Most significant growth decisions are made before the facts are complete.
A product begins attracting attention. Customers respond positively. Revenue appears. New opportunities emerge. The market starts sending signals that something may be working.
The difficulty is determining whether those signals justify commitment.
Founders routinely face decisions that cannot be answered through analysis alone. Should they invest more capital? Expand capacity? Hire key talent? Leave a secure role to focus on the business full-time?
None of these decisions arrive with certainty attached.
Yet waiting for certainty creates its own cost. Momentum fades. Learning slows. Competitors gain ground. The opportunity that looked promising six months earlier begins to look less obvious because the market has moved while the founder was still collecting information.
Arthur Jessop's experience building Base Case centers on a question every scaling CEO eventually encounters:
How much evidence is enough before you commit?
Early-stage companies operate under conditions where complete information is unavailable by definition.
Customer behavior is still emerging. Product requirements continue evolving. Distribution channels remain unproven. Market size is often estimated rather than known.
In response, many founders search for additional validation. They conduct more interviews, build more features, refine the strategy, and delay major commitments until the picture becomes clearer.
The instinct is understandable.
The problem is that clarity is rarely the output of analysis alone.
Markets tend to reward action more than observation. Customer understanding improves through engagement. Product quality improves through use. Business models improve through execution.
The goal is not to eliminate uncertainty. The goal is to determine whether available evidence is strong enough to justify the next commitment.
That distinction sits at the center of Jessop's story.
Base Case began with a problem Jessop wanted to solve for himself.
Working remotely while traveling frequently, he wanted access to a complete workstation wherever he happened to be. Existing products addressed pieces of the problem but failed to recreate the experience of a full office environment.
He started building prototypes and using them in real-world settings.
The earliest signal was not that people found the product interesting.
The earliest signal was that people wanted one.
That difference matters.
Founders often mistake attention for demand. Positive comments, social engagement, and enthusiastic reactions can feel encouraging without providing meaningful validation.
Demand produces different behavior.
Prospective customers ask how to buy. They request demonstrations. They introduce colleagues. Eventually, they spend money.
As Jessop traveled with his prototypes, those signals appeared repeatedly. What began as casual conversations became inquiries. Inquiries became requests. Requests became orders.
No single interaction proved the business was viable.
The pattern mattered more than any individual event.
Strong market signals rarely arrive as one dramatic breakthrough. They emerge through repeated confirmation from independent sources.
The turning point came when Base Case appeared at CES.
Until then, most feedback had come from relatively small groups of people who encountered the product through Jessop's network, travel schedule, or early outreach efforts.
CES provided something different.
It exposed the product to a large audience with no prior relationship to the company.
Institutional buyers, enterprise users, government organizations, and technology professionals all encountered the product independently. The response was consistent enough that it became difficult to dismiss as coincidence.
Potential customers sought out the booth. Organizations that represented entirely different markets expressed similar interest. Even before the company had fully launched, people were actively looking for evidence that the product was real.
Jessop described the experience simply:
“We got a strong signal that there are early adopters that love it.”
The importance of that moment was not visibility.
It was confirmation.
The market was beginning to answer a question that founders often struggle to answer themselves.
Not whether the product was interesting.
Whether the problem was significant enough that customers would act.
One of the most useful observations from the conversation is that commitment is not merely a consequence of success. In many businesses, commitment becomes a prerequisite for it.
Base Case required product development, manufacturing oversight, supplier coordination, customer support, fundraising, and sales execution. The complexity of the business model created a point where part-time effort was no longer compatible with the opportunity.
Jessop reached that point and made the decision many founders postpone.
“We had to burn the boats and go all in.”
The phrase can sound dramatic, but the underlying principle is practical.
Some businesses can be built incrementally while maintaining alternative options.
Others require concentrated effort before meaningful progress is possible.
Keeping one foot in a previous career can feel responsible. In some situations it is. In others, it becomes a constraint that prevents the company from reaching escape velocity.
Commitment does not remove risk.
It changes the founder's ability to execute against the opportunity that already exists.
The decision was never based on certainty. It was based on accumulated evidence.
One of the recurring themes throughout the episode is the role early adopters played in shaping the business.
Founders often assume broad awareness is the objective. Awareness matters, but awareness alone rarely improves a product or clarifies a strategy.
Early adopters do.
They provide direct feedback. They identify overlooked use cases. They reveal purchasing behavior. They help distinguish between features customers notice and features customers actually value.
Base Case's expansion into emergency management, defense, and command-center environments emerged through this process.
Customers identified applications the company was not actively pursuing. Their usage patterns exposed opportunities that internal planning had not uncovered.
This is one reason early adopters often become a more valuable source of information than market research.
They are not describing hypothetical behavior.
They are demonstrating actual behavior.
For founders trying to determine whether market signals are real, few forms of evidence carry greater weight.
As demand expanded across multiple industries, Base Case encountered a different challenge.
Too many opportunities.
For a young company, broad interest can create as many problems as it solves. Every customer segment introduces new requirements. Every market creates additional complexity. Every opportunity competes for limited resources.
Initially, the company could point to successful use cases across a wide range of industries.
The problem was that success across many categories did not automatically create a strategy.
A conversation with another entrepreneur forced Jessop to confront a simple question:
Who is the customer?
Not all customers. Not every possible use case.
The customer.
That question pushed the company toward a narrower ideal customer profile and a more focused allocation of resources.
The immediate benefit was not sales efficiency.
It was learning efficiency.
Concentrated effort produces faster feedback loops. Faster feedback loops improve decision quality. Better decisions create momentum.
Focus did not reduce opportunity.
It increased the company's ability to understand opportunity.
Jessop frequently returns to a principle borrowed from companies that prioritize speed of learning.
“The perfect product is dead.”
The observation applies well beyond product development.
Many executive teams attempt to make perfect decisions before acting. They seek enough information to remove the possibility of being wrong.
In practice, the strongest decisions often emerge through action followed by adjustment.
Customer feedback reveals information planning cannot.
Operational execution exposes weaknesses strategy discussions overlook.
Real-world use identifies priorities that appear nowhere on a roadmap.
The advantage does not come from moving recklessly.
It comes from shortening the cycle between decision and learning.
Organizations that iterate quickly generate information more quickly. That information improves future decisions. The cycle repeats.
Waiting for perfection delays the learning process that produces better judgment.
The central lesson from Arthur Jessop's story has little to do with hardware, crowdfunding, or manufacturing.
It concerns how founders evaluate evidence.
Most important growth decisions occur before certainty exists. The challenge is not eliminating uncertainty. The challenge is recognizing when enough evidence has accumulated to justify commitment.
Strong signals tend to share common characteristics.
They repeat across different environments.
They emerge from independent sources.
They progress beyond curiosity into action.
They survive contact with real customers.
For Jessop, those signals appeared through prototype usage, customer behavior, crowdfunding support, CES validation, and repeat purchases. None provided certainty on their own.
Together, they provided something more useful.
A foundation for commitment.
Scaling CEOs face versions of this decision repeatedly. New markets. New products. New hires. New investments.
The leaders who move effectively are not necessarily the ones with the most information.
They are often the ones who can accurately recognize when they have enough.
Arthur Jessop is the Founder of Base Case, a company that developed a portable command-center workstation for professionals who need full productivity in mobile environments. His experience building a hardware company—from prototype development and crowdfunding to manufacturing and market validation—provides a practical perspective on founder judgment, customer validation, and making major commitments before certainty exists.
__________
Jeff Holman is a CEO advisor, legal strategist, and founder of Intellectual Strategies. With years of experience guiding leaders through complex business and legal challenges, Jeff equips CEOs to scale with confidence by blending legal expertise with strategic foresight. Connect with him on LinkedIn.
Intellectual Strategies provides innovative legal solutions for CEOs and founders through its fractional legal team model. By offering proactive, integrated legal support at predictable costs, the firm helps leaders protect their businesses, manage risk, and focus on growth with confidence.
__________
The Breakout CEO podcast brings you inside the pivotal moments of scaling leaders. Each week, host Jeff Holman spotlights breakout stories of scaling CEOs—showing how resilience, insight, and strategy create pivotal inflection points and lasting growth.
Listen and subscribe on your favorite podcast platform:
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Want to be a guest—or know a scaling CEO with a breakout story to share? Apply directly at go.intellectualstrategies.com.
TRANSCRIPT SUMMARY:
00:00 From Corporate Life to Entrepreneurship
03:43 The Mindset Shift That Unlocked Entrepreneurship
08:01 Burning the Boats & Going All In on Base Case
12:52 The Problem That Inspired Base Case
15:21 CES 2025: The Breakout Moment
21:28 Crowdfunding Success & Building Customer Trust
26:01 From Prototype to Mass Production
29:08 Building the Team & Solving Manufacturing Challenges
32:21 Customer-Led Innovation & The Birth of Quadzilla
35:41 Finding the Ideal Customer Profile (ICP)
39:49 Going Viral & Building Brand Awareness
43:08 The SpaceX Philosophy: Iterate Fast, Improve Constantly
47:11 The Future of Base Case & Portable Command Centers
50:10 Startup Reality: Your Job Is to Solve Problems
FULL TRANSCRIPT:
Jeff Holman (00:00)
That's when we burned the boats and went all in. It's time for me to do what I love and enjoy iterating quickly instead of making a perfect product. And we got a strong signal that there are early adopters that love it. My job is to just solve problems.
Arthur Jessop (00:12)
Welcome back, everybody, to the Breakout CEO podcast. I'm your host, Jeff Holman, with Intellectual Strategies, and I am here to help explore some of the pivotal moments that scaling CEOs navigate as they as they start and grow their businesses. And since I can't share all of my confidential client stories with you, I bring guests on who've done pretty amazing things and are building awesome companies. And today we've got Art Jessup with us. Art, hey, welcome to the show.
Jeff Holman (00:40)
Thanks, Jeff. Thanks for having me.
Arthur Jessop (00:42)
Yeah, so so it I'm really glad to have you. I saw your ⁓ product come out. I was thinking it might have been a couple years ago, but you you clarified for me before we started recording here that it was just maybe the beginning of twenty twenty five when you launched your Kickstarter. So it fe it I guess maybe something about this product feels familiar enough that ⁓ I thought I had seen it before that. So
⁓ I'm we'll we'll we'll get into that and ⁓ hear about your product and your company and ⁓ you know what you're building. ⁓ but first give the give the audience a flavor of who you are and I wanna I wanna bring back in something we talked about in our icebreaker ⁓ segment earlier. You're a trail runner, right? Can I say that?
Jeff Holman (01:27)
Yeah, trail runner, mountain biker, you know, roadrunner as well. So yeah.
Arthur Jessop (01:31)
so you so you're out and about. Like, does that I know I've run with a lot of people in the past. I do some mountain biking. I did a lot of high school here in Utah we've got the the high school mountain biking teams. When your kids get to that age, I I I highly recommend it. It's probably already on your radar. ⁓ do you identify as a runner ⁓ or as a a sp I mean, does this help define who you are or is this just something you do?
Jeff Holman (01:56)
No, it's really just something I do. ⁓ I've noticed the more I tell people I run, the more annoyed they get. So I try to not bring it up. ⁓ but yeah, I mix it up though with mountain biking, trail running, road running. But I I definitely don't identify as a runner, but I enjoy it. It's my outlet.
Arthur Jessop (02:14)
I tell people I don't I I I always enjoyed running. ⁓ I am not built like a runner though. I'm not built built like a cyclist either. So ⁓ for me it was a little extra work. But but no, that's interesting because ⁓ that crowd has a very there there are some people who are very ⁓ definitively defined by that by that role in their life. Do you ⁓ to compare, do you identify as ⁓ an entrepreneur or
Or you know, what would you say if you had to label yourself? Would you give yourself a label?
Jeff Holman (02:46)
Well, you know, I've I didn't grow up wanting to just always be an entrepreneur. I actually grew up wanting to be an investment banker and be part of that whole system. And and also a pilot. I you know, I did my license in high school and was always wanting to be a a commercial pilot before investment banking. And then, you know, didn't end up going that path. But it's really not over till the last five years that the entrepreneurial bug has just really kicked in.
Most people want to take risks when they're young and don't have kids. It's for me, it's kind of been inverted, much to the detriment of my poor wife. She you know, the stress and everything there. But it's really the last five years, ⁓ something's just kinda unlocked and maybe it's the experience from growing up in the corporate world. ⁓ building that confidence, I'm not sure.
Arthur Jessop (03:33)
What do you mean by that? Like what when you say unlocked, was there a moment or was there a ⁓ something that happened or a conversation? Like like how did how did something get unlocked for you?
Jeff Holman (03:43)
Yeah. So I've always kind of treated things of like I'm the intern. I'm willing to do whatever. You know, throw me in, coach, I'll I'll figure it out. I'll do it. a little bit unselfishly, right? 'Cause I always looked out of the long game, like I'll learn from a I'll build relationships. Yeah. About three, three, four years ago, something unlocked and just said, you know what, it's time it's time for me to do what I love and enjoy instead of always just being, you know, a tool for someone else to use.
Nothing about like a great employee, like a Rockstar employee that you don't you you get thrown in, you're the Navy CEL that parachutes in and you fix things. That's what I was always known for. Yeah. And it was really a couple of years ago I just said, I am I'm I'm ready to do what I'm ⁓ passionate about, what I want to do versus what other people need. That was kind of the unlock and that's where the entrepreneurial s you know, juices started to really flow.
Arthur Jessop (04:40)
That's interesting because I think I I mean I've been as I've been ⁓ with companies and helping companies, I I've seen some companies where I've thought to myself, man, these guys have a lot of employees. Not not just numbers, just people who, you know, they fill the employee role really well. Right. And and sometimes I'm like, man, why are these employees sticking around? There's ⁓ you know, comp I work with startups and startups go through cycles and sometimes on the down cycles, you're like, more people are sticking around than you would expect. ⁓ but
But and and then nothing wrong with that, it's just a contrast like you're doing ⁓ the certain mindsets of maybe just operating and executing for others versus for yourself. How how did you know when you wanted to do something different that that building your own company would be it? Did you did you just automatically say, ⁓ time to build my own thing and you had and like you just jumped in there or this a process to kind of discover where you wanted to be?
Jeff Holman (05:37)
It was certainly a process. For the last five years, I've kicked around different ideas. You know, now that doesn't work. Someone's done it. And I have a friend who started a company when he was in his early twenties. ⁓ and just went and did it. And I've always been scared of that. Like, you know, things are gonna f fall apart. You know, it's always been a very risk ⁓ you know, risk off mentality. And like I said, that unlock was a few years ago that's just like I found a product that
resonated with me. It's something I absolutely needed. It didn't exist in the market. Went out in the garage and started building it, tinkering and started traveling with this proof of concept and people loved it. They wanted to buy one. Yeah. And that's really where the the unlock kind of is like, hey, this is a product that I I built myself. I'm passionate about it. I need it. It kind of hits the three things for me. I love products that transform. I love to travel.
And I'm kind of a workaholic. And so base case is really it does all of us. It transforms. I use it for my work. And you use it for your travel. So that was like the three things for me that just had this unlock that I was like, this is the per it's all the direction, this is the signal. And then the name of the company is what really like propelled me. So yeah, I was on my mountain bike thinking about this idea. I have a case. What can I call it?
And I don't want it to be some generic like Arthur case or travel case. Yeah, yeah. I wanted my family's identity involved in it. And so I started thinking, like, how can I put my kids' names in the brand, but still have a really nice name. Yeah. And so I used the initials of my three kids, and that's how I came up with base case. And it it clicked in two seconds. Now that's to me is like this is absolutely this is going to work. I just know it. And
So my firstborn is Brooks Arthur, my daughter's Scarlett Ellen, and then our third is Baylor Craig. And that's the base case. And then my wife is Ashley Ellen. And she's in there twice. So so everything just kinda like the whole thing's covers. This is supposed to be
Arthur Jessop (07:50)
man. Well so so base case is your first jump into the entrepreneur world? Or did you have you did you do any, you know, any other attempts at businesses before this, or this was the first thing?
Jeff Holman (08:01)
I've been involved in a few little startups, but it wasn't my idea. It wasn't my company. This is the first. Like I went all in, burned the boats, walked away from a very good corporate job. Yeah. And just said, what's gonna, it's gonna work. ⁓ we have to make it work. you can't really start a company without that mentality. If you go into it like, hey, I got these backups. If this doesn't work, I can go back to my corporate job. You probably are not going to be able to build a product that's this complex.
That has a global supply chain, you have mechanical, you got electrical, everything involved as your first product. ⁓ it's probably gonna be impossible if without that mindset. So you have to burn the boats and go all in. But you also gotta be smart about it, you gotta be prepared, you gotta have a product that you've gotta have done your homework before you burn the boats. ⁓ but yeah, so that's that's really been the story.
Arthur Jessop (08:54)
You mentioned some earlier risk aversion. What like how how did you how did you feel the confidence to to make this leap? ⁓ 'cause like you're like you're saying, you know, I've I've talked with a lot of people who they come and they're like, I got this idea, I'm gonna, you know, it's a great idea. My my parents told me it's a billion dollar idea and ⁓ you know, I someone's gonna pay me a bunch of money just to just to have this 'cause it's gonna save the world. you know, I talked to somebody a month ago, they have they have some
ideas about how to save the Great Salt Lake. And I'm like, that's awesome. But how do you like, how do you get from where you're at today, which was, you know, unresourced and unskilled and you know, to to the point of doing that. Like, like there's so much that goes into it. How did you how did you kind of find the confidence to to take that leap? Because are you a, you know, do you have an engineering background or a sales background? Or, you know, well where'd that confidence?
Jeff Holman (09:48)
Yeah. None
none. I'm I'm actually I got a very engineering mindset, but no engineering training other than financial engineering. But ⁓ really it's come from that intern mentality, just jumping in, learning as much as I can. So over the last five years I went from a finance more into like operations, private equity, and learned a great deal about supply chain because all our portfolio companies were having issues with supply chain during COVID. Yeah. So has the Navy Silva to jump in and help.
establish and clean up. And without that knowledge, I wouldn't have had the confidence to start this. ⁓ so really that that inter mentality and and maturity, you know, ⁓ taking the time, I'd say some of the best entrepreneurs that you probably don't hear about are the guys that started in their forties. You know, they don't have the sexy tech startup, but it's these sleeper companies that are worth probably a couple billion that a guy started when is forty or fifty years old that
you know, maybe not tech, but just compounded over over years and decades. So really having that maturity is what kind of swip flipped the risk profile for me.
Arthur Jessop (10:58)
Yeah. And I don't usually get into this this part, but you brought up your your wife and you know, wives, spouses, partners put up with a lot of a a lot through this. How does she deal with this? Just a quick note about our guests. I host the Breakout CEO podcast to share behind the scenes insights from scaling businesses. As an attorney, I see the real challenges leaders face long before success becomes public. But client stories have to stay confidential.
So we invite guest CEOs to share their own moments of struggle and success. I'm so grateful to our guests and my team at Intellectual Strategies for making this show possible. Now, let's get back to the show.
Jeff Holman (11:41)
And and we're by far we are far from the finish line. ⁓ but you know, it it's been very stressful, very tough on a marriage. ⁓ but you know, I'd say communication, I'm not the best at it, but we're doing better. ⁓ having to be able to sit down and just talk, take and a break from the kids with just with her is you know, it's hard, easier said than done, but it's a must.
Arthur Jessop (12:06)
Well and I'm one who works with my wife. So my wife is the is the operational brain of a of our law firm. So I I I know the I know the struggles, I know the complexities of it. ⁓ it it works for us, it doesn't for everybody. So ⁓ but it's
Jeff Holman (12:20)
that's that's impressive that you can do that. ⁓ yeah. ⁓
Arthur Jessop (12:23)
I would
say it's a it's a display of her it's a display of her patience, probably more than anything. Patience with me, of course. But she's very good at what she does. Well so okay, so so you started doing this. Tell me what was the issue where you're like, I need to put well, why don't you describe what the product is and then maybe explain how you how you determined that this would be a product line worth, you know, starting a business around.
Jeff Holman (12:52)
Yeah, so I it essentially what we've created is a full portable command center, command and control center workstation that's in a sleek elegant suitcase. So you think of that, a lot of people are like, that's kind of lame. And then I show it to people and they're like, Wow, I was not expecting that. How innovative and sleek and how well you guys designed this. But really that the product was born out of I worked fully remote, but traveled a ton. We'd always be at like
acquisition targets be set up in the conference room working on your teeny laptop and your extender screen. Yeah. I'm like, if I just had my full office like I do at my house, like the 32 inch dual screens and your laptop. If I just had that everywhere I went, I could be wicked efficient. Like one out on the road. And so I'm like, why does that not exist? You know, you've got a little extender screens that go in your backpack, but I'm like, no, I need a new category. I need like
a full dual screen system that can raise that's clean. I hate wires everywhere. I need it to be plug and play. So I went out, went on the Google machine, the Amazon machine. I didn't find it. It didn't exist. And so I'm like, well, I I was kind of due for a project. Like as a kid, I'd go out and tinker in the garage and build things. So I was like, okay, I'm going to take a suitcase off the shelf.
Arthur Jessop (14:05)
Yeah.
Jeff Holman (14:19)
We're gonna got seeing we had to re engineer it. ⁓ and 'cause a regular suitcase opens like this, we needed it to open like a hot dog, you know. So it's like your horizontal
Arthur Jessop (14:22)
Yeah.
Taking zippers off and the re sewing stuff. ⁓ okay.
Jeff Holman (14:31)
These were hard shell case. Okay.
No zippers. So we did this and then I had to find an engineer to help me with the the legs, the telescope out of the case. So everything's fully integrated. Okay. There's no attachments. So it's fully integrated. They come out and they spin, and then this thing can raise to three different heights depending on your preference. And then it's fully plug and play. And ⁓ so we built the initial proof of concept and then we built a prototype.
And then our breakout moment was going to the consumer electronics show. And we I was still working on my full time job, three kids, you know, just crazy. But we got a booth at the CES in Las Vegas and where there never been this was twenty twenty five, January.
Arthur Jessop (15:18)
Okay, so just a a year and a half ago.
Jeff Holman (15:21)
Yeah. So we we had no idea what to expect. We went down there and it was just mayhem. Like everyone is like, to be honest, this is probably the most practical thing we've seen, you know, because everything's AI this and AI that. Right. It's like, no, is all we've done is we've kind of made screens kind of fun again, you know, because the way it deploys and how fast and and so we had people showing up to our booth like completely we had never done this before, but we had the secret service.
But we had massive seek
Arthur Jessop (15:52)
The Secret Service as as as buyers and researchers, not not not nothing clandestine, right?
Jeff Holman (15:59)
No, they were there it was their technology division that they were just walking the floor and they showed up and now they're a customer, you know. How interesting. And so and then we had a big hedge fund that stopped by, one of the biggest in the world. And they had actually been foul following us on our social media because we had started doing ads and building for our crowdfunding campaign. And so we had all this interest. And I'm like, Whoa, what's going on here? Like I had no idea what to expect, you know. And then we went to Shark Tank because they had a audition there.
Yeah. And we wait in line, go through the audition. They're like, we've already heard of you guys. We're planning on to reach out to you. So Yeah. So that was we never made the show. We got to like the one foot line and then, you know, didn't make it. But anyways, so that was our first breakout moment. And that that's where the the unlock is like, okay, there is clearly resonating this is interesting to ⁓ niche. And so that's when we that's when we burned the boats and went all in.
Arthur Jessop (16:57)
I want to hear more about that and but but I wanna back up if I can because I imagine there were a couple a couple moments leading up to this where you were, you know, you like you mentioned, you were building prototypes, you were testing them. And and I have this picture in my mind, you can tell me if this ever happened or not. Of of you, you know, going to one of your were you still going to these off site meetings and you show up, you know, in the conference room and everyone pulls out their laptops and you're like
put by the way, for the audience who's what if you're watching the video, you you've got one of these ⁓ you know on the on the this was the one behind you and you you're you know you're sitting there and you pull this thing out, you put and people are kinda like, What what's what's this guy gotta get out of his suitcase? And all of a sudden you open this up and you got, you know, dual monitors and st like was there a moment like that where people are like, What is what are you doing? Where'd you get that? Yeah.
Jeff Holman (17:48)
Everyone asked where I bought it. I was like, Clearly you didn't I didn't purchase that. This is very rudimentary. We built this. And so Yeah, yeah. But yeah, it was fun. People were like, Where did you buy this? How did you build it? This is amazing. It sells itself because I want one right now. Yeah. Things like that. So
Arthur Jessop (18:07)
So you were doing I mean you were you were you were doing call it technical feasibility, right? K lugging this around and ⁓ carrying it through airports probably, but but you were also doing a little bit of market validation a along the way with people who I I suspect a lot of the people in those rooms have the money to buy this and would be your target market if, you know, if it had been available at the time, is that right?
Jeff Holman (18:30)
Yeah, a hundred percent. So like CS was market testing validation and then just taking it. I've set this thing up in the Delta Sky Lounge more times than I could count. You know. ⁓ I've sold these at the Delta Sky Sky Lounge. People set it up, people walk by like, What is this? They're taking photos, and they I've had people buy it right there. So ⁓ the the natural thing with base case is when it's set up, it's a natural billboard. I mean, they're big, huge screens. You
roll in with a carry-on suitcase and in thirty seconds I have this thing deployed and the screens are on. And people are like, What just what did you just where did that come from?
Arthur Jessop (19:06)
No with a wires and plugs and everything. Yeah.
Jeff Holman (19:10)
⁓ you got these dual twenty four inch screens in the skyline and people can see your email, but it's a great marketing opportunity.
Arthur Jessop (19:16)
Yeah. Well, I love it. I love it. Well, and so that's when when you said I you know, you showed up to CES, you weren't sure what to expect. I imagine you had a you know, you had you'd built some level of confidence with the with the reaction you'd received up to that point. ⁓ Yeah.
Jeff Holman (19:30)
But it had been a re a really small sample size.
Arthur Jessop (19:33)
Yeah. Very just
Jeff Holman (19:35)
So we went into C S really not knowing. Like I was like, there's a chance we spent a ton of money. I was on PTO during C S, you know, man in this booth and so we
Arthur Jessop (19:45)
Well
what did the team look like for the time?
Jeff Holman (19:48)
It was me. And we had a couple of engineers on contract. You know. They were I'd hired an engineering firm, you know.
Arthur Jessop (19:55)
Got it, got it. So you were you were really putting yourself out there. ⁓ at what point did you so you're at the meet you're at C E S and that's a week long thing. Are you are you out displaying the full week or several how
Jeff Holman (20:08)
Yeah, you're on the floor for four days. It's it's brutal.
Arthur Jessop (20:11)
That is that is brutal. Well, so you got a good reaction. Did ⁓ and they do awards and stuff there. I don't know if you what what did you walk away with from CES in addition to a bunch of contacts? Like like what did CES tell you?
Jeff Holman (20:25)
Yeah, CS told me that there's clearly this resonates with the right audience. So like the Secret Service hedge funds, the guys that had come to our booth had actually been had known about us. We'd also had people that showed and like, yeah, we've actually I've seen your stuff. I I'm glad I ran into you because I've been wanting to see if this is real. We had people that were like, I'm one of your pre backers for your crowdfund, because we did this whole pre
You know, we build this community before you launch your care ad fund. We had we had people in our community showing up to our booth and we were only a few months in. So that that was like, okay, like this was resonating. If you have, you know, Citadel Securities and you got the Secret Service that are coming to your booth and telling you like this is really interesting. We wanna explore this. That's a pretty strong signal for me. It was like, Okay, we're gonna we're gonna figure this out. ⁓ yeah, 'cause I can't do this.
you know, working full time. So so in in March we we went full time on it, twenty twenty five and have a look back.
Arthur Jessop (21:28)
Okay. And and and tell me about the crowdfunding. Was that in between C E S and going full time or around the C
Jeff Holman (21:33)
Yeah,
that was in in February. February right after C S.
Arthur Jessop (21:38)
Okay. What w what went into the c for for someone who hasn't done one of these, we don't need to go through every detail, but for someone who has not done a crowdfunding campaign, w what surprised you both the good and the bad in that process?
Jeff Holman (21:52)
Yeah, I would say the biggest surprise for me was learning the law of large numbers, that the funnel. You you start with ten thousand people on your email list, you get a thousand people that become a VIP out of that, 300 people commit. It's just it's just the sales funnel, the marketing funnel. You know, I'd never really been on the marketing side to that extent where you're like in the weeds, in the trenches.
Arthur Jessop (22:19)
Yeah.
Jeff Holman (22:19)
Emailing people like individually figuring out what's making them interested. The the other side of that was how many people believed in me and our team to give us $1,500 for a product was kind of a pipe dream. You know, there's a lot of crowdfunds that never actually come to market. And, you know, we had had we had our prototypes, but they are so far from a mass produced item. There's a difference between prototyping and mass production. Massive gap.
Yeah. And so having, you know, that many people say, here is fifteen hundred dollars. I've never met you in my life, but I believe in you and I trust you. And like, well that that's huge, you know. So we had at the end by the time we shipped, we had about five hundred pre orders and those were all resting on my shoulders. And it was getting very heavy. Yeah. But but the belief, ⁓ people believing in you is like it's a huge, huge motivator. ⁓ then we we did deliver.
We did deliver and to way past everyone's expectations. Amount of people is like, I've backed tons of p crowd crowd funds. I've never seen a product sold and it comes out came out better than what I was expecting. really? That was a that and I I I give all the credit to Josh, our head engineer. He's amazing. So
Arthur Jessop (23:38)
Well so so five hundred units of fifteen hundred unit is that seven hundred fifty? Did I do my my real time math ⁓ roughly correctly? You guys raised about seven fifty ⁓ in the craft funding.
Jeff Holman (23:46)
Sorry, what
Yeah, by that time it was all said and done. Some of it was on our ⁓ Shopify post crowdfund. Yeah. So funny thing about crowdfunding, it's very public. People would walk up and be hey art, you guys are crushing it. I'm like, how do you know? Like, that's right. It's all online. You can see exactly the what you've raised.
Arthur Jessop (24:10)
I've always been curious when I because I've I've helped some clients who've had successful fundraises there and some who have have tried to have successful fundraises. I've always wondered for those that that do well, and you bring you bring this up, you know, they believed in you. I think some people go there and they think, well, if I have just a if if I just have a cool product, that'll do it. But but you didn't just say, Hey, I have a cool product and people wanted the product. You're like, no, people believed in me. Did did you
Did you purposefully create the messaging to take that into account as you as you launched your crowdfunding? Or was it just simply the product is out there, let me tell you how cool the product is and then you realize after the fact, wait, that was an investment in in me in addition to the product?
Jeff Holman (24:55)
Yeah, I never thought of it in that way. I thought that the product was cool enough because I believed in it. You know, I was like, this product really is cool. I love it. I use it every day. And this should sell itself. However, with crowdfunding, most crowdfunds are a pretty small ticket item. They're not a fifteen hundred dollar. You have a few like some e bikes that are higher. Yeah. But you know, a lot of crowdfunding is games. It's forty dollars, it's fifty dollars. So ours is fifteen hundred dollars, so completely different.
in a level. ⁓ but for me it was always like these guys will buy it 'cause the product. But at the end of the day, it was that but they they're taking a bet on you. Yeah.
Arthur Jessop (25:36)
Imagine some of that is just realizing as the as the pledges roll in, the commitment builds and you start to say to yourself, ⁓ I gotta like I gotta make this work now. I gotta do this and and make it work.
Jeff Holman (25:49)
It's
another form of burning the boats. Like these guys have believed like they're at it. So you you're you have to be in.
Arthur Jessop (25:57)
Yeah, yeah. Well so that was a that was February and I think you mentioned and the product came out ⁓ earlier this year. Yeah, how did that process go to to go from the the working prototypes that you had, in whatever form they were, to to getting a commercial product out to your out to your crowd?
Jeff Holman (26:01)
Yeah, twenty twenty five.
Right twenty twenty six. Yeah.
Ten times harder than I would have ever expected. It was relentless. Thankfully we have a great team. Josh, who I mentioned earlier, he's been to China six times in less than a year. Yeah. Just spending the time with our our manufacturing partners, figuring out how to DFM, which means the design for manufacturing. Like I said, going from prototype to mass production is like the whole education. ⁓ so really refining our designs over the summer.
you know, settling in on your vendors, then finishing the designs for your injection molding, which is by the way, terrifying. Because these these these molds are tens of thousands of dollars. And if you don't have a perfect, then that's tens of thousands of dollars and time that you're losing. So making that final decision is is super hard. ⁓ and then just like bare knuckle brawl. Just you have to be on your
partners, your suppliers like twenty four seven. And to the point where they probably don't like you anymore, but we we got through the finish line. A lot of people doubted that we'd ever hit our timeline. ⁓ we did have to extend a little bit, but a lot of people are like, this is a two year project.
Arthur Jessop (27:34)
I was just gonna say one year to to to bring a new product to market that needs all of that design work. I mean you weren't just, you know, printing new new labels on a on some commodity product. You had to put things together, create an entirely new product. Twelve months that that's not a typical time frame, is it?
Jeff Holman (27:53)
No, not at all. And honestly, we it'd be hard to do that for us now because we've got other sides of the business we have to worry about. Back then, this was the only thing. This was the thing that we had to work on, right? So that's the beauty about being a startup is how fast you can move. But once you get other product lines and a team, the things are slowing down tremendously. So but we're gonna try to keep that hustle, keep that iteration fast, like you know, the SpaceX model. A little bit, you know, fire then aim.
Arthur Jessop (28:21)
Yeah, let's let's get into that in a moment. I I just wanna ask, d have you had a chance to go to China yourself or go over and see the machines and the molds and it fas fascinating world, isn't it, to be walking through those factories and seeing where where the products are actually made and how they do it. Like I I love it every time I get a chance to go over there.
Jeff Holman (28:40)
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I I went over in August and then also in November ⁓ of last year. So
Arthur Jessop (28:47)
I imagine you were in Shin Jen, is that right?
Jeff Holman (28:49)
Shenzhen, Don Juan, ⁓ yeah another place up north, ⁓ called Zang Chao. Probably mispronouncing that, but
Arthur Jessop (28:57)
I haven't been there. No, I I love it. That's i it it's amazing. ⁓ and so you've built your team up, it sounds like, since the since the CES days. What does your team look like today?
Jeff Holman (29:08)
Yeah, so we we still rely on ⁓ some contractors, but we've we've got about six people in ⁓ full time ⁓ on the team now. Still rely on some fractional, you know, marketing, fractional engineering. but we do have a couple engineers on on staff, which has been great. It's hard to outsource that, ⁓ especially with our product. There's certain things that you just have to be all in to really understand the product, you know.
Arthur Jessop (29:36)
What
do you mean by that? Are ⁓ are they are they you just have to be full time or you have to be, you know, fully dedicated?
Jeff Holman (29:42)
Just dedicated, you know. If you're working on four other clients, you know, design, it's hard to know like some of this institutional knowledge. For instance, our we have these legs that come out of the case and they spin. That's how the case stabilizes and elevated. We had a spring on the foot that that pops it out. And we had some issues with that spring. We were going into mass production and this the legs kept popping out.
We'd be walking down the sidewalk and it pops out. But that doesn't work. You know, that's gonna be a huge recall. And we're literally we're we're at CS this last January of 2026. We were going into mass production and we had this influencer that had one of our cases, and he was walking around CS like leg kept popping out. He's like, guys, like you got a big problem here. I'm like, We got people at the booth, and Josh and I held all up and we're we have got.
We cannot manufacture a thousand cases with the legs popping out. So we went in the triage mode and we got that fixed and resolved, but we can tell if it has the wrong spring because we know our product so well. Yeah. We know if that spring is the spring that's gonna pop out or if it's a spring that's gonna stay secured. You know, and that that just comes with just intimately knowing that product like every square centimeter.
Arthur Jessop (31:07)
Well, y i I think it also illustrates another point too that that I see a fair amount with clients, then that is there are so like you're saying, there's so many details to a product that you have to know. And from the outside, it's easy to look at these and be like, it's a you know, it's a suitcase with some legs and some monitors in it. Put a few cables in and, you know, you're there. I could I could redo this myself in a in a matter of months. but when you get into it, you see all of the nitty gritty details.
And not only are those details that you have to solve, maybe you know, figure out as in kind of more of a problem mindset, but I see that and I I see a lot of people come back and they're like, hey, I was working on my product, and when I got into XYZ, I realized there was this issue. And in order to solve it, I actually had to invent a new piece that doesn't exist anymore. So now I have a product and I I I want to patent this part of it. So so you start to see the
problems and it opens the door into the innovations that you're actually creating. So have you seen many of those innovations along the way or or your whole product is an innovation but but but do you see it more granularly than that?
Jeff Holman (32:21)
We we had a customer that came to us. They do ⁓ mission planning for the F-35. So they're a Lockheed Martin subcontractor. They reached out to us, they saw our initial prototypes, and this was this early, early ⁓ during crowdfunding. And they asked if we could come to an event they had. They had 20 NATO countries at their facility in Orlando and they wanted to show our cases for like portable, like tactical mission planning. So we we go down there and show the cases.
They agreed to buy some of our prototypes and then they're like, Could you guys stack these? Like, we need to actually four screens. And I'm like, What? Like never thought of that. But the way our our case is designed, we have these locks that ⁓ how the case closes and stays shut, the locks. We're actually able to use that infrastructure to take a second case, stack it, and we just printed off these clips. We're able to just connect them.
And now we came up with this whole other product line that that was a pro a customer's need, wasn't ever even on our radar. And now we have this four screen command center that we call Quadzilla. And I can set this up in, you know, less than a minute. And then that's become a huge product for backup nine one dispatch. Yeah. For command and control, for drone operators, ⁓ for fire, you know, the whole emergency management public safety world.
was never on our radar. And now we went to this little teeny trade show. We set up Godzilla and everyone's coming out of the woodwork. Like, holy crap, that is our backup dispatch center. That is our dispatch center in a box. And so yeah, it's these little things where you're like, how are we gonna stack and you innovate and you create and then you have a product line that was never even in your thinking. So those are the fun things.
Arthur Jessop (34:09)
Yeah.
That's awesome. Yeah, that's how I I I look at I look at some companies and I'm like, you know, you you see their product and you're and then you're like, they have thirteen patents. They have seventy patents or whatever. You're like, well, it's because they're they're actually patenting the problems that they're solving, you know, the solutions to the problems that they're solving or the the opportunities that they're that they're jumping on. So that's that's pretty cool. Well I have to ask though, why do command centers because I don't know, I don't work in one, why do command centers prefer the the quadzilla, the four screen layer?
Jeff Holman (34:40)
So they're normally working with six to eight screens, like a dispatcher. You know, they they've got screens on top of screens. Okay. And you know, they've got their CAD, their computer aided dispatch, they've got their RMS, they usually have like some camera footage, ⁓ their messaging platform. you know, there's a lot going on. And so for them, if they have to evacuate their dispatch center, they've got to take their laptop and go set up in a conference room. Yeah. Some some municipalities have a full emergency operation center.
on Sambo, but a lot do not. That's a five to ten million dollar investment. So if they can buy some base cases and they can stack Quadzilla, they can use these head across town set up in minutes. Yeah. That that's an excellent backup solution. But it's also multi use. They could be using these every day and then, you know, use it in emergency.
Arthur Jessop (35:30)
That's fascinating. Well i and it illustrates that you know your c you know your customer. You're you're telling me stuff that I I bet ⁓ two years ago you you didn't know much about command centers and now you're
Jeff Holman (35:41)
Ago didn't know much about command centers. And that that's the breakout that we're starting to find is that ICP, the ideal customer profile. We've really narrowed in the last few months and said, okay, we're going to just focus on these groups. We're going to go all in. We're going to learn everything we can about them. We're going to go to every trade show that we can, and we're going to just dedicate ourselves. So I'm dropping acronyms. I didn't know, you know, a few months ago. And and it's been really helpful. It's been beneficial.
The power of focus and instead of trying to serve every industry, which we could be, you know, let's focus on two and go all in on it. And then we can eventually build the team to focus on everyone else, but we can't right now. So limited resources, we got to get incredibly focused, narrow in on the ideal customer profile, the ICP, and then let's go perfect those and then build out.
Arthur Jessop (36:35)
From there. Well, you're pr you're pretty early stage though. And I think a lot of early stage companies are like, I'll sell to anybody. Like I gotta like I just gotta make sales. In fact, you said earlier on how focused you are in in sales. Maybe in maybe that was in our initial icebreaker segment. But but what was what was the prompting for you to say, you know what, we gotta narrow down, we gotta niche down, we gotta we gotta define the ICP. 'Cause being a year or two in, that's the you're you're moving fast towards
towards, you know, marketing to a specific segment, it seems like.
Jeff Holman (37:08)
Yeah, it really came from a friend who's that young entrepreneur I told you about earlier that just went and did it. He he I was bragging to him like, we could do this and this and this and this, all these industries, you know. We we're we're working with T Pain, we're working with the Secret Service, we're working with the special ops teams. He's like, Who's your customer? I'm like, All these guys. He's like, Who's your top three? And I honestly couldn't answer it. I was like, honestly, I don't know. He's like, There's your problem.
Arthur Jessop (37:28)
No.
Do you like what he means?
Jeff Holman (37:37)
Focus.
Yeah. But he's like, Well, you you can't do all that. You've gotta get you've gotta find your top three and go all in on that. And so that's what we've done. You know, the last three months, two, three months.
Arthur Jessop (37:50)
But this is a natural staging thing, right? Like when you launch your crowdfunder, it's kind of like, let's validate this across a broad set audience. Like you're not even necessarily targeting any particular ICP at that point. You're just like, if you're on Kickstarter, you might be our audience, right?
Jeff Holman (38:05)
You're fight if you're figuring out who your audience is. You're figuring out if there's what's the signal? Is this even applicable? You know, so we got a strong signal that there are early adopters that love it. You know, and now we're in that stage where like, hey, we're a clearly a B2B. People do not buy this to go to Starbucks and set up and write a novel. They they're using this for their business. They're using this, they're an accountant, they're a lawyer. So we've identified we're B2B.
And now what businesses are we going all in on? We'll take everyone's revenue. We'll take sales. Sure. What sh what shells are we going to that we're going to be the best educated? The relationships we're building. We've also found this very ⁓ impactful partner program. We're trying to get in the doors of like the sheriff's department. We're trying to get in the doors of like Dallas City. Well, you can call and cold call and go to the front door and like wait in the lobby and it's hard.
But we found that we've got all these software companies that sell they're already selling into, you know, Dallas or Yeah, yeah, Houston. And we say, well, our products are incredibly complimentary. You need to set up a dual screen anyways to demo your product, to sell, to do training. We'll just let you take one. And so it's like the Trojan horse effect. They just roll into City Hall, set up a base case, and everyone's like, What is this?
Arthur Jessop (39:30)
What ⁓
Jeff Holman (39:31)
What is this? And it it's been an incredibly successful lead lead generation for us. So we had a massive order ⁓ quote request from the US Reads that came in. Very same thing.
Arthur Jessop (39:44)
'Cause it was that partners that the you gave a partner
Jeff Holman (39:47)
⁓
Yeah.
Arthur Jessop (39:49)
Well that that makes me wonder. And and I do need to we need to get back to the SpaceX stuff in a minute, but because I know you had some comments about that. But ⁓ are when you do this, there's there's real brand opportunity here, right? I mean your your your case by itself, the product itself is branding for the company, for the for the product. Have you done anything else or have you said how do we how do we amplify the branding opportunity when people are already drawn to the product when it's in use?
Jeff Holman (40:19)
Yeah, we've had recently we've the other breakout was really figuring out how to tell the story in a social media setting and have it go viral. We've had three consecutive videos that have gone viral and we kind of unlocked the what how we su how we sell it. It's not a high end video. It's very low production. And it's us just opening the case and saying base case about a thousand times. Figured out this kind of format.
Arthur Jessop (40:46)
really?
Jeff Holman (40:48)
But then we had a guy who came to our booth at CS this last year. His format is he interviews you setting up your product. He goes to trade shows, that's his thing. He's got a million two followers. His name's Stan Legendek. He f he launched his video of us, a C S last week. And it's has over two million views and it's just brought this incredible amount of interest. It like really, like it's you know, it's gone viral. And from all over the world.
So that that's been a huge unlock of breakout. Just insane. Like I can't keep up with the inbound ⁓ interest. People asking about it. And it's not all converting to sales, but it's getting the name out, getting awareness. Yep. Partly it's the product. The product really does sell itself to the right audience.
Arthur Jessop (41:37)
Yeah. I love that. You you're in the middle of so many things right now. How how are you balancing the growth oper I I know you're narrowing your ICP, which is helping to control your, you know, your resource allocation, stuff like that. But ha with when you have growth, ⁓ it's it does become really hard operationally, strategically, to to really balance the growth and the fulfillment and the, you know, the team like
How do you think about that balance as you grow? Yeah.
Jeff Holman (42:09)
It's it's been hard. I'm not gonna lie. I've always been the systems, operations, finance kind of behind the operation side. I've flipped that. No I'm revenue, revenue, revenue, customer service. Like those two are like the most important. ⁓ but really I've gotta allocate. I gotta allocate or ⁓ not allocate. Sorry, I'm delegate, that's where I'm yeah. Learning how to delegate and bringing on guys that we can trust and that can do it. It's really hard when you're
Arthur Jessop (42:32)
Yeah.
Jeff Holman (42:38)
start up and the cash flow is, you know, still getting there. It's just it's a wing and a prayer. You know, you gotta figure it out, but we're we're getting there.
Arthur Jessop (42:41)
Yeah, for sure.
I love it. Now you mentioned SpaceX before. Tell me wha how d how do you what what are your views on maybe parallels or or how your product or your philosophy might ⁓ you know parallel what what the what Elon Musk is doing with SpaceX. And he's he's of course got a lot of attention with the with the recent IPO and all that.
Jeff Holman (43:08)
Now I mean I mostly mean just kind of their philosophy, obviously, no comparison clearly, but they take an approach of like, hey, the engineer should also be building the product. Instead of like I engineer this, I throw it over the wall, and then someone else engineer, you know, builds it. So I'm a huge believer in that. Like, hey, if you're gonna engineer this, you gotta be able to build it as well. If you're gonna engineer this, you should use the product, you know. So we're we eat our own cooking. I'm yeah, literally doing this podcast on a base case.
⁓ our engineers, they design on a base case. We don't use regular screens. And first off, that has been the best way to optimize and perfect and in you know, iterate on a product is by using it. There'll be so many times I'm going through the bill materials and I just look at the case, okay, I forgot that part, you know, because I got my spreadsheet on the base case. But really like eating your own cooking, iterating quickly instead of making a perfect product, let's build something that's getting
be good and let's get it out of the customer, get their feedback, iterate quickly. But also let's build our own designs. Our first prototypes, we were designing it, getting the product ship out is personally assembling it, you know, figuring it out. There's no better way to learn your product than physically assembling it yourself.
Arthur Jessop (44:26)
Yeah. Is that why you're able to do you think that's why you're able to do kind of that twelve month cycle instead of a longer cycle? You you y how did you know where to draw the line and say, Okay, that we gotta we gotta stop designing and and start producing?
Jeff Holman (44:40)
To where I felt comfortable with it, that our early adopters would enjoy it and like it and use it. there's there's still some things that I hate about it, but it's like people a lot of people don't even comment about it. Like, I don't mind that. Like, well, it's killing me. But like, well, they're the guys that are, you know, buying it and they if they don't l hate it, okay. We we built something good, especially for our first product. ⁓ so there's a ton of times
I have to sit the team now like, let's give ourselves some credit here. Because we're all beating ourselves up, like, this and that, you know, it's not great here. It's like the customers aren't saying that. Yeah. Customers love it. There's a few things they say, and we're working on it. But ⁓ the the thing about SpaceX, though, I will say, is we use what we call a Raptor Engine mentality. So there's a photo out there you can actually go find, and it shows the iteration of the Raptor engine for the Falcon 9.
The first one has wires and cords and stuff going everywhere. It looks like the rocket engine. And then the second iteration, you can see they've clearly refined it. There's still a few cables and pipes and things. And then the third iteration is absolutely beautiful. Looks like a Rolls Royce and it's just beautiful rocket engine. So we're always every day we're like getting stressed out about the design, this and that. It's like Raptor Engine. We're going to get there, but not today. Yeah.
'Cause if we get there today then we'll never launch a product 'cause it takes time, takes iteration.
Arthur Jessop (46:11)
You can't wait to build perfection before you start selling or you'll never you'll never be able to fund perfection, will you?
I love that. Well well this is this is fantastic art. I'm I'm so excited for where you're headed and you know, this ⁓ having seen your product a couple of years ago and I'm like, what what's the use case for that? How does it work? You know, I I carry around my ex my extender screen and you know, work all the time while I'm traveling, just part of what I do. ⁓ and so the but this the the B to B play here, the emergency services, the you know, kind of the the the defense industry, like
Like this makes a ton of sense that that they would be looking for this, looking for the quadzilla, you know, setup for for what you're doing. ⁓ so it's really exciting to hear all the progress you've made and and and the success that you've found so far. Where do you see this going? ⁓ you know, the product, your team, the business. Where where is this headed?
Jeff Holman (47:11)
Leaning into that emergency s management space, defense, like you said, ⁓ and really trying to tailor it around ⁓ portable command, portable command and control, ISR. So everything's going drone, you know, defense, very drone warfare. So really trying to tailor it for that, for the defense side, and then for the emergency management, really like the reliability, ⁓ innovation on
Touch screen, compute inside the case, faster deployability. Believe it or not, like there's we can actually improve that, even though I can set this up in 30 seconds. ⁓ but just there, there's a whole roadmap of products that we've got. It's exciting. I get really excited thinking about it. ⁓ but yeah, we we just want to build a great product that resonates with people, that ⁓ there's nothing better than a repeat bar. Yeah. You know, we've got a startup company in Denver that's bought fifteen of these.
And not all at once. They've bought over multiple cycles. And that that's the best thing is when you have a customer that comes back and buys more of your product. That that's the true step of like approval. And so we want to just keep keep that going.
Arthur Jessop (48:23)
Wha what do you think it's gonna take to to get to the next level or two for your business? In addition to s maybe s sales is sales is the easy answer, right? Where where do you see where do you see building and growing in internally within your business to get to those next levels?
Jeff Holman (48:42)
Yeah, improving on our current product. There's a lot of things we're doing to ruggedize it to make it more applicable for a defense or emergency space, you know, weatherproofing, all all that stuff. I don't want to get too far in the details and sure and technicalities, but continuing to make a product that is so easy and plug and play, remove a lot of friction for setup, things like that, where you know, your my mom could set it up and be working. You know, that's really the goal. If
If you have to have an IT guy set up for you, you're probably on the wrong path.
Arthur Jessop (49:16)
Makes sense. And if there's one thing that our audience, if somebody listening to this could could bring to your team either a skill or a resource, what would be one of the one of the most useful things that you would you'd be like, ⁓ w we'd love to have some more of that. Yeah. ⁓
Jeff Holman (49:31)
Yeah, probably a you know, another really, really good mechanical engineer.
Arthur Jessop (49:35)
Awesome. Well maybe there's maybe there's one out there listening that says, I've been looking for something to tackle. Yeah. So I love that. Well, our this is this has been fantastic. ⁓ for CEOs who are out there who have ⁓ you know, been on a journey like yours, or maybe they're a little ahead of you but haven't experienced all the bumps, or they're a little behind you and saying, Man, if I can make it as far as art, you know, that's that's the next stage for me. What what would you what would you say to those people as they're
you know, traversing similar similar paths as you are.
Jeff Holman (50:10)
Yeah. I I think the biggest thing for me is approaching every day of like my job is just solve problems. Today is not gonna go perfect. If if you go in every day thinking, today's gonna be smooth, then this probably isn't for you. But if you switch your mindset and say, today we're gonna have a ton of stuff that doesn't go right, and my job is just to like figure those out and solve them, then it's actually not that bad. It's stressful, but it's like it's just a mindset shift. Like if I come in and be like,
Crap's gonna hit the fan, but that's all right, 'cause I'm I'm ready for it. Like I'm excited to s tackle those problems. Then ⁓ the start up life isn't too bad. So but it's not for everybody.
Arthur Jessop (50:52)
w may maybe there's a way we can like make a t shirt or a hat or something. It isn't that bad.
You got this. It isn't that bad. Well well our thank you so much for sharing your insights here and your story. ⁓ you know, there's s as always, ⁓ talking with you and other CEOs, there's so many details that that we can't really see from the outside. ⁓ there's the behind the scenes things that are happening that ⁓ that just aren't aren't present on the website. So it's really ⁓ insightful and helpful I think for other scaling CEOs and aspiring CEOs to hear those stories. So thank you for sharing that with us today.
Jeff Holman (51:30)
Yeah, absolutely.
Arthur Jessop (51:32)
And for our for our audience who's listened to the episode today, thanks for joining us again on the Breakout CEO Podcast. Be sure to follow or subscribe on your favorite podcast platform. And if you enjoy the show, a rating or a review goes a long way. Our mission is to promote the stories of breakout CEOs in scaling SaaS, e-commerce, and tech companies to equip peer CEOs with valuable perspectives and confidence.
Thanks again for joining us on this episode of the Breakout CEO. I'm Jeff Holman, and I'll see you next time.
