10 Years
Hey Interweb! long time no blog.
Ten years ago today, my wife woke me up by yelling, “Jeremy, get out here, we’re going to war!” She had gotten a phone call telling her to turn on the TV. We watched the towers fall, and knew a lot just changed. I find myself flying to Boston today for the Shop.org conference on the 10th anniversary of that fateful day. And having to fly today makes it an especially sobering and reflective day. I was pretty removed from the situation compared to a lot of others who lost loved ones that day. To all of you: my thoughts and well wishes are with you on this tough day.
For me, today has got me to thinking, both about those specific events, but also just about the last 10 years. An event so impact-full happens in your lifetime and you can sort of mark your life by it. It puts a concrete time frame to things. Provides a point of reflection. At least today it did for me as I waited to board a plane.
First of all, since it was such a major event in United States history, I ought to comment on my country. But I won’t be able to say it better than Connor Boyack, so I’ll just link you to Connor’s post 9/11, 10 Years Later. He nails exactly my thoughts about America in the last 10 years. Not good. Not good at all. Go read what Connor says, then consider if the next 10 years of America’s history gets better or even worse. I know what way I see it going: downhill, probably faster and faster. I wish it wasn’t that way, as I love America.
But no need to spend today on that. It is what it is, and I can’t change it. What I do want to do is summarize my last 10 years. So here’s what is in my head at the moment.
GearTrade – we were about a year into GearTrade full time 10 years ago. Like all good first time entrepreneurs, we didn’t know what the hell we were doing, but thought we did. Had made some good progress (we thought). Right around now was when all our efforts to raise additional $ or find a bridge failed, we ran out of money from our friends/family/angel round, we laid everyone off (13 if I remember right), then shortly after merged with WebOutdoors (Ryan Nichols who was living nearly the identical story), found someway for the 3 or 4 of us to hang on for another year, and then sold the assets in Oct of 2002. Definitely not a success. Definitely not a catastrophic failure. And the lessons learned? Priceless. One thing I’m most proud of? GearTrade is still running today. We might not have executed right, might have been wrong on timing, might have misjudged the size/scope of the opportunity, but the problem/solution we identified was real. If I ever could find time to blog, I could fill 100′s of posts about those 2 years. Maybe a goal for the next 10 years? 
Doba – we started the entity that would become Doba October 22, 2002–the day the asset sale for GearTrade was signed. That’s 9 years ago in 5 weeks. 90% of my professional life the last 10 years have been spent working on and at Doba. We started as Secure Offer doing email marketing, lead generation, and SEO products. Anything to make $ so that we could spend it to solve virtual inventory and drop shipping on the B2B side of eCommerce. We launched that first solution as Wholesale Marketer, and then changed the name to Doba in 2006. The entity is now TriHoldings.co and we run Doba, Simple Source, and are launching our next product/biz model DropShip.com at aforementioned Shop.org tmrw. Over those 9 years, we exploded and were the fastest growing company in Utah, #23 on the Inc 500, and #6 on the Deloitte Technology Fast 50. We have won Utah Business best companies to work for 3 times in the last 4 years (we forgot to apply the year we didn’t get it.) We have 65ish awesome employees who bust their butts to make our company go. We will have our most successful and profitable year in our history this year, all while investing significantly into these new opportunities (Simple Source, DropShip.com). And the proudest thing of my entire entrepreneurial career? We did all of it without any investment capital. Not. A. Single. Dollar. of outside funding. I honestly can say I never thought I’d be at any company I started after 9 years plugging away. But I am, I’m pumped, and the next 10 years for the company are going to be super great. We have lots more big problems to solve. That 90% has been a major defining period for me, has taken a ton of my energy and faculties, and I’m grateful to have been (and to continue to be) part of it.
LaunchUp – I started LaunchUp.org in 2009 after talking with lots of people about the need for Utah to have an event that got people out of their offices, their homes, their entrepreneurial silos to get together and geek out on entrepreneurship. The mental image I had was of community barn raisings of yesteryear. Then I heard Barack Obama talk about two things: one, give back and be part of something bigger than yourself; two, that we need to support the doers, the risk takers, the makers of things for America to be successful. Two days later, LaunchUp: Barn Raising for Entrepreneurs was born, we had the LaunchUp site up, and we started doing events a couple months later. We did a couple, then after a many month break due to a life curveball (see below), started at the end of 2009 going every month. We’ve done 22 events in Utah. We average over 100 attendees each time. We are starting events in Las Vegas this week, Seattle and Northern Utah before the end of the year, and hopefully lots more next year. We’re setup as a non-profit, and there’s a great number of people donating time and money to make this work. Almost 70 companies have presented at our Utah events. Some have failed. Some have succeeded. Some entrepreneurs have gone through the entire lifecycle, and we think LaunchUp has been a positive influence in the community. It’s my labor of love, and I hope others will try to find something altruistic to get involved with and give back.
Amy – we’d been married just over two years 10 years ago. We just celebrated our 12th anniversary this June. Hasn’t always been great, in fact at times has been the opposite of that, but we are awesome now. I love that woman, and I can tell you that ANY success I’ve had as an entrepreneur is because of her unfailing support and willingness to let me do what I do. That everyone could be as lucky as me to find someone to go through the highs, the lows, the mistakes, the failures and joys of life.
Kaitlin and Alex – didn’t have kids 10 years ago. Weren’t even sure we would have kids. We consciously decided to wait, as Amy was supporting us by working since I wasn’t getting paid much at all in the first year of GearTrade, and didn’t get anything the second year. If GearTrade had ended with me having to pay back the $150,000 and change of biz loans, leases, credit cards, etc I’d signed my name on for the biz, who knows…..but I digress. KK and Alex. Who knew how much you could love another human being? My kids are awesome. Although I joke with people that if you have kids, and if you’re honest, seriously honest, 50% of the time you think it was the best thing you did, 50% you wonder if it was the worst mistake. OK. It’s probably more like 60/40. But in all seriousness I love those little kid weeds like the dickens. That everyone could be as lucky as me to have healthy, smart, little versions of themselves. My favorite and best times in the last 10 years have been when we’re together with our small family on some adventure somewhere. It’s what life is about.
Life – I had quite an adventure in 2009. You can read all about the Curveball that was a large boulder picking a fight with me on Mt. Nebo. I got lucky. Had a near miss and it helps you reassess and focus on the right priorities in life. — Hint (especially for all you entrepreneurs out there): it’s family and friends, it’s why I put that last above, best for last and all that. — None of us know how much time we have, so go out and be awesome in whatever you spend your time doing. Do what you love, love what you do, and love those you’re with. Give back to others and the communities you’re part of. Don’t waste your time, you don’t know how much you’re got.
I think that’s the major stuff. Take a few minutes today and do your own reflection on your last 10 years. And write it down. You don’t have to publish to the world, but get it written down. Otherwise, no one will ever know what you thought. (BTW, a few tweets DO. NOT. COUNT. This stuff is way too serious/important for 140 char)
I’m off. Got lots to do, and only 3,650 days to do it in before I’ve gone through another 10 year life window. Maybe one of those to dos is more blogging so I don’t go 10 months between posts.
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Kiley Newbold
