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HIGHEST commission ambassador program Volair Pickleball | Pickleball gear | Building Pickleball
203 Plays2 years ago
I interview Ryan Cohen, co-founder of Volair Pickleball, pickleball gear brand co-founded with pro Julian Arnold. Having known Julian since high school and always finding himself generating ideas and pursuing them, it was a no-brainer that he'd eventually start a business in the pickleball space, especially after falling in love with it in 2020. He talks about how his business acumen is translating to finding opportunities in pickleball, resulting in improved management and treatment of players and developing the highest commission ambassador program.
VOLAIR DISCOUNT: Get a 10% discount by using code: LIM20
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0:00 Intro with Ryan Cohen
00:27 Background
10:54 Family business
17:31 Transition to entrepreneurship
22:32 Ideas that failed
28:40 Choosing ideas
31:36 Andiamo push button
34:05 Prioritizing focus
39:14 Julian Arnold signature paddle
42:00 What is missing
48:00 Doing things differently
55:00 Volair ambassador program
01:01:00 Last words
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Volair is on a mission to create the best pickleball gear on the market. We’re dedicated to providing you industry-leading technology and premium quality in all our products.
We don’t settle for good enough. We're raising the bar because your equipment should support you in taking your game to the next level.
We’re built for the bold. Stand out, be different, be loud, be the wild card. Let your game do the talking, and let Volair put a (!) at the end of it. Andiamo!
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Transcript
Introduction to Ryan Cohen and Olair Pickleball
00:00:01
Speaker
Hey, what's going on, everyone? Thanks for joining us. You're listening to Building Pickleball, where I interview pickleball company and brand founders to uncover their story as a founder, their idea, setbacks, failures, and their contribution to the fastest growing sport, pickleball. Our guest today is Ryan Cohen, co-founder of Olair Pickleball. Thanks for joining us, Ryan.
Ryan's Journey into Pickleball
00:00:24
Speaker
Can you go ahead and tell us a little bit about yourself?
00:00:27
Speaker
Yeah, thank you so much for having me. So it's pretty cool because everyone that plays pickleball, the connections you get to make through playing the sport. I've met so many new friends and people to collaborate with and actually met you, Brian, playing pickleball even before Belair was even thought of, which is pretty cool. So just a little background.
00:00:54
Speaker
I've known Julian Arnold since I was like 11 years old. We both grew up in San Luis Obispo, California. He was a superstar tennis player since the day I met him. And that was his main sport. I love to play basketball and football, but we both would play basketball together a lot. So that's how we bonded. And so it just became really good friends. And after high school,
00:01:21
Speaker
He went off to UCLA to play tennis and I went into my family business, which was restaurants. And so I thought that was going to be my career path. I was just working at a family restaurant for a while and I got to a point where I had a side business that was
00:01:42
Speaker
doing pretty well. So I went on to pursue buying and selling tickets for concerts and live music festivals and sporting events as a full-time job. I'd been doing it as a side hustle since I was 13. So when I was, I think about 19, I was already doing that full-time and I kind of told my dad, hey, I got one more year.
00:02:04
Speaker
And then I'm out of the restaurant business, which I thought I was going to do restaurants my whole life growing up. That was my dream. So fast forward a little bit later.
00:02:19
Speaker
I've been doing the ticket business for a while. I have a few other businesses also, but then when Corona happened, I went from playing basketball like four, five days a week at the gym, and then they closed all the gyms because of Corona and I live in Austin, Texas.
From Restaurants to Events: Ryan's Career Transition
00:02:39
Speaker
I actually had a buddy that had grown up with Julian and myself that also lives in Austin. His name is Zach. And he kept asking me, hey, you want to come play pickleball? You want to come play pickleball? And I was like, I don't know if I know what that sport is. And I was kind of hesitant at first. But then he was like, hey, I'm at Bold and Acres right across the street from where you live. Let's go play some pickleball. And I was like, man, I need to go get some exercise. So I went over there.
00:03:05
Speaker
had so much fun. Like, obviously, I didn't even learn all the rules in my first time playing. But I just felt that it was just such a fun activity. I didn't really have a racquet sports background. But I, you know, when I play basketball or football, like I'm a hustler, I'm a grinder. So I was able to have a good time like playing pickleball and
00:03:25
Speaker
and feeling that I was truly competing. And from there, I kind of got hooked. And I had a lot of free time during Corona because again, my main business is tickets for live entertainment. And they pretty much put a halt on that whole industry.
00:03:47
Speaker
Um, so I went from, you know, working full time to just having a lot of free time. And so I was playing pickleball, you know, two, three, four hours a day in the morning so that I could be tired and not feel like I was like, you know, being unproductive. I, you know, at least felt like I got a really good workout. And, you know, as I'm getting addicted to pickleball, I was doing this with my girlfriend at the same, you know, we're, we're getting addicted at the same time.
00:04:15
Speaker
I would call Julian who was still living in San Luis Obispo and he was doing tennis lessons because he had made a name for himself locally as a really good tennis player.
00:04:27
Speaker
He was doing tennis lessons and I'd reach out to him like, hey, you got to play pickleball. Like I'm telling you, you can be, I think you can be really good. And he kind of just had like what I would consider the typical tennis player attitude of like, no, like that sports easy. Like, you know, tennis is, tennis is where it's at. Like that, like that sports, you know, it's just not as competitive. It's not hard.
00:04:49
Speaker
And so I kept just calling him and just bothering him and being like, hey man, you got to check out Pickleball. And one time or before this, I looked online because I was just like, I want to go.
00:05:05
Speaker
on a vacation, but I also want to learn how to play pickleball and get better. And at the time I had a couple lessons locally here in Austin. Riley Newman had actually came through and I got a lesson from him. And so I was starting to actually learn strategy and learn the game, but I still did not know a
The Pickleball Passion: Mexico Camp and Julian's Pro Journey
00:05:24
Speaker
lot of the game. I was still fairly new to it.
00:05:27
Speaker
My girlfriend and I went to one of the Ben Johns pickleball getaway camps and it was in Mexico. And so we went out there for five, six days and got to see what the top level pros were playing at. And even though when they were playing, everyone was ooh and an ahh, but I knew I was like, they're playing like 60%. I understand how they're not gonna go out there and go play 100% unless they really need to bring it.
00:05:55
Speaker
So yeah, I learned how to actually play pickleball at that camp. And while I was there, you know, I got to know a lot of the top pros of the time. Michelle, Rob, Colin, Ben. Those were the main pros that were teaching and the average age of the camp was probably like
00:06:18
Speaker
60, 70, and right now I'm 32. So I think I was 29 at the time or 30 and.
00:06:26
Speaker
So we got to hang out with a lot of the pros like, you know, when we were like off, you know, not during the camp, like throughout the rest of the week in Mexico, just because we're a little closer in age. So that's normally well. And so that was a cool experience, you know, something usually where in other sports, at least from my experience, you don't get to mingle with the top, the best of the best and, you know, have those experiences, you know, because usually they're just like, you know, have thousands of fans just
00:06:54
Speaker
you know, try and get a glimpse or a second with them. And, you know, that wasn't the situation. And, you know, pickleball is still fairly new. Like now, there's a lot more celebrities that are interested. But before, and still now, like pickleball, you can still reach out to your favorite player and you might get a response, which is really cool. So while I was there, you know, at the end of the camp, I told Ben Johns, I was like, hey, my buddy is really good. He was a really good tennis player growing up.
00:07:22
Speaker
And I'm going to try to get him into pickleball and have him compete as a top pro. And I said to him, I said, the day that Julian beats you, just remember, it's your fault. You got me hooked on pickleball. You got me wanting to continue to play and just have pickleball as part of my life. So fast forward a little later. I think it was Thanksgiving. I was back in San Luis.
00:07:52
Speaker
And I think Julian had maybe played a couple times by then. And he had some clients that he taught tennis to that had said to him, hey, you know, you should look into pickleball. You should teach pickleball.
Founding Olair Pickleball and Entrepreneurial Insights
00:08:05
Speaker
And at the same time, I was calling Julian like, hey, you got to play pickleball. So during Thanksgiving.
00:08:10
Speaker
I was like, hey, come play. I know it may not be fun, but just do it for me. I want to have this experience. It was my girlfriend, my dad, Julian, and myself. My dad had just done an extremely hard hike where we're just like, man, okay, I guess we're going to go play pickleball. My dad couldn't bend his knees. It was his first time ever playing. He was just not having fun because he
00:08:37
Speaker
He likes to compete and he was just like, man, I can't even hit the ball. I'm like, yeah, you got to bend your knees. So it was Julian and my dad versus my girlfriend and myself. And we won the first game and I told, we had a good time, but Julian reached out to me later and said, hey, that was a lot of fun. Not that it was competitive or serious, but he's just like, that was just fun. We're out there laughing, having a good time.
00:09:00
Speaker
And so then I'm still just keeping in contact with Julian. And I don't know, maybe another month and a half goes by. And he's like, hey, I'm hooked. I've been playing multiple times a week. I'm having so much fun. And he's like, I'm good. I think I'm getting pretty good at this. And I was like, I believe you.
00:09:19
Speaker
And so he's like, I'm signing up for a tournament. And, you know, Julian, he's a competitor. He signed up at the pro level. He had never competed at pickleball. He'd only been playing for a couple months. And the level that he was competing against, you know,
00:09:36
Speaker
Um, you know, no, no pros, um, you know, some five O's, some 4.5. So, you know, that was the competition that he was, um, you know, practicing against. So he didn't really know how he stacked up. Um, he entered a tournament. Um, I forgot who he lost to, but he lost, he lost, I think he got like through the qualifier, but then, um, you know, he, he lost to like a pretty good pro. Um, and you know, we had a couple of conversations and.
00:10:06
Speaker
I was like, Hey, like, do you want to try to do this? Like, is this something that like you want to pursue? And like, you know, do we think we can do this? And, you know, we were both excited. We're both like, yeah, we think we can do this. Um, and so to just the, my biggest fear was that we were going to pursue this. And, you know, if for any reason, one of us felt like we had let the other, you know, the other person down that like, that would like hurt our friendship.
00:10:33
Speaker
It tells a really big fear of both of ours. So, um, what we, uh, you know, I reached out, um, to, to Ben and I was like, Hey, like I got my buddy, he's, he's like starting to play pro or wants to play pro. And do you have any like pro trainers that, you know, I could have him sent to and just like, kind of check them out and see how good he is. Yeah. Um,
00:10:57
Speaker
I kind of wanted to rewind this was interesting. I mean, it's definitely fascinating that this happened to all like within a two year span. Um, but kind of, kind of rewinding and going back, what was your role in the family business with the restaurants? Yeah. Yeah. So ever since I was, I don't know, I'd say like,
00:11:22
Speaker
No, eight, nine years old, like I was working my summers in a family restaurant, dishwasher for like five years and my dad really had the attitude of like, hey, you know,
00:11:36
Speaker
one day this could all be yours. And if you wanted to be like, there's like a path to be really successful at it. And his path was all about really learning each and every job and every aspect of the business so that as you later
00:11:58
Speaker
you when you're working with someone, you can know, hey, that person is actually like doing what they're capable of, or, you know, I'm asking stuff that's unreasonable of them. So, you know, I pretty much did every single job in a restaurant growing up, you know, five years as dishwasher as a busser for
00:12:16
Speaker
five, six years also. At the same time, while I was busing at the end, I started serving when I was old enough to. I did not cook. I was not in the kitchen at all. My dad more had me focusing on the business side instead of the kitchen side of it, which now looking back, everyone's like, wait, you grew up in a restaurant, you don't know how to cook well? I'm like, no, I focused on everything else.
00:12:45
Speaker
Yeah, I did some bartending. I was pretty slow at that, so I did not enjoy that too much. But I got into managing, I think when I was like 19 or 18 or 19, I started managing full time. And yeah, I thought that was my career path for the rest of my life. And again, I thought that at a very young age. And then I got to the point where
00:13:14
Speaker
Uh, I have a lot of creative ideas and a lot of things that I wanted to do, whether it was in the restaurant or outside the restaurant, you know, business ideas, mostly. And, um, yeah, with all these ideas, like I wanted to go pursue them and I'd have ideas in the restaurant, but the, my family restaurant was ran so well that.
00:13:35
Speaker
Like when I would manage, I was pretty much like babysitting my dad's like perfectly oiled machine. And so there wasn't too much creativity on my part and there wasn't really, you know, everything was good. You know, a lot of the workers had worked with him for 20, 30 years. So like they all knew exactly what was expected. And, um,
00:13:59
Speaker
they would actually like, if there was a new worker that came in, they would kind of like keep them, you know, in, you know, on the team and be like, Hey, like, this is what we expected. It wasn't just coming from management or the owner. It was coming from, um, you know, this family that had grown up, you know, for years. And my dad, when I was young, had, uh, a seafood restaurant, um, in Avenue beach.
00:14:23
Speaker
called Old Port Inn, it doesn't exist anymore. But then he opened another restaurant when I was in high school called Schapino. And that was, so he had two seafood restaurants. And yeah, so my experience was I did every single job besides in the kitchen. And I learned a lot. I learned what goes into each and every job, the things that are hard, the things that can be expected of each and every single person.
00:14:53
Speaker
And so, yeah, when I was managing, I could talk to any worker except for the kitchen and say, hey, I have a good idea what's possible. And yes, you're doing a lot. You're doing great. Or I could also be like, hey, we know more can be done or whatever it is. Or this is an issue. This is not working for our system.
00:15:17
Speaker
And so in the big picture, it was a well oiled machine and my creativity was super limited and I would have like some, I'd say really creative ideas. And my dad would really have to add to it. Like, Hey, everything's working as is. And so, yeah, that was, um, kind of where I, I think another, another big driving factor was I was like the schedule of a restaurant tour is it's, it's nonstop. I mean, it's.
00:15:47
Speaker
it's your whole day. There is no schedule. I mean, there's times I had to be at work to clock and clock out, but it's not like when I went home, um, work was not still part of what I had like as a responsibility when I was managing or, you know, running the restaurant. And again, um, I'd seen my dad his whole life, um, you know, live the restaurant lifestyle and it's something I always wanted in, you know, growing up, but then,
00:16:12
Speaker
I realized that, you know, that restaurant, everything he was doing was limited to our small town of San Luis Obispo. And a lot of my ideas and creativity, like I wanted my ideas or my thoughts or to attempt what I wanted to do, like at the scale of the USA or the world, like those were what I saw possible. And so at a young age, I really, you know, learned how to use the internet pretty well. And
00:16:40
Speaker
I was doing some side hustles along the way along this restaurant career and I had a business partner starting at 13 where we were buying and selling basketball cards on eBay.
00:16:53
Speaker
you know, that kind of took off into event tickets and just kind of expanded. And so I got to a point where I was kind of, you know, dreading the restaurants and like not enjoying it. And I just, I didn't feel that it was, it wasn't my passion is what I was realizing pretty fast. And yeah, it's, it's interesting when you're the offspring of an entrepreneur that
00:17:21
Speaker
and they want you to carry on that business, it seems like oftentimes when it's your turn to run it, a lot of that fun stuff has already been done because I use the word fun loosely. I think when you start a business, a lot of the struggles, the ups and downs, what makes it worthwhile, what makes
00:17:44
Speaker
Yeah, what makes it all worth it in the end is that kind of fun stuff. When you're being creative and you have to find different ways of competing with other people and trying to do things differently and the idea of execution, timing, innovation, marketing, and branding.
00:18:02
Speaker
I feel like a lot of that stuff had already been done by your dad. And by the point, by the time he wanted you to run it, it's like, oh, now you're just like kind of managing it. And like you said, you have a lot of creativity, which that could have also come from your father. So you're now looking for like an outlet. It seems like that outlet was this ticket selling business. Yeah. Yeah. And, and so I always was a hustler, like,
00:18:31
Speaker
on the side. And it's not like anyone told me, hey, go do this. It was always my own ideas or collaborations with my first business partner, James, or
00:18:46
Speaker
Like with my dad, we would walk our dog every night and we lived on a golf course and we would collect golf balls and sell them back to that golf course. And then also to the other golf courses. And then I would take out the best golf balls that were, you know, pro B ones. And I could sell those on eBay for, you know, way more money. So I was, you know, that, and that we were doing that every single night. And so that was, um, you know, my dad always encouraged the, you know, being,
00:19:15
Speaker
you know, having your own ideas and like pursuing them. So like, that was how I worked. Like we'd be like, Hey, let's go get some golf balls. And like, he was a big golfer. So he already knew he's like, okay, this is where all the people are going to hit out of bounds. And he was friends with the owner of the golf course. So we, we had permission to go down onto the golf course at night, walk our dog and, um, you know, collect a bunch of golf balls. And so we did, we did that for years, like a few years. And this is when I was like,
00:19:46
Speaker
probably 12, 13, 14, 15. And these walks with my dad were not just, the goal was not to get golf balls, but that was a byproduct that was like, and I made some good money with it. But like, those walks were just, you know, I grew up in a family of a blend of five kids and
00:20:05
Speaker
That was kind of my, you know, alone time with my dad. It was like us on these walks. So just be, you know, sometimes some other kids would go, but like, you know, we're, we're hiking through the out of bounds areas of a golf course that's super hilly. And so we're, you know, we're looking for golf balls. So we, that was our bonding kind of talk about life, talk about whatever was on my mind, whatever was on his mind. And, um,
00:20:28
Speaker
And yeah, really just bond and, you know, that was our quality time. And so, yeah, so we were looking for golf balls, but then.
00:20:38
Speaker
kept, you know, later on at some point in my life, I was selling like avocados for my neighbor's tree. And then when I got my business partner, James, like we started by like literally, um, like recycling and dumpster diving for recycling. Like we, he grew, he grew up in San Luis near Cal Poly where all the parties were. And
00:21:00
Speaker
we would go knock on houses and say, hey, we'll clean up all your party's cans. And these college kids were stoked. Like, they're like, you're gonna clean up my house? We're like, yeah. And we're stoked because we're like, oh, we're gonna recycle all this, these cans. And so then we got into some
00:21:16
Speaker
obtaining addresses on, you know, the curbs and that was, that was a good one. And like, so just kind of evolved. And then, you know, we kind of always just kept finding what we thought was like, okay, this is worth our time more. So let's focus more on it. So, um, then we started being more online and doing, you know, basketball cards. And we were able to scale that business at the age of 14, you know,
00:21:40
Speaker
I'd say pretty large. I don't remember the numbers, but, um, and then, yeah, it turned into tickets and, you know, we're, we're using all of our own money, you know, draining our bank accounts, buying a couple of tickets because, you know, however much money we had, we'd buy a couple of tickets and, you know, just kept bankrolling it and, um, and, and had a lot of success, um, at a young age. And I think one of the best things were,
00:22:07
Speaker
Like I was not afraid to fail at all. And James was a really good supporter where he was like all in on like my ideas, but he also could like pull me back from like, you know, going too far. And like, you know, there's like a, definitely a healthy balance that's needed sometimes because you can be really aggressive and have, you know, big ideas, but.
00:22:31
Speaker
you can you can also collapse if you go too far. Yeah, you tell me about any ideas that you like you said your dad always encouraged you to have ideas and pursue them. Can you tell me about any ideas that didn't pan out? Yeah, I don't
00:22:46
Speaker
I don't know if there's any one particular idea that didn't pan out, but like a lot of different aspects or like, um, ideas within a business or a project that did not pan out that happened multiple times. One that really, uh, was the funny one. And my dad even tried to warn me of like, from his own lessons and I didn't listen. And he was like, okay. Which.
00:23:07
Speaker
I respect that. He tried to give me some advice. So at the time, I think I was 16 or 17, and the family restaurant had a taco booth that was at a farmer's market on Fridays at the beach in Avila Beach, and it was a really fun farmer's market. And we were like the most popular booth selling fish tacos, and it was myself and all my friends.
00:23:37
Speaker
Even Julian worked there for a little bit. He burned all the tortillas for the fish tacos. He wasn't there too long, but it was all the friends. So we'd have a good time working together, all my best friends. And we got to a point where we were like, hey,
00:23:58
Speaker
I think we could sell some cool t-shirts that say like, follow me for $2 off, you know, a fish taco or a dollar off fish taco, and people will buy these shirts and then they'll also wear them and they'll get discounts. And then on Friday, people will be walking all over with these shirts and people are going to be like, Oh, like what's up with that shirt? So, um, James and I, we were like, okay, we're going to make some shirts and tank tops. And.
00:24:25
Speaker
We got someone to take us some professional photos of fish tacos and the photos looked really good. Found a shirt company locally and we printed in our first order
00:24:40
Speaker
I'm just guessing probably three or 400 shirts. And we had like taken surveys from people at the fish taco booth and like everyone was just telling us like, Oh yeah, I'd buy that. I'd buy that. I'd buy this. We're just like, Oh my gosh, this is going to be a home run. So, uh, my dad was like, Hey, maybe start with like 50 shirts, maybe like a hundred and like kind of see how it goes. And I was like, no dad, like everyone's, everyone's they're all going to buy it. Like they're all saying they're going to buy it. And he was like, okay, like, you know,
00:25:10
Speaker
You do, you do you. So I'm like, okay. So we buy like 400 shirts. And I think out of the shirts, I think maybe like a hundred or 150 were tank tops.
00:25:21
Speaker
And so then we start selling them and we started off all right. Cause like, you know, everyone, a lot of these people came every week. So we started off and like some of the locals and like the diehards, like they all bought a shirt and we're like, started off kind of good. We're like, hell yeah, this is like, this is going to be so good. Uh, and then it really died off because then no one was buying a shirt, like really at all. And I was like, Oh crap. Like.
00:25:45
Speaker
Okay. Well, I don't know. You know, and then I realized, I was like, oh man, all these people, they were just telling me like, yeah, we'd buy that like just out of excitement. And like, you know, I don't know. Maybe they want to crush my dreams or like, you know, I was a 16 year old kid and I had a lot of enthusiasm and a lot of excitement. So I don't know, but it didn't translate to sales, um, how we had thought. But the funny thing was we, um, we sold out tank tops because
00:26:15
Speaker
Years later, so we sold maybe about 400, maybe we sold like 60 of them, 70 of them, I don't even know, maybe a little bit more, not sure, but not enough to get our money back. We lost money. And so then we just have these boxes of shirts just sitting there. And like a couple of years later, I'm just like, man, this is awful. I got these shirts. I don't even want to look at them anymore. They kind of pissed me off that I have these in my possession.
00:26:44
Speaker
Um, I went, well, before donating them, I started listing some on eBay and the tank tops started like selling really well because like, I guess it kind of looked like a frat tank top in a way, but it just, we literally put frat tank top in the description. And so the tank tops were doing great. And so however many of those we had, we'd sold some and we're pretty like stoked about that, but we came and saw a t-shirt. Um,
00:27:12
Speaker
And we ended up just donating all of them locally to Goodwill because we just didn't want them in our site anymore, in our garage. So yeah, that one did not pan out. I think there's a lot of situations like that, that it's not like it went bad, but what sometimes is a hard thing to gauge is when you're really excited and you have a lot of, you feel like, okay, I'm about to make this decision, I'm gonna do it. Sometimes being over,
00:27:42
Speaker
Um, over expecting the results. And so, you know, not starting small, but like starting big. Um, I've had that happen in other situations too. Um, but yeah, so that one was a one that I remember overall though, I try a lot of things in my businesses and when things don't go right, I.
00:28:05
Speaker
I don't really think of it as like it went bad or like that was a bad idea. I'm still glad I attempted it because like as I tried like five, six things, one or two things might really stick and really advance the business in a way that would have never happened if I was not trying to be, you know, pursuing just a bunch of, you know, creative ideas or like kind of out of the box ideas.
00:28:32
Speaker
I mean, every business I've been in, I've had major losses, I've had major successes. So yeah. So then after an experience like that, maybe that was one that kind of stuck with you.
Balancing Business Ventures
00:28:48
Speaker
What do you look for when you're in the process of considering which ideas to pursue and which not? Yeah.
00:28:58
Speaker
So when I was in my ticket business, if I have any ideas in my ticket business, I kind of pursue all of them. I have a very large team, a lot of support, and a lot of people that can take my ideas, or one in particular. My business partner currently is Zach Hogan, who I also grew up with.
00:29:24
Speaker
So he really can help support and take my ideas and add processes around them or get the help needed to make those things happen. So when it comes to ticketing, I pursue almost every idea. And I've been doing it for so long that when I do think of a new idea, they're not too out there. They're kind of, you know, maybe not how other people are doing things, but it has a very low
00:29:54
Speaker
like cost of trying and the upside is extremely large. But when it comes to my other businesses, I have an NFT business where I buy and sell digital art and also some physical art too. I kind of picked, I did a lot of that during Corona, taking my time. I love art. So that was what drew me to learn a lot about that during Corona. So in my pickleball business and in my art business, I take
00:30:24
Speaker
way more calculated risks. I'm not trying to just do everything all the time because it stretches a lot of my available energy and how much time I can actually focus on these ideas. And it's a lot more of me actually doing the legwork and everything around it on my own with the art business and then with the
00:30:47
Speaker
pickleball business. If I have an idea, I have to put together the process. I have to do a lot of the legwork to make things happen. I do have support from people that are part-time or independent contractors to help us throughout the whole business. But yeah, it's a lot more work. So before I get into one of them, I really think it out. I talk to some people that I like to bounce my ideas off of.
00:31:16
Speaker
that have just known me a long time and can really give me their opinion. I've like a small, you know, my family and friends, just really small group where I'm like, Hey, this is what I'm thinking. This is what I want to do. And they'll listen to me and give me their feedback. And yeah, so I do a lot more, a lot of thought before I even pursue a certain thing, like,
00:31:40
Speaker
And also with the pickleball business, because we're a new brand and this is the first time I'm like actually being a customer facing brand, every other business I've been besides the restaurant, I've been more behind the scenes. I've been very
00:31:53
Speaker
you know, calculated on like, okay, this is my creative idea for this, this is my creative idea for this part, but I don't want to have 20 different creative ideas because as a new business, it just looks like you'd be all over the place. So really just focusing on a couple and then bringing them
00:32:12
Speaker
you know, to light, like the Andiamo push button, like, you know, that is something that we give out our signature gift boxes with flare paddles. And it's a push button that has Julian yelling some of his, you know, phrases, you know, Andiamo, let's go by like, you know, and so, you know, that one came alive because of I'm really good at like, seeing something that exists and being able to like,
00:32:38
Speaker
improve it like I'm not coming up with these things out of nowhere I guess I just I like to improve what I've already been exposed to so like my mom had gotten me a while ago a push button of Donald Trump saying you're fired and like from you know the apprentice show and so I would have that button and I never really used it but in my closet and like I would click it and
00:33:05
Speaker
as like, you know, like never used it on someone's like, you're fired, because that would just be like the weirdest way to fire someone with a fricking push button, Donald Trump. But I thought it was a funny, funny thing. And
00:33:18
Speaker
you know, that idea was just like, okay, well, Julian is the only person that yells, you know, a lot of these phrases, you know, some people might have like a couple of things that yell, have a catchphrase, but like, Julian, like, that's, um, you know, a lot of his, a lot of his energy, he's, you know, a loud, passionate, um, performer and, um, you know,
00:33:38
Speaker
Yeah. That was just like, Oh, I think that'd be really funny. I think people would push this. I think it would be just something creative and unique. Like I haven't seen that in the pickleball world, but if anyone's going to have a push button, it would be Julian. So, um, but I'm not trying to do like 30 of those different funny things at the same time, because, um, I just don't think that the business, you know, being so new would, um, you know, look like we know what we got going on. Yeah, definitely. Um,
00:34:07
Speaker
between your NFT business and the pickleball business, how are you prioritizing between those two businesses and also, I guess, kind of as far as like work-life balance too? How do you manage between all three of those?
00:34:25
Speaker
Yeah, so I really don't like schedules. I'm not really like a scheduled person. I'm a pretty free flower, but I love to work.
00:34:39
Speaker
Like when I am working, I like, you know, I'm not doing projects or no one's telling me, hey, you need to do this. Like everything I'm working on, it's, you know, a lot of it's my ideas and like, you know, like my own creativity where I'm like, okay, this is fun. Like a lot of fun.
00:34:56
Speaker
So if I'm wrapped up in something like I can work on it endless hours, like, you know, like an, you know, an unhealthy amount of hours of like in the ticketing world, if there's something I'm like, Oh, I'm, this is what I'm working on. Like I can work on something for three days, uh, 12 hours a day for three days straight. And it could be one thing. Um, you know, and so I, you know, that's how I've worked in the past. And now that the pickleball business is, um,
00:35:24
Speaker
part of my businesses that I run, it's a little different. I'm connecting with a lot more other people. So there is a little more scheduling going on. But when I wake up, I have a to-do list of things. I will only put something on my to-do list if I know I have to do it by a certain day. And then those are the things that I attempt to make sure I actually do. I have a meeting, I have to do it.
00:35:52
Speaker
I have to ship something out by the state okay i have to do it so those are the first things i look at and then after that. I kind of fill in my time with. I jump around businesses or off focus on one really i put my effort wherever i feel.
00:36:12
Speaker
is either the biggest thing that I want to improve or the biggest project where I think it has the best return for success and money. So the pickleball business, I'm not trying to go make as much money as I possibly can right now. The goal is to become a respected brand in pickleball and have good products, do the right things and
00:36:38
Speaker
kind of worry about money later, the profits later. Because if I put out a good product and good content and it's really consistent and everyone's enjoying it, I know that later the money will come. So this business, again, it's so new that right now I'm investing. I'm investing. I'm investing.
00:37:00
Speaker
pretty much try to have as little of a schedule as possible, put all my means on Wednesday if possible. And then I've been putting more time into training for my ticket business because I'm trying to get that to run itself in the next year and a half and kind of have like minimal input from myself. And like right now it still relies on me to
00:37:24
Speaker
to do really well. So right now that's been a main focus of mine is like, so right now I'm doing on Tuesdays and Thursdays, I'm doing like a couple hour training session in the morning. And I'm going to keep doing that. And I'm training five people at the same time that are five of our stronger workers to really learn a lot of high level
00:37:45
Speaker
um things that are like kind of have been like keeping like to myself like in my head because I've all like I've had fears of like if I train someone how to do these things they can go run off and just do it without me and um
00:38:00
Speaker
that is still possible and it's happened in the past, but these five ladies I'm working with right now, like I've been working with them for five years and I'm, I'm just super excited to like teach them everything I know because they're, they're so bright. And I know that that will allow that business to continue to grow without me, um, really need to put a lot of work and you know, time into it. So, um, and then with,
00:38:25
Speaker
you know, Valer right now, everything, because it's a business where I have not dealt with customers as much where I'm like a customer facing, I'm learning a lot right now as I go. So.
00:38:38
Speaker
Like I'm pretty much trying to work on one major project at a time, maybe two, but I don't want to like try to tackle all, you know, 10 things that I do want to tackle all at the same time, because I just want to have all the content and product be just very high level and
00:38:56
Speaker
not try to spread my energy too thin where we're putting out possibly a bunch of crap that is going to just not help us succeed. The first priority overall for the paddle company was the paddle itself. We came out our first paddle, the Mach 1,
00:39:17
Speaker
joint signature paddle. And right now, we are getting a lot of good feedback on that. We are making a little tweaks. But overall, we're like, okay, cool. Our paddle is good. It's high quality. People are enjoying it at all levels. And so then I'm working on the next things. And the next big thing we're working on right now is
00:39:40
Speaker
Um, we're putting together our ambassador program, which we'll be releasing in the next few weeks. And so that's been taking up a lot of my focus now. So I guess, how do I divvy up my time? It's mostly project based and, um, but starting with what I would consider the things I have to do. And then it's me flowing between, okay, I want to work on this project or this project is my highest priority for this business. And.
00:40:05
Speaker
Right now the pickleball business is my passion project. So it's getting a lot of my attention. Um, and so, yeah, so I, I can't help, but you know, think through a lot of situations or ideas for the pickleball company, like all throughout the day. Um, you know, that's, that's where my mind goes when, when I'm, when I'm being creative, um, and not, you know, sitting on a computer.
00:40:30
Speaker
Definitely. When you were talking about how you want your ticket to business to be self-sufficient, essentially, and you're going through training right now for, and you have these five ladies that you want to be really successful. And considering the fact that you don't have children right now, like what is something that you want them to know about the business that you don't think that they can learn from training or books?
00:40:59
Speaker
something I want them to know that they can't learn from trainer books. Um, that as you, I mean, I tell them this all the time, but like, it's a never ending learning, like, there's no end, like, Hey, I know everything, like in the ticketing world, it's it's ever evolving. And so just,
00:41:22
Speaker
being able to be flexible to know, Hey, this might be working now, but always be looking for ways to improve or like be open to other ideas to make things happen. Because in the ticketing world, um, there is not a blueprint of this is how you do it to succeed. Like there is a hundred ways to play the game. There's more than a hundred ways. There's a hundred ways to succeed in the ticketing world. And some people focus just on one aspect. Some people focus on 10. Some people try to do all of them.
00:41:53
Speaker
And overall, just because I taught them how to do something one way doesn't mean don't be open to that there might be other or better ways to do it and to
00:42:06
Speaker
You know, when you test it in the ticketing world, you can test it on a very small sample size and figure out if the mechanics even work or not. Um, but yeah, so I just say, just be open to that. There could be better ways to do things. And then, because again, everything I know is from trial and error and no one told me how to do it. So like, there are better ways to do things and I, and I just don't know what they are.
00:42:31
Speaker
So yeah, just being open to that because, you know, they look at me as like, oh, you're the boss. You've been doing this since you were 13. You know, if Ryan teaches me this, then this is how this is the best way. And as of now, it's the best way I'm aware of is more of the not like the lesson I'd be saying for them.
00:42:47
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, I love that.
Motivation and Innovation Behind Olair Pickleball
00:42:51
Speaker
Speaking of better ways of doing things, Full Air is, I think, a newcomer to the pickleball hardware and technology game coming out since, I guess, coming out in 2022. What is something that you saw as deficient in either the pickleball paddle businesses
00:43:17
Speaker
Yeah. I think like, what do you think was like missing and like kind of like, how did you think that coming out with the layer would be more successful or different in what it could contribute to this sport? Definitely. So, um, when Julian and I both said, Hey, we're going to, you know, pursue this full time, you know, I sent him to a trainer and the trainer was like, Hey,
00:43:42
Speaker
your buddy doesn't know what he's doing. And he's like top 10 right now. And I was like, okay. And I was like, okay, do we pursue this? And he was like, yes, you guys should pursue this. I'm like, okay, cool. Like, again, the main thing was like, we didn't want to potentially have a falling out based on us pursuing something that we didn't have a chance to succeed at. So that was our first thing. And so
00:44:05
Speaker
I was Julian's financial supporter throughout his first year of pickleball. And so I had him moving with me in Austin. I was like, hey, move to Austin. You're on the road most of the year anyways. So he went up to all these tournaments and is competing across the APP and PPA and MLP.
00:44:32
Speaker
Yeah, we started off with Julian was using Electrum. Julian's girlfriend Lauren was sponsored by Electrum. So, you know, we kind of have a connection there and Julian was using the Model E and
00:44:48
Speaker
I was communicating with the paddle companies or other potential sponsors, so I was doing managing also. As I was communicating with them, certain companies, some of the ones we wanted to talk to or the ones we did talk to,
00:45:09
Speaker
There was just an extreme lack in professionalism of communicating with pros or pros agents. And so it was really frustrating trying to pursue certain things.
00:45:23
Speaker
We were betting on ourselves from the start like that's how I've always been and you know Julian's a competitor and so We would we got you know some offers or and we look down we're like no We're gonna be top 10 next year like weird and we knew that and so I told him I was like hey, you know we're gonna pass for now and whatever the offers were that we got and We know that you know bigger offers might come if we accomplish what we think we can do and
00:45:54
Speaker
So yeah, so there was like lack of professionalism on the business side. And so that was really frustrating. And so the first thing I was thinking as I was like, man, I know how to handle these conversations. I know how to make sure that these players feel heard and that they're part of the team and they're not just
00:46:12
Speaker
you know, being used, I guess. And besides that, it's like, here's paddles. Besides that, we don't, we don't talk to you, we don't communicate. So that was a little frustrating. But also what we saw is the technology changing and just new paddles coming out that we liked better. And we felt that if we got locked into a contract, which would be a year or two years, that
00:46:39
Speaker
we could get locked in with a paddle company where they don't advance their paddle in that next year and that there is a better tool out there and Julian can't use it because he's signed by a certain paddle company. And when we saw that with a lot of paddle companies in the last year and a half,
00:46:56
Speaker
certain players signed by some of the bigger paddle companies, they hadn't released a carbon fiber T700 paddle yet. And we all felt that they were at a disadvantage and we didn't want Julian to be locked into something that he wouldn't be able to have say and say, hey, we can change this. Let's stay with the times. Let's innovate. Let's try
00:47:22
Speaker
try what's going on or, you know, be, you know, be able to like, you know, just, I didn't want Julian to not be able to compete at the highest level with the best tool. And so, you know, we got to a point where we were like, okay, um, yeah, let's, you know, let's pursue this. Let's bet on ourselves. And, um, I, I have excitement in, you know, taking a couple of loves of mine, which is pickleball and, you know, business and,
00:47:52
Speaker
you know, after eight months, we were having a lot of success, you know, with Julian, you know, competing at such a high level and having some, you know, major tournament wins and, and being some really big names. So like we were, we're like, okay, we're, we're doing really good with our first project, which was like, get top 10 in the year. And then got to the point where I was like, okay, you know, do we want to pursue this? And
00:48:18
Speaker
Julian and I are right now, we're still in the early process of it, but yeah, those were the main driving factors was the professionalism on the business side. And then the idea of being locked into a contract where we may not have the best paddle available in six months. Yeah, that's what I'd say.
00:48:44
Speaker
Absolutely. So how are you doing things differently given that Valer has sponsored athletes?
Sponsorship and Ambassador Program
00:48:53
Speaker
Yeah. Um, so right now we have, um, four, four sponsored athletes and
00:49:02
Speaker
I've known, like I've known Wes since one of Julian's first tournaments. And in the beginning of Julian's tournaments, I was traveling, I traveled with Julian, you know, a couple of times because him traveling all around the country was very new. He had not even been to like the East Coast before being a professional pickleball player.
00:49:23
Speaker
Got to know Wes really well and just He I think everyone knows this Wes is the nicest guy in pickleball like everybody loves Wes And so as we're talking about this I you know this idea Behind the scenes I'm able to like reach out and like at least like gauge if there's any interest and see if that's something that you know some of those other pros want to be a part of and
00:49:49
Speaker
you know, my main goal of like how to treat the players differently was to, you know, they have direct access to me, you know, they can have stuff to Julian to be like, for a lot of the operations, and everything besides what Julian's, you know, doing on the court and like representing the layer as the face of it. You know, a lot of the stuff I'm doing, like, they can directly reach out to me and say, Hey, I have an idea, or I have a question, or what about this, and
00:50:18
Speaker
And I've had a lot of really good conversations with every pro of like, you know, just, I don't know, I wouldn't consider it the typical, you know, um, sponsored pro and, you know, business relationship. I'm not saying it's not out there. I know it is. Pickleball is a small sport overall and the community is very tight, but just giving them that experience that like they matter, um, you know, more than just the results and that they're holding the paddle. Um, so yeah, like.
00:50:47
Speaker
That's how I've been treated different. I've been very prompt on anytime anyone's owed money or that there's a deadline or what they're expected to do. I just have it very organized so that it doesn't feel chaotic or stressful for them.
00:51:06
Speaker
Whenever I feel that I'm running behind on something, I just keep them updated and say, hey, this is not on track. We're gonna have a new timeline soon and just really keep them in the loop of what is going on overall, just so that they know and that they feel included, that they are part of the family. So Wes, just stand up guy, partner with Julian at the very beginning of his career.
00:51:35
Speaker
his skill is for how much he was playing, you know, when he first probably joined, like he had even practiced for months and they went out there and competed pretty well. And I was like, Wes, you got to go, you got to get back at this full time. Like I see what you can do. And, you know,
00:51:49
Speaker
he knows what he can do. And so he's been training a lot more. And so yeah, having Wes and then Emily, I never met Emily, but Emily went to Cal Poly and Julian and I being from San Luis Obispo and Cal Poly being in San Luis Obispo, like right away.
00:52:06
Speaker
I'm like, I want to own a work with Emily. And Emily had played in the term of Julian a while ago and had known Wes for a very long time. Emily just put together a really nice post about Wes and how she's known Wes. I forgot how many years, but since Emily was extremely young, so that was really cool. I didn't know the extent of how long they'd known each other, but I think it went back to the days of Wes, I'm guessing, doing tennis.
00:52:36
Speaker
And then Grant, I had met in a tournament in Arizona, had dinner with him when I was out in Arizona with Julian and, uh, just really nice guy. Um, you know, and so like, when we were reaching out, like we reached out to people that we, uh, you know, we started with the people that were like really good friends with and you know, that they would understand that we are going to do all the things that we say we're going to do because.
00:53:02
Speaker
Being a company that didn't exist yet, I did talk to some other top pros that obviously they know Julian, but they didn't know me. And so when I'm reaching out and trying to say all these things I'm going to do, I look at it and I say they shouldn't believe that I'm going to do all those things. And so the people we did connect with and did sign as of now,
00:53:26
Speaker
they all believed in us before they even like had a paddle, like pretty much like West didn't have a paddle. He never even tried it. He was like, I'm going to sign with you guys. Like I'm going to, you guys, I just want to work with you guys. You guys are my friends. Um, and you know, we get along great. And so it was a lot more about the relationship than anything else with Wes. And he's like, I don't even care what paddle I have in my hand. I'll go compete. It doesn't matter. I was like, Oh, cool. So.
00:53:52
Speaker
So yeah, just really that, that's, you know, that's kind of how we're trying to do it different. And like right now.
00:54:00
Speaker
Uh, we might sound like another pro or two in the near future, but overall, like that's where we're, I think we're overall good with our like, um, tournament pros as of now. Um, you know, that was our, we wanted to come out with a bang and have, you know, four or five, six pros all using the paddle at the beginning, um, of when we release, um, just to, you know, show that it's not just Julian using a signature paddle. Um, and so, yeah, so that's kind of where we're at with like the pro aspect. And now we're going to focus on.
00:54:30
Speaker
a lot of other aspects of the business because in the big picture, what goes on at the pro level and following the pros,
00:54:40
Speaker
it's a very small percentage of pickleball players. Like most pickleball players are, you know, you're, you're go to the park. I just want to get a good workout and, um, you know, they may not follow the pros at all. So now I really want to tap into those, um, different communities and, and really, you know, get our paddles into people's hands because as of now, everyone that's had our paddle, they really enjoy it. So I just want to get into as many hands as I can, um, and see what happens.
00:55:10
Speaker
Yeah, I can definitely attest to that being around you in Austin, you know, like me being able to try a paddle, but also like a lot of the people that we play with, everyone's really enjoying it. And you're talking about people who are using the Hyperion, using the other different lines of YOLA. Yeah. They're using the diatoms, they're using the Electrum, a little bit everything and people are
00:55:36
Speaker
definitely seeing something a little bit different. Um, and you know, you do have a different way of looking at how to build the relationships within business. And it's definitely showing in pickleball given, you know, you already have your pro talent figured out. Is there something that you can tell us that you're doing differently with the ambassador program? Um, also I've been learning a lot about ambassador programs the last,
00:56:05
Speaker
Geez, like two, three weeks, like, I don't know. I've been just literally reading everything I possibly can and learning how other ambassador programs kind of have worked. And yeah, I think we're going to be putting together an ambassador program that a couple of ways I think it's going to be different.
00:56:29
Speaker
Well, what we're going to be giving out as a commission per paddle, it's going to be higher than anywhere I've seen. And that is like, you know, I want people that, you know, first off, I want you to like the paddle, like before you even get into like, hey, I want to be an ambassador. Like, you know, if you don't like the paddle, like I don't want you to try to sell it. It just feels unauthentic at a certain point. So, you know, after someone likes the paddle, being able to make, you know, a good
00:56:59
Speaker
commission per paddle, I think is really important. I know there's a lot of ambassador programs out there. And I feel that if we don't have a good financial incentive that people will be an ambassador and then see another ambassador program that, you know, might have a decent or good paddle and just jump from one to another and really not, you know, become a Valera ambassador where they're like really repping the company and, you know, are
00:57:26
Speaker
a part of our ambassador family, which, you know, I want someone to be an ambassador for as long as they enjoy playing pickleball. Um, so financial incentive is, you know, one way that we're going to come out of the gate and like say, Hey, you know, here's a pretty strong financial incentive and your community gets like a 10% discount. So.
00:57:47
Speaker
as they're selling these paddles. They get a commission and their friend or family or whoever they are selling the paddle to also gets a little discount. And then on top of that, we are going to be highlighting a lot of
00:58:03
Speaker
our ambassadors. And as we're doing now, we have pro content, which we like to post, but Valer is not going to be the Julian show. As we continue to grow, the goal is for Valer to be, Julian to be, he is a co-founder and he's going to always have input and be doing a lot of the testing on the paddle side. And
00:58:29
Speaker
you know, just testing everything and really, you know, being our feedback because he is just so dialed in with how things feel and what he prefers and so.
00:58:41
Speaker
You know, we want to highlight a lot of our ambassadors, um, highlight their successes and, um, you know, on top of that, we don't, like right now we don't have any merch available yet, but we will later. Um, I know right now we're in incentivize where it's like, after you sell, you know, 10 paddles that you're going to get one of our tour bags in either black or blue. And so those will be available, you know, at the end of.
00:59:06
Speaker
February hopefully and so and those bags are pretty cool so just as they continue to sell paddles like there's going to be just you know other you know things like a bag but then like I don't want to like say this is I'm not going to put this in our ambassador program like
00:59:26
Speaker
I guess in the pitch, I'm not going to say, hey, top person gets this or that, but some of our ambassadors, anyone that goes above and beyond, I'm going to go out of my way to do stuff special just to make them feel that their work is appreciated and things like that, things that could happen would be like,
00:59:46
Speaker
um you know like private lesson with Julian or come to one of our camps or um you know things like that where they can interact with you know some of the pros of the highest level um you know whether you know it's playing games with them or um i don't know do we come into some you know valer celebration um
01:00:09
Speaker
Yeah, so it's kind of, I don't have anything set in stone. It's kind of what I'm getting at, but I want to do things like that to really reward people that are going above and beyond. Yeah. And I think people will definitely appreciate that. Um, and you know, we're coming up on the hour. So, um, now you can kind of plug away, you know, like where can people find out more about the layer and help if you want to even, um, plug your ticket business.
Conclusion and Community Engagement
01:00:37
Speaker
I know like.
01:00:38
Speaker
tickets now or getting crazy. So yeah, plug away man. Yeah. So, um, for pickleball, um, you can follow us at Valer pickleball on Instagram. Um, and that's right now Instagram is like our main, um, social that we're updating the most. Um, we're going to start doing a little bit more content on tick talk and Facebook, um,
01:01:05
Speaker
But when it comes to ticket company, I don't have anything to plug. I'm a behind the scenes company that just helps supply inventory for, um, a lot of the secondary websites. So, uh, I don't even have a direct website, but yeah, no, you know, we're gonna have the information for the ambassador program announced in the next couple of weeks. And, um, we'll do some posts on Instagram about how to apply and we'd love for everyone to apply and, and, and really, you know,
01:01:32
Speaker
First off, get to experience our paddle, but then also, you know, rep our brand and hopefully make a little bit of money along the way. But no, thank you so much for having me. And this was this was fun. Got to go down memory lane a little bit on some some some different situations that I haven't thought about, you know, in a while or been prompted to answer in a while. Yeah, absolutely. I'm glad we could capture kind of some of your history and
01:02:02
Speaker
your entrepreneurial spirit and your brain and the way you look at things. I think this has definitely been a very exciting one, something that I learned a lot about. Um, even though I've known you for like two years, these are things that I don't get to normally experience, but you know, really appreciate your time today and excited to push this one out and have everyone listen. Uh, if you have any last final words, feel free. Um,
01:02:29
Speaker
I don't know anyone that stopped playing pickleball, you know, for the most part. So, um, you know, pickleball is going to keep growing. And, um, you know, this is, it's a, it's a passion of mine and it's passionate of yours. And that's why we're, you know, doing things like this interview. And I just, you know, I love the pickleball community. I've never experienced so much support.
01:02:52
Speaker
Um, for people I don't even know, uh, it's awesome. We've had a lot of reach out and say, Hey, like, how can I help you? Like, I want to support Julian and you in any way we can. And, um, so thank you to everyone that has helped us get to where we're at now and, and, and who's going to help us, um, you know, continue to, to be relevant in this, um, sport that's just absolutely exploding. Yeah. Awesome. Well, thanks again for your time and have a good one. Awesome. Have a good day.