Advice Line with Carlton Calvin of Razor

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That's Framer.com slash built for 30% off. Framer.com slash built. Rules and restrictions may apply. Hello, and welcome to the advice line on how I built this lab. I'm Guy Raz. This is the place where we help try to solve your business challenges. Each week, I'm joined by a legendary founder, a former guest on the show, who will help me try to help you. And if you're building something and you need advice, give us a call and you just might be the next guest on the show. Our number is 1-800-433-1298. Leave us a one-minute message that tells us about your business and the issues or questions that you'd like help with. All right. Let's get to it. This week, I'm joined by Carlton Calvin. He's the founder and CEO of Razor USA. You've probably seen a Razor scooter. Maybe you've owned one or bought one for your kids. Carlton built Razor into a hugely successful company, turning an overnight craze into a classic toy. Carlton, it is great to have you back on the show. I love being here. Oh, we love having you. Well, so you were first on the show back in September of 2025. And as always, to anyone listening, if you haven't heard that episode, we'll put a link to it in the show notes. Really great story. And I have to say, as you will hear in the story, Carlton has this uncanny way of knowing what kids want even before it happens, including how about two decades ago, you caught wind of this sleek collapsible aluminum scooter was trending in Japan. You saw the potential immediately. You reached out to a factory that was making them. You locked down the exclusive US rights and then you brought them to the US. Before long, it was a massive, crazy, you were selling a million units at one point every single month. It makes me wonder, Carlton, I mean, obviously trends have changed and it's not a million units a month and the technology has changed. You also have electric scooters and electric bikes and so many of the products you sell. But do people still buy the old standard aluminum collapsible scooters? Absolutely. I think it's still our largest selling item by volume. So, you know, close to a million units a year. Wow. I know we talked about this when you were on the show about like succession, like you own this company. This is your company, right? Yeah. With partners. I mean, it's privately owned, I should say. Yeah. But, you know, you do a bunch of other things that we didn't really talk about on the show. You're interested in art and you support different initiatives. What do you sort of see your role in Razor? I mean, do you at some point think that you want to focus on. I absolutely am trying to do that. Yes, 100%. But this one part of it, I've got amazing people that work for me that are super capable, but this weird talent that I have for the new product, that's very, very hard to find a new person. I'm getting on in my years and I am trying to institutionalize it. Razor, my trend seeking abilities. I am actively trying to see if I can figure out how to teach people. I'm kind of a fun analytical person and I'm trying to analyze and see if I can come up with like an algorithm for it in some way. In a sense, right? What you're saying is you have developed this instinct or you have an instinct, but you've honed it over the years because you've picked some losers. It's normal. We all have, right? But you've picked a lot of winners. And in a world where there's lots of people out there, you've picked a lot of winners. In this space, looking for the next winner, it's got to be almost like the analogy I think of is going to the beach with a metal detector. And it's like bottle cap, bottle cap, bottle cap, bottle cap for hours and hours. Then maybe you get a quarter. And then if you're really lucky, you get a silver dollar once every month. Is looking for the next big toy kind of like that? It depends how energetic you are. And I think that what's been very sad, satisfying to me is that in going, trying to develop this algorithm, I'm exercising that organ much more aggressively than I have been in the last several years. I think for many years, I was even, I might say passive, just like, I don't have to go out and look. I'll just spot it when it comes. And it did, you know, it always came through for me. But now in the process of trying to make this transition, and I'm seeing a lot more opportunity. I think if you're really out there looking, you can see more, but it is rare. The things that really shift the culture are rare. But if you keep your eyes open, there's more than you would on an early thing. One that's probably people already know just burst like maybe two months ago is hacky sacks are coming back in a huge way. And Razor already has hacky sacks in the, you know, in the store start shipping this week. I mean, we moved very quickly to hop on that trend, but I've got many more on my plate right now. Carlton, I'm curious about, and earlier this year, you won a patent infringement case against some competitors who were doing copycats of one of your products, the Hoverboard, I think. And so you won that. And I, you know, from the outside perspective, you hear, oh, they won and you'd assume, oh, you got a bunch of money and whatever, but actually it can be a mixed bag, right? I mean, it costs a lot of money. It takes a lot of time. And in the end of the day, if you want to solve the problem, how, how has that been for you? I think that's a deep insight. I think I've learned a lot pursuing patents over the years. I think they're most helpful for an inventor going after a big company or big companies battling each other. My biggest challenge is we want our patent lawsuit that helps me clean up the market, but actually getting all those damages. They're, they're very small copycats. They don't actually have much money. No, there's no deep pockets at all. So it costs millions and millions of dollars to do a patent case. And then you get nothing except helping to clean up the market. It's very, very challenging. It's kind of demoralizing when you think about it, because it's like the system and the courts work so slowly. I mean, I guess by, by nature, by definition, they have to, but it, it really does disincentivize brands from protecting their products. And just, I guess many brands are saying, you know what? We're just going to focus on brand, the brand, rather than trying to go after these copycats gives me a waste of our time. That's exactly right. I just think that the copycats again, just to the point, they're so thin that there's, I mean, the patent system functions like in drugs or, you know, where you have big, deep pocket of people to sue. So you got to focus on the brand and you got to be, you got to focus on being quick and delivering a good product. Yeah. Carlton, we've got callers waiting online for your wise advice. So you ready to take our first call? Sure. All right. Let's bring in our first caller. You are on the line with Carlton Calvin, the founder of Razor. Please tell us your name and where you're calling from and a little bit about your business. Hi, guy. Hi, Carlton. Thanks for having me. My name is Sean Barasa. I'm calling from Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada. Wow. And I'm calling about a party game that I created called Eulogy. So the premise is everyone playing has had a funeral and the game helps you create the character. You're there to mourn the loss. And then the winning player gets to pick who's going to perform the eulogy for the character you just made. Wow. This sounds depressing, but I don't, I think it might be wrong. I think that this might actually be more of a funny game, right? I would be surprised if, based on the layout of the game, if anyone could make it a serious game, like, sorry, it's a serious subject, but the game itself just usually gets ridiculous. So in round one, you pull a portrait and it's kind of like Cartoon's humanity game flow. So each, uh, player takes a turn being the judge. In round one, they flip a portrait and everyone else writes a name down that they think goes with that portrait. Uh, put them into the game box and then they'll read one out. The judge picks their favorite name. Now we've named the character whose funeral we're at. The rest of the rounds are all different life stages. So birth and toddler, school age, young adult career, family life, old age, and death. So you bring them to life through all these different rounds in that same format. You write the answers and then, uh, you kill them and someone's got to perform the eulogy. So, oh, wow. And then how do you win? Uh, so each round has a point. So if, if, uh, if you write the answer that the judge selects for that round, so round two, a prompt would be something like, uh, we didn't have toys growing up. So we played with blank and the judge will pick their favorite of all the players who submitted. Got it. Okay. And it's called eulogy, but spelled Y O U legy. And how did, and how long have you been, when did you launch this, this idea? So this was a COVID, baby. Like I kinda, I'm an extrovert and I lost all my social outlets. And then I, uh, most of my mind, I tell people, and then I had the people in my bubble. I don't know if you guys had the bubble in the States where you could hang out with a certain amount of friends. And I was like, do you guys want to play a homemade board game? And everyone was kind of like, oh yeah, I want to play your homemade board game. But then when they left, they were like, oh my, like they wanted to play again and again, like it was a long night. Wow. So you decided to turn this into, yeah. So, uh, so right now we've, um, we did a Kickstarter in 2024 and then we got our product in 2025 now. And I haven't, I, like, I have a vision to make this, uh, replicate the basic game structure with different life events. So you're going to kind of get us the same game flow. If you know how to play one of our games, you'll know how to play them all. You'll get an entirely different experience based on, uh, based on what you're doing. Got it. Okay. And is this your full-time job, Sean? Uh, no, I'm, uh, by day I'm a registered nurse at the pediatric hospital in, uh, in the operating room. So amazing. Okay. So you have, and how many copies of the game have you sold so far? We've sold just shy of a thousand. Uh, and then on top of that, we've given some away. So we've got about an inventory of about 500 currently. Got it. Okay. And before we dive in further, tell us what your question is for us. Well, I've created something that like I've proven to myself as special. People have told me this is special. I have visions of this being the next household name and party games is my, my question is basically, how do I get it there? Got it. Carlton, uh, please say hello to Sean before we answer his question. Do you have any questions or thoughts for Sean? I think I understand. So, you know, again, I've been in the toy business for a long time. I do know that, you know, a very, very traditional way of getting your game out there is to bring it to a publisher, a toy, another toy company. And I think that's a super solid way to do it. Um, you know, I would often suggest to people who invent toys, it really depends on whether you love being in business, like, which I did, you know, I do. I mean, the day I started doing scorpion pogs, I was like hooked for the experience of selling and packing up the stuff and sending it out and bookkeeping and everything. I love, I loved it. So if you love being in business, be in business. If you love inventing toys, then I would say, um, you know, I would license it for sure. I work with inventors and they've done extremely well from me. Carlton, I have a, I have a question for you. Cause I'm thinking about this licensing question, which is, and you know, this, and I I've got a kid's media company. We make kids podcasts. I think I've told you about it. We actually, we actually have a line of toys that toy companies don't actually buy ideas that often. You are definitely right. That, that is the sad, that's a sad half of the other side of it. And I was going to sort of give you that little bit of a warning. Um, the people who buy games are going to look at hundreds or thousands of games and buy one. So your chances of getting, it's a great thing if it can make it happen, is what I would say, but they want to, they want a proven product, right? They want, something that already has traction, which is, and it sort of get, gets to this idea of like, and Carlton, I think you're getting to this, which is that Sean needs to, needs to prove this out more like a thousand units is great, but it's like, you need like a 10,000 units sold or like, right. Like retailers asking to carry it. The other thing I would say is, you know, the upside of you scale it yourself is huge. I mean, we did exploding kittens on this show. They've got like different card games and they built this on their own, you know? Um, I guess if you were able to just luckily get this as, you know, this becomes a hit, you own the thing. But I think before you even think about trying to pitch it to somebody, you've got to prove that, you know, that there's demand for this, right. And striking lightning would be striking if somebody brought it from you without any track record, like guy is saying, I would assume you would have to go into these, this to be rejected. And then I agree, build it on your own, which is also, that's extremely challenging. You have to go to all the toy conventions and get it into every mom and pop little store. And you have to go knock on the doors yourself and you have to have game night. I mean, you must know all this. I kind of knew this answer going in almost right. Like you, you have to build it yourself. I'm not, I'm not, uh, opposed to that. So that's, that's such sound advice is like keep putting in the work. Um, now I'm at the stage where people are coming back to the conventions and they're like, Hey, we played this and it's so fun. So that's such a rewarding thing to actually be on the ground level. And so that is the part that I really enjoy. Yeah. I mean, trade shows, you got to get in the trade shows. Obviously you've got a full-time job as a nurse. You have a very important job, but, uh, but maybe a plans to go to a trade show if one's coming up. I mean, right now, and you know, this Sean, people are looking for community or at least people are talking about wanting to look for community. And, um, you know, their games cafes here in the Bay area, there, some of them are doing very well. People are showing up to be together. And so, and so you're, you're onto something, you've got something interesting. Now you just got to get into more hands. Not easy. I admit. And I will give you, and I will give you one more compliment. You have a very, um, unique sounding game. You know what I mean? And that's a good edge. So if there's something that's an interesting story to it, it does have the potential to get some traction on Instagram or in some kind of a news format. For sure. I like the story. Yeah. And thanks for saying that. Cause that's, that is a really fun part because people will introduce me to people that they've created and then, uh, tell me all about the person they've created. So that's pretty fun. Sean Barasa, the game is called eulogy. Y O E U L O G. Uh, good luck. Thanks for calling in. Thanks so much for having me. Appreciate you guys. All right. We're going to take a quick break, but we'll be right back with another caller and another podcast. We'll be right back with another caller and another podcast. We'll be right back with another round of advice. Stay with us. I'm Guy Raz and you're listening to the advice line right here on how I built this lab. We get support from engine. A lot of founders start with a product or an idea, but at some point the business becomes something else. Think about Brian Scudamore. He started one 800 got junk with one truck and a vision to make junk removal, a real brand that worked. 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For the first time ever, new Delta SkyMiles Reserve American Express card members can earn two Delta Comfort round-trip flights for travel within the 48 contiguous U.S. states, Puerto Rico, or the U.S. Virgin Islands. Plus, you can earn 50,000 bonus miles towards your next getaway. And who doesn't appreciate an elevated airport experience? Delta SkyMiles Reserve Card Members. Delta SkyMiles Reserve Card Members get access to the Delta SkyClub, your pre-flight oasis to recharge, with 15 visits and four one-time guest passes each medallion year when flying Delta together. That's up to $950 in annual value. Value estimate based on $50 per visit rate to purchase additional visits or bring a guest to the Delta SkyClub. Make every trip feel more rewarding with the card that upgrades your travel. Apply today at delta.com. Welcome back to the Advice Line on how I built this lab. I'm Guy Raz. And my guest today. My guest today is Carlton Calvin, co-founder, president, and CEO of Razor USA. Carlton, let's bring in our next caller. Welcome to the Advice Line. Please tell us your name, your name of your company, where you're calling from, and just a little bit about your business, please. Hi, Guy. Hi, Carlton. I'm so excited to be here with you guys. I am Shereen Tippett. I'm calling from Houston, Texas, where it is 1,000 degrees. And I have a business called Honey Bespoke Stationery and Paper Goods. I am a designer of. I have stationery, such as flat note cards, birthday invitations, birth announcements. And one of my biggest sellers right now is Collegiate Stationery. And I have licenses with a number of big schools. So, yeah, I sell paper goods. Yeah. Amazing. I'm looking at your website. And so you design all of the cards or stationery. Like, I see personalized stationery with, you know, note cards with people's names on it. And you've done licensing deals with some universities like Indiana and Clemson and Texas. So that's cool. So. And tell me a little bit about how the business is doing. It's doing well. My revenue last year was $120,000, nearly $120,000, which is funny because I talk to people about it. And I think people think it's just like a little side job, like a fun thing that I'm doing, like a little hobby. Your cute little Etsy business. I'll get that kind of comment. Yeah. But I'm like, no, it's actually. It's doing pretty well. I'm not doing as well this year. It's been a little bit slower. But like I mentioned, I sell predominantly on Etsy. And that marketplace gets very saturated with competitors. So, yeah, that's been. That's part of why I'm calling today. So let's jump into it. What's your question for us? So my question is, I do sell predominantly on Etsy. But I have a website, which I also build my website all by myself. I've done all of it by myself with my AI partner. Good. So I want to know how I transition from. Keeping my customer base on Etsy, because there are people who are shopping specifically there, but also shifting over to my own website. How do I get found in this sea of other stationers? I was listening to Carlton's episode a while back, and you had mentioned you weren't the first scooter, but you set yourself apart. How do I set myself apart? Okay. I want to bring Carlton in. Carlton, please meet Shireen. Tippett, Honeybee Spoke, making stationery. And pretty good business, $120,000 in sales last year, but of course, crowded space. And everybody wants to know this. How do you stand out? So before you answer the question, any questions that you might have for Shireen or thoughts? Well, I would say I'm not an expert on how to drive people to a direct sales website. So I am someone who sells at retail, and that's what I. I think you could stand out. By doing the hard work and trying to get into stores, into stationery stores. And even, I mean, my initial thing that sounded really good was trying to get into the stationery stores associated with the schools that you have licenses from. And I've got questions about that too, but I'll let Guy. Guy, do you have any other. Yeah. I mean, I think that's an interesting idea, especially if you're talking about like cards, right? Sort of, you know, you've got some beautiful designs here. I'm looking at them. And you could. Yeah. A lot of what you do, of course, is personalized, but there are lots of things that, you know, are just universal, right? There's a card store near where I live, and they have beautiful embossed cards, and they're lovely. And they're like $7 to $10, sometimes more. And I buy them, believe it or not. You know, I wonder if you have tried. First of all, have you done paid advertising? Yes. And that is one of those things where I did it in. I started at the end of March. March for the first time on Meta, and did it for about a month or two, and my sales skyrocketed. Awesome. But. No, not so awesome, because I don't know. I felt like I was just throwing money out there. I was like, oh, okay, let's put $100 here. Let's put. I wasn't doing it smartly just because it's confusing to me. I'm a one-woman show. I'm doing all of this, literally everything by myself. So the advertising, I think, would help. I just don't understand how to do it. And how were you advertising? Were you doing social media video? Were you doing just stills? No, just stills. I have what's called flat lays. Like, when you look at my website and you see the picture, I just boost that. I boosted on Instagram. I boosted on Facebook. And most of my sales were coming through the Instagram. I did look at that data. But it would lead traffic to my website, which was great. But. But, yeah, then it slowed down. Yeah, yeah. Okay, let me ask you a question. How did you learn how to. how to design cards. Well, it was another COVID story. I had time at home. I had a seven-month-old baby, and we were being very protective of her during COVID. So we were at home all day long. So I decided I loved playing on the computer. I liked doing things on the computer, graphic design things. And long story short, I took an Adobe course on YouTube. But you learned this by watching videos, basically. Very much so, yes. So this is important because I think that you can do a similar version of this with how to advertise. I could imagine you taking your iPhone and putting it on a tripod and angling it and a video of you sketching designs and a video of you being kind of the face of this brand and putting some money behind. Not too much money, maybe $100, $100, and seeing how that does. Because I think that there's something about you making this will resonate in a way that is different than just seeing a static image of stationery. I agree with you because when I look at other people in this marketplace, other women who have these businesses, or men, but it's predominantly women, the one difference between the two of us is I'm not putting my face out there. I'm not putting videos of myself out there just because I'm not comfortable on camera, really, to be honest with you. But I realize when people see a person, it makes a difference. And so I have thought maybe that would make a difference. You're a mom. You've got a great story. Yeah. I don't know. Carlton, what do you think? I'm 100% there. I mean, I think you're doing very well. I mean, I'm only seeing you on Zoom, but I think you're doing very well on Zoom. Thank you. Yeah, you look great on camera. You should be on camera. It's just so – That's another way of saying that. Thank you. Yes, I think you're photogenic, and I think you could develop a following on Instagram or TikTok. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. It's just like you can even have your kids. You know, you're narrating it, right? Yeah. Like a voiceover. Like, you know, I couldn't find cards that I loved, so I decided to make them myself. Right. I've never thought of this. Yeah. You know, and it's like your voiceover with you, just images of you, like, putting a card together and, you know, it's your design table, something like that. Yeah. It could be a cool thing. Just a short 30 seconds. It's not easy to do. Right. I'm not saying it's easy, but you could figure it out. And I'd almost say you'd have to do it because paying for advertising is almost like a always a very challenging thing in your kind of space. If you can develop your own following, that's everything for what you're trying to do. And also try to get into the stores. I would say that too. Like, if you can get up the nerve, you know, and get up the budget to go to a show and just start building that, you have to, I mean, I could give you the whole thing with sales reps and the whole thing. You have to get aligned together, but there's like tens of thousands of stores out there you could be selling at. Right. People are so focused on the internet, but getting some of that. That old fashioned, get into the stores. But if you're going to do it on the internet, you have to have a social presence and you have to, and you have something to take advantage of. I do. I was hoping that you wouldn't say that, but, but I think that you are correct. And then I have considered going to the big marketplaces. There's a big Dallas market. There's one in Atlanta. And I actually was reached out to by the Dallas market, the lady who puts that together just a few months ago. And I thought maybe I should put some money into doing that. Maybe I'll see a return on that. You need to go to the markets and you need to get reps. And the whole thing is about getting reps. And it's, you know. Okay. That's good to know. I never, I never even thought of that. Yep. All right. Well, you have, you get your marching order, Shereen. Thanks so much. Thank you so much. All right. The brand is called Honey Bespoke. Good luck. Thanks so much for listening and for calling in. Thank you for your time. Bye. Thank you. All right. We're going to take another quick break, but we'll be right back with another caller. Stay with us. When you run a small business, you have to wear a lot of hats. You're the hiring manager, the payroll department, and the benefits team all wrapped into one. And after talking to hundreds of founders and running a business myself, I know how overwhelming wearing all these hats can be. Thankfully, Gusto is here to take a few of those necessary tasks off your plate so you can get back to the bigger picture. Gusto. Gusto is online payroll and benefits software built for small businesses. It's all-in-one, remote-friendly, and incredibly easy to use. So you can pay, hire, onboard, and support your team from anywhere. Save time with built-in automated tools like offer letters, onboarding docs, direct deposit, and more. Plus, get direct access to certified HR experts to help support you through any tough HR situation. Try Gusto today. at gusto.com slash built and get three months free when you run your first payroll. That's three months of free payroll at gusto.com slash built. One more time, gusto.com slash built. I'm Guy Raz, and today I'm taking your calls with Carlton Calvin. He's the co-founder, president, and CEO of Razor. USA, the scooter company. Let's get back into it and take another call. Let's go. All right. Let's bring our caller in. Hello. Please tell us your name, where you're calling from, and just one quick line about your business, please. Yeah. My name is Mark Ganter. I own Little Water Distillery in Atlantic City. We're a craft spirits distillery, and we've been going since 2016. Awesome. Welcome to the show, Mark. And tell me, what do you guys do? I mean, I'm assuming vodka and gin. Yeah, so we make, I rarely do this without actually giving the brand names. Rusty Revolver Gin, 48 Blocks Vodka, Liberty Rum, Prosperity Rum, 16 Knots Bourbon, and 48 Blocks Espresso Martini, 48 Blocks Chocolate Martini, and then a Barrel-Aged Old Fashioned. Wow. Okay. Those three have really been kind of running the show for us recently. All right. I got it. Okay. So tell me a little bit. So this is a Little Water Distillery based in Atlantic City. You mentioned you started in 2016. Did you come from? Like the spirits world? Were you in this world when you launched it? Yeah, not entirely. Not entirely. I worked for Total Wine & More on the design development side, really kind of building out their retail facilities and kind of getting them to the point where we turned them over to the operator. So I was familiar with the industry. I had some contacts within the retail industry, but the whole thing started with just a random gift for a seven-year-old man. My father turned 70 in 2013. My brother and I bought him a copper pot still. And we, as a father and father, we bought him a copper pot still. And my son spent time together, really kind of playing with it. And we became aware of the craft distillation laws being enacted in New Jersey and applied for one of the earlier licenses. And we were like, I guess we're doing this. So we kind of put the business plan together and launched, left our careers and kind of went cold turkey and then launched the business. And tell me a little bit about where you sell your spirits at, mostly restaurants and bars. Are you in shops or both? So the spirits industry, the alcohol industry is regulated. In the US, it's challenging. So in New Jersey, with this license, we're able to manufacture, operate a tasting room so we can sell retail out of our tasting space, direct distribute, or go through distributors. And we initially went, we did direct distribution because we get to keep a lot of that margin back at home. But you quickly see you're wearing a lot of hats for a small business. I mean, you're a manufacturer, you're marketing, you're now distributing. You have to have a vehicle or vehicles on the road. You have to have sales. You have to have salespeople employed, but then you're also operating on the retail side. You have a tasting room. So you're doing almost hospitality and you have to staff that. It's a completely different staff than you'd have. So you have a tasting room and you are still in spirits. We're manufacturing. And then we're also taking them to the market and we're also branding them. And we also have quite a few SKUs for what we do. I mean, I'm so envious of a brand like Tito's. They make vodka. It comes in three sizes. That's it. And how is the business? How is the business doing? Are you guys. Is it profitable? Are you. Tell me a little bit about how it's. No. We had some ups and downs. Obviously, we went through COVID and we kind of came through that with shining colors because of. So we pivoted and produced a huge amount of hand sanitizer during that period. During COVID. During COVID. So we actually were able to really turn a profit that year. But I've taken on a fair amount of debt in recent years. And I'm so jealous of some of these other callers because they were starting out that they're early on in the operation and the process. And they have. Nowhere to go but up. And we've kind of seen some contraction of our sales. And we recently made the decision to work through distributors because we just couldn't figure out. We couldn't get the direct distribution model working to the point where it was profitable for us. Bars and restaurants and liquor stores to some extent, they're used to working with distributors. They're used to having like one sales guy come in and have a thousand SKUs or 500 SKUs or whatever. So we decided to make this strategic decision to go through distribution. All right. So before we get to Carleton, tell us your question. So like I said, I'm jealous of those brands that have one product or two products. That's part of our challenge. We have too many out there. But we have one product, our 48 Blocks Espresso Martini, which is really best in class. It's truly the best product out there. It's priced at a premium and it's a premium product. And the industry is trading down. A lot of what you see is coming out in cans, you know, smaller, like where quality is being kind of traded up for convenience. How do we take this product from where we are, which is a solid but very small local reputation to. this is the industry standard for the best espresso martini all right i want to bring in carlson calvin calton first of all uh say hello to mark um hi mark hi thank you and as you heard he's got this brand um but of course it's a challenging in general in this industry across the board wine and spirits but he's got to make some some decisions here so um thoughts or questions for mark um yeah i mean my overall i do like this idea of focusing i do like the idea of you know you're really trying to tell your story about get how do i get my story about my product out there which is making a good story out of it you need to get out and be the face of your product you have to have an instagram presence you have to have a tiktok presence you have to again you're in a highly regulated industry i don't even know what you you could do but you have to have an instagram presence you have to have a tiktok presence but you could show how you distill you know the process of distilling and what makes yours better and show it the other thought is if you could get some influence or somebody with a reputation for judging quality to endorse your product probably out of just affection for you i think there's you're onto something there for sure carlton i want to double down on that mark i question for you what are your best selling you've got rum drums gin vodka espresso martini chocolate what's top bestsellers so 48 blocks espresso martini 48 blocks chocolate martini and they're they're they're a line espresso and chocolate both again top top and the chocolate martini espresso martini are made with vodka the vodka based and our vodka is called 48 blocks vodka okay so it's it's a the bottle the espresso martini has the espresso and vodka in there and you just chill it and pour it over a glass in a glass basically cocktail shake it with ice shake it strain and the coffee we use is from la colombe we use a cold pressed brazilian espresso oh fantastic coffee but um you know no one in the industry is talking about the quality of the coffee and the quality ingredients they're simply pushing convenience i mean it sounds like you're already moving in this direction but i think i think you've got to reduce skews right because you're talking about a challenge around cash and debt right and and as you probably know many companies that die don't die because the demand goes away necessarily they die because they run out of cash so i think if you want to optimize and it sounds like you do you want to optimize for cash for the moment simplify the product line and then you focus on the the highest channel margins maybe you you continue to make smaller quantities of the other ones for the for the tasting room i don't know but really lean into those especially the the you can serve cash because and you want to talk about what you just mentioned it's la colombe coffee what kind of chocolate are you using in your in the yeah so it's it's a it's a custom roasted chocolate from a small producer a small chocolatier called the dairy chocolates in north carolina i mean amazing you know you you've got la colombe coffee this high quality chocolate i think that cook i mean is that realistic to really double down on especially those two products and maybe sunset some of the other ones that you're using i think that's a good idea i think that's a good idea yeah it's you know it's hard right that's the challenge right it's emotionally hard which is a terrible reason terrible excuse but yeah kind of getting past it and then also limiting the experience of the tasting room that's where you know that piece which is weekly revenue that's very important we've got to figure out how to keep that interesting while we focus on these distributed products these two distribution products um and really grow them because that's where that you know we're limited by the four walls in the tasting room but the market is is vast and endless i hear you right and that's hard right because it's going to come to a point where you're going to have to make a decision and it's going to be painful we've had many examples of this on the show over the years where people are like we abandoned you know our main product and we went with this product mailchimp it's a great mailchimp is a classic example you should listen to that episode they were a website building business that was 90 percent of their revenue but they they saw that there was potential in this email list site and they basically dropped 90 percent of revenue you know instantly but mailchimp you don't want to sell for many billions of dollars the point i'm making is that it's there is gonna be pain but you never know what's gonna emerge from it i mean in five years time you might be the martini brand got espresso martini chocolate martini now you're making dirty martinis and pickle juice martinis and and your story is we put the best ingredients in the bottle you know that that might actually be what you are in the future i'm not saying it's going to happen but that put sort of sets you in ideally a more efficient course and and i would just add my experience is always it's so rare to find anything that resonates with the consumer that if you've got one thing that does resonate or two things that resonate really focus you you don't have time for anything that doesn't sell in my world i have one more question for carl specifically about kind of the trends because you're you're you know you have that as you said a gift of identifying trends and part of the challenge right now with what we're doing is is not following a trend which is trying to take what we do and put into cans because cans are extremely trendy right now but i feel like the consumer perceives like a lower quality product in the can and we're trying to maintain a position of premium quality what do i do and so my general analysis is you want to be on those trends early but if you can perceive a trend in your business like cans like that i i even even i'm seeing you know and i don't drink but i'm seeing trends in the alcohol world and and i think there is for sure uh this notion where like i have my vision i'm going to stand out and be very different i'm like don't fight the culture just like because american idol you know came out and you know did a uh uh you know singing contest on tv you'll notice there were 27 other singing conists that came out after them some of them exceeded american idol and being second being third being 10th you want to be inside the culture so i'm not saying it's these cans but if you can see anything that's happening in your industry and and you're one of the early people to notice that's a huge advantage are there are there there must be maybe not are there espresso martinis and cans oh there's quite a few tons okay yeah by the way just as a as an aside is there a world where you have like a sort of a white russian meets an espresso martini where it's it's you've got the espresso and the vodka but you add a little bit of cream or milk yeah i mean there's there's this core can can have extensions to this line you know we can we do various we combine the chocolate and the espresso and make a mocha teeny which is very very trendy and there's no there's no r&d to that we just add them together in a can yeah i think there's something to this martini thing anyway you i think you've got you've got a sense of what you got to do it's not going to be easy mark i do not envy you but it's probably what what's going to be best for the business thank you so much yeah it's a little water distillery mark ganner thanks so much for calling in thank you for having me i'm carlton before i let you go i want to ask you a question that i've been asking everybody who comes back on which is that now that you have all of this experience if you could go back to when you were first starting out what advice could you now would you now give to your former self um i mean i made so many mistakes when i was starting you know and and this gentleman was also the in the distillery you think oh i don't want to give up my margin to a sales rep because they'll take five or ten or fifteen percent but you have to delegate you have to give the sales reps they're so much better at selling and you can't do it all so that was a big huge thing that i you know took me a long time to figure out that just trying to do it's very fun and satisfying to do everything yourself but you can't you have to delegate it all out and it really that transformed my business yeah that's carlton calvin co-founder president and ceo of razor usa carlton thanks so much for coming back on the show my pleasure and by the way if you haven't heard carlton's original how i built this episode please go back and check it out we will put a link to it in the show notes and here is one of my favorite moments from that interview wait so in june of 2000 you were selling a million a month yes and january of 2001 you couldn't sell one that's the sales stopped yes it doesn't make sense it makes no sense it doesn't make sense unless you understand crazes it happened to me so many times and no matter how many times the retailers go through this no matter how many times i went through this everybody's thinking to themselves this time is different yeah like this time it's going to sell a million a month for the next three years and they can't even just do simple math that there's not a million people hey thanks so much for listening to the show this week and by the way please make sure to check out my newsletter you can sign up for it for free at guyraz.com or on substack and of course if you are working on a business and you'd like to be on this show send us a one minute message that tells us a little bit about your business and the questions or issues that you're currently facing because we would love to try and help you solve them you can send us a voice memo at hibt at id.wondery.com or call us at 1-800-433-1298 leave a message there and make sure to tell us how reach you and we'll put all of this information in the podcast description as well. This episode was produced by Casey Herman with music composed by Ramtin Eroglui. It was edited by John Isabella and our audio engineer was Anli Huang. Our production team at How I Built This also includes Alex Chung, Carla Estevez, Sam Paulson, Chris Messini, Elaine Coates, JC Howard, Catherine Seifer, Carrie Thompson, and Neva Grant. I'm Guy Raz and you've been listening to The Advice Line on How I Built This Lab. Thanks again to Enjin for their support. If your business is growing and your team is traveling, Enjin makes it simple and saves you money doing it. 33,000 businesses have joined. Now it's your turn. Enjin.com slash built. We get support from Enjin. He started 1-800-GOT-JUNK with one truck and a vision to make junk removal a real brand. That worked. And then it became hundreds of crews across multiple cities, trucks on the road every day, routes changing by the hour, and a team that had to be in the right place before the customer even called. Or Beryl Stafford, who started Bobo's by baking oat bars in her kitchen. Next thing she knows, she's flying to retail meetings, demoing at trade shows, managing distributors, running a national food brand out of what used to be a family recipe. Or Tom Hale, who built backroads around the idea that active travel could be a premium experience. It's what happens. It's what happens. It's what happens. And that's why I think Enjin is worth knowing about. Enjin is the fastest growing modern travel and spend platform in the country, built for small and medium-sized businesses. With Enjin, that drops to as little as two and a half minutes. Last year, Enjin customers saved $318 million on travel. More than 1,000 businesses join Enjin every month. Join them and get $500 when your business signs up and starts traveling at enjin.com slash built.