‘Being Isolated Is Just a Bad Idea’

Introduction:

This week, Hans Schrei and Shawn Busse talk about why they put their businesses through accelerators, and Paul Downs explains why he might have done the same thing if accelerators had existed back when he started his business—”although,” he says, “I was probably too dumb to realize the value of it.” Hans, who just completed a 13-week accelerator program with his partner, Luis, also tells us how Wunderkeks fared while he and Luis were in the program, what they got out of it, and why they felt it was worth giving up the equity that was the price of admission. Plus: why Shawn went to an employee’s college graduation and how Paul managed to take a vacation. Oh, and Paul also talks about what surprised him about the recent 21 Hats event in Chicago.

— Loren Feldman

Guests:

Hans Schrei is co-founder of Wunderkeks.

Shawn Busse is CEO of Kinesis.

Paul Downs is CEO of Paul Downs Cabinetmakers.

Producer:

Jess Thoubboron is founder of Blank Word.

Full Episode Transcript:

Loren Feldman:
Welcome Shawn, Paul, and Hans. I appreciate you taking the time. I want to start today with Hans. Hans, you’ve been busy lately, putting your cookie company through, I gather, a consumer packaged goods accelerator in Austin. I believe it’s called SKU. Can you tell us about it?

Hans Schrei:
Yeah, sure. It’s been 13 weeks, and it was a lot to handle, but basically, the purpose was, there was an insane amount of opportunities coming our way. And a lot of the time, we were not prepared. Our first impulse was to say, “Yes,” and we’ll figure it out later. But at some point, we realized—and I’m very grateful that we did this. I don’t know what miracle happened—but we said, “You know what? We don’t really have the capabilities right now. We need to build them before we actually go and tackle the Costcos and the Targets of the world.”

So that’s what we’ve been doing, and it was a very challenging experience. This accelerator is called SKU. It works on a mentorship model. So you get assigned a ton of mentors, and we have a team. We got access to a large network of CPG professionals. And they all come from different disciplines, and from the different parts of the corporate experience. So there were entrepreneurs and finance people and big, big companies, big CPG people. They run the gamut: investors, people in PR.

And it was very interesting to really get to talk to people in every single corner of the world of CPG. And to understand their perspective, because I think that what happens as a founder is that you’re a founder, your friends are founders, the people you talk to all day are founders. And it’s very easy to lose track of the stakeholders. Because down the line, you’re gonna have to manage all of these people. And it’s very useful to understand how they think and what they see that you don’t. So it was, frankly, very enlightening.

Loren Feldman:
Did you have to go through an application process?

Hans Schrei:
Yes, from what I understand there were 800 applicants. It’s actually the second time that we applied to this accelerator. So we ended up being down to six companies. And then we had to pitch, which was kind of intimidating, because I was expecting to pitch to three people, and it was 30 who were on that call, a lot of very intimidating people. So yeah, it was a whole process. At the end of the day, I think that what really worked in our favor was that we had the ability to convey what the larger purpose of what we’re doing is, and what we needed out of the accelerator.

Loren Feldman:
Did you and your partner Luis both go through the experience?

Hans Schrei:
Yeah.

Loren Feldman:
Did I hear you say that there were six companies whose applications were accepted and participated?

Hans Schrei:
Yes, it was six.

Loren Feldman:
And 13 weeks. Can you give us a sense of: What was a typical day like?

Hans Schrei:
Basically, everyone has their team of mentors. You have a lead mentor, and you have a team of eight people. And then you have access to all of the others. So in total it was like 70. And there was a weekly call, like, “Okay, so this is where we are, this is where we need to establish priorities and then move onto the next thing.” So a weekly check-in with everyone, and then you got to work on the individual parts of it with different teams. So if you were looking at the marketing part, you went to the marketing people. If you wanted finance, you went to the finance people. And you got to talk to whoever you wanted, and everyone was extremely willing to help.

And then there were classes, which, at first I felt like, “I don’t really need this. I went through this already. I know this.” But as they progressed, I realized that it was very useful. Even things as silly as—well, not silly—but things that you take for granted, like doing a P&L. There’s some nuance and some things that you want to see. Yeah, sure, I can do a P&L. But it’s a very different thing to do a P&L that is going to convey the information that investors need, for instance, or that is going to convey the information that the buyer is going to need. So that was very enriching to go back to all of these things from the lens of a startup.

Loren Feldman:
Paul, Shawn, if you guys have questions as we go, please feel free to jump in.

Paul Downs:
I do have a question. So you said there were 800 applicants and six chosen. Did you get a sense for the level of viability that you had to demonstrate in order to be considered?

Hans Schrei:
I’m not sure that we talked about this explicitly, but I think what they were looking for, for the most part, was some traction and also the potential. Because there are a lot of ideas that are very—in CPG, particularly—a lot of them are kind of niche. So if you’re doing something that is very small, that doesn’t really have the possibility to really grow, it probably doesn’t make sense. Because the whole idea here is these are companies that are being built to scale. And sometimes—and I think this is something that was not made explicit—but my conclusion was: That is where the difference between a small business and a startup lies. Is this really scalable?

I heard about a few examples that were companies that were solid businesses and were making money but were working in categories where it was not really realistic to expect them to grow into national brands. So I’m guessing that that potential was important. And from what I gather, it was very relevant also that the founders were coachable. Because that’s something that happens a lot. And for us, frankly, a year ago, I don’t think we would have been the best candidates. Because it took us a lot of time to recognize what our shortcomings were. So we’re at a position where, “Okay, we are asking for help. We’re looking for help, and we know exactly what help we need.”

Paul Downs:
I think it’s really interesting you use the word coachable, which is a word I haven’t used since I coached kids playing soccer, but I think that is a pretty critical indicator of potential success for any business person. But I’m curious what you think the definition of that is.

Hans Schrei:
The way I see it is having this appreciation of your strengths and weaknesses. Because what’s gonna happen, for the most part, is that you’re gonna realize—and this is where we find ourselves—what took you this far as a founder is not necessarily what is gonna take you the rest of the way. But if you want to grow a company into a national or international brand, then that means we’re going to have to find the very, very, very clear-headed expert on branding, the expert on finance, the expert on logistics, instead of thinking that you know everything. So it is a process. At some point, you realize that your role within the company needs to change.

Paul Downs:
Who was funding this? Why are they doing this? Do they want to take a position in your company?

Hans Schrei:
They take a little equity in the company. And the mentors, they make a small investment into the accelerator, like they pay a fee. I’m not sure how much it is. I know that it’s something significant. So I guess they do have skin in the game. And the equity gets distributed between the accelerator itself and the mentors. So down the line, it ends up being a tiny, tiny piece of equity, but there’s some upside for them.

Shawn Busse:
What’s a tiny, tiny piece of equity look like?

Hans Schrei:
I cannot say that, because every deal is under an NDA.

Shawn Busse:
Oh, so they negotiate with each individual accelerator member on a one-to-one basis?

Hans Schrei:
That is my understanding. Frankly, I don’t know. But I do know that it is under an NDA. I mean, it’s a small piece. I’ll tell you, it’s under 10 percent of the equity. And it gets distributed to between 60 or 70 people. So it’s a tiny, tiny sliver for each.

Loren Feldman:
Tiny for them, but significant for you. Did you have any second thoughts about whether it would be worth that kind of equity?

Hans Schrei:
Yeah, for sure. Once we were accepted, we had to go and ask questions to people who have gone through it—people who were a part of it that we knew, people who had considered being a part of it but said no. And to see: Is this worth it for us? And it was a hard decision. And frankly, we kept them on pins and needles for a while because we couldn’t really make up our minds. But all things said, I’m glad that we did.

Loren Feldman:
You were in the program for 13 weeks, both you and Luis, your partner. How did the business do while you were in the accelerator?

Hans Schrei:
There was a lot of stress. It was like having two jobs, frankly.

Loren Feldman:
You were still trying to run the business at the same time. You didn’t delegate that?

Hans Schrei:
I mean, there was no one to delegate it to. So we did slow down on like all new launches and that type of thing, because the focus was here. So we automated as much as we could, I guess. But yeah, it was like having two jobs.

Loren Feldman:
And were there performance issues?

Hans Schrei:
No, no, I mean, not really. Because at the end of the day, you are working on things that are related to the business. So you’re looking at the most urgent things first. So that really helped, and getting perspective really helps.

Loren Feldman:
I think you said earlier that one of the things you most wanted to get out of this experience was to learn an approach to funding that would work for you. I’m curious whether you feel you came away with a clear vision of how you want to approach that, going forward?

Hans Schrei:
So one of the exercises that I’ve never even thought of doing was the equity cascade for successful rounds. So like, of course, you say, “As a founder, I would rather have 20 percent of a $100 million company than I want to have 100 percent of a $1 million company.” That makes sense. That’s $1 million versus $20 million.

The problem is that you’re not the only factor in this ecosystem. So by the time you are holding just 20 percent of your company, you’re also looking at you’re not really being in control of your destiny anymore. And that is a part of it that is normal, but it’s a type of thing that you want to really ask yourself, “Is this where I want to go? Is this something that I will be comfortable doing down the line or not?”

Loren Feldman:
So did that experience change your view of where you’d like to fall on that continuum, in terms of how much of the business you control?

Hans Schrei:
I think it didn’t change it, but it did give me a more nuanced perspective, I would say. But down the line, at some point, you’re gonna lose control, most likely. If you really want to grow, you’re gonna lose control. And that is fine. But you want to lose control at a point when you have proven yourself and when you have options.

Loren Feldman:
Did you have any kind of demo day at the end of it? Did this lead up to you pitching to potential funding sources?

Hans Schrei:
Yes. That was last Tuesday.

Loren Feldman:
How’d that go?

Hans Schrei:
It was a lot of fun. You know, even that is a learning experience, because there’s a lot to be said about knowing your audience. It was fine. I wouldn’t say that it was not successful, like our own pitch, but I think it would have been way stronger had we asked ourselves the question: Who is gonna be listening to this? And we really didn’t.

So we had this amazing presentation. It was beautiful. We talked a lot about our mission, about our brand. We didn’t really talk much about the financials, which makes sense in certain contexts. I’m not sure it made sense there. But frankly, I would have liked to do this knowing who I was pitching, and I didn’t. So that was on me for not asking, frankly.

Paul Downs:
If you’re selling anything, knowing who you’re selling to is pretty basic. We deploy all kinds of different playbooks, depending on who we’re speaking to.

Hans Schrei:
Yeah, absolutely. The nice thing about this is that this is a controlled environment. All the people who we were in front of were within the ecosystem. So you kind of have a little taste of the real world, if you will. So yeah, that was a mistake. That was a mistake, but you learn. I can promise you, that mistake won’t happen to me again

Loren Feldman:
It seems like the kind of thing that they might have coached you on. I’m surprised they didn’t give you a better feel for that.

Hans Schrei:
This is the thing. You wish you would go to an accelerator, and they’re going to tell you, “Oh, this is what you have to do.” That is not how it works. What’s going to happen is that you’re gonna get exposed to a ton of different perspectives. And, of course, you get coached, and you get some direction. But for the most part, it’s also about you being able to walk through that the same way that you would do in real life.

Loren Feldman:
Shawn, I think you told us about going through a program that EO offers fairly early in your journey. What was it anything like this?

Shawn Busse:
I think considerably different. I mean, for context, I did this in the end of 2009. I think it might be called EO Accelerator. But it’s a really structured—or at least the way it was run then—it was a really structured curriculum. It was designed as a three-year program to get your company up to a million dollars in annual revenue, and you had to be at least $250,000 a year in sales.

So a very, very different thing. There was no investing component to it. And because it was a three-year program, it was pretty in-depth around each of the different areas of the business. I had been running the business for nine years, by the time I joined it, but I really didn’t know anything about business. So I really wasn’t living up to our potential, and the accelerator program really unlocked that potential for us. That’s when we saw really considerable growth year after year.

Loren Feldman:
Is there something specific you would point to that unlocked that potential for you, that you got out of it?

Shawn Busse:
I mean, a lot of it was being exposed to how to think about a business, how to look at finance, how to look at your operations, how to look at culture, hiring, just a lot of fundamentals that I was never exposed to. And then I would say the most important part was strategy and business valuation. So I focused a lot on what made a business worth something and really built the organization around that—things like recurring revenue as opposed to project revenue, things like low turnover of employees, things like higher value customers that valued you for what you did, as opposed to transactional relationships. So a lot about strategy, in that case.

Loren Feldman:
Paul, I don’t think there were accelerator programs when you started your business, but you’ve spoken here about how you feel it was a real turning point for you when you started getting some outside perspective on your business, in part from participating in a peer group setting like Vistage.

Paul Downs:
Yeah, well, it was a turning point, but it was 26 years after I started.

Loren Feldman:
So you survived 26 years. Do you think an accelerator of some sort would have been of interest to you, had it existed back then?

Paul Downs:
Absolutely. Although I was probably too dumb to realize the value of it. But I would say that, for anybody who’s trying to start a business, just getting out of your office and talking to more people is almost always worth doing. And we just saw that when we all went to Chicago a couple of weeks ago, but you will meet people who know more than you. And if you’re smart enough to listen to them, it’s going to open up worlds of new information, plus building a network of people you can call to help you.

And I think it’s very, very difficult, particularly these days, to even imagine someone succeeding without building a network, reaching out, making use of the ease of connection that we’ve been blessed with. And so I think that these things are great, and I definitely would have done it.

Shawn Busse:
Yeah, I mean, I think about, for example, the period of time in the early pandemic days. When the government put out the PPP funding, the people who were networked in and who had connections and knew how to navigate that terrain, they got money so much faster than those who didn’t have those resources. And the same with other issues like the employee retention tax credit. As I look back on my career, I could tie all of its success to the network and the people around me. Being isolated is just a bad idea.

Hans Schrei:
That was what I found the most valuable about the whole thing, that it was people who, of course, I could reach out to them, but getting to know them in this mentor-mentee relationship, instead of just professionally, really allowed for a lot of things. I guess it helps you put yourself in this position of vulnerability, because when you have your business hat on, you want to come across that you have it together.

So talking to this guy, for instance, our lead mentor used to run M&A for Coca-Cola for years. And there was the equivalent for Pepsi. And these were guys who are crazy experienced who have seen the biggest brands, how they move, and how they operate. And had I met them on the street, I would have been a lot more self-conscious about asking questions.

So here’s the safe space, if you will, to say, “You know what? I don’t have my shit together. Could you help me?” And what I really enjoyed, a week after, is we’re still talking to a bunch of them. So it really allows for this closeness, because you’re talking to those people week in and week out. And for us, particularly as immigrants, we don’t have a network per se. It really was helpful.

Loren Feldman:
Well, also, you’re talking to these people, and you’re not just asking if you can pick their brains, they have a stake in the outcome. They benefit if you do better.

Hans Schrei:
Exactly. So you can actually ask them for stuff like, “Hey, can you do this for me?” Or, “Can you make this introduction?” Or, “Can you look at my model? Check this out, because I’m not sure.” It’s way different. So at the end of the day, just having the network, it just makes a lot of things easier. Because, frankly, I spent a lot of time asking people, “This is what I want to do. I’m pretty sure that I’m missing something. What is it that I’m missing?”

Loren Feldman:
So, last question, Hans: What has to happen for you to know that this experience was successful?

Hans Schrei:
I already know that. You know what, there’s a lot to be said for knowing yourself better and understanding both the good and the bad. As a founder, you tend to be a generalist. You know a little bit about everything. And there are some things that are more your inclination. In my case, marketing is definitely my thing. One of my weaknesses, personally, is in the leadership side of things. Because I tend to be focused on, “Oh, the spreadsheet says that this should be this and this,” and the reality is that, well, there are humans actually doing the things. So you need to take that into account. And that’s something that I have learned a lot about. So I would say, even if our company folded tomorrow, I would say I am in such a better place to find a new one, if I had to.

Loren Feldman:
Well, let’s hope it doesn’t come to that.

Hans Schrei:
I really don’t think it will. But I do think that the experience is worth it. And think of this: I mean, I really hope that we’re gonna sell our company for hundreds of millions of dollars. Sure. I am also aware that the possibility of that happening is limited. So this is not a sure thing, by any means, no matter how good I am. Even if I was the perfect operator and the perfect founder and everything was perfect, there are a lot of things that are going to be out of our control for many, many years. My husband and I always talk about this: If you wait to start living your life until you’re rich, or until you have accomplished this and this and this and that, you’re gonna be waiting a long time with no guarantee that it’s gonna actually come.

Loren Feldman:
All right, I want to hit a couple other topics in the time we have left. One is, Shawn, because of your activity on LinkedIn, I learned recently that you attended an unusual—well, not an unusual college graduation, but it was kind of unusual that you went to this college graduation. Can you tell us about that?

Shawn Busse:
Yeah, sure. I haven’t been to a graduation ceremony in a long time. But one of my longtime employees, Susie, in the pandemic, decided to use the opportunity to go back to school. And she’s been with us for, I don’t know, nine years or so. And it’s always been sort of a hope for me that she would want to go back to school, because I think it would just do some really great things for her. And so she decided to do that, and we supported it. And so she was going to school full-time, while working for us full-time. And so when she graduated, I decided to go down to San Diego where she graduated from and congratulate her. Yeah, it was great.

Loren Feldman:
Was it a big deal when you hired her that she didn’t have a college degree, at that point?

Shawn Busse:
No, it’s kind of funny. You know, Susie, has everything you want in an employee, right? She’s got the right attitude. She’s a go-getter, hustles like crazy, and she’s got incredible skills. She can run a spreadsheet like nobody’s business. She’s a fantastic writer. She’s just had a really great career.

But what was really interesting is that when I met her, she was trying really hard to make a career change. She was trying to get out of hospitality and into creative services, and nobody would hire her. She didn’t have the degree, and she didn’t have the work experience. She’s just really talented. And you know, what really got her the job was she had had a blog that she was running at the time, and so she was just writing her own kind of personal stuff. And it was fantastic. So I kind of hired her on the spot.

Loren Feldman:
You don’t often hear of business owners attending the college graduations of their employees. Was that just a spur of the moment thing? Or was it something that you thought about from the time she went back to school?

Shawn Busse:
Yeah, actually, it was maybe somewhere in between those two. I’ve gone to employees’ weddings, I’ve kind of helped them with the process of buying houses, and sort of coaching them through that kind of stuff. And I mean, these are big life events. And I think that it’s just a good thing to celebrate your employees’ accomplishments. San Diego is a two-hour flight from Portland. So it’s not really that difficult. I tend to have relationships with employees that are hopefully a little bit deeper than just the working-together relationship. I think that’s part of the reason we have low turnover.

Loren Feldman:
Are you at all concerned that now that she has that degree, and you just gave her that great plug here on the podcast, that you’re gonna lose her? [Laughter]

Shawn Busse:
No, I mean, I don’t think you can live your life worrying about losing employees. I think you just have to be gracious and celebrate people for their awesomeness and hope that you provide the kind of place where they want to stay. I think we’ve done that. And over the years, I’ll occasionally meet an owner who’s like, “Well, I don’t want to put my employees names on our website, because people will poach our employees.” And I think that’s thinking about things in the wrong way.

Loren Feldman:
I’ve heard that many times.

Shawn Busse:
I think you need to think about how you’re keeping people excited to be there as opposed to fearful of others, quote-unquote, taking your employees. With LinkedIn now, all that kind of thinking is kind of moot. Recruiters know who works for you, and they’re calling them and emailing them all the time. So I think it’s your job as an owner to create a great place to work. That’s your job. And if you’re not doing that, you have bigger problems than whether your employee’s on your website.

Loren Feldman:
Paul, I wanted to ask, you recently managed to take a vacation. Tell us where you went.

Paul Downs:
I went to Ireland. My wife is an artist, and she went with a group of other painters for a week of painting the Irish countryside. And I had no particular role in all that. So I just got to hang around in the Irish countryside for a week doing very little, and it was lovely.

Loren Feldman:
Has this been something that you’ve been able to do through the years?

Paul Downs:
No. From 1986 to 2017, I don’t think I ever took more than two days off work.

Loren Feldman:
Ouch.

Shawn Busse:
Oh my God, Paul.

Loren Feldman:
I think Hans was just talking about not waiting until you’re successful to enjoy your life.

Paul Downs:
Well, a big piece of that was my personal situation with my autistic son just made it difficult to travel. So even if I had just left work and stayed home, it’s not like we could throw the family on an airplane and go places until his situation was sorted out. I mean, don’t get me started on some interesting travel moments with an autistic kid, but it’s not easy to travel when you’ve got a challenge like that in your personal life. And it was just something that, you know, that’s just how it happened. But then, once he was out of the house and settled into an adult living situation, then my wife and I were able to travel more.

Now, I’m not a huge traveler, it’s not like I get up every morning pining to go somewhere. So usually what happens is she will initiate something like, “Hey, I want to go here. I want to see this.” And I resist, and then at a certain point, she’s like, “I’m serious.” And then I have to take over and do all the bookings, because she just doesn’t do any of that. And so I’m swearing until the moment we get on the plane. And then when we get there, it’s almost always lovely. And I’m happy I did it, but I hate the wind up for it.

Loren Feldman:
You have told us on the podcast, in the past, that if you got hit by that proverbial truck, your business would not be in great shape. How’d it do for a week without you?

Paul Downs:
For a week, it was no problem. I could probably take up to, I would say, three weeks without much difficulty. And the biggest thing that requires me to be around is I’m still signing checks and reviewing checks that go out. Aside from that, I mean, first of all, when you travel, it doesn’t mean you’re not seeing what’s going on in the business. I have my business set up so that there’s information that I would like to see available via the internet from anywhere in the world. So I can see my emails, and I can see the orders that came in. I can see our cash flow.

So, even when I’m out in the middle of nowhere, as long as there’s an internet connection, I can reassure myself that things have not gone completely over the edge. But in terms of just the people, they barely know whether I’m here or not. I came back after the three days I was in Chicago and then immediately went to Ireland, so basically gone for two weeks. And a number of them were like, “Oh, there you are. You know, he’s back, whatever.” Which is good. That’s exactly what I want: a team that gets along and gets work done, and everybody understands what has to happen. They don’t need me around every minute of the day, and I take advantage of that. I don’t try to micromanage them in any way.

Shawn Busse:
All right. So the real question, though, is since, Loren is a terrible self-promoter, what about Chicago? Tell us about that.

Paul Downs:
Do you want Loren to tell or me to tell?

Shawn Busse:
I want you to tell us, Paul. Like, why did you go? And what did you get out of it?

Paul Downs:
Well, why did I go? As I said at the beginning of the show, I believe there’s always value in just meeting a new group of people. And I really like a format where you actually have some time to sit down with every single person and get to know them a little bit. I also have faith in Loren that he’s going to put together an event that’s just basically valuable. I mean, he’s been to 10 million small business conferences, I believe. So you probably know what’s good about them, what’s bad about them. And it was a chance to meet some of the people I’d interacted with on the podcast, but I’ve never met face to face.

And I would say that it was a well-managed event. There was never any useless downtime. Everything that Loren planned seemed to be well thought out. Jay Goltz deserves a huge shoutout for being an extremely gracious host, and Chicago’s a nice place to visit and the weather was good. So, yeah, it was good.

And Loren has such an interesting mix of people, I’ve gotta say. We were in Jay’s boardroom, and I’m looking around the room. And there’s something really weird happening here. And what it was is that, for the first time in my entire life where I was in some kind of business situation, there were more women than men. And a huge shout out to Loren for being able to find a diverse group of people to get together that really reflects what the future of business is going to look like.

Of all the people who were there, I know Liz Picarazzi best, because she and I have known each other for a number of years. And she would probably be the one to comment on this. But I have a feeling that, for your average founder who walks into a room of 50-plus-year-old white guys, there’s an intimidation factor. And so I was just really happy to see successful business owners in a mix of demographics that really looks like the country. And that’s so unusual. So six stars for Loren for putting that together.

Loren Feldman:
I did not pay Paul to say that. But I would have.

Shawn Busse:
What did you learn from it, Loren? What did you get out of it?

Loren Feldman:
You know, for me, I viewed it as an opportunity to kind of prove that there’s real potential to create a 21 Hats community, and that if you brought people together, they would connect. And I made some mistakes. I definitely learned some important lessons doing it, but it exceeded my expectations, in many ways.

You know, it almost felt like a family reunion. The group came together really quickly and just seemed to feel really comfortable. And we discussed some difficult issues, and people let their guard down. And to Paul’s point, one of the things that I did decide, based on all the business conferences I’ve been to previously, is, the one thing I’ve just heard over and over again is, “I just wish there’d been more time to get to know the other people who attended the conference. There seemed to be some really great people there.” So I did go all in on that. There were no speakers. We just talked, and I felt like it worked.

Paul Downs:
I think that that’s a huge plus, honestly. We all got together for drinks, the first evening. Everybody was arriving, and there’s sort of like, “Ahh, strangers. How are we gonna get along?” But everybody there was absolutely worth knowing. There was a depth of knowledge, and then a generosity to share what people knew about their own particular business, their own particular sector that they worked in. And there was a broad range of people doing different things. And it was just super valuable to have that time without being lectured to. So kudos to Loren.

Loren Feldman:
Well, thank you, Paul. I really appreciate all of that. And the biggest thing that came out of it for me is I definitely am going to do another. And hopefully, maybe Shawn and Hans will join us on the next one.

Hans Schrei:
Yeah, definitely.

Shawn Busse:
Congratulations. I mean, as somebody who’s organized a conference before, it is no small feat. Even a small group is a real challenge. And it says a lot about the kind of relationships you’ve built over the years that people were willing to really take a risk, sight unseen. And I think you really hit on something there about speakers. You know, we’re organizing Catalyst for our fourth year. The feedback we’ve gotten in years past has been similar. It’s that people want time to connect to each other, and make it less about the speakers.

And the paradox to that is that people often choose to go to events because of the speakers. So it’s a real tough needle to thread because you want to get people to come, which is typically, “Look at the speakers that we have!” But actually, when they get there, they don’t care that much about the speakers. They really care about who’s in the room with them. And that’s a neat trick that you’ve pulled off there. And I think it means you have deep relationships with people, and I think it says a lot about who you are and also the value provided connecting people who share values with each other. Yeah, great job, man.

Loren Feldman:
I appreciate that. Well, before you guys embarrass me any further, my thanks to Paul Downs, to Shawn Busse, and to Hans Schrei, and to our sponsor, the Great Game of Business, which helps businesses use an open-book management system to build healthier companies. You can learn more at Greatgame.com. Thanks, everybody.