Right About Now with Ryan Alford
Creativity - Uncommon Leadership - Profitable Pivoting - Luke Peter’s Path to $600 Million in Revenue
Tue, 10 Dec 2024
Right About Now with Ryan AlfordJoin media personality and marketing expert Ryan Alford as he dives into dynamic conversations with top entrepreneurs, marketers, and influencers. "Right About Now" brings you actionable insights on business, marketing, and personal branding, helping you stay ahead in today's fast-paced digital world. Whether it's exploring how character and charisma can make millions or unveiling the strategies behind viral success, Ryan delivers a fresh perspective with every episode. Perfect for anyone looking to elevate their business game and unlock their full potential.Resources:Right About Now NewsletterFree Podcast Monetization CourseJoin The NetworkFollow Us On InstagramSubscribe To Our Youtube ChannelVibe Science Media In this episode of Right About Now, host Ryan Alford sits down with Luke Peters, former CEO of Newair, a leading brand in portable refrigeration. Together, they delve into the intricacies of entrepreneurship, sharing invaluable lessons on achieving business success. Luke recounts his early days of spotting market opportunities through Yahoo search trends back in 2001 and how these insights fueled NewAir's growth into a flourishing enterprise.Listeners will gain practical strategies, including the necessity of maintaining robust profit margins, the art of hiring the right talent, and the power of influencer marketing. Luke also highlights the critical role of differentiation, emotional branding, and ongoing market research in staying competitive. This episode offers a wealth of actionable advice for entrepreneurs looking to carve out a unique space in the business world.TAKEAWAYS Entrepreneurship and business success strategies Identifying and capitalizing on market opportunities Direct-to-consumer (DTC) business models Adapting to market changes and competition Importance of profit margins in business sustainability Effective hiring practices and attracting top talent Creating a clear vision and motivating employees Long-term perspective in business growth Emotional connection and branding in marketing Role of influencer marketing and content strategy in business success If you enjoyed this episode and want to learn more, join Ryan’s newsletter https://ryanalford.com/newsletter/ to get Ferrari level advice daily for FREE. Learn how to build a 7 figure business from your personal brand by signing up for a FREE introduction to personal branding https://ryanalford.com/personalbranding. Learn more by visiting our website at www.ryanisright.comSubscribe to our YouTube channel www.youtube.com/@RightAboutNowwithRyanAlford. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
Chapter 1: What inspired Luke Peters to enter the portable refrigeration business?
At the time, Yahoo showed that there was a lot of searches for portable air conditioners. That's literally how I got into this business. And just from the beginning, we were just cash flowing it. It was super easy to show up and search. I don't even think there were paid ads at that time, 2001. There may have been, but early on, the paid ads were super cheap.
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What's up, guys? Welcome to Right About Now. I hope you're doing great wherever you are, whatever you're listening. We appreciate you for making us number one in business and marketing on Apple Podcasts. Today, talking one of my favorite subjects, entrepreneurship, success building, and hey, I like the little mini fridges, baby. You'll know what that means shortly once we talk with Luke Peters.
What's up, Luke?
And stoked to be here. Thanks for having me. Looking forward to it.
I know. Hey, avid surfer too.
The waves are right here. So yeah, love it.
In Huntington Beach.
It's a great place to surf, I hear. It's beautiful. We've had last month's been really nice. Kind of small right now, but the weather's gorgeous. So, yeah, blessed. Very lucky.
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Chapter 2: How did Newair achieve $600 million in revenue?
And, um, you know, that's kind of what kickstarted the growth is selling into these large retailers.
Yeah, that 2012 rings true because that's right around – I think when all the big boys woke up, that's when Facebook stopped working organically for the most part, 12, 13, somewhere in there. And Google, all the big boys came in. I think they realized where they could get the ad dollars from versus giving the young, scrappy guys that rode the train in. Then they let – they knew, oh, I can sell –
a million dollars a month in that pay-per-click ads to home Depot. Yeah. I remember that year.
And, and the big guys don't care. They'll spend whether they're profitable or not. You know what I mean? So yeah, it's, it's a metric game.
So out of whack, like it's like, they got to hit a certain number, no matter what the expense is kind of like the government, you know, that's true.
That's true. That's a great parallel actually. Yeah. Too big to fail. Up until a few years ago. Then all of a sudden they got wise because they're getting crushed by Amazon and Walmart, so they all had to compete. But yeah, there is that grace period in the middle.
You know, 20 years, I mean, like as a leader of a company and doing the marketing that you did and having the growth that you had, when you reflect on both the success and what you learned, are there like light bulbs that kind of... key points or things that come to mind.
Yeah, for sure. So we ended up selling in 2001. Okay. And for me, you know, personally, that was a big thing, you know, cause it's like, if you sell, you've created something that is proven value and then private equity is coming in and buying. And then I stayed on for a while and then I was, and then I, and then, you know, I've got a great new CEO running it now.
And so I'm able to take time and reflect on it. And, and I would say that there are definitely a couple of things. Like the first one is when you can afford it, like as a business leader, as a business owner, is getting the best people in and getting some skin in the game for the best people. Okay. And then creating a vision and letting them know what that final outcome looks like.
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Chapter 3: What strategies helped Newair stand out in a competitive market?
And they just assume that like, I mean, success will be guaranteed, but it just doesn't happen that way.
Yeah, no, that's why it's important early on. Like, I think it's tough because a lot of times people give up too early. So it is really, really tough to say, you know, if it's not working, you got to tweak this. But I guess you should always be tweaking. But too many people, I would say it's a bigger error is to give up early. So you can't do that.
But it's like at the beginning, you have to be smart and you got to look at your product and, you know, have some way to measure your competitive advantage over what the market is offering. I guess I'd say it like that. Think deeper about your competitive advantage and even use things. I mean, there's all kinds of online tools. You can use SurveyMonkey. You can use your friends.
You could use LinkedIn. There's ways where you can... vet that. But often what happens is as you're growing your business, you kind of naturally do that. You know what I mean? The good leaders are naturally, like you're probably not even thinking about it, but you're learning. You're like, oh, okay, I got the sale here. What copy did I use? Or what pitch was I using?
Oh, okay, this is what they wanted. I thought they wanted this, but they actually wanted this, right? And you're sort of iterating along the way. But if you can do that without making it accidental, like from the beginning, if you could do your basic market research. And this is basic branding, right? So it's like, what is your position in the market? Okay.
And can you create some sort of emotional connection? Now, not every product, a lot of people think, well, like with us, with fridges, how are we going to do that? You know, but you can do it. You can come up with fun ways to create some emotional connection because a brand is a feeling that somebody has about you. That's literally what it is. So
How do you make more people feel a certain way about you, you know? And I think that would be a good one. I think the guys, like, I don't drink a lot, you know, but the company, it's like, you know, we're having all these beer partnerships and stuff like that. And the guys, and every year, though... you can even do this in a company. It's like, I'm really not, I don't drink whiskey.
I'm, you know, I like my IPA a little bit, but I don't drink a lot. Right. But every year we would, I would joke around and at our party, we'd have a shot of Jaeger Meister. Okay. Everybody hated Jaeger Meister.
Okay. I've had flashbacks of you say that like, Oh, Jaeger bomb. That was like, I don't, it just come out when I was in college, like the, you know, mixing Red Bull with Jaeger, like, Oh, good idea. Yeah.
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Chapter 4: What are key lessons on hiring talent from Luke Peters?
Luke, what's the craziest thing you ever saw at your company? Like, tell us a fun, like, or anything crazy, like, or funny, or just out of the box that people would get a kick out of, you know, running a multi-million dollar company. Like, shit happens, right? I mean, so the more funny the better here, Luke.
Well, I'll tell you, I'll tell you. Yeah. I don't know if I can even tell. Okay. Something's happening.
That means those are the ones we want, Luke.
Yeah. You know, when you have two employees at a Christmas party, get friendly with each other. Yeah. Oh, boy. that can make it awkward the next day when we show up for work.
That never happened, right? I mean, how many employees did you have? How many employees do you have?
At that time, we probably had 35. There's probably 35 at the Christmas party.
That is pretty obvious. That's pretty, that's not a big number. I mean, like, yeah, it's sticking out.
Everybody knows everybody at that point and everybody knows what happened that night. And, uh, okay. That, that was one. I can't, another one, uh, another funny one. I can get more into more detail was, uh, You know, I'm in California, right? So this is the land of the stupid lawsuits, okay? It's like, you open a business here, you're going to get sued.
It's like, as soon as you hire an employee, get ready to get a lawsuit, right? So I had this one guy and I always thought he was kind of odd because, you know, he told me, you know, he's talking about his son and his son is going to, his son is going to MIT. And one time I was right next to MIT because we were visiting Wayfair. And I'm like, hey, There's MIT. Let's go visit your son.
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