478: Why Hope Is a Strategy with Brad Pedersen of Pela and Lomi

29:03However, if you're thinking of starting your own business and you want to hear from some incredible stories from everyday people like you or I who are actually in the trenches, only been building their business for maybe one year or two years, like they're building right now and they're really in the early stages, but they're getting success. You should come and check out our new podcast from zero to founder hosted by our community manager, Molly Flynn. These are in the trenches stories from our very own successful students that have gone through some of our programs. People just like you who are deep within the process of building their very own successful business.

29:42These are the founders of tomorrow. You can find the From Zero to Founder podcast on all platforms. And remember, it's founder without the E. All right, now let's jump in the show. Coming back to kind of, I guess, the idea of failure or having a business that didn't work out, what advice would you give to founders that have been in this position where they've created a company and it didn't work out and are looking to start again? Look, I'm a big believer in starting over again. I think you should expect that during your life, you will have seven or eight opportunities to really make a meaningful impact like a tent pull event in your life and while life is short in the grand scheme of things when you consider all of eternity it's not that long you know you should expect that you're going to live about 100 years if you're listening to this podcast the average age right now is i think coming up into the high 70s or early 80s and they're getting better at um at extending life and not just extending, but quality of life.

30:51I mean, I listened to a podcast the other day with Ed Milet and the gal being interviewed and her name was Gladys. She's 102 years old and her clarity blew my mind. And I was like, wow, that's a lot of hope. So since life is also long, which is a truism, that, you know, if you break it down into five to 10 year tranches of time, that's a lot of time to be able to create impact. So look at every opportunity as a learning opportunity. Everything that's happened to you didn't happen to you, it happened for you. And it's the opportunity for you to reflect and to take the lessons. And you know, there's kind of like three, when bad things happen, there's sort of three opportunities you have, okay?

31:35The first is you can be a victim. You can just simply say, life dealt me bad cards, I'm a victim, and you're going to suffer from something I call the four B's, which number one, you're going to be blind to how you co-created the outcome. You're going to be begrudging of other people who are successful and somehow they got lucky, right? You see them going by, begrudging of them. You're going to be blaming all the circumstances and people around you. And ultimately, you're going to be bitter. And as I think it was Nelson Mandela said, you know, becoming bitter towards someone else or to some situation is like drinking a bottle of poison, hoping that it's going to inflict pain on someone else.

32:17And of course, I'm paraphrasing that. So that is the one choice. You could become the victim or you become the bystander, which is, you know, life dealt me a hard hand and I just got my hands smacked. And you know what? I've decided that instead of actually leaning in, I'm going to just choose to be passive and be more on the sidelines. Yeah, I'm going to do enough just to get by. You know, I had big dreams and bad aspirations, but I'd rather just sort of like not try too hard because I didn't like the pain that came from that situation. The third option is you can be the champion. And what do champions do?

32:56Champions get up and go again. They continue to choose to be the heroes amongst their hero's journey. They take all the wisdom they can from their wounds. They turn the adversity to their advantage. They allow the challenges to forge their character. You know, when you fail in life, challenges will either beat the strength out of you or beat the strength into you. You choose. You're going to face challenges. And all our challenges are going to be different. But at the end of the day, it's a required part of our humanity. I think it was Maslow who came up with like what the basic needs for humans are.

33:32You need like water, shelter, companionship, food. These are kind of the baseline things. Well, I'd add to that, you need struggle. Like you literally do not become any, nothing great ever happens without the ability to go through the crucible of difficulties. And while our difficulties are going to be different for all of us, like my father told me that if money can solve my problems, it's not really a problem. And quite frankly, all my problems pretty much have been money problems. I don't have health problems. I don't have family problems. Thank God. But money problems, I know a lot about. I've had a bunch of those.

34:10And so everybody's challenges are going to be different. But at the end of the day, those challenges are there to refine you and not to define you. So if you have gone through difficulties, you are going through difficulties, my advice to you is choose to find the lessons that are there that can help you choose again. and choose in ways that will help you advance yourself to become the best and best version of yourself. Yeah. Yeah. Look, that was incredible. I, yeah, I can't agree more, but being in that is so difficult, right? When you're in it, it is so difficult sometimes to see that light.

34:50And did you have any, did you have a really great support network? Did you, you know, like what did that look like? Were there any external things that really helped you when you were in those positions? Yeah. I mean, I would tell people that the underpinning of my sport was my, my wife. She's, she probably should have hit the eject button several times on our journey. We've been together over 30 years. Um, when she said, you know, I marry you for better or worse. I'm pretty sure she said not for this. And, uh, but she never did. And I'm so grateful for that. it was the one thing that became kind of the backstop.

35:32Rock Bodden can become a great foundation to build from because you get to start over. You can't go any lower. It's a great foundation just to start again. And it particularly is helpful when you have a partner in life who's going to be standing beside you. And she never wavered. And there was tough days. Lawyers came to the house to collect on it, you know, and that was a really tough day for her. Um, so I think, um, beyond that, my faith and I, uh, you know, I, I daily, the mantra for me became Proverbs three, five, and six, which says, trust in the Lord with all your heart, lean not on your own understanding in all your ways, acknowledge him and he will guide your paths.

36:11I said that over and over and over. I'd go to the gym in the mornings and I just literally, this was my mantra. I'd be meditating. I would just say that over and over again. And it just, it helped instill hope. You know, I believe there's two things that fundamentally motivate all human behavior, fear and hope. Fear is natural. It's just not optimal, but it's the natural, it's that reptilian brain of like something happens and we automatically default to fear. And that's part of what's kept us alive. And when saber tooth tigers are chasing us, you know, millennia ago, what kept us alive. And so it's really naturally where we go to, but hope is more powerful.

36:56And it's, what do I need to do to continue to just hit the drum of hope? If you, if you like sports, you see this happen all the time and pick whatever sport you want. I mean, the recent World Cup is maybe a good example, right? Where Argentina was up to nothing. And I think it was in the 75th minute, France scored a goal. I mean, it looked like Argentina was going to walk away with that game because, you know, they were just, they dominated the field, they dominated possession. And then all of a sudden a goal was scored and suddenly France had hope. And that game transition. Ultimately, Argentina won.

37:33But let me tell you, it wasn't an obvious outcome, right? I mean, it went right to, it was probably the most exciting World Cups I've ever seen to see France come back and score two goals quickly like that. And then to go to overtime, it was incredible, but it was there you saw when teams have hope, they are playing to win. When teams have fear, they're playing not to lose. Playing to win is often way more powerful than playing not to lose. And so my encouragement to anybody who's going through difficulties is find ways that will inspire hope. Surround yourself with people who will actually build hope into you.

38:08They're balcony people that'll help lift you up instead of pull you down. And I can tell you between my wife, my faith, and I have a very small network. Because you kind of pointed something out. There was a lot of shame. When you go through difficulties, you find out who your real friends are. There's a bunch of fairweather friends who like being around you when things are great. When you smell like bankruptcy, it's very revealing about who really cares about you and who sees the inner character that ultimately will prevail. Because time and character over time ultimately will demonstrate what's true.

38:47Yeah, I agree. One last question on this, and then I want to move to Pilar and Lomi. You talk about hope, right? When you're going through a turnaround phase, you're going for a rebuild phase or starting from scratch again. Strategies can't be built on hope though. Well, I think I agree. You hear the statement, hope is not a strategy. look I think it comes down to hope is a part of our human emotion and if you think about what hope is hope is not something that can happen in the past that was regret hope can't be in the now that's being realized hope can only ever live in the future it's something you're hoping for so it speaks to reimagining a future that can be better and if that's all you have then you're right, it potentially could just be a fantasy.

39:46The value of hope is that it lays out a vision for the future, something you can imagine. And the right entrepreneur will now put the building blocks in place that takes what you've imagined and make it into reality. But it starts with hope. And I have a thesis on this. I call it the courage flywheel. And hope is a part of it because it is about imagining. But courage is of the four original virtues that Aristotle talked about. I think courage is the most powerful because it requires action. And the best definition I've come up with courage is that it's taking action despite uncertainty. It's that bliss point between recklessness and cowardice.

40:28You're right in the middle there. And there's a flywheel that I think that builds an entrepreneur's capacity to grow themselves and starts with curiosity. I call it the six C's. Curiosity is the first thing. You get curious about a problem you want to solve. That thing goes into creativity. You creatively come up with a solution, but ultimately it takes the courage to actually try, right? I mean, just having ideas, ideas are like noses. Everybody has one. Taking that idea and putting it in action, the courage to do that, that's when the real rubber hits the road. And once you do that, you should expect challenges.

41:05That's just part of the deal. We'll talk about that even with like, with Pila and Lomi because there's a whole bunch of challenges that we had to overcome as we've been trying to create that category. And the challenges then form your character. They give you a new sense of understanding about yourself and your ability to push through those pains and often more creativity along the way. And if you're building character, that leads to confidence and confidence ultimately gets you back to being more curious again, which starts the process of creativity, courage, and on and on. And it builds a flywheel that grows you.

41:37So hope is on its own, not that helpful, but with intentional action and the courage to actually attempt to build things and put them into reality, it's incredibly powerful. That makes sense. Thank you for sharing. So let's talk about Pila. Can you share how you were able to develop the first iteration of the phone case? Yeah. Great. Great question. So maybe I can just kind of play into the story of me getting fired and how I ended up falling into this opportunity, if that's helpful. Yeah. That is very helpful. Let's start there. And I think it speaks to the power of associations too. So back in 2012, I joined a mastermind talks group.

42:23This is an entrepreneurial meetup with a bunch of really fascinating founders from around the planet, really incredible people. And, um, uh, you know, some of my best friends come from that to, to this day. Um, we were at a meetup in 2015 in Napa Valley. And while I was there, I met an entrepreneur by the name of Matthew Bertulli and Matt and I discovered that we were both from Toronto. We both were founders and we both had a passion for mountain biking. And so we decided when we get back to Toronto, we're going to hang out and do stuff together. Um, so that's exactly what happened. And our relationship grew and eventually we actually became a part of the EO form together.

43:00And, uh, you know, we, we just built a really great relationship. Um, I had just been fired from my, my toy company and I was at one of our, uh, EO forum meetings in Boston and we had a delay in the airport. And, um, that delay proved to be providential to where I am today because we sat in this lounge, drinking a glass of wine talking and he was mentioning about a company he'd invested into called Pila that made these biodegradable compostable phone cases. And the founder, a guy named Jeremy had come up with the material science of how to create them, but he just didn't know how to market them.

43:37Well, Matt is a world-class marketer and he started doing the marketing and all of a sudden it was growing like crazy and they couldn't keep up. They couldn't scale it. There wasn't enough capacity to meet that. And all the problems he was describing they were having, I'm like, I've shipped a billions of places of toys around the planet. I know exactly how to scale something like this. And as we talked about the opportunity, it just became obvious that maybe there was a way for us to work together. But, you know, kind of like wisdom from your wounds, I didn't want to rush into a partnership where I'd end up like being fired from a company that I would co-found sometime later.

44:12So we decided to take the time to really figure out, did we have a proper fit as founders, as co-founders. And we went through, did assessments, personality tests, took some time, and it just, it worked really well. I mean, we just looked at skills and backgrounds and sets, and we had external coaches kind of look at it and they said, yeah, it looks like you guys are all a really good fit and would work together. So in the spring of 18, I became the co-founder of Peel the Case. And Peel the Case makes compostable, biodegradable, protective wear for smart devices. You know, phone cases, AirPod cases, straps, watches, even my ring is made out of the peel of material.

44:54And it's super cool because at the end of life, you can put these into a home composting bin and they return to the planet responsibly. They go back to being dirt. One of the challenges that we ran into, and this kind of leads to Lomi, if you want me to continue to tell that part of the story, because most people ask me like, how are they connected? so um most people don't have access to home composting infrastructure and or if they have industrial infrastructure for composting um most industrial composters don't take compostable biodegradable materials they take food waste and then they don't want to try the other stuff because they don't know what is or is not so they filter it out and they just send it to landfill and that's not really the right environment so we started thinking about how do we solve that problem and uh and that's ultimately what led to lomi and uh you know lomi was designed to resolve the end of life for the um the the organic waste that we were creating through our end of life of our phone cases but also turned out to be an incredibly valuable tool for food waste and then we discovered well food waste is a massive problem in fact um as a contributor to greenhouse gas emissions it's one of the top because of the methane gas emissions that are out there and if we could solve that problem, it would make massive difference and dent in how climate change is, you know, continue to propagate across the planet.

46:15And we're reading about in the headlines today, right? Record temperatures throughout the world. It's, I think people are starting to say, hmm, I don't know this is a theory anymore. I think it's real. The unexpected great. Okay. So we've, we've, we've, we created this machine. It's, you know, we call it a magic dirt making machine. The unexpected great was that we found out that the output that we call loamy earth turns out to be his really valuable regenerative output that is a superfood for plants. And it not only is great for plants, but it also is a carbon sequesterer. And so we're in the process of actually validating that Lomi will be a carbon asset, which is incredibly cool that we're not only diverting methane or eliminating that altogether, but also now creating something that captures carbon and helps do decarbonization at a mass level.

47:05So we launched this product on a crowdfunding campaign in April of 2021. It went on to become the largest cleantech crowdfunding campaign of all time. We have since shipped close to 200 ,000 units into the market. It's right now focused in North America, but we're very quickly evolving so that you will be able to get these in Australia and other places in the world very soon. and uh i couldn't tell you that i just feel so excited about the impact that this is making um and aligned with my worldviews and values being put towards an enterprise a social enterprise that ultimately will make a difference a hundred years from now when i'm not here that this will have made a difference for that generation and it just feels so cool and i feel very humbled and grateful to be a part of it yeah man i have to say that that is uh there's so much i want to ask like i've We've got tons of questions, but I'm conscious of time as well.

47:58It's almost been an hour. This has been awesome. Are you hesitating to take the next step in your e-commerce journey? Founder Plus has you covered. With proven frameworks tailored to your business needs for fast results, a supportive community of over 30 ,000 like-minded entrepreneurs, and weekly live mentorship sessions, Founder Plus is your key to success. Try Founder Plus today for just$1 for seven days and start building your dream business with confidence. You can visit founder.com forward slash start dollar trial or click the link in the description to claim your trial. Look, a couple of questions, right?

48:32With Lomi, you guys raised$9 million, give or take, just from that crowdfunding campaign. That's really, really, really impressive. Can you share like any advice or the marketing piece? We've done a crowdfunding campaign for Founder, but it was a long time ago. We sold a coffee table book. It was up there at one point in time with one of like the top 10 most crowdfunded books, but that was a long time ago now. But yeah, like advice on the marketing piece? Yeah, look, I mean, Matt would be way better to speak specifically to, you know, what were some of the key insights to the marketing. But I can just tell you from somebody who was deeply involved in a world.

49:16We, first of all, it requires a team. It requires focus. This is not something you do off the side of your desk. This is your lightning strike and you are creating an event that you're building around. And storytelling, that's the real magic. I mean, if you go back and look at the hero video that we used on a crowdfunding campaign, you can still see it. It's on YouTube today. That has been watched now almost 200 million times. Why? Because it was such brilliant storytelling, identifying the problem, seeing the world as it is and the world as it could be. And taking, you know, focusing on the pain versus like, okay, so let me step back and say that products that focus on being painkillers are more effective than those focused on being vitamins.

50:04They both have a place. And the cool thing about Lomi is it really is a vitamin. It's great for the planet. But we really focused on the painkiller side of it. Number one, food waste is gross. It's messy. There's rodents, there's pests, all kinds of stuff around that. And we really focus on that problem. But then we also tease out the aspiration of, hey, maybe with the push of a button, you can help solve a big problem that the world is facing. And I think that captured people's imagination. So, you know, I give, my partners are incredible at what they do. Matt is an amazing storyteller. And that video, a lot of that was his brainchild, which is why he's the face of that video.

50:44And certainly, you know, we just, we had a team focused on it. I will tell you that when we launched the campaign, our goal was a million dollars. And in crowdfunding, that is like, that's a unicorn. That's hard to do. I used to do crowdfunding campaigns back when I was in the toy business. And, you know, if you got to six figures, that was like, wow. I tell people in, you know, in comparison, Peloton did, I think 250 ,000 and their crowdfunding campaign, right? So to achieve$9 million on a crowdfunding campaign was like beyond our expectations. but that also teased out for us okay we went from you know do we have product market fit to we have product market fit now we need to figure out how do we scale and do this in a way that's sustainable and enduring awesome thank you for sharing um so you mentioned that uh was it you and matt they're an eo forum together correct yeah um so i used to i was at eo for five years now YPLR.

51:42Doing business is not encouraged. Yeah. You're 100 % right. How'd you get around that? Yeah. So no, no. I love that question because it's funny. You're right. You're not supposed to. I mean, it becomes... For you to show up in a forum and be able to speak truth, it's hard to have that happen when you have a conflict with someone in the group. um so it is the absolute right way to think about it so what ended up happening is that we uh we exited the forum at the next meeting because of the conflict so we were totally in integrity with living out the values of eo this this is a this is an interesting one uh somewhat controversial i feel like you'd be cool to to answer it um how do you respond to critiques that say no matter how eco-friendly your business is, its existence is inherently wasteful?

52:39I don't think I've had to respond to that question, but I'm going to give you as thoughtful of his response. Look, I think that it would be easy to look at the glass half full with the planet, its problems. I mean, one of the things I hear often is that reduce, reuse, recycle, and we need to enforce those values on developing countries. And I tell people that's not fair. Why would we enforce values on them that, quite frankly, we didn't have to live into when we were trying to achieve the quality life we have today? What we have to do is reimagine how we do these things in a way that is less harmful and in many cases actually helpful.

53:23You know, we used to power the world with whale oil. That's crazy when you think about it today. but at the time that was just what we did we just went out harvested whales or or or bat poop that was the other uh you know that was used for grease and lubricants as well as for for um for uh fuel and it's just what we knew at the time so we went from that type of economy to coal to petroleum and now we're transitioning to uh this electrification and all of these have been you know they have improved the quality of life they've improved the the the gdp of the countries the quality of life that we've been able to achieve as humans the best time in history to be alive right now right um and at the same time given us a more sustainable path because we are aware of the problems with what we're currently using so yeah i mean the best thing for this plan is probably just humans one way altogether right we it would probably strive really well about us.

54:25But that's not how it works. I believe we were called to actually be the caretakers of this planet. And I think we were given the God-given gifts to actually come up with sustainable solutions that benefit both people and the planet. And it's been greed and ego and a number of other things that have gotten in the way from us actually achieving that. But I think as we learn from our history, we will not repeat the mistakes. And I think we have the potential to actually design and develop a better future. And I actually believe we live in the greatest time ever. And I'm more inspired and excited about the future, even though we do face some really significant challenges, but there are some bold entrepreneurs out there who are doing really cool things to say, I want to be a part of the solution.

55:07Why not now? And why not me? Yeah, no, look, I hear it's incredibly rewarding when you're creating a product or a service that solves a deep problem, but then also drives humanity forward. That's an incredibly rewarding thing to be able to say that you can make a difference. So look, we have to move to the hot seat round and we're going to wrap. So rapid fire questions and answers, but I could talk to you all day, Brad. This has been awesome. What's your go-to outdoor activity? Mountain I'm biking. What daily habit makes you a better founder? I spend time in meditation and stretching. I do it together because I actually on my own can't sit my own thoughts just doing nothing.

55:55I stretch and I meditate at the same time and that helps me get through both. That's a good hack. What advice do you wish you knew when you'd started in business and entrepreneurship. My father said it to me. I'm not sure I heard it when he said it, but now that I remember it, it was profound. Don't despise the process for what it'll make of you. You're going to go through life and you're going to see challenges and look at them as what they are, character forming moments. They're building your character and your resilience to become the person that ultimately can be their best and brightest version of self.

56:34Last question, my favorite hot seat one. If you could have dinner with any entrepreneur dead or alive, who would it be and why? Gosh, that's a great question. I think I'd go with alive and I'd probably be Elon Musk. He seems like an obvious choice, I think, for a lot of founders, but I love the fact, if you know his story and where he was when he was at that sort of precipice with all his money was into Tesla and or SpaceX and both seemed to be failing. He literally was like living in other people's places and had no money left. And that's after having a massive exit from PayPal. So it hurts, I think, a lot of founders' heads to actually know that he took all those chips off the table and then put them back into the marketplace.

57:22What kind of courage, you know, what did he have to get? Like, I think my challenges are one thing. His challenges were in another level. And now he's got, you know, companies that are solving massive problems. I just would love to pick his brain about what was going to your mind back then? And could you see where you are today? Love to just pick his brand up. Yeah, I agree. Awesome. Well, look, Brad, thank you so much. This was an incredible interview. Thank you for just sharing so many just real experiences and raw experiences. I know this will help a lot of founders. So thank you again. Nathan's been great.

57:55I'll actually know you're one of the first podcasts I ever listened to. So I've been doing this for a long time. You're one of the OGs in the podcasting world. And I want to thank you for just being a beacon of hope to founders and entrepreneurs around the planet. Oh, thank you. That's really cool to hear. I'm honored. Thank you so much. Hey, guys. I hope you enjoyed this interview. As you might already know, our mission at Foundr is to help tens of millions of people every single week with our content, either start or grow their business, which is exactly why we're partnering with world-class founders such as Damon John, Alexa, Von Tobel, Greta Van Riel, and so many more to teach crucial skills such as negotiation, finance, e-commerce, and so much more.

58:43So if you'd like to get access to these free exclusive trainings, please go to founder.com forward slash free. These are 100%. We go super in depth on teaching a particular topic, and I know that you're going to love them if you enjoy this podcast. So just go to founder.com forward slash free. All right, guys, I'll see you in the next episode.