696: Jamie Left a Nike Exec Job to Bootstrap A Drinkware Brand - Now It's On Track For Seven Figures
About this episode
Jamie shares his journey from a Nike executive to bootstrapping his own drinkware brand after a life-changing accident.
Jamie spent over 20 years in corporate America, including a stint as a Nike executive, before a barbecue accident changed everything. Hosting friends and family in Park City after a near-perfect day outdoors, he tripped and sent a tray of drinks flying over everyone. That clumsy moment sparked two ideas at once: a better, genuinely leak-proof product, and a brand built around the outdoor-lifestyle-and-moments-of-pause philosophy he and his wife Michelle wanted to live by. He funded SMMT Outdoor entirely himself, went all in from day one, and spent nearly two years and 50 prototypes getting the product right. In this episode, Jamie is refreshingly honest about the unglamorous middle of the journey - the weeks with one or two orders, the pivot away from the category he launched in, the agency burns, and what it actually feels like to go from leading teams of teams at a billion-dollar company to being a solo operator with one contractor. What you'll learn in this interview: The barbecue accident that sparked the whole brand - and why Jamie built SMMT around an emotional "active days and moments of pause" philosophy, not just a product spec Why he launched in bags first, then pivoted…
People in this episode
Host: Nathan Chan
Guest: Jamie
Topics covered
- entrepreneurship
- product development
- outdoor lifestyle
- pivoting business
- corporate to startup
Keywords
- Nike
- SMMT Outdoor
- drinkware
- entrepreneurship
- product prototypes
- outdoor lifestyle
- business pivot
Mentioned in this episode
Organizations: Nike, SMMT Outdoor
Places: Park City
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