Rearview Mirror
"Everything will be OK in the end.
If it's not OK, it's not the end."
-- John Lennon
I made a boatload of mistakes in my career journey. I am, after all, a Libra. I am naturally restless, easily distracted, and hopelessly entrepreneurial. I have often said I would be retired in wealth if I had just stuck with my first business idea, Odd Jobs, Inc.
There are dozens of huge success stories of contractors who set up a marketing office, collect leads, sell odd jobs, provide the proper services using independent workers, and constantly expand their business. If I had any advice for young people, it would be to choose a pathway, any pathway. Stick with it, because it will evolve and you will grow with it. You will come to forks in the road, but try to cling to the most familiar to expand your knowledge base instead of pursuing a whole new one.
I loved the ski industry and would have been satisfied to have spent my life in that business, but I ran into some obstacles, and the industry underwent massive reordering, shifting into snowboarding, and eventually was swallowed by the big box sports retailers. The only way I could have stuck with the specialty ski business would be to relocate to a mountain resort.
The Rub? I look back at my old Ski Outpost store location and see that my neighbor, a beer bar, annexed my space. That is the perfect use for it and I am certain no one could have made that spot a success with retail snow ski equipment. In hindsight, it was setting me up for failure to determine the location based on it having the cheapest rent. We simply overlooked the long term implications of only offering single season products. I was wildly naive, and ambitious, but the industry itself went into a deep recession. Only a very few specialty stores survived, so I accept my failure as a learning experience. A very expensive tuition to a grad school that doesn't offer a degree.
Sidas Orthotics
I tried to go into independent outside sales with Sidas Orthotics. I had a nearby orthopedic doctor using the device, but I couldn't get the ski industry to embrace it. It would take a national effort and Sidas (home office in Paris, France) was not in a financial position to fund that kind of marketing tactic. They seemed content to be represented by multiline sports reps, which was at that point failing miserably. They were getting their asses kicked by a cork footbed product that was much less forgiving a little less money. Sidas footbeds were very easy to adjust, and people could use them in other sports shoes too.
Today, the concept of "foot beds" for pain relief is huge. The Good Feet Store is well established. Dr. Scholls offers semi custom foot beds in major drug stores. Though there are hundreds of foot bed manufacturers with dozens of self molding materials or semi rigid platforms, none of them are comparable to the Sidas System of heated pads put under the clients foot while resting on a shaped cushion. Each one forms according to the customer's bone structure, and evenly supports proper foot alignment that will withstand the forces imposed by sporting activity like skiing.
The Rub? I never understood why the Sidas System didn't dominate the industry, but I wasn't in a position to drive a national sales effort to capture an as yet un-established market. Once again, I think I was standing next to a spark, but the fire didn't ignite for another decade.
Beyond Belief
I hooked up with two ex-Blue Angels forming a startup company in Vista. They called it Beyond USA. They had a patent (or so they said) on an aerosol formula that eviscerated potent smells like tobacco or mold. It was based on a molecular protein that binds with microscopic cells that harbor the odor, dropping them to the ground, where they could be vacuumed up, terminating their chemical action. It uses no perfumes and leaves no lasting odors. If you have ever encountered a car with a horrid tobacco smell, you know how impossible it is to remove.
And most importantly, they had an 'approved vendor' standing with Pilots Flying J, the nation's largest truck stop chain. That, in and of itself, could easily result in a million dollars in sales, since trucks often had nasty odors from the drivers smoking, eating, and living inside their cabs.
I tested it out, and it worked! I was convinced they had a winner. It was a start up, so I knew it was risky, but this product was amazing. I really believed it could be one of those monster products that flies under the radar while racking up millions in sales.
The next week was the SEMA (Specialty Equipment Marketing Association) Show in Las Vegas and Beyond USA had a booth. SEMA is the largest auto industry only trade show in America, and we would be in attendance, all expenses paid. The company had managed to acquire a booth at the very last minute, so we had to innovate to put together our displays and handle everything by ourselves.
What should have been the first red flag: They needed my van to deliver the booth equipment, and me and two other newbie sales reps would have to set it up to avoid expensive trade union labor charges. No problem, right? I have never worked so hard in my life, carrying massive tables and displays across huge asphalt parking lots in 100 degree heat. But our unbridled enthusiasm blinded us to the obvious contradictions that we were being fed.
The two owners seemed more interested in attending "Rave" parties and nudie bars than in signing new accounts. The following Tuesday, after we broke down the booths, packed my van and drove back from Vegas, I walked into the owner's upstairs office unannounced and caught them sniffing coke.
They owed me money, so I pretended I didn't see what I saw. I reminded them they owed me for my hours, and my expenses including gasoline reimbursement. They handed me a check.
It turned out they were liars, druggies, and they wrote me a bad check. When I took it to the Vista Sheriff's office, they said sorry, it is a check written on an LLC: exempt from criminal liability! I was for the first time in my life so angry I wanted to kill someone.
Beyond Belief! The building was locked up within a few days. Everyone disappeared, and I was left holding a bad check. I am now certain that all of the information they "shared" with the staff, their Blue Angels photos, their Certificate of Approved Vender status from Flying J, was all fraudulent. They must have been defrauding other investors, because we did put on a good show. But for what?
The Rub? Today there is a product called Pooph! It is a nationally advertised line of pet products that established its bona fides with the nation's largest trash and recycling yards. It uses the exact same technology those crooks said they had a patent on!
EVR CBD
One day I got a call from a former fellow employee at Merillat. He was an account manager in Northern California at the same time I was working in Southern California territory. We were about the same age, so we hung out together at sales meetings and trade shows.
He was excited about a new business venture he was involved in and he wanted to recruit me. He had a neighbor that had been very successful marketing a variety of promotional items. He had recently been introduced to CBD (Cannabidoil) and was putting together a marketing team.
The CBD company was a Canadian Investment Group, and my buddies neighbor was just appointed National Sales Director. EVR Premium Hemp Oils was a leading CBD manufacturer who was already servicing major accounts in South America and Europe, where the laws about hemp growing and usage as a health care supplement were much more liberal.
The laws were quickly changing across America, and the time to enter the emerging multi-billion dollar industry was now! I was already using CBD oil daily. I was well read on its unique healthcare properties, and when he promised to award me exclusive rights to all of Southern California, I signed on. I was at that time working at kitchen remodeling, and I was traveling all over San Diego County. I figured I had some time I could dedicate to prospecting and cold calling.
I am not going to go into how many lies and mischaracterizations were spread, but leave it to say this was perhaps the most disappointing venture of them all. The potential was enormous, and if just 10% of what the company promised had ever been realized, it could have set me up for a nice retirement.
On my first day of marketing, I walked into a newly opened CBD store in downtown La Jolla. It was a refurbished jewelry store in the business district. The salesman was well dressed and the store was stocked with tons of CBD products. But it was obvious they all had the same label. It was a company owned store, so they were not interested in bringing in a competitive brand.
I walked out on the sidewalk and searched my GPS for nearby Organics/Vapes/CBD retailers… Up popped a store just a few miles away in Pacific Beach. It was a vape store, but I thought, what the heck. I'm here, let's go see what they were up to.
It turned out to be the biggest CBD retailer in San Diego! The owner had spent years in the investment banking industry and helped finance many cannabis entrepreneurs in the Southern California area. Those were the pioneers of legalizing marijuana, and were currently pushing the cannabinoid oil concept as a gateway to marijuana legalization.
He told me he was selling $100K a month in various hemp oil products. He placed a $12K order with my company, EVR Premium Hemp Oils, because we offered a tincture with zero THC. That was appealing because though the law allowed up to 4% THC (the active ingredient in marijuana) in hemp oil health enhancement products, many of his clients ( healthcare, drivers, military or other law enforcement professionals) were being drug tested and they needed a CBD oil that could pass random tests.
We struck up a very friendly relationship. I wanted to mine his experiences to understand how he was selling millions of dollars of hemp oil annually. He was operating a cash-only business with essentially all walk-in customers. He related to me that his college football background put him in touch with many celebrity sports legends who live in the San Diego area and they are looking for products to help reduce chronic pain in damaged bodies. He named a series of former star athletes he had as clients. Many had to go through rehab to end their addictions to opioid prescription drugs and found refuge in cannabidiol. He had a Rolodex of 4,000 clients using cannabidiol for cancer, auto accidents, arthritis, Parkinsons, and dozens of other conditions that cause tremendous pain or seizures or both.
He spent hours familiarizing me with the history of the cannabis industry, and revealed that most of it had its roots in San Diego.
I went home thinking I had just found my new 'retirement' career path.
At one point I wanted my National Sales Manager to fly in to meet my new client. I wanted to strengthen the relationship and hopefully become a preferred source, as my customer had ambitious expansion plans to move into high-value markets like Laguna Beach and Santa Monica.
We all met for lunch and everyone seemed to agree on some things, but my sales manager made some condescending remarks that seemed disrespectful of my clients business acumen and industry experience.
A week later, I was asked to pick up some supplies at the airport and deliver them to the store. The owner took me aside and confided: "You should look for another company to hook up with. The guys you are in bed with are crooks. Be wary, EVR is never going to go anywhere."
WTF?
It took me six more months to reach the same conclusion. All of the rosy scenario predictions of my sales manager, and the promises he made about the roll out of new "Game Changing" products were lies. EVR was always behind in filling orders. Some products got canceled and others were introduced for no apparent reason.
I started calling other EVR marketing reps around the country and was surprised to discover most had been released for mostly bogus reasons. It was all coming unglued.
The Rub? I watched the whole scheme disintegrate while many of my competitors were scoring huge orders with major accounts like Whole Foods, CVS and others. I invested hours marketing to dozens of authorized dispensaries, to health food retailers, and nutraceutical specialists, all across San Diego County.
I never got paid any commissions. The company was delisted and is in bankruptcy reorganization as I write this. I lost every cent of time, gasoline and cash I invested. EVR Premium Hemp Oil (aka, Tree of Knowledge International) was, without doubt, the most costly business mistake I ever made. Oh, and my old buddy who turned me onto EVR? He later told me he lost over $40K on stock and product purchases. Yet he still considers the ex-sales manager his friend.
***
If it's not OK, it's not the end."
-- John Lennon
I made a boatload of mistakes in my career journey. I am, after all, a Libra. I am naturally restless, easily distracted, and hopelessly entrepreneurial. I have often said I would be retired in wealth if I had just stuck with my first business idea, Odd Jobs, Inc.
There are dozens of huge success stories of contractors who set up a marketing office, collect leads, sell odd jobs, provide the proper services using independent workers, and constantly expand their business. If I had any advice for young people, it would be to choose a pathway, any pathway. Stick with it, because it will evolve and you will grow with it. You will come to forks in the road, but try to cling to the most familiar to expand your knowledge base instead of pursuing a whole new one.
I loved the ski industry and would have been satisfied to have spent my life in that business, but I ran into some obstacles, and the industry underwent massive reordering, shifting into snowboarding, and eventually was swallowed by the big box sports retailers. The only way I could have stuck with the specialty ski business would be to relocate to a mountain resort.
The Rub? I look back at my old Ski Outpost store location and see that my neighbor, a beer bar, annexed my space. That is the perfect use for it and I am certain no one could have made that spot a success with retail snow ski equipment. In hindsight, it was setting me up for failure to determine the location based on it having the cheapest rent. We simply overlooked the long term implications of only offering single season products. I was wildly naive, and ambitious, but the industry itself went into a deep recession. Only a very few specialty stores survived, so I accept my failure as a learning experience. A very expensive tuition to a grad school that doesn't offer a degree.
Sidas Orthotics
I tried to go into independent outside sales with Sidas Orthotics. I had a nearby orthopedic doctor using the device, but I couldn't get the ski industry to embrace it. It would take a national effort and Sidas (home office in Paris, France) was not in a financial position to fund that kind of marketing tactic. They seemed content to be represented by multiline sports reps, which was at that point failing miserably. They were getting their asses kicked by a cork footbed product that was much less forgiving a little less money. Sidas footbeds were very easy to adjust, and people could use them in other sports shoes too.
Today, the concept of "foot beds" for pain relief is huge. The Good Feet Store is well established. Dr. Scholls offers semi custom foot beds in major drug stores. Though there are hundreds of foot bed manufacturers with dozens of self molding materials or semi rigid platforms, none of them are comparable to the Sidas System of heated pads put under the clients foot while resting on a shaped cushion. Each one forms according to the customer's bone structure, and evenly supports proper foot alignment that will withstand the forces imposed by sporting activity like skiing.
The Rub? I never understood why the Sidas System didn't dominate the industry, but I wasn't in a position to drive a national sales effort to capture an as yet un-established market. Once again, I think I was standing next to a spark, but the fire didn't ignite for another decade.
Beyond Belief
I hooked up with two ex-Blue Angels forming a startup company in Vista. They called it Beyond USA. They had a patent (or so they said) on an aerosol formula that eviscerated potent smells like tobacco or mold. It was based on a molecular protein that binds with microscopic cells that harbor the odor, dropping them to the ground, where they could be vacuumed up, terminating their chemical action. It uses no perfumes and leaves no lasting odors. If you have ever encountered a car with a horrid tobacco smell, you know how impossible it is to remove.
And most importantly, they had an 'approved vendor' standing with Pilots Flying J, the nation's largest truck stop chain. That, in and of itself, could easily result in a million dollars in sales, since trucks often had nasty odors from the drivers smoking, eating, and living inside their cabs.
I tested it out, and it worked! I was convinced they had a winner. It was a start up, so I knew it was risky, but this product was amazing. I really believed it could be one of those monster products that flies under the radar while racking up millions in sales.
The next week was the SEMA (Specialty Equipment Marketing Association) Show in Las Vegas and Beyond USA had a booth. SEMA is the largest auto industry only trade show in America, and we would be in attendance, all expenses paid. The company had managed to acquire a booth at the very last minute, so we had to innovate to put together our displays and handle everything by ourselves.
What should have been the first red flag: They needed my van to deliver the booth equipment, and me and two other newbie sales reps would have to set it up to avoid expensive trade union labor charges. No problem, right? I have never worked so hard in my life, carrying massive tables and displays across huge asphalt parking lots in 100 degree heat. But our unbridled enthusiasm blinded us to the obvious contradictions that we were being fed.
The two owners seemed more interested in attending "Rave" parties and nudie bars than in signing new accounts. The following Tuesday, after we broke down the booths, packed my van and drove back from Vegas, I walked into the owner's upstairs office unannounced and caught them sniffing coke.
They owed me money, so I pretended I didn't see what I saw. I reminded them they owed me for my hours, and my expenses including gasoline reimbursement. They handed me a check.
It turned out they were liars, druggies, and they wrote me a bad check. When I took it to the Vista Sheriff's office, they said sorry, it is a check written on an LLC: exempt from criminal liability! I was for the first time in my life so angry I wanted to kill someone.
Beyond Belief! The building was locked up within a few days. Everyone disappeared, and I was left holding a bad check. I am now certain that all of the information they "shared" with the staff, their Blue Angels photos, their Certificate of Approved Vender status from Flying J, was all fraudulent. They must have been defrauding other investors, because we did put on a good show. But for what?
The Rub? Today there is a product called Pooph! It is a nationally advertised line of pet products that established its bona fides with the nation's largest trash and recycling yards. It uses the exact same technology those crooks said they had a patent on!
EVR CBD
One day I got a call from a former fellow employee at Merillat. He was an account manager in Northern California at the same time I was working in Southern California territory. We were about the same age, so we hung out together at sales meetings and trade shows.
He was excited about a new business venture he was involved in and he wanted to recruit me. He had a neighbor that had been very successful marketing a variety of promotional items. He had recently been introduced to CBD (Cannabidoil) and was putting together a marketing team.
The CBD company was a Canadian Investment Group, and my buddies neighbor was just appointed National Sales Director. EVR Premium Hemp Oils was a leading CBD manufacturer who was already servicing major accounts in South America and Europe, where the laws about hemp growing and usage as a health care supplement were much more liberal.
The laws were quickly changing across America, and the time to enter the emerging multi-billion dollar industry was now! I was already using CBD oil daily. I was well read on its unique healthcare properties, and when he promised to award me exclusive rights to all of Southern California, I signed on. I was at that time working at kitchen remodeling, and I was traveling all over San Diego County. I figured I had some time I could dedicate to prospecting and cold calling.
I am not going to go into how many lies and mischaracterizations were spread, but leave it to say this was perhaps the most disappointing venture of them all. The potential was enormous, and if just 10% of what the company promised had ever been realized, it could have set me up for a nice retirement.
On my first day of marketing, I walked into a newly opened CBD store in downtown La Jolla. It was a refurbished jewelry store in the business district. The salesman was well dressed and the store was stocked with tons of CBD products. But it was obvious they all had the same label. It was a company owned store, so they were not interested in bringing in a competitive brand.
I walked out on the sidewalk and searched my GPS for nearby Organics/Vapes/CBD retailers… Up popped a store just a few miles away in Pacific Beach. It was a vape store, but I thought, what the heck. I'm here, let's go see what they were up to.
It turned out to be the biggest CBD retailer in San Diego! The owner had spent years in the investment banking industry and helped finance many cannabis entrepreneurs in the Southern California area. Those were the pioneers of legalizing marijuana, and were currently pushing the cannabinoid oil concept as a gateway to marijuana legalization.
He told me he was selling $100K a month in various hemp oil products. He placed a $12K order with my company, EVR Premium Hemp Oils, because we offered a tincture with zero THC. That was appealing because though the law allowed up to 4% THC (the active ingredient in marijuana) in hemp oil health enhancement products, many of his clients ( healthcare, drivers, military or other law enforcement professionals) were being drug tested and they needed a CBD oil that could pass random tests.
We struck up a very friendly relationship. I wanted to mine his experiences to understand how he was selling millions of dollars of hemp oil annually. He was operating a cash-only business with essentially all walk-in customers. He related to me that his college football background put him in touch with many celebrity sports legends who live in the San Diego area and they are looking for products to help reduce chronic pain in damaged bodies. He named a series of former star athletes he had as clients. Many had to go through rehab to end their addictions to opioid prescription drugs and found refuge in cannabidiol. He had a Rolodex of 4,000 clients using cannabidiol for cancer, auto accidents, arthritis, Parkinsons, and dozens of other conditions that cause tremendous pain or seizures or both.
He spent hours familiarizing me with the history of the cannabis industry, and revealed that most of it had its roots in San Diego.
I went home thinking I had just found my new 'retirement' career path.
At one point I wanted my National Sales Manager to fly in to meet my new client. I wanted to strengthen the relationship and hopefully become a preferred source, as my customer had ambitious expansion plans to move into high-value markets like Laguna Beach and Santa Monica.
We all met for lunch and everyone seemed to agree on some things, but my sales manager made some condescending remarks that seemed disrespectful of my clients business acumen and industry experience.
A week later, I was asked to pick up some supplies at the airport and deliver them to the store. The owner took me aside and confided: "You should look for another company to hook up with. The guys you are in bed with are crooks. Be wary, EVR is never going to go anywhere."
WTF?
It took me six more months to reach the same conclusion. All of the rosy scenario predictions of my sales manager, and the promises he made about the roll out of new "Game Changing" products were lies. EVR was always behind in filling orders. Some products got canceled and others were introduced for no apparent reason.
I started calling other EVR marketing reps around the country and was surprised to discover most had been released for mostly bogus reasons. It was all coming unglued.
The Rub? I watched the whole scheme disintegrate while many of my competitors were scoring huge orders with major accounts like Whole Foods, CVS and others. I invested hours marketing to dozens of authorized dispensaries, to health food retailers, and nutraceutical specialists, all across San Diego County.
I never got paid any commissions. The company was delisted and is in bankruptcy reorganization as I write this. I lost every cent of time, gasoline and cash I invested. EVR Premium Hemp Oil (aka, Tree of Knowledge International) was, without doubt, the most costly business mistake I ever made. Oh, and my old buddy who turned me onto EVR? He later told me he lost over $40K on stock and product purchases. Yet he still considers the ex-sales manager his friend.
***
