Order of Man - 149： Purpose-Driven Entrepreneurship

00:00:00.000 Everyone these days wants to be an entrepreneur. And while I can applaud anyone's desire to go out

00:00:05.660 and create something from nothing, too many men are in it for the wrong reasons. Today,

00:00:10.300 I am joined by my friend and founder of Origin USA, Pete Roberts, to talk about the meaning

00:00:15.180 of entrepreneurship. This one is unlike a lot of the podcasts you see on entrepreneurship,

00:00:19.620 where you'll hear the 10 tactics every entrepreneur needs to know. Instead, we go

00:00:24.020 deep into why entrepreneurship is so important, why you should and should not go into business

00:00:29.740 for yourself, why vision is so crucial, ethical responsibilities and obligations,

00:00:34.000 and why creating a business without compromise is so critical.

00:00:37.640 You're a man of action. You live life to the fullest. Embrace your fears and boldly chart

00:00:42.480 your own path. When life knocks you down, you get back up one more time, every time.

00:00:47.920 You are not easily deterred or defeated, rugged, resilient, strong. This is your life. This is

00:00:54.560 who you are. This is who you will become at the end of the day. And after all is said and done,

00:00:59.740 you can call yourself a man. Gentlemen, what is going on today? My name is Ryan Mickler and I am

00:01:05.780 the host and the founder of this podcast, The Order of Man. I want to welcome you. Without you guys

00:01:10.280 tuning in each and every week, this just would not be possible. So first and foremost, I want to give

00:01:15.520 credit where credit is due. And thank you for tuning in and spreading the message and mission of The

00:01:21.140 Order of Man. To that end, guys, I would ask if you would please rate and review the podcast. If you

00:01:25.880 haven't done that already, only takes a couple of minutes, rate and review, goes such a long way in

00:01:30.100 spreading this message. And then while you're there, make sure if you haven't subscribed to this show,

00:01:33.960 I've got some amazing, amazing guests that you are not going to want to miss. So make sure you

00:01:38.240 subscribe. And then one last thing, be sure to share this, share this with your brother, your friend,

00:01:42.400 your colleagues, your coworkers, any man that you know that would benefit from the message that we're

00:01:47.780 sharing here. So again, if you would just please share the show. I do appreciate that guys. Now,

00:01:52.180 as most of you know, by now, we are very, very close to the launch of my first book,

00:01:57.300 Sovereignty, The Battle for the Hearts and Minds of Men that comes available February 1st, 2018.

00:02:02.460 So we're just a couple of weeks out. I could not be more proud of the way this thing turned out from

00:02:07.220 the exterior cover to the interior layout to the message and the words used. This is a book that

00:02:13.700 will impact millions, millions of men across the planet. I wrote it from personal experience in living

00:02:19.100 my life without the control we are all born with. We, as men have given away so much of our power in

00:02:25.580 the forms of lies and excuses and rationalizations, all designed, all designed guys to keep us safe,

00:02:32.740 all designed to keep us comfortable. This book is about reclaiming that power and sovereignty by

00:02:39.300 stripping away the lies that we tell ourselves and adhering to a code of 13 virtues, 13 virtues designed

00:02:44.860 to help a man wrestle back ultimate ownership of his life. So if you're interested in downloading

00:02:50.260 the introductory chapter, figuring out what this thing is all about, and then of course,

00:02:54.660 being notified when the book is available, head to order of man.com slash book order of man.com

00:02:59.960 slash book. Well, that said guys, let me introduce you to my guest and my friend entrepreneur and

00:03:05.180 founder of origin USA. His name is Pete Roberts. I came across what Pete was doing through

00:03:10.340 Jocko. And I know a lot of you guys listen to Jocko. He's actually partnered with Pete on some

00:03:14.680 projects and guys, I was immediately, immediately inspired by Pete's story and message behind his

00:03:20.100 company origin USA. This man is not just an entrepreneur, but someone who has meaning and

00:03:26.500 significance about the work that he's doing to bring manufacturing back to his hometown and to

00:03:32.160 create a product that is entirely made in the U S without compromise. But more than anything today,

00:03:38.160 you're going to hear why he does what he does, where his idea of vision, ingenuity,

00:03:43.180 and discipline come from and how the notion of business ownership ties into our responsibility is

00:03:48.920 meant to protect, provide, and preside. This is in our homes. This is in our businesses,

00:03:53.060 in our communities. Again, this isn't a checklist type interview of everything an entrepreneur should

00:03:57.980 know and do, but a conversation about ideas, responsibility, and creativity. So listen to the stories,

00:04:04.760 listen to the message Pete has to share, implement it, and I guarantee you will live a more fulfilled

00:04:09.620 life and help those you come in contact with along the way do the same. Pete, what's going on, man?

00:04:15.340 Thanks for joining me on the show today. Ryan, what's happening? I am honored to be on your show and

00:04:19.340 even more honored to get a live look at that amazing beard. You can't go wrong with this thing,

00:04:25.360 right? Yeah, man. I trimmed mine off recently. It was gray and bushy. But it was rad. I saw it on the

00:04:32.540 Hands in Daylight podcast, the podcast cover. Oh, yes. And it looks good. I'm like, dude,

00:04:37.180 why did you shave that thing? Yeah, you know, my kids don't like it, but I grow it for the winter

00:04:41.700 because it's a necessity. Yeah, because you're the very northern tip of Maine, right? Yeah, I mean,

00:04:47.540 we're in Maine. I don't know about the northern tip because Maine's a big state, but we're up here in

00:04:52.120 basically Canada. Yeah. It's behind Alaska. I think Maine is the coldest state in the country.

00:04:59.300 Yeah. So what? Is it warmed up or something? So now you feel like you can walk around without

00:05:03.420 a beard or what? Yeah, it went from minus 40 to plus 15. So yeah.

00:05:09.000 Yeah, you're a heat wave right now. Yeah, it's a heat wave. All right.

00:05:12.060 Jeez, man. Well, hey, I got to tell you, man, I'm excited about this conversation. I've been blown

00:05:16.460 away with what you guys are doing with Origin, a little bit about your story, who you are,

00:05:21.220 where you've come from. I've been listening to the Hands in Daylight podcast. I know you've partnered

00:05:25.580 with Jocko, who is somebody I admire and respect, and that says a lot about you as well. Tell me a

00:05:31.500 little bit about why entrepreneurship is so important to you, because I know your story.

00:05:36.520 The guys don't, but I think this is something really valuable to talk about.

00:05:39.800 You know, entrepreneurship, you know what's important to me, honestly, over entrepreneurship

00:05:44.720 is doing something, doing anything. For me, I like to put my hands on things and do things,

00:05:52.560 and I do that through being an entrepreneur. I do it through making something. You know,

00:05:57.860 I call it dirt to shirt or field to finish or fiber to fabric, however you want to call it.

00:06:02.700 I like seeing something come out of the earth and then something being produced with that.

00:06:08.120 And that's a wonderful thing, and that's a wonderful feeling you get from that. So for me,

00:06:12.860 I just enjoy the part of entrepreneurship where I believe that we can build something that the

00:06:21.640 consumer needs and they don't even need it yet. And that gets my blood flowing, you know, and that's

00:06:26.680 when I see that challenge, I want to go after it. I want to prove to them that they need it. And that's

00:06:32.160 really the core of what I enjoy with entrepreneurship. And it also gets my creative juices going. I'm a

00:06:37.660 creative guy. I'm a designer. And those two things combined for me is that's what gets me up in the

00:06:42.500 morning. Where did this come from? It's easy to say, and I'll be honest, I didn't grow up as an

00:06:47.580 entrepreneur. Like I wasn't selling baseball cards when I was, you know, seven years old or mowing

00:06:52.300 people's lawn. I didn't have that mentality. I do now. Is this something that you were born with?

00:06:57.300 Is this something that was fostered over time? Where did this come from for you?

00:07:00.740 You know, I think for me, I saw some of my cousins and my grandfather was an entrepreneur. He owned

00:07:07.360 sub shops. And when my family immigrated from Greece in the early 1900s, a lot of the second

00:07:13.560 generation became entrepreneurs. For me, I, my mom and dad moved myself and my three siblings up here

00:07:21.160 to Maine. And what they did is they said, where is the last spot in Maine that has all the amenities?

00:07:27.520 But that's it. There's nothing north of that. And that's where I live. So in my little village,

00:07:33.900 this town, we do have a Walmart, you know, and we have, we have a McDonald's and all that stuff.

00:07:39.380 You have a stoplight. That's the real question.

00:07:40.880 We have a stoplight. We have two stoplights. Yeah, we have two stoplights. So, but when you leave

00:07:46.540 this place, you're hitting nothing. It's the great Boreal wilderness. It's forest and moose and that's

00:07:53.820 it. So I got to watch from afar and we lived, uh, I wouldn't, I don't want to say poor. I mean,

00:08:00.920 you know, my mom made $24,000 a year with four kids when she was a single parent. So

00:08:05.880 I didn't have regular TV growing up, a couple of channels I got to watch. And my mom was always

00:08:11.320 like, be creative, be creative, be creative. Oh, find something to do, you know? And so us four

00:08:16.620 kids, we just had to figure it out. And I got to watch from afar, my, my older cousins and uncles

00:08:22.340 and stuff, and they were building businesses and they were building great businesses. And I wasn't

00:08:27.080 really part of that, but I yearned for it and I didn't get to learn from them. I just got to kind

00:08:32.280 of watch and we'd go to family events and stuff. And I'd be like, man, how do you do this? How do

00:08:37.420 you build something like this? And I never outwardly asked that question, but it's something

00:08:43.480 I wanted, you know, I saw how they lived their lifestyles and what they were able to do in life.

00:08:49.080 And it came from them working their asses off. And it's something I just decided I knew, I knew when I

00:08:54.880 was in high school, I was going to have my own business. I would say, I'm going to have my own

00:08:58.360 business. When I get older, I'm going to have my own business. Cause I found, I saw freedom through

00:09:02.760 having your own business. When I looked outside of the way I lived. And you jumped right into business

00:09:07.520 out of high school, right? You were doing, what were you doing? Design or you were doing, I mean,

00:09:10.880 and this is about the time really the internet started to like come around and websites.

00:09:15.080 Yeah. 97, 98 was like when the internet hit, you know what I mean? Right.

00:09:21.760 You had that movement. And so right around then, yeah. So I was in college and I dropped out my

00:09:26.840 senior year. I was going for new media and I had cut my teeth through college at a marketing agency

00:09:31.900 and learned, you know, kind of the ropes. And so, uh, I dropped out and I started my own company.

00:09:37.420 We ran with it, you know, renovated an old barn, just a small little old barn and had a little

00:09:42.660 studio in there. Took out a $2,500 loan and I just started doing it, you know, and everyone's like,

00:09:50.720 let's go ahead. I was going to ask, what do you miss about that? Cause I I've listened to you and

00:09:54.700 some of your story and some of the things that went right. And some of the things that went wrong.

00:09:57.600 And even for, for me with what we've built here with order, man, uh, I would say probably six

00:10:03.660 months or so ago, we started outsourcing our shipping, which is nice. Cause now I don't have

00:10:08.180 to do it. My wife and I aren't down here for hours at night doing it. But then at the same time,

00:10:12.000 I'm like, that was actually kind of fun. So what are some of the things that you miss about those

00:10:15.000 early days? I think, I believe you've got to be kind of naive to be in business. I think you've

00:10:20.380 got to be naive enough to be arrogant enough to want to get into business. Almost delusional in

00:10:24.980 a way, right? Delusional to think you can. And you know, what's funny? I had a guy, I had a guy who

00:10:30.060 hired us. We did a lot of packaging. We did a lot of interactive touchscreen kiosks. We'd bring the

00:10:34.860 like apps and screen based. And then we'd also do a lot of print based stuff, did a lot of packaging

00:10:39.320 design. And I remember a guy, he hired us, he was out of Boston. He heard about this company,

00:10:44.120 my company through a mutual friend. And he hired us. He looked at our portfolio and hired us.

00:10:49.060 He came up and visited us like two months later. He goes, if I knew that you guys were here in this

00:10:56.020 location, in this tiny little office, I would have never believed it. I would have never hired you.

00:11:02.160 Interesting. I said to him, you know, that's the great thing about technology is that there's talent

00:11:09.260 everywhere and what technology has done. And it's taken the talent and the customer and it's merged

00:11:15.560 the two through this conduit of the internet and it works. And you got to look at us for our work and

00:11:21.940 what we could do, not for where the office was, not for what the staff looked like, you know? And I

00:11:27.860 think that was pretty awesome. And I miss being able to do that type of work for these huge brands we

00:11:34.480 used to work for. We used to do a lot of stuff for the Quicksilver, Rossignol Group and all sorts of

00:11:38.680 other companies. I miss that, but I get the same fulfillment building my company origin. It's the

00:11:45.880 same. It's more fulfillment actually. So I do a lot of the same stuff. Yeah, I do do a lot of the same

00:11:50.540 stuff. So what is it about website design in your early years that made you migrate towards that?

00:11:56.720 Because a lot of guys are listening to this and they are, man. They're like, I want to start a

00:12:00.140 business. I want to start a side hustle. I feel like I've got this entrepreneurial spirit.

00:12:04.540 I talk about it a lot. Everybody talks about it a lot. And so these guys have got the bug,

00:12:08.080 but they don't know what to do. So why did you go that route? And then even why did you get into

00:12:12.920 origin now? I mean, this is something that's completely different, although there may be

00:12:16.140 some similarities. Absolutely. Well, as I answer that question about why to get into business or why

00:12:23.720 not to get into business for that matter, I want to say that as an individual, you have at the

00:12:29.800 minimum four real chances to do something great when it comes to business. And so even if you get

00:12:36.520 jump in head first, hands tucked into business, most people won't have a business plan, you know,

00:12:43.700 and they're going to be excited. They're going to design a logo there. You know, they've got this

00:12:47.620 idea. You've got 10 years to like make that great. And if you fail, you've got 10 more years. And if you

00:12:54.460 fail, you've got 10 more years. I mean, you can be pushing these 10 year cycles up till you're 60

00:12:59.300 years old if you wanted to. Sure. For me, I'm 38. I'm on number two. I spent my first 10, 20 to 30

00:13:05.780 with my first business. After the recession, I had to kill it. I'm on my second 10.

00:13:11.200 And I'm right there with you at the second 10.

00:13:13.400 Perfect. It's the second 10. It's your second decade of opportunity. You know, and an old timer

00:13:18.220 told me this. A guy, this guy had built a hundred million dollar company. He had come from

00:13:22.380 nothing and built this huge company. And he's the one that he sat me down one day and he said that

00:13:27.180 to me, you know, he said, first of all, you're not special. What you're doing isn't special and

00:13:31.740 nobody gives a shit, you know? So if you really want to do this, then you need to be focused and

00:13:36.980 you need to basically, you know how Jocko uses this whole discipline thing, discipline, you got to

00:13:42.200 have discipline. Well, it wasn't just discipline. It was discipline and action. You know, you can have

00:13:47.900 discipline, but if you're going to do get into business, you've got to have discipline and action.

00:13:52.380 And you've got to, you've got to be able to bear the weight of some of the stresses that are going

00:13:56.700 to come with that. And you've also got to learn a lot of balance between family and this vision

00:14:01.520 you have. So I'd say for me getting into business, I was just ready to take on the world and that's

00:14:08.620 the naive part of it. But for someone else to get into business, I asked somebody, one of my friends

00:14:15.100 asked me the other day, they said, Hey, I'm thinking about starting or buying a business.

00:14:22.260 I said, okay, well, why? He's like, wow, you know, I think it's a good opportunity.

00:14:26.060 I said, okay. I said, well, what do you make a year? And he's like, I make six figures just over

00:14:31.360 six. Currently is what he's currently. Okay. I said, right. I said, don't get into business.

00:14:36.040 You're making good income. It's going to be a little while before you get able to recoup that.

00:14:40.260 Don't get into business. I said, cause you're going to like leave that, you know, and go into something

00:14:45.200 where you're not going to be earning right off. I said, what's the point, dude? Why do you want to do

00:14:49.860 that? So for me, I think you really need to look inside, strip away your ego, strip away your ADHD

00:14:56.960 kind of feelings about the whole thing and ask yourself, why do you want to get into business?

00:15:02.140 And the only reason to get into business, the only reason is because you want to do more in life or

00:15:08.960 want something more out of life than what you're able to get with your current job. But know that

00:15:15.860 those things that you want, wait 10 years. Like if, if look 10 years, I would say, I can get that in

00:15:21.180 10 years. If you still want to be patient and wait, get into business. This is just a delayed

00:15:26.400 gratification thing. I mean, it's, it is look around in society today and it seems like more and more

00:15:31.000 people can't, they're not able to delay the gratification. And so we look at the guys on

00:15:37.480 Instagram or social media or the pocket or whatever. And we think, well, this guy, you know,

00:15:41.260 origin, for example, you know, like these guys just came out of the woodworks. They're just all of a

00:15:45.340 sudden overnight success, except for that's not really true. You just didn't know when things were

00:15:49.820 struggling and you were in debt and weren't paying yourself and all that fun stuff.

00:15:54.100 You're exactly right. And be prepared not to pay yourself and be prepared to be in, you know,

00:16:00.780 you're never be comfortable in debt. But I'll tell you for me, the first time I went really in debt

00:16:06.940 for origin, like a new, almost was enlightened. Everything became clear. My focus became clear

00:16:15.220 and my mission became even clearer. And my action was now. And it's almost like, you know, you talk

00:16:22.920 about when you like fast and how everything is clear and because your body is saying, Hey, you're

00:16:29.140 in survival mode. Now I'm going to, I'm going to get your brain and your mind ready to go hunt.

00:16:34.120 Well, it was, it's almost like that in business, you can create that same euphoric

00:16:38.200 drive and feeling. And it's when you put yourself in a place where you need to live or you need to

00:16:43.180 die. And for me, I'm always like, Hey, put yourself in a place where you need to live and you need to

00:16:47.000 die. I'm not giving myself an out. I have one direction and that's the direction I'm going.

00:16:51.460 So there's different levels of business. There certainly is different levels. And it could be like

00:16:56.200 opening a sub shop or a pizza place, or it could be, you know, Hey, I'm going to build and

00:17:00.760 manufacture and sell this product globally, but at any level, have a reason why you're going to do

00:17:06.660 it. How much debt did you go into with, with origin? Uh, overall, I mean, I probably total debt

00:17:14.760 was a million dollars. So guys hear that. I hear that guys hear that. And they're like,

00:17:20.740 Whoa, a million, you know, we're talking seven figures. There's a lot of us quite honestly,

00:17:25.920 who don't believe in ourselves that much to put seven figures on the line. Why did you do that?

00:17:32.100 And how did you get people to give you a million dollars? I mean, I got so many questions.

00:17:35.860 I didn't take on any investors initially. It was just all loans and don't get me wrong. I didn't

00:17:43.040 start with shit. I didn't have, I started, you know, with my wife and I, you know, and that's it.

00:17:48.980 And support from family and stuff, just like emotional support. But, uh, people think like,

00:17:56.220 Oh, you're so like, you have a lot of debt and it's not that much anymore. It's not a million

00:18:00.320 dollars anymore. Maybe three quarters, but it's not, it's different because when you start a

00:18:06.340 business, it's incrementally growing. So your expenses are growing and your gross revenues are

00:18:12.800 growing. Right. It's not like I'm going a million dollars in debt. No, you start day one. It's not.

00:18:18.100 No, right. Right. Exactly. You know, if I tell someone, Hey, my overhead is a hundred thousand

00:18:23.180 dollars a month. They're like, Whoa, it's a hundred thousand dollars. Holy cow. How do you,

00:18:26.780 how do you manage every day? Well, it's incremental. You know, the, the revenues have to be there to

00:18:33.000 support your overhead, you know? So you start out with $25,000 and you show the bank, you can make

00:18:38.920 that work. You show yourself, you can make that work. You gain confidence in the confidence shown

00:18:44.100 between yourself, the bank, your, your spouse, everybody. And then you push further and you

00:18:49.740 push further and then you put your plan together and your plan becomes better and more clear and

00:18:54.660 more concrete. And then you decide, do we need to go more in debt or can we do this ourselves?

00:19:00.240 In a lot of instances, you might need a little more. You might need a line of credit for me.

00:19:04.800 You know, when I started like this factory, this is a 20,000 square foot factory. We wanted to own it.

00:19:09.500 That's a big chunk of my debt. You know what I mean? But we're very resourceful. Like for someone

00:19:14.420 else to do what we're doing, I think they'd start $5 million in debt, but we were resourceful with

00:19:19.900 how we started. It's the long play. It's the 10 year plan. It's not a three year plan.

00:19:26.000 Help me understand this because if I remember correctly, you bought this loom that's like

00:19:29.420 a hundred years old or something. And that was like your, your first piece of equipment,

00:19:32.960 right? Did I understand that correctly? Yeah. Yeah. It's not a hundred years old. It's actually,

00:19:37.420 it's old, but it's not a shuttle loom. It's not like a wooden bull.

00:19:41.860 Right. You're like a hundred years old. It wouldn't even last, man.

00:19:45.120 Yeah. No, I mean, uh, it's an old piece of equipment. It's gotta be 45, but you know,

00:19:51.100 that was one of those things where that was probably the biggest nut we could chase.

00:19:57.500 Was that just a practical decision then? Like this is what we can afford or was there a bit of

00:20:01.420 nostalgia with that as well? Like where did that decision come from?

00:20:03.840 It's what we could afford, you know, because as I called around for like, I probably 18 months,

00:20:10.880 I was looking to weave and can't be done. Can't be done. Can't be done. You're going to start with

00:20:14.460 a million dollars. You need the space, you need the people, you need the knowledge. And it was just

00:20:18.020 like, okay, I finally found one loom, the last one left. What I thought was the last one left. I

00:20:24.000 found a couple more since then, but you know, and this loom was going to be part of a museum.

00:20:29.300 Hmm. And I talked to the woman who was like the curator and she sold it to me and it took like

00:20:35.380 nine guys, eight hours to move at a hundred feet across this buckled, broken water damaged,

00:20:41.800 disgusting wood floor in this million square foot mill. It was like just in the middle,

00:20:45.900 soaked in grease apart. And we moved it, we moved it out. And I found the old timer with the knowledge

00:20:52.620 and he helped us bring it back to life. And that was probably the greatest success we've had in

00:20:57.640 business in my opinion. Why do you, why do you consider it that big of a success?

00:21:02.220 You know, we brought something back from the brink of extinction and I'm not talking about

00:21:08.440 the loom itself. I'm talking about the knowledge that was here. I mean, the, the, the mill that this

00:21:15.960 thing came out of, they wove the military uniforms for the silver war. Like, I mean, this mill had so

00:21:24.740 much heritage and so much knowledge passed down. And there's like a couple of people left that know

00:21:30.500 how to do what they did. This industry is basically on its death bed. And what we're doing is, is we're

00:21:37.760 basically nurturing it back to life. And how we do that is by getting the knowledge and putting it into

00:21:46.860 a 20 year old or a 30 year old, a young person. And that takes years, not days. It takes years to be

00:21:54.160 able to pass this knowledge on because there's so much to it. So that is pretty incredible to see,

00:22:00.020 you know, and it's special to us. It's special. And, uh, and it's special to this area, which is

00:22:05.220 important to me also. Yeah. I want to get into that. But before I do, you said something, it's nearly

00:22:10.280 dead, but I'm going to challenge that a little bit because it's nearly dead for a reason.

00:22:14.680 And so it's not help me because from my perspective, I'm like, well, there's gotta be a

00:22:21.280 reason that it's dying. So help me understand how, because I know there's probably a ton of

00:22:25.840 naysayers who say, no, you can't do this. This can't be done. It's a wasted, uh, time, energy,

00:22:32.700 resources, do something else. Yeah. Okay. So I will answer that for you. Why do you feel it's nearly

00:22:40.840 dead? Where'd you hear that? Uh, that's a good, to me, I don't know if I heard it as much as I feel

00:22:46.960 like, is it an outdated way of doing things? Well, that's a question that you can pose, but what

00:22:54.580 what's happened to you and I, because we're close in age is we've been brought up in the time where

00:23:01.660 everything moved overseas. Sure. Right. And the reason that happened was because of some pretty

00:23:08.320 poor trade agreements. And I don't blame if there was 20 mills in Maine, I don't blame the owners of

00:23:15.540 the mills. They didn't want it to leave. But if one jumped, if one jumped overseas and became so

00:23:22.640 competitive, the others couldn't do anything but do the same. And the way that these mills were set

00:23:29.020 up where they were huge, huge beasts, they're huge half million, million square foot mills,

00:23:34.840 the infrastructure alone to support that infrastructure. You had to have huge chunks

00:23:40.500 of market share. So what I've said is I'm not, I wasn't in manufacturing. How can this be done

00:23:47.240 better? Let's just be smart about it. Why is that mill only spinning cotton? Why is that mill only

00:23:53.680 weaving cotton? Why is that one only dying cotton? Why can't you take all those potential,

00:23:59.320 you know, potential kind of tasks and put them into one in a smaller building, a smaller version

00:24:07.020 of that? Because then what you can do is you can skip the markup on how much it costs to do everything

00:24:13.500 in between. All right. And this is what I'm calling new vertical, not just vertical integration. It's

00:24:19.700 new vertical. It's true vertical. Because in our tiny little 20,000 square foot mill, we can take a raw

00:24:25.840 fiber to a finished product, like in a day. And we did that through a little bit of automation

00:24:31.480 in the transition between the stations. So basically, it's like boxing, man, you can stand

00:24:39.200 in front of the guy, and he can punch you in the face as many times as it takes to knock you out.

00:24:42.860 Or you can start picking your angles and ducking and dodging. You know, let's find this angle. Let's

00:24:48.120 find this angle. I'd run it by I ran an idea. And I can't really say it because they said I should

00:24:53.220 that. I ran an idea. I ran an idea by the North American Toyota distributor for Toyota Loomworks,

00:25:00.440 which Toyota, they invented weaving. Let's just put it that way. I ran this idea by him. They said,

00:25:07.260 the Southern guys like, wow, we've never seen that before. I said, well, is it possible? And they said,

00:25:13.520 I don't see why not. I said, has anybody done it? And they said, no. And I said, okay, I'll do it then.

00:25:19.960 And they said, it's a great idea. You've got to be smart about things. And I think a lot of that

00:25:27.100 for me is like when I used to build technology products, like finding the pathways to do this

00:25:32.180 or do that. It's the same thing. It's just critical thinking, which is the most important thing to

00:25:38.280 teach our kids, I think. But it's critical thinking. Guys, I just want to take a quick

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00:26:30.880 growth when you go to netsuite.com slash man. Again, download that free crush the five barriers

00:26:36.240 to growth guide at netsuite.com slash man netsuite.com slash man. With that said, let us get back to

00:26:42.340 the conversation with Pete. So I'm really glad that I asked that question. And it's always important to

00:26:48.760 like to challenge that and to think about that. And one of the things I commend you with is being able

00:26:53.180 to come up with a lot of these resourceful ways to manage this stuff. Why you? Like why did nobody

00:26:58.260 else figure this out before you have? You know, maybe there's some people that have, but let me say

00:27:05.180 this, why would they even want to think about doing it this way overseas? What's the reason they don't

00:27:11.720 need to have to be more efficient or more cost effective for them to do? You pay somebody five

00:27:16.400 cents an hour and bare feet on a dirt floor, right? You don't care about efficiencies, but what they've

00:27:22.940 done is they they've challenged us. They've challenged me and said, I'm going to sell this product from

00:27:29.060 overseas for this price point. And I got to think like, Hmm, how can I do the same thing and hit that

00:27:38.500 similar price point, but do it smarter? That was the challenge. And so now you've got to come up with

00:27:44.720 a solution and you've just got to be smart about the solution. And why haven't other people thought

00:27:49.880 of it is because this, it's the way it was. It's the way it's been. It's the way people do it. It's the

00:27:55.820 way we do it. That's how it's done. How many times have you heard those words? Sure. All the time.

00:28:00.500 Why, why is it done? Probably why I got in trouble a lot as a kid, you know, why, why is it that way?

00:28:05.880 You know, you got to ask that question. Uh, when, and whenever you're being, you know, taught something,

00:28:11.620 I think of don't just take their word for it, you know, either prove it or disprove it, but figure out

00:28:18.200 why. So that's important to me. And, uh, I hope we're starting something awesome.

00:28:23.360 From my perspective, it certainly is one of the things that we talk a lot about is our obligation

00:28:29.260 and responsibility as men. And I think we have obligations to our family, but also outside of

00:28:34.600 that, we have obligations to our community and the neighborhood and the neighbors that we have.

00:28:38.640 Then you're somebody who I feel like is stepping into this, especially bringing manufacturing back

00:28:43.280 into your hometown, which I think is really cool. Appreciate it. Why have you taken the burden

00:28:47.700 of that responsibility? Because I want to, you know, some men want to coach football and I coach

00:28:57.860 lacrosse. I coach youth lacrosse. Uh, I really, I'm passionate about it. It's my contribution to

00:29:02.860 coaching. Let's just say, but some men are really into coaching. You know, they, they want to coach,

00:29:07.980 they want to live vicariously. They want to coach football or wrestling, and they want to pass their

00:29:12.700 knowledge on in that way. I don't necessarily want to pass my knowledge on. I want to rediscover

00:29:19.540 the knowledge we had because that gets, that gets me engaged. You know, there's a lot of people

00:29:25.420 that can pass their knowledge on. There's not a lot of people that can figure out what knowledge

00:29:33.120 has been lost and try to recoup that, you know, and bundle that up and redistribute it.

00:29:38.620 I take a lot of pride in that. I take a lot of pride in finding those old timers, finding those

00:29:43.200 people, finding the way it's been done, you know, and then taking that and modernizing it, let's just

00:29:49.200 say. And I think you've got to be a little bit naive to be a little bit arrogant enough to think

00:29:54.240 you can, you know, and I think people are scared of that. I don't think you and I are all that unlike

00:30:00.300 when it comes to that. I mean, I look at what masculinity was like and how it's changed and

00:30:05.000 some for the better and frankly, some not. And how, not how do we redefine it, but how do we

00:30:10.380 reclaim it? And then like you said, modernize it and make it available in a way that serves

00:30:15.440 ourselves and serves the people that we have an obligation responsibility for most effectively.

00:30:20.300 What's your vision for Origin? Not just with the company itself, but with your community,

00:30:25.400 with your neighborhood, state, country. I know that's important to you. What is your vision?

00:30:29.960 You know, Maine had LL Bean. They have LL Bean, right? That's a great company. They still make

00:30:39.400 a bunch of stuff here in Maine and that's cool. But this area also had Bass Shoe. Everyone knows

00:30:45.760 Bass Shoe. The Penny Loafers and the Weegians and all the other stuff, they built that Bass Shoe.

00:30:51.160 And we had Hathaway Shirt Company and we had Dexter Shoe, you know, and we had all these manufacturing

00:30:58.480 companies that are gone. They're completely gone. So for Origin, it's going to take place of these

00:31:06.840 in a new and modern way. And with a different vision, which is 100% sourced and made in America

00:31:16.500 without compromise. Show me another company that's going to say without compromise.

00:31:21.120 That thread, that's made in America. That's without compromise. That textile, that's made in America.

00:31:28.820 That cotton, that's grown in Tennessee. Think of the supply chain. Think of the influence you're

00:31:33.900 having over that supply chain by saying that last statement without compromise. We're releasing these

00:31:42.160 leggings, compression leggings that can be used in MMA or football or field hockey. The reason we

00:31:50.000 haven't released them is because the elastic band, the elastic band is not made in America.

00:31:57.700 Right. Interesting. Okay. Now it is. Now it is. Right. We were either going to buy the machinery.

00:32:03.840 So we've had this for a year. We've been wanting to release this and we haven't. You know how much

00:32:08.240 money we've lost because we have that without compromise? I can't even imagine. Greed will kill a

00:32:15.580 man. Okay. And when you say patience is a virtue, it is. But when I sell this, we're launching next

00:32:22.100 week, these compression pants. I know that's a hundred percent made in America. And I know it's

00:32:27.120 made in America without compromise. And I can say even that elastic was woven at our factory in Rhode

00:32:34.340 Island. You know what I mean? That feels good. And it's driving it down the chain. And that's what this

00:32:39.920 country was founded on. You know, and of course I'm from New England. So I, you know, I feel like

00:32:44.000 we've got to stay true to that, you know? Well, not only that, but just the level of integrity,

00:32:48.260 because quite honestly, if you were to put that out into the world, nobody's going to ask about the

00:32:52.460 elastic. Nobody's going to even know. Right. But the fact that you have that level of integrity says

00:32:57.940 a lot about who you are and how you run your business. I think that's important. I think that

00:33:02.240 that's the value proposition. I think that that's full transparency, you know, and I think it's

00:33:07.620 authentic people these days, they want authenticity and that's what I'm all about, you know? And that's

00:33:14.340 why it just works really well. What our message, our story, what we're saying, what we're promoting,

00:33:19.040 even if it's not for origin, just in general, like what happened to that? Where did that go?

00:33:26.340 Strip away everything else. Where did that go? You know, and I pose that question.

00:33:32.560 Well, Pete, we've talked about so much, man. We've talked about responsibility, obligation,

00:33:37.980 vision, integrity. I mean, I could go all day about this stuff, but I really liked the direction we

00:33:42.580 took because it's different than another entrepreneur type podcast. And I think there's

00:33:46.580 a lot that you're doing that speaks highly of you. Of course, I did want to ask one of the things that's

00:33:51.000 pretty cool is you've been able to partner on some things with Jocko. And I know a lot of guys are

00:33:55.700 going to ask me this question about how you're able to connect with somebody as influential as that.

00:33:59.480 And I know there's other people that you're connecting with as well. Any insight that you can shed

00:34:03.100 there that would help these guys is that reaching out to other people that are influential in their

00:34:07.880 lives? Sure. I think first of all, timing is everything. You know, there's a lot of entrepreneurs

00:34:14.120 that would be like, you know, I tried to get in contact with this person and I never got a

00:34:19.820 response. Timing's everything. The first thing you need to do is you need to give something up.

00:34:26.220 Whatever that is, your time, show up somewhere, engage with somebody on their turf, on their terms,

00:34:33.360 but you need to give something up instead of looking for something. You know, I think that's

00:34:38.640 where people make the mistake when they're looking for like influencers or they're looking like, I need

00:34:43.320 this for her. I want this from this person. I want to get involved with this. It's coming from an eye

00:34:47.740 perspective. And I think you need to look at it differently. I think that's an important thing.

00:34:54.520 First of all, what can you give to this relationship? What can you offer? Right? Because you're going to

00:34:59.720 offer something up before you can get something in return. Instead of looking for what I can get,

00:35:03.360 what I can get, what I can take, how this can work in my benefit. So let's start there with Jocko.

00:35:08.780 And myself, it was kind of like the perfect storm. I like to say that, you know, first of all,

00:35:14.440 he's from New England, you know, grew up a lot in Maine. We had that connection. And we also had

00:35:20.120 the jujitsu connection. That's deep. You know, we're both black belts in Brazilian jujitsu. And

00:35:27.020 any jujitsu thing, it's weird, but it's kind of a special bond type of thing. Let's just say when

00:35:31.900 you're in jujitsu that deep, when you've committed that much. With Jocko, the way that we hooked up was

00:35:38.240 you know, he kind of like called me out on his podcast. I didn't even know what a podcast was

00:35:42.420 up until last year. I had never listened to one. So he's just like, hey, someone tell this guy,

00:35:49.640 this psychopath over at Origin, that's trying to like pull these old looms out of these factories

00:35:55.400 to get in touch with me or whatever. And one of his friends is now a mutual friend of both of ours.

00:36:01.820 She, she got in touch with me and we introduced, you got introduced. And our first conversation was

00:36:08.220 like four hours long. You know, we're just shooting the shit, man. Just like, you know,

00:36:13.080 having a good time. And I wasn't looking for anything from him because I didn't know that's

00:36:19.320 what we were doing. You know, it was a real honest, an honest thing. And I think the same thing from him,

00:36:26.300 he liked what we were doing and he wanted to get involved in it somehow. And it just worked,

00:36:32.540 you know, and I think that the timing was right. And that's important. And people get caught up on

00:36:37.460 like, you're pushing for something that doesn't happen. And they get caught up in the moment of

00:36:42.860 that instead of saying, okay, what am I not seeing because of this? What angle am I not seeing? And I'll

00:36:49.640 tell you things that people, I could have gotten caught up in. And I'll tell you this briefly.

00:36:53.780 I could have gotten caught up in history channel did this big, they came up here and they did this

00:36:59.420 big development deal with origin for a reality show producers. And, and it went to a green light

00:37:06.460 meeting, which if you know, in TV, that's the last meeting before it goes on air. The new president

00:37:11.600 of history who had come in a couple of weeks earlier, like shut it down. Oh, really? Right. Yeah. I had

00:37:16.640 another opportunity to be ever seen that show, the prophet. Yeah, they did. They did the same type of

00:37:21.400 thing. And at the same time, like Jocko was coming into the picture. So a lot of things

00:37:26.140 were happening. And I thought at first, like, well, this thing is important. This can get us

00:37:30.700 out to the masses. This can tell our story the best. No, that's not right. And I thought

00:37:37.220 after it didn't happen, they craft the story. We don't craft the story. You know, they're not

00:37:43.060 going to tell our message the way we want it told. Sure. And so it's like, that happened,

00:37:47.940 but didn't happen. Then the next thing happened, but didn't happen. And then boom,

00:37:51.640 Jocko came on board. I knew it was right. The timing was right. It made sense, but I didn't get

00:37:57.000 caught up in the other two too much that it was a detriment to what we were trying to do.

00:38:01.380 You know, and those are some examples. There's a lot more examples, more people could relate to,

00:38:06.220 but for the Jocko, the Jocko circumstance, those other two things were related deeply.

00:38:11.840 I think there's so much value in offering value. I mean, there's something to be said there.

00:38:15.540 That's the reason that we even started talking, right? I mean, value, no expectation for me,

00:38:19.940 no expectation from you. Hey, I like what you're doing. You like what I'm doing and opportunities

00:38:24.440 to create win-win type situations. Right. Like what you're, what we're doing right now,

00:38:30.160 we're engaged in conversation and engaged in building some type of relationship. But right now

00:38:36.800 it's just really helping each other. That's what it is. So you're, you through Facebook,

00:38:40.940 we connected whatever, man, I've been listening to your podcast. I love them. I'm already getting

00:38:44.960 something out of them, listening to some of your guests. It's been really helpful. I really enjoy

00:38:49.840 that. And then I was like, Hey, what, what can we do together? And you're like, I don't know,

00:38:54.020 but why don't you come on the podcast? We'll get it figured out. You know, Hey, I'm going to start

00:38:57.060 jujitsu. Hey, let me send you a geek. Hey, why don't you come on the podcast and talk about this?

00:39:00.840 That sounds good. Instead of going, Hey, I'm just going to go for the, that final thing.

00:39:06.440 Right. Right. If you put that thing, you think you want, that's the key. You think you want this

00:39:12.740 thing. No, man, get on this path to go to the thing you want. And I'm going to tell you right

00:39:17.920 now, the thing you think you want that is going to be different because there's going to be so much

00:39:22.380 more you're going to be getting involved with. There's going to be so many avenues, so many

00:39:25.420 pathways as it splinters out, that's building a relationship. You can help each other multiple

00:39:31.420 ways. And then maybe you get on the path together and maybe you go in a completely different

00:39:35.980 direction together. Who knows? But you've got to start that way by giving more than taking.

00:39:41.280 Yeah. Love it, man. Obviously we could talk about this stuff all day. We are winding down on time.

00:39:45.840 I do want to ask you a couple of questions as we wind down. The first one I prepared you for,

00:39:49.820 I think this is like the third time we've tried to do this interview now. Like both of us have had

00:39:53.740 technology issues. So you've had plenty of time to think about this. You better hit this one out of

00:39:58.940 the park, man. Okay. What does it mean to be a man? That's easy for me. Really, when it boils

00:40:05.760 right down to it, to be a man is to raise a man. That's it. If you can raise a man, you are a man.

00:40:17.320 It's awesome. It's awesome. You're doing it, man. You are doing it. I appreciate what you're doing and

00:40:21.820 I see what you're doing in your community and what you're doing with your business. It's inspiring to

00:40:26.160 say the least. So how do we connect with you? How do we connect with origin? Learn more about

00:40:29.400 what you guys are doing, your story, your videos, your products, all the cool stuff you guys are up

00:40:33.140 to. Absolutely. Yeah. You know, I did start a podcast, which is awesome. In fact, I got to

00:40:39.680 interrupt you here and I apologize about that. A lot of times people ask me like, what are my favorite

00:40:44.360 podcasts? And I've always got anywhere from five to six, seven, eight different podcasts I'm listening

00:40:49.860 to. And yours man right now is at the top. Like you have a really, really good podcast. So anyways,

00:40:55.320 I interrupted you, but go ahead, go for it. That I am, man, that means a lot. That means a lot. You

00:41:00.920 know, it's really does. I hope you you're hearing those words. It means a lot because I wasn't in the

00:41:07.120 game and I'm just trying to get into the game. So I appreciate that. You know, supporting what you're

00:41:14.080 doing. First of all, I mean, man, I've learned so much from your podcast, you know, and some of the

00:41:20.560 guests you've had, I've really made me think, you know, and I'm a thinker. And I think as men,

00:41:26.240 we need to humble ourselves and create new perspective. It's all about perspective.

00:41:30.820 And so thank you for that. First of all, and, you know, to support us, originmaine.com is where we do

00:41:37.040 what we do. There's lots of videos up there about how we are bringing back manufacturing from the brink

00:41:43.220 of extinction here in Maine and making a bunch of great gear. And we have awesome nutritional

00:41:48.680 products. We partnered up with Jocko on some really incredible stuff, but doing that, just getting the

00:41:54.640 message out there and believing in the American dream. It's not dead. Just believe in the American

00:42:03.360 dream and act on that belief in whatever way you think you need to, to be part of this. So that's

00:42:12.900 it, man. Awesome. We'll make sure we link everything up so the guys know where to go.

00:42:16.640 They can connect with you, man. I'm looking forward to building a relationship with you,

00:42:19.860 working with you a little bit more and doing some cool things together. So got to tell you,

00:42:23.280 I appreciate you, appreciate you taking the time. And then of course, just imparting some of this

00:42:26.780 wisdom. This is valuable, valuable stuff for any man out there, especially those that want to

00:42:31.000 do something big, you know, want to create something big for themselves, want to create something

00:42:34.860 big for their community. A lot of good stuff here. Appreciate you, brother.

00:42:37.680 Yeah. Thank you, Ryan. I appreciate it.

00:42:40.840 There it is, gentlemen, my conversation with Mr. Pete Roberts. I told you this one was going to be

00:42:45.360 a little different on the topic of entrepreneurship, and I'm sure that you heard that it was, but I hope

00:42:50.220 that you took a lot away from this. I know I certainly did. And again, just Pete's stories and

00:42:54.340 the message behind what he's doing is inspiring to me. So I'd love to hear from you. Pete would love to

00:42:58.940 hear from you. You can hit us up on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, wherever you do the social media

00:43:03.960 thing. Tell us what you enjoyed about the episode. Tell us what you'll be doing differently or

00:43:07.600 implementing in your life. You can find me on just about any platform that you might be on

00:43:12.120 at order of man. And then a quick reminder, guys, I mentioned it earlier. The book again is coming

00:43:16.800 out February 1st, 2018 sovereignty, the battle for the hearts and minds of men. If you want the

00:43:22.460 introductory chapter and you want to be notified about when the book will be available, go to

00:43:27.280 order of man.com slash book order of man.com slash book guys. Again, I appreciate you thankful

00:43:32.760 for you. I'm glad you're tuning in each and every week and glad to be on the same mission and

00:43:36.520 journey as you are until next week, take action and become the man you are meant to be.

00:43:42.300 Thank you for listening to the order of man podcast. You're ready to take charge of your

00:43:46.560 life and be more of the man you were meant to be. We invite you to join the order at order of man.com.

Order of Man - January 23, 2018

149： Purpose-Driven Entrepreneurship ｜ Pete Roberts

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