Bet Before the Outcome Is Certain: How Bob Dalton Builds Businesses, Communities, and a Life Worth Living

Bet Before the Outcome Is Certain: How Bob Dalton Builds Businesses, Communities, and a Life Worth Living

Most of us wait for proof before we move. We want the plan finished, the risk priced out, the outcome all but guaranteed before we raise our hand. Bob Dalton has spent his entire adult life doing the opposite—saying yes first and figuring out the rest on the way down.

From starting a youth ministry at nineteen with no idea what he was doing, to sewing blankets out of his trunk for a homeless population he understood more personally than most, to building a local-first social platform while the tech giants chase scale, Bob keeps placing the same bet: act before the world catches up. What he’s learned about risk, timing, and weathering the storms longer than anyone else might just change how you think about your own next leap.

My special guest is Bob Dalton

Bob Dalton is an entrepreneur, keynote speaker, and self-described social designer working to reclaim human connection in the digital age. He never planned to become an entrepreneur—after a high-school mentor named Todd Tardy showed him what it looked like to serve a community, Bob moved to a small Oregon town and, at nineteen, started a Young Life chapter from nothing. Years later, when his mother’s life unraveled and she ended up sleeping on beaches and benches despite two college degrees and a relentless work ethic, his entire understanding of homelessness shifted. He called local shelters, asked what they needed, heard “blankets,” and bought a sewing machine and a roll of fabric. That became Sackcloth & Ashes, the one-for-one blanket company through which he has donated hundreds of thousands of blankets to homeless shelters around the country.
Bob Dalton is an entrepreneur, keynote speaker, and self-described social designer working to reclaim human connection in the digital age. He never planned to become an entrepreneur—after a high-school mentor named Todd Tardy showed him what it looked like to serve a community, Bob moved to a small Oregon town and, at nineteen, started a Young Life chapter from nothing. Years later, when his mother’s life unraveled and she ended up sleeping on beaches and benches despite two college degrees and a relentless work ethic, his entire understanding of homelessness shifted. He called local shelters, asked what they needed, heard “blankets,” and bought a sewing machine and a roll of fabric. That became Sackcloth & Ashes, the one-for-one blanket company through which he has donated hundreds of thousands of blankets to homeless shelters around the country.

“When you operate out of a survival spirit for a really long time, you can get burnout—and that same spirit that got you here is the thing that’ll keep you from where you’re meant to go next.”

In this episode, you will be able to:

• Find the courage to start before you feel ready and act on a vision while it’s still unproven.
• Turn a personal hardship into a mission-driven business that serves the people around you.
• Build and recruit a team that can carry an early-stage idea further than you could alone.
• Rethink competition by focusing on brand, philosophy, and staying power over the product itself.
• Embrace the duality of success and struggle so you can lead—and live—with more gratitude and resilience.

Why Acting Before Certainty Beats Waiting for Proof
Bob’s throughline is conviction ahead of consensus. He started Young Life at nineteen, launched a blanket company while friends laughed, and is now building local infrastructure he believes is two years ahead of its time—each move made before the outcome was guaranteed. His point isn’t recklessness; it’s that the journey and the lessons matter more than any single win or loss, because as he puts it, we’re always succeeding at something and failing at something at the same time.
That mindset reframes risk as participation rather than gamble. When a backer like GoFundMe co-founder Andy Ballester wrote his first check and offered to advise, the affirmation mattered more than the money—proof that support shows up once you’ve done the work of stepping forward. For anyone weighing a career change, an investment, or a leap into ownership, Bob’s example suggests the people who benefit most are the ones willing to move while the outcome is still uncertain.

The resources mentioned in this episode are:

• Visit sackcloth.com to buy a blanket and trigger a one-for-one donation to a local homeless shelter, or to explore corporate gifting partnerships.
• Download the LOCL app or browse communities at locl.com (spelled L-O-C-L) to organize online and gather offline in your own city.
• Look into Longer Tables, Tim Jones’s nonprofit behind the mile-long shared-meal dinners that inspired Bob’s San Diego events.
• Explore franchise ownership as a lower-risk way to start a business with a built-in community of support.
• Listen to the Free Agent Podcast with Meg Schmitz for real stories of self-employment and business ownership.
• Contact Meg Schmitz to schedule a free, no-obligation call for insights into entrepreneurship and franchise opportunities.
• Use the form on the Free Agent Podcast page if you’d like to be considered as a guest on the show.

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Click to Take the Leap into the full interview transcript of the Free Agent Podcast, Episode 8.22 with Meg Schmitz and her guest, Bob Dalton

 

Free Agent Podcast with Meg Schmitz – Guest: Bob Dalton – Founder of LOCL

Meg Schmitz: Hello, everybody, and welcome to, or welcome back to, the Free Agent Podcast. My name is Meg Schmitz, I’m your host. This discussion, this podcast, is all about free agency and taking control over your financial future. The mission of my show is to share inspiring conversations with real people who took the leap into self-employment, business ownership. Financial freedom, and sometimes franchising, but not today. The conversation is for corporate refugees and executives who are tired of their desk job. It’s also for entrepreneurs and investors who are looking to share camaraderie and inspiration through their own business journey. My podcast aims to spotlight on real people who stepped into the unknown, took control over their destiny, and became their own boss, and Bob Dalton is, like, the exemplary person to be a free agent. You are, and have been. Operating… running businesses independently for a long time, and it’s been very inspiring and rewarding to get to know you.

Bob Dalton: Yeah, thank you. Thanks for having me.

Meg: Well, thank you. I’m grateful that when you flew from California to Green Bay, you thought of even checking in with us, and then making the drive to come on down here to visit with Pete and me. It really solidified for us. as potential investors, or mentors, or I don’t know how… I don’t know where this whole relationship is going to go between the three of us, but I wanted to have you on the podcast to talk about You’re mission-driven, initiatives, one inspired by your mom. And then the next one inspired by lack of community… community being disrupted, really, I think, by technology. So, I don’t know where you want to start, because both of those are just so fascinating to me. So. Maybe start chronologically with, when did you feel the urge to become an entrepreneur?

Bob: Yeah, definitely was never planning on being an entrepreneur. I graduated high school and went straight into nonprofit work, because I… I had a pretty life, altering experience, in high school. When a gentleman named Todd Tardy took me under his wing and started mentoring me. And I grew up without a dad, so having his… you know, Todd was the first person that I looked to, and I said, I want to be like that when I’m older. And he was a demonstration of how he served his community, how he loved his family, just how he showed up, and, loved God, and the whole thing. Like, he was the first person I was like, I want to be like him when I’m 40, you know? So when I graduated high school, I moved to a small town in Oregon, and I grew up on the Oregon coast, but I moved to Central Oregon area, the Valley. And, there was no Young Life there, which is a youth ministry organization, so at 19 years old, I was like, I’m gonna start Young Life. And that was my first entrepreneurial journey. That was the first time I said yes to something that I had no idea what I was doing, but I was willing. And I started Young Life and got to see this entire small community transform, because I built a team of leaders, I formed a committee, we started Going into the high school, and… building relationships with kids, which I was basically one of their peers, I was 19. But we got to… we probably had about 100 kids coming to club every week, and getting to build relationships and love on them, and… because of that, we got teachers involved and business owners involved, and so I got to experience starting with absolutely nothing, and stepping out in faith, and getting to see door after door open up, and watch an entire small community transform, And I got to do that from 19 to 24 years old, and so I had experience before I actually started a business with experiencing stepping up, raising my hand, saying that I’m willing, and actually seeing things open up, and me continuing to walk through those doors. So… around 2013, I was around 24 at the time, trying to figure out what I was gonna do after Young Life and that nonprofit. I knew I wanted to speak, I knew I wanted to make an impact in the world, but my mom was really struggling at that time, and she ended up, Really heavily falling into drinking, losing her mother and her brother, you know, who were her pillars in her life. And, she really was just kind of… she was spiraling enough to wanting to start her life over, and so she booked a one-way plane ticket from Oregon to Florida. And thought her aunt would take her in, and she didn’t, and she ended up sleeping on beaches and benches. And it’s not somebody that you would expect would end up living on the streets, or being on the streets. She’s a beautiful woman, she has two college degrees, she raised my sister and I primarily by herself. And for her to end up in that situation changed my entire paradigm of how I view homelessness, because she’s the hardest-working woman that I know. And, it inspired me to call homeless shelters and see what they needed, and they said blankets, and so I bought a sewing machine and a roll of fabric from Joann’s, started making blankets and selling them out of my trunk, and formed a company, an LLC, called Sackcloth and Ashes. Which means mourning and repentance, an ancient, like, biblical… studies, it’s, the whole concept was every time somebody wraps themselves in one of our blankets, every blanket we sell, we donate a blanket to your local homeless shelter, so it represents mourning over the homeless population and repenting by contributing to a homeless shelter in your area. And so that was kind of, like, my next leap of… of… Into the entrepreneur world. But as everyone was kind of looking at me, being like, oh, you’re kind of crazy for starting a blanket company, and what are you doing? And my wife, you know, walking into my house with a roll of fabric and a sewing machine, and my wife and her friend were watching TV, and they’re like, what are you doing? I’m like, I’m starting a blanket company. And they both just laughed, you know? But I… that wasn’t new for me. I had an opportunity to start something with Young Life at 19 years old, and get to experience those nights where I’m like. looking up into the night sky and being like, I have no idea what I’m doing, but I’m willing to step out and move forward in this, because I believe in it, and… So yeah, so I started Sackcloth and Ashes in 2014, and started selling blankets out of my trunk, and it’s still around, I’m still involved, 12 years in. We’ve donated hundreds of thousands of blankets to homeless shelters around the country. And, I grew up with the brand, you know, from 24 years old to now I’m 37. And it’s been an unbelievable journey of lessons and heartache, and my mom found sobriety through that journey. I’ve traveled the world because of the brand, and so it’s been an amazing decade of… of growing as a young man into a man, And all the things that came with it. You know, I’ve been through everything you could go through as a product entrepreneur.

Meg: Alright, so you just filled in some of the blanks for me that now the whole story makes sense for me. I’ve heard bits and pieces of it, as we’ve either met via Zoom or here in person, but that whole, element of 19 to 24… and I… what I love about that And so many adults do this now. They’re afraid to lean into something that they’re passionate about. Oh, I’ve never done that before. Oh, what if I fail? But your youthful intrepidness took you into something. You had tutelage and mentoring from someone who obviously inspired you, but I… what I am so glad that you brought up, and I want people to really embrace this, I don’t care how old you are, is just do it! You don’t know what opportunity is gonna come. Step over the fear, step over the threshold, and just do it.

Bob: Yeah. Yeah, I mean, it’s a really powerful message for anybody that has that prompting to do something, you know? And, I think that, like, I just talked to a good friend of mine named Chuck yesterday, and he’s 75 years old, and he just started… he had a really successful nonprofit organization here in San Diego. And then he started something new 3 years ago, thinking that it was gonna be his mark and his legacy in his own words. And it didn’t work out, and he’s in the process of shutting that down. And we were having this beautiful discussion around how, what if it’s not about the failure or the success of what we do, it’s about the journey and the lessons that we learn along the way and how we grow. And I think that that is a big part of life, and the human experience, is that we’re always holding two things at one time. We’re always succeeding at something, and we’re always failing at something. We’re always wrestling with, addiction, and we’re also in a recovery process. And I think that when you start to embrace the human experience as… it’s both. It’s, I’m going to succeed in certain areas. and I’m gonna fail at certain areas, and that’s okay, because that’s what it means to be human. You start to take a little bit more risk with your life, because you realize that this is what it means to be living, you know?

Meg: Oh.

Bob: So, I admire anybody who’s taken a step of faith and stepping out and doing things, what they feel called to do, you know?

Meg: So, the… if I’m understanding correctly with the blankets, the company sells blankets To people like me, but it’s a one-for-one donation, is that correct?

Bob: Yeah, we sell blankets on our website, sackcloth.com, and we also… 80% of our business and our revenue comes from partnering with companies, so we partner with Financial services, real estate companies. Car dealerships, and they buy our blankets as gifts for their clients or their customers.

Meg: Oh, nice.

Bob: Yeah, and that’s a big part of our business now, is because you have a lot of companies that want to make an impact, and so they partner with us to give a gift and make an impact in their local communities.

Meg: How did you… you were telling Pete, I mean, that you have a connection in Florence for, I think, manufacturing blankets? Yeah.

Bob: Yeah, great.

Meg: place to go.

Bob: It is. It really is. Yeah, the first two… after I got through that first hump of sewing locally. I found a manufacturer in Florence, Italy, and there’s a little town right outside of Florence called Prado, and at one point, they made, I think, 80% of the fabric in the world at one point, and their slogan was, we made the shirt on your back. And, and they were the… they were the best, you know, at making fabric. And, over time, China started taking a lot of production from them, and so you have this fabric community out there, Where they have these massive mills, and you have people that specialize in yarn, and recycled fabric, and jackhard looms, and washing, and all these things. So our blankets actually went through, like, an 8-step process, from scraps of fabric, scraps of recycled fabric. All the way to the point of making the product and the fabric, and then… So we’ve gotten to go over there and actually meet all the families that are involved in making the fabric itself. Once the fabric is made, it gets shipped to our production in Oregon, where we cut, sew, label, polybag, and ship all of our products. But as of last month, we just launched our first American-made product, and so now we are bringing a lot of our production into the United States, which we’re excited about, cuts the lead time from 4 months to 4 weeks, and it’s gonna give us a lot more flexibility to work with artists. But we deeply love our relationship with the Italians, and always enjoy our trips over there.

Meg: I need to get one of the blankets that comes from Florence before… They’re all gone unless they’re all gone.

Bob: Oh, no, I’ll send you one.

Meg: that’s my, one… I won’t say regret. Pete and I were just in Florence for about 10 days, and I went with the purpose of just take it all in. Treat this whole… city as an art and history and literature experience, and don’t look at it from, oh, you’re in the leather capital, you’re in the… it’s so easy to get caught up in the buying things instead of taking it all really absorbing. that was a huge… that trip made a huge impact on me. Have you been to China, by the way?

Bob: I haven’t yet. I haven’t been to China, and I really want to go to Japan, but everybody wants to go to Japan, you know?

Meg: Well, yeah, so that’s another story for another time. Okay, so this is also making more sense to me, how your next endeavor, local. came to be. So talk about… that was so great when you were here and sitting in our kitchen and talking about the Socratic method and engagement of humans on a very real level. Now I understand better where this is… where the germination of the idea came from. So for the audience, go ahead and talk about local.

Bob: Yeah, so as I was traveling the country for sackcloth and doing blanket drops, that’s why I was in Green Bay prior to meeting with you, was I was doing a blanket drop at the homeless shelter there. And so I do them still every once in a while, where we actually pass out blankets in person at shelters. And through that journey, I got to go to, like, 60 cities in the U.S. and meet with some of the best grassroots leaders that are showing up every day. serving their communities. And as I started getting to know these people, they’re brilliant. Like, they’re creating true solutions to solve some of society’s biggest problems. And I saw that… doing it boots on the ground and approaching issues on a local level was far more strategic and effective than trying to go a top-down strategy to solving massive problems that we’re dealing with. So that’s why we see billions of dollars being invested into trying to help and serve the homeless population, and the numbers are continuing to go up, it’s because the local solutions are actually struggling, because we’re supporting the more international and national organizations. And so… and on top of that, like. most of the media is discussing the issues of society, they’re not discussing the solutions, and so I started to be like, I want to use my platform to highlight local solutions, and what’s working. And so I started bringing a microphone and, and and a videographer with me into all my trips, and I started recording my interviews with all these people, and it was… I felt like a journalist. But through that journey, I became convinced if we’re gonna see real change happen long-term that’s actually sustainable, it has to be done on a local level. And so I started… I started crafting my keynote messages around that. I started writing a lot around the philosophy of localism, and really wanting to figure out what is my role in helping integrate localism back into modern society. I’ve always been a fan of communication, mass communication, and messages that are being, promoted out to society that’s help… that’s shaping society. A lot of society’s perception and the way they live is… is altered based off of the information that’s being communicated to them, and that… I’m really passionate about that because we can make a lot of change if we can get involved in how things are being communicated to the public. And so, I started studying the local digital landscape and how information was being, shared, and also how communication was being done. And to my surprise, there really wasn’t a lot. I hopped on the Nextdoor app. Studied WhatsApp, I studied Meetup and Eventbrite, and from a local digital infrastructure, there wasn’t a strong enough plan or strategy or technology that I felt like was actually going to move the needle from a massive societal standpoint. And societies live and die on communication. Like, if we can’t communicate and understand what is going on around us, that’s a really big problem for the future of society. And so, I designed out an app called Local, and spelled L-O-C-L, and I brought it to my buddy Andy Ballister, who founded GoFundMe. And he lives here in San Diego, and him and I had been friends for a couple years, doing coffee together and meeting up, and he was familiar with the work I was doing with Sackcloth. So, we were just meeting up, catching up most of the time, and I brought this idea to him. I’m like, hey, you’re the most successful tech entrepreneur I’ve ever met. what are your thoughts on this? Like, I think I’m gonna start a local social network and really… trying to move the needle here on local community and events and commerce, being on the same platform. And he was like, we absolutely need this, and I’ll give you your first $100,000, and I’ll personally advise you. So that was a big moment for me, and just like any entrepreneur in their journey, it’s kind of like, you start with an idea and a concept, you gotta work out that idea, you know, tangibly. What is it gonna look like? What is the business plan and the executive plan? And then you can start bringing around and kind of getting feedback and thoughts from folks, and you never know where support could potentially come from. And he backed me, right out the gate, and I was really grateful for that. because it was more than just about receiving the money, it was about getting support from somebody that truly had built a multi-billion dollar company that was globally known. And to get his affirmation in that was a really big energy shift for me, and I was really grateful for that, and I’ll always look forward to that. So, I started to develop the app. I formed a really good team of people. my three biggest strengths as a leader is I can… I can craft an amazing team, and I can recruit anybody. And so, one of the first people that I talked to was the head… one of the head software engineers for Snapchat. And, he lives in Utah. And I said, hey, can I fly out and meet with you? I, I think I’m gonna work on crafting what the next major social network is gonna be. And, And so I flew out and met with him, and he said, I’m in. I’ll develop the infrastructure for you. And so he built the entire foundation of Local for me on Flutter, and it was a… that was another massive win for us, because, you know, we developed with a lot of framework in mind in the early stages of this thing. We don’t have to rebuild this down the road. So the concept of local is you can create or join any digital community, or find events in your local area. really seamlessly on one platform. And as a community builder and event host myself, I host a lot of events, I build community here in San Diego, I’m using these other tools, technological tools, and I can see where all of them are falling short, and I get to craft local based on what I personally need as a local builder. And so, it’s been an 18-month journey of building and building the MVP, testing it out, getting people on the product, figuring out what they want. And we’re about less than 30 days away from kind of relaunching, the app with the knowledge of all the feedback that we’ve gotten from over 3,000 community builders. And so, we’re in a great, fun season, you know? We’re building, but the thing that I… have learned with Sackcloth, and that I’ve learned about myself, is I’m in this for the next decade, you know? When I commit to something, I’m in it for the long run. And, one of my competitors, who just started a, event community app, here in San Diego. We text back and forth, we’re buddies, and I was joking with them the other day, I said, hey, I’m launching events here in 30 days, and just want to let you know, you know, enjoy the rest of your time. The only chance that you really have to compete is I need you to change the name of your company, it’s not good enough, and and you’re gonna have to make these changes to your product, you know, and… but I share that laughingly, because it’s not about what product we make or technology we make now, anybody’s gonna be able to make whatever technology they want here soon, very quickly. It comes down to how… how do you brand your organization? What is the philosophy of your organization? Why are you doing it?

Meg: Yeah.

Bob: what is your marketing strategy, and what is your monetization strategy? So, when you look at two technologies on face value, or two products, where you’re like, oh my god, they’re a competitor, and you start distressed out, you gotta understand that for the long run, there’s way deeper roots that happen that, as a seasoned entrepreneur now, I look at and I can laugh with my competitors, because I know that I’m gonna have the stomach to… weather the storms more than them over the next decade, and see this thing through. So, so I’m excited to get into tech, and I think that the decisions that we make in tech in the next two years are going to shape generations to come. I really believe that. And so, I’m enlisting in tech, is what it feels like. I don’t need to be involved in tech, I don’t need another company. But I believe that we need really quality people that are getting involved in technology and actually crafting technology for the future of humanity. And so I feel like it’s, like, my… my contribution and service. Like, I’m doing this because I really think… I couldn’t just sit on my hands and watch where Zuckerberg and Elon were gonna take some of these companies, I wanted to make sure that we had at least a few options that are making decisions on behalf of the people, and not just making decisions on behalf of corporations. So, and I love it. I’m a design nerd, and… I’m a social designer.

Meg: You are a social designer. The… and so, for people who are looking, because I talked to a gal yesterday, and if she hasn’t connected with you directly, I’ll… her name is Emmy, I’ll connect the two of you. She’s in Appleton, so right outside of Green Bay. Very similar… Sociological… desires, and so I think the two of you will have some synergies for talking, but right now, Local, the app, is… Is this correct that it’s San Diego-based, but you’ve also launched it in Green Bay?

Bob: Yeah, pretty much anywhere in the world, you can actually download the app. You can visit local.com, L-O-C-L.com.

Meg: Okay.

Bob: you don’t even need an account, you can browse around different communities that are on the platform. We just launched the desktop browser version recently, and we needed that before we launched events.

Meg: Okay, so when the three of us were meeting here, you were talking to Pete and me about events in San Diego. I believe you’ve had one already, where you you wanted to bring together top leadership. I just let you talk about the event, and then what the future looks like. Because that was truly inspiring for Pete and me to hear how effective you’ve been at bringing top leadership together on a local level.

Bob: Yeah, I mean, so I’ve been in San Diego now for 8 years or so, and I came across a photo probably, like, 6 months ago. It was a photo on LinkedIn where 3,000 people got together for a shared meal around a mile-long table, and it looked revolutionary. I reached out to the guy, I’m like, his name’s Tim Jones, and I was like, what is this, you know? And he was like, oh, you know, I have a non-profit called Longer Tables, and… we just brought together 3,000 people in Littleton, Colorado, right outside of Denver, and I was like, I need to meet with you. So I flew out, like, a day or two later and met… had dinner with them. And, got to learn more about the work, and I was like, I want to do this in San Diego. Like, this is absolutely unbelievable, and San Diego’s ready for it. San Diego, as… I’ve been to a lot of cities, San Diego is a blank canvas right now. We have yet to set the bar on doing anything monumental from an event standpoint. And the city’s in a little bit of a limbo right now. We just cut the arts budget, which a lot of people are really disappointed in. Leadership is in limbo. Leadership is in transition right now. There’s so many things that are kind of, like, negatively being talked about about San Diego being a local here. And that’s uncalled for. We’re one of the biggest cities in the United States, we have some of the most resources, we live in one of the most beautiful places in the world. There is no reason why we should be at odds at all, and we should be setting the table for as many people as we possibly can to bring our people together. And so I came back to San Diego, we crafted a small team of people. And, we did our first long table dinner about 2 months ago in March, where we brought together 120 of the top leaders around the region. For a shared meal, and I shared the vision that night. What you experienced on a micro level this evening, we are going to do on a macro level later this fall. We are going to bring together 3,000 people around a mile-long table here in San Diego. And so, our next table is going to be in July with 500 people. I’m in the tail end negotiations with where that’s gonna be right now. I’m pretty pretty pissed that it’s not done yet, but we’re… we’re, it’s close, and we have a great backup plan. If we… if we don’t do it at the location that we want here in summer, got a great backup plan, and then in fall, we’re gonna be doing the 3,000-person dinner at Waterfront Park in downtown San Diego, and So it’s a… it’s, to me, it’s art. And, it’s this beautiful portrayal and symbol of uniting our city, it’s about the relationships and the connection that are made along the way of creating it. There’s so many people that I’ve met. That I never probably would have met if it wasn’t for the table. So, I’m looking at it from a holistic standpoint, and it… the… ROI on this is unbelievable, you know, from a relational standpoint. And I’m glad that my journey has led me to the table. Truly.

Meg: my brain is going crazy with logistics on this, how you… how you… and that’s a different topic for another time. The… The conversations that people had At the first event. Were people able to… logistics, were they able to move around and talk to other people?

Bob: Yeah, so when they got there, we handed them a mocktail, and they were able to connect, kind of like what your normal standing… standard networking night looks like. Everyone’s kind of walking around, seeing each other. A lot of people knew each other that evening. Because that one was invite-only, and we were very specific on making sure every region, industry, and ethnicity was represented at that first table. And then we opened up the walls at the restaurant that generously allowed us to be at, and we revealed the table, and everyone literally was coming up to me being like, oh my… I didn’t even know we were gonna do this. I thought we were just doing the networking thing, and that… that was good, you know? So they come into this beautiful experience, and we had their names on the plates and everything, like, we really curated this beautiful experience with intention. They all sit down. Our two main rules for the evening is you can’t be on your phone and you can’t talk about work. And we have prompts at the table, like. What was a meal that you had in your childhood that… meant something to you, or what is a memory that you think about often that makes you smile? And so, you’re getting to know these 5, 6 people around you at the table, and you don’t even know that this person couldn’t be the… we had the DA there that night, you know, so it’s like, you don’t know who you’re talking to. And that was the beauty of it. Like, I still don’t personally know the people that I actually sat with. what they do, but at the end of the evening, when they were leaving, we, like, hugged, and we’re like, we… I love you, you know? So, there was this beautiful… it was just… that’s the thing, it’s a social experiment in some regard. Like, we’re getting to know each other on a human level, and we’re not talking about what we do. And so, that was… and I gave a blanket, sackcloth blanket, to everyone who attended as they were leaving, so it was this kind of, like, beautiful moment of, like, they’re like, I don’t even… like, I got invited to this thing, and I didn’t even have any clue that this was gonna happen, and now they’re getting handed a blanket, like… the whole experience, they all absolutely walked away, and they’re like, literally anything that you do moving forward, like, I’m in, you know? And so that was, like, what we needed. We can’t… we can’t pull 3,000-person dinner off without getting the affirmation and the support from the top leaders in the city. And so, yeah, so that was when we were like, okay, we posted it online, it got over 100,000 impressions in San Diego, so every… basically everyone on LinkedIn in San Diego was circling and, you know, knew about it. And that’s when we were like, holy smokes, like. this is gonna be vague. This is gonna be really big. And… and so that’s where… that’s what makes it fun. Like, we’re… we’re gonna… potentially shift the energy of the city to being like, yes, I’m proud of this city, I’m proud of what we’re doing together, and out of that energy can come so many beautiful things, and so that’s what I’m very, very excited about, this whole… You know, and I get to use local and in different areas, and so people are always like, oh, what’s your plan with local? How are you gonna market in? So I’m like, I’m going to demonstrate what it means to build real community. And then use the product and be able to… I’m not gonna go around promoting, hey, download my app, you know? Like, that’s cheesy. I want to do this in an authentic way, where I actually show people, like, it really is about organizing online and gathering offline. That is the goal.

Meg: Mmm. So, there’s Madison, Milwaukee… I could… markets that are right here that I could touch. It seems like… there’s a pocket, it seems like there’s a sweet spot, I think, is what the word that’s coming to mind, for some of these cities that, like you’re talking about with San Diego, has a great reputation, everyone knows about the weather, you’ve got a great zoo, but when you live local. then you know what’s actually happening with homelessness and drug addiction and some of the other undercurrents that no one really wants to talk about, and getting leadership…

Bob: the arts.

Meg: getting… oh my gosh, we have such a robust community here. That’s one thing that you and I… I didn’t even know about your artistic leanings until right before we started to talk, and I don’t want you to talk about that. I can see so easily how… Pete and I can help with local, To bring it here. for the benefit of even a town as small as Whitewater, or bigger, like Milwaukee or Madison, Is… do you have something similar happening in Green Bay yet?

Bob: Yeah, so Green Bay, I was actually in Green Bay when I launched the app.

Meg: Okay, I thought there was a tie there.

Bob: Yeah, yeah, and just basically, I just love Green Bay. Green Bay’s not… it doesn’t take that long to get to know all the key stakeholders. And so I got to know them all. I’ve… I’ve shared at the, you know, to all the nonprofit leaders, I’ve spoken at the largest church there, So, like, I got a lot of good friends there, and so… Green Bay was a monumental part, I’ll say this, there’s not, like, a lot of active people in Green Bay right now, because a lot of them demanded events on the platform, and we have yet to launch events on the platform until next month.

Meg: Okay.

Bob: So a lot of them are just waiting for events to get onto the platform so they can use it for both their community and their events. But they were monumental in our beta test. Like, I had enough leaders in Green Bay get on the app, create communities, beta test it out, give me the feedback, enough for me to be like, okay, I know what we need to do. And yeah, so, like, Green… that’s what I love about Green Bay, is, like, you get the key stakeholders on a product, and now it’s fully adopted by the city. And I don’t think, like, Green Bay’s gonna be that hard, but it’s been a journey to, like, go through the true MVP process. Crafted product that people actually need. and be able to bring it back to them and say, okay, I did everything that you said you needed to be done, now let’s partner together. And so… when I was in Green Bay this last trip, I had one community builder that I met with, they’re like, can I go into an exclusive deal with you, sign with local, and I’m going to exclusively use local for my community and my events? And so, that was interesting. That was the first time a community builder had pitched me exclusivity, and that kind of got me thinking, like, building a community network of people that I’m actually signing for exclusive partnerships with this thing, and I think we could sign a lot. So, that’s the power of Green Bay, they get it. They know… they know community.

Meg: And we’ve got a saying here, but Milwaukee is small walkie. Small enough community that people… Chicago? No, not so much. It’s too big and gangly and too many other moving parts, but it seems to me, and Pete and I were talking about the sweet spot of different cities, even around Wisconsin.

Bob: Where…

Meg: Hopefully, word of mouth. and I’ve got listeners that are all over the place, they’re not just specific to Wisconsin here. So I’m hoping that people will listen to this and want to adopt this app and this platform and this mindset, really. I was so glad to read recently California schools are eliminating, prohibiting, reducing the amount of time that students can have access to their phones. It’s just… I’m not sure, Bob, if I said this to you, but in my portfolio of franchise companies, the fastest-selling brand, I think, ever that we represented was a mental health concept. And it launched pre-pandemic. It was a pandemic that highlighted for everybody that mental illness, drug addiction, alcohol, everything is in every corner of every community.

Bob: 100%.

Meg: we isolate people, and that’s what our little devices do. They isolate your brain and your eyes from engaging in the real world. It’s going to continue to be a bigger problem, so Pete and I… Very clearly understand your mission and your purpose and how effective we hope it will become as you grow.

Bob: Yeah, no, thank you. I think it… I think local is a bit ahead of its time. I think that we have… I think we’re two years ahead of our time, actually, so we’re in a good… good space to innovate. I think we’re gonna see a massive shift back to local economics in a very strong way, as millions of people get laid off. they’re gonna start asking the question, what can I make with my hands, and what services can I provide to the people around me? And we don’t have the digital infrastructure that’s set up for that yet, and that’s one thing that I’m really focused on and working hard to get done, because Local’s not just gonna be like, oh, it’s fun to communicate with my friends locally, or figure out what events are happening around me, which are legitimate needs. But it’s gonna… you’re gonna be able to launch successfully a community and a business through Local. where it’s going to end up saving a lot of people economically. And I think that that’s where, like, my… I’m looking at this from a… decade standpoint, and I want to help shape the future of local economics, and… I think that’s where I’m gonna be able to make the most impact, if I’m honest. it’s kind of like a legacy project for me, you know? And I can see it super clearly. Like, it’s one of those things that feels prophetic. And I can see where things are going, and it’s scary with… where society is heading, but I’m very optimistic that we have a window of time to innovate products and technology that’s going to service millions of people that are going to be affected in a negative way, but it’s going to set them up for the future in a really positive way. So, I’m still very optimistic. Surprisingly.

Meg: Well, that’s probably because you’re a faith-based person who is well-grounded and has lived through adversity, as well as… it’s, you know, if you don’t like today, wait till tomorrow. And if you love today, wait till tomorrow, because that’ll be different, too.

Bob: You’re a guy.

Meg: Who embraces the… embraces the change and the opportunity to help people Connect, truly, at a base level, connect.

Bob: Yeah, thank you. Well, one of my, I was telling you right before the call, I’m getting in… I’m gonna be doing my first art show, and one of my pieces… I’m a conceptual artist, so I create pieces, physical objects, that communicate messages out to people, you know? And… one of the pieces that I’m gonna have in my exhibit later this year is… I was just looking at myself in the mirror two weeks ago. And I was thinking, man, that’s awesome, like, I’m able to look at myself in the mirror again. I’ve been going through a two-year process of getting back to being able to look at myself in the mirror. And so I took a marker, and I wrote on the mirror, look how far you’ve come. and I took a photo of myself in the mirror, and so one of my pieces in my exhibit will be this giant mirror, and I’m gonna spray paint, look how far you’ve come, where people can take a photo of themselves, because… As you just said, like. tomorrow will come, you know, it’s like, we… when we look in the mirror, we often are looking at the flaws and the failures and the sufferings and the things we’re going through right now, but we don’t often look in the mirror and think, man, look how far I’ve come. You know, look how much I’ve been through. And I think that that is a really simple change of perspective for a lot of people that have something to be proud about. Something that they can look at themselves and go, I’ve made it through, you know?

Meg: So you said at the beginning of our conversation that nothing was off-limits, and… and I’m going to ask you the question, and if you don’t want to answer, or you want it edited out.

Bob: Oh, no, nothing’s… Absolutely.

Meg: Because there are a lot of people who struggle. My degree is in counseling. I know all about looking in the mirror, or not being able to look in the mirror. Was there a catastrophic or catalytic event? Or was that a buildup that, for a period of time. Just… you didn’t want to face yourself. And now…

Bob: Yeah, it was… it was both. I… I’ve always operated out of survival spirit for most of my life. You know, I got kicked out of my house when I was 16 years old, and I’ve been, you know, a street kid. I walked everywhere when I was a kid, and And I learned how to survive on the streets. You know, I’m street smart, as they say. That said, when I got into entrepreneurship and I started building, it played into my favor. I’m a survivor, you know, I push through, I make things happen. It was a strength of mine. But… when you operate out of survival spirit for a really long time, you can get burnout. And so, about 2 years ago, I had a moment where everything felt on tilt, you know? I’ve been married for 16 years to my high school sweetheart, we got married at 19, And 16 years into marriage, I’m running a company that’s a decade old. I had to do my first wave of layoffs back in 2021, 22. You know, first time in 10 years I had to lay off people. I’m experiencing some depression, all these things happening at the same time. My wife and I are trying to decide if we’re gonna stay together, all these things. I have a good friend that lives in Montana. I called him up, and he allowed me to come and stay at his property for 3 months, and I completely got to isolate myself and move off the grid for 3 months, and have a reset in my life. And this was 2 years ago. And, he provided a counselor out there for me to do intensive counseling, and, I started going to AA groups and all kinds of stuff. And the thing my counselor said, he said, the thing that your survival spirit, the thing that… he said, praise God for it. It’s gotten you to where you’re at now. But it’s that same survival spirit that’s gonna keep you from getting to where God wants to take you next in your life. So you have to figure out what are the roots of that survival spirit, and how can you enter into this next season in a more grounded state? And so, coming… like, Montana, if you know me long enough as a friend, you’ll hear me reference Montana. It’s kind of like my BC and AD moment for me. Because it’s the thing that ended up allowing me to realize… I had a moment when I was in Montana that I thought, if I faded away tomorrow. I would be very happy with the life that I’ve lived. I’ve lived a full life. I’ve lived a beautiful. Full life, truly. I’ve lived a lifetime worth of life, you know? But when I got back to San Diego after Montana, and I go, oh my god, I’m still alive, I’m still here, I still have work to do. I’m, like, operating as if somebody had a near-death experience.

Meg: Damn.

Bob: I’m… everything I thought I might lose, I didn’t lose. Including my wife. My wife and I started dating again when I moved back to San Diego, and we ended up back together and chose each other after 16 years, so… It’s one of those things that I… I went through that journey of having to truly hit rock bottom. to realize that moving forward, operating out of a survival spirit was no longer going to be sustainable for the heights that God wants to take me to next. And he called me out into this quote-unquote desert, and he reminded me that I… am a son of God, that I am… it’s not about failure or success moving forward, but it is about doing what He wants me to do while I’m here. And… getting realigned with that mission and that purpose again. So… I, am very… I’m operating out of a lot more gratitude. I’m creating a lot more art and expressing myself in a really authentic way, because I’m reconnected with myself. And working my hardest now at being a better husband and a better friend to the people close to me, and being an entrepreneur and a good leader, with my teams, and Yeah, just trying to now get… contribute to the world what I can, but not feeling the pressure that I have to. And there’s a huge difference.

Meg: Huge, huge difference. Is your art… available… can I view it? Do you have any pictures.

Bob: I’m gonna do the revealing of all my pieces on December 9th, which is my 38th birthday, and I’m gonna do my full solo exhibit here in San Diego. There will be about 15 installations around this warehouse, and then in the middle of the warehouse will be a long table dinner, so everyone that comes to my opening night, I’m gonna set the table, and we’re all gonna break bread together.

Meg: Pick me! Pick me!

Bob: For sure, though, you definitely can.

Meg: That would be quite a reveal. Very exciting. I love the inspiration behind that piece in particular, looking at yourself in the mirror, because a lot of us… don’t, or won’t, or… I’m one of those people that, for whatever reason, has more confidence I don’t have a whole lot of negative self-talk. There’s a little bit that’s in there, but that one of my therapists said to me once, you’re… you’re probably the most well-adjusted, fucked-up person I know.

Bob: Yeah, and, well, that’s the point. That is the point of the duality of the human experience that I’m talking about. It’s like, yes, you’re smart in areas, and yes, like, you’re a fool in areas. Yes, you’re… you know, positive in areas, yes or negative in areas. They’re, like, the complexity of a human is a world of two things existing at the same time, and as soon as we start to believe that one is way more than the other. that’s where we start to get really screwed up in our lives, is we start to believe that we’re way more successful than we are at things we failed at, or we’re way more in recovery than we are addicted at things. Like, it is… it is a… we are holding two things at one time, and my hope is to inspire people that that’s okay, and to embrace that duality of the human experience, and you’re gonna be a better human because of that. You’re gonna have a lot more empathy and gratitude and realistic expectations about where your life is gonna go, if you can have the ability to hold two things at once.

Meg: That’s really insightful, and, for whatever reason, the timing of your message… I just feel like I’ve been to church, Bob, so… been at the altar, and I have, sat in the pew today and listened to your message. It’s… Entirely unexpected how How this interview has played out, and… the things that I didn’t know about you that I now do know about you. I can’t wait to share this with Pete. I’m gonna send it to him unedited, and I got another couple of people I’d like to take a listen to it as well. This has been an absolutely phenomenal, gift for me, and so thank you very much for saying yes and carving out the time for me. to talk about all these topics today. I’m excited to see where local goes. I want to be there for your… art reveal, and, I can’t wait to see what… what is coming next.

Bob: Yeah, thank you. No, thank you so much for having me. I’m so glad our paths crossed in the strangest of ways, and I ended up in the middle of nowhere in Wisconsin two weeks ago at your table. I’m very grateful for that.

Meg: Well, it was phenomenal, and this was even… this was so beyond… I won’t say my expectation, because every interview I do. is unique and unusual, and even if it’s somebody I’ve known for some time, they’re always… we’re storytellers. You, my guess, are storytellers, and so this was, insightful way beyond what I expected today. So, happy Friday to you, and I hope you have a great weekend.

Bob: Yeah, thank you, you too.

Meg: Thank you.

Free Agent Podcast with Meg Schmitz – Guest: Bob Dalton – Founder of LOCL

Meg Schmitz: Hello, everybody, and welcome to, or welcome back to, the Free Agent Podcast. My name is Meg Schmitz, I’m your host. This discussion, this podcast, is all about free agency and taking control over your financial future. The mission of my show is to share inspiring conversations with real people who took the leap into self-employment, business ownership. Financial freedom, and sometimes franchising, but not today. The conversation is for corporate refugees and executives who are tired of their desk job. It’s also for entrepreneurs and investors who are looking to share camaraderie and inspiration through their own business journey. My podcast aims to spotlight on real people who stepped into the unknown, took control over their destiny, and became their own boss, and Bob Dalton is, like, the exemplary person to be a free agent. You are, and have been. Operating… running businesses independently for a long time, and it’s been very inspiring and rewarding to get to know you.

Bob Dalton: Yeah, thank you. Thanks for having me.

Meg: Well, thank you. I’m grateful that when you flew from California to Green Bay, you thought of even checking in with us, and then making the drive to come on down here to visit with Pete and me. It really solidified for us. as potential investors, or mentors, or I don’t know how… I don’t know where this whole relationship is going to go between the three of us, but I wanted to have you on the podcast to talk about You’re mission-driven, initiatives, one inspired by your mom. And then the next one inspired by lack of community… community being disrupted, really, I think, by technology. So, I don’t know where you want to start, because both of those are just so fascinating to me. So. Maybe start chronologically with, when did you feel the urge to become an entrepreneur?

Bob: Yeah, definitely was never planning on being an entrepreneur. I graduated high school and went straight into nonprofit work, because I… I had a pretty life, altering experience, in high school. When a gentleman named Todd Tardy took me under his wing and started mentoring me. And I grew up without a dad, so having his… you know, Todd was the first person that I looked to, and I said, I want to be like that when I’m older. And he was a demonstration of how he served his community, how he loved his family, just how he showed up, and, loved God, and the whole thing. Like, he was the first person I was like, I want to be like him when I’m 40, you know? So when I graduated high school, I moved to a small town in Oregon, and I grew up on the Oregon coast, but I moved to Central Oregon area, the Valley. And, there was no Young Life there, which is a youth ministry organization, so at 19 years old, I was like, I’m gonna start Young Life. And that was my first entrepreneurial journey. That was the first time I said yes to something that I had no idea what I was doing, but I was willing. And I started Young Life and got to see this entire small community transform, because I built a team of leaders, I formed a committee, we started Going into the high school, and… building relationships with kids, which I was basically one of their peers, I was 19. But we got to… we probably had about 100 kids coming to club every week, and getting to build relationships and love on them, and… because of that, we got teachers involved and business owners involved, and so I got to experience starting with absolutely nothing, and stepping out in faith, and getting to see door after door open up, and watch an entire small community transform, And I got to do that from 19 to 24 years old, and so I had experience before I actually started a business with experiencing stepping up, raising my hand, saying that I’m willing, and actually seeing things open up, and me continuing to walk through those doors. So… around 2013, I was around 24 at the time, trying to figure out what I was gonna do after Young Life and that nonprofit. I knew I wanted to speak, I knew I wanted to make an impact in the world, but my mom was really struggling at that time, and she ended up, Really heavily falling into drinking, losing her mother and her brother, you know, who were her pillars in her life. And, she really was just kind of… she was spiraling enough to wanting to start her life over, and so she booked a one-way plane ticket from Oregon to Florida. And thought her aunt would take her in, and she didn’t, and she ended up sleeping on beaches and benches. And it’s not somebody that you would expect would end up living on the streets, or being on the streets. She’s a beautiful woman, she has two college degrees, she raised my sister and I primarily by herself. And for her to end up in that situation changed my entire paradigm of how I view homelessness, because she’s the hardest-working woman that I know. And, it inspired me to call homeless shelters and see what they needed, and they said blankets, and so I bought a sewing machine and a roll of fabric from Joann’s, started making blankets and selling them out of my trunk, and formed a company, an LLC, called Sackcloth and Ashes. Which means mourning and repentance, an ancient, like, biblical… studies, it’s, the whole concept was every time somebody wraps themselves in one of our blankets, every blanket we sell, we donate a blanket to your local homeless shelter, so it represents mourning over the homeless population and repenting by contributing to a homeless shelter in your area. And so that was kind of, like, my next leap of… of… Into the entrepreneur world. But as everyone was kind of looking at me, being like, oh, you’re kind of crazy for starting a blanket company, and what are you doing? And my wife, you know, walking into my house with a roll of fabric and a sewing machine, and my wife and her friend were watching TV, and they’re like, what are you doing? I’m like, I’m starting a blanket company. And they both just laughed, you know? But I… that wasn’t new for me. I had an opportunity to start something with Young Life at 19 years old, and get to experience those nights where I’m like. looking up into the night sky and being like, I have no idea what I’m doing, but I’m willing to step out and move forward in this, because I believe in it, and… So yeah, so I started Sackcloth and Ashes in 2014, and started selling blankets out of my trunk, and it’s still around, I’m still involved, 12 years in. We’ve donated hundreds of thousands of blankets to homeless shelters around the country. And, I grew up with the brand, you know, from 24 years old to now I’m 37. And it’s been an unbelievable journey of lessons and heartache, and my mom found sobriety through that journey. I’ve traveled the world because of the brand, and so it’s been an amazing decade of… of growing as a young man into a man, And all the things that came with it. You know, I’ve been through everything you could go through as a product entrepreneur.

Meg: Alright, so you just filled in some of the blanks for me that now the whole story makes sense for me. I’ve heard bits and pieces of it, as we’ve either met via Zoom or here in person, but that whole, element of 19 to 24… and I… what I love about that And so many adults do this now. They’re afraid to lean into something that they’re passionate about. Oh, I’ve never done that before. Oh, what if I fail? But your youthful intrepidness took you into something. You had tutelage and mentoring from someone who obviously inspired you, but I… what I am so glad that you brought up, and I want people to really embrace this, I don’t care how old you are, is just do it! You don’t know what opportunity is gonna come. Step over the fear, step over the threshold, and just do it.

Bob: Yeah. Yeah, I mean, it’s a really powerful message for anybody that has that prompting to do something, you know? And, I think that, like, I just talked to a good friend of mine named Chuck yesterday, and he’s 75 years old, and he just started… he had a really successful nonprofit organization here in San Diego. And then he started something new 3 years ago, thinking that it was gonna be his mark and his legacy in his own words. And it didn’t work out, and he’s in the process of shutting that down. And we were having this beautiful discussion around how, what if it’s not about the failure or the success of what we do, it’s about the journey and the lessons that we learn along the way and how we grow. And I think that that is a big part of life, and the human experience, is that we’re always holding two things at one time. We’re always succeeding at something, and we’re always failing at something. We’re always wrestling with, addiction, and we’re also in a recovery process. And I think that when you start to embrace the human experience as… it’s both. It’s, I’m going to succeed in certain areas. and I’m gonna fail at certain areas, and that’s okay, because that’s what it means to be human. You start to take a little bit more risk with your life, because you realize that this is what it means to be living, you know?

Meg: Oh.

Bob: So, I admire anybody who’s taken a step of faith and stepping out and doing things, what they feel called to do, you know?

Meg: So, the… if I’m understanding correctly with the blankets, the company sells blankets To people like me, but it’s a one-for-one donation, is that correct?

Bob: Yeah, we sell blankets on our website, sackcloth.com, and we also… 80% of our business and our revenue comes from partnering with companies, so we partner with Financial services, real estate companies. Car dealerships, and they buy our blankets as gifts for their clients or their customers.

Meg: Oh, nice.

Bob: Yeah, and that’s a big part of our business now, is because you have a lot of companies that want to make an impact, and so they partner with us to give a gift and make an impact in their local communities.

Meg: How did you… you were telling Pete, I mean, that you have a connection in Florence for, I think, manufacturing blankets? Yeah.

Bob: Yeah, great.

Meg: place to go.

Bob: It is. It really is. Yeah, the first two… after I got through that first hump of sewing locally. I found a manufacturer in Florence, Italy, and there’s a little town right outside of Florence called Prado, and at one point, they made, I think, 80% of the fabric in the world at one point, and their slogan was, we made the shirt on your back. And, and they were the… they were the best, you know, at making fabric. And, over time, China started taking a lot of production from them, and so you have this fabric community out there, Where they have these massive mills, and you have people that specialize in yarn, and recycled fabric, and jackhard looms, and washing, and all these things. So our blankets actually went through, like, an 8-step process, from scraps of fabric, scraps of recycled fabric. All the way to the point of making the product and the fabric, and then… So we’ve gotten to go over there and actually meet all the families that are involved in making the fabric itself. Once the fabric is made, it gets shipped to our production in Oregon, where we cut, sew, label, polybag, and ship all of our products. But as of last month, we just launched our first American-made product, and so now we are bringing a lot of our production into the United States, which we’re excited about, cuts the lead time from 4 months to 4 weeks, and it’s gonna give us a lot more flexibility to work with artists. But we deeply love our relationship with the Italians, and always enjoy our trips over there.

Meg: I need to get one of the blankets that comes from Florence before… They’re all gone unless they’re all gone.

Bob: Oh, no, I’ll send you one.

Meg: that’s my, one… I won’t say regret. Pete and I were just in Florence for about 10 days, and I went with the purpose of just take it all in. Treat this whole… city as an art and history and literature experience, and don’t look at it from, oh, you’re in the leather capital, you’re in the… it’s so easy to get caught up in the buying things instead of taking it all really absorbing. that was a huge… that trip made a huge impact on me. Have you been to China, by the way?

Bob: I haven’t yet. I haven’t been to China, and I really want to go to Japan, but everybody wants to go to Japan, you know?

Meg: Well, yeah, so that’s another story for another time. Okay, so this is also making more sense to me, how your next endeavor, local. came to be. So talk about… that was so great when you were here and sitting in our kitchen and talking about the Socratic method and engagement of humans on a very real level. Now I understand better where this is… where the germination of the idea came from. So for the audience, go ahead and talk about local.

Bob: Yeah, so as I was traveling the country for sackcloth and doing blanket drops, that’s why I was in Green Bay prior to meeting with you, was I was doing a blanket drop at the homeless shelter there. And so I do them still every once in a while, where we actually pass out blankets in person at shelters. And through that journey, I got to go to, like, 60 cities in the U.S. and meet with some of the best grassroots leaders that are showing up every day. serving their communities. And as I started getting to know these people, they’re brilliant. Like, they’re creating true solutions to solve some of society’s biggest problems. And I saw that… doing it boots on the ground and approaching issues on a local level was far more strategic and effective than trying to go a top-down strategy to solving massive problems that we’re dealing with. So that’s why we see billions of dollars being invested into trying to help and serve the homeless population, and the numbers are continuing to go up, it’s because the local solutions are actually struggling, because we’re supporting the more international and national organizations. And so… and on top of that, like. most of the media is discussing the issues of society, they’re not discussing the solutions, and so I started to be like, I want to use my platform to highlight local solutions, and what’s working. And so I started bringing a microphone and, and and a videographer with me into all my trips, and I started recording my interviews with all these people, and it was… I felt like a journalist. But through that journey, I became convinced if we’re gonna see real change happen long-term that’s actually sustainable, it has to be done on a local level. And so I started… I started crafting my keynote messages around that. I started writing a lot around the philosophy of localism, and really wanting to figure out what is my role in helping integrate localism back into modern society. I’ve always been a fan of communication, mass communication, and messages that are being, promoted out to society that’s help… that’s shaping society. A lot of society’s perception and the way they live is… is altered based off of the information that’s being communicated to them, and that… I’m really passionate about that because we can make a lot of change if we can get involved in how things are being communicated to the public. And so, I started studying the local digital landscape and how information was being, shared, and also how communication was being done. And to my surprise, there really wasn’t a lot. I hopped on the Nextdoor app. Studied WhatsApp, I studied Meetup and Eventbrite, and from a local digital infrastructure, there wasn’t a strong enough plan or strategy or technology that I felt like was actually going to move the needle from a massive societal standpoint. And societies live and die on communication. Like, if we can’t communicate and understand what is going on around us, that’s a really big problem for the future of society. And so, I designed out an app called Local, and spelled L-O-C-L, and I brought it to my buddy Andy Ballister, who founded GoFundMe. And he lives here in San Diego, and him and I had been friends for a couple years, doing coffee together and meeting up, and he was familiar with the work I was doing with Sackcloth. So, we were just meeting up, catching up most of the time, and I brought this idea to him. I’m like, hey, you’re the most successful tech entrepreneur I’ve ever met. what are your thoughts on this? Like, I think I’m gonna start a local social network and really… trying to move the needle here on local community and events and commerce, being on the same platform. And he was like, we absolutely need this, and I’ll give you your first $100,000, and I’ll personally advise you. So that was a big moment for me, and just like any entrepreneur in their journey, it’s kind of like, you start with an idea and a concept, you gotta work out that idea, you know, tangibly. What is it gonna look like? What is the business plan and the executive plan? And then you can start bringing around and kind of getting feedback and thoughts from folks, and you never know where support could potentially come from. And he backed me, right out the gate, and I was really grateful for that. because it was more than just about receiving the money, it was about getting support from somebody that truly had built a multi-billion dollar company that was globally known. And to get his affirmation in that was a really big energy shift for me, and I was really grateful for that, and I’ll always look forward to that. So, I started to develop the app. I formed a really good team of people. my three biggest strengths as a leader is I can… I can craft an amazing team, and I can recruit anybody. And so, one of the first people that I talked to was the head… one of the head software engineers for Snapchat. And, he lives in Utah. And I said, hey, can I fly out and meet with you? I, I think I’m gonna work on crafting what the next major social network is gonna be. And, And so I flew out and met with him, and he said, I’m in. I’ll develop the infrastructure for you. And so he built the entire foundation of Local for me on Flutter, and it was a… that was another massive win for us, because, you know, we developed with a lot of framework in mind in the early stages of this thing. We don’t have to rebuild this down the road. So the concept of local is you can create or join any digital community, or find events in your local area. really seamlessly on one platform. And as a community builder and event host myself, I host a lot of events, I build community here in San Diego, I’m using these other tools, technological tools, and I can see where all of them are falling short, and I get to craft local based on what I personally need as a local builder. And so, it’s been an 18-month journey of building and building the MVP, testing it out, getting people on the product, figuring out what they want. And we’re about less than 30 days away from kind of relaunching, the app with the knowledge of all the feedback that we’ve gotten from over 3,000 community builders. And so, we’re in a great, fun season, you know? We’re building, but the thing that I… have learned with Sackcloth, and that I’ve learned about myself, is I’m in this for the next decade, you know? When I commit to something, I’m in it for the long run. And, one of my competitors, who just started a, event community app, here in San Diego. We text back and forth, we’re buddies, and I was joking with them the other day, I said, hey, I’m launching events here in 30 days, and just want to let you know, you know, enjoy the rest of your time. The only chance that you really have to compete is I need you to change the name of your company, it’s not good enough, and and you’re gonna have to make these changes to your product, you know, and… but I share that laughingly, because it’s not about what product we make or technology we make now, anybody’s gonna be able to make whatever technology they want here soon, very quickly. It comes down to how… how do you brand your organization? What is the philosophy of your organization? Why are you doing it?

Meg: Yeah.

Bob: what is your marketing strategy, and what is your monetization strategy? So, when you look at two technologies on face value, or two products, where you’re like, oh my god, they’re a competitor, and you start distressed out, you gotta understand that for the long run, there’s way deeper roots that happen that, as a seasoned entrepreneur now, I look at and I can laugh with my competitors, because I know that I’m gonna have the stomach to… weather the storms more than them over the next decade, and see this thing through. So, so I’m excited to get into tech, and I think that the decisions that we make in tech in the next two years are going to shape generations to come. I really believe that. And so, I’m enlisting in tech, is what it feels like. I don’t need to be involved in tech, I don’t need another company. But I believe that we need really quality people that are getting involved in technology and actually crafting technology for the future of humanity. And so I feel like it’s, like, my… my contribution and service. Like, I’m doing this because I really think… I couldn’t just sit on my hands and watch where Zuckerberg and Elon were gonna take some of these companies, I wanted to make sure that we had at least a few options that are making decisions on behalf of the people, and not just making decisions on behalf of corporations. So, and I love it. I’m a design nerd, and… I’m a social designer.

Meg: You are a social designer. The… and so, for people who are looking, because I talked to a gal yesterday, and if she hasn’t connected with you directly, I’ll… her name is Emmy, I’ll connect the two of you. She’s in Appleton, so right outside of Green Bay. Very similar… Sociological… desires, and so I think the two of you will have some synergies for talking, but right now, Local, the app, is… Is this correct that it’s San Diego-based, but you’ve also launched it in Green Bay?

Bob: Yeah, pretty much anywhere in the world, you can actually download the app. You can visit local.com, L-O-C-L.com.

Meg: Okay.

Bob: you don’t even need an account, you can browse around different communities that are on the platform. We just launched the desktop browser version recently, and we needed that before we launched events.

Meg: Okay, so when the three of us were meeting here, you were talking to Pete and me about events in San Diego. I believe you’ve had one already, where you you wanted to bring together top leadership. I just let you talk about the event, and then what the future looks like. Because that was truly inspiring for Pete and me to hear how effective you’ve been at bringing top leadership together on a local level.

Bob: Yeah, I mean, so I’ve been in San Diego now for 8 years or so, and I came across a photo probably, like, 6 months ago. It was a photo on LinkedIn where 3,000 people got together for a shared meal around a mile-long table, and it looked revolutionary. I reached out to the guy, I’m like, his name’s Tim Jones, and I was like, what is this, you know? And he was like, oh, you know, I have a non-profit called Longer Tables, and… we just brought together 3,000 people in Littleton, Colorado, right outside of Denver, and I was like, I need to meet with you. So I flew out, like, a day or two later and met… had dinner with them. And, got to learn more about the work, and I was like, I want to do this in San Diego. Like, this is absolutely unbelievable, and San Diego’s ready for it. San Diego, as… I’ve been to a lot of cities, San Diego is a blank canvas right now. We have yet to set the bar on doing anything monumental from an event standpoint. And the city’s in a little bit of a limbo right now. We just cut the arts budget, which a lot of people are really disappointed in. Leadership is in limbo. Leadership is in transition right now. There’s so many things that are kind of, like, negatively being talked about about San Diego being a local here. And that’s uncalled for. We’re one of the biggest cities in the United States, we have some of the most resources, we live in one of the most beautiful places in the world. There is no reason why we should be at odds at all, and we should be setting the table for as many people as we possibly can to bring our people together. And so I came back to San Diego, we crafted a small team of people. And, we did our first long table dinner about 2 months ago in March, where we brought together 120 of the top leaders around the region. For a shared meal, and I shared the vision that night. What you experienced on a micro level this evening, we are going to do on a macro level later this fall. We are going to bring together 3,000 people around a mile-long table here in San Diego. And so, our next table is going to be in July with 500 people. I’m in the tail end negotiations with where that’s gonna be right now. I’m pretty pretty pissed that it’s not done yet, but we’re… we’re, it’s close, and we have a great backup plan. If we… if we don’t do it at the location that we want here in summer, got a great backup plan, and then in fall, we’re gonna be doing the 3,000-person dinner at Waterfront Park in downtown San Diego, and So it’s a… it’s, to me, it’s art. And, it’s this beautiful portrayal and symbol of uniting our city, it’s about the relationships and the connection that are made along the way of creating it. There’s so many people that I’ve met. That I never probably would have met if it wasn’t for the table. So, I’m looking at it from a holistic standpoint, and it… the… ROI on this is unbelievable, you know, from a relational standpoint. And I’m glad that my journey has led me to the table. Truly.

Meg: my brain is going crazy with logistics on this, how you… how you… and that’s a different topic for another time. The… The conversations that people had At the first event. Were people able to… logistics, were they able to move around and talk to other people?

Bob: Yeah, so when they got there, we handed them a mocktail, and they were able to connect, kind of like what your normal standing… standard networking night looks like. Everyone’s kind of walking around, seeing each other. A lot of people knew each other that evening. Because that one was invite-only, and we were very specific on making sure every region, industry, and ethnicity was represented at that first table. And then we opened up the walls at the restaurant that generously allowed us to be at, and we revealed the table, and everyone literally was coming up to me being like, oh my… I didn’t even know we were gonna do this. I thought we were just doing the networking thing, and that… that was good, you know? So they come into this beautiful experience, and we had their names on the plates and everything, like, we really curated this beautiful experience with intention. They all sit down. Our two main rules for the evening is you can’t be on your phone and you can’t talk about work. And we have prompts at the table, like. What was a meal that you had in your childhood that… meant something to you, or what is a memory that you think about often that makes you smile? And so, you’re getting to know these 5, 6 people around you at the table, and you don’t even know that this person couldn’t be the… we had the DA there that night, you know, so it’s like, you don’t know who you’re talking to. And that was the beauty of it. Like, I still don’t personally know the people that I actually sat with. what they do, but at the end of the evening, when they were leaving, we, like, hugged, and we’re like, we… I love you, you know? So, there was this beautiful… it was just… that’s the thing, it’s a social experiment in some regard. Like, we’re getting to know each other on a human level, and we’re not talking about what we do. And so, that was… and I gave a blanket, sackcloth blanket, to everyone who attended as they were leaving, so it was this kind of, like, beautiful moment of, like, they’re like, I don’t even… like, I got invited to this thing, and I didn’t even have any clue that this was gonna happen, and now they’re getting handed a blanket, like… the whole experience, they all absolutely walked away, and they’re like, literally anything that you do moving forward, like, I’m in, you know? And so that was, like, what we needed. We can’t… we can’t pull 3,000-person dinner off without getting the affirmation and the support from the top leaders in the city. And so, yeah, so that was when we were like, okay, we posted it online, it got over 100,000 impressions in San Diego, so every… basically everyone on LinkedIn in San Diego was circling and, you know, knew about it. And that’s when we were like, holy smokes, like. this is gonna be vague. This is gonna be really big. And… and so that’s where… that’s what makes it fun. Like, we’re… we’re gonna… potentially shift the energy of the city to being like, yes, I’m proud of this city, I’m proud of what we’re doing together, and out of that energy can come so many beautiful things, and so that’s what I’m very, very excited about, this whole… You know, and I get to use local and in different areas, and so people are always like, oh, what’s your plan with local? How are you gonna market in? So I’m like, I’m going to demonstrate what it means to build real community. And then use the product and be able to… I’m not gonna go around promoting, hey, download my app, you know? Like, that’s cheesy. I want to do this in an authentic way, where I actually show people, like, it really is about organizing online and gathering offline. That is the goal.

Meg: Mmm. So, there’s Madison, Milwaukee… I could… markets that are right here that I could touch. It seems like… there’s a pocket, it seems like there’s a sweet spot, I think, is what the word that’s coming to mind, for some of these cities that, like you’re talking about with San Diego, has a great reputation, everyone knows about the weather, you’ve got a great zoo, but when you live local. then you know what’s actually happening with homelessness and drug addiction and some of the other undercurrents that no one really wants to talk about, and getting leadership…

Bob: the arts.

Meg: getting… oh my gosh, we have such a robust community here. That’s one thing that you and I… I didn’t even know about your artistic leanings until right before we started to talk, and I don’t want you to talk about that. I can see so easily how… Pete and I can help with local, To bring it here. for the benefit of even a town as small as Whitewater, or bigger, like Milwaukee or Madison, Is… do you have something similar happening in Green Bay yet?

Bob: Yeah, so Green Bay, I was actually in Green Bay when I launched the app.

Meg: Okay, I thought there was a tie there.

Bob: Yeah, yeah, and just basically, I just love Green Bay. Green Bay’s not… it doesn’t take that long to get to know all the key stakeholders. And so I got to know them all. I’ve… I’ve shared at the, you know, to all the nonprofit leaders, I’ve spoken at the largest church there, So, like, I got a lot of good friends there, and so… Green Bay was a monumental part, I’ll say this, there’s not, like, a lot of active people in Green Bay right now, because a lot of them demanded events on the platform, and we have yet to launch events on the platform until next month.

Meg: Okay.

Bob: So a lot of them are just waiting for events to get onto the platform so they can use it for both their community and their events. But they were monumental in our beta test. Like, I had enough leaders in Green Bay get on the app, create communities, beta test it out, give me the feedback, enough for me to be like, okay, I know what we need to do. And yeah, so, like, Green… that’s what I love about Green Bay, is, like, you get the key stakeholders on a product, and now it’s fully adopted by the city. And I don’t think, like, Green Bay’s gonna be that hard, but it’s been a journey to, like, go through the true MVP process. Crafted product that people actually need. and be able to bring it back to them and say, okay, I did everything that you said you needed to be done, now let’s partner together. And so… when I was in Green Bay this last trip, I had one community builder that I met with, they’re like, can I go into an exclusive deal with you, sign with local, and I’m going to exclusively use local for my community and my events? And so, that was interesting. That was the first time a community builder had pitched me exclusivity, and that kind of got me thinking, like, building a community network of people that I’m actually signing for exclusive partnerships with this thing, and I think we could sign a lot. So, that’s the power of Green Bay, they get it. They know… they know community.

Meg: And we’ve got a saying here, but Milwaukee is small walkie. Small enough community that people… Chicago? No, not so much. It’s too big and gangly and too many other moving parts, but it seems to me, and Pete and I were talking about the sweet spot of different cities, even around Wisconsin.

Bob: Where…

Meg: Hopefully, word of mouth. and I’ve got listeners that are all over the place, they’re not just specific to Wisconsin here. So I’m hoping that people will listen to this and want to adopt this app and this platform and this mindset, really. I was so glad to read recently California schools are eliminating, prohibiting, reducing the amount of time that students can have access to their phones. It’s just… I’m not sure, Bob, if I said this to you, but in my portfolio of franchise companies, the fastest-selling brand, I think, ever that we represented was a mental health concept. And it launched pre-pandemic. It was a pandemic that highlighted for everybody that mental illness, drug addiction, alcohol, everything is in every corner of every community.

Bob: 100%.

Meg: we isolate people, and that’s what our little devices do. They isolate your brain and your eyes from engaging in the real world. It’s going to continue to be a bigger problem, so Pete and I… Very clearly understand your mission and your purpose and how effective we hope it will become as you grow.

Bob: Yeah, no, thank you. I think it… I think local is a bit ahead of its time. I think that we have… I think we’re two years ahead of our time, actually, so we’re in a good… good space to innovate. I think we’re gonna see a massive shift back to local economics in a very strong way, as millions of people get laid off. they’re gonna start asking the question, what can I make with my hands, and what services can I provide to the people around me? And we don’t have the digital infrastructure that’s set up for that yet, and that’s one thing that I’m really focused on and working hard to get done, because Local’s not just gonna be like, oh, it’s fun to communicate with my friends locally, or figure out what events are happening around me, which are legitimate needs. But it’s gonna… you’re gonna be able to launch successfully a community and a business through Local. where it’s going to end up saving a lot of people economically. And I think that that’s where, like, my… I’m looking at this from a… decade standpoint, and I want to help shape the future of local economics, and… I think that’s where I’m gonna be able to make the most impact, if I’m honest. it’s kind of like a legacy project for me, you know? And I can see it super clearly. Like, it’s one of those things that feels prophetic. And I can see where things are going, and it’s scary with… where society is heading, but I’m very optimistic that we have a window of time to innovate products and technology that’s going to service millions of people that are going to be affected in a negative way, but it’s going to set them up for the future in a really positive way. So, I’m still very optimistic. Surprisingly.

Meg: Well, that’s probably because you’re a faith-based person who is well-grounded and has lived through adversity, as well as… it’s, you know, if you don’t like today, wait till tomorrow. And if you love today, wait till tomorrow, because that’ll be different, too.

Bob: You’re a guy.

Meg: Who embraces the… embraces the change and the opportunity to help people Connect, truly, at a base level, connect.

Bob: Yeah, thank you. Well, one of my, I was telling you right before the call, I’m getting in… I’m gonna be doing my first art show, and one of my pieces… I’m a conceptual artist, so I create pieces, physical objects, that communicate messages out to people, you know? And… one of the pieces that I’m gonna have in my exhibit later this year is… I was just looking at myself in the mirror two weeks ago. And I was thinking, man, that’s awesome, like, I’m able to look at myself in the mirror again. I’ve been going through a two-year process of getting back to being able to look at myself in the mirror. And so I took a marker, and I wrote on the mirror, look how far you’ve come. and I took a photo of myself in the mirror, and so one of my pieces in my exhibit will be this giant mirror, and I’m gonna spray paint, look how far you’ve come, where people can take a photo of themselves, because… As you just said, like. tomorrow will come, you know, it’s like, we… when we look in the mirror, we often are looking at the flaws and the failures and the sufferings and the things we’re going through right now, but we don’t often look in the mirror and think, man, look how far I’ve come. You know, look how much I’ve been through. And I think that that is a really simple change of perspective for a lot of people that have something to be proud about. Something that they can look at themselves and go, I’ve made it through, you know?

Meg: So you said at the beginning of our conversation that nothing was off-limits, and… and I’m going to ask you the question, and if you don’t want to answer, or you want it edited out.

Bob: Oh, no, nothing’s… Absolutely.

Meg: Because there are a lot of people who struggle. My degree is in counseling. I know all about looking in the mirror, or not being able to look in the mirror. Was there a catastrophic or catalytic event? Or was that a buildup that, for a period of time. Just… you didn’t want to face yourself. And now…

Bob: Yeah, it was… it was both. I… I’ve always operated out of survival spirit for most of my life. You know, I got kicked out of my house when I was 16 years old, and I’ve been, you know, a street kid. I walked everywhere when I was a kid, and And I learned how to survive on the streets. You know, I’m street smart, as they say. That said, when I got into entrepreneurship and I started building, it played into my favor. I’m a survivor, you know, I push through, I make things happen. It was a strength of mine. But… when you operate out of survival spirit for a really long time, you can get burnout. And so, about 2 years ago, I had a moment where everything felt on tilt, you know? I’ve been married for 16 years to my high school sweetheart, we got married at 19, And 16 years into marriage, I’m running a company that’s a decade old. I had to do my first wave of layoffs back in 2021, 22. You know, first time in 10 years I had to lay off people. I’m experiencing some depression, all these things happening at the same time. My wife and I are trying to decide if we’re gonna stay together, all these things. I have a good friend that lives in Montana. I called him up, and he allowed me to come and stay at his property for 3 months, and I completely got to isolate myself and move off the grid for 3 months, and have a reset in my life. And this was 2 years ago. And, he provided a counselor out there for me to do intensive counseling, and, I started going to AA groups and all kinds of stuff. And the thing my counselor said, he said, the thing that your survival spirit, the thing that… he said, praise God for it. It’s gotten you to where you’re at now. But it’s that same survival spirit that’s gonna keep you from getting to where God wants to take you next in your life. So you have to figure out what are the roots of that survival spirit, and how can you enter into this next season in a more grounded state? And so, coming… like, Montana, if you know me long enough as a friend, you’ll hear me reference Montana. It’s kind of like my BC and AD moment for me. Because it’s the thing that ended up allowing me to realize… I had a moment when I was in Montana that I thought, if I faded away tomorrow. I would be very happy with the life that I’ve lived. I’ve lived a full life. I’ve lived a beautiful. Full life, truly. I’ve lived a lifetime worth of life, you know? But when I got back to San Diego after Montana, and I go, oh my god, I’m still alive, I’m still here, I still have work to do. I’m, like, operating as if somebody had a near-death experience.

Meg: Damn.

Bob: I’m… everything I thought I might lose, I didn’t lose. Including my wife. My wife and I started dating again when I moved back to San Diego, and we ended up back together and chose each other after 16 years, so… It’s one of those things that I… I went through that journey of having to truly hit rock bottom. to realize that moving forward, operating out of a survival spirit was no longer going to be sustainable for the heights that God wants to take me to next. And he called me out into this quote-unquote desert, and he reminded me that I… am a son of God, that I am… it’s not about failure or success moving forward, but it is about doing what He wants me to do while I’m here. And… getting realigned with that mission and that purpose again. So… I, am very… I’m operating out of a lot more gratitude. I’m creating a lot more art and expressing myself in a really authentic way, because I’m reconnected with myself. And working my hardest now at being a better husband and a better friend to the people close to me, and being an entrepreneur and a good leader, with my teams, and Yeah, just trying to now get… contribute to the world what I can, but not feeling the pressure that I have to. And there’s a huge difference.

Meg: Huge, huge difference. Is your art… available… can I view it? Do you have any pictures.

Bob: I’m gonna do the revealing of all my pieces on December 9th, which is my 38th birthday, and I’m gonna do my full solo exhibit here in San Diego. There will be about 15 installations around this warehouse, and then in the middle of the warehouse will be a long table dinner, so everyone that comes to my opening night, I’m gonna set the table, and we’re all gonna break bread together.

Meg: Pick me! Pick me!

Bob: For sure, though, you definitely can.

Meg: That would be quite a reveal. Very exciting. I love the inspiration behind that piece in particular, looking at yourself in the mirror, because a lot of us… don’t, or won’t, or… I’m one of those people that, for whatever reason, has more confidence I don’t have a whole lot of negative self-talk. There’s a little bit that’s in there, but that one of my therapists said to me once, you’re… you’re probably the most well-adjusted, fucked-up person I know.

Bob: Yeah, and, well, that’s the point. That is the point of the duality of the human experience that I’m talking about. It’s like, yes, you’re smart in areas, and yes, like, you’re a fool in areas. Yes, you’re… you know, positive in areas, yes or negative in areas. They’re, like, the complexity of a human is a world of two things existing at the same time, and as soon as we start to believe that one is way more than the other. that’s where we start to get really screwed up in our lives, is we start to believe that we’re way more successful than we are at things we failed at, or we’re way more in recovery than we are addicted at things. Like, it is… it is a… we are holding two things at one time, and my hope is to inspire people that that’s okay, and to embrace that duality of the human experience, and you’re gonna be a better human because of that. You’re gonna have a lot more empathy and gratitude and realistic expectations about where your life is gonna go, if you can have the ability to hold two things at once.

Meg: That’s really insightful, and, for whatever reason, the timing of your message… I just feel like I’ve been to church, Bob, so… been at the altar, and I have, sat in the pew today and listened to your message. It’s… Entirely unexpected how How this interview has played out, and… the things that I didn’t know about you that I now do know about you. I can’t wait to share this with Pete. I’m gonna send it to him unedited, and I got another couple of people I’d like to take a listen to it as well. This has been an absolutely phenomenal, gift for me, and so thank you very much for saying yes and carving out the time for me. to talk about all these topics today. I’m excited to see where local goes. I want to be there for your… art reveal, and, I can’t wait to see what… what is coming next.

Bob: Yeah, thank you. No, thank you so much for having me. I’m so glad our paths crossed in the strangest of ways, and I ended up in the middle of nowhere in Wisconsin two weeks ago at your table. I’m very grateful for that.

Meg: Well, it was phenomenal, and this was even… this was so beyond… I won’t say my expectation, because every interview I do. is unique and unusual, and even if it’s somebody I’ve known for some time, they’re always… we’re storytellers. You, my guess, are storytellers, and so this was, insightful way beyond what I expected today. So, happy Friday to you, and I hope you have a great weekend.

Bob: Yeah, thank you, you too.

Meg: Thank you.

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