Tactical Wealth: From Military to Money

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Unknown
every time something goes wrong in my life since then,

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Unknown
I just look back to that moment and I'm like, don't focus on the problem. Focus on a solution.

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Unknown
all CEOs, to some degree have to have a never quit attitude. But your journey through buds is one of the extreme examples of that

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Unknown
I realized I didn't want to be a Navy Seal for this selfish reason of doing something hard, I wanted to do it to go hunt the most evil people in the world and make sure 911 happened again.

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Unknown
entrepreneurs draw inspiration from all kinds of places.

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Unknown
I had to pitch single life thousands of times. It was almost like, speed dating

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Unknown
Don't try to just figure it out yourself. When it comes to business.

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Unknown
For too long, those that have worn the cloth of the country, that have fought and sacrificed for our nation have been left out of the greatest financial engine the world has ever seen. My service paved the way for my success, and that's true for so many venture partners. In fact, some of the greatest companies were created by veterans.

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Unknown
I'm your host, Carson, and in each episode, we'll bring you the stories and the wisdom of those who have gone from boots on the ground to successful careers, from military to wealth and how they've done it. So you can apply those insights to your own mission and life. Welcome to tactical wealth, from military to money.

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Unknown
Jeff, welcome to the show. Before we get tactical, we're going to do a couple quick questions. If you had to sum up your journey from your naval service to your entrepreneurship career in one sentence, what would it be?

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Unknown
I'd say problem solving, brotherhood. And just grit grinding through, grinding through both. Both of them together. Nice. And what's one moment from your time in the teams that's, we call it, say, your time in teams. You don't say as a Navy Seal. That completely reshaped how you see the world.

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Unknown
Yeah. So going through hell week, getting really sick and having my dreams basically ripped away.

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Unknown
But still finding a way through, persevering. And then still making it through doing all these different things. It wasn't just being tough. It wasn't just talking and communicating effectively. It was, talk like talking to the right people, building the right allies. All these things had to come together at once to, get back in and and persevere.

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Unknown
So

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Unknown
every time something goes wrong in my life since then, I, I just look back to that moment and I'm like, don't focus on the problem.

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Unknown
Focus on a solution. Yeah. And

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Unknown
all CEOs, to some degree have to have a never quit attitude. But your journey through buds is one of the extreme examples of that I think.

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Unknown
Okay.

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Unknown
Reticent to ask this next question, but was there a specific moment during your time in the teams that planted the seed for single life? Yes, definitely. So going down to Brazil many times, I was very close with the Gracie family, and they were a lot of my lot of my best friends in California. I would go to Orange County, train with them, go out with them, they would come down, Pacific Beach.

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Unknown
I would take them out. It was like a bunch of allies between the Gracie family and the Seal teams. And so I was like the lone gringo they would bring down to Brazil. And I'd be on the beach, and I'd be wearing a big pair of boardshorts like Americans do, and and I'd be going in the ocean and then everybody's and singers and they're getting better suntans they're swimming through the water better.

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Unknown
And then I'm walking around in like a soggy pair of shorts. I'm talking to a Brazilian girl. I'm like, hey, I think, I think I need to get some of these singers. They seem like way, way better for all these reasons. And then she goes, yeah, they're so sexy on men. And I'm like, all right, that's it. I'm buying ten of them.

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Unknown
I started wearing them all over the world and everybody would be guys at first would be like, oh, I don't know about these things. And then they'd just see, like, I wouldn't even have to talk to girls. They would just come up to me and like, compliment me on my swimwear. And the guys would be like ten minutes later, hey, do you have any more of these things I could get?

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Unknown
This would be at Vegas, at a pool party or cruise Yacht Week, or all of these kind of fun things. And I'm like, you know what? I think I need to, like, make, make, bring these singles to the U.S. and I'm like, would be a name for them. I'm like, oh, single life, single life for everybody, and I love single life was born.

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Unknown
I love it, I love it. You know, in entrepreneurship we call that an moment. It's like one of the best moments for some Brazilian girl right in your face being like, oh, we find these short shorts incredibly sexy. Well, like, that's it, go to the store. A company was born. Yeah, awesome. That was it. And it is a lesson like

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Unknown
like entrepreneurs draw inspiration from all kinds of places.

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Unknown
So fascinating.

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Unknown
All right. Excellent.

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Unknown
Okay. Well, Jeff, let's talk about your journey to the Navy. Tell me why you wanted to become a Seal. Yeah. So it actually started when I was 16 years old, and I wasn't sure what I wanted to do. I wanted to be, like, an athlete of some kind, but, then I was still, you know, I thought maybe I had gotten, you know, braces.

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Unknown
I'm like, oh, maybe being a dentist would be good. I always got along with the dad. And your sister's a doctor, right? And so then my sister became an orthodontist. A dentist. Because. Because I was saying at first. And she's doctor gum DMD owns gum dental. So it worked out really well for her. But then I was playing basketball my sophomore year.

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Unknown
It was a fast break. It was scrimmage before the season started and someone pulled up first shot and it came back as a line drive. I caught it, landed, tore my people, hit me in the air. I fell on a crazy split with my leg under me, and I tore my ACL and I was just stuck in a brace.

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Unknown
And I went from working out every, every day and having like two hours of team practice to just being stuck in a brace. And I realized I needed the biggest challenge in order to be fulfilled. I didn't want to go and work in an office as a young man, and I started looking on the internet. What's the biggest challenge I could find?

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Unknown
And I found out about Hell Week and Navy Seals. I was like, oh, I want to go be a Navy Seal and do this hell Week thing. And I almost wanted to do it more to do Hell Week than anything else. But I and in the next couple of years, I just learned more and more, became obsessed with it.

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Unknown
And then 9/11 happened when I was 17 years old, sitting in my high school senior class, and

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Unknown
I realized I didn't want to be a Navy Seal for this selfish reason of doing something hard, I wanted to do it to go hunt the most evil people in the world and make sure 911 happened again.

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Unknown
I used to go on field trips to New York City, so it really hit home.

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Unknown
It was 90 minutes away from where I grew up in Pennsylvania, and so from there on, I was just like, I wanted to do special operations. Yeah, yeah. And I think we know now, in hindsight that the people who make it through are not people who want to do it for the glory of the job, because that's ego based.

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Unknown
But for the mission. Right. Now buds was super fucking hard for you, right? Like, yeah, I like that little mantra like one and done and you're like, oh no, I'm going to make this as hard as possible. And we call that extra buds. Yeah. I mean almost like an extra kicked out at one point. Right. I was kicked out.

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Unknown
I was tell us everything. Yeah. So I'm going through I'm going through first phase and I, you know, I kind of have a thing stack all the odds in your favor. I wasn't just going there, showing up, seeing what happened. I'm like, I am getting through this. No matter what I'm preparing for, you know, everything going wrong. And and, you know, it talked about I wanted, like, really hard.

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Unknown
I wanted really hard all week and all these things like, be careful what you wish for because I got it Friday before, everything was going great. Originally, I never failed a single evolution. Every run, every swim, every. Of course, I trained with some. I made friends with guys who were in a class ahead of me. I practiced drown proofing.

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Unknown
I, practiced the underwater knot tying, underwater swim. I'm like, I'm not going to fail anything. Even though water. I wasn't great in the water yet, I, I was training all that so I wasn't failing anything. And I, I get to Friday and all of a sudden I become very nauseous, not feeling good. And I ended up getting viral gastroenteritis.

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Unknown
And I've never been this sick in my life where I would drink water and immediately throw up. I couldn't keep any water. It's literally the only time it's happened in my life. And it happened Friday before Hell week. And so our mentor at the time was speaking to us, Master Chief Guile, Legendary Seal that speak to us about stoicism and philosophy and delayed gratification and all these things to help, like young men like get through this training because it's more mental than it is physical.

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Unknown
So I walk, so I have to literally walk out while he's in the middle of talking to everyone. I just throw up in a garbage can and I like, try to. I'm so thirsty. I just drink more water immediately throw up. And this goes on for a while, like a couple hours. And you never want to go to medical as a seal.

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Unknown
Especially before I as a as a bad student because then it just it just looks bad. They can find something wrong with you. You get rolled to the next class, you have to start all the way over. I'm already six weeks into this thing. Everything's going great. I'm really good physically. I just want to get through Hell week because that's kind of if you get hurt before hell week, then you get rolled back.

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Unknown
You start all the way over. If you get if you get to like Thursday of Hell Week, you'll get rolled, you'll get rolled forward and then you're at least a brown shirt. And if you have to and you don't have to repeat, you don't have to repeat all these things. So I'm like, I got to get I got to get through hell week two, hell week.

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Unknown
And I was just pumped. I've been waiting for this moment my whole life. It's all I've talked about since I was 16 years old. Now it was 24. So I'm ready to go and. But, so I go, I have to go to medical because I literally can't even drink water without puking. So I go in and they go to give me an IV and can't even get the IVs in me.

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Unknown
It's just rolling, rolling. So dehydrate it. And finally they get one in and I'm like, later that night I'm able to start drinking water again. Next day I still can't eat food. Finally, maybe Saturday night I'm able to keep a little bit of food down and I'm like, that's it. I'm going, I'm going into this thing. And you have Sunday, where everybody kind of hangs out as a class, have some pizza, watch some movies, try to get fired up because they're about to have breakout.

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Unknown
You go in your tent and I'm so fired up. I'm so ready. I think I'm feeling good. But I was like massively dehydrated at this time. And then we go, breakout! Breakout happens. This is the beginning of Hell Week. You're starting all week. But you're already starting behind the power curve. Yeah. Massively dehydrated, hardly had any food. I might have lost 15 pounds or something before and then we kick it off and immediately everywhere you go, you just have a 200 pound boot on your head and you're just running, running, running.

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Unknown
Then we go to log PT, you're just lunging everywhere with these logs, doing all the these things, and then you have to lay in the ocean for an hour at a time getting surf, tortured. Remember, we go to Steel Pier and we had one of the strongest guys in our class. He kind of looked like, Drago from Rocky.

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Unknown
From Rocky four, he was second fastest guy and just huge and jacked. And he ends up quitting in that moment. Like, everybody sees the strongest guy, like quitting. And it's just mass exodus. Everyone falls and we lose like 24 guys on that evolution. We keep going and keep having more boats and we like next day. I think it's out doing the Bowie swim.

00:12:18:04 - 00:12:39:21
Unknown
We lose like another 25 guys and then having like, what is it, base tour over. The base side of the island, just sprinting with the boats all night and end up. My legs start to crash. So this is like Tuesday or Wednesday, right? Yeah, this is like Tuesday. And people don't realize, like, you've been up for 48 hours at this point.

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Unknown
Yeah. Run like 40 miles working out of 40 hours a day. Yeah. Yeah. Like extreme exertion. Eating memories in the surf. Yeah, yeah. So it's mixing extreme exertion, dehydration and hypothermia. And those things are what really can lead to getting rhabdomyolysis. So my legs start cramping so bad, and it's a type of cramp. Or a football player will get carried off a field.

00:13:05:11 - 00:13:25:11
Unknown
And for me, you can't. You can't just stop running when you're under these boats. So I just bit down as hard as I could, ran through the cramps. And I think that's what really gave me wrapped up with that at that time, which had never heard a rap nobody had ever heard of Rabideau had never been diagnosed and Seal training before.

00:13:25:13 - 00:13:46:13
Unknown
And I get through, I just bite down. We run like a few more miles, and then now we're going to have a four mile timed run. Yeah. After I literally I was literally like the last maybe 30ft, we were almost there and I was about to fall out from under it, and I just held everything I could to get there.

00:13:46:16 - 00:14:08:06
Unknown
And and then now we're going to do these runs on your own and maybe we do the first one, and maybe ten people are behind me on the first one. I'm so slow, like my my legs aren't working. I'm like, what's going on? And then nearly all these people quit. I'm like, that's not good. Because then the the target starts coming to you more.

00:14:08:06 - 00:14:26:22
Unknown
So eventually either you just get to the point of no return. Yeah. And they, I'm just falling out from under the boat now. The whole day Tuesday, I can't even stay stand of the boat. The boat's taking off. I can't even keep up with it. And all the heat. I keep getting written up in chats. I'm telling them something's wrong.

00:14:26:22 - 00:14:47:08
Unknown
I don't know what it is. They're like, quit making these excuses. And. And, finally, it's an hour from Wednesday, and they performance, they they're like, this is it. You're going to active. I'm like, I'll do anything to stay here. I don't know what's wrong with me, but could you just, like, surf torture me the rest of the week?

00:14:47:08 - 00:15:07:17
Unknown
I don't know, like, we can't we can't do that. So I go, I go, I'm like, all right, I need to go to medical because I like, this is wrong. I need to find out what's wrong. I thought I had a thing called Sipe, which was well known. Swimmer induced pulmonary edema and pulmonary edema typically only happens to people that are climbing Mount Everest.

00:15:07:19 - 00:15:30:17
Unknown
Or it's called Hape for that high altitude and but student swimmer induced. So I think I have that too because I can't breathe breathe great either. So I go to medical. They put a pulse ox on me and I, I like it's not it's not that low. My lungs are blood. Everything's seems okay there, except my legs just won't really push anything.

00:15:30:19 - 00:15:49:08
Unknown
So I, call my mentor. I call my mentor. The next day might get, this legendary. Since they've kicked you out a week. That's what they kicked me out of hell week. And I actually didn't go. Yeah, so you get dropped like your dreams of being a killer over here? Totally over. Got it. My heart is crushed.

00:15:49:10 - 00:16:14:07
Unknown
Right. So in the end, you went from being this, like, incredible top performer. Yeah. To what the instructors would call a total shit bag. Yeah. You got, like, the white hot light on you, and they're like, what the. What the fuck? Like, why can't you perform even when you're performing? Well, you don't you there's, you know, 200 guys, 253 guys is what I started with in the next class.

00:16:14:11 - 00:16:36:20
Unknown
So you're. I might have been more of, like, a grit, like gray. Man, I hadn't failed anything. Yeah, I wasn't winning the things. But there's, like, tremendous athletes there, and but I was like a super solid performer. Totally. And now your dreams would be. Now eventually you claw your way back to Bud's in the end. Well, it's literally days, like, two days later.

00:16:36:21 - 00:16:57:21
Unknown
Okay. Yeah. I wasn't having I was not good because the weight for the big desk. Right. And they literally give you a uniform, like the uniform you wear in boot camp. It was like the utility uniform. Yeah. And I called it the quarter uniform dungarees. It was also. Yeah, it was, it was utilities I think dungarees or something more when you're cleaning stuff.

00:16:57:23 - 00:17:14:19
Unknown
But I was like, that's a quitter uniform. There's also the quitter room because yeah, they make you go to that. I didn't go to that either. Like, I have not going to any of this quitter stuff. I did quit. So I'm in and there's five of us who did it. Usually people that don't make it through hell week.

00:17:14:19 - 00:17:35:18
Unknown
They all quit Sunday, Monday, maybe a few. On Tuesday there was five people that didn't make it. On Tuesday, some were performance dropped and some some had quit. And somewhere like injured. And they're all there. They're all in utilities and I'm in my dress blues and he like talks to us, gives us all our papers to go to XT5.

00:17:35:20 - 00:17:56:21
Unknown
And I was like, crew chief. Good. Can I, can I talk to you after everyone leaves? And he was like, yes, no problem. I was like, hey, I was like, I'm 23. I've college degree. I never failed anything this entire time. I just got viral gastroenteritis. So I spent the entire day Friday throwing up. I couldn't even eat food.

00:17:57:01 - 00:18:13:20
Unknown
They were just giving me IVs. I was like, you can take away. Because when I signed up, there was a $40,000 bonus. I go, you can take away my bonus. You can take away my pay. I have savings I can live on till the end of buds. I just I'll do anything to start over again. I was like, I don't want to go.

00:18:13:20 - 00:18:30:23
Unknown
I don't need to go away and get stronger and more mature. I just need to be healthy. I just want another chance. And he's like, looks at me like I'm crazy. You are the first person to ever walk in here and want to do this again after getting dropped. Like, I like that attitude. I've got to talk to the other instructors.

00:18:31:01 - 00:18:53:12
Unknown
So. And then eventually he put you back into the next class. Well, it was still a fight because the other instructors just saw me literally, like dying the next day. But ultimately, you not only made it through that hurdle, which is basically like being on death's door. Never have steel career either, right? And then you go back to graduate with which class I graduated with.

00:18:53:12 - 00:19:18:13
Unknown
But, but the well, I went to the next class, still had rabideau failed everything. Yeah. Then graduated. Then they figured out what it was, I got healthy, Ty woods was my. Who's a hero. Benghazi was my instructor. And then I persevered and got through to the very next class because of me. It went from like the hardest thing in the world to, like kind of being easy because, you know, everything is relative.

00:19:18:14 - 00:19:39:07
Unknown
So you go through, you finally graduate after this incredibly arduous journey. You graduate class, 272, you got to seal team five, like you say, Surf Team five. But what was I. I went to No Fun one. That's. You got the better deal for sure. But you earned it by, like, going through three bugs classes, and 17 log parties.

00:19:39:08 - 00:19:41:09
Unknown
Right. Usually there's seven, and then

00:19:41:09 - 00:19:51:17
Unknown
you end up having this extraordinary Seal career. You spent a decade in the teams. Yeah. You're an a rock veteran. You become a combatives instructor. You you do everything there is to do as a frogman,

00:19:51:17 - 00:19:57:09
Unknown
basically. And then, you decide to transition out. So I want to talk about your journey to entrepreneurship.

00:19:57:09 - 00:19:59:11
Unknown
What inspired you to transition out of the Seal teams?

00:19:59:11 - 00:20:21:16
Unknown
And what do you want to do? Yeah, so I, I actually had a dream before the Seal teams. I had, I had lived with my cousin Lula and Teddy before I started at UCF. And he was a very successful entrepreneur. He ended up founding Echelon Fitness and several other things, and I just loved the control that business owner had over their life.

00:20:21:16 - 00:20:42:15
Unknown
It was all on them. It wasn't going in punching a clock. So I that was kind of the goal go be a seal and and be an entrepreneur. I also had injured my back and my back had been getting worse. And ACL teams are very physical. So I had I saw one door kind of closing, but I was going to LA all the time.

00:20:42:15 - 00:21:11:00
Unknown
I had a lot of friends up there, you, you as well. And they had all gone to college or gone and done a graduate degree. After several had gone to Wharton, I saw I saw the opportunity, one door closing, one door opening that these guys had done their MBA and then all their deals and founding companies. It was kind of done through through, their graduate school connections and so I was like, this is actually a great way to transition.

00:21:11:02 - 00:21:32:02
Unknown
I don't have to go right into the real world right away. I haven't worked in business yet. I had a business degree, but I can and I was ready to found my company as well. I had the idea everything was ready to go, and I was actually actually had it for a year while still in Active Seal, and I was studying to do the GMAT.

00:21:32:04 - 00:21:59:13
Unknown
And so I was like, this is kind of the perfect way I study business, but studying it can honestly be a little boring. So if I have my own company to apply everything directly to, it makes it a lot more engaging for me. And so I applied at UCLA, got in, brought it through the entrepreneurship pipeline, had a bunch of MBA students working on it for a grade, and then taking all their, you know, like many of them had a decade working in corporate already.

00:21:59:14 - 00:22:21:11
Unknown
And so kind of really was able to grow and scale single life through, through that pipeline. Yeah. So, you know, contrary to popular opinion, you and I actually didn't really meet in the teams. We were both in the teams. I was serving our service. You were transitioning off active duty. We met, of course, jumping out of an airplane skydiving in San Diego, where we found ourselves in the middle of the air.

00:22:21:13 - 00:22:42:19
Unknown
We got a photo, we got a photo, and we were like, 10,000ft. Yeah, we'll do a sunset. It's so awesome. But what I'm hearing is that the first thing that you did when you really transitioned out is that you change your circle of influences. Now, you know more people than almost anybody I know, like your sort of network effect is really extraordinary.

00:22:42:20 - 00:22:47:16
Unknown
How key do you think that is for other Seals or other service members who are transitioning out?

00:22:47:16 - 00:23:08:17
Unknown
how do you think that sort of network effect is like knowing like a broad base of people are changing your social circle, right? Because prior to this, you were really San Diego Ultimate Team guy, right? And then you started going up to LA and meeting a bunch of like, you know, some ex team guys like me who become entrepreneurs, but also like, like real civilian entrepreneurs like James Williams and stuff like that.

00:23:08:17 - 00:23:35:16
Unknown
Right. So you changed your circle? Definitely. I, I've always been very extroverted, for sure. And like kind of a super, super connector. And I was someone else who's a really great networker is my friend Joe Sweeney. He would come and speak to the Honor Foundation. He wrote the book networking as a Contact Sport, and he would talk about how you're the average of the five people you spend the most time with.

00:23:35:17 - 00:23:53:06
Unknown
And I would I was fighting by myself up in because I was I got excited to create my own company and grow it and scale it the same way. I was excited to go be a seal and I looked at the same way and I'm like, this is going to take a lot of grit, a lot of problem solving.

00:23:53:06 - 00:24:00:06
Unknown
And I'd found myself up in LA and I'd be the only person out of the dinners that didn't have an Ivy League MBA,

00:24:00:06 - 00:24:14:11
Unknown
right? And I was like, I'm sitting at the right table, right? Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Really, really smart. And what what was the hardest thing about starting and scaling your own company? Just all the things I didn't know.

00:24:14:13 - 00:24:33:03
Unknown
You don't even know what you don't know. And and, but what I did know was a lot of people. So every time I had a question, I could just call on a friend who had done it already, and they were literally like some of the top people in the world at that, at that part of business.

00:24:33:05 - 00:25:01:01
Unknown
And they would they would walk me through it. And UCLA Anderson was also extremely they had an amazing support system. I ended up single life, ended up being my master's thesis there as well. And I did three accelerators startup, UCLA, the the Business Creation Option and Anderson Venture Accelerator. So any time I had some issue pop up in business, I could talk to the faculty, talk to all these mentors they had.

00:25:01:01 - 00:25:06:18
Unknown
I had to pitch single life thousands of times. It was almost like, speed dating

00:25:06:18 - 00:25:19:10
Unknown
and be on. And I'd have to like, I'm glad. I'm glad you brought that up, because I always consider that like an essential entrepreneurial skill. So I like to do little role play. Don't worry. We're not gonna wear any weird costumes or anything.

00:25:19:12 - 00:25:40:06
Unknown
I might do a little role play. Let's say we're walking onto an elevator together. You recognize me as a prominent venture capitalist? Like, how do you open the conversation and give me, like, the elevator pitch for single life? Yeah, yeah. So immediately, I would try to. It's a lot like being a human guy in the, in the like, teams, which I was.

00:25:40:06 - 00:25:56:08
Unknown
You want to build rapport right away and so I could bring up something if I see that we both have maybe maybe you're in a like a let's do it. We step into the elevator seat, you're in a little pair of shorts, and as you just got done working on the beach, you're all sweaty. I'm like, oh, what's up man?

00:25:56:08 - 00:26:17:05
Unknown
You got a you get a good workout in. You're like, yeah, yeah. You know it was. Yeah. It was it was hot out there. I just did Murph. You know Murph Monday. Yeah. And so I'm like, oh, that's cool. I, I like, I like your shorts. I, I have my, I have my own swimwear brand, but they, actually founded it after being down in Brazil with the Gracie family.

00:26:17:05 - 00:26:37:10
Unknown
I was, I was a Navy Seal for ten years before I founded my company. And that, I kind of took the popular swimwear from Brazil and made it patriotic and all that freedom. You can think of it. I start making more products. You can think of it as the Navy Seal, Lululemon, and we do a lot of epic charity challenges.

00:26:37:10 - 00:27:00:14
Unknown
Every year we do the Hudson Seal Swim and have 3 to 400, Patriots and 100 Navy Seals, all wearing single life and save the coral reef with other special operators. It's on it's have all kinds of prominent fighters. Nick Diaz, John Fitch, orgasm. All these people were there for their fights and everything. And. Yeah, it's it's pretty.

00:27:00:18 - 00:27:21:05
Unknown
It's, almost become like a cultural icon. People will have entire drawers filled with every type of single life pattern there is. And and so a it but it's more engaging. They'll usually be talking. Yeah. It's going back and forth I love it. Yes I love it. Yeah I really like oh I got to get you I try to have with you you can you have to do that a thousand times.

00:27:21:10 - 00:27:32:15
Unknown
Some time, thousand times. Right. At events like randomly all that stuff. Yeah. Yeah. Great. All right. We're going to end here with, some rapid fire. Okay. Best investment you ever made.

00:27:32:15 - 00:27:35:22
Unknown
This time Tesla. Nice. Tesla in, like,

00:27:35:22 - 00:27:43:19
Unknown
2017. Yeah, I wish I put more in I. Yeah. Smart. Dumbest financial mistake you've learned from.

00:27:43:23 - 00:28:04:03
Unknown
I'd say business. Business was there before I learned about print on demand. I would print a whole bunch of, like, shirts and things. It was. It's a lot more risky to do like that because you don't. If it doesn't sell well, then you're left with all this inventory, which just creating a lot of creating a lot of product.

00:28:04:05 - 00:28:26:10
Unknown
And then sometimes it can be if, if it's not a winner, you get stuck with all this inventory. I've moved my t shirt printing to print on demand, and I've actually gotten the same pricing I had before. And so and and no overages, no overhead, no storage fees. And they have them in locations US, Mexico, Canada, Europe, Australia.

00:28:26:10 - 00:28:37:20
Unknown
So people order there. They they can create it and ship it locally smart. And I'm like wow, I wish I interesting had that years ago. We could do supply chain all day long. Navy skill that's been most helpful in business.

00:28:37:20 - 00:28:48:04
Unknown
Just never giving up, finding us fighting, finding a problem solving and persevering and finding a solution.

00:28:48:06 - 00:29:09:14
Unknown
Good. Favorite piece of single life gear? I know this is like Sophie's Choice. Like asking you to pick your children. So, Yeah, maybe the Peacock singer or one of the OGs, like the Peacock singer. You know, it's even the Brazilians got jealous when they saw that one. It's such a subtle statement. When you show up with the Peacock singer.

00:29:09:15 - 00:29:13:17
Unknown
Yeah, yeah, yeah. All right. And finally,

00:29:13:17 - 00:29:15:21
Unknown
book that changed your mindset.

00:29:15:23 - 00:29:48:13
Unknown
I don't know about changed, but it made it made it even stronger. Gates, gates of Fire by Steven Pressfield. It was just like I was reading that right when I. When I got to buds, and I was it talked about, you know, all these. The Spartans are on their way in into where they're going to do battle, and all the other men and people and families are all just evacuating and running and, and talked about the people that go into battle to save all the others and the ones who run away.

00:29:48:19 - 00:30:08:01
Unknown
And I was like, I'm never going to run away because this is a battlefield. Yeah, sure. Yeah. Okay. Just wrapping up, what's one key piece of advice that you would give to any veteran who says, like, I want to start a business, but I don't know where to begin? Yeah. A lot of people think, oh, I'm going to do this big investment here.

00:30:08:01 - 00:30:34:03
Unknown
I'm going to take my life savings and put it in there. I try to mitigate all your risks and stack all the odds in your favor. So if there's a way to do preorders, if there's a way to do, yeah, like smaller minimum quantity, get it out, build, build a demand. I say like, minimize all the risks that you take.

00:30:34:03 - 00:30:56:09
Unknown
Don't buy a ton of inventory and have 100% confidence you're going to sell it all because you're going to have to keep making micro improvements on everything you do. You might you don't want to make all this inventory and then realize, oh, I could have made this if I just made this better, it would have been make a little bit sell that, take the profit from that, go into the go into the next one.

00:30:56:15 - 00:31:06:13
Unknown
And, don't be a lot of people, a lot of veterans have a problem asking for help. That's one thing I never had a problem with. Always ask early and often.

00:31:06:13 - 00:31:10:03
Unknown
Don't try to just figure it out yourself. When it comes to business.

00:31:10:03 - 00:31:17:15
Unknown
Yeah, I think they have a problem asking for money too. But I'm with you. When I see a veteran dump his like entire TSP into some business idea.

00:31:17:15 - 00:31:34:11
Unknown
He's got, you know, some, janitorial washing, gym service or whatever, like, hey, that's great. Like build boring businesses. But, like, sometimes the first litmus test, some idea is whether you can actually get other people to pay for it. So you can have the best ideas in the world, but you got to test it in the marketplace. Absolutely.

00:31:34:12 - 00:32:05:05
Unknown
Yeah. Awesome. How can our audience connect with you? Get on the single life style? Yeah. So if you want to check out what the single life is all about, it's go, go online so everything, it'll ship out like a day or two. Single life.com unga life on Instagram. It's, single life for you. I found myself at GFC, and, I do a lot of warning.

00:32:05:05 - 00:32:14:05
Unknown
You might see a lot of photos of Jeff and I in the zoom guys that we reference so much. Yeah. Awesome. Well, thank you, Jeff, for coming in. Really appreciate it.

00:32:15:07 - 00:32:38:06
Unknown
Hey, thanks again for walking in with us today. I hope this episode stimulated the old brain housing unit. Step one to becoming richer is becoming smarter, and I hope some of the lessons and ideas from today have sharpened your knife. As always, I hope you're taking notes and more importantly, that you're taking action. Thanks again to Siebert Bauer and Siebert Financial for the support.

00:32:38:08 - 00:32:48:15
Unknown
And remember, stay tactical, stay driven. And don't forget to bang that subscribe button.

00:32:48:16 - 00:32:56:09
Unknown
You can.

00:32:56:11 - 00:33:01:19
Unknown
Find.

00:33:01:19 - 00:33:21:15
Unknown
Tactical wealth is a Gabby, a media production brought to you by Siebert Valor, a military focused initiative from Siebert Financial. The Tactical Wealth Podcast is for informational and entertainment purposes only. The views expressed by guests are their own and do not necessarily reflect those of Siebert Financial. This podcast does not constitute investment advice or an offer to sell or solicitation to buy any securities.

00:33:21:17 - 00:33:28:01
Unknown
Past performance is not indicative of future results. Listeners should consult a qualified financial professional before making any investment decisions.