The Nick Bare Podcast - Archive - Nick Bare Q&A | STAND FOR SOMETHING

Episode Date: October 31, 2022

We're live with another Q&A session with Nick and Jordan Utter! The guys sit down to answer questions that you submitted on Instagram; with topics like: is social media essential to build a brand, how is Nick's health different during the Hybrid Build vs an Ultra Marathon prep, the best way to maintain a consistent, healthy diet, how to not sacrifice culture for the sake of growth, and does Nick drink alcohol.  These episodes happen periodically from questions Nick will ask on his Instagram Story, so if you have questions for him, follow Nick @nickbarefitness.  And follow along the Youtube Series "The Hybrid Build" on Youtube. New Episodes launch every Monday at 10:00AM CST More Resources: BPN Website - Supplements and Apparel: www.bpnsupps.com Nick’s Website: www.nickbare.com Nick’s Youtube: www.youtube.com/user/barelifenutrition Follow Us On Social Media: Instagram: @thebareperformancepodcast Facebook: The Bare Performance Podcast

Welcome back to another powerful episode of the podcast. I'm your host, Nick Baer, founder and CEO of Bear Performance Nutrition. Every week, we bring you insightful stories, knowledge, and inspiration to help you reach your full potential in life, fitness, and business. If you enjoy the message we're promoting in this podcast, we would greatly appreciate it if you would leave a rating and review on the platform you're listening to. Make sure to subscribe so you don't miss out on future episodes. that embody the go one more mindset.

We are back with another episode of the Bear Performance Podcast, and today I have co-hosts Jordan Utter joining me, and we're going to walk through a series of questions that we got from Instagram, and we're going to work our way through. Jordan's going to take lead facilitating this conversation, and I'm just going to let it rip on every question. Happy to be back, excited for this one.

I've been looking forward to just facilitating some questions for a while. Just letting you just rip off. So here we go. As Jeff Cunningham says, we're ripping ass. He does say that a lot. That was like one of my favorite.

That was on the podcast, actually. I was asking Jeff a question. And he said it's so serious. And I was biting my lip so hard trying not to laugh. That actually happens in podcast quite frequently with guests. Is they'll say something not intending to be funny. And the way like they say it, their emotion.

It makes me laugh. I bite down on this inner lip so hard. I can taste blood in my mouth. So if you see Nick biting on his lip or his lip quivering a little bit, we know that you're trying not to laugh. So many of those situations. Jeff needs his own YouTube show, though, that's for sure. Like his own series on either Netflix or YouTube TV or something.

Well, what people don't know is Jeff is now the official run coach of BPN. There it is. So we're going to be sending a videographer on Wednesdays to record him and his team's workouts. in Austin. So there will be a lot more content with Jeff. So his series essentially will be on BPN's channels for now. Yes. So tune in there and be ready for that because that is pure entertainment.

That's going to be so exciting to watch. I remember when, and we'll get into these questions here soon, but I remember when I met Natasha for the first time in preparation for Iron Man Prep. And she's like, hey, I'm going to introduce you to this run coach. He's my run coach. He's going to be great for the series because he's a character. Yep. And I was like, okay.

This guy's probably a little funny. I met Jeff and I was like, perfect. Yep. Throw a camera in his face, perfect. There you go, Jeff. There's your shout out if you're listening. All right, let's get into it. Let's do it.

So first question, I want you to take me back a little bit. Ten years ago, little baby Nick Bear, maybe not baby, young Nick Bear in his college apartment starting a supplement company, what is now BPN. What do you know now that you wish you knew back then? I guess the cliche question would be, what would you tell? that younger Nick Baer and the college department starting BPN. I remember sitting in my college department, it was 2012. And I'm going to paint this picture because I believe a lot of other entrepreneurs

or want to be entrepreneurs, want to be founders of a company, are probably in this similar situation. And when I was in my college department in 2012 starting the business, I never thought it could reach a level of success in size that it has reached today. I just didn't think that I had the capability. I didn't think I had the capacity. I didn't think it was realistic. So I always thought smaller rather than the larger.

And if I could tell myself then what I know now, it would be literally a very intimate conversation. of, hey Nick, younger Nick, I just want you to know that everyone starts at zero. Everyone starts not knowing anything. And anyone that you see who is 5, 10, 15, 20 years ahead of you, if you see anyone that is doing something right now that you want to be doing in the future, but you're not right now, they started exactly where you're at today. Everyone starts at zero.

Everyone starts with no money, no experience. no education, no knowledge. Everyone has to start at zero. And it's what you're willing and able to do and learn and experience. That's going to get you to step one, step two, step three, step four, so forth and so on. But everyone starts at nothing. And I think if I would have realized that back then, it would have influenced me at a

younger age to have the confidence to dream much larger, much larger than what I was in the beginning. In the beginning, I just wanted to do 20 orders a day. If we could do 20 orders a day, for me that was like hitting the lottery. But to do a thousand plus orders a day, now it wasn't achievable in my mind at that point. Yeah, I think that's a really important note to talk about how you said your vision of success or what your goals were back then were so much smaller than obviously what BPN is now. And I think that's really important because I think it's crucial for people to have a vision of success for their company or something they're passionate about or something they're starting. And so like you said, I was going to ask what that looked like,

but it sounds like it was 20 orders a day. At what point did you realize you needed to shoot for a bigger goal or you're thinking too small? At what point did it hit you? Was it a pivotal moment or was it a gradual, oh, we're doing 50 orders? We're doing 100. This could be big. All right. now 500, what did that process look like of starting to think bigger? I think it was probably 2020, actually. There's only two and a half years ago, almost three years ago, where up until that point, I mean, when you joined the team in 2019, we were four or five people on the team. And still at that point, I knew we had such a long way to go.

I looked at all of these people operating the same. space who were, in my opinion, crushing it at the time. They were in retail. They were doing strong D to C numbers. They had a huge presence. Everyone was wearing their t-shirts everywhere. And I saw they had 100, 200 plus employees. We had four or five employees. I was like, there's such a huge disconnect from where we were at to where we wanted to be. But in 2020, we picked up some more momentum and we actually started growing at a faster rate. And we started breaking past my previous goals. And that's when I had like this feeling of,

I think we're actually just scratching the surface. Fast forward two and a half years. You know, it's October of 2020. I still believe we're only scratching the surface. And I think once you finally realize, oh my gosh, we're 10 years in, but we're just getting started. we have so much more room to grow and scale.

There's so much opportunity left on the table. There's so much more we could still be doing. Well, nothing's unbelievable. When you get to a point and you say, well, crap, we reach this certain level, whether that's reach or revenue, or it's where you want to be. And when you reach that point and you don't know where to go next,

it's like, how do I grow past this point? You might be stuck. Yep. but we're at a point now where we know what we have to do to grow. It's now just building off with that foundation to get there. Like we know the plan. We know the strategy of getting from where we're at today to where we want to be in the future. It's there.

We just have to go seize it now. But 2020 was probably that year where I realized, and if you think about it, that was eight years into the business. After eight years of doing this thing, I finally realized, I think we can actually be the biggest best supplement brand in the entire world. Now let's go to get it. Yep. And so looking into the future, what does it look like when VPN is the largest supplement brand in the world?

Yeah, I was talking to the team about this recently. So right now we're implementing EOS into the business, the entrepreneurial operating system. And this has been something I've been talking about in the podcast recently. It's built and based off of the business. book traction. If you're a business owner, entrepreneur, do you want to be an entrepreneur in the future, you should be reading traction. It might not make sense to you now, but it will make sense to you at some point. It's probably going to be a book that you have to read multiple times. But EOS, the foundation of it, it's you're building a company and an organization based off of accountability functions

and a vision and goal based off of rocks, which are quarterly, objectives and say for example we set our goal of where we're going to be in one years, three years, five years, and ten years, well then we start backwards planning and implementing our objectives to hit those goals with the accountability of functions that we have in the organization. So going back to what does it look like when we are the biggest supplement company in the world, I want BPN to be the largest supplement company in the world, but feel and look like it is still the same size it is today.

I want the brand and social to be relatable, to be family oriented in terms of just like community, and tighten it and like this tribe, but reach a larger amount of people, have stronger operations and systems and an Omni Channel presence in terms of retail and e-com. I don't want to scale and grow at the expense of sacrificing culture and community. So I want to be the biggest without looking or feeling like we are the biggest.

Yep. And there's a lot of ways to become the biggest, and you can definitely lose that culture and that community. Why is it so important for you to keep it around? Like, why is that your number one thing? A few reasons. One, selfishly, that's where I want to work. That's where I want to operate.

I want the people that have uprooted their life and moved here and left their previous job and came to BPN to want to keep showing up to work and build something absolutely amazing. So selfishly, like, that's what I want to be a part of. And I want the people who are a part of it too to feel that as well. In the same time, if you. scale and grow at a rate where you sacrifice culture and community, you don't have a tribe anymore. You don't stand for something unique and specific.

You're just another one. You just get lost in the sea of other brands. And I want BPN to always stand for something, represent something. Because when people wear a BPN t-shirt or they carry around their BPN shaker bottle or they scoop a, you know, they put a scoop of flight in their shaker bottle before they go into a workout for their pre-workout, I want that to mean something to them. It's not just a product. It's not just a shirt.

It's not just a shaker bottle. It represents the go one more mindset and mission. And when you see someone carrying that bottle, it's, oh, you get it. Like, you get it. Yeah. That's great. I love that. Do you feel like you've sacrificed a short-term growth or to reach that goal of being the biggest

supplement brand in the world for the sake of keeping this core community, not even culture internally, but community outside and in that feeling of when I take a scoop of flight or scoop a pro team out, part of something special, I didn't just buy this off a shelf and I'm another just customer. Do you feel like you've sacrificed the ability to scale and grow even faster to maintain that? 100%. Yeah. But I will say it wasn't necessarily intentional. So to add context to that. I didn't three years ago say we're going to slow the growth of BPN

because we don't want to sacrifice community. It's that we put community, we put the mission, we put the tribe, we put Goin Moore first, and then we built off of that. So every decision we made was very intentional

and strategic and deliberate because we built off of that foundation. So the decision, decisions we made allowed us to grow at an appropriate rate that we were comfortable with without sacrificing our foundation. Yeah, that's so good. Awesome. Man, that was a great series of questions.

Going to pivot a little bit. Obviously, these questions kind of came in from Instagram, so they are going to be a little all over the place. But moving on, do you utilize debt for the business? And how do you leverage debt for the business? Yeah, so we're a bootstrapped brand. I started BPN, as many people know, with a $20,000 loan when I was in college. And that was the only debt that built BPN.

And I might have paid off this loan like in two years or something like that. And we have no debt on the business. We haven't touched a line of credit. And the only reason I bring that up is because that was mainly due to ignorance for the longest period of time. If I would have known how to leverage debt to finance inventory or marketing early on, I definitely would have done that. I mean, it would have saved me a lot of sleepless nights,

a lot of tears, a lot of stress, a whole lot of stress. But I didn't know that for years and years and years. I thought that the only way to build a business was based off of the money you had available that was liquid in cash in your bank account. Like when me and Preston were building the brand, the amount of money we had in our business checking account, that's how much money we had to pay for rent. It's how much money we had to pay for inventory and marketing.

And if it wasn't in that bank account, we didn't have it. Looking back, yes, it would have been smart to get a line of credit. Maybe take some debt on the business to scale it, at a faster rate. I just didn't know that then. Today, I would still implement that if we had to, but we operate a healthy, profitable business.

We have an established line of credit, but we never touch it. We haven't touched it yet. But if you're a business owner and you have product, you sell a product, you have inventory, if you do it smart, if you're smart, you're conservative with it, and maybe even get a mentor, an accountant, someone who's savvy with finances to help you navigate it.

But utilize debt, apply for and secure a line of credit so that you can pay for inventory to scale your business. Because a business like us, our largest expense, which is an investment, is inventory. I mean, it's a lot of money. There's a lot of money in inventory. And that gets tied up because you're not selling it right away. So I wish I would have known more about the financial aspects of a business earlier on. But at the same time, what we did and how we bootstrapped and how we were conservative and scrappy, it taught us a lot and it got us to this point.

But now I have CFO in house. We have CAT, our chief revenue officer in house, who are very intelligent when it comes to finances and forecasting. and projecting and budgeting, and they help us navigate the future. Do you feel like finance has been one of the largest obstacles for you to overcome when starting VPN? Definitely. Yeah.

Definitely. It's just like, it's one of those things. You don't know what you don't know. And my dad's side of the family, they were dairy farmers in central Pennsylvania. My mom's side of the family, you know, they were,

a lot of them were military. both sides of the family growing up they weren't loaded with cash and reserves and they were very scrappy and resourceful and cheap it's very cheap so that's where I learned all about finances growing up but it's one of those things that you just don't know what you don't know

yeah and I think that's such a good point for like young entrepreneurs too because there's obviously things that you did know really, really well. Like you are a creative at heart. And yeah, at that same time you're like trying to figure out finances. You were like got this YouTube thing just figured out and you're crushing it. How do you kind of navigate working through your strengths and weaknesses for an entrepreneur specifically? And then at what point do you start to be like, okay, I'm not the best of this. I'm never going to be the best of this. You know, for you maybe sitting down and looking at Excel sheets all day as CEO, you're like, I don't want to, I don't want to do this. I'm not the best at it.

How do you start to navigate either how to delegate that stuff or to find someone who is an expert in that area and hire or outsource? What does that look like to navigate those kind of weaknesses that may be holding the business back? Well, I think being a creative at heart was a competitive advantage for us because when you are creative, you can be resourceful and scrappy. and when you're low on cash, if you are creative, you can stretch that cash very thin for a long period of time.

And that's where I learned how to do. But I always use the reference of the, or the analogy of the Swiss Army pocket knife. So in the beginning of building a business, especially if you're bootstrapped. I mean, there's bootstrapped businesses like VPN and there's venture-backed businesses

where someone goes out. And there's no right or wrong, but someone goes out, raises a bunch of money, millions of dollars, hires a really strong executive team, get some investors, and it's a completely different way of starting. But when you're bootstrapped, the analogy of the Swiss Army pocket knife

is you have to wear multiple hats in the business. You've got to be customer service, you got to be operations, you have to be marketing, you have to be fulfillment, everything, right? and you'll reach an inflection point where you start growing and what's going to hold you back is trying to be and maintain that Swiss Army pocket knife. This happens to a lot of entrepreneurs

is that they're not willing to delegate responsibilities and functions in the business. They want to hold everything. And they think it's being resourceful and scrappy and conservative, but really it's holding the business back tremendously. And I would say, I realized that pretty early on.

You know, I handed off operations and fulfillment as soon as possible because I knew that if I was packing orders, I wasn't able to market and build the brand. So it was the first thing that I handed off. And then I handed off customer service. And then I handed off creation, you know, when we hired you, 2019, videography, photography, editing. and then as we grew and scaled at a faster, larger rate,

I was able to hand off more and more and more. And now it gets a point where you get more comfortable handing off duties and responsibilities and functions because you realize that every time you hand that off to someone who is more effective and efficient with those duties, you grow. You instantly grow. And as a leader of an organization of a business, you should be focusing in your area of genius.

That kind of goes to where I'm moving in the business now into a chief creative officer role. That is my area of genius. That's also my passion. That's what I love doing. That's what I'm good at in terms of vision and strategy of creative and media and building a brand and telling a story. So you have to eliminate your ego in a business.

and I think that's one thing that I've been able to do over time. It wasn't easy in the beginning by any means, but you get better at it. When you eliminate your ego of, I need to hold this position, I want to move into this position. I was like, where are you best fit in the business? And that's where I've had to tell myself, like, Nick, where are you best fit in the business? Where are you going to help it grow at the fastest rate? And where can you help out the most? And that's putting myself now on this, you know, chief creative officer role of vision and strategy.

you just get better with it with more repetition. It's not easy in the beginning, but you quickly realize that once you delegate duties and responsibilities to who's going to do it best, everyone wins. Yeah, it's the analogy we talked about of like giving away your Legos. Don't be the selfish little kid doesn't know this is, these are my Legos. When you hand it off and let someone else build that,

you move on to the next stack. It's just so impactful, so powerful, so powerful in the company. So that was a great answer. I love that. on a little bit, pivoting a little bit to you personally away from BPN, exciting things going on. We got the hybrid build. That's probably already going to be out when this podcast comes out, I assume. So Monday, October 24th, every Monday at 10 a.m. YouTube series, super pumped. Obviously, you're putting on a little size, looking a little beefier. So I really like this question.

How are you not putting on any excess fat yet while gaining so much muscle? I am. So when I did a... A Dexas scan. I think at this point now, it's probably seven or eight weeks ago. It was in August. And if we even take it back further than that, when I finished the Buffalo New York Marathon in the end of May, I was probably sitting around 6% body fat.

I was lean. And my lowest I got down to 187 pounds. In August, I was probably sitting at 205 pounds. And I was at 8.9% body fat. and then we just weighed in recently. I'm sitting around 212 pounds right now, and I think we were at 10.7% body fat. So I'm putting on weight, I'm putting on size,

and maybe you can't tell based off of videos and photos, but I am putting on body fat. I mean, I can easily tell in terms of just abs are disappearing a little bit more than they were. muscle separation you know from a visual perspective is a little blurrier there's not as much separation as there was

to throughout this build and you know I'm gaining size I'm gaining strength and putting on weight you can't assume that it's going to be all muscle I mean there's going to be more fat gained than more muscle gained but the hopes is that in a chloric surplus

you're able to synthesize more muscle than you are breaking down and if you're you know body your tissue is in a surplus

of gaining as opposed to degrading well then you put some some lean tissue on but to answer the question I am gaining body fat right now and I'm okay with that it's it's having the realistic expectation

of what a build is and does. Yeah, and you mentioned being in a caloric surplus, how are you allocating those calories between carbs, fats, protein? Does that macro kind of make up look different right now than it did during marathon prep? Oh, yeah.

I mean, my calories right now are 4,200, roughly. I feel like I'm eating all day. And it makes it hard, like, if I skip a meal or I'm behind on a meal, it's hard to catch up for me because you have to add all these calories into one meal, but essentially right now I'm about 250 grams of protein, about 450 grams of carbs, and about 135 grams of fat.

So instantly, the first thing I'll do when I'm going into a build is I'll increase carbohydrates and dietary fat. Protein will probably remain constant during the whole build and the cut. But if you want to be very efficient with getting calories in, a gram of fat is nine calories per gram. A gram of carbohydrates is four calories per gram. So if I'm eating more dietary fat, because they're more chlorically dense per gram, I'm getting more calories in. So an easy way to get more calories, increased dietary fat you're consuming, but also, you know, as a balance of increasing carbs and fats. And the goal throughout this whole build is going to be to get calories as high

as possible, still being responsible and deliberate with it. You're not just throwing calories, 6,000 calories a day and putting on all this body fat. It's kind of like, you know, you're playing a game where you're trying to increase caloric intake as much as possible, gain weight, minimize too much fat gain, because then when you go to cut, if your calories are starting really, really high, well, then you're just, you're slowly pulling them down. But if I were to end a bulk or a build at, say, 2,800 calories, well, then I have less room to play with when I go to cut.

So if you can get them as high as possible and your metabolism is still very healthy, the cut should be fairly, I don't want to say easy, but easier. Yeah. And, you know, bulking or cutting, there's a level of preparation and consistency. You said if you miss a meal, it's going to set you back. know, and if you're cutting, you're probably going to have, you know, similar, similar challenges. Obviously, you're not trying to hit a super high calorie count. But what do you feel like the most important thing for people to remain consistent in whatever

that healthy diet for them looks like? I think it's having the right relationship. I don't know if relationship is the right word. The right thought process behind foods. So, for example, I see food as fuel. and obviously I like going on for dinner. I like having really good tasty foods. I do.

Love a good margarita. Exactly. I love a good margarita. But when I have a specific goal, I'm eating foods that facilitate that goal. So right now I'm eating very clean, whole nutrient-dense food sources to facilitate energy in the way I feel and strong workouts and great recovery. And I think the best way to be consistent with a diet is in the way you think about food. Do you think about food in terms of what's going to taste the best, what I'm craving,

what I want right now, or are you selecting foods in your daily diet that you know are going to make you feel good? There's certain foods that they might taste really, really good, but you're, you know, You know after you eat them, your stomach's going to be wrecked. Your digestion is off. You can't go to the bathroom. You're backed up. You're lethargic and tired.

Well, I don't want those certain foods in my diet as tasty as they are because they're just throwing me off course for not even just like body composition wise, but the ability to work and think and feel. So the way I look at foods is what's going to make me feel really, really good so I can show up as the best entrepreneur and leader and father. husband because what you put in your body is going to facilitate how you show up. So I think it's that thought process and relationship with the way you think about food. And then being consistent, like for me, it's a lot of food prep.

I'll do a lot of meal prep in terms of ground beef and chicken and rice and sweet potatoes because if I'm ever in a pinch four meal, I have food readily available. And if I don't have food readily available and prepped, I'll grab strong food and just use I was about to plug it. I was about to plug it. Strong food. That's why we created it. It's literally the most, I feel like it's the best product that just naturally integrates

into your life. Like that wasn't you trying to be salesy or plug it. Like it just flows so easy. It just, it's so easy. Yeah. And it makes it really easy for me right now to get calories in. Yeah. Because normally my first meal of day is at 7 a.m.

And that's, you know, if I don't run in the morning, I eat it at 7 a.m. if I run in the morning, I eat it at 7 a.m. And then how many calories? Strong food? In a serving? You get like 450 to 500 calories depending on flavor. That's insane and a shake. Yeah.

Because my first meal is at 7 a.m. Then my second meal is at 10 a.m. My third meal is at 1 p.m. And then I have dinner around 6, 6.30. And then before going to bed, I have another meal. But you got to think, like if I don't have that first meal until 9 and then it's not until and 12 and then three and it throws off my workout schedule. Like the last thing I want to do is miss a meal

because I'm trying to gain size and strength and put weight on right now. So where strong food comes in really in clutch is if we go film for a morning or filming a run, say out in the country, why don't have time to come back to the house and make my breakfast? I'll just do a serving of strong food,

maybe a banana, and then head right into the office. And I'm not missing a meal and I'm not behind. Yeah, some of the content we did with strong food was you on the bed of the truck, scooping strong food and shaker, that's real life. We get done filming at 7.30, 8 o'clock in the morning. And again, it's going to be another 20 minute drive home. You'd have to cook food.

But you could dump that in a shaker, be drinking down the way home, already got nearly 500 calories in. And I think what scares off a lot of people with strong food is the price point. Yeah. It's $85 for 20 servings. The reason we price it there is because it's a very expensive product to make. I mean, it's weight protein, pea protein, MCT oil powder. You have flaxseed, chia seed, sweet potato powder, oats. It's an expensive product to manufacture.

But strong food isn't necessarily one of those products that you have to use every single day. Have it in your truck, have it in your pantry. So when you need it, it's there. Yeah. I might use strong food two, maybe three times a week. But it's there when I need it. Yeah. And I mean, it really isn't that expensive when you break it down.

I mean, it's right over $4 per meal. And you could do, you know, you could utilize that. Or after those runs, you could go stop through the Chick-fil-A drive-th and get a chicken biscuit for the same price. And not nearly the health, you know, the ingredients are going to be totally whack compared to strong food. Like, it's a compromise. Yeah.

I mean, like, even if you're traveling, it's come in such clutch while traveling. that is the hardest part about trying to gain and build. Yep. Like if you're traveling and trying to cut, it kind of makes it easier because you're going to fast. You're going to wait until you get to wherever you need to be. Yep. And now it's like, holy crap. Now I can just eat this massive meal.

You buy $8 little half lunch meat sandwich from the snack shop at the airport and not feel it at all. And you just dropped $8. Yeah. And you got 300 calories out of it. and crappy deli meat. Like traveling, traveling makes it tough and, and sticking to, like,

a gaining phase because I used to go to, like, Starbucks, for example, and I'd get three servings of the egg white bites. That right there is, like, $14. Yeah. And then I get some fruit, and I'd get, like,

the oatmeal from Starbucks, too. I'm like, $22 into a breakfast. I mean, and that was years ago. Now it's probably $30. It's insane. I will say those egg white bites are spot on. Yeah. Again, none on our pumpkin spice, though.

Nothing. Man, moving on just a little bit. Obviously, it seems like you're in a place right now where your health is in a good spot. Maybe talk about how you're feeling compared to how you did during these intense challenges, the ultramarathon, marathon. It's easy to look at the physique.

You talked about muscle separation. Obviously for you, like physique does matter, but how are you feeling actually your health and your wellness compared to when you did during these challenges when maybe some people don't know you well don't know the health implications that those have or that have never done an event like that. It's night and day. Yeah. I mean, you've seen me deepen in endurance preps. Yep. How would you describe me deep in endurance prep? Brain fog. Yes. Still, compared to the normal person, and this isn't tune your horn,

operating at a very high level, you push through it, you could, you have every excuse to not. but the Nick that I know when he's healthy and thriving versus the Nick during these intense challenges, brain fog, little tired, little irritable, not as creative, which is your powerhouse. And I know all of that frustrates you. That's the worst part of seeing you be in this very self-aware state of like, I hate feeling this way. Yeah. But it has its purpose. So, and I know you love doing it.

But I don't think the intention when you go into a challenge, a race, an event like that is to reach, you know, peak health. That's not what those are for. It's to hit a fitness, you know, a goal, a pace, a time. It's not for health. Yeah, I mean, when I go all into those things, anything, it's all in. Yeah. I'm fully committed. And when I'm deep in like a marathon prep or an Iron Man prep, it's just that.

Like, it's pure exhaustion. It's brain fog. I'm not creative. Yep. I'm not operating at a high level. Yep. In terms of business, when I get home from work, I'm dead tired. Let's get Steph on here and let her talk about the difference.

Steph is so happy that I'm not in a, like, an endurance prep right now. Yep. And from the outside looking in, people don't see this. Yeah. And we don't show it a lot because we don't want to come across this, like we're complaining about it. Yeah. It is part of the prep. It is part of the sport.

you're beating yourself down over weeks and months to get a certain time or distance on a race. And a lot of people ask the question, like, why ain't you going back in another race? Like, go do another race. Go do this. It's time to focus on my family and the business. And if I went back into another race, I know confidently, I couldn't show up for both those things the way I want to. to. And now where running volume has decreased.

I'm not training for a specific endurance event. I'm putting weight back on. Strength is coming back. I mean, my creativity is night and day. Yeah. Compared to what it was. My energy is night and day.

My mood is so much better. The things I know that I'll implement into the business in the next three to six months are going to change the course of the business because my mind is just once again firing on all cylinders. And I think there are people out there who can go from race to race to race to race and not really feel it. Like they operate pretty well there.

I'm just not one of those people. Like when I go into a prep, I feel it because I'm used to operating at such a high level. In the past couple years, I've beat myself down pretty hard. And I also think that there are those chronic cardio racers. who go from race to race to race and they can't handle it. And they feel the effects and it negatively impacts their family. It negatively impacts their job, their business, their performance. But sometimes people just don't care.

They can't see through the weeds or the fog of what's creating these issues in their life. And sometimes it's honestly racing continuously. Yep. So how are you feeling now? Great. I mean, creatively, I feel like I'm at my peak. Operationally, in terms of the business, I feel like I'm at my peak. I obviously have a lot of help in the business right now,

which is helping facilitate a lot of my ability to work deeper into the creative. Mood is like so much better. I mean, I even have a newborn at home in my energy, in my mood, and like everything is just feels like it's firing on all cylinders. So I'm really happy with this spot I'm in right now. I'm enjoying this season, this chapter of life.

Love it. You want to do a rapid fire to... Hit me. And this one? Do you drink alcohol? I do. And I actually want to dive deeper into this one. All right.

Yeah. Take your time on answering it. I do want to dive deeper into this one. This is an important topic. I think a lot of people assume that I don't because I'm so health conscious and performance focused. But I enjoy some good cocktails at a good restaurant, a good dinner. I love going out with some friends or out with Steph on a date night and get in a margarita or a beer and sit back, relax, and enjoy life.

I did by no means go out and, you know, drink eight beers or eight cocktails at dinner and then at the bars. Like for me, drinking is one, three drinks, like three drinks for me is like, that's a big night. But it's usually one to two drinks when we go on to dinner or with some friends. Sit back, relax and soak it in and enjoy life. And for me, yes, I do drink. What's your favorite drink? Margarita. 100%.

I know you love a good margarita. I love good, you know, I'm not a spicy fan, but I love jalapeno marg. I love a spicy marg. Do you have a experience of the best margarita you ever had? The best margarita I've ever had. Man. With the food and... There was a jalapeno marg.

Me and Steph, oh, we were in in Cabo. The place we go to Cabo has really good marks. but I do remember we were in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. A little curveball. And it was right after finishing the sub three-hour marathon. And you became best friends of Sean White. I was going to tell that story. I'm going to tell that story.

Ruin it. But we were staying at this hotel, and we'd go there and get a cocktail before going to dinner at night, and they had a really good spicy margs. But the one night I was going to put our name in at the restaurant in the hotel. and it was the same weekend in Jackson Hole that they were having some sort of like snowboarding competition. And I knew I knew Sean White was in Jackson Hole that weekend. So I'm putting my name in at this restaurant.

And I like seeing my peripherals behind me, I'm thinking, that looks like Sean White. And I know Sean White has a tattoo in his forearm. So I was like, okay, I'm going to, I'm like, acting my arm and reach back and like stretch my neck. I'm going to look for the tattoo. Were you scratching the panther? Or were you scratching the outside? I didn't have the panther then. No panther.

I would have shown Sean the panther. But I turned around and I saw the tattoo. I was like, holy shit. This is Sean White. So I put my name in and then I walked back to the elevator to go back and grab Steph. And Sean White was following me. And I started getting real nervous.

I was thinking, if we go into elevator together, do I say something? Yeah. What do I say? Yep. I was sweating. Like my heart was beating. so fast. Walked into the elevator,

Sean White walked right by. Dang. Kurt, you just swerve to the bathroom. Let's really quick, if you would have got on that elevator, what would you have said? I would have played it off real cool. Hey, don't want to bother you, Sean, big fan. Sean, that

that 540 last year was sick, bro. What's the movie with Justin Timberlake and is it like oh man Justin Timberlake and like Mia Clunis

Oh it's a movie where they like They just hook up No strings attached Friends of Benefits It's one of those It's got to be one of those That's

The other one's The other one's Ash and Couther Yeah One of those movies And Sean White's in that one Yeah Remember he said something Like he's really mean in that movie

He said something along the lines of like I'm gonna like rip your ears off And turn it into like turtle soup That's what you would have said to? Yeah Like What if he like didn't get it? It's just like

What? He just completely forgot about that It's like messing up the line from Tommy boy I bet you could get a real good look at a steak by putting your head up And butcher's ass You know what I'm talking about?

Tommy. All right. Well, my rapid fire concept really didn't work out, but I'd like to end on this question. Yeah. Is it possible to build a business without social media?

I thought about this question for a little bit. The answer is yes. 100%. We have obviously built a business off of social media. I wrote down the four things that you need to build a business. If we simplify it,

if we just simplify it. Number one, need a product or service. You need something you are selling. Two, you need to have a brand or you need very clear messaging. Three, you need a community. You need a tribe. You need what we call sneezers. People who are loyal to your company. The reason you need this is because without it, you can't build a healthy, sustainable company that has rebuild or retention. If you're constantly, just trying to sell to people for the first time, you're spending a lot of money on customer acquisition

and you're going to run out of cash. So you need some sort of loyal customer base. Four, you need distribution, whether e-com or retail. Social media is the leverage of your community, tribe, or loyal following. If you don't have social media, you can build that community.

You can build that tribe elsewhere. it might be more difficult. But if we go back 10 years, maybe a little bit more than 10 years before social media is a thing, guess what? People are building brands. People are selling products.

People are selling services. Now, in order to compete with today's culture and organizations, you probably have to have social media. You have to have a presence because what happens? People find your product. They find your service.

service, the first thing they're going to do is they're going to go look it up on social media. And if you don't have social media, you really have no credibility and people are just going to, this is a fake company. So I think now, more than ever, social media acts as like that first line of defense to provide verification that is an actual organization and business. So I think you can do it without, but it's difficult. It's challenging. You don't necessarily have to have this massive following on it.

but you need to have a presence. It's great. I think it's a good place. Lay in the plane, let you close us out. Any last thoughts? Well, ladies and gentlemen, we're going to have Jordan on the podcast more frequently.

Co-host. Pressure's on. And we'll have Tony and Jordan helping me out along the next couple podcast going to the future. But I just wanted to say, you know, it's been a crazy year for us at BPN. We've made a lot of changes. We've hired a lot of new people. We've experienced growing pains.

And at some point in the future, we'll talk about all the things that we experienced in 2022. We learned a lot from it. That's going to be a midnight cocktail hour podcast. I agree. Round table. Everyone's got a glass of whiskey. Maybe some cigars.

I mean... We did really good in 2022. Yep. But at the same time, we got our ass kicked because we're learning. Yep. We're learning. We haven't done this before. We haven't navigated this before.

Yep. But I would love to talk about, you know, what we learned in 2022, what everyone learned. Um, because it was a, it was a growth here, especially for me. I learned a lot. I was challenged tremendously this past year. And it pushed me pretty hard. but I'm a completely different entrepreneur on the other side of it.

But we couldn't do any of this without the people who follow the brand and support BPN and buy the product. So if that's you, whether you just listen to the podcast, you just watch YouTube videos, you buy BPN supplements and apparel and maybe you have to go in more tattoo.

I just want to say a massive thank you for all the support because we could not be here without you. and we look forward to building a tremendous 2020-3 together. Yep, absolutely. Thank you, guys. All right, guys, that's it.

And we'll see you in the next episode. That's a wrap. Thanks for tuning in to another episode of the Bear Performance Podcast. Please leave a rating and review on the platform you are listening to if you enjoyed it. It helps us to grow and reach more people

with the intent of changing lives through the Go One More mindset. If you are ready to take your health and performance to the next level head over to bpnsups.com to take the first step.