Branded Merchandise Strategy: Ethan Dowie on Visibility, Loyalty, and Referrals | Ep. 207

Ethan Dowie: 00:00:00

It's really less about being an order taker and more about understanding what the vision are the companies we work with have for their project. But I am the world's biggest super fan. You're like a super fan.

Intro: 00:00:15

Welcome to the Business Superfans podcast. We will discuss how establishing business superfans from customers, employees and business partners can elevate your success exponentially.

Learn why these advocates are a key factor to achieving excellence in the world of commerce.

Discuss the invaluable insights of business owners who have successfully implemented the strategies in the book to build their own team of devoted super fans. Gain insightful knowledge from the experts who create applications to help you create passionate super fans.

This is the Business Super Fans podcast with your host, Freddy D. Freddy Fred.

Freddy D: 00:00:58

Foreign.

Freddy D: 00:01:04

Hey super fans. Freddy D. Here in this episode 207, we're joined by Ethan Dowie, founder of Indigo Promotions.

Ethan tackles the challenge many service businesses overlook.

Branded merchandise is often treated like cheap giveaway stuff when it could be a powerful tool for visibility, loyalty, referrals and real brand momentum.

Through Indigo Promotions, Ethan helps companies turn merchandise from an afterthought into a competitive advantage using creative strategy, global factory connections and a sharp eye for the detail that make people actually keep use and talk about branded products. If you ever wondered how merch can create strong customer connections, Ethan brings a practical, energetic path forward.

Freddy D: 00:01:53

Welcome, Ethan, to Business Superfans Advantage. Great conversation we had before we started recording. Welcome from New York to the Arizona world and welcome to the show.

Ethan Dowie: 00:02:03

Thank you for having me on, Frederick. I really appreciate it.

Freddy D: 00:02:05

So Ethan, you've, you know, you've been in, you know, branding and merchandising and all that stuff. But you know, what got you into that direction? What's the backstory?

How did you come up with, you know, what you're doing today and really helping businesses really develop their brand and get their brand out.

Ethan Dowie: 00:02:26

So this is gonna be a two part answer because when I was in college I early on I really had no interest in business whatsoever. My whole goal was just to qualify for the Olympics. That was my every be every fiber in my being was just focus on that in track and field.

And then I actually worked at a summer camp that was specifically for kids with cancer and their siblings.

And I had such a positive experience at this camp and saw all these kids playing and having fun and having a great time even with all their health challenges that I wanted a way to give back. And that's actually how I founded my first company called Dowie Corp, which was just, I Would hold sporting events and donate the money.

And that really right there.

Having that business open for a while gave me the entrepreneurship bug to just figure out how to make a business work for me where I'm actually helping people and actually doing something that I care about. Fast forward a couple of years. I ordered a lot of merchandise for the company I was working for.

And what I realized about the whole merch ordering process is not a lot of people are good at it. And we would be working with vendors that would send stuff in the wrong color with holes in it.

It would arrive late, it would arrive too early, and just all of these problems. And I just thought to myself, we're paying these vendors a lot of money, and they're not doing a good job. I think I could do it better.

And from there, I just jumped in headfirst. I had no experience in merchandise or apparel or branding really, at all, But I was very, very determined to find a way to make it work.

Started from scratch. Started with no clients, no vendors, no employees. Up until today. We're a team of about seven. We'll be at a team of 10 in a couple of months.

And we've worked with some of the biggest brands on the planet. Wow.

Freddy D: 00:04:09

What a story. What were you doing in. In the track and field?

Ethan Dowie: 00:04:12

So my best event was long jump. I was a long jumper since the seventh grade of high school, of middle school, and I just. I loved it so much. I trained every day. I didn't party.

I didn't do anything but think about track and field. And, you know, my whole mission as an athlete was just, how do I find my way into the Olympics? Like, what do I do to make it work?

And I think that set kind of my mind and wired me early on of I just have to work just nonstop all the time and think about my goal and my vision for my life. You know, ultimately, it didn't come true, and I wasn't good enough. But now I put that focus into business and growing my company.

Freddy D: 00:04:50

Yeah, the reason I ask was I was also in track and field back then.

Ethan Dowie: 00:04:54

What was your event?

Freddy D: 00:04:56

So my. My was running long distance.

Ethan Dowie: 00:04:59

Nice.

Freddy D: 00:04:59

Okay.

Freddy D: 00:04:59

And I learned a lesson. I, you know, wasn't going for the Olympics. I was just doing it. My dad kind of forced me into it.

I wanted to play football, and he said, no, you're going to do track, so, okay. But in the mile run, I used to be the in. In the mile race. And one of the lessons I learned was one of the events I was in.

And we were Running and I kicked in a little too early and I got myself to second place.

And the guy from that was in first place was just like a rocket, you know, there was no chance I could catch him, but I caught and passed the guy in second place first. So for a moment, I was in second place in the mile race and I let up.

And I never forget that is that, you know, you really gotta time your strategy of in life or in business of when you're gonna kick it in. And then if you kick it in, you've gotta be able to go the distance.

Ethan Dowie: 00:05:52

Love that. And I think I talk about this with my friends all the time. There are so many life lessons that come from really any sport but track in particular.

It's kind of a weird one where it's like, it's a team sport, but a lot of it you're alone for.

And I think that it's an interesting combo because it's like you have that team spirit and obviously you're rooting for all your teammates, but then when it comes time to compete, you are alone. And. And I think that's one of the few sports that is like that, if that makes sense.

Freddy D: 00:06:21

Oh, it does, totally. I was in it, so I understand exactly what you're saying. So I just wanted to share that.

So let's go back to, you know, a little bit about, you know, how did you get started with the Indigo business? And I mean, you mentioned that, you know, you've kind of gone, but what's the story of, you know, you started by yourself.

How did you make that happen? How did you grow the business? What's, what's the, what's the story there?

Ethan Dowie: 00:06:43

Yeah.

So day one, I immediately was just in hustle mode because my thoughts were, all right, I don't have any clients, I don't have any employees to help me. I don't have any factories or vendors that I know of that can actually make my products. So what do I do?

So immediately I just started picking up the phone and calling anybody that was willing to listen about what I'm trying to do and just about what my vision for my company is. Now keep in mind this vision was very limited at this time. I didn't really know any how to even think long term in this industry.

So I just started cold calling people. I started with clients.

I would take famous businesses that have been around for a while, find some type of number online and just call them in and just say, hey, I'd have a little simple script telling them that I was A merch vendor, and I would love to create some merch for them and understand what their merch needs were. Now, that failed about 195ish times. And then on the 496 phone call, I tell this story all the time and I love it so much.

I had really, what was the most important phone call of my business to Zappos.com, which is a company owned by Amazon out in Vegas. And I got an amazing woman on the phone who I'm still connected with to this day.

She let me into her world of merch at Zappos, and then we landed our first big account and big client.

And what was so special was they knew I didn't really know what I was doing yet, but they loved my tenacity and they loved my spirit of trying to build something and trying to figure out, figure it out that they let me into their world, they gave me orders, and it led to this amazing relationship.

So that really, that one phone call allowed me a playground to understand what merch actually was and what taking orders meant and how to make something work for a brand and for their events.

Freddy D: 00:08:34

Yeah, I mean, you, you know, persistence is the key to sales. And, yeah, you're going to get a lot of no's, but that one yes can be the game changer. And in your case, it was the game changer.

But, you know, a lot of people give up. And at. In sales, a lot of people give up at the third, fourth, fifth phone call.

And, you know, as you said, 498 phone calls, the 98th was the one that made the difference. That's really it in sales, it's a timing thing because maybe today is not the right day, but tomorrow might be.

And if you don't call on tomorrow, you've got zero chance.

Ethan Dowie: 00:09:09

Absolutely. Yeah. And it's also, though, that I was learning along the way, too. Like, I wasn't just doing the same thing, repetitive, over and over again.

I was saying, oh, okay, what worked last time? Okay, that kind of got me maybe a minute extra on the phone. Okay, let me do that again this time.

And I just, I've taken that into my every day at Indigo for the past five years. I mean, that happened five years ago. Ish.

And I've taken that with me every day of just saying to myself, even if it doesn't work right now, even if it's not as good of an opportunity as I thought it was, whatever I'm working on, at least I'm getting better and becoming a better entrepreneur. And I'll know how to do it better next time.

Freddy D: 00:09:45

Right, right. And that's really.

I did a few face plants myself when I first got, I used to be a tech guy and as I mentioned before, I started recording and I got in a computer industry, computer Aided Design and Computer Aided Manufact CAD CAM we called it. And I used to be an engineer prior to that.

So I was doing drafting on drafting boards and now I've got to go learn how to do presentations and teaching people. And you talk about a train wreck getting an engineer to go in front of people and try to teach them how to use technology.

Yeah, it just didn't work out well. It was bad because we were taught how to use the technology but we weren't taught how to train. So I had to teach myself how to train.

And unfortunately back in the mid-80s, I raised my hand, I got picked and I got some high end sales training and that's when I really learned about presentation skills and phone call skills and engagement with people and follow up and everything else. As an engineer, that's not your world.

So I can completely appreciate what you're talking about because yeah, it's an evolve, you evolve with it and as you learn more, you get more confidence. And that confidence is really what becomes the secret ingredient.

Because now you start getting attitude and once you've got attitude, you walk into a room, it's contagious.

Ethan Dowie: 00:11:06

I love that. Yeah. And I think that you're right, it spreads to your entire team.

Like it's like if you're willing to figure it out and you're willing to face plan and you know, wipe out and just embarrass yourself, I think everybody else is too. And then the biggest learning breakthroughs can happen.

Freddy D: 00:11:20

Yeah, yeah.

And it's, it's life transformational because in, in my case I was at a company and a guy basically said it was the worst effing training he ever seen in his entire life.

And I've shared a story many times and he basically says, I'm going to give you to the next day to get it fixed out or I'm going to call your boss and have your dumb ass terminated. And I, that's when I invented engagement training. I started asking, said Ethan, okay, we got this whole command string up on the marker board.

Is this correct to create the design a 3D box? I think so. Well Steve, do you think, do you agree with Ethan? No. There's this syntax there.

Mike, what do you think with Ethan and Steve and got everybody talking and Looking and stuff. And I became the most sought after applications guy to install software.

And I installed it in some General Motors and a multitude of different companies that I've trained. But that whole face plant was transformed my life.

And I still think and I talk, I don't remember that guy's name, but that guy changed my life for the.

Ethan Dowie: 00:12:23

Positive, even though it was negative at the time, but really long term wise, it's, it's been everything.

Freddy D: 00:12:29

Yeah, yeah. So, so let's talk about how do you work with the company?

So, okay, I'm, I'm here and I'm, you know, I want to get, I want to get a T shirt brand for my business and some other stuff. How does that all work?

Ethan Dowie: 00:12:42

So for us, it's a lot of questions.

I mean, it's really less about being an order taker and more about understanding what the vision are the companies we work with have for their project. We have some complex merch that people want to create.

Yes, we can do all those simple things like apparel and bottles and whatever else you can think of. But a lot of times our merch is just one piece of the entire complicated puzzle that, that our client is trying to put together for their event.

So we might be working on a large scale event that has multiple events inside one that's going to be a countrywide tour where they need merchandise in every state. And we have to figure out, okay, what is the best way to get their vision for how they're going to use our products done.

And the way we do that is through questions. We just, we under, we try to understand what their vision is. We try to see and feel exactly what they're trying to create.

And then once we've asked all of our questions and once we have a complete understanding of what they're trying to do, we can suggest exactly what we think would make the most sense. Now some people come to us with very clear visions of, hey, this is exactly what I want. And those are great people to work with.

We still do our consultative work where we're trying to always now enhance their vision too. But some people have no idea. Some people say, hey, I know merch is important, but I don't really know where to start. Like what do I do?

And there we just start further back in the roadmap and it's, it's understanding, okay, what is the result that you want to get from buying all of this merchandise? And I see it all the time where vendors, merch vendors don't reverse engineer the whole process. And when you don't do that.

You're just an order taker. You're just trying to make a transaction real quick. That's not how I see Indigo at all.

We want to be the company that people think of when they need ideas, when they need help with their merch vision.

And that's how I feel like we've grown the most and also have helped our clients the most, because we're not just who's making the stuff, we're also helping with the ideation and the brainstorming. And it sounds simple, but you'd be surprised how few companies that do what we do do that.

Freddy D: 00:14:57

Well. You absolutely nailed it and crushed it.

Because that is one of the approaches that I used when I was selling technology was what's the outcome that you're looking for? And that's what you basically just mentioned. And when you start having that conversation, you're no longer talking about the stuff.

Whether it's technology, whether it's merchandise or whatever it is, it doesn't matter. It's really. Now you're having a business strategy conversation. And so you change the whole dynamics because now you become a trusted advisor. You're.

They're brainstorming with you and you start talking about other things. And this just happens to be a thingamajig that's gonna help them get to where they wanna go from their business, and you can't compete with that.

Freddy D: 00:15:45

And I.

Freddy D: 00:15:46

And that's. I'm really glad that you brought that up because that's how you change the game.

That's how you eliminate your competition, and that's how you create super fans of those customers, because now you've helped them grow their business and you're a contributor to that business as a partner, and that's the way you're looked at down the road when you have that relationship with those customers.

Ethan Dowie: 00:16:12

And on top of that as well, though, say we're working with. We work with some Fortune 500 companies.

Of course, the person who's ordering the merch, it's kind of their neck on the line because they're responsible for it. So if they don't have a good vendor, who's going to help them look good and look like the hero, because they're the hero orderer.

I think that's really like, how have we been able to create champ internal champions and brand advocates? For us, it's by making them look good and it's by saying, like, hey, we know you're going for this, but what about this? Have you thought of this?

And just the options and just being there for them and knowing that, like, if you. If we create bad merchandise, sure, maybe they'll never order it from us again. That person could be fired.

That person could lose responsibility and just not be looked at as a good employee.

So that's why every conversation I have, I don't care if it is a $1 item or a $1 million item, I take it very seriously and so does my team, because we don't know the scale of how much this person needs this to work out. It could be super important, it could be not important, but we're treating it as if it's the most important thing constantly.

Just so people know, I can rely on this company no matter what, they have my back. And that's always what we try to put out to the world and all of our clients.

Freddy D: 00:17:28

And that's how you're creating internal superfans. And that becomes your sales team within that organization. Because you said.

A key thing there, too, that I want to emphasize, Ethan, was the fact that you're helping that person in their position and their aspirations.

And if you don't take the time to learn about their business aspirations right now, today they might be the person that's ordering the merchandise, the branding materials, and things like that, but tomorrow they're looking at being the VP of marketing, or they might be the VP of sales, or they might become the CEO of the company. You never know until you have those conversations with them. Because that's one of the things that.

When I was working selling manufacturing software, I would talk to the IT guys. What was their goals? What was their business plans? What was their objectives?

And you're absolutely right by making them look good, you know, that helped them get promoted or to a higher level, because they made the right decision. You've helped them in that decision, and they become your best sales force.

Because when I was selling to other companies, I would mention this company and they'd say, oh, those guys are using your stuff. Yeah, okay, that's good enough for me. Let's wrap up the deal. And I closed more sales because I could name drop who were my customers.

Ethan Dowie: 00:18:45

And there's so much that you don't see on the back end when that's happening, when you have all these people that are just constantly talking about you chatting it up. Oh, who made this for you? Oh, Ethan did. Ethan Indigo did. Perfect. I just.

There's so much that goes on that just creates this constant referral chain, and that's really. I just. I'm obsessed with customer service. And I'm.

I'm obsessed with making projects work, and I think that alone has created so many different referrals into I don't even know how many companies. And whether it's projects that came to fruition or not, I just, I love having conversations with people.

And I think my whole team has gotten good at understanding exactly what their needs are and what the situation is. So, you know, that's what's fun for us. And I think that's.

That's what makes the whole merch ordering experience now different than if you're going to a different company that you say, all right, give me your credit card information. It's like, it's just two completely different stories, you know?

Freddy D: 00:19:42

Sure. Absolutely correct. Absolutely correct.

And before we started recording, we talked a little bit about, you know, the differences of just branding stuff and then personalized branding. So let's talk a little bit about that.

Ethan Dowie: 00:19:54

Yeah. And that's not something that many people that, that come into my world are even thinking about, because a lot of times there was.

There's this one story that I have where a guy was receiving all of this merchandise as it was like a thank you was like, hey, here's my company T shirt. Have it for me. There's no connection that the guy has to a random brand. It's a yes. Maybe he's your. His. He's your client. It's just stuff to him.

He doesn't care.

And then one very, very, very wise client of his sent him something that was a Star wars based item that had his name on it, and the logo was somewhere in the back. But he got it and said, this person knows my interests. This person understands the stuff that I like. And he just.

It was amazing because it was like this epiphany that he had of, oh, this is what it's like when you brand something well and have the person interest in mind of what they like to do and what they enjoy.

And I think that's a whole entire different conversation of how much ROI you're gonna get from products when you're actually considering those types of things compared to just checking a box and saying, yeah, yeah, I sent him his gift, he got it, it's fine. But they're not. There's no result. There's no like, oh my God, that's amazing type of outcome. It's more of just, thanks, I appreciate it.

And that's not what we try to create. We try to create the first one. The wow, this is amazing.

Freddy D: 00:21:25

Right, Right.

And that's One of the things I'm going to bring show up here is that, you know, if you send something like this, this is what we're talking about really. Basically, you know, that's, that's just stuff. But you put the person's name on it like you just described, all of a sudden it's my coffee cup.

Changes the whole conversation changes the equation, don't touch my coffee cup versus that's just a cup.

Ethan Dowie: 00:21:47

Yeah, it's just, you know, I think the part two of that is also knowing your brand and also knowing what your, whether it's your employees or your clients, knowing what they believe in and the stuff that they like.

Because when you combine the two, when you're creating tangible products, something physical that people can actually touch with the spirit of what your brand means, that's how you create products that are going to connect with your existing audience. If you're just saying I like YETI Tumblr, so we should create that.

You're, you're almost there, but you're missing part of the equation because if you're some type of, you know, travel brand and everybody that buys from you is, are big hikers and then you make something that is a known hiking brand, you already have a leg up on everything because you're already halfway there.

Now if you just make the design good, you have a physical product that people are going to love, a design that stands out and you are giving it to people who are going to connect with the first two parts. And that's usually my three part equation of making merchandise that's going to actually make an impact.

Freddy D: 00:22:54

Yeah.

So share a story of how you worked with the company and right there and how you transformed them into what they're what I call business super fans of what you did for them and they're one of your biggest advocates.

Ethan Dowie: 00:23:06

We actually just had a project finish. It was for a little company that most of you might know called Nike.

And Nike called us on a Friday night needing 320 bags, luxury bags on Wednesday afternoon. Pretty crazy rush type of project. But for Nike, obviously we're gonna try to pull it off.

And when they were coming to us, they had this idea in mind that was, okay, we're gonna have this basic bag, it's just gonna be a regular stock bag and make it nice, make it work for whatever we're going for. And I just, you know, we, after talking for a bit, we just said this isn't Nike's brand.

Like this isn't the luxury style that people are used to do you mind if we spruce it up a bit? We use different materials. We made it out of ballistic nylon and leather.

We made the embroidery humongous on it because we wanted to stand out and create that Nike type feel. And once they saw it, they were like, oh, this looks way better.

And I just think little things like that, of being that consultant and being able to pitch something that, you know, might connect better to their audience. Because everybody knows Nike type of audience. They. They are able to appreciate it.

And then when they see that in person, they go, my gosh, this is exactly what we needed.

And they might not know that what they needed because they don't have a manufacturing background or they're not used to making items on a daily basis. But that alone just creates. Has created fans of Indigo. And this was a recent project where they go up.

Not only does he understand what his product should look like, he also understands, per client, what it should look like. It can't just be one or the other. You need both parts.

Freddy D: 00:24:47

So they're super fans of you guys. Now you can also name drop, as you just did, that you worked with Nike, which, you know, does not suck.

Yeah, it's like I can say that I've sold into this little company called Bosch, $10,000 sale. Lost my butt on that sale. Flew twice to Germany for the sale. But then I could name drop.

And that got all the suppliers that were doing work for Bosch, because if Bosch is using it, we should at least take a look at it. And that's it. That opened up the doors. So same, same approach.

Ethan Dowie: 00:25:20

Absolutely. We actually. One last funny story. We had a project last year. This was when Madonna was. Was doing her tour, her comeback tour recently.

And they wanted to do a pen that they had done all the way back in the 70s or 80s, long before my time. And this was more of a client knowing exactly what they want.

And I wish I had the pen here to show you, but the pen was basically a Madonna, fully closed. When you hold it this way, and it's called a. Oh, my gosh, a action floating pen. When you flip it, her dress flies off.

And everybody just went crazy for it. They loved it. And they sold tons and tons of units of it. And it's just. I think it's so funny knowing when.

It's almost like that's a different equation where not only does the client know exactly what the product should be, the vendor knows exactly what it should be, the audience knows exactly what it should be.

So when you get into a situation like that, it kind of adds some pressure that you have to create the perfect product or else everybody's going to know and be like, this was not it, buddy. Like, you guys did not do a good job. Luckily, everybody loved the pen and that's one that we, we try to show off as much as possible.

Freddy D: 00:26:28

So how do you find your vendors and how do you work with the suppliers, in a sense, to manufacture all these particular products? Because I know that you've, you know, you work with domestic and international suppliers, so how does all that kind of work?

Ethan Dowie: 00:26:41

Yeah, so we're a little bit different than most merch vendors in the way that we are partially vertical, integrated. We have our own embroidery in house, we have our own screen printing in house and have a custom bag maker in house. It's as well.

So that allows us to one, get out a lot of our products much quicker than most other companies we compete with.

But for the products that we don't make in house, we run our vendors through a pretty rigorous onboarding system where we're not just ordering from, from anybody.

We need to make sure that our factories have the same mindset as us and they view it as a partnership and they understand that if they do something wrong, they don't exist in our world. It's us to our client.

So if they do anything incorrectly or print something wrong or embroider something wrong, it's us that has done it wrong and we have wronged our client.

So after five years of building our vendor, our preferred vendor portal and suppliers we enjoy working with, we've gotten to the point where we have a few that we can rely on for anything and then we have almost like a B tier category that we can rely on for most things.

But at the end of the day, everybody who we order from is trusted and can build the quality of product that we need to build to keep our clients happy and just keep good things coming 24 7. And you know, it's both overseas and in the US but at the end of the day, the process is always the same.

It's how do we know that when we have something that is needs to be done quick or needs to be done perfectly, that they're going to be able to stay up to our standard? And we do. We give them a lot of test projects, we give them a lot of questioning and ask them how they do things, pop quizzes.

And if we don't feel comfortable with it, I always trust my gut and we don't work with somebody. So that's really how we've been able to keep it nice and lean and not work with a million different factories for a million different products.

Freddy D: 00:28:37

It's also think important. You're also building relationships with those people.

So because this one things, you know, we talked before we started recording is, you know, I work with a bunch of distributors around the world and you know, how do you get.

Get mind share of those from those people if they're in another particular country, You've got to build that relationship and maintain a relationship so that all of a sudden you've got something that's important and needs to be turned around quick. That relationship comes into play. And he says, oh man, our buddy Ethan needs some help on this thing.

All right guys, let's you know, roll up our sleeves, let's get this thing done and out the door properly. And if you don't have that relationship, that becomes a little bit of a challenge.

Ethan Dowie: 00:29:19

It's all rela. This industry is all relationships. I mean, both on the client side and the factory side.

And that's why I always say, like we're in a very virtual world right now. Everybody knows that everyone is meeting over zoom or social media or wherever.

And I always say my biggest rule is if I have the chance to meet somebody in person, I'm going to make it happen. A lot of our overseas factories, when they're in the U.S. i am going to.

If it's close by New York, I am trying to meet up with them and understand how they view business, how they view their factory, how passionate are they. And just knowing that and being able to shake their hand and saying, hey, I'm Ethan.

I think it changes the whole dynamic of the relationship because, you know, I can see someone on screen a million times. If I met them in person, I feel like there's a deeper connection there.

Freddy D: 00:30:05

Oh, sure.

I mean, I remember being invited to stay at some of my distributors homes in different countries because I was flying in to help them attend a trade show, for example, to market my technology. So I flew in to say, I'm going to be shoulder to shoulder with you in the trade show. And it says, well, we have an extra room.

You know, you're willing to stay in the house, we'll pick you up from the airport. And those relationships, I still have those relationships still.

Today we're talking 20 plus years later, we, you know, I'm not in that industry anymore, but those are friends of mine.

Ethan Dowie: 00:30:43

It's amazing, honestly. And I think that's kind of been the coolest thing for me over the last five Six years. We started with nothing. No clients, no factories, no whatever.

And now to have the network that we've built and to, you know, you could see our case studies and the big clients we've worked with, to be able to almost be in charge of a lot of these huge company events and making sure the merchandise hits the spot for each one. I take it as a huge responsibility.

And I think the only way you can keep those relationships built is at the end of the day, to have a really good product. You can't just talk about it and say, I can do this, I can do that. The product has to be perfect, or else the relationship aspect can't develop.

You have to constantly be delivering good things, and then also the relationship can increase at the same time. And I think that's just the whole mindset we've had since the beginning.

Freddy D: 00:31:36

Yeah, I mean, that's the. That's the game changer right there. Because it's. It's a partnership. That's really what it becomes, too. And, you know, there's gonna be some missteps.

It's life. Things happen. But that's also when that relationship comes back and says, okay, well, you know, we understand.

Stuff happens, but more importantly, you stepped up and made it right very quickly. So life moves on forward. And it's how you handle the missteps.

Ethan Dowie: 00:32:02

I love that. Yeah, I think it really is how you handle the missteps. I mean, you're not usually judged, in my opinion. And this is.

Yeah, there's a million things that can go wrong with any merchandise project from the jump. But we had a few clients that would always say to us, like, look, it's not that a mistake happened. It's how you fix it. And you better bet your butt.

Every single time there was any type of mistake, my team and I were all over it. And that became the most important thing for however long it takes to fix.

Freddy D: 00:32:28

Yeah, it's. That's. That's the game changer right there. Because, you know, things happen in life, but it's how you handle them. And you're absolutely right.

That's the M.O. At that point in time. That's the most important thing that needs to be taken care of.

Everything else can wait because that person is counting or that business is counting on you delivering whatever it is that you're delivering, whether it's, you know, in your case, you know, merchandise, you know, but if it's technology and all of a sudden the software crashes and you've got. And they've got a deadline, to get some stuff or there's a bug in the software because it's not doing what it needs to be doing.

Especially in a manufacturing, engineering and manufacturing world, you know, they're stuck, they can't move forward and that's costing them money every day. So it's very important how you handle that misstep.

Ethan Dowie: 00:33:13

Absolutely, absolutely.

Freddy D: 00:33:15

So as we kind of get closer to the end here, so tell me a little bit more of the different things that you guys do.

Ethan Dowie: 00:33:20

Yeah, so any product, I always tell people, I mean any item you can think of is something that we make. We've created everything from pens and pencils to lanyards to bags, all types of apparel to custom vending machines.

And you know, you can tell also, I don't really consider this is going to sound odd, but I don't really consider the products the most interesting part of my business. The products that we make, it's how we use the products and it's the vision that we're trying to help people create on their end.

So all of these items, that's the easy part.

It's easy to, to find something that we can make in house or it's easy to brand an item overseas and ship it to the U.S. what's hard is to build out and reverse engineer every single step along the way of how these items are going to be used. So yes, we can create anything. And you know, if someone needs something branded like a T shirt or a hoodie, that's obviously simple to us.

But the challenging part is to act as a consultant and join these brands for an important conversation of what the best path forward is.

So that's really what we've been getting experience in the past five years is just how do big companies, who our main clientele, how do big companies use our merch to create cool experiences at their events or at their team building events, Whatever it is, whatever the use case is, how do we create things that are going to make an actual impact, get remembered, have that person act as an amazing internal champion and be looked at as a hero for making this merchandise instead of just someone who is just making an item and it is what it is. That's really what we do on a day to day basis.

We're talking to big brands that have fun projects to work on and we give them the best way to get it done and bring their vision to fruition.

Freddy D: 00:35:16

Add a little twist to that, you're creating super fans on both sides of the equation. You're helping, you're creating super fans of the customers that you're dealing with because of the work that you're doing.

But at the same time, you're helping those organizations create super fans of them a hundred percent. And that's the really cool part that you're doing that I want to really emphasize is that you're creating superfans on both sides of the equation.

Ethan Dowie: 00:35:42

Yes.

Freddy D: 00:35:42

And that is something that, that you really need to be marketing yourself with because that is a unique talent and that's a very powerful growth engine.

Ethan Dowie: 00:35:53

And it's super interesting because a lot of times where the brand behind the brand, like we might see our products talked about somewhere or in a store. I was actually walking in a, in a retail store once and said, is this an item that we made? What the heck?

And it's funny because there is this, you know, interesting dilemma of sometimes we have to make it look like that company didn't use a factory, that they made it on their own. We're kind of behind the scenes a lot of times, which almost makes it a bit challenging to promote that aspect.

But at the same time, you know, there are all these brands that tell us how much of a difference they. We made at their event, or they tell us, oh my God, without these items, we could have never done X.

And I, I think it is really cool to be able to have super fans coming from all directions, just from one physical product.

And I think I just, I have such a, I play such a bet on physical products and something tangible that people can hold in their hands because I don't think they're ever going out of style. I love stuff that I can touch and feel. I hate when stuff is just virtual. It's just, it's in my brain. It's a figment of my imagination.

But when I can touch something, when I can touch a hoodie that we've made or a Polo or a bag, and, and when the design hits the spot, that's always where I go, wow, we have truly made a difference here. And this is really cool.

Freddy D: 00:37:13

And you're, you're really, again, you're, you're creating dual super fans because the company that you're developing and delivering the merchandise to, they're super fan of what you've done, and now you've helped them create super fans for their company. And that's, I mean, that's just outstanding because it's a view across the board.

Ethan Dowie: 00:37:33

Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. And it, but I think it also, it, it, it adds the pressure to it too.

Like, it, it really, you have to know okay, If I mess up this project, not only am I screwing over my client, we're screwing over their clients. And you don't know how deep the, you know what Russian doll type thing it has, and it could go on forever.

But I just, I love that pressure and I think that's the, the fun thing about merchandise, that it just, it could be endless. You never know how far one uniquely branded T shirt could go. It's hard to track that type of thing. It's hard to track the ROI of merch in general.

And if you're not selling it, if you're just giving it away, which most merch is given away. And it's kind of cool to, to know that something you make could make it so far. And you have no idea. We.

Those Madonna pens that we made, my fiance's friend texted, oh, hey, have you seen these pens? They're so cool. I just bought one and it was a pen that I just showed her the day before that we made. And I'm like, what?

Who else could have this experience and, and have this type of thing happen to them? And I just, I love the industry so much. I.

That's why I'm so passionate about it, because it's so fun and, you know, it's allowed me to experience what working with big brands is like.

Freddy D: 00:38:43

It comes across, Ethan. It comes across. So as we come wrap up here, thank you so much for your time. Great conversation. You and I could talk about this for days, I think.

And how can people find you?

Ethan Dowie: 00:38:54

So we try to be as active on social media as possible. My social media handle ishandowie on all social medias, just my first name and last name. We're mainly on Instagram and LinkedIn.

And you know, I love talking to people and I love seeing what their mission is for their brand and how they want to use physical products.

So if anybody from this show that's listening, DMs me, superfan, I'll give them a 20 minute free consulting, one on one, just to figure out what type of products they're trying to make. So free. 20 Minutes with me and we'll see if we can create the wildest items of your imagination.

Freddy D: 00:39:29

Cool. Make sure that that's in the show notes. Again, thank you so much for your time. Love to have you on the show down the road.

Ethan Dowie: 00:39:34

Thank you, Frederick. I appreciate you having me on.

Freddy D: 00:39:36

Aidan reminded us that branded merch isn't just stuff. It works when it's built around the customer, the brand, and the outcome you want to create for service based business owners.

That matters because the right tangible touch point can deepen relationships, spark referrals and turn everyday customers into into advocates. And that's exactly what I believe too.

When you when you stop thinking transactionally and start creating memorable experiences, you build super fans on both sides of the equation. Know another another service based business owner who could benefit from this? Send them the link and help them get one superfan closer.

And if you're ready to take what you learned today and actually put it to work, come join me inside the Referral Revenue Lab, my private community where service based business owners learn how to turn happy customers and six overlooked groups in their ecosystem into predictable referral revenue.

When you join referralrevenuelab.com I'll hand you a free copy of the Referral Revenue Playbook plus access to the Dynamic Superfans to Authority scorecard so you can actually see where your business stands today and what to work on next.

And if today's conversation sparked a vision for where your business could be not just this year, but 10 years from now, don't let that spark fade when this episode ends.

That's why every week I share one practical insight pulled from years in the trenches and more than 200 guests on this show in my Prosperity Pathway newsletter. Sign up at ProsperityPathway Tips. Thank you for tuning in today. I'm grateful that you're part of the Business Superfans movement.

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We've got another great guest coming up that's going to drop some valuable insight, so I'll talk to you in the next episode. Cultivate superfans. Build authority. Own your market.

Intro: 00:41:43

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