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The Unstoppable Marketer®
Trevor Crump and Mark Goldhardt bring you quick marketing and entrepreneurial tips, tricks, and trends for DTC business owners, entrepreneurs, and marketers. These are lessons they've learned through the years of being right in the thick of scaling dozens of businesses. Whether you have an established business looking to grow, just starting your business journey, or trying to become a digital marketer, this marketing podcast will not let you down.
The Unstoppable Marketer®
EP. 112 The Epic Power of Product Market Fit: Derek Tillotson's Journey with Haven Tents
In this episode, Derek Tiltson, CEO and founder of Haven Tents, discusses how his innovative hammock-tent hybrid solves common camping sleep issues. He shares insights on product development, Kickstarter campaigns, and creating engaging content for a niche outdoor brand. Learn how Haven Tents expanded beyond traditional campers to attract non-campers, revolutionizing the outdoor sleeping experience.
Please connect with Trevor on social media. You can find him anywhere @thetrevorcrump
Anything you're doing as a business, you should put it through this good, different kind of like exercise, which is to say, if you have an X and Y axis and you have different quadrants, y axis represents good and the X axis represents different, and every tent is the same. At the end of the day, they have some different features.
Speaker 2:That's like Well, you've got like the spring bar version. Yeah, it's a little bit a little more lightweight. Then you have the white lightweight.
Speaker 1:Oh, hey, we hey. We added Like LED lights to it, which are cool features, but are they different enough to make Somebody say I'm gonna buy that? You've based your entire Product development Strategy off of a Core problem that the most savant Campers have and the most basic campers have.
Speaker 3:Right.
Speaker 1:Which is hey, everyone, everyone has a hard time sleeping. Yep, and I think that that's the brilliance of what you're doing with Haven and every product that you're creating. It still solves that problem. Yo, what's going on? Everybody? Welcome to the Unstoppable Marketer Podcast. With me, as always, is Mark Goldhart. Mark Goldhart, how are you Doing? Uh, I'm so tired. Yeah, I am tired too.
Speaker 2:Last night just destroyed me.
Speaker 1:Mark and I decided to go see a client. It wasn't really last minute, but we decided.
Speaker 1:Like normally, when we go visit clients, we I mean if they're close by we drive obviously Close by like, usually like within an hour, an hour or something like that, but these guys are like four hours away in the same state and normally we would fly. But but like at the end of like, usually when we see clients like I don't love staying overnight, like I just want to get back to my family as quick as possible, and so we're like well, let's just there wasn't a flight back that's right, the flight would have come back the next day yeah, so you would have.
Speaker 1:We would have had to stay the night yeah, and so, and at the end of the day, like 2020.
Speaker 2:Probably just should have done that.
Speaker 1:But yeah, it's fine but yeah, we woke up, we were on the road at 6 30 met with a client. No well, it took us like five hours to get there, normally like a three hour 45 minute drive, but we drove the Tesla.
Speaker 2:No, it took four hours from your area.
Speaker 1:No, it didn't. Yeah, it didn't, it did, it didn't, I promise. Well, we agree to disagree on that one, but anyways, we had to stop twice With the Tesla.
Speaker 2:Well, anyways because we left with the tesla. Well, anyways, we left your area at 7. We got down there at like 11, 15 okay, number one, so tesla makes it longer.
Speaker 1:Yep, we love our teslas, which wasn't bad on the way, it was one, it was great it wasn't bad on the way there because like we're meeting yeah we're meeting, we're talking about things that we need to talk about, that we oftentimes don't get time to talk about, so it was good right like, we have a four-hour meeting, which was fine, but the way home I was like man but then, yeah, then we met all day.
Speaker 2:We left at 7 30 and that's when, like, all hell broke loose and we had to stop three times because it was so cold but I will say, say this for Elon Musk If self-driving could just self-drive and like, not monitor me, like if I could just fall asleep while self-drive, I would pay $200 a month for that easy.
Speaker 1:Oh, I'd pay like $400 a month for that I don't know about $400.
Speaker 2:You know I'd turn it on and off if it was $400. Yeah the self-driving was hard, but I'd just leave it on all the time, like for 200 a month.
Speaker 1:So yeah, that was rough. We had to stop three times because it was like 18 degrees driving, so the charge wouldn't charge fast just because batteries, and Well it was at the one, and anyways yeah, it was at one station, it was at another.
Speaker 2:It was silly.
Speaker 1:It was an awesome meeting.
Speaker 2:But I am excited If the client's listening to this.
Speaker 1:It was well worth it.
Speaker 3:We are very grateful we did it and you made the planet better. Totally worth it?
Speaker 1:Yes, Low emissions, yeah, we Low emissions, yeah, exactly, much better emissions than my forerunner yeah yeah.
Speaker 2:Very true. The forerunner is not emission friendly, but but we're dedicated. So I'm sorry, yeah, I'm a little tired, but I am very excited. The product he makes and the industry it's in, yeah, should we introduce him.
Speaker 1:Yeah, he's been just sitting here just so quietly just listening to our banjo.
Speaker 2:I've been enjoying this story.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, it's great. So let's introduce our guest today is the CEO and founder of an awesome product called Haven Tents, derek Tiltson. Derek, how are you, my friend, doing so well? Thanks so much for having me on. Thanks for coming on. I've been a longtime listener. Thank you, this is well. That's why I, like, originally reached out to Derek was because I, you know, I post content on my phone. You know and, and, and I'm like Derek, I can always like. I can always expect a like and or a comment about anything we post.
Speaker 3:Well, the algorithm knows I wake up in the morning and, like, the first thing that I do is like. I see, you know Trevor's just great advice about marketing. And so this is my like. Ok, great, I'm energized.
Speaker 2:I'm going to start my day. Look at you.
Speaker 1:So I was like.
Speaker 2:So, like you know, I looked at it, I looked it up, but I'm like look at that no-transcript and I'm like Sandy Utah, like, oh, this guy, our offices in Draper.
Speaker 1:I grew up in Sandy and I'm like what's up, man? Like I'm like I graduated in 04. Yeah, yeah, I was like I was 06 and then he, and he's like my name is derek tills and I'm like I know blake. In fact I've spent tons of time like blake was, blake was uh blake is your friend well, blake was friends of friends. You know what?
Speaker 1:I mean like blake had his group of buddies which was, like, I would say, the basketball soccer, because he played basketball and soccer. Did he end up playing soccer or basketball for Utah?
Speaker 3:State. He played basketball for Utah State, played soccer for BYU.
Speaker 1:Oh, he went down. Okay cool, he could take his sport. He was a really great athlete.
Speaker 3:Shout out to.
Speaker 2:Blake. Yeah, really A D1 athlete for two different schools and two different sports, that's pretty impressive.
Speaker 1:A little different sports, that's pretty impressive little dion sandry. You know that's, that's pretty cool so anyways, yeah, so blake had his group of buddies and then I had my group of buddies and my group of buddies was like friends with his group of buddies, so like we weren't necessarily the like. I'm not calling blake to be like, hey, what are you doing? I'm calling my buddies, we go to a party, we see blake and his friends at a party and then we're all together. That was does that make sense.
Speaker 1:Relationship wise, yeah, so. So, yeah, I know Blake very well and I knew of you, but I didn't know you.
Speaker 3:And you knew my sister and sister-in-law Went to school with them.
Speaker 1:Small world Utah's a fun hub for e-commerce.
Speaker 3:It's underrated it is, and it's been fun to kind of get to know the community. Yeah, and you know, meet different founders Totally, you know marketers like yourselves, that is fun.
Speaker 2:Well, let's jump into the podcast here, but more fun is this hammock tent, yeah, so what I want to hear.
Speaker 1:Let's jump into your story a little bit and let's jump into the product, because this product is like. The product was one of the main reasons why, like in my mind, I was like I don't even need to ask what your sales are, I don't care if you're selling ten thousand dollars a month or if you're selling a million dollars a month. Like this is a really cool story and I think it's a huge, huge lesson, no matter how, what level of success you've accomplished, so let's jump into it.
Speaker 1:Let's talk about the product, let's talk about you. So let's give you the floor for a second, and then we'll jump into thanks for Thanks for having me on.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so sales by background. It's been a lot of time in sales and marketing and in storytelling and I was just laying in a hammock one day and thought this would be so much better if I was flat. I'm sure a lot of people have been in hammocks before and they know that it bends them like a banana or it kind of constricts them, pins their feet together or whatever. There's a bunch of reasons why people enjoy hammocks for like 10 seconds or 10 minutes but not for a whole night. Yeah, and so that was me. I was not a hammock camper. It wasn't like I spent all this time camping in hammocks. That let me just, you know, refine this just a little bit. I was a complete outsider and thought how could I make this thing different? I never spent any time making a product. I'd never done that at all.
Speaker 3:But earlier that year my wife and I had sold our house and we went to travel with our three kids for a year, went to 38 countries in a year, and as I was traveling I was creating content for hotels and travel companies to kind of like fund our travel.
Speaker 3:We weren't getting paid for it, but we were getting a lot of free stuff, which was fun. But I was creating all this content and I set a goal to make that year my year of creativity. And so I have this idea for a hammock or a hammock design, and before I put it to bed, I thought, no, this is my year of creativity, so let me take it to at least the first prototype, and the first prototype was actually pretty good. It was a lot better than our second. And our third prototype was actually pretty good. It was a lot better than our second and our third. But we continued to evolve and figure out exactly what made that first prototype so great and continue to tweak and develop and build. Then we launched on kickstarter in 2019, did just under a hundred thousand in sales as part of our first kickstarter but it was the goal, kickstarter goal, it was like 20 000 or something and so, but it was completely bootstrapped.
Speaker 3:Like it was literally just me. I made the video I shot, I made all of Like. It was literally just me. I made the video, I shot, I made all of the things. It was literally just a one-man show.
Speaker 3:At that point, and I remember I had told such a good story this is the most comfortable way to sleep outside is basically what I had pitched on this Kickstarter campaign. And so when this like little mini container of tents showed up at our office in Sandy, I was like, oh my gosh, did I just? I mean, kickstarter is the perfect example of jumping and learning to fly on the way down because I literally told everybody this is the best thing ever. And now I'm going to start shipping it. And are people going to be disappointed? Are they going to be impressed? And so I'm shaking as I put these tents in boxes with nerves and shipped them out. And they loved it. Our first batch customers loved the product. We saw that you would go camping with your friends and you would actually sleep better. Our product is demonstrably better at providing sleep outside. I don't think you can say that about a tent or a regular hammock.
Speaker 3:It's just like different ways of mitigating the worst case scenario which is camping, which is for most people, you know, sleeping outside, and so this is a huge improvement on that. And so we've continued to grow, you know, year over year it's been great. We've been in business now for about five years and, yeah, it's been an awesome ride. I never would have thought, you know, six years ago that I'd be here on a podcast talking about marketing and hammock companies, but it's been great.
Speaker 2:Wait, explain why it's demonstrably better for sleep. Okay.
Speaker 3:I mean, anybody who's ever tried to sleep outside on a tent or sorry, on a pad or in a hammock, they know that it's a far cry from sleeping in their bed at home. Sure, it's super different, right, and maybe after a few nights you'll be tired enough and sleep deprived enough that you can make it through a night. But normally when I'm camping and sleeping on a pad on the ground, I wake up at like three and then I'm not tired enough to go back to sleep, and that weighs on the rest of your day, because now you're tired. And so the fact that this is much more like the at-home sleep experience you basically just carried your bed from home outside. It feels so much more like your, like your bed at home, than anything else.
Speaker 1:Well, I would probably say also like I mean, I haven't used the product yet, but as a as you're probably more stereotypical Utah that isn't an avid camper like I camp once to twice a year and generally no more than like two nights, Right Like that's. And I would say that that's like the. I bet that that's actually the average Utah. Now you have some Utahns who are like well, your true average is less than that.
Speaker 2:Yeah you're true, yeah, but like most, like if you're an avid camper outdoorsy.
Speaker 1:Obviously, that's very different, right, you're a lot more outdoorsy than I am. And like there's three reasons why I hate camping. And all through I shouldn't say, hey, hate camping, why camping? I don't do camping more often? And all three of those reasons have to do with sleeping. And the first is, like one, if I don't have the right comfort of pad, that's that's what makes it hard for me to. I'm never level, right, yeah. And three, when I'm on the ground, dependent upon where, what time of year, I'm like really cold, like even though I'm in a sleeping bag. I just don't like a sleeping bag, you know. So I wonder if this like one levels you out more from like depending on where you are at the pad, right, I don't know, it sounds like it's really comfortable.
Speaker 3:It's a thick pad and it's if you lay our pad on the ground, which we do at shows sometimes, we'll lay the pad on the ground and people lay on it. And it's a comfortable pad, but then they put it in the hammock and it's just that much better. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:Because the hammock provides more of a yeah, like it's more level, yeah, and that to like it's not, it's more level.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, and that to me actually almost seems like the best, but it probably probably makes you feel like there's a little more give too right like you have a little.
Speaker 2:What do you say? Like buoyancy, yeah, but that's with water, like sure.
Speaker 3:Yeah, like you know, you like if you watch the, you know mattress commercials that you've seen a million times. They always show like the person's spine and like right, like the body's kind of contouring and the spine is straight and that's what our hammock does. And for people that don't know what a Haven tent is, it's basically it's a lay flat hammock tent that's built around a pad, so where a lot of people kind of throw in a pad as an afterthought into a hammock for insulation or for some stability. We actually built it from the ground up, like how can we make this pad float in the air?
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 3:And that's kind of the idea around it. Yeah, super cool.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I believe it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I believe people sleep a lot better because, yeah, I'm very excited for your take on it when you use it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean I again sleeping. Like you said, we bought a camping trailer for our family so that my wife could sleep, trailer for our family so that my wife could sleep, like I mean she loves camping, but like we had to get a trailer because she's like I can't, I can't sleep out here and it was just then.
Speaker 2:It was miserable and then obviously we have, like you know, we have little little kids like a one-year-old, so that also changes things a little bit. But but for me, like I go up without kids just for like a fly fishing trip with some friends, like at least once or twice a year, right, and I would usually do a hammock really yeah, and I mean I don't sleep good at all yeah, that sounds miserable to me, a hammock waking up and fly fishing makes it worth it, but for sure this would be far better so why would you go hammock over just regular ground tent?
Speaker 2:Because it's like if you're only up there for a night, it's usually like, hey, let's go up there, fish sleep, fish leave. I'm not going to set up a whole tent.
Speaker 3:So the quick setup is kind of what you're after I just want to get something set up.
Speaker 2:I want to sleep.
Speaker 1:I don't want to carry a bunch of equipment because I already got my fly fishing gear right, so that's why I did I would do okay, cool, so tell me what. What do you think like? You set a goal of 20k on kickstarter and you you end up doing over 100k. What? What do you think was the catalyst that was was able to help you skip? What was? Was that you know a five X of what you what your goal was Like? What do you think about it? Did that for you.
Speaker 3:I think it was the promises that I was making, and the story I was telling and how many people it kind of resonated with, right when, when I was explaining what our product did, you started to kind of connect the dots. Well, I love camping, I love being outside, but the three reasons why I don't like it are sleep, yeah, are all sleep related? Yeah, well, we kind of come in and solve that, yeah, and we say we can make the outdoors comfortable, sure. And so I think that initial value add was what carried us over the top. I got to say that the video was okay, yeah, sub part, it definitely looked homemade, sure. So I think that we carried some of that like oh, this is a legitimate startup, we know that by supporting this company, we were supporting this guy who's an entrepreneur. Like, it definitely had some of that to it too, but I think it was just connecting those dots for people of comfort outside.
Speaker 3:Did you guys run ads to it? We did run some ads. Yeah, cool, through Meta, through Meta, yeah, right. And honestly, everything that I did was kind of like oh, I guess we're supposed to run ads. How does that work, I don't know. And everything was kind of like just kind of stumbling forward, and so a friend of mine had had, you know, run some ads, so he's he stepped in and helped us run some ads and things.
Speaker 1:And well, kickstarter is interesting, right, because I feel like the heyday of kickstarter was maybe 2014 12, 14 is what I was going to think. You know, I'm not a huge kickstarter guy, so I don't. I can't sit here to say like I know exactly what to do and how to do. But if I remember right, that was when, like, if you created a good video and a good story, like nomadic was a yeah, big kickstarter story from utah that I I'm trying to remember, I mean, I think chirp Chirp was Chirp Fawn Design. Was.
Speaker 2:Fawn? I believe so.
Speaker 1:Yeah, they might have been. Rags might have been as well. I don't know about Rags Was Thread.
Speaker 2:Wallets, one I don't remember. But, for sure, nomadic was a big big big.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I know Chirp was for a fact, but of quality yeah, they still do that. Yeah, you kind of hit kickstarter on the tail end of when it was I don't want to use the word easy, because nothing's easy but it got so much more competitive and so many more products and it just wasn't as easy. What was the other one kickstarter? And then?
Speaker 1:indiegogo indiegogo, indiegogo, right. So, um, to me, like, my first thought is like, I think, between the story you tell and the problems that it solves, but also just the sheer fact that the product is very different, like it is very different.
Speaker 1:I know I know people create fat like you're not the only person who creates a flat bed hammock, yeah, but it's so different from anything I've seen and I like one of my favorite Quotes. We had a guy on the podcast he why can't I forget his name? Anyway, he's the CMO of Bruce Boll and Chris Hall. That is a.
Speaker 2:The.
Speaker 1:EECOM cowboy. Yes, I know him from Twitter. Right, we had him on the podcast, bruce. Well, it's like a Batting gloves, okay for kids, yeah, oh yeah, yeah, they just exploded, you know like a hundred million plus dollar company, wow, and he said this quote that I just like I always think about all the time and he says behind every great marketer is a better product.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know and so, like I think it to you know, it's like there's the storytelling which is the marketing, and then there's a product which is just like right. Sometimes when you have a great product, you don't, it doesn't matter. The story like the product tells the story itself. And so how important has product development been for you since the first launch to now?
Speaker 3:yeah, it's been huge. I think word of mouth has been one of our biggest drivers. You know, you'll go on this next fly fishing trip with your haven tent and your buddies will act Well. They'll want to hop in and try it out and say, wow, this is more comfortable than what I have. And they're going to spend all night tossing and turning, sliding off their pad, being at a weird angle, being cold or whatever Right, and they're going to say, oh, you know, next year I'm going to get this. We've seen some of those early Kickstarter supporters now go on hunting trips and they have seven Haven tents all set up with their crew, which has been fun to see.
Speaker 3:The fact that the product is out there telling the story for you makes it so much easier. Sure, you just have that core, I would say. As far as our success and growth within Haven Tents, it's been on the merits of our product. I feel like I'm maybe an above average storyteller, but not that great. The product has definitely made it a lot easier. Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 2:What's your process for developing the product?
Speaker 3:It was that taking that initial idea and then sketching, doing thought experiments, trying to figure it out, you know, building paper models initially Like when I look back and think of the fact that it's here, it's kind of a miracle, based off of how poor my skills were when I was starting. We're going to be doing we did another Kickstarter a few years ago for the safari version of the tent, which is the uh, you know canvas version of the hammock, and that did just over 400,000. And we're doing another Kickstarter this year for an ultralight version of our hammock and I don't know what we're going to do. It's funny.
Speaker 3:The first Kickstarter, I went total bootstrap and my whole goal was I'm going to fund the first round of production. That was the goal and we did it. That goal was I'm going to fund the first round of production. That was the goal and we did it. That's that's what we were able to do. For the second, you know Kickstarter, I started to kind of listen to all of the marketing hype around Kickstarter. Like no, it's about finding customers, it's about reaching an audience. You're not supposed to make money through Kickstarter. And so I kind of took took that approach. We did a whole lot more in sales, but we actually didn't make any money through the process.
Speaker 3:I mean granted, we acquired customers and you're get your name out there and stuff, yeah. But anyway, this time I think I'm going to do a happy medium of a blend. And so if it ends up being more than 400,000, great yeah, but I'm not necessarily uh, you know shooting for like just the most we can possibly sell by just pumping a ton of money into ads either. Like, I want it to be an organic, natural campaign that actually helps our brand too.
Speaker 1:Tell the audience why you guys utilize Kickstarter versus capital that you may or may not have, just to create it up by yourselves.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so we could do it ourselves. Right, we could just run ads or whatever. But I think that Kickstarter gives you a public validation tool, so people aren't able to see, wow, a thousand other people are buying this already, which makes it easy for them to adopt. It kind of sits out there as a bit of a beacon in a different space as well. You're able to market differently, you're able to be excited about it in a different way. Also, the model that the success that we've had within Kickstarter in the US has been replicated through partners in Japan. So we have a partner in Japan. Once we do a campaign, they'll go and do it in Japan and they'll usually beat our campaigns.
Speaker 1:Oh, wow.
Speaker 3:And so kind of setting an example of okay, how much, how successful is this product in the us? Yeah, and then we can talk to our partners in norway, we can talk to other retailers and things and say, hey, look what, look what the this is proof that there's demand for this totally.
Speaker 1:I asked the question just because one. I think that there's definitely some brands out there that focus on product development, but you have a lot. There was a. There was a point in time like where, ok, let's go through a timeline here.
Speaker 1:So I feel like in the 2012 to 2017 realm, it was really really, really hard to start a brand, primarily because you couldn't click a couple buttons and find a manufacturer, right, so, and alibaba didn't exist, amazon was not what amazon was. Drop shipping didn't really exist. I mean, it did, but it didn't, you know, not at the scale that it was. And so the barrier of entry to build a website, to manufacture a product, to raise capital to, you know, it was really hard. In fact, the only thing back then that made the barrier of entry easier was Kickstarter, in my opinion, right. Right, because Shopify wasn't.
Speaker 1:What Shopify was right back in 2012 is what it is today. Right, like you, just a couple of couple buttons and you have a whole website ready to rock and roll, you know. So I think product was really important because, like it, it took a lot of effort for people to do it, you know. But then what happened in maybe like 2019 to 2020, up until maybe a couple years ago, product to me almost started to get devalued because everyone said storytelling and marketing is actually what sells more, and I still actually believe that.
Speaker 1:Right, you see some of the crappiest products getting sold and crushing it now. Will that brand succeed in the long run?
Speaker 2:most likely not I think I think one of the terms that's missing in this conversation is product market fit. Sure, because in SAS they talk about it all the time yeah, like, product market fit Like, yeah, you need a great product, but you also need a great product that has fit within the market. Like, sometimes, yes, good marketing can sometimes create that fit. And I think everyone goes back to like the toothpaste example of like the 1900s. Like, oh they, they convinced people of like how needed it was because of the foam right.
Speaker 1:Like they made it foam and then they would market that as like, so it felt like it was cleaning them.
Speaker 2:It felt like it was cleaning them. So they felt a clean feeling. Yeah, but a lot of e-commerce companies, in my opinion, just will not accept the fact that there is something called product market fit, even with consumer goods, and sometimes your product has it or sometimes it doesn't. And you find I think the great thing about Kickstarter going back to Kickstarter is it's a validator of how much product market fit you actually have. Now it might not be a great validator of your total obtainable market or maybe your total addressable market. Like you, you might not really understand because maybe it's a niche product and you have like a really cult crowd that wants it. But it is a great opportunity to get on there and, like you said, you get validation very quickly of if you you have, if you're at least in the realm of product market fit, and then you can iterate off of that well, that's what I was.
Speaker 1:That's kind of the point I was trying to get to. Right is like, as time has come on, like people are starting to recognize how much more important good product is to sustainably keep their brand going. But sometimes I think people get nervous to go through the product development stage because one they don't really know how to do it like, how do I test if there is product?
Speaker 2:market fit. Yeah, sometimes I think probably like to your point. You know I wanted to, I wanted to emphasize product market fit, because product development, I think, becomes an endeavor unto itself. Like we're developing product like it just in this loop, with no really idea of the outside scope of does like, does this product even fit within the market? Is it going to work? Is it right?
Speaker 1:for us. So that's why I like I actually really you don't see a lot of people doing what you're doing with Kickstarter. Right, I would say it's actually happening a lot less right? We we have some clients who who use it. It like we talked about quality right, they generally don't create a new product unless they go through kickstarter and it's a lot of people think it's for a capital purposes. But I like what you just said that's actually not it. Hey, we could totally fund, yeah, we could do this tent, but we want to go through and validate to make sure that people actually want I would say this hammock is a unique, you know, kind of case study for it.
Speaker 3:So we launched with our regular Haven tent and then we launched Haven exhale one year later, just kind of as as a regular launch. And then the next year Everybody was pushing for us to make a lighter hammock, which is easier said than done, because now you start working with different materials and there's all of these different, different constraints but I saw that there was and also like are you catering to like one percent of the crap?
Speaker 3:like yeah, yeah, sure, the most outspoken one percent versus that, you know bigger part of the of the curve there this episode is brought to you today by bestie.
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Speaker 1:Where were you? Can I ask a really quick question now because I want you to finish the story? But where are you getting this information? Is it on social? Are you surveying people? Yeah, what's?
Speaker 3:it's a little everything, a bit of the squeakiest wheels so it's on it's on social being in the community.
Speaker 3:And then, well, honestly, when we go to shows and we're showing the hammock to people, yeah, like you just get real-time feedback so quickly and you make great content too, totally, you're just getting this, you know real. So people, the one, the first kind of hang up that people have, is odd. It's not an ultra, ultra light system. You know, our standard is about six and a half pounds. With you pick all the lightest options, it makes it about six pounds for our standard, haven 10. The XL is about seven pounds, I was going to say with all of our lightest options. But that's, that's with the pad right.
Speaker 2:I was gonna say this is not that heavy, considering that there's a pad.
Speaker 3:Yeah, there's a pad in there and that's just it. That make really really good canvas, heavy big tents and there's no spring bar, there's no canvas hammocks out there, that there's no, you know glamping hammocks, yeah. And so I thought, well, what if we made one of these just as comfortable as possible? Again, that's kind of been my design thing, like how can we make the pad more comfortable? How can we make this more comfortable? Just 100 kind of focused on comfort, and if weight wasn't an issue, what? How comfortable could we make this thing? And that's what we came up with safari.
Speaker 3:And so we launched something that had never been before. Nobody's ever made a canvas hammock, nobody's ever tried to see how heavy they can make a hammock. It just hasn't been part of the product. That product development loop has always kind of tended towards being a lightweight hammock, and so we didn't really know what kind of market there would be for it. Launched the Kickstarter. It did really well. It kind of proved that, oh, there is a spot for this product, which helped convince a lot of our you know, retail, retail partners. Oh yeah, this actually is is pretty cool, and now xl is our top selling product.
Speaker 1:But this is number two yeah, um, what is your anticipation for the lightweight one?
Speaker 3:oh, I have high hopes for it. Yeah, yeah, I do.
Speaker 1:It's super cool, yeah, um yeah, what is the weight supposed to be? Because that one you said is seven or seven, with the pound seven and this is this.
Speaker 3:It'll be the same hammock and it'll be around. It'll be around four the the lightest option would be about four and a half cool with the pad and which is a huge difference more basic option will be around five pounds and so it's still not going to be hyper light.
Speaker 3:So when people are doing the Pacific Crest Trail or whatever and they're, you know, cutting their socks in half or like just trying to conserve as much weight as possible, it's probably not going to appeal to that crowd. But like the guys that are going to hike in a few miles or go for a week long backpacking trip, like totally within the realm and you're able to be as comfortable as you are in your bed at home, sure, so like that is going to be a huge, you know, value proposition.
Speaker 2:I think totally, very cool how worried about weight when samwise had uh cast iron all the way to more, all the way to more door.
Speaker 1:Geez, what a stud though he was.
Speaker 3:Yeah, right, people cutting their socks and Frodo just is out there carrying his little ring around. Just nothing yeah.
Speaker 2:There's a nice metaphor in that the ring, although light in weight, was heavier in spirit. That's true. That's right, that's true.
Speaker 1:Maybe that is the heavier burden. That's right. I think it was.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I think it was. Now I'm just thinking about Lord of the Rings. How has product development been from a like what's your returning customer look like? Is it? Do you have a pretty solid returning customer rate? I mean, this seems like a. My guess is these aren't wearing out.
Speaker 3:Right, right. So we were looking at it last week actually, and the number one repeat purchase after somebody buys a Haven XL hammock, which is our biggest main hammock, is another Haven XL. Yeah, which is cool to see. Sure, it's a one person system.
Speaker 3:So, it means that they are enjoying it enough that they're going to go buy it for somebody else in their family, maybe a spouse or whatever. And so we've been able to tack on some accessories as well, again focusing on comfort, like how can we just improve the camping experience? And I would like to evolve away from just being a tent hammock company to more of an outdoor like let's just make the outdoors as great as possible. And so, yeah, it's fun because we do see a lot of repeat customers.
Speaker 3:We see these communities growing and like little pockets, and there's an event that somebody in our company goes to every year called Hang Con. It's in Florida and this last time there was a Haven Village. They called it I mean, haven Haven is kind of like a you know gimme, but they called it the Haven Village. And there were like 10 you know gimme, but they called it the haven village and there were like 10 haven tents that were all set up around each other and yeah, you know they're gonna have like a sign made for next year and everything.
Speaker 3:So it's fun to see these communities I was actually just thinking about that.
Speaker 2:Like this is this is disrupting the outdoor experience in a lot of ways, right, right, because I think everyone, when they think of camping, like they're thinking, okay, we have to get a 10 up, right, and then it's usually if you're a family, even if you're not, like a big family, generally tents end up being communal, right, like a three person tent to six person, 10 or two, but like with a better sleeping experience and it just takes up less space, like I'm, I'm picking this up right, this is an xl, yeah, like this xl is with the pad is like basically a tent, right, right, but with such a better sleeping experience, like, yeah, like, why would a family prefer to get four of these? Yeah, maybe they're not sleeping all in the same, quote tent, sure but I mean there's some advantages to that.
Speaker 3:Honestly, like let's, let's be honest.
Speaker 2:You know the snoring, the I was gonna say like the like the rolling around like someone isn't sleeping, someone's always not sleeping, well someone always someone's not sleeping. Well then, they're gonna get up and move.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, nothing's worse, like then. And then they zip, like when I, when I camp. Oftentimes when you're camping, you're being active. So I feel like whenever I camp, I'm drinking a ton of water. So I feel like I have to wake up and pee once, no matter what, twice sometimes, and I hate that. Like, and my wife and my kids, and the next morning my wife's like, well, thanks for waking us up. And, and you know, I like the next morning my wife's like, well, thanks for waking us up. I'm like dang it, you know.
Speaker 2:Yeah, Outside of getting a trailer like how do you fix that experience? Right and this and this is probably the only way to fix it.
Speaker 3:I mean, we keep going back to that pain right, where so many people love camp, like I, I love fishing. They struggle with with that sleeping experience, right. Yeah, and also it's about being present in the outdoors. A lot of times when we set up a tent, it's like you you hike to this beautiful spot and then you hide out in a little cave for like part of the day.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and you can't see a darn thing with this. You know you get the fly that's that's guide open. You can see 360 degrees, you can see everything, yeah.
Speaker 1:And so you're actually like present and immersed in the space, yeah, would you say, uh, like, who's your customer? Like you we were kind of talking about this a little bit, you know would you say you have this like predefined customer, or would you almost say, like, based on this conversation, I'm almost feeling like, hey, our customer is the person who's experiencing the prop, this problem. So it's not even like a age, x, y, z, they camp X amount of times, or or is it that type of person?
Speaker 3:I think that you have that as a core, but I think that where we've been able to do well and grow I mean we've sold nearly 40,000 of these hammocks- over the last so we've sold quite a few of these things, um, and how we've been able to do that is, honestly, by expanding outside.
Speaker 3:So when I started the company, obviously it's a, it's a hammock, and so you could, when I named the company, I named it Haven tents to initially just like step back from that little circle of hammock camping. Yeah, because if you look at the camping space and then you zoom in on how the percentage of people that camp, how many of those guys sleep in a hammock and I say guys because very, very few girls sleep in hammocks it's like a very small little circle, right, and those companies do such a good job. They've been there for so long, they have these great branding, they have everything just totally dialed in. So rather than competing in that space, let me position this as a tent, because really the sleep experience is completely different. Yes, we have a hammock, but it's not like sleeping in a hammock at all. Have you done any?
Speaker 2:research about that pain point with men and women.
Speaker 3:Do women?
Speaker 2:like, is sleep a bigger pain point for women when they go camping than it is for men generally? Yeah, because in my I mean just this is totally subjective, right, but you would say yes, well, in my family that's for sure what it is Right Like, just from all the women I know in my life. Like the men like to go camping, the women like to go outdoors, but the sleeping part is just like.
Speaker 3:I don't want to deal with it yeah, one of the best comments that we get pretty often is my wife will go camping with me now, which is just a cool thing. That like they were. Maybe it was something they did when they were younger. And then the wife's like, ah, I'm over that, and now she's going back out there. It's cool, it's like you're getting people outside. And last year we did a poll and we asked we were bringing people to our site for some other reason. But while they were there, we asked them, you know, a few questions to kind of get to know them a little bit, and we asked, before getting involved with Haven Tents, what kind of a camper were you? Were you, you know, did you sleep in hammocks, did you sleep in tents, or were you a non-camper and 35 you sleep in tents or were you a non-camper?
Speaker 3:yeah, and 35 of our customers identified as non-campers 35 self-identified as people that before getting a haven tent they did not camp, and so it's. It's like a smaller piece, but still that's a huge piece. Well, 35 is pretty substantial for a camping product right and the fact that we are connecting dots for people saying, oh, I'm not a camper, but I would if I had this.
Speaker 1:That's very interesting.
Speaker 2:It's also interesting what you said, that one of the number one responses you get is like now my wife comes camping with me.
Speaker 3:I mean, that's not, but we hear that quite a bit. It's not like the number one thing, but we get that a lot. Or like, oh, I used to love camping, but my you know born again campers because now they can sleep comfortably.
Speaker 1:Born again, campers, yeah.
Speaker 2:That's a good term.
Speaker 1:That's a good term.
Speaker 2:That is a good term. Yeah, I love that because it shows that you've identified a problem and that you're working to fix an actual, real problem. Not just that you experienced, right, because sometimes we experience a problem that's quite unique and we think everyone's experiencing it. You're working to fix an actual, real problem, not just that you experienced, right, because sometimes we experience a problem that's quite unique and we think everyone's experiencing it, but it's like is it really product worthy? But you went down this exploration and discovered like oh yeah, I mean, look at how many people have stopped camping, because that example you said is very relatable to a lot of people. I used to go camping as a kid. My dad took me camping a few times as a kid, or whatever. It is Like they have a few experiences as a kid and they loved it, but then as they got older, it's just that experience of sleeping in a tent and just like the nuances of it just became not very fun.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And now it's becoming fun again because, hey, if you can get a good night's sleep, that does change the camping experience very significantly.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and not just your nights, it changes your days too, so it's like the whole thing is better. Oh, yeah, well yeah, sleep dictates.
Speaker 3:So our goal is to make sleep the the highlight of camping, which obviously it's going to be the other stuff. But, like, imagine looking forward, like, oh, I I'm going to go camping next week and I'm going to go fishing and I'm get to sleep in my Haven tent. Yeah, we have a guy, uh, uh, uh, Will, uh, will, bill, and he has been. He's now on what day is it today in january, it's january 28th, so he spent 28 nights in a haven tent so far this year, right, and he's like posting every single you know night that he does it.
Speaker 3:How many nights? 28, so he every night of the year. His goal is to spend the first month of the year sleeping in a haven tent every night and he's in utah, it's been cold, yeah, and he's posting and he's just having like the time of his life and and so it's fun to. Yeah, as a see, as somebody who created a product, to see it being enjoyed to that extent is just awesome.
Speaker 2:One thing I want that number, though that 35% number is is is actually pretty crazy, because we always talk about expanding your market, and the fact that you're getting 35 of your customer base that are not campers in an in a camping space to come and buy your product, I would say, is that's got to be pretty significantly yeah, I think it's shocking, which means you're like you're starting to break outside of this, like, hey, we're just targeting campers, like people that want and are camping now to get a better product to people who aren't even engaging in the activity.
Speaker 1:You've broken out of your addressable market right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, or the obtainable. The obtainable into the total and you're expanding it, yeah.
Speaker 3:And I think that's why the Safari has done so well, because with our other tents they are focused on hey, you're already camping, here's a better way to sleep outside. And then this one goes hey, you don't even have to leave your car, you can just camp right there at the campsite and you're gonna have a great night's sleep. And it makes it really you know, approachable, I guess.
Speaker 2:How, how long does it take to set them up? Because that's another pain point for people, right?
Speaker 3:yeah, so what I hate about setting up tents is you have to set them up twice. You set up the tent first, then you have to put up the rain fly right and all the poles and you kind of you know, slide them through the little deals and, uh, hammocks are confusing as well, cause you set up the hammock first and then then the rain fly and you have to guide out in all these different places. This has two connection points. So you put straps around trees, you connect the hammock. Uh, you'll have to put the rain fly on the first time, but then you never have to take off the rain fly again, so it stays on there the whole time. Yeah, and so I can do it. Honestly, what takes the longest is blowing up the pad and you have a pump for that?
Speaker 3:and the stuff sack for the pad is also like a, you know, a bellows, so you can use it as a pump bag, and so we tried to just go through every single. And then, if you look at how like baggy the bag is, you, you know, for the hammock, a lot of times when, uh, when, you buy a tent, it looks really good on the shelf and it looks really small.
Speaker 1:You can shove it back in there.
Speaker 3:So we went and made the stuff sacks loose so that it's easy to get back in, like just I tried to just solve all the pains that I had as a consumer quick setup, easy takedown and just tried to put it all into one product.
Speaker 2:It's fun to be able to do. Do you think you can get this tent set up in under?
Speaker 3:five minutes? Oh for sure, yeah, I can do it in like two or three. What about the like? One of us, one of you guys' first time might take you five or six or so.
Speaker 1:Which is crazy, right, because I just went camping as somebody who set up the same tent over and over, you know, september or something like that, right, and it took me 15 to 20 minutes to set up like a five, six man tent well, that's what I wanted to ask, because that's one of the other biggest pain points and, putting it, away too is a dream, because if it rains, like how muddy it is, like I'm gonna have to set this up in my basement and let it dry out, like, ah, this, you can keep it off the ground the whole time, just kind of roll it back up, then put it back in the baggy stuff sack and you're good to go.
Speaker 3:Like it, we try to make it just and you're not like worried about the dirt and yeah, that's pretty well, here's what I love about.
Speaker 1:I want to kind of go back to this product development process.
Speaker 3:I think give you guys haven tense, I might have, I might have sold to here, right, yeah, you, you've already sold me.
Speaker 2:I'm going to have to get some for my family.
Speaker 1:Grayson over here sold too. So this is what I love. So, mark and I, we talk about this all the time and I bring it up all the time. Maybe you guys get annoyed by this, but there's this good different chart that I bring up all the time and essentially it's not just about product development, it's about marketing campaigns, it's anything you're doing as a business. You should put it through this good different kind of like exercise, which is to say, if you have an X and Y access and you have different quadrants, right, I think, if I remember right, uh, the Y access represents good and the X access represents different and in in your world, right, you could have.
Speaker 1:You go on this fun excursion with your family, where you're traveling, and let's say, maybe you're staying in some hotels, maybe you're staying in some, you know, maybe you're camping a little bit. I don't know if you were, but anyways, you have this idea for a hammock. But what you could have done and what most people do is they say you know what I should create a tent? Right, like, I want a tent, and okay. You know what I should create a tent?
Speaker 2:right, like, I want a tent, and okay you know, every tent is how do I just keep making the same?
Speaker 1:yeah, yeah, like the point I'm trying to make is you got coleman out there who makes a 10. You probably know all the other tent names, right, and and every tent is the same, at the end of the day they have some different features.
Speaker 2:That's like well, you've got like the spring bar versions, and then you've got a little more lightweight then you have the white lightweight, or oh hey we added.
Speaker 1:We added, uh like, led lights to it, which are cool features, but are they different enough to make somebody say I'm gonna buy that? Or are they different enough to make somebody say, oh, we just saw coleman do this, we're gonna add it to it? So it's very easy, you know. So that's what I love about this is like you didn't go down the route of which, like what is the easiest barrier of entry, which is everyone loves tents. Therefore, what if I created a tent brand and I just added some additional features, but, at the end of the day, that wouldn't be different enough for me to be like I'm going to go with Haven tents versus guess what? I just walked by Costco, saw Coleman tent. Right, it's only 300 bucks versus the 550. This one costs, I'm going to buy that one, I know Coleman, it fits my family, et cetera, et cetera. And so I love how you you made out of necessarily been going through the good different.
Speaker 3:When I watched your video about this, it's like oh, that's why. Yeah, that's why we sell a lot of hammocks. Totally Right and different.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you've based your entire product development strategy off of a core problem that the the most savant campers have and the most basic campers have, right, which is you still like, no matter what, like, like you said, with the hammock, like it's a crappy sleep. I do it because I love fly fishing so much that I'm okay with a bad sleep.
Speaker 2:Yeah, like I love fly fishing enough, and it's usually a day, it's a two day thing I have. I have kids like I'm not going to be spending like five days out there, right?
Speaker 1:So it's like where I'm like I need to get there and back, and I don't love fly fishing enough to justify the bad night sleep, so I just rather not go, even though I love the outdoors. And every time I go camping I'm always like ken's that's my wife like why don't we do this more often? And she's like well, because we don't like to sleep intense yeah that's why we don't do this.
Speaker 2:That's how we might go.
Speaker 1:Okay, yeah, well, now you're gonna do it more often so I love that you based your entire product development strategy off of this. Hey, everyone the good camp, the experienced campers and not everyone has a hard time sleeping. Yep, and I think that that's the brilliance of what you're doing with haven and and every product that you're creating. It still solves that problem, right? Hey, I'm trying to make this one light that's a new feature like a little bit lighter, but at the end of the day, it's still the same thing. It's helping people sleep better and have a better experience at night, which then helps them have a better experience in the day, like you said. So the good different chart is defeated.
Speaker 2:It is. It is undefeated. That's a quadrant.
Speaker 1:That's a quadrant. I like that Right there. So how has? Okay, we talked a ton about product development, the other thing that I've been loving that you've done really well, and I'm like wanting to ask you questions, but I'm also like answering questions in my head as I'm like thinking about this has creating content been so much easier for you? Because the product just tells the story itself?
Speaker 3:Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 3:And what I found as a content creator in the travel space was man, my content is the product here and I'm going to have to do this like forever. Yeah, if we grow this audience, if we become outdoor you know family travel content creators, there's no tangible good here and the second that the views drop off of a video, like I'm out of business. You know, I got to go out there and create more and more and more. But what that year of travel and constant content creation taught me how to do was how to make mediocre content very efficiently. And I I say mediocre. If you're not a content person and you see some of the stuff that that we do at haven tents, you're gonna think it's probably pretty good, yeah. But then you see like actual content creators and like with their transitions and their masks and all their stuff, it's like wow, that looks amazing. Yeah, and I don't put in the energy for that.
Speaker 3:But I do it quickly yeah, one example is we were at the outdoor uh, or sorry, at the Western hunt expo, uh, which is a show that we do here in Utah every year, and I was kind of I had a tripod set up when people were getting in the tent I was filming this kind of reaction video of just first impressions, and I filmed like 20 testimonials one day and then that night I smashed them together and made like a little bit of a reaction video, yeah, and that started to do pretty well on on Tik TOK, yeah. And then somebody asked, oh, I want to see the whole presentation, yeah, and so my wife Kenzie, who's also McKenzie, was uh helping me that day, you know, uh with with the booth, and so she filmed just the next person who came by, yeah, and she filmed them. This gal got in the hammock. I gave my whole spiel, my whole pitch, and that night went, cut it, posted it and that blew up. For us.
Speaker 3:It's done collectively across all the different channels that we have. It has over 40 million views. Nice, this presentation.
Speaker 1:I know exactly what video you're talking about.
Speaker 3:People are electing to watch me give a presentation talking about how great the hammock is, you know, and anyway, like the lift that that's done for us has been huge and so, like being comfortable in front of the camera came just because I'm too lazy to try to find, you know, talent to go and be in my stuff for me. It's much easier for me just to bring a tripod Totally and then being able to put out content that's okay but like good enough, yeah, pretty quickly has been huge for us. Yeah.
Speaker 1:How did you?
Speaker 2:get comfortable with good enough. Was it the travel? Yeah, man, how do?
Speaker 3:I get comfortable with good enough. Was it the travel? Yeah, man, how do I get comfortable with good enough? I guess I'm not, because I think everyone overthinks it.
Speaker 2:Oh for sure. Yeah, and I'm not saying I would do it too. I don't produce a lot of content, but when I think about content, I think I overthink it.
Speaker 1:It's a good question. Actually, this is a good question. I like it because you're right, Everyone's like, oh well, the edit's not good or I didn't get the good shot.
Speaker 2:I said something weird yeah. I don't like the sound of my voice.
Speaker 1:It doesn't seem on brand or whatever.
Speaker 3:Yeah, how do you make those decisions? Because I've done some stuff I've put a lot of thought into and a lot of care and it just doesn't do well at all. Yeah, of care, and it just like doesn't do well at all. Yeah, and then there's that one video that's pretty organic and it's just and it blows up, you know, half-baked.
Speaker 3:So well, I don't think this is gonna work and, honestly, having tiktok is kind of like my testing ground sure has been great. It's like I don't care as much about tiktok because I think that we have a good following there it's like 130, some odd thousand but at the same time I haven't put any like weight on it because it was going to be here.
Speaker 2:It was going to be there, like who?
Speaker 3:knows what's happening with it. So I'd like like I don't mind throwing stuff at tiktok and seeing what sticks, yeah, and then, if it like, I'll kind of, you know, refine it and put it on the on instagram, and then I'll put it on shorts, so I'll end up posting something three, three different times, maybe doing like a slight improvement. Yeah, but I guess it's just lowering standards, like not saying every video has to be like elite quality edits. Yeah, has been awesome. Yeah, and we have had a few creators make high quality stuff for us and I post it and it just falls flat, like it just doesn't convey what we're like. Our message of this is a small business. Yeah, like a family, you know company that's. This guy's going to be out there with his kids making videos. Yeah, about hammock tents, like that has kind of become our brand, yeah.
Speaker 1:I mean, we've been saying this for the last. What are we on year three of this?
Speaker 2:I don't know.
Speaker 1:We are, I think.
Speaker 2:Are we?
Speaker 1:Yeah, like for the last three years we've been saying founders always just need to be in the videos, like I know it's hard and some people don't want it, but no one does it better.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:No one does it better. You know, like, yes, get creators involved, right, like you said. You've got this guy who's doing the 31 days of Haven, like that's awesome Creative. Yeah for sure, right, and that's reassurance. And and I would imagine you know you, you said that, or do you do post-purchase surveys at all? We do, yeah, like I imagine.
Speaker 3:Not like in super in-depth ones to be honest yeah.
Speaker 1:But, I would imagine that if you ask the question, how did you first hear about Haven Tents? I'd be willing to bet a lot of money that your number. I don't know what your ad spend is, but between one and two position is friend or family member.
Speaker 3:Oh, for sure.
Speaker 1:Right Guaranteed and my guess is it's over 30%.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:You know of those people. So what I think is really cool about going back to this I just keep circling back to product is we just like the client that we just went and visited, that whole story we the shebang about us traveling. You know we had a huge conversation about them creating content and becoming an authority in the space where they have a really, really awesome product, and one of the founders you know what she was saying was she's like we know we need to, but it's so hard to think of the content, it's so hard for us to take like that's the hardest part is like thinking about what we're going to do. It's not even producing, it's not even editing, it's like what should we do? Should we do and and part, part of it, and and they would I'm not saying anything that would be disrespectful to them.
Speaker 1:They don't have much of a different product. It's the same thing a lot of people sell. You know they're not manufacturing it on their own, they're like more of a distributor of it and so they don't have anything real different. And what's so nice about having something that's different is you probably don't have to think much on.
Speaker 1:I'm not trying to take away from the content you're creating but, like you know, somebody comments like let's see the whole thing. Okay, cool, that's a video. You know you could almost turn every one of your questions in your comments into the next like 45 days worth of content strategy. And that's the beauty of being a having product market fit and solving problems is not only do you connect with a customer better, but it's so much easier to just create content.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Like. It's just like product. Good product development solves every single problem.
Speaker 2:Well, you just showed us a video of your of you QAing a product. Right yeah, with sand or not sandbags salt bags yeah. Right to test the actual weight capacity of a lightweight hammock, which is like that's content.
Speaker 1:And it's a story too. That's really interesting.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'm not going to give away the details, but Nah, wild stuff, wild.
Speaker 3:And so my cousin Blake, who we've already talked about, and, and you know, my cousin matt these are, these are my besties that I do my adventures with, and so we used to do adventures anyway, but now that I have this outdoor company, it all of a sudden falls under the the thing of haven. Yeah, and so we love using our products. We'll go. Last year we went to uh, was it last year? No, two years ago we did a packrafting trip in Alaska. So we go to Alaska, we do this awesome trip, we film content the whole time, and then I get like the long form you know, youtube video and then a bunch of short form content and like, when we're just out there using our product, I'm filming, I'm, you know, and then you just you're able to cut that up and put into all sorts of different way, and that content ends up serving you for a year or so. You know, each trip.
Speaker 3:And so the IRS is making. You can easily see that this trip to Alaska was a business trip. Yeah, yeah, it was a work trip, but just being out there and using the product and if you, if you have a product, that's not as weird as a haven tent, like just filming your product in use and then narrating the story. One of the best videos that I did recently was I just set up a tent and I had, I just talked about it as I was setting it up, yeah, and then posted that that's and that did really well, yeah, um, and so if it's any, I think you can do that for any product just talk about it using the product.
Speaker 2:It has this like asmr quality where people just kind of get like sucked into watching the process of a product in use which has been helpful, but the asmr trend is kind of interesting, right, because people love watching how things are made and so it makes a lot of sense, like, why, like, if you start from the beginning, like just like box openings even well, and it's kind of like a hook right, like if you're saying something, you're strapping something around a tree.
Speaker 1:They're like what's this guy doing?
Speaker 3:yeah, you know what I mean, like it's they always think that that would apply to and the nearly any product have you done like a strict asmr ad yet no, I, I have not but that's it.
Speaker 2:that's a good idea. Yeah, I need to do one because you have like the zip, because you have like the zip, and then you have the rap on the tree For sure you have like this noise right the canvas on canvas.
Speaker 3:Canvas on canvas, yeah, and then the air.
Speaker 1:And then the air.
Speaker 2:And then, like the last bit of ASMR, I might have to kind of dull that down a little and, like the last bit of ASMR should be you laying and it being like a. Well, it's like that cushion, yeah. Well, it's like that cushion, yeah, you hear, like the cushion and then the last thing is his let him like exhaling.
Speaker 1:You know, yeah, you should try that. Awesome there it is. You can have that idea for free. Sweet, I love it. Well, dude, this has been awesome. Any like, uh, any tips, like if you had like a last minute thing, a last minute piece of advice that you would give to like you're a listener of the podcast, right, right, so, as a listener of the podcast, like what's something that you'd want to hear if you could go back four years ago for yourself that you've learned I mean, the more time you spend learning in the beginning of your business, the better.
Speaker 3:And I know that's probably not talking about my product in particular, but just like my daily you know, maybe it's not a daily, but every couple of days watching your, your videos, like it's awesome and so connecting with the, the, the e-comm community, and connecting with people that are out there influencing and like when I started this, I knew how to sell, I knew how to tell a story, but I didn't know anything about ads or product designer, like all of this stuff. I remember sitting on an airplane and somebody told me about SketchUp, which is like the Google tool for 3D modeling, and it was like, wait, what you could do this.
Speaker 3:And I had spent hours building paper models and doing all this nonsense and just like so. If you're open, if you just acknowledge the fact that you don't know anything and you're open, you go to the source of information and you just like become a student again. And I have young kids that are in school and they're they're learning. We become adults. We kind of stop, and so maybe the one bit of advice to look in the camera is to like become a student. Cool yeah.
Speaker 1:I love that Super smart. I like that, too. Be coach. Yeah, I love that super smart. I like that, too. Be coachable. Yeah, and and and. That doesn't just necessarily mean what I like you're saying. That doesn't necessarily mean go read all the self-help books, no right. It means, like, go meet and talk to people like for sure like you said, like hey, I've been wasting all this time drawing or whatever, and now, oh, I got sketchup.
Speaker 3:You know my ability to that changes everything for me iterate and make changes on products. It went from glacial to light speed. The second, I learned about a tool. Totally, totally Very cool, so you never know when that aha moment's going to come, yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I like that analogy because it's similar to going camping, right, or going on a big hiking trip. You have to just enjoy the exploration because you're always going to encounter things that you don't know or that are kind of interesting, and you're always going to have to problem solve a little bit along the way. So, being coachable, I think sometimes people think of like I need to find a coach, yeah, and me, yeah, maybe a coach might help you right, mentor, that's great, like we're not saying don't do that.
Speaker 2:But what we are saying is you just have to enjoy the process and be open to changing the way you're approaching it. Right Like, if you're hiking up a mountain or if you're if you're a rock climber, especially like rock climbers you might have to change your approach on the face to to get to where you want to go.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:You can't just always go exactly the way you think you're going to be able to go up the mountain Right. Always go exactly the way you think you're going to be able to go up the mountain, right. So change your approach. Just be agile, just realize like it's not a straight way up, right, it's going to be some zigzagging, like you're going to have to make some adjustments along the way, and if you're flexible, you'll be fine.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and also acknowledge that, like your chapter one is different than a chapter 20 from somebody else. We get that all the the time. Like I'll reach out to people and I'll be like, hey, for example, come on our podcast, like I'm only doing, like, oh, like I'm only doing 5 000 sounds like well, it doesn't matter. Like you could be at the very beginning stages, like that, that doesn't really matter. You know, I think a lot of people get really almost embarrassed at those early stages to go out and reach out for help because they're like, oh, I, I don't want them to know how inexperienced I am or how little revenue I've made or how.
Speaker 2:You know what I mean when it's like or like we work with brands that are scared to show behind the scenes stuff because it's like well then, they're going to see that we're not like this big polished brand.
Speaker 1:Totally yeah, it's like that doesn't matter.
Speaker 3:Actually, like I think that's probably why people would want such a strength and, honestly, as a startup and our first production runs had some issues, you know, but the amount of leeway that people give startups is incredible and the amount of patience versus like a Coleman or whatever, like if you, if they have, you know, 30% of their tents have an issue, like it's going to be huge and they're going to be blasted for it, but like they just understand and, of course, we've done everything to make it right and we continue to improve on everything. But, yeah, lean into it. I mean, if you're a startup and you're new, that is one of your biggest advantages and one of the biggest points of your story. The other thing I think that we've done well is we've found out who we are. We are comfort outside and we tell that story. Yeah, we just focus on that. Like we can get bogged down in features and talking about, like, different elements of our product, but at the end of the day, what compels action is that comfort yeah, messaging is everything people.
Speaker 1:People underestimate the power of messaging. And then who your audience is like and defining who you are can change changes everything. You don't even have to change your product and you can change those things and you can go from nothing to something really quickly.
Speaker 2:So yeah, I love that too, because a lot of people focus on who their customer is and they kind of forget, like, who they actually are. Like you, get caught up in this idea of who you think your customers are when it's like well, who are you actually like?
Speaker 3:what is your company?
Speaker 2:and you just said it. You've distilled it down to comfort outside, yeah, which allows you to now focus on well, who? Who are we attracting?
Speaker 1:and who can we attract? How can we test different messaging, etc. Etc.
Speaker 3:So well, dude, thank you so much. This has been awesome. Where can? People find haven on instagram, on tiktok. Uh, those are our main. Haven tentscom is our site, but our our handles are Haven tents Cool.
Speaker 1:Awesome. We'll go follow them. Uh, like seriously such a cool product, uh, and this has been so awesome. So thank you so much and uh, thanks for having me on. We appreciate everybody for listening, you know.
Speaker 3:Thank you, and uh this might be the only episode that I don't listen to out of your guys, but thanks for having me.
Speaker 1:You're going to learn a lot from yourself. You're going to be like oh, I didn't know how smart I was.
Speaker 1:That's really cool All right guys, thank you so much and we will uh, we'll see you next week. Thank you so much for listening to the unstoppable marketer podcast. Please go rate and subscribe the podcast, whether it's good or bad. We want to hear from you because we always want to make this podcast better. If you want to get in touch with me or give me any direct feedback, please go follow me and get in touch with me. I am at the Trevor Crump on both Instagram and TikTok. Thank you, and we will see you next week.