Meeting Title: Illmore Marine Digital Marketing Audit Date: 2026-02-10 Meeting participants: Robert Tseng, iPhone (117)
WEBVTT
1 00:04:47.350 ⇒ 00:04:53.629 iPhone (117): Oh… We are a, a marine engine manufacturer.
2 00:04:53.630 ⇒ 00:04:54.250 Robert Tseng: Yeah.
3 00:04:54.410 ⇒ 00:05:10.310 iPhone (117): like, high-end green engine manufacturer. So our business looks very similar to other automotive parts businesses, which is tricky when it comes to, paid ads, right? Because there’s a lot of noise. You’ve got people that are looking for
4 00:05:10.310 ⇒ 00:05:18.410 iPhone (117): all sorts of different, you know, like, the big three, there’s a lot of search activity for, as well as, like, any of the other car manufacturers.
5 00:05:18.410 ⇒ 00:05:30.009 iPhone (117): traditional ice, that is, right? Like, people are looking for spark plugs, they’re looking for oil filters, they’re looking for fluids, they’re looking for all of these things that, have a lot of commonality. And so…
6 00:05:30.610 ⇒ 00:05:39.700 iPhone (117): the one thing I struggle with is we have a, a resource out in Italy, who’s really been with us since we started paying for,
7 00:05:39.810 ⇒ 00:05:49.760 iPhone (117): ads, and I think he gets it, I just… and our ROAS is pretty good, right? We hover somewhere, you know, our average annually is about a 3.5, right?
8 00:05:49.800 ⇒ 00:05:51.140 Robert Tseng: Okay.
9 00:05:51.370 ⇒ 00:05:55.350 iPhone (117): But I’d like to see that get a little higher.
10 00:05:56.230 ⇒ 00:06:01.369 iPhone (117): As anybody would, right? You know, it’s kind of like everybody’s dream is just to get more juice for the squeeze.
11 00:06:01.380 ⇒ 00:06:20.130 iPhone (117): And I just, you know, I’m always open to a second set of eyes, right? We’ve had this guy for a while, he’s done alright, but is there something that he’s missing, or is there a language barrier there where, you know, he gets it, but maybe not as deeply as somebody who’s, an English native, right?
12 00:06:20.130 ⇒ 00:06:32.890 iPhone (117): Sure. And so, it just… it’s one of those things where, yes, like, our GA4 project got shelved, but I know that I could make a case for us to open a small project, it wouldn’t be big. We,
13 00:06:33.080 ⇒ 00:06:47.920 iPhone (117): we’re a medium-sized company who acts like we have really small budgets, it becomes very frustrating at times, but I could probably get, like, a, you know, 1,500, together for just, like, a review and maybe some, like, high-level recommendations.
14 00:06:48.920 ⇒ 00:06:55.600 iPhone (117): And if that is something that’s, like, within your guys’ company’s appetite, great. If not, totally understand.
15 00:06:55.830 ⇒ 00:07:04.410 iPhone (117): But I kind of like to share where we’re at and, like, what our budgets look like before we get too far, just as I don’t want to waste, your time or mine.
16 00:07:04.810 ⇒ 00:07:14.579 Robert Tseng: Sure, yeah, no, I think, that makes sense. Thanks for being upfront about it. I think we, I mean, I think for… that’s the first step anyway, to do some sort of audit, so I think…
17 00:07:14.790 ⇒ 00:07:17.930 Robert Tseng: Yeah, I think getting to understand what…
18 00:07:18.470 ⇒ 00:07:33.520 Robert Tseng: what channels you’re actually activated on, and I mean, I guess you mentioned your ROAS already, but we’d probably want to look at your NCACs, and I don’t know if you have, like, an LTVAC metric, but yeah, these are just some baseline things that we do for every kind of digital marketing setup, and then…
19 00:07:33.520 ⇒ 00:07:38.960 Robert Tseng: That… I mean, we don’t… I think it’s not the same… it’s not the same approach to every… every org, so…
20 00:07:39.230 ⇒ 00:07:39.820 iPhone (117): Right.
21 00:07:39.820 ⇒ 00:07:52.090 Robert Tseng: you know, we’re… we’re… I mean, we’re a data… we’re a data company first, and then we have… we have, kind of digital marketing specialist on our team as well. So, I think kind of my, like, bias is that
22 00:07:52.250 ⇒ 00:08:04.700 Robert Tseng: Yeah, if you don’t have a good view of, like, true costs and revenue on a channel, like, that’s probably what I would bias towards, like, making sure that you have a good look at that. I’m sorry.
23 00:08:04.700 ⇒ 00:08:12.440 iPhone (117): Oh my god, no, you, you completely dropped out, so I, I, I, you ended it, my bias, and then you went dark.
24 00:08:13.050 ⇒ 00:08:14.929 iPhone (117): Oh, yeah? Okay. Yeah.
25 00:08:15.540 ⇒ 00:08:29.269 Robert Tseng: I was saying my bias is, as a data person, is to make sure that you have visibility into your cost, revenue, at the most granular level you can. So, I don’t really know, like, what…
26 00:08:29.270 ⇒ 00:08:42.390 Robert Tseng: But, you know, if you’re a company that only does, like, you know, less than 20 SKUs, it’s probably not that important, but that’s why we work with… typically work with bigger… bigger companies that are doing multi-hundred SKUs, and they want to look… they’re doing very specific campaign.
27 00:08:42.390 ⇒ 00:08:58.409 Robert Tseng: tracking, and, you know, they’re trying to understand if I channel my ad dollars on this particular channel in this region for this set of products, like, how it… like, I don’t… I can’t… they can’t break out of the curse of averages, which is, like, kind of what happens if you just…
28 00:08:58.410 ⇒ 00:09:21.820 Robert Tseng: use these in-platform tools. Like, you’re not really able to get a true granular look. So, that’s really, like, the difference… the difference between working with us versus, like, a traditional kind of growth agency that, you know, we’re not really interested in managing your ad budget or anything. We just want to make sure that you’re able to get good visibility to make the best decisions, and we can help… we can definitely
29 00:09:22.220 ⇒ 00:09:24.919 Robert Tseng: Help measure the performance of your existing
30 00:09:25.370 ⇒ 00:09:42.119 Robert Tseng: person, or team, or whatever, like, I think that’s also something that ends up coming up a lot on the way that we help you look at the business, maybe look at… maybe different from what, your current team does, but, yeah, I think that’s generally kind of how we would get started anyway.
31 00:09:42.560 ⇒ 00:09:43.220 iPhone (117): Okay.
32 00:09:43.390 ⇒ 00:09:44.000 Robert Tseng: Yeah.
33 00:09:46.380 ⇒ 00:09:46.900 Robert Tseng: Yeah.
34 00:09:46.900 ⇒ 00:09:47.610 iPhone (117): No.
35 00:09:47.610 ⇒ 00:09:50.679 Robert Tseng: Yeah, I mean, can I ask a few more questions about your current setup?
36 00:09:50.680 ⇒ 00:09:52.060 iPhone (117): Go ahead, I mean, it’s whatever you want.
37 00:09:52.060 ⇒ 00:10:08.499 Robert Tseng: Yeah, so you mentioned Google Ads, yeah, you’re saying it doesn’t feel like it’s gonna be the most efficient because of some possible language barrier, or even just, like, it’s just a really noisy, noisy channel. What other… what… what’s your… what’s your… how much do you spend right now, and, like, what channel… what other channels are you in?
38 00:10:08.990 ⇒ 00:10:15.070 iPhone (117): I think our ad spend for last year was something like $80K. We…
39 00:10:16.740 ⇒ 00:10:30.500 iPhone (117): we seem pretty… like, it’s a very seasonal business, right? So most of our business happens in, North America. Yeah. And even, like, it’s not even North… it’s just the United States. So right now, it is, fenced to just a U.S. program.
40 00:10:30.960 ⇒ 00:10:49.800 iPhone (117): And we, like, have really zero analytics on it, right? So, like, I can’t tell what, like, my car drop-off is, I don’t know, you know, what my, like, LTV is, I don’t know a lot of these things that would help me make, some really meaningful decisions about,
41 00:10:49.890 ⇒ 00:10:53.770 iPhone (117): Where we put our ad spend, what products are the most,
42 00:10:54.180 ⇒ 00:11:03.690 iPhone (117): you know, looked at, but, you know, what’s, just… we’ve got nothing to… to really start to make sense of what our world looks like and customer behaviors.
43 00:11:03.690 ⇒ 00:11:04.270 Robert Tseng: Yeah.
44 00:11:04.500 ⇒ 00:11:08.210 iPhone (117): The, the tricky part is,
45 00:11:09.160 ⇒ 00:11:28.330 iPhone (117): we’ve got two experiences, right? So we’ve got a, like, a B2B site, and that’s behind a login, and that’s on one platform, and then we’ve got this B2C site that serves the US that is on WooCommerce. Neither of them have great analytics. The tricky thing is, is that we are looking to, in the beginning of April.
46 00:11:28.370 ⇒ 00:11:31.649 iPhone (117): fold the BDC site into the B2B site.
47 00:11:32.500 ⇒ 00:11:33.830 Robert Tseng: Oh, interesting. Okay.
48 00:11:33.830 ⇒ 00:11:48.909 iPhone (117): Yeah, yeah, at least, from, like, a… like, a content management perspective, right? So, like, if we can have one data hub to power both, obviously B2B will still stay behind a login, but we at least have, like, one content management system, and then we’re just, like, onlining products.
49 00:11:48.910 ⇒ 00:12:00.259 iPhone (117): In the back end, but, like, the look and feel will be very similar. Pricing will be obviously different for, like, a consumer, like, end user versus, like, one of our dealers. Okay.
50 00:12:00.520 ⇒ 00:12:09.860 iPhone (117): And so, I think before we were to do, like, anything really meaningful as far as, like, tracking’s concerned, I’d want to fold the experiences into each other.
51 00:12:09.970 ⇒ 00:12:10.910 iPhone (117): So…
52 00:12:10.910 ⇒ 00:12:12.429 Robert Tseng: the B2B site built on?
53 00:12:12.690 ⇒ 00:12:15.939 iPhone (117): Why am I blanking? PIMCOR.
54 00:12:16.510 ⇒ 00:12:19.060 Robert Tseng: Okay Got it.
55 00:12:20.640 ⇒ 00:12:30.569 Robert Tseng: Okay, and then, like, say… what’s the split in sales in your B2B versus B2C business? I didn’t even realize you had the B2B… I was just looking around the B2C side, to be honest.
56 00:12:30.570 ⇒ 00:12:36.720 iPhone (117): Totally. So, B2B is our biggest. We probably do,
57 00:12:36.830 ⇒ 00:12:40.280 iPhone (117): So we do, like, $4 million a year in sales on that store.
58 00:12:40.790 ⇒ 00:13:00.669 iPhone (117): But that’s, like, it’s com… like, there’s zero advertising that we do. Like, we might do, like, an email, like, a constant contact campaign out to our dealer network if we, like, launch a new conversion kit, or we online some kind of accessory, or we bring on cleaning products, or stuff like that. But it’s really just kind of organic growth every year.
59 00:13:00.670 ⇒ 00:13:01.920 Robert Tseng: Yeah.
60 00:13:01.920 ⇒ 00:13:17.830 iPhone (117): Based on the fact that every year we build more engines, more engines are out in the field, and subsequently more engines fall off of warranty. So, like, there’s just kind of this self-fulfilling prophecy of more engines that need more work every year, as that pool of product grows annually.
61 00:13:18.520 ⇒ 00:13:22.559 iPhone (117): And then our B2B store,
62 00:13:23.330 ⇒ 00:13:28.140 iPhone (117): it’s one of those things where, like, I don’t have a lot of great analytics, but, like, I have a hunch that
63 00:13:28.650 ⇒ 00:13:34.170 iPhone (117): the people that go to B2C, they’re… most of them are, like, what I’d call man in a van.
64 00:13:34.280 ⇒ 00:13:51.720 iPhone (117): repair shops, so versus, like, a do-it-yourselfer, that’s, like, wrenching on it himself, it’s these guys that don’t want to necessarily become an Illmore dealer, because there is, there’s, like, some fees and requirements involved in that, but if they can get those Illmore parts and service people.
65 00:13:52.100 ⇒ 00:14:06.980 iPhone (117): you know, wherever they’re at geographically, it makes sense for them. But I don’t have, like, any way to really make sense of that data, other than, like, I’ve done some very crude measurements myself by, like, sorting out, email addresses.
66 00:14:07.490 ⇒ 00:14:12.629 iPhone (117): And trying to make sense of ones that look more business, specific than, like,
67 00:14:13.270 ⇒ 00:14:15.280 iPhone (117): Just like a consumer address.
68 00:14:17.220 ⇒ 00:14:17.919 Robert Tseng: Got it.
69 00:14:19.380 ⇒ 00:14:26.170 Robert Tseng: Okay, well, yeah, I mean, I guess… and so this is all just the Marine. Obviously, Elmore is more than marine, so, like, I’m.
70 00:14:26.170 ⇒ 00:14:43.619 iPhone (117): Yeah, good research there. So, yeah, we got our start in, high-performance, like, motorsports. Yeah. And so, I… I work on the marine side of the business, but there is where we got our start in, like, the 80s with IndyCar, Mercedes-Benz, Formula One, all that, NASCAR.
71 00:14:43.620 ⇒ 00:14:49.460 iPhone (117): And ARCA Truck Series, like, we still do that today.
72 00:14:49.490 ⇒ 00:14:52.290 iPhone (117): But I’m only focused on the marine side of the business.
73 00:14:52.690 ⇒ 00:14:55.869 Robert Tseng: Okay, yeah, that makes sense.
74 00:14:57.460 ⇒ 00:15:03.390 Robert Tseng: Okay, yeah, no, I think that helps me to get a better sense of… I mean, we’ve… I’ve worked with, like.
75 00:15:03.690 ⇒ 00:15:13.829 Robert Tseng: specialty, seasonal, like, parts manufacturer companies, and I guess, like, some of the… and around your size, doing, like, kind of $5 million a year in revenue, I think, where
76 00:15:13.920 ⇒ 00:15:19.809 Robert Tseng: Where our work has been effective there has been, yeah, definitely more on the…
77 00:15:19.820 ⇒ 00:15:33.770 Robert Tseng: like, tracking… tagging and tracking, kind of giving more discipline around that, helping you to actually see, like, your tax and your LTV very clearly, and then, like, really just building, like, a, all-in-one reporting suite so that
78 00:15:33.770 ⇒ 00:15:41.039 Robert Tseng: I guess as you… at this point, at that size, you don’t have a data team, probably don’t have, like, a technical staff on hand either.
79 00:15:41.040 ⇒ 00:15:47.020 Robert Tseng: probably using, like, different, I don’t know, like, other contractors to build out your WooCommerce and stuff, and so…
80 00:15:47.020 ⇒ 00:15:52.110 Robert Tseng: What’s happening is people kind of just, you know, your, your, your digital,
81 00:15:53.380 ⇒ 00:16:04.940 Robert Tseng: Yeah, I mean, you probably just have a bunch of different tools that are kind of sprawled out everywhere, so people don’t really… everything kind of exists in different silos, there isn’t really, like, a good centralized view of everything, so that…
82 00:16:04.940 ⇒ 00:16:05.530 iPhone (117): No.
83 00:16:05.530 ⇒ 00:16:05.870 Robert Tseng: That’s.
84 00:16:05.870 ⇒ 00:16:06.410 iPhone (117): Well, that…
85 00:16:06.410 ⇒ 00:16:12.990 Robert Tseng: yeah, that’s… that’s typically what I found to be, like, a… you know, something that people… people want at that stage.
86 00:16:12.990 ⇒ 00:16:23.779 iPhone (117): Well, that resonates hugely with me, so we have, like, a Looker Studio implementation that we try to tie into, our dealer store, and, our third party
87 00:16:23.780 ⇒ 00:16:38.680 iPhone (117): group that built the new B2B site, which is probably a year and a half, two years old at this point, just kind of missed the mark. They haven’t been able to get it. We had another resource, and it just, it wasn’t working, so it works alright, but there’s a lot of opportunity for improvement there.
88 00:16:39.020 ⇒ 00:16:54.450 iPhone (117): And my fear is, is that when we fold in B2C, and then we try to segment things and really get this, like, reporting tool where it needs to be, they’re not the team for it. Yeah. And so I would see you, just kind of everything that you’re saying today, that would probably be, like, the first…
89 00:16:56.180 ⇒ 00:17:04.519 iPhone (117): first project we want to pick up with you guys is trying to get, like, all of the tracking in place, and, like.
90 00:17:04.980 ⇒ 00:17:09.840 iPhone (117): Data order flow into whatever we need to, so that we’ve got a…
91 00:17:09.920 ⇒ 00:17:23.729 iPhone (117): a dashboard that we can look at that shows us global, like, you know, what is… what are sales across the board, right? You know, regardless of segmentation. And then, if I start to segment out, what do those sales look like for… for, you know, either of the two experiences.
92 00:17:23.730 ⇒ 00:17:33.560 iPhone (117): And then some of the specifics around, like, what are our, shipping times, what are the geographies, like, you know, what, where are most sales happening at any given time?
93 00:17:33.840 ⇒ 00:17:40.629 iPhone (117): and then getting some, like, daily reporting structure in place. It’s quite important for us, like,
94 00:17:40.730 ⇒ 00:17:47.000 iPhone (117): Us being kind of a high-end brand, well, we’re a brand inside a brand, but the brands that we’re inside of
95 00:17:47.000 ⇒ 00:18:01.540 iPhone (117): are, are very much luxury, right? They cater to the upper end of the market. And so, like, where we really differentiate ourselves, beyond just the level of engineering and thoughtfulness that goes into our products is the customer service side.
96 00:18:01.540 ⇒ 00:18:09.109 iPhone (117): And that extends to, like, the… the, delivery averages of our goods. So, like, you know, how many orders am I getting out a day?
97 00:18:09.110 ⇒ 00:18:21.920 iPhone (117): how many of those are same-day shipped, what are the… what is the SKU count for orders, all that sort of stuff. In-stock, out-of-stock notifications, and like, how long things have been out of stock,
98 00:18:22.300 ⇒ 00:18:27.170 iPhone (117): all that kind of stuff, and I feel like I could really say, like, this is… this is our tool today.
99 00:18:27.820 ⇒ 00:18:32.200 iPhone (117): Take it to the next level, and you guys would be kind of the perfect people for that assignment.
100 00:18:32.940 ⇒ 00:18:38.539 Robert Tseng: Yeah, totally. I mean, that’s right in our wheelhouse. I mean, I guess I’m curious, like, if, kind of.
101 00:18:38.880 ⇒ 00:18:41.340 Robert Tseng: If the Marine…
102 00:18:41.970 ⇒ 00:18:58.009 Robert Tseng: is part of, like, great… the bigger org. Do you guys… how does that work? Like, do you share a resource? I mean, I’m assuming with, like, high-performance auto parts is probably, like, the bigger part of the business. So… Yeah.
103 00:18:58.010 ⇒ 00:19:04.699 iPhone (117): Yeah, so, very different kinds of businesses. So, like, Elmore’s put into 3 different…
104 00:19:04.710 ⇒ 00:19:22.659 iPhone (117): companies. So you’ve got the… you’ve got the engineer, like, like the high-level engineering skunkworks talent that’s in the UK. Yeah. And so folks like Mercedes-Benz, and McLaren, and Aston Martin, and all those folks are like, we have this very specific
105 00:19:22.770 ⇒ 00:19:40.720 iPhone (117): engineering problem that we need help solving, can you use your engineering talent to go through, kind of, discovery, design, prototyping, implementation validation, right? Yeah. So there’s all of that that happens in the UK. Then you’ve got,
106 00:19:41.470 ⇒ 00:19:53.930 iPhone (117): our Plymouth, Michigan location, which is Illmore Engineering, and they do all of the build-outs, right? So, with all of these IndyCar engines, NASCAR engines, ARCA engines.
107 00:19:53.930 ⇒ 00:20:02.750 iPhone (117): There’s zero variation to them, right? Because everything has to be standardized to create an even playing field. And so, these folks aren’t…
108 00:20:02.750 ⇒ 00:20:09.539 iPhone (117): aren’t working on their own engines. We build them an engine, we spec when it has to come back in for, rebuild.
109 00:20:09.650 ⇒ 00:20:28.169 iPhone (117): And these teams usually have 2 or 3 or 4 engines per team, that they’re using, and they’ll put it in, and they can do a little tuning themselves, and they can make adjustments to the car, but the engine is the engine. So, if something breaks, they just send it back to us, and we repair it.
110 00:20:28.170 ⇒ 00:20:28.729 Robert Tseng: It’s not like it.
111 00:20:28.730 ⇒ 00:20:41.119 iPhone (117): Yeah, so they’re… those teams, you know, an IndyCar team isn’t going on a store and ordering a new alternator. It’s very high touch, and they send it back to us, and we fix it. Same with NASCAR, same with ARCA.
112 00:20:42.080 ⇒ 00:21:00.879 iPhone (117): For the marine side of the business, we… you know, we end up shipping anywhere between, like, you know, 1,000 to 3,000 engines a year. Those go into boats, and then our… our customer experience team works hand-in-hand with our dealer network to manage the… the…
113 00:21:01.010 ⇒ 00:21:05.290 iPhone (117): All of the engines that are all across the world that those dealers interface with for our customers.
114 00:21:05.400 ⇒ 00:21:10.710 Robert Tseng: Yeah. And so those dealers are ordering those parts to work on the boats and the motors.
115 00:21:10.710 ⇒ 00:21:14.300 iPhone (117): For our… our end users.
116 00:21:14.790 ⇒ 00:21:15.460 Robert Tseng: Yeah.
117 00:21:15.600 ⇒ 00:21:25.890 Robert Tseng: I saw that on your B2C side, it was mostly accessories. You’re not, like, buying, like, base engines off of, like, the site, right? No, yeah. It’s mostly the B2B through dealers, and… yeah.
118 00:21:25.890 ⇒ 00:21:41.460 iPhone (117): Yeah, and like, I guess, I mean, for our… for our ARCA, like, our NASCAR and ARCA customers, those… those… those guys can buy parts, and work on their own engines. IndyCar is a whole different story, a much different kind of business.
119 00:21:41.460 ⇒ 00:21:48.610 iPhone (117): But then we’ve got, like, a Shopify store, that really is just used as, like, a, a point-of-sale system.
120 00:21:48.730 ⇒ 00:21:52.980 iPhone (117): for our teams. So, you’ve got,
121 00:21:53.460 ⇒ 00:22:07.059 iPhone (117): you’ve got a group of folk that are always there, like, as part of the pit crew, and they’ve got a truck of parts, and so if somebody’s… yeah, I’ll use the alternator example again. If somebody’s alternator blows while they’re on the racetrack and they need to put a new one in.
122 00:22:07.060 ⇒ 00:22:15.869 iPhone (117): For, you know, the second day’s race. You’ve got an Ilmore truck with an Ilmore representative that’s using our Shopify store to just kind of check that out.
123 00:22:16.040 ⇒ 00:22:18.160 iPhone (117): But we don’t really… I mean…
124 00:22:18.460 ⇒ 00:22:25.270 iPhone (117): We understand the value of that business based on how many, How many teams we’re managing.
125 00:22:25.630 ⇒ 00:22:32.150 iPhone (117): And how many engines those teams, and how many racers those teams have, so it’s, like, less important for us
126 00:22:32.220 ⇒ 00:22:48.650 iPhone (117): to really understand, like, the sales data around that. It’s where the marine business is really where, like, a lot of our growth stems from, and so understanding consumer behaviors, both on the business side and, you know, and, like, consumer side is massive.
127 00:22:49.950 ⇒ 00:23:01.449 Robert Tseng: Okay, cool. Yeah, no, this was great context, thanks for… thanks for that. I guess, yeah, I was… I mean, like, why not consolidate the WooCommerce and the Shopify, you know, like, there’s a lot of… seems like there’s a lot of different,
128 00:23:02.270 ⇒ 00:23:13.239 Robert Tseng: not necessarily POSs, but, like, just customer, like, shopping experiences that you could bring under… under a single, ecosystem, but I… I guess…
129 00:23:13.240 ⇒ 00:23:17.170 iPhone (117): Seems like these are 3 very separate businesses, and yeah, definitely so.
130 00:23:17.170 ⇒ 00:23:19.470 Robert Tseng: I really like sharing resources or whatever with each other.
131 00:23:19.470 ⇒ 00:23:23.850 iPhone (117): No, no, we’re a bit silent. I mean, like, our engineering talent’s a little shared, but that’s about it.
132 00:23:24.030 ⇒ 00:23:24.650 Robert Tseng: Okay.
133 00:23:25.270 ⇒ 00:23:37.070 Robert Tseng: Okay, cool. Yeah, no, I think that makes sense. I think I get better understanding of where you guys are at. Yeah, I think what I’d like to do next is to put together a…
134 00:23:37.210 ⇒ 00:23:53.069 Robert Tseng: Yeah, I’ll just give you some ideas. I’ll give you some sample proposals of work that we’ve done. I feel like with, once again, like, the seasonal specialty parts, company around $5 million in size, like, I feel like we have a lot of good case studies that are there that might be relevant to a lot of the
135 00:23:53.150 ⇒ 00:24:02.500 Robert Tseng: what are you describing? And then I guess I’m curious, so from your… from your team, like, who’s… who would be reviewing this? Is it you and, like, yeah.
136 00:24:02.500 ⇒ 00:24:06.790 iPhone (117): Yeah, it’s gonna be myself, and then we’ve, like, our director of, sales and marketing.
137 00:24:06.800 ⇒ 00:24:26.209 iPhone (117): So I take a look at things, get my arms around it, and then really just kind of put it to him in layman terms as to, like, this is what the proposal’s for, this is what the benefit of, you know, moving forward with the project would be, and then he would approve it. We’re on a bit, like, like I said, I could probably free up, like, 1,500.
138 00:24:26.210 ⇒ 00:24:30.219 iPhone (117): We’re on a pretty big spending hold until April.
139 00:24:30.220 ⇒ 00:24:34.290 iPhone (117): And that’s just due to,
140 00:24:35.380 ⇒ 00:24:48.700 iPhone (117): us moving. So, our manufacturing footprint was in North Carolina last year. We bought a new building and moved all of that, all of those resources and capabilities to Michigan.
141 00:24:48.710 ⇒ 00:24:56.500 iPhone (117): Which is nice, because our… our motorsports division and our marine division are all of, like, 25 minutes away from each other.
142 00:24:56.800 ⇒ 00:25:10.909 iPhone (117): Nice. Now, and it’s great because we can share some engineering brainpower when we need to, but it was a very expensive move. So, we’re just trying to watch our expenditures until April when, our… our cash flow’s a bit better.
143 00:25:11.530 ⇒ 00:25:18.119 Robert Tseng: Sure, yeah, no, I guess it sounds like you made the move with, with the team then, what moved from North Carolina to Michigan as well?
144 00:25:18.450 ⇒ 00:25:34.499 iPhone (117): Yeah, so I lived in Michigan… I’ve lived in Michigan my whole life, but I… I’ve been with the company for about 7 years, and they’ve sent me down, for special projects, in North Carolina, so I’ve spent probably equal times in North Carolina as I had Michigan, funny enough.
145 00:25:34.800 ⇒ 00:25:35.420 Robert Tseng: Nice.
146 00:25:35.600 ⇒ 00:25:39.340 Robert Tseng: Yeah, I mean, I, I was… I grew up in Michigan.
147 00:25:39.340 ⇒ 00:25:39.880 iPhone (117): Really?
148 00:25:39.880 ⇒ 00:25:41.710 Robert Tseng: I was born in Troy, yeah.
149 00:25:41.710 ⇒ 00:25:50.009 iPhone (117): Oh my god, okay, my parents, that’s where, they had an apartment in Troy before they, bought my childhood home, so I know the Troy area quite well.
150 00:25:50.010 ⇒ 00:25:58.130 Robert Tseng: Yep, that sounds like my parents’ journey. I apartmented in Troy, and then we moved out to California when I was, like, 10, so…
151 00:25:58.130 ⇒ 00:26:01.600 iPhone (117): Oh, God, that would have been my dream. I always wanted to live in California.
152 00:26:01.600 ⇒ 00:26:07.240 Robert Tseng: Yeah. Lucky dog. And so you’re, what, you’re in New York now, or are you guys, still at Kelly?
153 00:26:07.520 ⇒ 00:26:16.320 Robert Tseng: I’m in… I’m in New York. Our business is based in Austin. My business partner is there, then we have a team kind of scattered across the country, so,
154 00:26:16.560 ⇒ 00:26:17.120 Robert Tseng: Yeah.
155 00:26:18.130 ⇒ 00:26:28.479 iPhone (117): Very cool. I was just in Austin for a wedding, end of January, so it was fun. Hadn’t been there since, like, 20… 2014 or something like that, so it’s changed a lot in 12 years.
156 00:26:28.910 ⇒ 00:26:35.980 Robert Tseng: Okay, cool. Yeah, I mean, that… yeah, I feel like it has. I… last time I went to Michigan was last… I have a client in Ann Arbor, so, like, I’ll.
157 00:26:35.980 ⇒ 00:26:38.010 iPhone (117): Oh, that’s where I live, that’s where my house is at.
158 00:26:38.350 ⇒ 00:26:38.960 Robert Tseng: Okay.
159 00:26:38.960 ⇒ 00:26:41.340 iPhone (117): What’s the… I gotta know, what’s the client in Ann Arbor?
160 00:26:41.400 ⇒ 00:26:53.960 Robert Tseng: Well, I guess he just lives there, but, like, he is… it’s called Eden Health, they’re a, basically, like, a hymns and hers competitor, GLP-1 supplement company.
161 00:26:53.960 ⇒ 00:26:55.029 iPhone (117): Got it, okay.
162 00:26:55.030 ⇒ 00:26:55.880 Robert Tseng: Yeah.
163 00:26:56.230 ⇒ 00:27:07.410 iPhone (117): Cool, very cool. Awesome. Yeah. Well, yeah, if you, if you want to go ahead and send me some case studies, and maybe, like, sample, proposals that you’ve done for other companies,
164 00:27:07.450 ⇒ 00:27:24.190 iPhone (117): kind of looking for the same stuff, I’d love to take a look at it. I’ll read through the stuff as I have time. Maybe later this week, it might trickle into early next. And then, if I have any questions, I’ll reach out just to kind of get a little bit of clarity, and then I’ll start picking the brain of,
165 00:27:24.250 ⇒ 00:27:31.699 iPhone (117): My boss, just to kind of see what we might be able to free up and what we could do, in the short term, as well as, you know, maybe a couple months out.
166 00:27:32.110 ⇒ 00:27:33.609 Robert Tseng: Okay, that all sounds great.
167 00:27:33.890 ⇒ 00:27:35.589 iPhone (117): Excellent. Thank you, Robert, I appreciate it.
168 00:27:35.590 ⇒ 00:27:36.780 Robert Tseng: Yeah, good to meet you.
169 00:27:36.780 ⇒ 00:27:38.169 iPhone (117): Dan, nice meeting you. Take care.
170 00:27:38.170 ⇒ 00:27:39.070 Robert Tseng: Bye-bye.