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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. 131 Turning Teacher Know-How into Business Gold w/ Noah and Kelsey Cook, Co-Founders @ Learning with Kelsey
In this episode of the Unstoppable Marketer podcast, hosts Trevor Crump and Mark Goldheart interview Noah and Kelsey Cook, co-founders of Learning with Kelsey, a subscription box service for educational activities. The Cooks share their journey from Kelsey's initial preschool packets to a thriving business, discussing the challenges of entrepreneurship, balancing family life, and the importance of curiosity in business growth. Learn valuable insights on building a successful business while maintaining a healthy work-life balance as a couple.
You can find Kelsey on social media @learningwithkelsey
Or you can visit her website at https://learningwithkelsey.com/
Please connect with Trevor on social media. You can find him anywhere @thetrevorcrump
At the beginning, when you're a business owner, it's a little scary because you really don't know if people really want it.
Speaker 2:No.
Speaker 1:Even if you have some validation, you're like I don't know.
Speaker 2:I remember I took one to an influencer that summer. I knew there was an influencer in our area. I dropped it off. My son was like five. I made him run it up to her and then she came outside, which was like my worst nightmare. I didn't want to see her in real life. So she came outside. I was like thank you, and I was like spread the word and so our oldest son, owen. He's nine, he brought it up to me last week.
Speaker 3:He's like isn't that the place where mom said spread the word? And just started giggling?
Speaker 2:because I like got, I like drove when I was like that was the most embarrassing thing I've ever done.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we all have Michael Scott moments, oh my gosh.
Speaker 2:I was like, okay, yeah, maybe I'm not cut out for this.
Speaker 4:Yo, what's going on everybody? Welcome to the Unstoppable Marketer podcast, with me, as always, my co-host, mark Goldheart. Mark, how are you doing today? Great?
Speaker 1:Wonderful.
Speaker 4:Good Yep, always the same response.
Speaker 1:It is.
Speaker 4:It's great, Great to be alive. It is good to be alive. It's a good day. In Utah we were just talking to the we've had like a cold front, which has been nice Yep For us. We have?
Speaker 1:Yeah, but I got. I went fishing over the weekend with three kids and each of them caught a really big fish, so Nice. Very nice. I think I'm on a lucky streak right now.
Speaker 4:Did you catch one?
Speaker 1:No, did you catch one. No, I didn't try. I just we had the three reels up for the three kids.
Speaker 4:And you were just managing, I was managing the reels. So just one parent on three kids yes, Fishing.
Speaker 1:That's a lot. That's pretty successful, I'd say so. We were there for one hour.
Speaker 4:Oh, really Nice. One hour three 18-inchers.
Speaker 1:Catch and release or did you keep them? No, we kept them. Nice, we're cooking them up tonight, Sweet, very nice. Trout Trout, which isn't like the best-tasting fish. But get some bacon, some onions and Reap the rewards. Yeah, nice, you can make it taste good.
Speaker 4:Yeah, probably. I don't have much experience with trout.
Speaker 1:You got to use bacon though.
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And some people just use like some herbs and some like lemons, Like oh, it's still so fishy. I don't like fishy taste Bacon.
Speaker 4:Bacon fixes a lot of things in life. Yeah, that's true. Yeah, I'm excited for our podcast today.
Speaker 1:Me too.
Speaker 4:We've been wanting these guys on for a minute and we finally got them in town, arizonians. Yeah, is it Arizonians?
Speaker 2:I would call us Arizonians. Okay, arizonians.
Speaker 3:Arizonians. I think is the correct term.
Speaker 4:I never use it.
Speaker 3:But yeah, you finally reeled us in.
Speaker 4:Yeah, we finally got you, you guys. We had to pay you guys a lot of money, pun intended.
Speaker 3:Yeah, negotiating that, oh nice, contracting a bit yeah, exactly.
Speaker 4:Finally, well, we want to welcome Noah and Kelsey Cook. They are the co-founders of Learning with Kelsey. Welcome, guys, thanks for having us.
Speaker 2:Excited.
Speaker 4:Like I said, we've been wanting to do this for a minute and just has never been able to line up. And luckily, you guys come out to Utah and worked out perfect. Now we're here. Now we're here, Now we're here. We've been so. So we've been working with you guys for 18 months.
Speaker 2:Yeah, Because I always say you are the age of my youngest baby.
Speaker 4:Ah, that's always nice when you have like a.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and my first call with you two weeks before he was born. Whoa that's cool.
Speaker 4:In my mind, I was thinking it was longer than that. No, before he was born. Whoa, that's cool. In my mind, I was thinking it was longer than that. No, you're crushing it. It's easier for us to remember than you guys, though.
Speaker 3:What's that?
Speaker 4:It's easier for us to remember because we started with you guys after Archie was born, nice.
Speaker 3:Before.
Speaker 4:That's awesome. Yeah, so we've been working with you guys for a minute and it's been. How did we connect? Remind me how we connected.
Speaker 2:So I connected, so I had seen your tiktoks okay, I think either tiktok or your reels okay and I like, sent them to noah, and I was following you and then well, I also followed you on instagram okay so you're so.
Speaker 2:You guys were following me separately okay and then I was like, hey, no, I think I'm just gonna message him and see if we could just meet with him. And I emailed you and actually I think I like sent a request and then you didn't ever respond to me and then we started doing a lot of things and then in like middle of october, you were like, hey, I totally missed this oh, can we get on a call and I was like all right, we'll just get on a call.
Speaker 2:I'm like no, you want to just do it, and then we were we were sold. Yeah, yeah, that's right, that's awesome, best ever made, but it was good timing because, had you emailed me earlier, I think we were like in a weird mode where we were trying to do all these like moving from different warehouses. It was like kind of crazy, sure, sure, sure, and so it was like perfect timing.
Speaker 4:Yeah, yeah. So tell just let's give everybody the little background on, like what is learning with Kelsey. Give us a spiel on you, my quick spiel, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:Okay, well I so. I was a teacher. I taught kindergarten and third grade and then I stayed home and taught preschool out of my house.
Speaker 2:When my first baby was born and after COVID happened, I had to close preschool and obviously I was so sad because I love teaching and so I'm like I put packets together for my preschoolers of all the things that we would have done in preschool, like our activities, activities, our worksheets, whatever and I put them out on my porch and the moms would come get them, and mom started just like posting about them and so I was like, okay, well, I'll just create an Instagram because, also, I was trapped at home with two little boys and I was like, yeah, I'll create an Instagram I can post about this and I know three little boys.
Speaker 2:No shit, there you go three boys and so I started posting about it and more people were like, hey, can I, could you leave one out for me, like in my neighborhood? And I was like, ok, so I made more. And then I'm like, ok, I think I could sell these for fifteen dollars. I was like fifteen dollars, I sold ten of them. I was like this is crazy Nice Because preschool. I charge a hundred bucks a month for preschool.
Speaker 2:So I was like in one week I made $150. It's so crazy. So then people in other states were like, can you mail them to me? And so I was like, okay, I'll put them in giant envelopes. So I would put them in big envelopes, mail them out. I have vivid memories of going to the post office with bins of these and scanning each one individually. I was putting out my thing, scanning each one individually, I was putting out my thing, and so that was like August and I told Noah I'm like I think this is, I think this is more than just COVID. Like I think being a teacher and a mom, like I had this unique perspective that I don't think I realized not everyone had. Like I kind of knew what my kids needed to know, I knew what activities to do, and there were moms that didn't. And so I told Noah I'm like I think we could do this like as a box, and Noah was like, yeah, you should do it.
Speaker 3:Noah was always trying to get her to do something. She's got a brilliant mind and she's a teacher. Um, but yeah, I think August 2020. I set up an LLC because it looked like it was doing something and yeah, and I was like okay, I'm just gonna.
Speaker 2:I mean, I made it into a box.
Speaker 3:I'm like that's way easier to ship.
Speaker 2:Yeah and so at that point it was like kind of like a preschool curriculum and so.
Speaker 2:I was doing it and I just I had like a random person reach out to me and say like hey, have you ever done any marketing with this or anything? And I'm like, no, I just like post about on Instagram. And she's like, well, let me, let me have a meeting with you. I had a call with her. She's like really helped us with like our branding and our business like plan, because at this point I was just like guessing, you know you were kind of just giving people what they want.
Speaker 4:I was like people like it yeah.
Speaker 2:And it was nice that it was like a subscription, because then the next month I'm like, okay, well, for this month, with last month, like I could just keep it going, and they helped us create a business plan. And then I kind of thought like I think it needs to be 20 activities, I think it needs to be simplified, because people are going back to school, people are going back to work. You don't need a full curriculum, and so we made it the box in 2021.
Speaker 3:And I feel like that's like my real start date, because that's kind of when we yeah, I mean they helped us legitimize the business and helped us kind of work out some kinks yeah the branding yeah, but it was like I was doing all this during bedtime and naps sure, sure
Speaker 2:so it was like and all the while you were then pregnant, yeah, and I was pregnant with my third at this time, so it was like I feel like I was never not doing something and that it was chaotic because I was like okay, but I also have a problem where I can't not do things.
Speaker 3:So, it's like pretty normal for me, but then I was like no, this is too much.
Speaker 2:Like I got to quit. I would always tell them like I'm quitting. I can't do this.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and I'm working my day job. I, yeah, and I'm working my day job. I'm like just hire someone else to help you out. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:Noah's like the best at being like OK, just just hire somebody, Because I'd help her too, but it was.
Speaker 3:it was different. I'd make sure the bills were paid. Our warehouse was taken care of and things that are different from what she was doing, like heading the whole business up.
Speaker 4:But yeah, how much money did you guys make in that first, just like delivering packets? Do you guys remember like what it was?
Speaker 2:I think like my total that summer I made like a thousand dollars and that was just like, and you were so crazy out of your mind. I was so pumped.
Speaker 1:That's 10% of my teacher salary, literally 10% of my teacher salary, exactly.
Speaker 2:The first year I was a teacher. I was an intern, so I had my own class and I made half salary of a teacher salary.
Speaker 3:And she intern. So I had my own class and I made half salary of a teacher salary and she was grinding. So what is that 18? It was $14,000 because at that point.
Speaker 2:$28,000 was a starting salary and I was in a class I was teaching at a title one school. I was the only like.
Speaker 3:I didn't really have any support, and it was like, yeah, I'm in the vice principal sitting there with half her salary no, never I was.
Speaker 2:Like this is great. $1,000, like yeah, in there with half her salary.
Speaker 1:No, never I was like this is great A thousand dollars Like I've made it.
Speaker 2:That's so funny, that's awesome.
Speaker 1:When you said you sold 15, like 10 of them at $15 and you're like this is incredible.
Speaker 2:No, literally.
Speaker 1:Like whoa.
Speaker 2:And it was because it was like I was going. We were like going around the kitchen island doing it together Like I was like, like, like.
Speaker 3:I was like like late nights with Noah.
Speaker 2:like here's the packets, and at that point I was like cutting out the little squares for every like it was like, yeah, she was grinding, but it was like tedious work.
Speaker 2:I remember I took one to an influencer that summer. Like I knew there was an influencer in our area. My boys like still bring this up to this day because I dropped it off. My son was like five. I made him run it up to her and then she came outside, which was like my worst nightmare. I like didn't want to see her in real life. So she came outside. I was like thank you, and I was like spread the word and so anytime our oldest son, owen.
Speaker 3:He's nine. He brought it up to me last week. He's like isn't that the place where mom said spread the word? And just started giggling?
Speaker 2:because I like got, I like drove when I was like that was the most embarrassing thing I've ever done, I called no, I'm, like I said, spread the word. Like what is wrong with me?
Speaker 3:hey, maybe she did, though I think.
Speaker 4:I think she did you gotta find her? You gotta find her again and say hey, do you? Remember that spread the word.
Speaker 1:It's like like uh yeah, we all have Michael Scott moments oh my gosh.
Speaker 4:I was like, okay, yeah, maybe I'm not cut out for this or that, that high school boy that's trying to talk to the girl and he says something stupid.
Speaker 2:Yeah, Dang it, Just relive it forever. I'm always like spread the word Okay so.
Speaker 1:But at the beginning, when you're a business owner, it's a little scary.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:And I always was like.
Speaker 1:Because you really don't know if people really want it.
Speaker 3:No, no, like, even if you have some validation, you're like I don't know. Well, it's the first time you were even putting yourself out there to have someone possibly share about the product before everyone else was coming to you to ask.
Speaker 2:Before it was like people wanted you know, and then it's like, okay, if I want this to be something, I have to. And it was so hard because it's like such a like, so personal to me, like I've created it. It's like, yeah, it was like putting a piece of me out there for people to criticize and that was like so scary to me yeah, yeah for sure.
Speaker 4:You know, one thing that you hear a lot of entrepreneurs talk about is there's kind of this like there's two different. There's two different ways that I hear entrepreneurs looking at starting their own thing. You have those people who are like, just go all in quit what you're doing and just go for it Right, and you'll grow so much faster. In your guys's case, you didn't really have to do that because Noah was working and had a good, stable job and he was paying the bills or whatever Right Did that was that? Did you think that that made it a lot easier for you to just be able to creatively figure out a way to build this and turn it into a business, versus what if he would have come to you and said I think you have something here we have. We just made $1,500 in a summer. Let's just like I've got six months worth of savings. Let's, let's go for it.
Speaker 4:You know, do you think that helped, or do you think it would have made it quicker if Noah would have left?
Speaker 2:I think it would have made it harder for me.
Speaker 3:If I would have quit, if you would have quit early.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, more pressure, yeah, I mean because I felt like for two years, even though I was like technically I wasn't making any money like I, I felt like there was no stakes in it, you know, because I'm like, OK, everything's paid for the month before, I have employees that I can pay, and so I'm not like stressed, like, oh, I got to make this work, yeah. But I was more in like this is fun, I love doing this, this is exciting and, as we like prove the concept, I feel like that's when I started to be like okay, maybe I could have Noah come work with me. But even that like for so long was like really, really scary for me to think of, because I didn't want. I didn't want the pressure, totally, totally and there wasn't you.
Speaker 3:You felt pressure, you put you're one that puts pressure on yourself because you want to make things exactly how you want them. But there wasn't pressure because I I was working, sure helping on the back end and it's like yeah, a lot of trial and error and it ended up working.
Speaker 2:I mean I was working all hours, but yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Well, I think it's important for people to know what their personality is, because some people work good. I think some people do their best work under pressure.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And other people don't. So it sounds like maybe you didn't like have this self-realization, but you kind of guided this journey based off of like hey, you're not going to work well if there's too much pressure, yeah, but by allowing it to grow naturally and also have, like, the safety of your job, it allowed you to thrive with the creative process and the brand building.
Speaker 2:Yeah, cause I think, noah, no one knew that about me.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I've known Kelsey since I was 13 years old, yeah, yeah. So I know Kelsey really well. She's the stressor. I'm the one that can kind of massage things through and help her understand like this isn't that big of a deal, totally Like we don't need this income, sure. So let's figure out how we're going to work this out, let's make it work and then if something comes of it, great. If not, we tried and it was fun, it's a fun journey?
Speaker 2:Yeah, because I mean there were a lot. There are a lot of times that I tell Noah, I'm quitting.
Speaker 3:Yeah, if I had to count on that, I mean I'd pray like 20, 30 plus times.
Speaker 2:One mean comment.
Speaker 4:I'm like Noah, after like the 10th time I would just laugh yeah, like literally to her, like yeah, it's funny but you were good at being like Kelsey yeah, it's not the end of the world, that someone got the incorrect thing in there or whatever it was right at the time earlier it was like something so small, but to her it's like it's funny how it's a huge deal it's funny how like those loud voices, even though there's only like one or two online in, especially in those early feel big yeah, early days, right where they like, tear down your baby, you know you only have a hundred customers right, and one of them's like you, dummy you're like what?
Speaker 3:yeah, we had to take the uh customer service email access away from kelsey pretty early that's pretty common.
Speaker 4:She would go through it.
Speaker 3:I mean, she wasn't even the one responsible for responding to him. We always had someone else doing that. But she would like sneak in there and be like reading I like would guess the password like am I okay?
Speaker 1:how dare they say this about it?
Speaker 2:yeah, no one's like what are you doing? I'm like nothing, I'm reading.
Speaker 1:She'll be telling me something that someone has said and I'm like just never go on the natural man of me of like trying to hurry and tell her why that doesn't matter yeah when really she just needs.
Speaker 3:I'm still working on on that after 12 years of marriage. Like she doesn't want the, she doesn't want to know how to fix it, she wants to just be heard for sure.
Speaker 4:I still work on that as far as the customer service stuff, yeah, like Mark said, don't go to reddit don't ever type your name why did I search my name on Reddit?
Speaker 2:What's wrong with me? There's nothing on there yet.
Speaker 4:Have you searched? Of course I've thought about searching me. There's got to be something.
Speaker 1:Yes, I recently searched a lot of people on there. Did you search me Because I didn't know about it.
Speaker 4:There's like a Utah influencer sub thread. They just let Reddits rip subreddit yeah and it was just specifically to Utah entrepreneurs.
Speaker 3:I don't know if it's influencers so entrepreneurs, influencers and I went through a whole list of people and I was did you write my name, our names?
Speaker 4:um no. I didn't yet. Maybe I'm gonna do that after this but then maybe I should have.
Speaker 1:But I searched a lot of people and my jaw was for sure oh yeah, I was.
Speaker 4:It's crazy people just get in the business of other people like it's no, like it is their business I was floored for two reasons.
Speaker 1:I like the information being spread about personal lives. It's like, yeah, pretty wild.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you're like, wow, that's crazy there's nothing off limits also that there's people that spend that much time no, that's crazy posting about that, and that's crazy yeah, well, I was like, and then you just kind of feel gross after and you're like, yeah, you're like why did I? When I'm like why don't? Why would I ever think that I would be on reddit like I'm?
Speaker 1:I need to get I was like embarrassed.
Speaker 2:I'm like okay, delete, delete one, one day.
Speaker 4:One day we're gonna start a good reddit a good reddit, you guys so no, what was, what was the speaking of this? Okay, so we established it was easier to build the business without the pressure I think for very much so, that'd be.
Speaker 4:I I've actually subscribed to that. Like there's I think there was this kind of like. I think a lot of people on social media are like, oh, just quit. And you know, like there's this big kind of idea around if you just quit and go all in, you're gonna win. And I think that was almost a narrative.
Speaker 4:And then now you've had people who are coming out and saying there's nothing that will kill your business more than pressure of money. Like there's nothing that makes, there's nothing that will make you make a more emotional decision than if you don't have, especially if a family. Right, when you have to, like, feed your kids, you're not gonna put the business first. You're going to say, okay, I gotta go get a job or I gotta do whatever. So I I like the subscribing to this. Hey, find a way to take money off as a pressure point in order for you to grow and scale your business. But what was the? What was the straw that broke the camel's back to have you say, because I know for a while we were like Dude, you should quit.
Speaker 4:Like you, guys are growing at unreal rates.
Speaker 1:Yeah, well, we kind of missed that part of the journey, right is you? You've experienced massive growth. Yeah right over two years. Mm-hmm, I mean 20x.
Speaker 4:Yeah, it's really well. I just looked at it what it was. It was like a thousand percent Growth yeah it's really crazy Well, I just looked at it what it was. It was like 1,000% growth. Oh wow, From when we started working with these guys 1,000?, 1,000%?
Speaker 1:Yeah, and you guys have our permission Listen, listen listen.
Speaker 4:I'm like, is that right? It was like 996% yeah.
Speaker 3:You guys have our permission to use this in a Bestie promo ad if you'd like to.
Speaker 1:Because to? Because you know it's been. It's been crazy. Yeah, you guys have crushed it, and but that also comes with more pressure, sometimes too right. So I was going to ask how did you handle the pressure of going from spending hundreds of dollars for ads to tens of thousands of dollars, to multiple tens of thousands of dollars? How did that feel for you and how did you manage that as a business owner?
Speaker 4:what about my question with?
Speaker 1:no, I had a question first I know, but your question comes after, because then it's the growth well, I'll go this one first, then you'll remind me of that one.
Speaker 3:For me, I'm like to a fault sometimes I'm very logically, I'm a logical thinker, which, um, I mean, for me it's just like a mathematical calculation right are we? Are we making more than we're spending? Right? And if it is, and if the numbers are working out, then I can confidently continue to put more and more on that and know that we're going to get out of it what we want. So I didn't see that as pressure. I think that earlier, when we were starting to spend on ads, it was like the first group we were working with I think they were a little more nervous to say like we can up it a little bit, but I think they were worried about what we would think. Sure, but.
Speaker 2:But I'm under the assumption like, if, if it's working, let's keep, let's keep yeah, because at that time we still like, even when we started with you guys, no, you still had your full-time job I feel, like we were still doing so well that it was like not scary to us like.
Speaker 1:It just felt like gravy on the top, not the main course, and like that.
Speaker 2:We didn't. We weren't like, I wasn't like pulling that much. You know, it was kind of like okay, let's just put it all back in. So you guys were telling us like okay, if you do more, you're gonna make more sales. We're like okay, let's do it. You know, like and like you said, like the pressure thing is so true, we didn't, I didn't feel any like Anxiety about that, because it had been proven that it worked.
Speaker 4:You know yeah.
Speaker 2:I think if we had seen like a drop or like had not done well, that would have caused more anxiety. But like the fact that we were building this without a any ads before you know like we were now it seems like little numbers. Like I did 171 boxes. I just should know. I'm like the post-it is on my wall from October 2022. I did 171 boxes and I thought like that's so crazy like in one month.
Speaker 1:It was one month and I was like that how many boxes did you do last month?
Speaker 2:we did 14,000, yeah. So it's like to me like every single little thing was like a huge win to me.
Speaker 3:So it's like when you're saying, okay, well, let's do a little more, more, get more, I'm like, okay, let's do it yeah, yeah, for sure, yeah I think early on the concept was proven and we talk about, like the feedback we get from customers, the negative ones, but like I think what drove kelsey um a lot was the positive feedback, the positive reinforcement of pictures that moms would send of their kids doing the box, and I think that drove her to continue to do it and realize, like that we actually have something here. So then putting more into ads and doing all that was all a no brainer.
Speaker 4:Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 1:What I love about your product, too, is I don't want to say it seems obvious or it seems like, oh yeah, that could be a product. But it's one of like. I love the types of products that just seem like overlooked for so long or just like for some reason. No one's like, did it.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Because it provides such a need for so many moms out there, right, I think there's a lot of moms, even moms who might even have educational backgrounds, like your wife. Right, they know they need to be doing certain things. They know they need to fill up the time. They don't want their kids on screens all the time, but the planning is such an effort.
Speaker 4:The time it takes to do all that stuff, Just the planning right Like the materials are one thing, but it's the planning.
Speaker 1:Sitting down trying to come up with a game plan for the month of like these types of activities, and then you've just provided this awesome product for these moms to just oh, it's already pre-made, it's already thought out, like you've done all the work, thinking about the educational experience and making it fun and useful, but it's something that you know you could theoretically go do yourself. Oh yeah. So I think a lot of people maybe they're like oh, that's not worth doing a business over.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:And we've seen people in the comments sometimes say well, why would I spend this when I can just go to Hobby Lobby and get this? I mean, they're not at a target market if they're trying to save 15 bucks to do it. Sure, we're offering a convenient item With your time, but you won't Correct and they have so much excess because they're not selling it in.
Speaker 2:Well, and I kind of feel like, especially like millennial moms we've seen, like we've been through like this huge like TikTok, instagram, instagram where they're just like serving us so much info and you're like watching a video, thinking, okay, I need to be doing that with my kids, how do I do that with my kids? But then it's like the five other steps you have to take to do those things with your kids is so hard and we also feel like so much mom guilt by not you know, and so one thing that I like, that I hear a lot from moms.
Speaker 2:Analysis, paralysis, yeah, it's like people say I don't feel guilty now because I feel like I did one. You know, as simple as it is. I did this little thing with them and it's like taking the mom guilt away because I'm getting this interaction and I think that's like my biggest thing about these boxes is moms and dads are getting like parent connection with their kids and they're getting to sit down and work with them one-on-one and like cause it's not like a box that you just pass them and they do. You know, it's a box that you sit and you do together and, whether it's five minutes or 15 minutes, it's like something that they're going to remember and something that's going to stick with them.
Speaker 4:Totally One. One question I had that you might've maybe just answered right there was was there something you did whether it was the product or how you marketed it or how you built it that surprisingly became a bigger impact on the business that you had no idea was going to be an impact on the business? Does that make sense? Yeah, I feel like I'm asking that kind of weird.
Speaker 3:I mean, I don't know what you would say, but I think listening to our customers. I mean, the concept of what Kelsey produced was I don't know if I'm saying this wrong but like preschool in a box initially, but then then you had moms reach out and say, okay, what do I do with my younger kid?
Speaker 3:So I don't know if that's where you're going with this but, like listening to our customers, and now our most popular product is something that came out out of listening to our customer Um yeah, cause we wouldn't have done the toddler box Right, had I not.
Speaker 2:And then that's our best seller now, totally.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's like double what we do for preschool yeah.
Speaker 4:Yeah, I just love what you had said about like the she also. You know, you said something about guilt like mom guilt, Like I don't know if you building the product, but all of a sudden it was like.
Speaker 2:that makes a ton of sense when you say that I'm like oh yeah, like their moms are constantly beating themselves up for not doing enough well, social media makes it worse because everyone feels like they're not doing enough yeah, and you watch like a 10, a 30 second clip of someone's like day in the life and you're like, oh my gosh, she did this with her kids, she fed them this, she did this, and you're just thinking her house looks this way.
Speaker 1:Fed them this, she did the and you're just thinking like yeah, like wow, she made granola from scratch. No, literally. And I'm like well, I can't even like get these kids to eat chicken nuggets Like.
Speaker 2:I don't know what I'm doing wrong, but even and then like as I built it kind of. This probably answers a little bit more too is like I realized as a teacher. One of the things that I knew was like, if I'm giving them attention, if I'm giving them positive reinforcement, they're going to behave better for me. So if I'm, if I have a good relationship with these kids, they're going to my classroom management is going to be better everything. And I see that so much in motherhood too. If, if I give my kids even 15 minutes of undivided attention, like you're hedging off tantrums for the rest of the day, you know and and so giving your kids like if they know every day I get to do an activity with my mom, that's 10 minutes you're getting like your kid's going to behave better just because they know they're getting that time with you.
Speaker 4:Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 2:And as a stay at home mom, you're with your kids all day long, so you feel like I'm getting this time with them. I'm doing this while they're playing right next to me, I'm trying to pick up while they're doing so. This is something that you're doing with them, for them and getting to like be in their world.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and for working moms. It gives them an opportunity to come home and do a quick activity with their kid having to think without having to like oh, I got a pre-plan and sure I don't have the time for you know, like you've been at work all, all day. That's hard being at work trying to jump back and forth. Like you said, it services these people, and dads too, I'm sure, get involved. Yeah, but the data says it's mostly dads.
Speaker 2:We love dads too.
Speaker 4:What I love about—this is something we've kind of been talking a little bit more about on the podcast. You know, I think maybe three or four years ago I was very, um, I was very bullish on the product was everything, uh, when it came to like a running a successful business, you know, um, but what I've come to realize and not that that's not true the product is everything to you know in a in a way, because if you don't have a good product it's not going to win for you. But then the more I've studied other businesses, the more I've realized that it's so much more. The most important thing is the audience that you're serving. It's not necessarily the product. Yes, the product is, is a sub category to making that work. But, like I, I was looking at, uh, have you heard of?
Speaker 1:can I push back on you? A little bit just to clarify what you're saying yes, please, is I think what you're saying in my like how I'm understanding it is.
Speaker 4:The product doesn't have to be this brand new, sparkly idea that no one's ever thought of exactly this, this super innovative, challenging, you know, like, like tesla, for example, that did something so different and new. Right, it doesn't have to be that way, but I think a lot of us think about that, right, but the, the brand that comes to my mind is the uh, what's the dad cap company. Why?
Speaker 3:can't I dad gang? I see those everywhere.
Speaker 4:We're wearing three different hats.
Speaker 3:And we're not wearing a gang.
Speaker 4:But these guys have sold millions and millions of dollars worth of hats because they are servicing a very, very particular audience, which is new dads.
Speaker 1:And then southern string hat Very similar, very similar.
Speaker 4:Like the working man.
Speaker 1:The working man hat like this southern dude demographic? Yeah, it's, it's like led by uh, what's his name?
Speaker 4:richie I don't know what his last name is, but it's richie. Yeah, richie 250, I think okay, yeah, he's like an excavator, yeah he just is a guy that like represents nine to fivers. You know nice and like. Hardhat guys yeah, the beauty and like Blue collar. Nine to five work.
Speaker 1:And trade.
Speaker 4:Yeah, yeah, they're crushing it, you know, and you guys Did the same thing. It's like Moms there's all these things Like I love. We love the mom audience because there's like moms Are the most grindy people in the Entire world right, they're the people who Get like, who do all the work. And Because moms are the most grindy people in the entire world right, they're the people who do all the work and get none of the credit and they live with that, and so we like such an awesome demographic when you can serve them.
Speaker 1:So I think that's super cool, because if you can nail a product that actually serves a mom, you can really grow fast. Yeah, now there's a TAM equation here too right. Like there's a total addressable market and obtainable market. But, like you said, I I love that you noticed that it was servicing moms in a way that got rid of their mom guilt in the day.
Speaker 4:Yeah, I haven't even thought of it. That's really yeah that's really fascinating.
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Speaker 2:I have moms that will like message me. I've had quite a few that are postpartum and they say like I'm so grateful for this because I feel so guilty with, again, the mom guilt, but I feel guilty with my older one. You know, when you have your second baby and you're like this older one, their whole world was me.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and now I have this baby and so it's so nice, like I use this in my house. Like when I had my first daughter, goldie she was a newborn my older one, harvey I would put Goldie down for a nap and I would do an activity with Harvey, yeah, and he would just say every day, when's our activity? When's our activity? And it's like it was so, so simple but like it just made again. It made me feel like a better mom because I felt like I'm doing something that I know is educational, that I know is hands-on. Um, a lot of people are like just play with your kids that's like a common comment that I get on facebook. Like you just need to play with your kids, you don't need to do stuff with them, and like that's true, playing with your kids is important. But I'm also like a mom that has to have some structure like.
Speaker 2:I don't know if you realize I'm a little type a like I. I have to have some sort of structure and I and I also want to help my kids grow. I want to get them educational things. So, yeah, I let them free play. Yeah, we do blocks, but like sometimes I'm tapped out on a block tower you know like in the nicest way, like I want to do letters.
Speaker 3:I want to.
Speaker 2:I want to let, so it. It kind of gave me a way to do something fun in the as a mom that I enjoy too.
Speaker 1:And checks those boxes off.
Speaker 4:Yeah, yeah for sure. And if you can, like it is as a parent I mean, I've got three kids Like there's no better victory in life than when your kid chooses not to be on a screen and chooses to either be outside or be doing. Like you know what I mean Like there's just no better victory, like once we see our kids like walk outside. I'm like we did it, and we're not screen people, so our kids like walk outside.
Speaker 4:I'm like we did it outside and we're not screen people, so like we're not just like freely letting you know like we're pretty strict about it, but they always want it.
Speaker 1:You know of course.
Speaker 4:So yeah, who doesn't? I mean everyone does big time parenting when kids are not on screens. So, um, okay. So back to my question. Noah, what was the straw that breaks the camel's back? To have you say, let's, let's cause, cause I remember you were like I got like two more years of this dude.
Speaker 2:Yeah, he kept telling me yeah.
Speaker 3:I don't, I don't know if it was. I mean we were doing well, you guys helped us really sell our product in a way that made me more confident. I mean, at at some point it just becomes a numbers game of I'm not a very risky guy, especially when you mentioned earlier like you got kids to take care of mortgage pay right um so it just became a numbers game of like.
Speaker 3:okay, I've heard a lot of people say, like, once you, once you're doing like 75 percent of what you're bringing in on your day job, that's a great time to quit. But it's everyone's a little bit different, right? Sure, I'm not a very risky guy, so it was definitely more than that, yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I would say you'd need to be doing 150% yeah that's kind of at least where I was. You gotta be 50% more than what you're doing at your day job yeah. Because you know there is volatility.
Speaker 3:So it was really just that and just seeing how well we were doing over a month, over a month, over a course of a year yeah, and then that continued growth. So it was really that. I loved my job as a sales manager in health care yeah, worked in home health and hospice, loved my team, and a lot of that, too, was I'm a pretty loyal person. Yeah, didn't love the idea of leaving my team when we're doing some cool things, but at the same time, I loved coming home and working with kelsey too so for sure um, and I knew how big of a deal it was for her to for me to eventually quit, yeah.
Speaker 3:So I don't know if you know the story of how? Yeah, you guys know, this, but um, like I, I kept kicking the can down the road telling her well like maybe, yeah. So last like October, I told her yeah, I'm thinking maybe next summer yeah. I'll quit and that kind of and I was like like it's too big now.
Speaker 3:I cannot do this alone, so and I actually knew that I was going to quit pretty soon. Yeah, but, like I said, I've known Kelsey since I was 13. I've I've learned to tease her pretty good, but she didn't know I was teasing her in this case and I was just like pissing her off.
Speaker 2:I'm actually shocked that you stayed with your secret, because I was pretty mean, oh yeah.
Speaker 3:I was taking it on the chin. She's like what are you doing? Like.
Speaker 2:I don.
Speaker 3:If you said these words, but like you, just gotta man up and do it. Actually, that probably was a quote, yeah so, and I was just taking it on the chin like I'm like I'm playing the long game, just taking some emotional surprise.
Speaker 1:I've never been able to really surprise her.
Speaker 2:So no one has never surprised me this good yeah.
Speaker 3:So I don't know if I'll ever be able to top it. But I mean, to the outside world maybe this isn't that crazy, but to me and us this was like a big surprise. So anyways, I kept kind of playing that game with her like, well, this is going on at work, they're doing this now we're opening up this branch, and so, anyways, I would tell her that a lot. And then I told my boss in november that I would like december would be my last month. I was giving him my uh, six weeks notice or whatever. Anyways, I handled that and I didn't tell Kelsey until I wrapped a gift for her and opened it up. He opened it up on Christmas and I think she thought that I was going to, it was me quitting in the future and I already worked my last day.
Speaker 2:So I opened it and it said I quit. It was like business card with Noah's name on it for learning with Kelsey and it said I quit, quit. It was like business card with Noah's name on it for learning with Kelsey and it said I quit. And I was like okay.
Speaker 1:I was like so when I thought he was like saying he was gonna quit and then he's like, no, I already quit, I'm done and I was like what?
Speaker 2:it was the best surprise ever, because I I feel like that was the point where I was like at a level 1000, like I was. There were so many things happening, there's so many things with the business that I when you go from 100 boxes to 14,000 your November was the best month ever it was a crazy time to tell her I'm not quitting yet.
Speaker 2:I just had Archie right or no it was before I had Archie or it was after. No, it was the year after I had Archie, so Archie was one, but still, you just barely quit, I quit. We knew like two weeks before you did.
Speaker 1:I told them, but still, yeah, it was just barely, you, just barely quit. Yeah, it was. Yeah, I mean I quit. We knew, we knew like two weeks before you.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I told them that's true.
Speaker 4:Yeah, we were like so sick.
Speaker 2:My wife knew she was like Only goals to get.
Speaker 4:Yeah, we said the same thing. When we came up with you were like our goals to get this guy to quit.
Speaker 2:I think Alex MacArthur didn't he's the same thing. But even when I was like saying that I think Alex MacArthur didn't he say the same thing, but even when I was like saying that, I think it felt like so far in the distance, like I it even still feels crazy that I've like made a business out of these boxes.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I mean it. It's absurd to think about I'm. I mean every time Kelsey was pregnant, bringing it back to motherhood. That nine months for me always flew by. I know for moms that takes forever, but like.
Speaker 3:I'm just like in a mode where it's like head down, go to work and then all of a sudden the baby's here and then for this, for this business, it's been like the same thing. We sold 171 boxes in one month. Now we do what we did last month and I it's, it's just crazy. So, um, for me, for her always asking me to quit, I was just like, okay, one, one of these days, I will one of these days, yeah, and then when?
Speaker 2:I finally did it.
Speaker 3:It it was great yeah yeah are you, you all right with me? Still not having.
Speaker 2:I love it what, what's the?
Speaker 4:what's the thing? You guys, what's the the funnest thing about working together and what's the thing that's the hardest thing about working together?
Speaker 2:but do you want to do which one?
Speaker 3:I mean, the funnest thing is just, I don't know, we've had to adjust to me specifically. Like working from home is hard, like when the kids are in school it's a lot easier, but like when we're up here for the summer it's harder because, like the kids are just always around, I could always be doing something with them. Maybe that's dad guilt, maybe it is. We call that dad tax. Dad tax yeah, that's good. I'd use that one for food typically. Yeah, my dad tax, but just blocking my time making sure I'm as organized as I was in my day job.
Speaker 2:That's the hardest part. You're saying that's the hardest part, yeah.
Speaker 3:Funnest part is just being around my family all day, yeah we just get to hang out all day.
Speaker 2:It's so fun. Yeah, noah and I are like I mean, we've known each other since we're 14, but like we just like to hang out together. So it's like it's nice that we just get to hang out all day. I feel like the hardest part for me is like when I have to explain things to Noah, like because he knows the business from like the outside. But there's so many things that I've done on the inside that when I get caught. I'm like okay, so you think I did that wrong.
Speaker 4:You know I'm like he's just simply asking like why do you do that?
Speaker 2:I'm like okay, so you hate it?
Speaker 3:like let me yeah, and the first, like I mean january, when I came on full time, it was a lot of like me going down the warehouse just kind of auditing, observing the process to see okay not like to say, to say hey, this process sucks. Yeah, just kind of on the back end, but like I was going on there to one learn it, to see if there's anything that I could see from an outsider's perspective, because that's what I was really to see. If we could tweak anything, there wasn't much to tweak.
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 3:We tweaked some things, but like when I would bring that stuff to Kelsey. This is her baby, right? Yeah? You call the baby ugly, so it's like I can understand why she'd think like well, why are you questioning this, like we've been doing this for?
Speaker 1:three plus years. Why'd you choose that shirt for your baby today? Yeah, I know, I'm like okay.
Speaker 4:You know that happens all the time, like in the corporate world. You know when you hire somebody on there and everyone takes it very defensive. Oh, it's so hard, but it's not that at all. The person's just like, hey, I don't know.
Speaker 2:He literally doesn't know. I'm trying to learn here.
Speaker 4:Why do you ship this way and I'm asking out of pure curiosity, not out of this is stupid. Why aren't you doing it this?
Speaker 3:way. I didn't know. I mean, I knew enough to get by, but like the specifics on certain processes that we had going was like I need to understand this better.
Speaker 2:We have like we have two, two girls at work where we work really closely with it. One is a director of operations for us and one runs our warehouse and they're really good about like explaining it to Noah, talking Noah through and like also done on a meeting afterwards. I'm like sorry, I was so mean to Noah, I'm sorry.
Speaker 3:Yeah, those two are really nice and they're like no, you're doing great, you guys are doing great.
Speaker 2:Like sorry, it's just like. Why is he asking that? Like I think he just wants to know.
Speaker 1:Yeah, well, I think having an outside perspective is pretty invaluable, honestly. Oh for sure. You know, like with the rise of like therapists for personal lives, I'm surprised that so many people in the business world like think consultants like can't provide value.
Speaker 4:Yeah, because, because consultants are essentially the they're the therapist for your company. Yeah, yeah, we're not going to come fix your whole company.
Speaker 1:but it's so nice to have somebody come in from an outside view and say, oh yeah, like, why are you doing it that way? It's like I don't know.
Speaker 4:That's just how we did it. That, and that's just how we did it.
Speaker 2:That's how we started doing it and kept doing it.
Speaker 1:It made sense at the time Like is it wrong yeah?
Speaker 2:Well, and I think like one thing that's helped us meet specifically be successful with this, is that I didn't ever think of myself as like an entrepreneur. I didn't think I knew business. Like I still don't think I am in no business. It's hard for me to say I'm like always anyone tell me what to do you know like.
Speaker 2:I'm not afraid to ask someone to look it up to get. I feel like everyone knows more than me with this, so I think that really helped us in a way. Like I'm like okay, I want boxes. How do I do that? Well, I'm gonna ask people that have done boxes. They told me, and so I never felt like I was all knowing you know where. Sometimes I feel like if you go into it planning a business, you you feel like I know what to do, I should know what to do. I kind of just always assumed I was like dumb, like I'm learning with Kelsey this whole time, like I'm just trying to figure it out, you know yeah.
Speaker 1:I think the number one attribute of a entrepreneur is curiosity.
Speaker 2:Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 1:Right, because you don't have any preconceived ideas of what's supposed to work Like you kind of? Have, like you know, vague understandings, but you're just curious like, oh, I want to know how do you do this, like, how do you make it work? How does this happen? Yeah, rather than thinking you know it all.
Speaker 3:Yeah and maintaining that curiosity maintaining that curiosity once you get to a point where you feel like you're successful.
Speaker 4:That doesn't mean that your process is perfect you nailed on head one of the biggest killers of the most successful entrepreneur. Like entrepreneurs the people who are like the darlings that we talk about them, the utah darlings, the ones that were skyrocketing the same way you guys are skyrocketing the people all of a sudden start to feel like they know exactly what they're doing, and so they stop being curious and they start just doing the same things over and over again, and then all of a sudden you start seeing those businesses go, I mean dozens.
Speaker 4:We can, we could name. We won't name them, but we could name them internally.
Speaker 1:Well, they start following the playbooks of like a Nike.
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Apple and it's like you're not there yet.
Speaker 4:Yeah, it's like you don't have a technological advantage.
Speaker 1:You don't have to get that business oriented Like you don't have to be so rigid about it, like you're not a fortune 500.
Speaker 4:Yeah, well, the other thing that starts to happen, too is is, as you get bigger, you're going to start to have people who are going to start to copy you and do exactly what you're doing. You've probably already seen it.
Speaker 1:You get all scared.
Speaker 4:And then what happens is you guys stop playing the curiosity playbook and they start to be more curious than you and they start to overtake you. It will happen if you don't. And that's one of the things that we've loved about working with you guys. You said it right Like you guys always seem to be hiring somebody to come in and just look at things you know like and I love that about you guys you guys understand what you're good at and what you what you maybe not that you're bad at it, but it's not just your strongest attribute and so you're like hey, let's bring somebody in, and sure it might cost us more money than I want to spend, but if they could answer one question for us, it's worth it, you know. So I've loved that. We've loved that about you guys. We've said that all the time. Like these guys just, they just get it Right. They get what they're good at and they understand what they're not.
Speaker 1:I think a lot of that's because of what you just said. Like you don't consider yourself an entrepreneur, so you don't have this identity wrapped up in like what you're supposed to know yeah, I just feel like I still feel like I have no idea about business.
Speaker 2:You know, like I'm like I and I think Noah that's like to his credit he's the one that like told me just hire someone for that, just hire someone for that, just, and so that I think that is why we were able to get where we were, because he's like well, if you don't want to do it or you don't know how to do it, let's hire somebody.
Speaker 4:Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 2:That's how we found you guys.
Speaker 1:Easy peasy, let's hire people.
Speaker 4:Yeah, you got to hire the right people. Oh, for sure, so you guys have been working with each other.
Speaker 3:Obviously, you've been working with each other for a while, but full-time for the last six, seven months. Best advice you have for people who are running businesses together couples I love that we've started to plan our weeks, like when you're running a business as a couple and you have kids especially. Like you could go through a week and feel like you got nothing done if you don't plan properly and you have the guilt of the business owner.
Speaker 3:Like I needed to get those eight things done and I did one thing yeah so just planning and prepping weeks ahead of time and just kind of knowing each other's schedules, giving the other person enough time to kind of get stuff done and that's the thing I love about is right, I can. I can take the kids for three hours, let Kelsey knock out some stuff, and then she can do that. Vice versa, yeah, um, what other advice would you give?
Speaker 2:Yeah, what do you got?
Speaker 3:I think that's been big for us right the planning of our weeks.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think also like staying in your lane of what you're good at totally is really helpful. Like sometimes Noah and I will talk about something and I'm like I know I don't, I can't know about that. Like that's too, that's going to send me into stress mode, like you just have to handle that. So like no one knows the things that are just no one's going to handle it.
Speaker 2:And then he'll handle it with the team, which has been so nice because I felt like before my hand was in every single thing, and then that's where I felt like so burnt out or so like I couldn't create anything new, because I was like worrying about our paint staining something, or like you know, like something small but like things like that.
Speaker 2:So if I know now I know I have someone that I trust 100% taking care of that that's been like life changing for me. So I think, knowing what you're going to be in charge of, knowing what Noah's going to be in charge of there's obviously so many things that we talk about together Like we're constantly talking about our business but it's nice to have certain things that we don't have to cross paths on.
Speaker 3:Yeah, super cool and just taking time for like we'll go out every weekend. Good, A lot of times we're talking about the business, but it's like we don't make it too serious, Right.
Speaker 4:Sure, yeah, yeah, I would think that that's hard. You know, my wife and I don't work together the way Mark and I work together, but like she's the silent partner and even us now, like I'm like I don't need to be talking about what I'm doing, yeah all the time, you know, and so we've kind of started to set boundaries, even though she's not a part of the day-to-day business. So I think, even with spouses that are supporting you maybe not in a full-time role I think that's really good advice as well. Um.
Speaker 1:I have a question for you, kelsey, before we wrap it up. As an educator, I think you you were you touched on this earlier right About the importance of play and structure. I think a lot of people do their best work when they're playing, which is curiosity, right, playing is just curiosity and action. So how do you maintain a playful mindset when you're working on your business?
Speaker 2:I feel like for me the best thing has been that I have kids that are these ages, you know.
Speaker 2:So I'm constantly like doing different things with them, playing with them and then in like the actual business.
Speaker 2:Being able to separate myself, like having Noah come on, I think has been the best thing for that mindset, because I got to a point where I was like not ever able to be curious or not ever able to really be creative because I was so busy doing all these things that had to be done. So letting that go and having time where I can just like sit and think about the things that I like to do, get do things that are creative for me, like for me, I love creating, like the activities, I love coming up with the activities. So I kind of was doing the same ones every single month the last year, like month after month. I like September last year was the same as September this year. But now that I've had time to like really think about, I'm like, okay, I actually don, I actually don't like that activity as much, I like this better. And so giving myself time to just sit down and think by myself and do those things is, I think, what helped me be creative and playful.
Speaker 1:Awesome. I think moms would really appreciate knowing that too. Yeah, but you still think actively about these things every day.
Speaker 2:Oh, yeah, yeah. And then sometimes, like I'll pull out an activity to do with my kids and I'm like, ugh, this is not a good one, you know, yeah, yeah, like it was not as fun as I thought it was going to be, or like it was way messier than I thought, and so doing these activities with my kids has been so helpful. And I taught preschool this year. Right, I like added. And I taught preschool this year. I like added just a little preschool class for my.
Speaker 3:She takes on way too much.
Speaker 2:I think I mentioned that to you guys a hundred times but she taught a preschool class and she's already planning to teach our youngest, archie in two years, yeah, but I taught all the other kids. So I have to. I know yeah.
Speaker 3:You feel left out? Yeah.
Speaker 4:You can't leave him out.
Speaker 2:You feel left out. So I taught a three-year-old preschool class this year with like eight of my friends, little girls, and we had one little boy. But it was so fun because I got to like get down and be the teacher again and do these activities and like Play with them and come up with new ideas, and I think that was really really good for me, that's super, super cool.
Speaker 4:Well, my daughter's Six and she loves her box like so happy.
Speaker 2:She loves it, cuz she gets like.
Speaker 4:It's a package for her Like the kids.
Speaker 2:No, her box. She's so happy, she loves it because it's a package for her. Yeah, kids, kids don't get mail. Yeah, it is hers. To get a box with your name on it is exciting. Yeah, so when it comes.
Speaker 4:I'm like you know, in my office I have like a bay window that I so like. When a package gets dropped off, I see it so I can like see what it is, and I'm like Roma, there's somebody at the door for you and she's like what you know, so she loves it and she'll do it with like her friends. She's to the point now where, like my wife, will do it with her sometimes, but she'll just do it all by herself.
Speaker 4:Yeah, my wife will have to kind of sometimes spell some things out for her, you know, but for the most part she does all of that herself with her friends.
Speaker 3:She does make our craft room an absolute mess that's one where you're a little older.
Speaker 2:You can get after that well and like that kind of reminded me when you're saying, like what's something that you didn't realize is going to be a big deal, are boxes like our printed boxes. When I did that in the beginning it was just like, oh, because it's cute yeah but now it is like such a huge deal to people if they don't get a sprinkle box, they're so sad. And now, yeah, when you're saying this like, I realize why it's so important.
Speaker 4:It's the kids, it's not the parent.
Speaker 2:Because they're getting to see a box. That's fun. They know what the box is, yeah.
Speaker 4:Yeah. Yeah, there would be a cool thing for you guys. I know it adds an extra step, but if you wrote the kid's name on it or something like that, that could be kind of fun.
Speaker 3:We had an issue two months ago.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Our sprinkled branded boxes didn't come in in time, so we had to ship what like 2,000 or 1,500 that were like just white, non-branded 5,000 was it five?
Speaker 3:yeah, okay, um, unfortunately but like people, when we've had to do that a long time ago, they were not happy. Like they would complain like why didn't I get this like branded box? But this time we kind of turned it into a win and created a contest of like if we put markers in the box too and they would design their learning with kelsey box. And we picked like three winners for a three-month subscription oh, that's incredible.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so, and that was actually like our team members, again, like building a team is so important like I was sitting outside dance class with my sister stressing about it, of course my sister and, uh, the director of operations.
Speaker 2:We're sitting outside our girls with my sister Stressing about it. Of course, my sister and the director of operations were sitting outside with girls and dancing. I'm like, what are we going to do? People are going to be so mad. And she's like, well, what if we just have markers and let them decorate their box? And my sister's like, yeah, she runs our social media. And she's like, well, what if it was a contest? And like you picked the best winner. They got a three-month subscription. I was like genius, so we put a little note in there, we put the markers and then we got like the cutest submissions of kids, like decorating their box.
Speaker 2:We got one where she said like this might not look like the coolest box, but it's really special to us because it's the first time she wrote h, which is the first letter of her name, yeah, on the box. So it's like so simple, but it was.
Speaker 4:It was so cool and that's something you should probably do more often, that's I know it's like well, I was, have you thought about maybe like doing a limited edition box design for the winner? That would be cute, that would be awesome like with their design on the box.
Speaker 2:Yes, like that would be sweet, maybe 500 boxes, some of those shirts, maybe for the yeah, the parents yeah, be kind of cool, that would be sweet.
Speaker 3:That's a great idea yeah, I love that, so we turned a loss into a a win. Yeah, that's a big time lemonade moment, yeah we didn't know that one. Yeah, great team with great ideas behind us.
Speaker 4:Yeah, well, guys, this has been awesome. Thank you so much. Where can people find Learning With Kelsey?
Speaker 2:You can find us on Instagram or TikTok at Learning With Kelsey and then LearningWithKelseycom Awesome.
Speaker 3:Lovely Thanks guys.
Speaker 4:Well, awesome, lovely, thanks guys. Well, thank you, noah. Thank you, kelsey, this has been great. All right, guys. Well, thank you everybody for listening. Go check out learningwithkelseycom and we'll see you guys 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.