We made it to Episode 84 of the Behind the Golf Brand Podcast. In this week's episode, I interview my good friend Ryan Duffey the Founder and CEO of Meridian Putters.
At Meridian they don't believe that a custom milled putter should cost you thousands of dollars and they know your game deserves better than your typical machine cast putter off the rack that the big brands mass produce. That’s why at Meridian they have set out to create an elite yet affordable group of milled stainless steel putters emphasizing roll, direction, forgiveness and feel to give you the confidence to hole that putt whether it’s to win a $2 nassau or that club championship you’ve been gunning for. Their putters are designed by engineers with years of industry experience and tested by tournament players so you know you're getting the best product out there. They have three different models with different variations to fit your stroke and even have custom design options for those who want to take it a notch further.
We made it to Episode 84 of the Behind the Golf Brand Podcast. In this week's episode, I interview my good friend Ryan Duffey the Founder and CEO of Meridian Putters.
At Meridian they don't believe that a custom milled putter should cost you thousands of dollars and they know your game deserves better than your typical machine cast putter off the rack that the big brands mass produce. That’s why at Meridian they have set out to create an elite yet affordable group of milled stainless steel putters emphasizing roll, direction, forgiveness and feel to give you the confidence to hole that putt whether it’s to win a $2 nassau or that club championship you’ve been gunning for. Their putters are designed by engineers with years of industry experience and tested by tournament players so you know you're getting the best product out there. They have three different models with different variations to fit your stroke and even have custom design options for those who want to take it a notch further.
Today we play golf.
Speaker 2:Let me show you how we do it in the pros.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Welcome to behind the golf brand podcast. I never missed with the seven nine a conversation with some of the most interesting innovators and entrepreneurs behind the biggest names in golf. My
Speaker 4:Friends were the golf clubs. I lived on the golf course. I lived on the driving range
Speaker 3:From pro talk. You should learn something from each and every single round you play to fun from on and off the green. Why
Speaker 5:Would you play golf? You don't play it for money. Just
Speaker 6:Let me put the ball
Speaker 3:In a hole. This is behind the golf brand podcast with Paul liberatory to
Speaker 6:What's up guys, Paul from golfer's authority. Welcome to the behind the golf brand podcast. This week, I have my friend, Ryan Duffy from Meridian putters. I'm really excited to have him on the show. They're making some sick putters. The detail work is nuts. And so for all you gear heads out there that love, like, not like boring detail, like a line on top, but like face detail. It's fricking crazy what he is doing. So, uh, when I saw that I was like, I gotta have him on the show and I'm really excited to have him here. So welcome to the show,
Speaker 7:Paul. Thanks for having me. I'm excited to be here. This should be a fun time.
Speaker 6:Okay. So where do you live?
Speaker 7:I am just outside of Milwaukee, Wisconsin in a little, little town called Brookfield.
Speaker 6:Which way is that
Speaker 7:From the, um, just on the, uh, west, just on the west side of the town. If you go here in lake Michigan. So<laugh> yeah, so we're uh, we're about 15 minutes outside of downtown Milwaukee on the west side.
Speaker 6:Oh, right, right there. Yeah. How far of a drive is it to Chicago?
Speaker 7:Hour and a half. The big city.
Speaker 6:Yeah. It's a big city dude. Cause you go to the suburbs and crap like that. Yeah. Cause I'm from Chicago and like, okay. Like I know my like, well, my family's from Chicago, but we're like the black sheep. And then we moved out here when I was like, when I was born out here actually. But like, so all my family live in Chicago, like south side though, like Southwest suburbs and south Chicago and stuff. I like Milwaukee cuz I go through a lot of my friends and my fraternity brothers. And it's a fun town.
Speaker 7:It's a great spot during the summer. Um, you know, as you are winter familiar with the winner can get a little long. And if you're,
Speaker 6:If you have like, I love the fall there. Like the fall, the Midwest, like upper Midwest is beautiful. Like, you know, like come October, like, like Halloween, it's just awesome. You know what I mean? Like yeah. Now come it's it blows. But
Speaker 7:Exactly. I mean, you know, we, the falls are great, you know, winter up until Christmas is always kind of fun. And then, you know, January to March is, is a tough, tough stretch. Especially if you're a golfer like me and you wanna, you wanna get out and play. Um, you know, this year we didn't have like much of a spring. It wa it was cold. And then all of a sudden it was like 85 degrees. There wasn't much of a spring. Sometimes that can happen up here in the Midwest.
Speaker 6:Yeah. It's crazy. How, like, it just depends on what the, the weather's gonna be that year. And I just remember like being cold in January, January and February the worst, in my opinion. And then like, cuz February are so tired of it. And then March comes and you get like one day where it's like 30 degrees outside and like everyone's wearing shorts and like washing their cars. Yeah. And I did that. I was like, oh it's well, it's only three degrees outside. Yeah. You know, I think it's snow again. But
Speaker 7:Fake spring, fake spring, and early summer, you, you get, you get a, you get a dose of it and then you go back to reality for like another two or three weeks.
Speaker 6:Like I like most that thing where they say where it's like, you get depressed in the winter. What's that like condition called? There's something like,
Speaker 7:Like seasonal affect disorder.
Speaker 6:Yeah. I thought that was completely B dude. And then I went there and I was like, this sucks, like yeah. Every day gray and windy. And it's like, what the hell? And I came up and I'm from here and it's never gray and it's never well windy every once in a while. But like, it like, it never rains. So, um, anyways, it's, it's a Milwaukee Kaya<laugh> so tell me like, so did you grow up in Milwaukee area?
Speaker 7:Yeah. So I'm from Milwaukee kind of born and raised just outside of Milwaukee. Um, I, you know, was here until I was 17 or 18. I went to college in California, um, where
Speaker 6:I went
Speaker 7:To Santa Clara university, just outside of San Jose. Um, so I spent<laugh> sometimes I asked
Speaker 6:Couldn't afford it. Or you wanted to go back home for your family was one of the two I probably, or a hot chick. A little bit of both. Maybe there third
Speaker 7:One. Yeah, exactly. My wife. Um, no, a little bit of everything. I, I, I wonder in January and February when it's cold and dark here, why I didn't stay out there from time to time. But, um, but no, I did. I did four years out there in Santa Clara. Came back here to Milwaukee. Um, I now have two kids. Um, it's crazy how time flies and things change. Um, I live in a, I live not far from where I work and uh, not life. Life is good, man. It's fun.
Speaker 6:So what did you major in when you were in college
Speaker 7:Finance? I was a finance major. How
Speaker 6:Freaking finance people have had on the show that are not finance people. Like<laugh> a fair
Speaker 7:Number. Yeah. I mean, I, I don't finance people. Like I, I get along with them. I just wasn't wired them.
Speaker 6:I feel a catchall. I feel it's like, yeah, you're in college. Like what are you gonna do? I wanna go into business. Okay. What kind of business? I don't know. I'll go into finance. Right? Whatever that means. Like what's finance, like the guy at the car dealership, you know, like it's financing.
Speaker 7:Well, I don't think
Speaker 6:Into banking. Like everybody know that happens. Like my best friend. Right. He went to finance at U of a. And what does he do? He sells used cars, not like a used car dealership, but like, you know, fleet sales and crap like that. So I think like you become a salesman essentially, right?
Speaker 7:Yeah. I think it's a good catchall. You, you learn, you learn a lot of sort of general business ideas of that. Yeah. Yeah. Like I couldn't handle accounting, so it wasn't quite, you know, there's numbers, but it's not quite accounting numbers. So yeah. It was, you know, it was a safe major that's for sure.
Speaker 6:When I was in college, like all the football players were in management, like we all management, like, and we had a good management school. What was at Purdue. Right. So we had the best management school or one of the best management. What does that even mean? Like drew breezes in management, like management of what? Right. I was doing wanna be a manage or people like, I don't know.
Speaker 7:It's right there with communications. I, I, I,
Speaker 6:Another one dude don't even get me started on communications. Yeah. Okay. Here's my start with communications. I take communication class and like I had this like TA essentially I taught my class and she's from China and she spoke no English. Like I'm telling you like, like we could barely understand her. And she was my communications teacher and I was like this, you gotta be kidding me. Right. Like we don't even know what she's saying. Like, it was crazy. It was just crazy. Like
Speaker 7:She was like, step one. Yeah.
Speaker 6:It's just like, I think it's just the way that like, you know, colleges are like, oh, free teachers. Okay. You guys should be teaching the lowest level. Every class there is, you know, but I loved your class. I mean, I remember doing, I did, I did a report. I had to do a speech on like I did a speech on YouTube, the like the band. I remember that. That was the best one. So it was cool. That
Speaker 7:That's good. That would be a fun,
Speaker 6:I know a big flashback there. I was like
Speaker 7:Sevens. Yeah, no finance was good. I mean, I learned a lot about business. You kind of get the, I don't know the basics, uh, a little bit of everything. And so, you know, obviously I don't do, I'm not in the stock market or doing any of the finance stuff out, you know, on wall street. But you know, I know enough to, to be able to manage a business, which, which was good,
Speaker 6:Which is big. Right. Because it kind of prepared you for the next thing. So you graduate from college and then you go back to Milwaukee, I'm assuming, right? Yeah. Now, are you a golf pro or like what, how are you? Like, how are you a golf?
Speaker 7:No, I, you know, I, I never was a golf pro. Um, I did play a lot of amateur stuff. I did not play in college. Um, but I, I do play competitively and I, I still to this day play competitively. Um, so golf has always been like a big part of my life. I I've played it since I was, I mean, she's seven or eight years old. My, my grandparents introduced me to the game. Um, and then I played a ton of golf growing up with my dad. Um, and you know, like I said, I, I started playing competitively probably around the age of 13 and just loved it. Still love it to this day. Um, I play competitive tournaments throughout the summer, nothing, you know, major like U S G a level stuff, but Wisconsin state golf events. And, um, that's cool, you know, Wisconsin PGA golf events. Yeah. So I've always, you know, love the game and, you know, borderline obsessed with the game. And so, you know, with Meridian, which I know we'll talk about in depth a little bit more later, but it was, it it's definitely a passion project. I, I love working in the golf industry.
Speaker 6:What kind, like, what were you doing like between Meridian now? Like, did you start your own business business?
Speaker 7:Yeah, so I had a firm called engineering resource center and essentially what we did was rapid prototype and small volume production engineering components that we made out of metal, um, and plastic. And so, you know, we, we didn't do 3d printing, but we did like, excuse me, really
Speaker 6:Tight tolerance, like making like prototype stuff, like whatever it was now. Was it just metals or was it plastics? You're saying too.
Speaker 7:So we, we cut metal. Um, and then we also used, you know, we, we would make what are called injection molding tools or, or dyes. And so then we, out of those dyes, we would make plastic parts. So we did a little,
Speaker 6:So you would make the dye and then you'd make the part. Holy crap. Yeah. That's
Speaker 7:Cool. Yep. So we had a full on, you know, manufacturing, you know, facility here and to, to kind of tie it to Meridian or where the idea sort of got started was five or six years ago. Um, I did work with Nike golf and we were working with them on their driver design. And I met some of these engineers. I met some of these design guys and, you know, we were making carbon fiber driver heads and we were prototyping this stuff. And then, I mean, literally one day Nike golf kind of called us and said, Hey, we're going out of business. We're done. That's so weird.
Speaker 6:Cause then there clubs are like the holy grail of clubs, you know, that like some of those old, like there we're so much money. It's not even funny.
Speaker 7:It's CR and yeah. And the guys were all great guys. And, and so that's how I sort of got my first, I, I introduction into the golf club. Yeah. And it was fun. You know, we were making different heads, you know, we, we were doing, you know, the crown and the soul of these drivers and we were tweaking and modifying different designs. And it was, it was a very enjoyable process. And I really found myself like, wow, this, this is great. I love working with these guys. I was hoping, you know, the relationship would sort of blossom. And then, I mean, early one day, they're, they're done.
Speaker 6:It's
Speaker 7:So weird. So yeah. I, you know, I never knew the whole story behind that. Um, but
Speaker 6:Yeah, there's probably numbers game. Like Nike just wants to focus on stuff that like,
Speaker 7:Yeah.
Speaker 6:Like, well, we're probably losing money on that, whatever I try, you know, I'm sure finance major probably like made that decision, you know, but he is public really high now.
Speaker 7:Yeah. Maybe an accountant. I don't know. Yeah.
Speaker 6:Account. Yeah. He passed accounting.
Speaker 7:Yeah. The numbers don't add up when they're red. It's no good. Um, he's like<laugh> so it was, it was great to work with those guys. And I, in the back of my mind, I always was thinking it would be fun to, to do something like this. Um, but I never really knew how, what I was doing was going to, you know, work in the golf industry or what I was doing was gonna work in the golf industry. So, you know, for the last, you know, three or four years, we just got back to making prototype parts. Um, we did a lot of stuff for like the plumbing industry and the engine industry and, and sort of these tight tolerance, um, plastic components and metal components for sort of big industry. Um, and then a couple years ago COVID hit. And, you know, a lot of our work with OEMs was sort of put on pause cuz nobody really, nobody
Speaker 6:Knew it was gonna happen. Right, right.
Speaker 7:It was. And so research and development hit pause. A lot of the engineers, we were working with a lot of the purchasing people we were working with. They weren't even going into work anymore. And so we were kind of sitting in our shop with time, you know, we had nothing really to make, we were just kind of in a holding pattern. And so it was at that time where I sort of thought, okay, I've got steel, I've got machines. Um, and I have available capacity. What, what can I do? What can I make? What can I use this time for? And in the back of my mind, it was like, what about machining, putters? You know, what about seeing, if you can make a putter that you know, was high edge, I've got the steel in the shop, I've got the machines to do it. What about trying that<laugh>? So I literally designed a putter, like on a piece of paper, just kind of sketched one out, gave it to my designer here. And I said, Hey, let's, let's make this. And so we, you know, cut our first steel putter and it just, it looked awful. Like it was just, it didn't come out the correct way. The radius was off. Everything about the design was, you know, it was not uniform it, there was just so much wrong with it. And I was like, man, I need, I need to talk to an engineer. I need to talk to somebody who knows what they're looking at. You know, who understands the club head, who understands how it needs to relate to the shaft, the angles, all this stuff. Like I need, need to talk to somebody who can help me design. Who's got some expertise and all of a sudden, I, I kind of remembered the guys from Nike. You know, I remember like, Hey, what about these guys who you used to work with? And, and so I reached out to a couple of these old contacts and said, um,
Speaker 6:Where are they at now?
Speaker 7:One of'em I believe is working for Google. Um, and the other was contracting like doing freelance, uh, industrial design work. Wow. But still loved golf and, and, and still maintained relationships in the golf world. And even still design random clubs intermittently. And so I connected with him and I said, his name is Josh Boggs. I said, say, Hey, Josh, I would love to work with you on designing some clubs. I've got this idea for sort of a family. Can you help me? And, and he was like, yeah, I'd love to get into that. I'd love to help you out. Let's see what you got. And so he was able to take sort of my rudimentary, like here's what I'm thinking. And he was able to make it work, um, in terms of design. And he said, okay, here's, here's what we gotta do in terms of, you know, where, where your Hazel enters the club head, here's what we gotta do in terms of the waiting. Here's what we gotta do in terms of the
Speaker 6:S like all the craft you'd even know, right? Like I'm gonna make a putter and then you like threw it and then you made it outta metal. Cause you could physically make it, but like all the math behind it. Right. And all the little and nuances, as
Speaker 7:I've learned, there is so much that goes into designing a club, like so much more than I had ever considered. Whereas the weight where's the center of gravity. When you come into the Hale from this angle, when you come into the Hale from that angle, how does it impact the stroke? And so there's just so much more science behind it than, Hey, can you make what I drew on a napkin? And so, you know, we were able to start kind of machining these putters during COVID when everything was really, really slow.
Speaker 6:And, but you were making money on'em yet, though. Right. You were just making putter like you like, well, you're trying to keep everybody busy. Right, right. I'm assuming. Yeah. And like, not with people and like keep things going on. That
Speaker 7:Was my biggest fear. I mean, that was my biggest fear
Speaker 6:Because how long did it take you to build a team, right. That like you trust does a great job. And the last thing you wanna do during hard times that are like completely unprecedented is so sort of losing people, you spent 10 years trying to build, you know, you're gonna get back. Yeah. I totally get it.
Speaker 7:And we had, so we had that really, you know, scary 12 or 16 weeks where we didn't, I mean, it, it, it seems so long ago now, but it was just a couple years ago where we weren't sure what the future, what the future looked like for anything.
Speaker 6:And
Speaker 7:So, right, right. I mean, there was so much uncertainty. So we, this in my mind was okay, this is a path to a revenue stream that we can control. If we make good putters, if we make good product, if we market it effectively, maybe this thing could work. And it, you know, it could generate some revenue while we recover the other side of the business recovers from this slowdown or, or whatever it was gonna end up being. And so we, we just sort of dabbled with it. We, we started putting a little more time into it. We started prototyping these different putters.
Speaker 6:So when, when did this start? Like in February when COVID March, April or what?
Speaker 7:So we, we probably started, I mean, COVID, I guess hit, you know, in February or March, we probably started this project late in the summer. Maybe like July-ish timeframe a couple months into it when it was pretty clear that business was gonna be slow for a little bit.
Speaker 6:Yeah. We knew like, yeah, let's figure
Speaker 7:It. Wasn't just,
Speaker 6:Wasn't like back on you, would've never done this probably right. Like ever in a million years had that not happened. Right. You would've been just been like designing work, making money, running a business, and then you're like, yeah, you probably never have done it. Like,
Speaker 7:No, never, never in a million years, it, it opened up hours and capacity we didn't have before. And so, um, we, we messed with it for, you know, probably six or seven months just making different models and, and, and, you know, some of'em were terrible.
Speaker 6:You were probably like so excited too, when you're making'em cuz you're like want it's like, all you thought about probably was like, oh, I gotta do this. Like I do that. And like
Speaker 7:It becomes, yeah, it becomes a borderline obsession. And so it was last winter on one of the dark days, right. In like Brookfield, Wisconsin when it was like February and it was five o'clock and it was dark. And I was, I was thinking about, all right, do I wanna like take the next step with this? You know, I've, I've got these putters that I've machined. I, I see them, they look good. Do I want to do I want to take the next step and invest in this and, and turn it into a business. And I decided, yeah, like I want to go for it
Speaker 6:Now, did you already have like your prototype, like you felt comfortable enough to bring that to market? Or did you have multiple ones or what?
Speaker 7:So we had four different putters that we sort of settled on. Um, and I felt, I mean, listen, I never feel comfortable bringing something to the market. I have no idea how the market is going to
Speaker 6:Oh yeah, yeah. Who knows
Speaker 7:React, but I was like, I like it. You know? And, and, and I'm a good player I had given it to some other people and the, the feedback had been, Hey, these are, these are really good. Um, so I was optimistic about it, but no, I was, I was super nervous and yeah, I wasn't sure how people were gonna respond to it. So, um, but I was confident, you know, I, we, I had a good, you know, support team. I knew the putters were machined very well. We have state of the art machinery, we got great designers. So I knew we were making a good product. Um, and I knew the design was good. Our designer had a ton of experience in, in golf club manufacturing. So I, I was confident in the design. Um, then it just became a function of all right, well, how do we take these putters and, and create a business? And, um, so last hard part March. Yeah. Right. And, and so last March was the time where I said, okay, sort of mentally. I was like, I'm invested, let's go. And I reached out to some people who could help me, you know, a obviously form the business, create the business. And then Richie, uh, the man who is behind the website, uh, he came on board. I think we spent last summer building the website, kind of creating, you know, the, the, the stock we needed to get the putters, like up and running. We made some custom putters for some people last summer. And, uh, yeah, September, first of last year we launched the website and the response was, was awesome. I had never, in a million years thought people would be as
Speaker 6:Excited about, oh, like when you launched, okay. I mean, this is the scary part for any business. Right? Like you, you feel like you have a good product to sell, but like when you came out of the gate, like how did you do that? Right. Was it like, like how, how did you market your product I guess, and, and make yourself known? So
Speaker 7:There were, there were a lot of people in Wisconsin who sort of knew what we were doing. Uh, we had been in touch with the Wisconsin state golf association. We had done some social media. So there were people who, who were aware of what we were doing. And so we with Thery cup coming up, um, at the end of September, we, we placed sort of an advertisement in the Wisconsin state golf association emails and in, in their publications, kind of introducing ourselves. Um, and then on social media, we started posting, you know, on our Instagram and Facebook accounts, introducing ourselves. And so that was that September timeframe where a lot of people in Wisconsin were very interested in golf. That's when we started raising our hand and saying, Hey, you know, we're
Speaker 6:A putter. Yeah. And you're saying, Hey, we're local. Like, we're we, are you guys, right? Like, we're not
Speaker 7:We're. And the response was, the response was great locally. The response was very strong. I mean, like I said, people had kinda heard about what we were doing had, you know, through the grapevine had seen some of our stuff or had maybe even used a putter over the summer, but we just, it, it just sort of, I, I don't know. I, it, it started to snowball a little bit in September. We, we started posting some stuff. We did a rider cup giveaway where we had some custom head covers and, uh, you know, some custom putters that were team Europe and team USA and all of a sudden like, Hey, we got an order from like Ohio, you know, that's pretty cool. And then, oh man, we got an order from Texas. That's great. You know, oh, a guy in North Carolina ordered three. And it was, it was pretty fun because all of a sudden, like it had a little bit of traction and you know, the first time you put it in a box and you ship it, there's sort of this feeling of like, okay, you know, let's see what happens, you know, nine times out of 10, you don't hear anything. Right. The putter goes and it's, it's gone. But then every once in a while you get an email saying, Hey dude, this thing's great. You know, just wanna let you know. I love it. Yeah. I mean, you don't get many of them, but, uh, you know, you'll get a, you'll get a positive response where somebody will say, dude, this thing, this thing's great. And it's a great price. Um, you know, thank you so much. And it just, it kind of validates all the work you've been doing where you're like, okay, yeah, this is a good product. I'm excited about it. Last fall was fun because in September and October we saw like, Hey,
Speaker 6:And it's the end of golf season too. Right. So it's not like we're gonna, you know, you get all this momentum and then it's like the end of golf season, essentially. Yeah. So it's like, what? So that actually give you a lot of confidence too, I would think. Right. Because you're like getting sales in November and yeah. That's
Speaker 7:A finance major, right? Like a guy, you know, like, Hey, let's, let's launch a punter company right. At the end of golf season. It wasn't, maybe it wasn't the timing. Wasn't perfect. But, uh, you know, we, we wanted to be available as soon as we had the product of it. Yeah. Like, Hey, let's launch this thing right. As we go into the dead of winter up here,
Speaker 6:Let's do it. Yeah. Let's do that. Come on
Speaker 7:Guys. Um, so it was, it was great. And then, you know, we did last fall, we did, uh, you know, a black Friday sale. Right. So we offered this discount. Well, you know, it was fantastic until we realized, like now we gotta make all the putters we sold. Um, and so we, we definitely got up crap out of our skis. Yeah. Like my phone at that time, like would ping every time we would get a sale, just so I would make sure
Speaker 6:You excited, but then you get anxiety. I bet. You're like, oh crap.
Speaker 7:Oh crap. Oh yeah. People are ordering butters at like three 30 in the morning, four 30 in the morning. And my phone is vibrating on the nightstand. And I'm like, this is so awesome. And then after like Saturday, I was like, how are we gonna do this?<laugh>. And, uh, and so it was,
Speaker 6:And what's your lead time then too? Like we, were you gonna make'em they were even amazed, right?
Speaker 7:Yes. Right. So our lead time was four weeks, which should have been fine. You know, we wanted you to have your putter by Christmas. That was our objective. Um, and we were able to hit it. Um, but we were,
Speaker 6:You probably worked all the time.
Speaker 7:Yeah. We
Speaker 6:Were working seven days a week. Your team probably was in there as, yeah. Over time. I mean, but that's awesome though, because you get it out in the market. Right. That's the key it's like, well, there's the, the upside as you made money. Right. Some whatever that is, it's still a deal goes black Friday. Yep. Right. So you gotta work your off, but now you have X amount of putters now out in the world being used by, by Christmas morning, you're like, well, we did it. Right. And now it's like, in my mind, okay. I always look at this as like golf season, like golf season started yesterday. Right. Like technically in my mind, right. Like may is the worst month for golf. You think it's a good month. April's always great. Cuz masters get huge spike. Right. And it's interest golf. Yeah. Spring is here. Right. And then may kind like goes down cause weather's still kind of weird. And like, course there's done open. And then June, it's like June, July, August a little bit into September. And then it starts going down again. But it doesn't go down like bottom of the floor, like essentially the bottom of the floor is literally Christmas morning, just letting you know, by traffic wise, like bottom of, and then after that, guess what? Slow starts coming back up slowly,
Speaker 7:Creeping back up. Yeah.
Speaker 6:And then by April you get a spike and then back down and then up.
Speaker 7:Yeah. It, it was great. You know, initially it was very exciting. And then we, that was when we first started learning about quote unquote supply chain. Right. That was the first experience we had with supply chain issues is, you know, we were ordering, you know, 25 or 50 shafts at a time. We were getting grips in by bulk orders of 25 or 50. And then we just got swamped at Christmas and we started making orders, you know, larger orders. And our suppliers were calling me going, uh, we can't, we can't get you that, you know, um, I know you placed that order. I know we confirmed it, but we don't have those shafts. What about these shafts? Or we don't have those grips. What about these grips? And that was, that was when we first got into the world of man, the Gulf manufacturing supply chain right now is in a tough spot. It still, it still is. Oh yeah. It's very hard to get, uh, product delivered on time. Um, and I don't, I, I just think it's still sort of a ripple effect of, you know, the slowdown we had a couple years ago and, and companies starting,
Speaker 6:We were talking to about this. So I was saying something similar. And they're saying that like, let's say there's only so much material out there, material not like finished product. And so the, the supplier can't say, oh, Hey Ryan, here's all the material. Even though if they could fill your order, they have to like balance that order across everybody, how much, much material they have to balance it across. But then the bigger boys have more like whatever. And so it's like, you just get what's left. It's it's, it's called. They try to balance it. Cause they don't lose buyers essentially. But like it's still not gonna fulfill the order. Right. Is that right or wrong? I mean, so I was kinda explain it's
Speaker 7:Called allocation. And when I place orders with certain suppliers, the response I get is your only allocated X amount of product per month. And so
Speaker 6:Is that what it is per month?
Speaker 7:Per month? Yeah, so like, like on January 1st I can, you know, I'll get another shipment of stuff, but I won't get more until July 1st or August 1st and sometimes randomly, you know, we'll get, Hey, I'll get a phone call. Hey, good news. We were able to get some more shafts they're on their way to your facility. And you're like, oh, fantastic. Uh, and then other months, like, you know, the first of the month will come by and the ups truck will go by and won't deliver anything. And you're like, oh man, like when is, you know, when are the grips coming? When are the shafts coming? And so, um, that has been like a steep learning curve. We are doing our best to manage it, but it's, it's hard when, you know, there's, there's these elements that are out of control. Um, and so, you know, as we went through the winter, we started to learn about, okay, the product has a little bit of traction. People are liking the putters. Um, we need to start to get more inventory. We need to start to build up, you know, a little bit of a bank of stuff. We gotta be able to accommodate a surge in orders, knowing that the supply chain is tight. Um, there was a lot of that going on and at the same time we were still trying to run our other business, right. The engineering resource center, which I had done for, um, you know, six or seven years. And so, um, you know, in March of this year we made the decision to get out of the injection molding side and to get out the pro. Yeah. So we're, we're no longer making plastic because we're focusing on the putters. Oh. I've just that's. Yeah. So we are, we are focusing on Meridian. Um, you know, I sort of took the plunge and uh,
Speaker 6:That's a big plunge.
Speaker 7:Oh yeah. Yeah. And it's been, it's been exciting, scary nerve wracking, um, fulfilling, you get the whole range of emotions when you decide to, uh, you know, leave something that's relatively stable. Yeah. And you're like, Hey, I'm gonna be a putter guy. So, uh, but yeah. So now, um, we're, we're actually in a, but
Speaker 6:Life's short man, right? Like do like how long if you're not happy, unless you're, unless you're not happy or not, but right. But like, if you know that, like when you get older 10 years from now, you're, I mean, I just should have done it. Right. Like you look back and you're like, yeah. It's, you know, it's like, that's what it is because a thousand things can happen in the next 10 years or 20 years or whatever. But it's like, at the end of the day, are you gonna regret not doing it because of what year? Yeah. I mean, I don't know, or money. I mean, I'm saying like generally
Speaker 7:Well that's, you know, and that's kind of, you know, I was telling you about how it was like last February. Uh, I kind of made the decision, you know, you, you know, at some point, like if you want to make this work the way you think you can make it work, then you, you gotta go at it with a hundred percent, you know, you, you, can't kind of halfass it. Right. Because it's never gonna take off. And, and so you've gotta, you
Speaker 6:Can't be able to do it. What I tell people is like, you hit a ceiling, right. There's a ceiling there it's called time. Right. Yeah. And like, you can't, you can't bust through that ceiling cuz you only have so much time to devote to it because you have to do whatever this is over here. Right? Yeah. And so what happens is like whatever dreams you have or take it to another level or whatever it might be like, you'll never get there because you only have so much time, like you're gonna be, you're gonna be making the same putters and fulfilling orders now forever. Cause that's thinking of a lot of time. Yeah. And then it's like, well what about this other cool stuff we wanted to do? Well, I can't, I don't time for that. Right. Like I gotta do this other thing, my main job, which is X,
Speaker 7:Whatever. Right.
Speaker 6:And so I know, I know it's fricking scary as hell.
Speaker 7:Yeah. And it's also exciting, you know? And, and what, what I kind of really leaned into was, you know, this is, I, I I'm enjoying this process. I, I, I liked the old, you know, work. Um, when you did something, well, there was always a sense of fulfillment and you were proud of what you were able to provide. Um, you know, and if the dollars and cents were good, you know, you, you felt okay about it. It, but this, this world is, is really, you know, it, it challenges me. It, it, it forces me to think differently than I did in, you know, the old world. Um, and it's golf, you know? And I, I love, I love being involved in the golf world and it, it just provides a sense of fulfillment that I didn't have, you know, previously. And so I enjoy, you know, the longer hours or I enjoy trying to think about the next model. I enjoy the process. Um, and for me, that's
Speaker 6:You enjoy the creativity. Like you enjoy like all of it, right? Like it's joy, it's pure joy because it's almost like doing what you want to do. Right. Not like gonna have to do it
Speaker 7:And the dollars and cents, you know, from a business side of it, you, you know, people look at me like, I'm crazy. Like, ah, you're making butters, you know? And it's like, you know, like didn't, she used make big stuff, you know? Like, and I, I get, that's
Speaker 6:So annoying.
Speaker 7:Yeah. The accounts annoying, the accounts and the bankers, they look at me like, what are you doing? You're making butters. And it's like, in my mind, I'm like, this is gonna work. You know, I, I, I believe this is gonna work. And, and I'm excited about this and, and, you know, sort of just wait,
Speaker 6:Well, lemme, so is your team excited by it? Like, do they enjoy it? And like, oh, hell yeah, it's fun. Hell, I'm assuming they probably are. Right. Like
Speaker 7:At, at first they were a little skeptical, you know, they were like, what are we doing? We're making butters. And I said, yeah, we're making butters. Um, but now they're into it, you know? And luckily they play golf. Um, and so they see these, they see these products coming off the machines and they're like, man, these are, you know, these are good. And, um, yeah, so they're, they're very excited. And my David and John have been with me since the start and, and those two guys are the primary. I mean, there's been a couple others along the way, but those two guys, um, you know, they've been involved with the golf since the start and man, you know, without them, you know, I, I don't know how to run the machine. Right.<laugh> like, I, I, I see'em
Speaker 6:Are they, are they machinists?
Speaker 7:Yeah. I mean, they know, I mean, they're designers, Machin. Like they, they know how to make those things sing and how to make the product and, and, uh, you know, those guys
Speaker 6:That's for itself, dude.
Speaker 7:Oh yeah. I, I can't even pretend to understand what they're doing when they're out at those machines, but, um, but it's, you know, those guys have been pumping out putters and what's really exciting for us is we're going through a bit of a, a transition right now. We're actually gonna be moving to a new location in Brookfield, uh, on September 1st. Really? Yeah. And so it's gonna be a, it's gonna be kind of a state of the art facility. We're gonna have, um, you know, a putting green in there where people can test out the putters, if they want to come to the shop and check it out.
Speaker 6:Cause you're like going balls in man, like you are, that's unbelievable. Like, it's not like, oh yeah, I just quit doing this X thing. You're more like, look, dude, I am, we are making this real, like, we're making it a facility, we're doing a putting green. We're gonna like, it's not like, oh, we're a machine shop. And now we're making putters cool. You know, know, instead of doing like injection molding, you're like, no, we're gonna be the real thing.
Speaker 7:It's we're we, we wanna, you know, if we're gonna do this, we want to do it. Right. And, and right now we're kind of in this big warehouse, this, this 15,000 square foot warehouse, which is just, I mean, it's got racking for, you know, the old plastic stuff. It's got all this,
Speaker 6:You don't need all that anymore. Right. It's
Speaker 7:So you don't need it all. Yep.
Speaker 6:Is the facility gonna be smaller
Speaker 7:Building? Yeah. So instead it's gonna be 9,000 square feet instead of 15. So it's gonna be a little smaller. Yeah. It's about two thirds. The size of where we are right now, it's
Speaker 6:Cheaper. Right? Cause you, you real estate, you're not even using essentially
Speaker 7:That's right. We're no longer, you know, we don't need to store all the finished inventory of plastic parts, all the raw material, the resin that we used to have to worry about. We don't need all that stuff. So literally, you know, we're gonna have seven or eight dedicated machines just pumping out putters in this new facility. Um, and then we're gonna have robotics in between the machines that are gonna run. Um, you know, the machines essentially lights out. Right. They'll be able to run overnight. They'll be able to run over the weekend and we're just gonna be able to stock cutters. Yeah. It's gonna be, it's gonna be exciting. Um, and
Speaker 6:So United States,
Speaker 7:Oh yeah, yep. Right here in Wisconsin.
Speaker 6:Um, I mean like serious has a big deal and I bet you, like, when it comes to the custom, now you can be like, okay, here's our stock. And then you can be like, okay, now we're gonna spend time making some custom stuff. That's gonna look badass.
Speaker 7:And that, and that's been the challenge, you know, as we, as this thing took off and more and more people started ordering, you know, our, our issue was, Hey, we would get in a corporate order here or like a, a, you know, kind of a bulk order there. And then a guy would want a custom putter. And so in the middle of running, you know, 30 or 40 putters for customer a we'd have another guy come in and say, Hey, can I do this real custom job? And the problem was, it was like, well, we can get to that. But after, after this, you know, and, and so the new facility and the new machines that will be online in September and October, that's gonna let us really focus on, okay. We can get the bulk stuff done over here.
Speaker 6:Yeah. Cause it's like bread and butter. Right. Like the bread and butter is like, if you can, if you can, uh, make it. So it runs itself essentially. Yeah. Right. Like automated it's automated. Yeah. Then it's like, okay, now my machinists and the guys that wanna do design work have time to do the custom stuff. And this is just like machine popping out the product. Right. I mean,
Speaker 7:Yeah. That that's, that's, that's exactly. No, that's
Speaker 6:It's time. It's right back to the time thing. Right. Cause when you have the time to spend on making cool and not like pumping out the same bread and butter thing, which nothing wrong with that, it's just the time. Right. Like find the time to do it.
Speaker 7:The, the ability to automate this process a little bit is, is going to really open a lot of doors for us. And, and the real cool thing about it is, you know, what, what I want Meridian to do, you know, when Meridian grows up, I, I want to be able to, to offer a very high quality product. I want to be able to offer it obviously made in the United States. Um, and then I want, I want people to be able to put their spin on it, right? Like, you know, you don't have to go to a big box store and just choose one from a bag of a hundred or, you know, a wall full of 40. Like, Hey, if you want, you know, your initials on it, if you want to say something silly on it, if you want your company's logo on it, whatever, we can do that for you. And guess what, we can do that all for a price that, you know, isn't the equivalent of a mortgage payment, right? Sometimes for some of this custom stuff, you gotta pay so much money. It it's, you know, it's like a, a gut punch, right. And, and we can do it because of the way we are set up. We can do it at a reasonable price. Right. You get a very high quality product we're made right here in the United States and, and it's not gonna break the bank. And, and that's, that's what my objective is. I don't pretend to be able to make a putter as good as Scotty cam or a putter as good as Tyson lamb or some of those big ones out there. But I can make you a very, very high quality putter that you can use with confidence that can maybe be a little bit of a reflection of yourself in terms of the customization. And guess what, you know, it's not gonna be over a thousand dollars, you know, it, it's gonna be a reasonable price. And, and that's, that's what I'm trying to do with Meridian.
Speaker 6:So when are you moving that new facility?
Speaker 7:Well, so we'll be transitioning from this facility to the new one on September 1st. It'll probably be like a three or a four week period as we move the machines down the road and we, uh, reconfigure the new spot, but, um, we will be moving in on September 1st.
Speaker 6:Wow.
Speaker 7:Yeah. So keep an eye on like social media. I'm sure we'll be taking lots of pictures and, uh, it, it's gonna be really neat when it's done. There will be, you know, one of the things that people have asked, especially locally is like, can I come out and see it? Can I come out and like put, and right now we're in a big industrial building where like, literally it's not safe. You can't come out to where, you know, you gotta put a hard, you know, like gotta wear safety goggles, gotta go through all the stuff. Um, this new facility will like literally have a spot where you can see what we've made. You can test it out, you can hit punts on it are on the green. Um, and then you can actually look out into the plan, see where your putters are manufactured. So, um, it's gonna be a pretty exciting spot for people who are local. That's, that's one of the things that, you know, we need to address as a company is with the custom putters and the fact that we're not in like pro shops, um, yet, you know, yet, um, people, you know, want to test them out before they buy'em. And so this, you know, if you're local to Wisconsin, we'll give you the opportunity to test it. And that'll sort of check that box before we can get, you know, into a pro shop near you.
Speaker 6:So what's your plan then with, so like right now you're direct to consumer. Yep. I'm assuming. Yeah. Are you in pro shops or no.
Speaker 7:So, no, we're not in any pro shops. Um, direct to consumer a hundred percent right now. Um, we do mill some putters that are for, um, second swing golf, which is located in Arizona's. Cool. I believe it Scottsdale. Yeah. So, um, but besides
Speaker 6:They got a brand new facility, dude, it is sick.
Speaker 7:Yeah. So you can find,
Speaker 6:Yeah, it's find putters. It's the clueless place. You can find like some super high end putters in there too, like thousands and thousands of dollars, like rare putters, like behind the glass case, it's pretty sick.
Speaker 7:Like, yeah. So our putters are somewhere near those<laugh> um, they, if you look on the bottom, they say merge,
Speaker 6:How'd you get in contact with them.
Speaker 7:Uh, they reached out, they found us on social and, um, they reached out to us and, and asked if, if we would be interested in being a part of their, um, you know, sort of custom display, uh, for putters. And, and we said, yeah, absolutely. Um, and, uh, yeah, we were, we've done several orders for them now. Um, they seem like a great group to work with. And, and I guess, so technically, I guess we are in, I think they have five or six locations, so we are in those stores. But besides that, um, you know, everything that is made is done direct to consumer and we do have, um, a 30 day like return policy, no questions asked. So, you know, my, my thought is, and when people talk to me about it is, Hey, take it out, play with it for a round or two. Um, you know, as long as you don't smash it against the cart path, uh, you can return it to us. Uh, if you don't like it and, and, you know, we can, uh, gladly refund your money and, and, you know, we'll, we'll sell it to somebody else. Um, so we do try and give guys, you know, the opportunity or customers, the opportunity to, um, you know, to play with it, to mess around with it. Um, and if they don't like it, they can, they can send it back.
Speaker 6:See, I've always loved putter guys, man. Like I have, like, I've worked with like, for real, some of the, my favorite people I work with have been the putter guys. I don't know why there's a different breed and I'm being honest. Like I work with lab putters. Cool guys, right. Lab is cool as hell. That's Seymour like Seymour, my, like, I love them honestly, because they're such good people. When I started my podcast, I knew nothing. Right. First my podcast story. Yeah. I was at PGA show and I was like, it was like two in the morning. It was with one, one of my guys were on my team and we're in bed laying, you know, we're talking, we got back. Right. And I was like, Hey man, I got a really good idea. I actually have a podcast. Like, that's literally how whole thing started. Cause I know so many people I've talked to many people. I'm like, it'd be cool. People heard these stories. So then the next day at the PGA show, we were in the putting area, like the big putting area. Yep. And I know, and I saw the guys from Seymour, I've worked with them for like two years at this point. And I went and talked to them like, and I was like, Hey, I have the idea for a podcast, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And they're like, oh, we do a podcast. And I was like, seriously, they're like, oh yeah, we've doing it for the last like year and a half. It's I can, I can what it's called. So like, but we can help you. Like, we'll tell you what you should buy and how to do it and where to get. I was like, that's great grill. Yeah. And that's literally how I started my podcast. So like putter guys are just nice dudes figuring out cool stuff. And it's like, I don't know. And there's so much like customization you can do with the putter. It's, it's a, it's like, you can't do it with an iron. I mean, know people can stamp and they can do laser etching on wedges, but like that's kind of far full fur for the few and far between. Right? Like, so I think,
Speaker 7:And putter in the world
Speaker 6:Is really fun.
Speaker 7:Yeah. It, it, it's, it's a, you know, it's something that, you know, putters, you can have like a love, hate relationship with a certain putter you have, right. I'm gonna use it today. And then I didn and go, so, and use my other one, you know, and you go back and forth on it. But in general, like a, putter's something that you're gonna have for a long time. And, and what, you know, what we like to, you know, say, you can, you can customize, you can put your name, you know, some people have their own logos, believe it or not. Some people like, you know, we've done some camouflage putters on the back because guys, you know, veterans who wanna like, you know, shut, oh yeah, we've done all sorts of stuff. Um, you know, we've done dates, you know, engagement dates. We did a putter for a wedding once. Um, okay. So we've done all sorts of cool things like that. And you know, with, with, with us, you know, we can, we can kind of give you exactly what you're looking for. If you want, you know, a little more loft, a little less loft, if you want it to be upright or a little flatter, we can work with you on that and get something that's truly, you know, made to your swing. And, and, um, I'd agree with you, the putter world, as I've gotten to know more people and, and you know, I've gotten more communication and started to, you know, meet some more guys. Um, it's, it's very supportive, you know, there's always sort of this like,
Speaker 6:Yeah, there's not like a competition there, like, oh, it's like, I wasn't sure. And all those smaller to mid-size brands, you guys are like, the way I look at it is we are all allies, right? Like, yeah. You're not a Scotty, Cameron. You're not like these big boys. Right. Like, so it's like, let's just make cool putters and see what happens. And I don't know. I think that's, that's just cool about,
Speaker 7:That's just plenty of putters to go around. And, and what was, I was a little, I wasn't sure. I went to the PGA show this year and I was introducing myself to some people and I was kind of getting the lay of the land and everybody was like, let me know how I can help, you know, like, I'd love to be a part of it. You know, let me know if, if you need, if you have questions asked, you know, don't, don't feel stupid. Like, and it was really cool. Like I was, I was very excited after leaving that PGA show, I was like, Hey, this is, this is a cool
Speaker 6:Industry. It's people, it's like real people. Yeah. It's not like this mega behemoth company. That's like, oh, well, yeah, sorry, I'm just, you know, one,
Speaker 7:Well, you put a face with a name, right? Like, you know, so often, especially, you know, the last couple years with, with being limited on travel and stuff like you, you're emailing, you know, uh, contact us page or you're trying to get more information. And when you actually meet the guy behind the screen, you're like develop a relationship with him and say, Hey, this is what I'm doing. Can you help? Or do you know, how do I procure this? Or what's the best way to do that? They'll
Speaker 6:Tell you, um,
Speaker 7:They tell you, yeah. And then they're like, oh yeah. And here's my card and call me if you ever got any questions. And it's, it's very reassuring. And, and
Speaker 6:Was that your first PGA show?
Speaker 7:I had been to one like three years ago. Um, just when I was thinking about like the putter business, but this was the first time I went and really went down with a purpose and like introduced myself, obviously, you know, uh, talked to some suppliers, talked to some manufacturers and, and, you know, like established some relationships. But I, I hadn't been to one previous and, and you know, this year's show was a little, I guess, you know, with not as big stuff, it wasn't as big. Um, the big,
Speaker 6:I've heard both sides of it. Like I was gonna go, but then I got COVID, but I'm glad I didn't go. Cause I was afraid I was gonna get COVID so
Speaker 7:Yeah. But
Speaker 6:My friends told me that they liked it in some ways, because the big boys weren't there so that it wasn't like dominated by whatever they were doing.
Speaker 7:Oh yeah. I mean, you know,
Speaker 6:More like you could talk more people. I don't know. I mean, that thing is the thing is massive dude. Like I tell people's a square mile under, under whatever steel essentially. It's like, yeah, no, it's like you don't there's no way, you can see everything it's impossible. It's like it's impossible.
Speaker 7:Um, it was, it was definitely different without the big anchor displays. Uh, you know, I, I don't know that any of the OEMs or, or any of the big boys were there, um, they didn't, but it was, it was great for me because I was able to, you know, talk to, you know, shaft suppliers or head cover guys or different, you know, and who
Speaker 6:Weren't too busy. Yeah. We, weren't busy with talking to their big people and like, oh yeah. My one friend said that like, well, he didn't go either. And he told me that, like, they sent a small contingent of people and like they said, it was awesome because since the big boys weren't there, they still had to like the TV, like off channel, everybody still had to fill their content. Right. So then they started like going to other brands and like showcasing them more and giving'em a little bit more exposure than they would've ever done before. And it's all free marketing essentially. Yeah. You know? And so I was like, oh, it's cool. You know, like,
Speaker 7:Yeah. It's, it's obviously, you know, it's sort of the business. I, I mean, it's the hub of the PGA world for a week there in Orlando. And it, it, it was, it was great to go there for, for me just to, you know, meet some of the people who, you know, I'm talking to, especially now, if there's a supply chain issue, I can make a phone call and just kind of get an update and it know
Speaker 6:The truth.
Speaker 7:Yeah. I
Speaker 6:Hundred number and being like, I don't know, I don't have a person. I know that knows what's really going on.
Speaker 7:Yeah. Yep. And you know how valuable that is, you know, just to get like, Hey, you know, I was supposed to get X delivered on Monday, when's it actually gonna show up, you know, and oh, you know, that that's coming next week. Like the it's just good to like, have a voice on the other end of the phone that, you know, and that you trust and that, you know, gives you accurate information. So yeah, the PGA show was, it was fun this year to be, you know, a legitimate vendor, you know, to, we didn't have a booth, we just walked, but you know, it was, it was great to introduce ourselves.
Speaker 6:You don't need a booth dude. I mean, honestly, like I've heard both sides, you know, I've heard that, like, if you have a booth, like it's great for like, you know, whatever your reasons are. But like, if you're able to just walk around and talk to people, like, it's almost like a lot of people would just complain and say, oh, I gotta stay at the booth today, you know? Yeah. But they really wanna go, like they wanna go talk to people and they can't because they're stuck at a booth that they feel like they have to be obligated and they spend$10,000 on that. Like, you know, there's pros and cons, I guess you gotta be, you gotta bring at least two people essentially. Yeah.
Speaker 7:No, for sure. More
Speaker 6:For sure, but still expensive. How so?
Speaker 7:No. So that was, you know, that was fun in January to go kind of see the golf world from that side. Um, and you know, we, like I said, we developed some great relationships there that we've used, especially now as we've kind of gotten into more orders and the orders have kicked in and, you know, we're getting into bigger quantities, um, to be able to make phone calls and the, you know, kind of manage the supply chain has been important. Yep.
Speaker 6:So what now, right now with Meridian, how many you have three designs? Is that right? I can't, there's
Speaker 7:Four,
Speaker 6:There's four
Speaker 7:There's four models. Yep. There's there's the Charleston, which is kind of your classic ping answer. Ish Scotty new Portish model. Um, the time,
Speaker 6:Yeah, I remember that. Yeah.
Speaker 7:The Tivy is a, a mid mallet, um, that I really like, I, I use personally, um, the OCA is sort of a blade with a little bit of a back to it kind of like the putter that, you know, Phil Kelson, uh, used to use when he played golf. And then we have the Addo, which is, um, kind of the old bullseye style putter. Um, you can go either lefthanded or right-handed, it's a two-way putter. Um, that's been kind of fun to make and that's actually been surprisingly popular. So we have, we have those four models and, um, you know,
Speaker 6:It's, it's, it's, it's, it's like all the standard people like recognize yeah. At least the shape, right. Like, okay. I like that kind of putter, you know, and then let them go from there.
Speaker 7:Um, and we have, we have a couple more coming, um, that we're gonna launch this fall when we're in the new facility, we're working on sort of like a notchback Malad type model. Um, and then there's a couple other that are still, you know, really in like the first stages of design, but, um, yeah, it, it, those four models, I mean, it's kind of hopefully like something for everybody. Um, there are some people who come in with some crazy requests where we're like, nah, we, we just don't have anything that fits that bill. But, um, those are the first four. Um, and, and, you know, the, the Charleston is by far the most popular, um, but the OkHai putter has just been slamming for the last like six or eight weeks. We can't make'em fast enough. Um, so that's been really cool too.
Speaker 6:What I think is phenomenal is like the laser etching you guys are doing. Yeah. Crazy.
Speaker 7:Just to walk you through how we make a putter, you know, we literally make everything from a block of steel, right. We have either a, a kind of a, a plate or a block of steel that just gets delivered by our steel guy. Right. And then we take that and we, we cut it down a little bit in, in what's called a wire machine, basically make the rough shapes of the putters. And then we take those putters and we put'em in our CNC machines and every putter is made to order. So if you order, you know, if you order 1400, you know, we got your block and steel, we put it in the CNC machine and then it's milled a hundred percent, every, uh, you know, dimension is cut by a high speed spindle. You know, we, we make everything custom and then we'll take that putter. And if you want something, you know, there's a couple of ways we can get your, I guess, engraving on there. If you just want something stamped, we can obviously stamp it. Um, some people like something a little more clean, we can actually cut and mill, you know, your initials, if that's what you choose. And then the third option is we have a laser and it, it literally will just burn away the steel. We can put pretty much any logo, image, graphic design,
Speaker 6:That's where you're gonna separate yourself, man. Cause I could imagine if you start doing some cool laser etching on a putter and that could post it on social, I can guarantee you're gonna get a lot of traction. Like,
Speaker 7:And that's, you know, as we do this move over the summer, uh, and we start to get into more custom stuff. Uh, yeah, the laser etching is it's really, I mean, actually I'm nice.
Speaker 6:We posted, we reposted a really cool like wedge, like two weeks ago or something where like somebody had like laser etched, the backside of it, like dragon ball Z. And I had so many comments, like, we're gonna, I buy that port or can I buy that wedge we're can I buy that wedge we're can I buy that wedge? And I was like, holy crap. Now there's probably some trademark issues there, but still like<laugh> if you ha I mean, it doesn't, I mean, you could do some really cool that laser edging is nuts, dude, and it it's it hard to do that or not really.
Speaker 7:I mean, there's a little, so literally if you sent me like a, here's a PDF of what I want, as long as it's clear and, and we can capture that design, it's not too hard. Um, the
Speaker 6:Machine programming it and making sure the design works on the piece and all that. Right,
Speaker 7:Right, right. So there's, there's a little bit of testing we have to do, we got some blank steel. We always kind of do a test burn and like, just make sure it's gonna come out looking good. And, and there's, you know, we're, we're removing steel, so there's like some dimensions and like some 3d stuff we gotta look at. Um, but for the most part, I mean, we can do it, um, just takes a little bit of time and a little bit of energy, but once we got the design finalized, um, you know, we just fire up the laser and, and it, it gets burned and, and I've seen it, you know, for a year I've watched this thing burn every time I see it, I'm still like, wow, that is crazy. You know, like how it works. Um, so, and
Speaker 6:That that's cool. I mean, I saw it. You guys did. Cause you had that one when I was looking at your putters the other day and like you had laser etched, the face of the putter. Yeah. With like, um, Wisconsin. Wasn't Wisconsin's like shade. Yeah. Wisconsin. That so cool.
Speaker 7:Yeah. And it's crazy when we do that, like the, I mean the, like you said, the social, just go, Hey, can I get that? Can I get that? Can I get that? And so I
Speaker 6:Told you what I want from my order. I don't know. I want, if you guys did that, that will blow up. I could tell you right now, like I could tell you right now that will blow up. Like that thing is, which is not, it wasn't any different than what you already made. I'm just like swap that out with a different state. That's awesome. Yeah.
Speaker 7:No, it
Speaker 6:Was cool, dude. Oh my God's so freaking cool. You guys gotta see this. Like it is seriously the coolest. I've never seen that on a face of a putter. I've never seen that ever. That probably exist, but I've never seen it.
Speaker 7:No. And it was, it was fun to do because it's sort of this, like, we know that when we start showing this stuff, like people
Speaker 6:Are blow it's on blow up date. Yeah. If you could like change a patina on it and like, could like mess with that and then do some killer laser etched face. Like, dude, it's gonna blow up, dude. I can guarantee it
Speaker 7:Guarantee. So that that's one of the things that, you know, we are we're,
Speaker 6:Mine's all excited. Like, yeah. I can't wait to be so cool.
Speaker 7:Yeah. No, we're careful. Like, trust me, my guys, I would want to just turn that, like, let's do it, you know, but they're like, Hey, we need to, first of all, we need to move. We need to get this transition done.
Speaker 6:Yeah. We gotta, like, this is like something you probably do like six months from now. Right. When you actually have like the assembly line working and you're all caught up and it's the winter and it's cold and crappy in Wisconsin. And you're like, guess what? Design time let's have fun. And now we can actually start playing with our toys and like making some good stuff.
Speaker 7:That's that's, you're, you're exactly right. Like that's where we, we are that. And we're, you know, like me as,
Speaker 6:But you gotta build the machine. Right. The machine has to be built first and the machine is the assembly line and making this stuff automated so that you can have that time to devote yeah. To development or design or whatever you wanna do.
Speaker 7:Yeah. I mean, as, as like a kind of a sales guy, like I want to go as fast as we can and, and I want to go and I wanna push, but at the same time, like you can't over commit. Right. And then like, you know, not be able to say, yeah, Hey, we can't actually make your punter until December. Right? Like that's no good either. So we're, we're being very cautious.
Speaker 6:No, it's smart. Cause you off the person before they even get it. And so by the time they get they're like, I don't really care anymore because you me off. And it took four months to get my product and like, yeah. Whatever. And you're like, no, we'll just, I mean, think about a year ago, you're nowhere close to this. Right. Like you were. So imagine when a year from now is gonna be like,
Speaker 7:It's, it's exciting. You know, it it's,
Speaker 6:You have more designs too. I bet you have more like putter heads and like whatever.
Speaker 7:Yeah. There's almost too much. I mean, I'm sure I, I can tell you have the same sort of entrepreneurial edge, like where you're your brain starts like pumping in too much stuff and you're like, oh, we can do this. And then we can do that. We can do this. And it's like, all right, you gotta make sure you do everything and you gotta make sure you do it well. So sometimes I gotta reign it in a little bit. But when I do think about like, all right, where do I want be in one year? Where do I wanna be in three years? Where do I want this to be in five years? It definitely, you know, gets exciting. And, and you know, you just, you, you get that drive to like keep working and to keep pushing. What
Speaker 6:I love about this show too, is like, I'll talk to entrepreneurs who are like older than us. Right. Who are super successful. And they say the same thing, right? Like it's just the same. Like that's why like doing the show. It's more about like, if you want to go into any kind of, if you wanna be entrepreneur, like listen to the show, if you wanted to be in golf and like hear what all these entrepreneurs are saying about how to actually break into an industry, like, you know nothing about right. Like I knew nothing about the golf industry. That was not my world. Right. Same thing with you, right? Like you played golf. That's like me, I played golf. But like, it's the same thing. We all have the same thread that goes through all of us. It's just like, we love the sport and we wanna make some cool stuff. You know, whatever that means,
Speaker 7:I think. And I think that's why, like this podcast is so cool is like when, when you're an entrepreneur or when you are thinking about these things, like there are so many people who will look at you kind of like,
Speaker 6:You're stupid, crazy. Right. I get all time. Yeah. Dude though, nothing drives me more insane when people say stuff like, oh, how's, you know, whatever. And it's like, it's shut up. You know? Yeah.
Speaker 7:Well, they tell you like, oh, you're, you're making putters is like, yeah, we're making putters. And you gotta surround yourself with people who support that. Right. You gotta surround yourself. Your friends will be the guys who tell you like, Hey, I'm, I'm happy for you. I'm gonna support you. I listen to your podcast. I I'm gonna buy a putter. I, I wanna see you do well. And you gotta surround yourself with people who inspire you because there are so many people who are gonna give you that look and who are gonna like try and pull, you know? And it's like, Nope, you just gotta, you gotta focus on, you know, the voices that are gonna support you. Yeah.
Speaker 6:The doubt, all the doubt and the naysayers and whatever it is. And of course,
Speaker 7:Yeah, of course you have doubt, you know? Right.
Speaker 6:Like, but you know what? It's so cool. Like when I started doing this, like a lot of people, um, when I started doing this like full time and I told like, the brands I've worked with forever, they're like through about time. Like, they're like, why didn't you do that sooner? And like, those are the right people to be talking to you. Not like, what are you doing? That's stupid. You know, like it's and I'm like, really like you, oh, I don't know how you did for so long like that, you know, or those be comments. And I'm like, well, I didn't know that. Yeah.
Speaker 7:That's cool. You gotta, and it's, you know, you just gotta find that fuel, you know? And, and that's what I, I got a great team. I got a great team here who, you know, supports me and it, you know, my wife, like every time I have an idea, she's like pushing me to do it. You know? And my family, my parents, my brothers, you know, their family's, you know, I'm very lucky cuz I got people, you know, in my, in my circle who supported push yeah. Who push and who don't look at you, like you got two heads. Right. And you're like, no, I, I think this can work. I, I, I feel like this can work and you know, I know it's gonna work cause I'm gonna work my tail off to make it work. And, and, and so you just gotta find those, the, that support structure and then, you know, the sky's the limit.
Speaker 6:Yeah. Like that's the, I think that's key right. Is having the right support around you so that you don't feel like you're crazy. And that you're able to like, I mean, it's still scary and hard. It's just that like, you gotta,
Speaker 7:You gotta be, if you're an entrepreneur, you gotta be a little bit crate. Right. Like, you know, you're oh yeah. I'm giving up, you know, like I know that I can make plumbing, fixtures and engine stuff forever, you know, and I can be bored out of my mind making this stuff or I can make ERs and be excited and try and create a brand from nothing.
Speaker 6:Yeah. What's the worst case scenario. What's the worst case scenario it fails. Can you go back to making plumbing, pictures and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Like, I'm sure
Speaker 7:You were telling me a little bit about yourself before that you were in, you know, involved in the law and like, I'm sure there's probably people who looked at you and said what you're doing on a golf podcast, you know, but like at the same time, it probably really drives you to create this brand and, and have these conversations with people all over the country and
Speaker 6:Brands all with entrepreneurs. Right. So it's like, you know, that's the cool part. I mean, that's, I don't work with brands or with people and do you know, like, that's kind of how I do my business. And it's like, you know, I would rather work with the people that I like a lot and like support what they're doing and, you know, have supported me through the years. Like what, you know, whatever they have and, you know, contacts or insight, or I don't know. Yeah. I'm a nube, right? Like,
Speaker 7:Yeah. Well, it's funny you say like, you know, you work with people that there's certain people that have ordered putters from me, you know, over the last seven or eight months. And every once in a while, you'll get somebody who like writes a message on social media or who writes a message directly to me. And it's just like super negative about something. And I, I, I, I always try and like address it and I say, Hey, you know, I'm sorry you made the putter, didn't meet your specifications or something like that. And then I just, you know, I say like, Hey, have a nice day. And you don't then
Speaker 6:Move on,
Speaker 7:Let it and then move on. Yeah. And then, you know,
Speaker 6:No, I, oh yeah.
Speaker 7:I mean, I know in my head, you know, I go okay, of the thousand putters we should,
Speaker 6:But it, yeah, you're still kind of off and you're like, in the back of your mind, like, wait, what's wrong. Like, but then it's not, you it's that person, it's not the product. Like the product didn't work for them. Right. I'm sorry, it didn't work out. Or I'm sorry. It took so long to get to you or I'm sorry. Like, okay. You have like reasons for your unhappiness. Yeah. Like I'm not gonna make you happy. Like, so, oh, I get all the time, dude. You people like talk like all the time. And you're like,
Speaker 7:Yeah, you you'll read a review or response. And you're like, I want to like go engage in this conversation and explain something. But then you kind of know, Hey, it's not worth it. It's not worth, you're not gonna get any satisfaction out of it. You know, all you're gonna do is they
Speaker 6:Unhappy regardless if yeah. What, no matter what you do. And they'll probably be already be happy with anything they have anyways. So it's just like, like one time I had somebody like comment and I think it was on YouTube or something. They made some stupid comment. Like, I don't know what they said. And they're like, well, I'm gonna unsubscribe. I'm like good. Like see you later. Like, and they did. I was like, I don't really care. Like what? You know, it was like, oh no, I don't know. It was just like so ignorant. And like, I don't know what they said. I was like, it didn't even make sense. I was like, what? Oh, okay. You know, I was one, my, my one B roll clip. You didn't like, or something. It was like, something really like obnoxious. I was like, whatever,
Speaker 7:You know, like, and, and, you know, we, I, I, by no means, do I say what we do here is perfect we've, you know, but I do know that of, of the thousand putters we've shipped or whatever we've made in the last six months. Like, I know how many have been returned because of quality issues. And so I know like our hit rate is so high and we're making a good product. And if, if you don't like it, I'm sorry, I will I'll refund don't you send it on back and, and like have a nice day. And, you know, sometimes you'll see a message like, well, there are no Scotty camera. And then it's like, no, absolutely not. You know, I've been doing this for, you know, two years they've been in this market forever. Um, but what we are trying to do is like, like I said, you know, like, I wanna make you a good parter. I want to make it here in the United States. I want to have you the, you know, have the ability to customize it a little bit. And I wanna do it for a price that doesn't, you know, break the bank. Recognizing that times are a little bit challenging right now for a lot of people, you can get a high quality product and, and not have to worry about it. And that's, that's what we're trying to do. And if, if that doesn't meet what you're hoping, you know, life's too short to get in arguments, you know, we will gladly refund your money, have a nice day. And, and I hope you find out part that works for you. That's, that's kind of the mentality that Meridian wants to have. I, I modeled the whole thing. I I'm a beach guy. Right. I live in Wisconsin, you know, so that might not make sense, but like, I, I love staring at the water. I love staring at the ocean. And so all of the putters are named after beach towns in the Southeast<laugh>. Um, my parents are retired to Hilton head, South Carolina. I I've spent my life going down there. Um, you know, the Charles stand right up the road, the Addo, the OCA, the Tivy, all towns, like on the beach. And that was sort of my inspiration for the brand was, Hey, you know, like clear mind, clear head, like let's, let's do something that is fun. Um, that I enjoy doing those towns make me happy. So those are the towns that I named the putters after I found inspiration, you know, in each putter I could relate it to each town. And, and that's what I want Meridian to be. It's just like a, a, a fun, clean, refreshing spot to buy a putter. Um, and if you like golf and you like high quality, you know, machine to putters, um, I think we got something for you.
Speaker 6:Well, I think it's great. I think what you guys are doing is really cool. I, when I saw it, I was like, oh, that's cool. And then I saw the custom work, which yeah. I was like blown away. I was like, where are these guys coming from? You know, like, I've heard that. And, and, and not in a bad way. I was like, this is cool. So, um, where can people find you what's your Wise's website?
Speaker 7:So yeah, so Meridian putters.com is, is where everything is, you know, located. Um, you can order the stock putters, right through that website. Everything is, you know, the direct to consumer side of things. That's right there. And then if you wanna go custom on a putter, um, hit the custom putters tab. And, and there's a downloadable link where you can see the four putter prints for each model. Um, and you can print out a putter print and you will see on each print, the areas that you can SP, uh, that you can customize. So there's like seven areas on each area. You can, you can kind of whip up your design, however, you, you want to do it. Uh, and then you can send that in to Meridian, um, you know, support at Meridian and you can have us what we'll do. What we'll then do is kind of give you a quote, right? We'll give you the lead time and the quote, um, and ask you any like final specifics, you know, loft and lie, um, length of shaft, that type of thing, so that you can make sure that it fits your swing as well. So all of that information is right there on the website.
Speaker 6:Well, that's awesome. Well, thank you for being on the show today. I appreciate it very much. Um, and you guys really need to like check them out because it's something special that they're doing. And I don't know, it's like, they're gonna be big. I have a feeling, give it two years. You're busy to know what that is. That's my, that's my, uh,<laugh> Sayer thing. So, um, Paul,
Speaker 7:Thank you very much for having me. This was, this was a blast. It's, it's always fun to talk to somebody else in the golf industry and especially like an entrepreneur like yourself. Um, I, I appreciate, I appreciate the
Speaker 6:Forum. Oh, no problem. Thanks for being on the show.
Speaker 3:Thanks for listening to another episode of behind the golf brand podcast, you're gonna beat me a golf stay connected on and off the show by visiting golfers authority.com. Don't forget to like subscribe and leave a comment. Golf is always more fun when you win, stay out of the beach and see you on the green.