The Code To Winning - BUCKED UP THE #1 PRE-WORKOUT BRAND: 9 FIGURE EMPIRE IN 10 YEARS || RYAN GARDNER || EPISODE 084

Episode Date: April 30, 2026

Ryan Gardner founded Bucked Up in 2016 and has been the managing partner and CEO ever since. Under his supervision, Bucked Up has gone from a local supplement brand to the #1 best-selling pre-workout, available in over 100,000 stores worldwide.   Back in 2001, Ryan and his twin brother Jeff built a successful internet marketing company, promoting everything from supplements to biz opp to lead generation. By 2010, their affiliate network (with only 3 other employees) was earning over $25M+ annually in revenue. In 2015, they saw that social media was the future and decided to start their own social media agency. After over a decade of promoting other people's products, Ryan and Jeff realized it was finally time to put their talents to work promoting their own.   Ryan purchased the domain name DeerAntlerSpray.com in 2013. Not long after, Ray Lewis made headline news when he was accused of taking the spray before the Super Bowl. Sales exploded overnight. Sure, he was in the "Right Time...Right Place," but without Ryan's smart, hard work, he would've missed out on all that success. Shortly after the Super Bowl, he managed to get Deer Antler Spray into GNC and sold thousands of bottles a week for the next two years. Ryan, with the help of a GNC franchise owner, came up with the idea to launch a pre-workout. Despite some skepticism from family, he purchased BUCKEDUP.com for $1500 and named the first pre-workout "Bucked Up." With a great logo, flavor profile, the right ingredients, and a non-proprietary blend, the company started making waves in the supplement industry and never looked back.   This episode Ryan talks about his journey and the start of Bucked Up how the business structure works, affiliates and partners and the vision for the next 10 years. Timestamps 00:00 Introduction  03:37 How The Journey Begun 08:06 Brand Name Challenges ️ 10:48 Athlete Selection 13:20 Ambassador Payments 17:14 Company Growth 21:17 Networking Importance 24:13 CEO Involvement ‍ 27:32 Learning From Failure 30:03 Intuition in Business 32:50 Bucked Up Future 38:43 Next Athlete Partner? 42:06 Soccer/NFL/ NBA 45:35 Brand Equity Focus 48:47 Affiliate Program

Essentially, we were born and raised on a farm in Clearfield, Utah. So going from a farm to running a multi-hundred million dollar company, you know, it's been quite the journey. But, you know, we did everything from sales floors. We learned how to produce leads, drive traffic online. We had our own affiliate network, you know, where we had, you know, a thousand publishers driving traffic for different products or services. and then off to the races with doing our own thing, and that's what's led us to Buckup. Nice to meet you. I'm Ryan, the CEO for Bucked Up.

We just wanted to call you, tell you how much we appreciate you. Because it's our mission to give you the absolute best pre-workout out there. Let's go. Ryan Gardner founded Bucked Up in 2016 and has been the managing partner and CEO ever since. Under his supervision, Buckup has gone from a local supplement brand, to the number one best-selling pre-workers, available in over 100,000 stores worldwide.

And then we started going to Expos, and we saw that pre-workouts were really popular. And we were like, well, what is a pre-workout? We didn't even know. But we are marketers, right? And we were consulting and telling people how to run their business and kind of how a website should look

and how the branding should look. So we just applied what we had learned in the past and applied it to coming out with a pre-workout sticking with a deer theme and call it bucked up. And we had the vision in mind to grow a full line of supplements, not just pre-workout. But everything from protein, you know, now we have energy drinks, protein drinks, creatine, creatine candy, all those different products. So we have a full line of supplements now.

People don't fully understand the back offers of how these things kind of work like when you sign a person because sometimes they sell something and they get a commission. Yeah. With partnerships, how does that actually work in terms of? Yeah. So right now we have over. 100,000 ambassadors. Wow. And they get paid, like you said, when they drive a cell, or somebody uses their code, or they have a unique link that we're able to track, and it comes

back to them, they get paid a commission. But with a sponsored athlete, what's your mindset when it comes to risk and creativity in branding? Well, look, our forte is marketing. We came from a marketing background, online driving traffic, building out funnels, call them click funnels now, but we were doing these landing pages a long time ago and optimizing the data as it comes in. But, you know, we were always big on marketing. And our companies revolved around marketing. We actually hired the former CEO of Dr. Pepper. His name is Gil. And we hired him to help us build out our distribution network. And because he knew the network from working at Dr. Pepper and other places, he knew how to build that network and had relationships with those people.

We got our drinks into a lot of different places with Gil. Gill was the most expensive employee that we hired, but look at us now. I mean, we're on pace to sell 60 plus million energy drinks and protein drinks. So it's been amazing to have a guy like him in our organization. The co-2 winning insights you need today to seize the world tomorrow with an amazing guest. Right here, Utah's very own. Talk about Ryan Gardner's journey as well. Bucked up, which started in 2016, used to be just a local supplement company.

It's now the number one pre-selling workout in 20,000 stores worldwide. I've been excited to get this interview going. I've been trying my best. Without further to do, the man, the myth, the very legend himself, Ryan Gardner. Hey, well, thanks for having me on the cage. Appreciate it. Thanks for having me on. Appreciate that.

Appreciate that. I appreciate that. No, and I've always, like I said, when we started off, I was just very impressed with the journey that you guys have accomplished in the short space of nine years. I want to just talk a bit more just about, like, you know, Ryan Gardner. Like, how did this all begin for you, sir? Well, you know, I've told this story a bunch of times on different podcasts, but essentially we were born and raised on a farm in Clearfield, Utah. So going from a farm to running a multi-hundred million. dollar company.

You know, it's been quite the journey. But, you know, we did everything from, you know, we were on sales floors. We learned how to produce leads, drive traffic online. We had our own affiliate network, you know, where we had, you know, a thousand publishers driving traffic for different products or services. And then off to the races with doing our own thing and doing our own products and services. And that's what's led us to buck. up. Okay. And so was that always the vision at the beginning when you and your, you and your brother

Jeff, like, started? Was that all the vision in the beginning? No, no. You know, everything just happens. And, you know, at the very first, we're just driving traffic for people. And then we said, man, why are we, why do we keep building everybody else's business? Why don't we do our own? You know? And then the next guy that came in saying, hey, I want you to drive traffic by, you know, within an hour or two, we own 50% of the company. Wow. So, we just said, hey, we're only going to drive traffic for our own products. And he goes, well, let's be partners then. And so we did. And that kind of started down the road of owning our own stuff, right, and driving traffic to our own products. And then we bought a domain named Deerantlerspray.com. And we read an article in

Sports Illustrated that says, Deer Antler Spray is banned in Major League Baseball because it gives an athlete an edge. and they don't want to have anything that gives an athlete an edge they shouldn't be taking, right? So, you know, we bought Deeratlerspray.com, and, you know, a couple months later, Ray Lewis got accused of taking it right before the Super Bowl, and then we were off to the races. GNC called us within, you know, three days of that whole debacle and said, how fast can you fulfill 30,000 bottles? So we were selling thousands and thousands of bottles a month later. at GNCs.

Wow. And then we started going to Expos, and we saw that pre-workouts were really popular. And we were like, well, what is a pre-workout? We didn't even know. But we are marketers, right? And we were consulting and telling people how to run their business and kind of how a website should look and how the branding should look. So we just applied what we had learned in the past and applied it to coming out with a pre-workout, sticking with a deer theme. and call it bucked up.

And we had the vision in mind to grow a full line of supplements, not just pre-workout. Oh, wow. But everything from protein, you know, to, you know, now we have energy drinks, protein drinks. We have creatine, creatine candy, you know, all those different products. So we have a full line of supplements now.

No, that's amazing. And I think one of the most amazing thing about that is not just the fact that it's built a brand. It's almost like a household name everywhere you go. wherever you see bucked up, you know, you're associated with pre-workout, but it's more than just that as you just touched on, right? Yeah, exactly. You know, what was funny is BYU said, oh, when we first started, we went to BYU and said, hey, we want to do a sponsorship.

And they're like, now Bucked up will never be at BYU just because of the name. And now that we're more of a household name, now they're like, okay, hey, we want you to sponsor. And we're like, I thought we would never belong at BYU. So, you know, but that's where we are now. So it's now become more of a household name. You know, even when we started bucked up and we came up with the name bucked up, my parents didn't even like it.

You know, we're from Utah here and, you know, we're raised very religious. And so we couldn't say anything with the F word, like freak and fetch and flip, you know, like stuff that would mean a different word. But so, you know, even the name bucked up was really hard for a little while. But now that we're more mainstream, it's, you know, we've, we've, we've kind of passed those things. You know what I mean? No, I love that.

And I think another big thing that you guys have been very good at, it's not just the partnership with the collaboration. In your opinion, or like in what do you think most people overlook in terms of like collaboration, whether it's athletes, retailers, influences that people don't know about? Yeah, like, look, we've gone through the school of hard knocks on this. And you've got to figure out how to activate with that athlete or that person. or that sponsored athlete collaboration, whatever it is,

you've got to figure out how to do something that helps the whole picture. Because, like, for instance, you can just give a guy of money for NIL. But what is that going to get you in return, right? But, you know, like things like a Bryce and D. Chambot, for instance, right? We're going to be coming out with some drinks with Bryce and D. Chambot with his name on it. And they're going to be a really awesome, hydration drink this next year. And that's how we're going to be able to monetize working with or collabing with a celebrity or a sponsored athlete. That's how we do it. You know what I mean?

And so, you know, his name will get us into doors. Like for instance, Dick's sporting goods says, yeah, we'll bring it into all 800 stores as soon as it's available. So, you know, those are the different types of collaborations. But, you know, like when you're working with an NIL person, how do you you make that work. Exactly. You know what I mean? So that's what you got to think about. You know, we've, we've done some partnerships with people, but we're like, how are we going to make this work? You know, fighters, we've done just influencers, you know, social media influencers, but how do you make that work? You know, like with Bryce Hall, we did a we did a flavor collab with him and that worked out for us because, you know, we were able to get it into GNC. He came to GNC's openings and

stores and, you know, we did a lot of activation with them, and it was great. So that's, that's kind of how that worked out. No, I like that. And obviously with influencers and affiliates, it's a little different compared to when you do a bigger partnership like approaches as well, right? Yeah. Can you walk us through, like, what determines the right brand or athlete to kind of fit your ecosystem as well? Well, we're kind of edgy, right? Even our name's kind of edgy. So we need somebody that's a little edgy as well. We did do a sponsorship with Connor McGregor. I was going to get to that. And the thing is, is he was maybe a little too edgy. And he made some comments. And so we had to kind of discontinue that on his Twitter that we had to discontinue the

relationship because we had, you know, big companies saying, hey, we're not going to touch you if you have Connor McGregor. So that's kind of how that one kind of ended because he made some comments. And they didn't want to get canceled, you know. And to be fair, they, that one was signed, sealed, and delivered, wasn't it? Oh, yeah, yeah, it was signed, sealed, delivered. We had been working with him. We came out with a flavor. He came to Utah, did a production day, a meet and greet.

We took him to, you know, Temple Square. We took him to Family Search. We took him to the BYU game. It was pretty big news. So, you know, we got a lot of eyeballs. The issue is that he was maybe a little too edgy. but like someone like Bryce and D. Shambo where he's edgy,

he's really good at social media and getting eyeballs, that's what we're looking for. Okay. Now that makes perfect sense because I remember, I think when you were doing that tour with Connor McGreg,

and my friend texted me, he's like, I think Carter McGreg is at in and out. Like, it was in and out. We did. We were out in and out. And he's like,

you came with the bucked up like car and everything. I'm like, whoa, this is real. Yeah. And so I think everyone was anticipating that. So I think it's amazing. how far you've come in terms of just the brand that you've built and the people that you've attracted, that the fact that you're big enough to even say, no, we're not going to continue

this relationship. Yeah, it was a tough thing to do because Connor was awesome. He stayed at my house for four days. It was great. He's an awesome guy. I wouldn't say anything bad. He is who he is. And he goes with it.

You know what I mean? And there's, you know, you got to respect that too. You know what I mean? But when it came to a business decision, I mean, personally, Personally, I love the guy, but when it comes to a business decision, we had to make a really tough call there. No, I love that. And then when I said walk us through the process when you end up signing, is that usually like a payment that's made. People don't fully understand the back offers of how these things kind of work like.

When you sign a person, because sometimes with affiliates, they sell something and they get a commission. Yeah. With partnerships, how does that actually work in terms of? Yeah. So right now, we have over 100,000 ambassadors. Wow. And they get paid, like you said, when they drive a cell, or somebody uses their code, or they have a unique link that we're able to track, and it comes back to them,

they get paid a commission. But with a sponsored athlete, yeah, there's a pretty big upfront chunk, and then it's paid out over time as he does his deliverables. So what we do is we get them to agree to a certain amount of deliverables, like, hey, we need this many production days. You know, like Connor McGregor came into town because it was a production day. We needed it for ads. We needed it for, you know, we want to be able to do, you know,

in caps with his face on it, you know, to help build the momentum there. And, you know, so there is an upfront chunk, and then there's a monthly payment that's made as long as he's doing his deliverables. So that's how that works. And I think when we started the podcast, I told you where I'm from. And usually like outside America, soccer is a religion. Oh, yeah. Soccer is huge.

The World Cup's coming next year. Yeah. I don't want you to give anything away. But with some of the superstars coming, are we seeing any potential partnerships happening? We have a few in mind, but we have some other people in mind that we think would do a little bit better. Okay. Not just in the soccer realm, but we do have some things. like, for instance, we are the official sponsor, the official energy drink at SoFi Stadium,

which the FIFA Cup and everything will be at SoFi Stadium playing in that stadium. So, you know, that's, you know, we'll be the only energy drink sold there at that stadium. Wow. So during the FIFA Cup. So there's some things that we've done that help with that. You know what I mean? So, but, yeah. Because, I mean, I saw Rinaldo with President Donald Trump yesterday, so I assume you can come to

Utah, meet Ryan. He should. Why not? They call them up and have him come over. I love that so much. All right. So bucked up success also relies heavily on marketing innovation from gym partnerships to massive online present.

What's your mindset when it comes to risk and creativity in branding? Well, look, our forte is marketing. We came from a marketing background, online driving traffic, building out funnels. You know, they call them click funnels now, but we were doing the, landing pages a long time ago and optimizing the data as it comes in. But, you know, we were always big on marketing. And our companies revolved around marketing, right? And social media. So that's what we feel like we're very strong. And so when we're working with people and working with different, you know, or coming up with a different product, we feel like we can get

the eyeballs to get the, you know, to get it out there. Like, for instance, we launched our lightly carbonated protein drinks. It's 25 grams of clear, ice-lit-way protein. Caffeine-free, they taste great. They almost taste like an energy drink, really. And, you know, we said, hey, I think we'll do about $2 million this first year on it. We're already sitting about $14 million. But that's because we launched on TikTok, and we got a lot of eyeballs on the

brand and then everybody was contacting us because they were hearing about it and they were requesting it from us so now we feel like we have this machine and whatever we stick into this machine it works and it goes and so now it's just a matter of picking the right product and most of the time it's just going with the gut i love that so and i mean nine years to about like a nine-figure company do you feel that but up is like growing too fast or in your opinion no no no No, look, like we've done steps, right? But at the end of the day, we have a great team. My responsibility is to get everybody rowing hard in the right direction

and not just have people with their oars in the water or drill and holes in the boat, but going as hard as possible. And that's really my role and responsibility as a CEO is to make sure that everybody's focused and going in the right direction. I love that. I mean, as far as too big, are you too big? I mean, look, it could always, you could always do more, right? And we just keep pushing.

Okay. Now, I love that. And then, you know, scaling company as far as you did, what systems or principles helped you stay grounded as a leader? I mean, that's a tough question, but staying grounded, it's really who the person is. Exactly. I mean, I don't think, I mean, I don't think, I mean,

I'm just a regular person. Like I said, I was born and raised on a farm. I didn't go to school. I went to school at UVU, or it was called UVSC at the time, but I didn't graduate. I didn't do anything. I didn't, you know, school wasn't for me. I'm just a regular person that got taught how to work hard and figure things out. And we feel like, you know, me and my twin brother run the company. We're both the founders and we both run the company on the day-to-day basis. I mean, I'm in work every single day, still as a CEO, I'm still an operator. And that's not generally what a CEO does. But I'm into the day-to-day and I keep my pulse on things.

I'm operating as just a regular person, trying my best to do what's best for the company. And I think just to add up on that as well, and when you said everyone else who kind of like row at the same pace, it's so hard as a leader. And how do you keep people grounded, motivated to continue to not be passengers, but actually continue to row the same direction as well. Well, we have some things in place like certain bonus structures and things in place that

what's great is when you set up those processes and bonuses, it gets everybody, hey, if you're not pulling your weight, we want this guy off the team, right? So everybody's actually rowing really, really hard to get and accomplish those bonuses. So, you know, at the end of the day, people are holding their own team responsible, not necessarily me. So that's the best thing. It doesn't put a lot of pressure on me, but if you set it upright, you know, the team itself will kick the person who's drilling holes in the boat. They'll kick them off. And say, hey, this guy's not pulling his weight.

Let's get them off. We need someone that's better. So, you know, and it's worked for us. I love that. And, you know, just speaking about this whole thing, so one of the, I've done because obviously BYU and, you know, just schooling here, LDS mission and all the kind of stuff, naturally when you end up becoming acquainted to that,

Doa to Doe is a big thing over here. So people end up picking up sales, picking up the basic skills, learning that kind of stuff. So I've done Doe Doe Doe for like five years, like pest. Did you go pest control and solar and stuff? Yes, pest control and solar. Oh, right. Three years, pest, three years, Yeah. And so...

I mean, you sold religion door to door. Selling those things are nothing, right? Absolutely. And it's a best form of skill set. It is a good skill set. Yeah. For sure. And so I've always learned, but I always had that networking ability, like, within me. So when I did my internship in New York with Bloomberg, I was one of only 40 interns to actually meet Michael Bloomberg, but I ended up using a few channels to try and, like,

network from the next person, the next person before starting this thing. So networking, I've realized the importance of it. And obviously, you've seen my persistence. Yes. Very persistence. Very persistent. And so, hey, no, but guess what? That's somewhat what it takes, right?

You know, I kind of blew you off a few times. I'm like, he didn't get the hint, but he really wanted the interview. So I'm like, man, this guy's good. So which I want to kind of segue to that as well. How important has that been? Because right now I'm looking at Buckdup, 2017 when I first came here, to what it is right now. You can't drive any.

7-11, you get like a drink. There was a bucked up. It was a new drink that was ever for bucked up. And it's everywhere. And it's not just Utah. Like you travel either, you travel anywhere. Bucked up. It's not just become grown so much. But how important has like networking being to try and like leverage those networks to get you where you are right? Networking is really important. You know, we actually hired the former CEO of Dr. Pepper. His name is Gil. And we hired him to help us build out our distribution network. And because he knew the network from working at Dr. Pepper and other places, he knew how to build that network and had relationships with those people. And so we got our drinks into a lot of different places

just because of networking and knowing who he was and everything else. So it's really important. Networking is, you know, and, you know, just associating with other people like even here in Utah, we have a pretty good network of people that like to get together. And, you know, it's great getting to know all the other CEOs and everything here in Utah. So it's been great. And have you ever struggled with one thing where you feel like you, I mean, you and your brother are very good at one thing? But have you ever struggled in trying to delegate responsibilities because you know your work? Oh yeah, yeah. Like at the first, you know, really what was holding our company back from growth was ourselves. We tried to wear multiple hats throughout

the business because we wanted the controlling. We wanted to run it lean and, and, and, and keep it mean. And the thing is, is sometimes you need to bring in those experienced people in those positions because, you know, I was trying to be the CM, the CFO, and also the CEO all at the same time. And that's just not going to work. And in order to grow, you've got to have the right people in the right places to make it work. Some stuff. No, that makes a lot of sense. Because I feel like when you read the cash flow quadrant, you start seeing small business and employee, then you start seeing that when you are in big business and also an investor, that's when things are just flowing as well.

Yeah. And the fact that you're also in the forefront, when people start seeing their leader literally doing everything, the operational stuff, all is working, it shows like that level of motivation. If he is doing that, then let me also do my end of the stick as well. So I think it's important. Yeah, there's been a couple, it's been like two or three years now before we'd go in during Black Friday and fulfill all the orders, even as the CEO.

Wow. I'd be in there filling orders, people's orders, and I'm like, man, this is amazing. This is crazy because we had so many orders coming in. And I wanted a really great customer experience that I was in there packing orders along with the rest of them. Now, sometimes that's good and sometimes that's bad because I'm like, why aren't we doing this? Why aren't we doing? And it's like, hey, just let go. They'll get it out.

And it's working really, really well. And speaking about that, I've seen a lot of leaders micromanage too much. you don't allow people to actually, like, thrive as well. That's the importance of hiring the right people, though. You know, you've got to be able to say, hey, I hired the right person, and I'm going to trust that they're going to do it and just let go. Because that is a really hard thing for most people and CEOs, because we're, you know, we want to control things and we want to, I mean, that's why we run our own business, right?

We don't want to be told what to do. We want to do it and tell people this is how we'd like it to be done. but hiring the right person is really, really crucial in order for success. And sometimes, you know, in the past, we actually said, man, that guy's really, really expensive. But if he can bring 10 times or 15 times his value, it's worth it all day long. And so like with Gil, Gil was the most expensive employee that we hired. But look at us now. I mean, we're on pace to sell, you know, 60 plus million energy drinks, you know, and protein drinks.

So it's been amazing to have a guy like him in our organization. And apart from Gail, what would you say is the biggest risk that you've taken that's actually paid off in the nine years of running the company? The biggest risk is doing energy drinks. At first, we wanted to go out with energy drinks. and we made about 200,000 cans of energy drinks, like 155 or something like that, 155,000 or 200,000 energy drinks. And when we got them, they didn't taste like the samples. At the end, so we drank them, and at the end, there was this really bitter taste

that we didn't notice when we were doing the samples. So we had to destroy all of them. We had to destroy all of these things, and we're like, man, that was quite really. risky to not work. And this was pretty fresh. You know, this was 2020. And we were like, man, I don't know how we're going to do this if we don't. You know, to do energy drinks, it's a pretty big expense. And to ship liquid across the state, they're very, very heavy. You know, and so, but, you know, we took the risk to continue to do that. And, you know, like I said, we hired Gill, which was a big risk that we thought, because super expensive employee.

but it's obviously panned out. And then speaking of that as well, just another follow-up on terms of that. If you look back, obviously, from all the entrepreneurs, CEOs, leaders, and so forth as well that I've interviewed, there's always a failure or a setback that may have occurred within their life

that they're actually grateful for. If you look back in your experience, what would you say that was for you? Yeah, I mean, energy drinks was just one of those examples. We've done buck bars that failed. I mean, there's lots of things, but what we are quick to do is quick to adjust and go on to the next thing. And we also have pretty, you know, we just made a few mistakes along the way, but we're quick to adjust and move on. And that's really, that's really what it is.

That's been the biggest thing for me, because every time when I do the Code Twin and I ask people questions, it's always inspiring to always see that people are willing to admit their setbacks, but they're also grateful for them because in your situation, you quickly adjusted it. Rather than holding on to a losing stock, like let's quickly place a sell, let's buy something else again. That's right. And I think it's very important in business as well.

Now, just to make it very interesting, what are some of the strengths that you have and what are the strengths that your brother has, if you compare the two? What would you say? We're identical twins, and it's almost like we're ying and yang, so we complement each other really well

because one of us is a little more aggressive and the other one's not. And then vice versa, there's certain things that he does that I compliment him as well. But, you know, like, I'm really great at starting things and Jeff's really detail-oriented, and he helps manipulate it to where it actually goes from A to Z, too. You know what I mean? But it's great. I mean, just think if you had two of you. You know, it's like you would get twice as much, three times as much done, right?

And that's the way it works with me and my twin brother. It's been very complimentary. And we both have our strengths. We both have our weaknesses. And we're able to compliment each other because of that. So it's been great. It's like having two CEOs that bucked up, actually. So it's great.

And especially with two different skill sets and strengths as well, you know, because I think sometimes you overlook your weaknesses, focusing a lot on your strength. But like when you have somebody in a different partner, especially an identical twin partner. You know, like you've grown up, you know each other inside out from the day you guys were born.

It makes a massive difference, eh? Yes, for sure. And then, you know, with processes and everything, he's really good at figuring it out and having the process streamlined and worked really well. So it's been great. The whole thing's been good. Awesome.

What role does intuition play in decision making, especially as a founder and a CEO? Oh, yeah, it's, it's huge. You know, like I said with, you know, we, we, we said, hey, we were not very strong with protein. And protein has super, super low margins. What are we going to do that's different? And our intuition was it has to be completely different than what's out on the market. And we were trying all of these protein drinks.

We had them all on the desk in the conference room. And then we saw one, we had one that. said, hey, you want to try this. This has carbonation in it. And once we tried that, we threw all the other ones away. We're like, this is what we're going to go with. And it was something that was really unique on the market, and nobody was doing it. And so we were one of the first people to release lightly carbonated protein drink. And honestly, it tastes just like an energy drink to me. And, you know, the amount of energy drinks that I drink throughout a day is a lot less now, for sure. And my protein intake has definitely gone up.

No, that's good. I've tried a lot of your bucked-up products. I haven't tried the energy drink. So the reason why I have not, when I did pest in 2019, I was relying a lot on energy drinks. So it was so bad. You took a break. I had to take a break. So we were in New Jersey. It was Princeton at that time. And as we were in Princeton, we were doing sales. As a fact, you probably mightn't even know. My manager is now the owner of the grit. Probably knowing John Taylor. Yeah.

Yeah. Super. It was relentless. He's one of the best sales. Yeah, he's great. Great guy. And a good person too. We were down in Princeton, but like around the time, I was just, that morning, I think

I had eggs and I probably had three red balls. Stupid decision. Oh, geez. Absolutely stupid. So I'm out there pitching a customer, and my heart's just like pounding, like crazy. And the customer called an ambulance, I end up in, it was a disaster. But it was an acid reflux reaction. because of drinking.

Well, all that much acid, yeah. And so, yeah. So that's why I haven't tried. It was a good thing because sometimes you have that scared moment in life and you're like, I can't do this again. Yeah. That was it for me. So that's probably why I haven't tried your energy drink.

So nothing against you any. I mean, you know, there's, you know, people are definitely over-caffinated. For sure. You know what I mean? So, you know, we tried to, I always try to limit the amount of caffeine. And most of the stuff that I take is very low-caffinated and stuff. And we also have drinks that are lower. caffeine as well, like 100 milligrams of caffeine, not 300. So we have something pretty much for everyone.

And we even have some products that have zero caffeine in them. You know, like some of our pre-workouts don't have any caffeine. So stimulant free, non-stimulant. Yeah, that type of thing. What's the vision for bucked up moving forward? The first nine years, absolute success, the next 11 years, when you look back at 2036, what do you envision bucked up? to be. Well, you know, we want to become a household name, like a monster or a Red Bull that's recognized throughout the world, not just in our local area here. And I think we're doing a pretty good job on that, you know, and, you know, really, you know, doing these big things like SoFi Stadium, where the Rams and the Chargers play, you know, those are the things that we need

to continue to do to build brand awareness and education about our brand, you know, so, and what we provide. But, you know, our ultimate goal and vision is, you know, we want to be the NBA, you know, not the NFL. NFL, the people can't really see behind a mask, a face mask. But the NBA, you can ask a ton of people, hey, do you know who LeBron James is? And everybody's like, yeah, and I can recognize him, you know, and that's what we want to do. We want to be like a LeBron James or a Steph Curry that's recognized, you know, as one of the leaders in energy drinks, pre-workouts, supplements. You know, we have some awesome innovation

that's going to be coming out this next year. We already have the whole year lined out. It's going to be good. So next year is going to be even better. No, I love that. And obviously, I'll look at, like, the story of Nike. I'll look at the story of Adidas and Puma and all the kind of stuff. When right now, when people associate Adidas,

I think of, like, Leo Messi, when they associate Nike, outside America, they think of Christiana Ronaldo, inside America they think of LeBron James and Michael Jordan. Or Michael Jordan, yeah, exactly. Who is bucked-ups next to LeBron James? I know, a tough question. I don't know.

I don't know who that person is. I do have a couple things that we're working on. I don't want to kind of spoil it, like to say who we're going at. But, you know, there is, you know, We have the bucked-up L-A. Bowl, which is a bowl game, an NCAA football bowl game. December 13th, right? Yeah, December 13th, bucked-up L.A. Bowl.

And it's hosted by Rob Grunkowski, and he's a great guy. And so we might tend to lean a little bit towards Rob, because he's very credible, very liked. He's really good at social media. He's a good dude. So hopefully we can do something like that. That'd be great. And then there's other people that are even more popular than that that we're working on. I see, it's funny.

You don't want to give it away. I can't. I can't. I saw you and Ryan Garcia at SoFi Stadium like, I think, a month or two ago. Yeah, you know, we ended up doing a survey, right? And this is how we kind of, we work with this group that does these surveys, and they survey like 2,500 random people, right? And they go out and survey them. and, you know, we gave a list of like 10 people's names, and they tell us how credible they are, how liked they are, and how good that they would do for our brand.

Okay. And if they've recognized Bucked Up, you know, so we did, we asked a bunch of questions, but, you know, like a Ryan Garcia, he's just, it wasn't, it wasn't quite the person for Bucked Up. You know what I mean? There was, there was like three or four other people on there on this list. that we had, Rob Grownkowski being one of them, that scored way, way higher. And, you know, for credibility, for likeness, for, you know, do you follow them on social media, that type of thing. It was just, you know, we made a decision to pass on Ryan Garcia, even though he's a great guy. I wanted to do Ryan Garcia just because I like watching his

social media, his fights. I like Ryan Garcia. No, no. The reason I'm saying that you're remind me of, and this is the biggest compliment I can ever give you, you remind me of the Real Madrid president. What he does, he, the reason why Real Madrid are the biggest, I'm a Manchester United fan, but Real Madrid is the biggest, like, sports team outside of America. Yeah, yeah, because they've won Champions League. It's like a brand, like, and they're a standard, you know, they're a standard. However, the president, what he always did, he always believed, listen, brand is so important. So he always signs the best player. And, you know, he always signs the best player and it doesn't matter what it is, you know.

But you also make sure that they fit the standards and the brand of Real Madrid. So as much as that, so he's like, okay, well, we need to get Cristiano Ronaldo. Like, how are we going to get him? He's the best player in 2008 with Ben Chester. Like, it doesn't matter. We need to get him there. At that time, they hadn't won, like, the champions league in forever. They got Ronaldo.

They signed Kaka. They signed like the top two of the three best players outside, Messi. And from then, it's people that just were ambassadors outside. because he has Ronaldo's great, but he's also very good at just being focused, not being controversial, avoiding political stuff, all these different things. Just great for the brand. Great for the brand. Yeah.

And that's what we're looking for too. Who, you know, and you may be able to suggest who do you think would be great for the brand for bucked up? You know, and you run across lots of people, you tell us, who do you think would be great for bucked up? You're asking me right now? Yeah, sure. Okay. I personally. What would you, who would you say?

if you go, hey, of all the celebrities or all the athletes, who do you think we should go after? I'll be honest. I'm a big, are you talking upcoming or just in general? Any upcoming is even better because we can get a cheaper, usually, than they're upcoming. That's a very good question. So people, a person, I interviewed, a mentee of his people like a Terrence Crawford. Yeah. And we've been in talks with Terrence Crawford.

He's such a humble... Talk about an athlete. Good person, but also his upbringing, like, what he's been through. And he's such a role model in the sense where people look up to him. I remember, like, interviewing people in his team, like, they seem as, like, a leader. He engages the people that are even, like, in the lower tiers and stuff. Terrence Crawford has won. I went to the Canelo Crawford fight.

So it was awesome. It was awesome. And he ended up when... And we were in discussions with him prior to that, but, you know, we just didn't, you know, we had certain limits on budgets and things like that, but, you know, this next year, maybe we can go after him. Now that he's, you know, beat Canello might be up. He might be a little more expensive. But he's a great athlete, just unreal.

And I think the only thing, the reason I felt like it was also good, he doesn't necessarily have the brand of Floyd, doesn't necessarily even have like the brand of Canello. But all these stuff has just been hard work and grit. So he doesn't have the PR team to kind of push the stuff the way it is. So I felt like it was the perfect thing for bucked up because he's one of those people that's just raw, gifted, and he's relentless. Now, how do you implement with a Terrence Crawford? Do we come out with a flavor with Terrence Crawford? Do we, you know, like that's what we got to start thinking about. Exactly. Hey, maybe on his next fight, we say, hey, if he wins on his, he wins his next fight, 40% off our website for 24 hours. Exactly. Or something like that. That's how we have to implement. And that's how we got to start thinking. is how am I going to implement with this athlete?

So Terrence Crawford's a great one. Terrence Crawford's a great one. And then I'd look for people very similar to like a Steph Curry kind of thing. He's just, I'm a big LeBron James fan, but because of sometimes having a political stand, it may be controversial, especially in Utah. Like I've noticed, like he's not like he's liked by a lot of people, but also disliked by a lot of people.

Where Steph Curry, I'm not a Steph Curry fan. But everybody likes him, right? And, you know, that was, I don't know if you saw this, but on the break 50 with Bryson, he's also a great golfer, too. You know what I mean? He did the break 50. He did the break 50 with Bryson. You know, and break 50 with Bryson de Chambot, they golf from the front teeth, right? And they tried to do 18 holes under 50 strokes. And they were able to do that with, with Steph Curry. He's just a pure athlete. And, you know, I really like Steph Curry. And we made. maybe working on that tip. No, that's what I... He got introduced to bucked up through Bryce and Des Chambot. No, that's why I'm trying to say, because I don't want to do, like, my favorites. I don't want to do...

I try to always look for ambassadors that can actually carry out a thing, because you'll never see Steph Curry doing anything controversial, like, on a Twitter. You won't see he's just a good family man, and he's just liked by... Like, in Team USA, even people that weren't like Golden's, that people are like, oh, Curry, Curry, Curry. Yes, I'm a big LeBron James fan. I'll always be because I'll watch me. basketball because of him when I came up in South African stuff.

But let me try and think of upcoming. There is, I watch a lot of March Madness, but I'm trying to see there's. Yeah, a lot of March Madness. There's, yeah, but you may know a lot more soccer because you're a bigger soccer fan. Maybe, I mean, is there any soccer players out there that we should go after? So for the, obviously going to be big for the World Cup. There's, I'm trying to see there is so many young talent right now. there's an 18-year-old in Barcelona.

He's probably, he finished second in the thing. But there's even people that are not as big in terms of he's there branding that are just as good that are coming for the World Cup next year. Well, you'll maybe have to send me an email. A couple of these names, right? So we can start looking into him and going after him. No, and the thing about that, one thing I want to also touch on is American brands are so big outside there. If somebody is associated with the American brand, it's also a bigger kind of thing.

Bigger deal. Platform as well. Yeah. Yeah. There's many I'll share with you that are both in like South America that are upcoming. But in Nammer, I want to look out for, this is going to be the next big player. Okay. He's, I think only 18 years old.

He plays for Chelsea. His name. Like a Namar. He's going to be a Namar. He's going to be a Namar. He's going to get him now. Esteva. Estava.

I'll send you a text. He's like, he's going to be the next name. He's just, everything is around him right now. And he's 18 playing amongst men, right? PR is not even that good just yet, so that's a good... Okay, well, that's a good thing. That's a good thing. No, that's...

Yeah, what else? No, those are good names. And I actually like that approach as well, but yeah, that could be the next. Esteva could be the... Yeah. Well, and soccer's just so big worldwide. And we're now starting to expand internationally. So it could be a really good play with him, for sure.

Is he pretty recognizable? Like, as far as worldwide, he's really recognizable. So right? Right now, he's recognizable in South America and Europe. He's only upcoming, so it's going to become a bigger name as well. So it's one of those things. Especially during this FIFA Cup and everything, right? So what he did in the recently, Brazil was playing a friendly actually in England,

and he took the penalty kick, the winning goal for his team. But my point, the fact that they put that responsibility right now, and in Brazil, it's all his hierarchy because it's heritage because they won five World Cups. They wanted the favorites for next year. They want the best of the best. Exactly. But the fact that he did that, everyone's the first. everyone's now thinking they're trying to push him to be the next big thing as well.

So he's becoming, he plays for Chelsea. They signed him like two years prior in Brazil before he went to Europe. Nobody even knew him. I only learned about him like this season. And they had signed him way, way early. Yeah. They're now signing kids 10 years old, you know. It's crazy.

Yeah. Awesome. So that's my only suggestion. Try and go into soccer because right now soccer is a religion. And it's getting more and more popular every year here in the U.S. Yeah. you know, especially with Messi coming to, you know, Miami and all that. And not just that.

They're also doing like FIFA Club World Cups. They're doing FIFA Big World. They're doing all the stuff. And Manchester United, my team, they always come here for a US tour. They've come here for the last year. Oh, and they play a bunch of the U.S. teams. Exactly. So they play a bunch of the U.S. teams.

They do a pre-friendly. But because the fan bases of English Premier League's are growing so much, they come over here. And they love American fans because the economy is so big. invest in terms of like buying shirts, sales and all the stuff. So the American market is so big. Even those soccer's like, so big. And we're all consumers here, man. We just just consume.

We just consume everything. No, I appreciate that. Yeah, let's go back to the questions. Yeah, sure. Many CEOs focus on revenue and forget the long-term brand equity. How do you make decisions that protect the brand five or ten years from now? Well, that's a very, very good and tough question to answer. But, you know, like for us, we've always ran it as, hey, we're not just going after revenue. We want to make sure that the customer experience with Bucked Up is really good. Not only that, we want to make sure that we have really great tasting products and products that really work. And as long as we stick to our mantra or to our pillars that make us. great, we feel like that will make it to where it lasts forever. So, you know, a lot of people,

you know, they just go in and say, hey, I'm going to do this, but it's really great to establish what makes you different and what's going to make you last for a long time. And I think that's, you know, we like to innovate. We like to come out with the best, latest and greatest products. We like to make sure that they taste great. They're really effective and making sure that the has a great experience with us. So, you know, that's part of the flywheel that makes this thing spin so fast, you know, and delivering product on time, you know, just making sure that we, we, you know, really at the end of the day, it's about the customer.

You know what I mean? And making sure that they have a good experience. I love that as much. Now, the last and final question, I always ask this to all the athletes, CEOs, business leaders, successful founders like yourself. Yeah. Because it's the coat winning, winning means different definitions for every single person I've interviewed. For Ryan Gardner, as a founder, CEO of like, you know, the number one pre-workout supplement company, literally nationwide and arguably the world as well.

What is your definition of winning? You know, a lot of people may see that things are easy on the outside, but it does take hard work. and I think that if people are willing to work and work hard, they're going to be successful in whatever they do. You know, obviously through hard work comes a lot of opportunities, right? We're fortunate enough to be in this situation that our hard work is paying off, and now opportunities come our way, right? So like, for instance, an ingredient, a person who's coming up with a brand new ingredient

that's new on the market that never had been done before, guess who they're approaching. They're approaching us. Because of all of our hard work, they know, hey, if we can get a product in with bucked up, everybody else will start using it as well. So I do think when it comes down to it, I think the code to winning is work hard and never give up.

That's what I think. Obviously, work smart, hire the right people, all these different things apply to it. But if you're working hard, those things will come. I love that so much. Well, Ryan, if you could let people that want to become like affiliates or they want to try and qualify or apply to become an affiliate, if you could let them know where to get a hold of that, you know. Yeah, you can go to our website, apply at the bottom of our website where it says become an ambassador. Right now we get about 200 to 250 people a day that apply.

There's a few requirements. But, you know, the best thing about us is we're looking for anyone and everyone that, you know, meets these requirements. You don't have to be in like the greatest shape. We feel like we're a very relatable company. So we'd love to have you on the team. And it's better to have a whole army of people and then just one person. So we'd love to have you on the team. Awesome stuff. Well, the link will be right at below as well, where you guys can go to the bucked up link, which will be in the description section. So yes, the co-twinning, if you want to learn a bit more about how founders have built a successful nine-figure business.

This is the episode for you, the coach-winning insights you need today to seize the world tomorrow. Ryan Gardner, great honester. Thank you. KG, thanks for having me on, man.