030 | Jason Young | Ballistic With Benjamin

Welcome to Commerce Famous, the biweekly podcast all about ecommerce and retail. In each episode, your host, Ben Marks, cuts through the clutter and takes you straight to the stories and experiences of those who shaped digital commerce as we know it today. While their names and faces might not be recognized on the street, each of Ben's guests are famous for commerce or commerce famous. Without further ado, your host, Ben Marks. Hey, everyone.

Welcome to Commerce Famous. I'm your host, Ben Marks. With me today is founder of Ballistic Agency, Jason Young. Jason, welcome welcome to the podcast now. It's really fascinating for me to have, to have you on as a guest because I think this is, you know, I've been familiar with the shot space.

I have family that's worked, you know, worked in the industry over the years. And, but I've yet to have a guest on who knows the space in detail. How are you doing? I'm doing well, Ben. Thanks you thank you so much for having me on today.

I'm happy to happy to connect with you and tell you a little bit more about who we are and what we do. And, I'm an open book, man. Well, speaking of of of open books, we can go all the way back, to the, you know, the at least the chapters that start on LinkedIn for me. You have, like, you know, you're not alone as a guest on this podcast, having, somewhat indirect path into the world of e commerce. But, as I was telling you just a few minutes ago, you're the first person I think I've had on who actually went to seminary and has their master of divinity.

Now that that right there is is is an interesting start. I mean, how did you how did you jump from how did you go from from that and then also be in the the the technology world at the same time? Well, it's interesting. It's a long story, but I'll try to keep it brief. But I'm actually three classes why here in just a minute.

Oh, nice. So, yeah. I I I went to college. I was a musician, got a music scholarship to college, and, that was actually church music is is my undergrad. And so I've always been I was raised in the church, always, wanted to contribute to the church and just what it does for the community.

And so I I went into church music in, let's see, 2001. Graduated undergrad, got married in December 2001, and then we immediately went to seminary, which is where my father-in-law was. He was a professor. And, so we had an easy transition down to New Orleans. And, the whole time in in college, I did internships and part time jobs, in IT, web design, computer repair, networking, that kind of thing.

And so when I was I was still in college, and I was getting to work at places like Honda and, you know, some of their manufacturing facilities, which really opened my eyes to the IT world. And so that that continued when I went to seminary. So I wanted to go into church planting and nonprofit leadership, and that's, you know, that's the entrepreneurial piece in me and that's where a lot of that came from was just learning how to run a church, a nonprofit, an organization, lead people, put together systems and processes for, making an organization successful And then, you know, the outreach and marketing piece of it all. It's all very entrepreneurial, and that was very attractive to me. We started a church down in New Orleans, which is a very Catholic area, but we started a Baptist, network of house churches, which was phenomenally successful in the eleven months that we were able to run it until Hurricane Katrina happened and washed us completely out of New Orleans.

So our neighborhood took about ten or 11 feet of water. I did not get to complete my degree. I was that close, but we had a six week old baby at the time, and I was like, you know what? I think it's probably time to relocate. Wow.

And so I was I was still in IT. I had worked in IT at the seminary, and managing their network. You know, it wasn't a huge network, but maybe 25 or 30 servers and, you know, hundreds of workstations, but, you know, switches, routers, that kind of thing. All of that fell under my purview. But, it seems like no matter where I went and after Katrina when I got another job in IT, web design always seemed to fall in my lap, and I don't know why.

I guess because I was one of the younger guys on the on the team, they figured I knew, they they figured I knew websites and web design and HTML and all that stuff, which I did not, but I was a quick learner. So that's kinda how I got my start in web design. Well, this all this all sounds strangely familiar. I mean, for and for the for the kids listening, you know, the the the early two thousands were a time where, yeah. I mean, I think if you had any kind of entrepreneurial inclination, it was there was plenty of opportunity, right, to get involved in tech in general.

And then, of course, the web, you know, dovetailed, nicely with that. And there were all sorts of problems that needed to be solved, and those problems are all really well solved these days. Right? So, you know, we could we'd be getting a domain and setting it up and and all the programming that goes into building something. This is all highly commodified experience.

Back then, it was kind of the wild west. That's exactly right. And but I think it was it was great proving ground, to set people up to build, what they would eventually what they would eventually build. And you, being an avid, avid sports sportsman shooter, you found your way into the agency side of things. Right?

And you saw if I if I what I've what I've seen is is, if my interpretation of what I've seen is correct is that you you parlayed some of this this early experience into providing services for, you know, for a pretty important, commercially important segment in in The US. And, you know, and the problems the the problems, challenges, opportunities around that are, you know, are are specific. What can you tell me? What was the what was that moment when you when you realized, like, hey, I'm gonna do I'm gonna take my my experience and I'm I'm gonna start an agency, but I'm gonna focus on this, around this vertical. What what what was what was the decision making process there?

Well, it was all very selfish, and I'll tell you a little bit more about that. So that's three and a half in o five, continued working in IT, up until o eight. And then at eight in the economic downturn I lost my job. So I looked at my wife, I looked at my little kids, and I was like, well, we can't be any more poor than I am now. I might as well give a run, at starting my own business.

I had been doing some freelance work, up until that point, and all of that was successful, and I I really had a good feel for it all. But it turned out to be a a fantastic time where I really just thought, and I can I can pinpoint the exact place in Greenville, South Carolina I was? I was right right by the river in, in Falls Park. The, the Reedy. The Reedy River.

Yeah. Yeah. Right by the Reedy River, where I was just contemplating, what do I really wanna build? And it was at that point I decided somewhat selfishly that if, you know, I've been a sportsman, a shooter, my dad got me started shooting when I was five years old. I decided, hey, if I'm gonna do this I want to I want to be able to, to have a marketing expense that includes guns, ammo, shooting competitions, hunting trips, you know, that kind of thing.

Networking. Yes. Networking. That's exactly right. But I've met so many It turned out to be a great thing because I've met so many wonderful people on the shooting range or at competitions or, you know, at at different trade shows related to this.

And I came in the I can come in the door and immediately talk guns. I already know your product because I've I'm just a sponge for gun knowledge and, brands and and the people in our space. But, yeah, it was it was kind of a selfish, desire to want to to to more easily go hunting and shooting and, and be in the outdoors, as part of my job. Commerce famous is proudly presented by Shopware, the leading open source ecommerce platform for mid market and lower enterprise merchants. More than 50,000 clients already process over $25,000,000,000 in annual GMV through Shopware.

Find out more about Shopware and the best value in e commerce at shopware.com. Yep. Yep. Well, and and, you know, folks, if you again, this this you know, there's a there's a a worldwide audience for for Commerce Famous. So it probably is worth mentioning that, you know, when you go to some of these industry trade shows, around this business, I mean, this is, you know, this is a a substantial business in in The US.

I mean, how big is SHOT Show? I mean, it's it's several tens of thousands of people. This happens out in, in Vegas every year. Yeah. I think, every year, they draw somewhere between sixty and seventy thousand people, to to the last days.

It's a pretty sizable shift. Yeah. It it's I mean, it it's truly it's truly amazing, that, you know, that this this business, you know, confounded in in, found it's it's founded in the foundation of of The US itself. But it is not, it is not afforded the same level of convenience, that other industries are. You know, that's probably something worth talking about.

And and and I'll I'll put out there just my my limited knowledge, and I'll let you just really run with it since you're the since since you've been in it, for for, you know, fifteen years now. You know, it can be it can be a challenge. If you are if you are, a seller of, firearms, if you are a manufacturer of things that are related to firearms, that could be ammo, that can be accessories, anything else, you really have, you already have a limited set of options in terms of the platforms that you can choose, in terms of the the the various, the various entities that facilitate payments, whether that's, you know, it's your gateway, that's your processor, that's your bank. There are, you know, this this industry, is associated with, you know, risk profiles that, that mean, yeah, that you have to you you really have to work a little bit harder to be in this business, I think, than to be in, let's say, fashion. What are the what are the what are the things that you bring to the table, with Ballistic that, that help facilitate help help smooth out some of those some of those rough edges and make sure that your, you know, that your customers get a high standard of, high level of service and, and probably, I guess, just making sure that they are able to to stay in business and transact on the long term.

Right. Yeah. One of the most, value driven things that we do, I think, is, is really being that connector piece, between our clients and the and the tech providers, that are really friendly towards our industry, that understand our industry, and making and building a a platform and then a tech a marketing tech stack on top of that that is all complimentary. They're cool with our industry, basically, and and just putting the right people together and the right systems together that are gonna work. Because like you said, we, you know, this industry is, frowned upon by a lot of tech companies.

They just don't wanna touch it. They think it's radioactive. They put us in the same category as sex, hate, alcohol, tobacco, CBD, all that kind of stuff. When they forget this is a constitutionally protected right, and there are millions and millions and millions of gun owners, in this country. And, you know, some people just don't wanna deal with our industry.

That's fine, as long as we can accomplish what we need to. Thankfully, like what you said earlier, you know, in in the in the in the beginning, in the early two thousands, there weren't a lot of options. But today, we have tons of options. You can't shake a tree without a bunch of SaaS platforms falling out of it. It, and so, we're in a in in the golden era, I think, of e commerce in the gun industry, because, you know, and one of the things that we have to we have to fight, is the perception of our industry as well.

It's, you know, you say e commerce for guns. People don't understand. Our clients are not shipping guns to people's houses. You still have to FFL. FFL exists.

You have to ship the gun to a federally firearms, federally licensed firearms dealer, and that's where you do the FBI, background check and all of that kind of stuff. And it's Yeah. It is one of the safest, industries in that every major purchase every purchase of a gun goes through a background check. So I don't know how you could be much more safe about that. So Yeah.

You know, it's it's it's the Wild West. It used to be the Wild West. Things have have come a long way. We've got so much order and, thankfully, fantastic tech partners that are are really helping us, bring the gun industry into the modern era of commerce. Well and and, you know, I know historically, in The US, the the, you know, the I think the, well, the SaaS provider of choice of Shopify just completely begged off, not not just of the firearms category, firearms ammunition, but also I think it's it's difficult or even impossible to sell to to how to operate an accessories store, like firearms accessory store on Shopify.

I mean, and that's, you know, and that is a choice that they have made, as a as a as a business. So nothing it's not a value statement at all, but just, you know, Shopify being one of the, you know, one of the main choices for platform here in The US. BigCommerce has has really stepped in and I know is the is the, provider or platform of choice for a lot of businesses in this industry. Although, you know, as I with with and and, you know, Brett Brett Bell has has been and his his leadership team there, there were several, you know, card carrying, you know, card carrying members from NRA, in in the leadership there. But those guys are, those guys are are gone now.

And I and I know some of the conversations that I'm hearing these days are, well, you know, what what might happen, what may or may not happen. Now there's nothing that I'm hearing that that says BigCommerce is going one way or another, and certainly a substantial part of BigCommerce's portfolio is in this space. But it does for me just underscore some of the challenges that you can even do things well, set things up well today, but you always have to keep in mind you know, what might come down the road, right? So, how do you help your clients navigate, you know, navigate that reality where, you know, we can make a choice today that is good, in fact, for today. But know that perhaps down the road, we may need to, you know, we may need to pivot quickly, just on on one you know, in one area of our of our stack, our solution stack for ecommerce.

Right. Well, I mean, you you brought up Shopify and BigCommerce. Shopify has actually rolled back some of their restrictions against gun companies, but, I mean, the damage is already done and the perception is still that that Shopify is probably not friendly. You know, they're working to overcome that, but, I mean, you know, you you you've shown a industry for five years, and, it's gonna be hard to change those those perceptions. BigCommerce.

I've been putting people on BigCommerce since 2009. I'm probably the oldest agency there, But, you know, things are changing there. There's a little bit, you know, up in the air about how things are gonna how things are gonna be for the next few years. Love those people. They're they're great.

It's a good platform for certain certain brands. But a lot of people in the gun industry want to own their platform or they want to have more control of their platform, and and they want more flexibility and a stronger b2b part of their website that that's huge in our industry now So, I mean, Shopware has kind of come along at the right time to really soak up some of that, some of the the market share that has been maybe people just aren't happy with the other options out there or some of the other legacy platforms out there just aren't cutting it anymore or they're moving so far upmarket I'm thinking Adobe right now. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Magento for sure. Yeah. It's not attractive to that mid market and above, but not that huge enterprise market. You guys are positioned really well to capitalize on some of the changes that are happening with platforms in our industry. Yeah.

What's the so it it seems to me, you know, there are of course, there are there are plenty of there are plenty of mom and pop shops in this in this, you know, in this world. And then, down market, you have like the, you know, you've got, Migra and others that are, you know, that are, you know, they're providing ammunition. And there's not a lot of true enterprise. I'm thinking, you know, 800,000,000 plus, businesses in this space. It seems like it's solidly mid market.

When I look at some of the larger arms and related dealers, you know, these are they're they're you know, when you look at their retail shops and their, retail shops and their online, they're probably in that, you know, 100,000,000 to to 500,000,000 range. And you're right. That is a that's a it's an interesting spot. You know, Magento and and Adobe had had had historically been there, you know, until a few years ago when Adobe started, you know, intentionally and I think not not not not unprecedented at all, started taking, you know, taking their offering way upmarket. It does it does leave a bit of a vacuum.

And and and if you if you marry that with what you mentioned, that sense that, these businesses want to own the platforms on which they're running. I mean, it kind of fits in culturally with the whole, you know, with the whole, you know, purpose behind the second amendment. Right? You know, is is to, you know, sort of preserving preserving liberty for the ones who are liberated. Right.

You you know, that it I I think there is there is this the sense that, you know, with with a change in, legislative direction or the the the whims of culture that if you were operating on someone else's if you're playing in someone else's playground, they can always shut the gates on you. That's right. And and I and and so that's what I've heard, and it sounds like that's what that's what you're also what what you see, for the customers that you serve. Yeah. Definitely.

And especially for our larger clients, they they really just wanna own the platform because they've they've been around long enough to know that they can be de deplatformed at any moment. And that's some of the some of what I like about the composable commerce approach where you're you're building a stack of of different Yep. You know, tech providers, that kind of thing. If one decides not to play anymore or it's not just it's not working for you anymore, it's easy to pull out just that piece and stick another provider in there. Rather than having this giant monolithic, approach to e commerce and it's it's do or die, all or nothing in one bucket, I like to be able to compose things a little bit differently and tailor a a custom approach, for the brand or manufacturer's needs.

Well, I think you've just described, you know, really where a lot of, you know, a lot of merchant and agency mindset is these days. Right? Is that we want, hey, we want we want, you know, good good solid providers in our solution stack. We wanna be able to choose the best and most appropriate, you know, to solve whether it's it's, you know, customer or customer retargeting, whether it's fulfillment. You want you want the ideal provider, for for, you know, for your for your customers and for your operations.

And then if something if something either, you know, you outgrow them or the the winds change direction, yeah, you can you can somewhat easily pull that out, and you haven't built your entire ground around one solution. I mean, as a as a platform, you know, I've been working working for platforms now for, you know, first Magento and and now Shopware for many, many years. You know, we we we we were used to being the darlings. We were used to being the center of everyone's solar system, and now that's no longer the case. Right now, it's Right.

Now it really is. These these other systems have especially anything around customer engagement, customer data, their scope has expanded so much that we are we are playing, you know, at least as equals amongst amongst them. Do you find there are there are certain providers, like tech providers, that, that facilitate, the shot business really well? I'm thinking of, you know, whether it comes to well, obviously, fulfillment is is special. Right?

Because there is that that FFL consideration. Right. So there's kind of like that extra step in in actual logistics. But also, thinking in terms of of how, how customers are engaged, do you find that the the tech partners really do they even care what what category a merchant is, or are there, are some of them better than others at at understanding this space? Definitely.

There are some that are way better at understanding this space. Some people just want your money and and, you know, we'll provide you a service. That's fine. I like that. That's cool.

We live in a capitalist, economy. That's that's how it's supposed to work. Sure. But some people go way beyond that and actually engage and embrace the industry, and they go to our trade shows. They go to SHOT Show.

They go to NRA. They go to NASGW. They go to, you know, all of the events, and they actually support our industry or they sponsor events or that kind of thing. So many of them, are are scared to engage. They'll take the money.

They'll have the relationship, but they won't market it. They won't let anybody know that it's happening. Others understand that, you know, what, two thirds of this country owns a gun? I mean, it's it's not as taboo as you think it is. And so, you know, it what really frustrates me the most is when somebody really wants to engage, but then they're, unable or unwilling to actually talk about it publicly.

Their marketing departments are just really shy away from anything gun or accessory or weapon related. And and that's that's kind of the litmus test right there. How willing are you to talk about it? Will you talk about ballistic agency? Because we're only we're only working with shot brands, and related, brands.

Are you willing to talk about us? We have tech partners that we have done business with for years and years and years that are they just look at us and say, sorry. We can't really talk about that case study, or we can't put you in the spotlight. We we just wanna stay away from it. We're looking for partners that actively engage and aren't scared.

Yep. And I think there's, you know, there's there's I mean, I guess it it you know, you can you can understand the the mentality, but I've I've also I've seen this over the years. There were back when I was an educator teaching developers, I would have I'd have plenty of there were plenty of times I had people sitting in my class, and they would have been an amazing case study for my employer, but they were in a category that was, very often like, actually, in the early days, it was adult. And so Right. You know, these were these were, you know, multi $100,000,000 GMV businesses.

And we just quite simply were never gonna promote them because there was this idea that it would alienate, you know, alienate, significant portion of the clientele. I don't know. Well, PR isn't my job, so, I don't I don't know if that was an accurate accurate assessment or not. But, you know, it it is it, what you did mention is, you know, how important it is for, I think for the the three legs. I'd say the three legs or three pillars of of this business.

You have the agencies, you have the tech providers, and the merchants themselves, and that they're all kind of feeding back on each other and and really engaging in, participation in in, you know, in each other's worlds and promoting, promoting when they can. Right? Because it's it's, I'd say e commerce is always a, it's always a rising tide play. Right? So if you're if you're in if you're into a specific vertical, do what you can to support the vertical.

I'm a big, big, big fan of showing up at, at not e commerce trade shows but actual industry vertical trade shows. Honestly, it helps I think it helps you to better understand the nuances of the vertical and then the sort of the longer tail of demand and features and functionality. But also that that show of support, it ends up being I think it ends up being pretty valuable. Do you find there are, you know, certain trade shows that that help you all really connect with your with your, with your your your target customer group? Absolutely.

I mean, Schott is the is the, you know, it's the one you have to be at. But, we don't really go to close a lot of business there. We we go there to strengthen relationships, to spend time with people. Everybody's in the same building. We all have to eat dinner.

We all have to have coffee, that kind of thing. We we're really there to build relationships and strengthen, and and start new ones and strengthen existing relationships. Real business happens when you're when you're really just getting to know each other, honestly, and that's that's the value of the dinners or the happy hours or that kind of thing is you you get to talk about things other than transactional information about each other's business. Yeah. You know, because at the end of the day, I wanna work with people I know, love, and trust.

And it's gonna be really hard to know, love, and trust somebody if you're only talking transactionally about, you know, how can you help my business? I wanna go a little bit deeper than that. And so that's that's the real value of of events like SHOT Show or NRA. It's it's all the after hours kind of things. Right.

It's it's, yeah. It's it's that relationship focus. You know, I know there are some there are some agencies out there and they're, you know, they're very project focused. They want to they want to have the sale. They want to, you know, they want to sell a project, build a project, and then hand it off and be on to the next thing.

It sounds like that is not that that is the opposite of ballistics ammo. Yeah. We're very partnership oriented. I plan on retiring from this industry. So, you know, if if one of our competitors brags that that maybe they they closed a deal that we didn't close or something like that, I I kinda look at that as, like, well, well, I mean, I'm still gonna be doing the same thing twenty five years from now.

So I'm pretty sure I'm gonna work with who I wanna work with over the course of, you know, my forty years or so or whatever it ends up being in the gun industry. So it doesn't really bother me that much. I know that, that that know, like, and trust, thing, that that helps you build relationships and keep relationships. That's why most of our clients have been with us over five years. I think our longest has been with us for, good lord, fourteen years now.

You you become pretty sticky when you become an actual partner in their success rather than, oh, I'm gonna do a project for you, and then we're done. Or, I'm gonna charge you an arm and a leg to maintain what I built. No. No. No.

I wanna set you up for success, and, you know, let's let's let's keep the conversation going. And I'm you know, we're in and out of major brands in our industries. Their website, every day, we see their marketing. We see their analytics. We know what works.

We know what tech is really helping. And all of it is, you know, obviously, we protect confidentiality. But if we see a trend in the industry that other clients can benefit from, obviously we're gonna help our clients, to grow. We just have such a such a wonderful view from from where we are in the industry to be able to see those trends as they're happening and and really be nimble and and make changes, based off of what we see in real time. Well, I mean, what you've described just sounds like if if honestly, it sounds like good good advice if I were building an agency to serve, you know, to serve any vertical.

I think you've laid out a, you know, an ethos and an approach that, that would benefit them. So so in that in that spirit, I mean, what where do you see things headed? I mean, and and I'd say I'm not gonna bound your answer to anything. I mean, you could say in general in ecommerce or, in ecommerce in in this vertical. Well, I think it's gonna become more personalized.

Things will become and as we work on things like segmentation and, you know, just really personalizing the shopping experience. I think that's where a lot of this is going, and that is a sticky spot in our industry because not everybody wants you to know what they have. You know? I don't I don't necessarily want you to know all the guns I have or the calibers I have or whatever. But if we can find a way to to navigate those waters, you know, in in a way that that puts the customer at ease, I think that's a big area of growth here.

But really just looking more holistically as well at the and and then getting all of the the tech stack that I was talking about earlier to talk together and use that data to help the merchants make better decisions, to give the customers a better experience, and to put us in position to to really, orchestrate all of that. I I think that's the direction that that people like myself are are really moving towards and are and are anticipating and really looking forward to. Yeah. It seems, the, you know, the ability to to know your customer and the ability to tailor messaging and, messaging imagery engagement to that customer, in in an in an era where, systems are being designed to to to do that heavy lifting for us, especially with, you know, with, progress in, in in generative AI. You know, we're we're seeing we're doing some interesting, research and development in this space right now.

And we're not alone. You know, we're we're not we're not the only platform that's looking at this. And and, certainly, we're not we're not the only tech vendor that's that's looking at how how you can truly individualize, the presentation, merchandising, and offerings to each and every customer, and and and at scale, in a way that was just simply you you could you you could never hire enough staff to do. You know, basically, our customers our customers, do customers prefer to be more anonymous, do you think, in this business than than in other verticals? Absolutely.

Yeah. Yeah. I I think our customers are definitely looking to be, more anonymous, than than probably other segments, of of, of commerce, but, that's that's an opportunity for our our merchants to shine and build that brand and build that trust, that their data will be protected, it will be respected, and used really for for better serving them, and not shared outside of that. So if if these if merchants can really build that trust, well, know, like, and trust. Here we go again talking about that kind of thing.

If merchants can build that rapport with their clients, with their customers, I think that positions them uniquely to to do better than others in ecommerce. It depends on the industry, and it depends on, you know, what someone's buying. I mean, when I'm I know when I'm when I'm doing my shopping with Amazon, I don't I don't really care about having a relationship. You know, if I'm if I'm looking for, you know, for a diode or some wiring or something, I don't I don't I don't need to have a curated experience. I I want what I want, and I just wanna get it quickly.

And A diode or wiring? What are you building over there? Nothing dangerous except to my own fingers, or to or or to our fuse box. I I I I do my electrical engineering the hard way with with with second degree burns. But but, this is why I haven't gotten into, like, packing my own bullets or anything.

But but, no, it it, it seems to me that that, you know, this is a this is a this is a space where, really, one's impression of of the vendor, of the merchant as a as a customer, as a consumer, your impression of the merchant is is really, it is it is a critical critical, requirement for, for whether you're gonna buy anything at all. And to that end, I mean, I see I think I I see a chain where, you know, ballistic establishes trust with, you know, with your customer, the the merchant. And then and those merchants are relying on, you know, just the combination of your efforts to, to establish a an accurate and trust a trusting relationship with with their consumers. But but the beauty of that is once you have that, I would assume that the customer then it's a very sticky thing for the merchant, right, if if they are able to to pull that off. That's exactly right.

Yeah. The brand loyalty becomes a a big factor at some point, and, you know, that that know, like, and trust, that that can carry a brand for a really long time, because our our industry and our the customers in our industry are very loyal. They, they tend to pick brands that they know, like, and trust, and and will ride that for a long time. So it's, we do like variety. We do like to own a variety of different guns, that kind of thing, but, but we typically have our favorites.

And those are favorites for a reason because they do a good job. They build a great product. It's durable. It's, you know, aesthetically pleasing, that kind of thing. But, also, we we we want to deal with a brand that's like us.

And, and and I can't think of a more unifying industry, really, and I'm sure there's many others, but, where everybody's kind of on the same page, politically, maybe not perfectly, but but in the same direction. And, you know, it's it's, you you wanna deal with people that are like you and believe the same kind of things that you do. If you can express that and and do a good job of of branding, building that trust, you will be rewarded in this industry. Well, I I I think that's, that's an ideal place to, to leave this conversation. I, Jason, I really really appreciate your insight.

It is, it I'd say it's a it's a great indication of your approach, that you have, you have I mean, you have so you've got a customer for fourteen years. So they you you and you and this customer have been together for, you know, through the the this this crazy transformation that we've seen in this in this business, in that time. And I look forward to meeting you out at one of these trade shows soon enough. Absolutely, Ben. I appreciate your time and and letting me, letting me come on your podcast and talk and and explain who we are at Ballistic, and, it's a it's a great, time to to get to talk about our industry.

Anytime that I can put our industry in the spotlight, I'm gonna try to do it, so I appreciate you letting me do that today. Absolutely. And now what is it what is it what is it your people say, Ramajama, Yella, Hamma? Roll tide. Yes.

That's exactly cool. Roll tide. Well, see, now I've made this podcast really political. Probably lost some some followers, but may maybe we'll maybe we'll gain a few more. It's probably the most divisive thing I'd say in the South for sure.

I it it's it's it's, it's pretty fascinating down here. Alright. Well, I hope to see you at the rain sometime. Anyway, I'll catch up with you at SHOT Show. Awesome.

Thank you so much, Bill.