just so happy for her.
And I really kind of affected me to think everyone's happiness shouldn't always be trying to take over the world.
Tony Lam, founder of Kona Ice.
Thanks so much for coming back on the show.
Guy Ross, I would be on your show anytime that you would want me to be on your show.
This is such a great opportunity.
I'd still appreciate your time.
And by the way, if you guys have not heard the Kona Ice episode, please right now as we speak, go back and check it out.
Scroll back in your podcast queue or look for the link in the podcast description on your phone.
It is one of the funniest and most fun episodes of how I built this we've ever done in eight years.
It's so fun. And we, there was a lot of laughter.
I'd love doing that interview with you Tony, because it was so fun.
Life is funny. Life is funny.
It is. Yeah. Yeah, indeed.
And thanks everybody for listening to the show this week.
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And hopefully we can help you with that a little bit.
And make sure to tell us how to reach you.
You can send us a voice memo at hibt.id.wondery.com or call 1-800-433-1298 and leave a message there.
And we'll also put all this information in the podcast description.
This episode was produced by Casey Harman with music composed by Ramteena Ereblewe.
It was edited by John Isabella.
Our audio engineer was Sina LaFredo.
Our production team at How I Built This also includes Alex Chung, Carla Estevez, Chris Messini, Elaine Coates, J.C.
Howard, Catherine Seifer, Kerry Thompson, Neva Grant, and Sam Paulson.
I'm Guy Raaz and you've been listening to the device line on How I Built This Lab.
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