033 | Ben Marks & Jason Nyhus | Transitions & Reflections

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. This has been your host, Ben Marks. But I'd like to, introduce my guest today, Jason Nyas, US general manager, Shopware. Jason, what's going on with you these days, buddy? Hey, Ben.

Wow, man. What a changing of the guard. It's kind of an exciting opportunity for you, and you're leaving me with more work having to take on this commerce fam famous thing. But, yeah, let's flip the script a little bit, and let's talk a little bit about you and and your journey. Are you open for that?

I am, I am open for it also. I'm not too concerned because I know I have seen you and you love to talk about commerce. So I don't think this is actually gonna feel like work at the end of the day. Yeah. That's probably true.

But yeah. So you you you've been the host here at Commerce Famous. You helped launch it, give it birth, give it meaning, and and gain thousands of listeners. And kudos to you because you've really created something really valuable. You had 32 different episodes of Commerce Famous with a tremendous amount of guests that were really impactful in the ecommerce industry.

Yeah. It was it was, it was really it was amazing. Like, the you know, my first guest from the very first guest, cofounder of Magento, Roy Rubin. I mean, you know, Roy and and Yoav, like, they they changed the balance of power. So completely transformed how how ecommerce experiences could be delivered.

And and, you know, and and then it just it went from there. So, yeah, I was really lucky, really fortunate to have a great network of of people to draw draw upon, you know, and I hope that's still the case as I, strike out on my own here. Yeah. Well, let's talk about that. So, obviously, you announced publicly that you're moving on from Shopware, and I do wanna talk a little bit about that.

But let's maybe let's maybe focus first on what you're gonna be doing now because it's really pretty cool and pretty exciting. You wanna kinda intro that? Yeah. So I've, got this new venture, Commvizory, c o m v I s o r y, Commvizory. And the the coming out of the gates, it's my chance to, you know, to to to to work with work in this industry from a, I mean, I guess I'd say a different angle because I've always been, you know, I've really always been working either for an agency or platforms.

But, honestly, you know, I've always been about enablement and about helping people, you know, sort of understand the business and then understand especially ecosystems. You know, even though whether it's ecosystems I was curating or just ecosystems I was involved in. And that's both, you know, just community, community led ecosystems and also partnership ecosystems ecosystems because I think they're equally important in the commerce space. So that's, you know, coming out of the gate, I know I have, I I know I have some things to offer, and I encourage anyone to get in touch with me about that. But also the the longer term play is, know, a couple years ago, I I, met someone who who really helped me get my head into the world of payments.

And I know, Jason, you you came from a a payments, you know, payments oriented company. And, you know, one of the things that we realized, you know, as I as I was chatting with this guy who's just basically, you know, he works underneath an ISO and was just kinda going into the the lived pain. He'd he'd spent ten years trying to, help merchants basically pay less for their transactions. In fact, try and pay only as much for transactions as they should. And, once we started talking about things, I realized that, you know, a lot of merchants out there are paying way too much for their transactions.

And that that basically comes from, like, two main buckets. One, there's there's it really starts actually at the merchant end because however you whatever channels you're selling through, you have to pass along a certain amount of data, and you also have to have your your your information with the network set up correctly, in order for those transactions to qualify for the lowest rates possible. And then you you have the and, well, and a lot of merchants don't do that. So let me not not bury that lead. Right.

And and and and it's not really on the merchants to to to know this because the rules are incredibly complex, and there are a lot of players in the mix. And the rules change, you know, roughly every six months or so. So then there's the other side whether where it could be that the the mix of of of gateway and processor that you're using, isn't really they're they're either your relationship with them isn't isn't, isn't cost effective. You might be choosing the wrong ones, the wrong ones for your industry. And then they also like to change what they charge and what the what the rates, basically, what the effective rate you have, is.

And and again, there again, like, the whole industry with so many different entities involved, it's very easy for a lot of value to be left on the table. So I really wanna help, help merchants lower, you know, lower their cost. But but it's more than lowering their cost. It's really about enabling them so they understand what's actually happening as a transaction flows from their system into into the the payment network and comes out on the other side. And one of the things that I'm really focusing on is actually working with agencies to do this because I think it's time for agencies, you know, agencies are becoming more and more consultative.

And I think it's time for agencies to actually benefit from being able to to help their merchants optimize their their their payment cost and, you know, free up some capital for capital projects. Right? Because that's one of the things that I know you and I have seen, Jason, in the last few years is, like, the the the average cost of a project has been trending down, and that's if projects are happening at all. And, and I think payments is is one of the last one of the last great places in ecommerce for for the the the service providers to, you know, to really maintain a foothold. And the best thing is, what I'm proposing is that they do that, and they they they actually it it effectively is costing the merchant substantially less because we're, you know, we're saving them, you know, 100, 200 basis points, on their on their transactions.

Lovely. Well, you know, what's interesting about what you just said, is most agencies correct me if I'm wrong here. But most agencies, when they think about payments, they think about connectivity. They think about making sure that payments go through, the fraud processes happen appropriately, the note the reporting. So really the operational side of making the payment work.

And what you're talking about is adding a new service or a new capability for agencies to say, not only am I gonna make it work, but I'm gonna optimize it on an expense side as well. And it's gonna generate a tremendous amount of of economic benefit and in terms of savings, but it's also gonna reduce your fraud. Because the reason payment providers give you better rates when you give them better information is because they can help with better decisioning. Exactly. And and and you're right to bring up the operational side of it because that that's actually a component.

It it really you have to have a holistic approach if you're doing this if you're doing this right. The the challenge is that, again, this this information is incredibly opaque. Like, the the Visa manual that where they kinda create all the rules, and then define the matrix of transactions. And it's a combination of of type of card, type of businesses involved, you know, or whether or maybe if it's consumer and and and and there are multiple factors, but, like, just Visa's manual is over 300 pages. Right?

So so there's just a lot to understand there. And like I mentioned, they like to kinda change the rules. They they change rates and rules pretty regularly. They're super small increments, but they tend to, you know, they just collect over time. So, you know, so it really is about helping them understand the the the sort of the costs that they're they're setting up for themselves as a baseline.

And then on the operational side, absolutely. Like, what what is what is fraud costing you? What what is false positives and fraud costing you? What is what are chargebacks costing you? How can you reduce, chargebacks?

How can you win the chargebacks that do happen? And then for things like refunds and then, you know, are are are you getting your interchange refunded? I mean, there's just there's all sorts of operational components here as well. It's a big space. It's actually a really big challenge.

And, and I'm, you know, I'm lucky to be in a position where I have the network and, and the knowledge to help to help solve that. 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 ecommerce at shopware.com. Well, let's go back a little bit.

Actually, so so obviously, you announced recently that you were leaving Shopware, which was a pretty big change. I mean, when you came over to Shopware, it really shined a light on this company that a lot of Americans had never heard of, me included. And for those who pay attention, they'll know that Shopware is actually doing really, really well as a company. And so in North America, we beat our q one. We should beat our q two.

In Europe, we're crushing our q two. Like, business, and it's because we're the most modern commerce platform that's really open, that's adopting all, AI in a meaningful way. And everyone's like, why would Ben hop off the the train now? That seems like a terrible timing. He's he where he he works through the tough times, but now now when things are good, he's gonna go find something else.

How would you respond to that? What do you think about that? Well, it's a it's a fair question. And and, actually, let's just state objectively, folks, that this kind of authenticity is one of the reasons I I joined Shopware in the first place. Right?

Shopware was never shy about never shy about, you know, basically making sure everyone everyone on on on every side of the transaction knew knew how things stood, knew if there was a good fit. So for me, it was, you know, it was simply it was time to to to challenge myself in a different way. I've been, you know, I've been literally employed in in the, you know, sort of platform representative and a face of community business building role for, gosh, it was, seven and a half years at, you know, eBay, Magento, Adobe, and then just over four years at Shopware. So that's, I'm terrible at math, but that's a lot of years. And, you know, for me, there is a time where you take a risk.

It's it's honestly It is the most frightening thing I have ever done. I I I have been worried about losing weight, until now. Now, it's no problem to lose weight because I'm constantly worried about failure. But I I will say a great thing is been around so many great founders and entrepreneurs in this business that I've I've been able to learn a a good bit from them. I have a lot to learn about myself as as a as a founder and as an entrepreneur.

But I know I have a great network to to rely on. But but but, you know, to answer the question, I mean, directly, it was it was time for me to challenge myself and, you know, both in just what I was doing and also the industry that I was working in. And I think expanding into more broadly into payments, lets me address, you know, the needs of a of a of a larger set of businesses and from a a side of the industry that I've never worked in directly. Yeah. I love it.

I love it for you. I love it because, you've got an unbelievable network, unbelievable relationships, and it's time for you to bring them something new. You brought them shopware in in a meaningful way, and you really helped me personally get things started here in The US. But now you can take these relationships and add value to them differently. And that's pretty cool.

That's pretty cool. So, anyway, what are those few on that? I mean, it it's kind of I mean, it is I'm a it's a pretty lucky position, right, to be in. And and, you know, and, of course, I I thank the Shopware team for, trusting me to help, you know, help bring in Shopware, you know, bring bring some awareness in The US. And like you said, I mean, it's it has not been easy.

It's been actually even more difficult. I knew it wouldn't be easy, but it's been more difficult than I thought. And and we've had a lot of really good people, that have come into Shopware US, and every one of them has contributed something, to get us where where where Shopware is today. But but this is I don't know. This is being a a banner year for Shopware all around.

And and I think that just reflects, the the health and the attitude of the, of the business. I I really like the transformation that Shopware has gone through in the last in the last couple of years, growing into a more international, be a even even more disciplined, company. And, you know, the last set of decisions that I saw being made before I before I I took my my curtain call, you know, again, I I I like I like that Shopware invests where where it is strategically important and then exercises discipline, you know, at every in every step of the business, both to look out for the health of the company and to make sure that, you know, that that this ecosystem continues to thrive. I mean, and and actually, I just don't before we even go anywhere else, I wanna call out again how amazing an accomplishment, it was for Mark Stanley and team, to to pull off the the hub, the Shopware hub and and just the organic feedback that I've seen out in the ecosystem channels that are, you know, where where Shopware really isn't even necessarily involved. The the feedback is is is is just genuinely good.

Like, hey, this is this is one place where we can see everything that's happening and we can see who's doing what. And you can kinda get gauge, where you are as a community member in within the context of that broad ecosystem, you know, and as well as get all your training and everything there. So, yeah, for Mark Stanley and team and and for the leadership that decided to to make the investment, you know, because it took over a year to build. I'd say that's that's, that was a that was a a risk, but I think it's a risk that that that is already starting to pay off. Yeah.

My, we'll talk more about you in a second, but my my view on what short term was was is different than the way that Shopware thinks about short term. My short term is tomorrow. Shop you know, European companies' short term is, like, this year. And so it's a long term for me as a year for for Europeans. It's, like, five to seven, maybe 10.

So that that was a cultural shift at the commitment towards what short, medium, and long term look like. Yeah. There are def there are some there are some cultural differences. And, I mean, I love I love the, actually, within the company, we're always able to joke about it. And, like, you know, I remember in the early days, people were saying, like, what what do you think?

You know, you're working with Americans. Like, well, I didn't know I'd be using the exclamation mark button so much because we're always, like, everything's so kind of positive and, yeah, go and get it. But, you know, on the one hand, I actually actually think there's a really good balance when you have both sides of that. You have you have that, you know, kind of German rigor and and, you know, kind of sort of conservative outlook on things, and you have this American attitude of, like, you know, if we're not if if we're not going after this thing that we wanna do today, someone's gonna do it tomorrow. You know?

And so you you really you have you you you kind of have the optimism, of what what's possible, but, also, you have the imperative of what's possible. Well, let's talk about you. Let's shift gears off of Shopware for for this dialogue. This is about Commerce Famous, and you certainly are. Those two things.

You're deep in commerce, and you're and you're kind of famous in our industry. How did a Beach Boys bum from South Carolina turn into the kind of Kim Kardashian of the e commerce scene, by knowing everybody? Like, how how did this happen? Yeah. Take us back to the journey.

Where did it all start? Look. I mean, I think personality helps a lot. Like, I'm a I'm a golden retriever. So I I really I want everyone around me, and I want them all getting along.

I want them happy. I think that's actually not a bad foundation for this. But it fundamentally it started with I was, I was working in town, in in Charleston for a local web firm. The guy running the firm was well, a few years later, he got arrested for being a major manufacturer of narcotics. Nothing of that sort was evident when I was when I was part of the the web design firm, but he bounced a paycheck.

And I had heard, you know, when I I'd I'd I'd read stories that, like, when that happens, you know, this was, like, circa this was 2008. You know, when something like that happens, you you just it doesn't matter what the excuse is. You kinda you you should probably start looking for jobs. And I hopped on Craigslist that day back when Craigslist was a a good source for finding even tech work. And a guy just put an ad, like, that day on Craigslist.

He was moving from Atlanta to Charleston to start up, to start an agency, and he was looking for employee number one, you know, who understood, you know, PHP and Zen framework and was would would be interested and and especially knew some e commerce and would be interested to learn this thing called Magento. And so I sent him he actually pulled out the cover letter. I sent him and read it to the office years later. And it was it was truly it's truly like the most embarrassing cover letter. I tried to put in so much personality, but, like, the it was so it was so it was so on the one hand, it was kinda like a cringeworthy level of earnestness, but I think it was also just that kinda earnestness that that that, made an impression.

And the person I made the impression on was a guy named Kevin Eichelberger who started Blue Acorn. And if you, you know, if you happen to be in this business and you don't know Blue Acorn, you know, Kevin started it because he knew he he he he saw the potential for ecommerce, agency work, and and he he knew he just knew what what Magento was gonna do. So once he got to like, basically, once we became established, you know, thanks to Kevin's, you know, acumen and I I had to quickly level up my programming skills, I was not not quite the high level programmer I thought I was and that that Magento required. But, you know, we quickly started making a splash in in the Magento world. And at the time, Magento just, it took off faster than anyone could imagine.

And so there was no documentation. It was hard to, you know, basically, you had to go into, a, like, a an old school text chat, called IRC to to hope to get any answers from people with any kind of knowledge. And that's thankful though to the open source approach that Magento had had relied on and that Shopware also, also maintains. But the the real the real magic moment was was was actually a series of moments. Like, Kevin encouraged me to go on to, this developer resource called Stack Overflow, where people ask questions and then people can offer answers, but then there's a there's a there's a a big culture of the the participants in that community, like chiming in and and then up, like, voting and rating and and and curating, you know, this body of knowledge.

And Kevin just kept encouraging me to go in there, and it was great because I would I would I would encounter there'd be questions. I'm like, wow. I I don't know how that works in Magento. I'd have to go in and look and figure it out. And the more I participated there, the more I learned, the better I became.

And then my visibility kinda started to creep up. And and I I just kinda naturally and then I started participating in the Magento discussions on what happened on on Twitter. And, and I get my visibility came up to a point. And then, it was the real the real the real moment of moments was end of twenty ten, Magento realized they needed to put an education program together. And so they created, you know, this Magento U and the first program.

And I got to go out as a reviewer of this week long in person course. This is why you worked in Blue Acorn or This is why I this is why I worked at Blue Acorn. So this was kind of a benefit that that Blue Acorn was getting was that, you know, I would be out there and I'd get to visit with, visit the LA headquarters and, you know, and just just review this thing. But I I remember I was, the woman that they hired to run the program, Susie Selassik, you know, she we were all staying in, like, the same hotel. So it was myself and another alumina from, from the Magento world, BNI Copp, who's president of MachOS and, other many other cool things.

But I ran into Susie after, like, the first day of the class, and I was like, man, if if if you guys are gonna be to doing this, like, I would love to be a teacher. So, of course, I didn't really check with anyone if if I could do this. But Kevin Kevin basically farmed me out to Magento for two weeks two weeks a month for a couple years. So I would I would spend a week in The US somewhere teaching this class and then a week, you know, somewhere else in the world. I went all over the place, Europe, UK, Australia, teaching.

And and that's, you know, if you really wanna learn something, teach. And I learned and learned and learned and and then Magento decided because there was still no documentation and this was, like, 2011. They're like, well, let's just film the class and put it on YouTube. So there's I think to this day, you could probably still find forty five hours of me talking, about Magento. I still hadn't learned, as much as I learned by the end of my time there.

So we, yeah, anyway, it was it was interesting process, but that that that made that put me on the map. That, you know, meant that I could walk around, in India at at trade shows and stuff and and and just be swarmed with people, you know, who are all so thankful to me for teaching them. And I'm like, you really thank Magento for filming me and putting it online. And then, you know, and I have been actually recognized on the street in in in Europe, like, like, oh, spin marks from Magento. I'm like, oh, wow.

Yeah. Yeah. I'm I'm I'm I'm famous in a way that absolutely doesn't matter to a single person outside of outside of ecommerce. But Yeah. There again, the real story there is that, like, that is where my network started.

And then Magento created a job for me in 2014, and I went and joined. And I was literally for, you know, six or seven years, I mean, right up until COVID, if there was an ecommerce, especially, like, developer event, I was there. You know, so there were a few years I was on the road three hundred, three hundred days out of the year. My wife was smart enough to quit her job, early on and just travel with me. And, that's how I got to know everybody.

No shortcuts. No. I it it really it's is meeting people doesn't scale very well. You kinda have to be out there and do it yourself. Yeah.

There's no shortcuts. If you had to guess, how many different flights have you been on in the last twenty years related to ecommerce? I mean, well, I I don't live in a hub city. So, like, I literally anytime I'm going anywhere, unless it's, like, New York or Boston or something, I have to take a connecting flight. So that kind of pads the numbers a bit.

But for for many years, I was just I was going point to point. Like, I'd head from, you know, to Europe and then to Asia and then back to Europe and then Australia or Africa. You know, I'd never kept a close tally of the the actual flights, but it would be I'd be approaching, I guess gosh. It's gotta be, you know, 1,500, 2,000 flights or something. Yep.

I was thinking I know I know that, like, mileage wise, I've, like, button seat miles, I'm closing up basically right right under 3,000,000 miles. Incredible. Yeah. It's it's not it sounds great, but it really is not healthy at all. No.

It's brutal. I mean, I would train a lot of different life experiences for less miles. Yeah. I travel about every week. So I'm Yeah.

You you you you hit it pretty hard, and you do the domestic grind. I mean, at least I was doing a lot of international where I can kind of, like, relax on the plane as opposed to, like, have to work and catch up with email all the time on the plane. Yeah. So it's not really a badge of honor, but it is a it is a demonstration of commitment. And I think I think you should wear that proudly because what it means is you're willing to do the hard work.

You're willing to to be that Labrador retriever at all these events. And Yeah. Yeah. By the way, the the story you told about being recognized on the streets in Europe is exactly why we started this podcast. It's about people who are famous in this little industry of ecommerce.

But when they go downstairs from their home office, their wife and kids, they're like, yeah, dude. You're just dad or husband or this normal dude. You're not famous in our world. So you represent that well, having having hung out with you in in South Carolina. Yeah.

It's, yeah. And I and that that was what it was always about. I mean, you know, to be clear, folks, like, there was actually Commerce Famous as a podcast idea really came from from Jason. And, you know, and I got to just deliver on the deliver All of it together. No.

No. And, yeah. Well, you know, but but yeah. But it but you were absolutely right. There are so many people worthy.

I'd say worthy of having their story told, but I think it's also just it's so important for people to hear these stories because they can start to say, I think once you hear someone's story, and this was like, remember, this was one of the original conversations we have that, like, once you once you hear someone's story, as you start to hear someone's story, you you start to put yourself, like, in that context. I think you always you you start to see, like, oh, wait. Could I have done something like that? Or what would I have done differently? And, you know, the whole goal of it was to be, at the end of the day, an inspiration, both of what's possible and a means of inspiring, like what what can what can, you know, what can happen?

What can take place? What can I do? That and and, you know, I've had conversations with people where they've mentioned, you know, particular episodes and been like, wow. Wow. I had no idea that that's how so and so did this or that's how they built that.

And, and and, you know, and it gave them an idea for the business that they were in. Yeah. I love that. Well, so, obviously, Magento was a force of nature. There was there was a lot of companies who've tried to kinda replicate the magic of the moment.

Yeah. Yeah. So so to Magento, the magic of Magento with the open source technology, the community that was been built, the the the the basically, it went it went global and it and it went viral. And a lot of companies have tried to replicate that to no avail. I think Shopware is doing some of it, but we're running it differently than was run by Magento.

What was it about the Magento moment? Were these things all aligned? Well, I mean, you tell me the the business that can come along today and and replicate the, you know, exact like, just and do exactly what a company was doing ten or fifteen years ago and have the same level of success. Like, I'm I'm gonna tell you that, like, that industry has some problems because it should have evolved by then. And and thing is, it was it was it was on the one hand, it was timing.

I mean, there was there was a lightning in the bottle moment there. I mean, it it I don't even know if you can still find some of the old, like, the old oldest forum posts and and and blog posts. Basically, these guys announced it because there was there was this the context was there was this software back then called OS Commerce, and it was written in, like, the, like, a early versions of PHP that weren't that the the the PHP still had not become sophisticated like the language that it is today. And so it was it was very tough to do things. But what ended up happening, and and it was truly by an ocean by produced by an open consortium.

Right? So so you you didn't really have a company. You just have a group of people working together to do this. But then this, like, whole extension marketplace organically grew out of this, and you could just grab these extensions. Now there was no oversight, no quality control, anything, but you could you could grab functionality.

And this big ecosystem materialized materialized around it. So this is like 2002 into 2004 or 05/06, and is actually, you know, Roy Rubin was, you know, I think he and Yoav, maybe it was just him at first, but he and Yoav were building, you know, they were building ecommerce solutions, and they were effective enough when they were building these ecommerce solutions that they, you know, they went they they kept getting bigger and bigger customers. And they had some very, very sharp developers, that they were working with. I mean, top notch, like, Java developers out of out of, Ukraine. And it turns out, that they basically hit they hit the limit of what was sustainable on this nascent, you know, immature, unsophisticated platform and said, hey.

You know what? There's an opportunity here. Like, the thing is they realized there's this there's this whole group of people that found us and are using it and are building on top of it, and we can do something with this. So they made the bet, the, you know, the the the gut gut wrenching, like, heart stopping bet. Like, let's go ahead and invest a whole bunch of money creating this full fledged, like, professional, totally customizable, open source, commerce application, and it was a good bet.

I mean, they so they they saw the opportunity. They they they they hit ecommerce at the right time. So I think there are elements of everything that they did that can inform and can inspire what what what platforms or really any business, you know, any business requiring an ecosystem, you can can can do, which is just be open and transparent with your intentions, your road map. You facilitate interconnectivity amongst your your your the the ecosystem, put over index on supporting the the early promoters of the ecosystem. But, fundamentally, I went so I went, met up with Roy.

I was in, in LA area for for business a few years back and and reached out to him. And Roy Roy has Roy has been incredibly supportive of me throughout my career and still is to this day. Roy, if you're listening, I may I may come hit you off for funding, just just FYI. But but we went we went, he said he said, hey. You know, he's a he's a super healthy dude.

He was always pretty healthy, but he is really healthy now. So he's like, let's make it a walking meeting. We go hiking in the hills, like, outside LA. And, and I remember I was like, oh, this is I'm asking him a question now. We're we're really good buddies.

And, the question was like, you know, did you did you ever know that did you ever think that Magento would be just this smash, this phenomenal success? And I I asked him this question because I knew the answer was, no, man. I had no idea. This just, you know, it kinda blew up and and his his response was, yes, of course. Yeah.

He he said, I he did not like the balance of power that existed back then where basically if you wanted a professional ecommerce solution, you had to get WebSphere from, like, freaking IBM. Like, you had to you had to deal with enterprise players, pay enterprise prices, and deal with enterprise timelines. And at the end of the day, these were not very inventive experiences that were coming out of these things. So he said, you know what? I bet if I bet if we flip the script and we put the system out there and let everyone else bring their ingenuity and their understanding of their geography, the verticals, the kind of merchants they work with, then we will absolutely, not only have a big, you know, big hit on our hands, but we'll have, we'll have completely changed what what what what the world expects of ecommerce and and and and, you know, what what especially merchants, what they the kind of things that they see as possible.

If you if you dream it, you can build it kind of thing. And, and I think that kind of vision is is inspiring to me, as a as a founder. It is also you know, but at the end of the day, it's also like, you know, I always I always compare business success to, like, hey. Who is building the next Magento? And and and and is it me?

Well, I do think you you've got a shot at at the next generation of payment monetization, payment value for agencies. I do think that option is open for you. So one of the one of the new traditions I wanna start setting out on this Commerce Famous podcast, as I kinda take over take the baton from you is really asking the guests based on where you've worked, places like Blue Acorn, places like Magento and Adobe, who should we try to have on this podcast to let them tell their story? Does any any names stick stand out to you? Well, I mean, straight away, you know, Kevin, Kevin Eichelberger.

And I say this for for a lot of reasons. I mean, not not the least of which, of course, he, you know, he made, you know, he he made all of this possible. And which, by the way, I part of how he made this possible was, like, Magento created a job spec that only I was literally the only person in the world who satisfied this job spec, and they just put it out there. They weren't gonna recruit directly, but they kinda put that out there. And and Kevin, to his credit, I've been there six and a half years, was just about to get equity, which in retrospect probably would have been nice for me to stay and get a little bit of equity.

But, you know, he he and I kinda we kinda, like, walked past each other looking the other way, you know, for about a week or two. And finally, one day, he just said, you know, we we should talk about that that, that that job post from from Magento. And I was like, yeah. And he just said, you know, if you, I hate I hate to lose you, Ben, but but you out you have to do this. Like, he, you know, again, being the being the kind of forward thinking business leader that he is, he, you know and and and selfless business leader that he is.

He he knew that this would be life changing for me, and he was right. But so that's that's that's the kind of character you'd be having. But, also, I mean, Kevin Kevin was exceptional at making projections, his analysis of the industry. You know, a lot of a lot of other even his competitors, you know, he would meet with and they would chat business. And, you know, I think he he gave back a lot of of value and insight and understanding into the ecosystem.

You know, and along the way, he had some great experiences. He also went through some tremendously difficult times like when Magenta two came out. It was tough for every agency. His but but now what he's doing because he was able, you know, he was able to take Blue Acorn into, you know, into a a a a smaller private equity, you know, environment where he was able to also work with some of the other businesses. And, they ended up, you know, putting some things together that, you know, made Blue Acorn eventually a target for Infosys.

And so Blue Acorn is part of Infosys now. And if you don't know Infosys, there's this massive, massive tech firm out of India. So he has so much perspective from a from it just being, like, you know, he and his brother used to run little ecommerce websites, and then, you know, built building this agency, and I was there from from from, like, you know, from from being employee number one. You know, I left. We had, like, 60 employees.

And, you know, and he he learned like, I watched him kinda learn on the job. Like, when we were at 20 odd people, he brought in a COO, and I'm like, why the hell would you bring in a pure overhead position? He's like, Ben, I don't know how to run a 25 person company. And I think while it's expensive to bring in an overhead position, there's a huge cost to me getting this wrong. You know?

So I watched him just progress and learn along the way, and, you know, now he's working, and now he's working at a at a at a South Carolina funded, like, in the state funded nonprofit that facilitates tech investments, here in the great state of South Carolina. And and, you know, this is work that he is willingly doing. You know, I think he likes to give back, and I think he likes to have his, he likes to stay busy and and have his finger on the pulse of things. So, right away, probably a long answer, but but he is he's absolutely one I would have, on the podcast. He's been on the podcast before, but I think you'd be asking him different kinds of questions.

I'm trying to think, like, who have I not had on the podcast who should be on here? I'd say, you know, another one is Matt from, Gene Commerce. Oh, yeah. Matt's awesome. Matt from Matt is fantastic.

Yeah. He is, you know, he's hilarious. And and also, he's been like, he and his team have quietly been building, you know, not only just doing what they do as an agency, but, like, they have been building the, like, fundamentally, like, essential components for shop systems, you know, it like, since their entire lifetime. I mean, they built they maintained, like, payments integrations for platforms. They built BlueFoot CMS, which which I discovered at a, at a London Magento meetup.

And, you know, well, that ended up becoming the entire like, the c the enterprise CMS system for Magento. You know, and he's still out there building today. Actually, I've it just earlier today, I was looking at, it's called Bluefinch, and it is their, you know, the basically, their technology for essentially hands free, installation and and upgrades of Magento instances. And I imagine the lessons that they've learned there will probably apply, apply to other technologies and other other ecosystems. Those are two great recommendations.

I know Matt pretty well. I've met Kevin a couple of times. Definitely will take those recommendations. Wonderful. And I think, you know, you're no you're no you're no, you're not exactly shy.

But if I can ever help with any of these introductions, you know, I'm I'm I'm a I'm a phone call or a a message away. Yep. Well, actually, I'll tell one quick story, and then I'll let you go to deal with your construction at your house. The how we met is is is is kind of impactful to me personally. So so my old company was Digital River, and we had we had we were a leader in the Gartner Magic Quadrant for ecommerce.

And what we realized is when Adobe acquired Magento and Salesforce acquired Demandware and SAP acquired Hybris, it was little old digital river against Adobe, Salesforce, SAP, Oracle, and IBM. And we were like, holy crap. How are we gonna compete with the most funded companies on the planet? And so we pivoted. And, I saw a friend, it from being a commerce provider into being what was a merchant of record, a a payment centric business model that plugged into other commerce platforms.

And so we went from a position where we were a leader to then saying, no. No. No. We're not doing commerce anymore. We're only trying to be the app in your app store.

Well, my first 50 calls into Adobe, Salesforce, BigCommerce, all these other companies was we're not partnering with you. We compete with you. And I ran into a friend of mine named Andy Barker, and he'd be a good guest. Oh my gosh. Just up the road from me in Hopkins, Minnesota.

And he said, oh, I didn't realize you guys were doing that. We'd love to partner with with you guys at Digital River. You need to meet Ben Marks. Because everybody at Adobe would give you the cold shoulder and the kinda company line, but Ben would talk to you. He'd tell you who to talk to.

He'd get you to the right people. And that one conversation was really helpful because what what you did I don't know if you remember. You you you didn't you didn't say no. You were open to all sorts of ideas and you may you were a connector. You put me in touch with the right people.

We got things in place. We ended up doing a bunch of deals with Adobe, and that was a vibrant partnership for a long time, and it was on the backs of a couple of intros you made. And so that's how we met. And when you landed at Shopware, I had said to myself, who the hell is Shopware, and why does the world need another commerce platform, and why did Ben Marks, this guy that I met, go there? And it really be became a journey of discovery for me.

And so I just wanted to share that story, publicly on this pod. But, you know, you're, you're a big part as to why it got on my radar and why I even entertained coming here. Here. Well, that means a lot. I mean, my I actually didn't it's rare.

I I remember most of my meetings, even on the the late night ones in far off places. I can usually remember the conversation once someone kind of tells me what we were talking about. But, you know, I I'll never forget because, you know, I got to meet you in person at at shopper headquarters, and then you were flying out of Amsterdam. And, you know, and and and there are not a lot of great options. Like, the the travel between, you know, shopping in Germany and and literally anywhere else is, not not always convenient.

So so they threw you in a taxi. I was flying out of Brussels and I'm like, well, I'm just gonna take a taxi and a train, but I'll just ride in your taxi all the way to Amsterdam. And, you know, and and, Martin had was visiting town and brought like crates of his favorite beer. We grabbed some beers, hopped in the back of the taxi. We spent a few hours making our way over to Amsterdam.

And I just but I'll never forget that, like, you were just talking about things and you you didn't know me really well, but you you clearly knew a lot about the space. And I just, like, everything you were saying, I was like, man, that's, like, the smartest thing I've ever heard. Or like, wow. I'm I've known I've been in this business, and I never thought of that. And but everything was so clear.

I was, I was immediately glad that, you know, that that the leadership at Shopware had had found you, and and that you had found Shopware and and you'd come on board. Because I think it it it was it was gonna take it was always gonna take someone special, to, you know, sort of come up with the, you know, all the concept and the and the culture and the drive and the execution, in the last couple years to really get Shopware US on the map and and get it, you know, get it to where it is today. So I'll I'm reciprocating with the with the story about you, but I I think at this point, we can say there's there's there's tons of mutual respect. And, I I imagine that my my journey will will keep me probably at least, you know, you know, one degree separated from you, if not, having a having a cocktail with you at a at a party. I look forward to that day.

I don't know how I did it, but I made it about me somehow. So that was exciting for me. Thank you. It's a it's a Minnesotan thing. I mean Yeah.

Yeah. Yep. Yeah. Amazing. Well, Ben, really enjoyed getting to work with you here at Shopware.

Really excited for your next chapter. You have a really good history of working for companies and leaving right before it gets good. So let's, let's, let's hope it's the case here as well. I'm, I'm thrilled to, to be taking over the reins on Commerce Famous and, wish you nothing but the best and excited to have a beer with you on the road. Thanks, man.