Episode 31 – Building Niche Powerhouses: Leadership, Growth, and Positivity with Scott Hubble

Todd Bertsch: 0:10

Welcome back to the Bolt Podcast. I’m Todd Bertsch and I’m thrilled to be your guide on this inspiring journey of personal growth and leadership. Together with my guests, we’ll dive into transformational stories, uncovering how small, intentional changes can create massive positive results in your life From overcoming challenges and setting impactful goals to building lasting habits and living with confidence, health and positivity. We’ll explore it all and if you’re ready to embrace a growth mindset and unlock the best version of yourself, then let’s spark that transformation today.

Todd Bertsch: 0:46

Today’s guest is Scott Hubble. Scott is a self-described pragmatic, optimist, forward-failing servant leader, lifetime learner and practitioner of the mantra that people matter most. After collecting an accounting degree, a JD and MBA, Scott made his mark on the RV industry over the past 17 years with both nuCamp and Little Guy. His expertise lies in managing people, processes and technology, while interpreting market dynamics and authoring effective marketing, sales and product strategies. And authoring effective marketing, sales and product strategies, he has a proven track record of turning boutique companies into niche powerhouses by identifying unredeemed opportunities within the space through product distinction and building a strong community. Scott lives in Berlin, Ohio, with his wife and five children. Scott, welcome to the Bold Podcast, my friend.

Scott Hubble: 1:46

Thank you very much for having me, Todd, it’s a pleasure.

Todd Bertsch: 1:48

Wow, that is a lot. That was a mouthful. You have quite the CV. I’ll say that, wow, a true passion for academia, right.

Scott Hubble: 1:58

Yes, hey, you can never learn too much, right? And none of us know everything, right?

Todd Bertsch: 2:04

Right, self-proclaimed lifelong learner, which a lot of the guests on the show. We are big time learners, right, we never stop learning. It’s all about the growth. So let’s talk about your academic experience, because it’s a lot, and you went through a couple of different phases, from engineering to accounting to law, and then got your MBA. Sure.

Scott Hubble: 2:29

Yeah, I, you know, I was leaving high school Wasn’t quite sure what I wanted to do. I had an opportunity to pursue a scholarship at Cedarville University in electrical engineering, so I redeemed that. But after about a year I figured out I am not an electrical engineer and in the meantime my parents had moved to Akron. So I just moved home and I started taking courses at Akron and went to the College of Business and I needed to declare a major and again I was uncertain. So what I did at that point? I sought some counsel from my father. He’s like look, accounting is one of the five professions it’s solid, there’s always work there and I said all right, I’ll be an accountant.

Scott Hubble: 3:11

And as I was starting my senior year, I figured out I don’t want to be an accountant. But you know, saw the degree through and applied for law school, Went to law school and again it’s like we’re watching a replay, right? I did the first year, which is the toughest year of law school, and I realized I don’t want to be a lawyer. But I did the next two years, got the degree, but in the interim I started my MBA and that’s where everything started hitting for me and I was like this is easy, this is fun, this is who I am, this is what I’m supposed to do. So then I was equipped with all the degrees and, even though I wasn’t going to practice law or get into the field of accountancy, it had trained my brain to think in systematic ways and apply those processes in the things that I would encounter down the road. So it really helped round me out and be prepared for, you know, the unknown and to pursue larger things than perhaps I would have originally.

Todd Bertsch: 4:16

Yeah, absolutely yeah. Talk about well-rounded, especially for somebody who’s going to either start their own business or run a business. I think it’s a good life lesson too, right? We have a lot of students getting ready to graduate here in May and they’re probably wondering did I make the right choice? You know they’re worried about getting their first job. You know, I think the one thing that I can see here and correct me if I’m wrong but you have a genuine curiosity for life and learning right, and you just kept going until you found something that felt comfortable to you. I think that’s important in life.

Scott Hubble: 4:58

Absolutely. You know, not all of us have the same degree of curiosity, but I believe that all of us do want to find something we’re passionate about, and you know whether that is obvious to you, um, or if it’s something you need to go on a journey to discover one way or the other, don’t stop until you find it, because there’s nothing worse than just, you know, punching in from nine to five and not really embracing what you’re doing, right?

Todd Bertsch: 5:25

Absolutely. I know earlier when we talked and I listened to a podcast that you were on. This time period in life from 18 to 35 was, it seems like a time where you built some true resilience, went through some things? You want to share some of that time period and what that was like and how that really helped you build into the leader that you are today?

Scott Hubble: 5:49

Sure, yeah, you know, I think all of us, in one way or the other, are byproducts of what happens to us or the choices that we make. And during that period of time, I encountered a vast number of trials and I really felt that, in one degree or another, I had experienced bankruptcy in every facet of my life. Oh, wow, whether it was financially I didn’t have two nickels rubbed together and I owed a bunch of nickels whether it was socially, when I was younger, and maybe I felt like I didn’t have any real friends. Whether it was spiritually, and I was just, you know, hey God, I, I know you’re there, but I’m just sort of playing a game and I’m, I’m lonely.

Scott Hubble: 6:39

You know, I, I think at every facet that you looked at, I was at ground zero at some point, and what that taught me was hey, look, when you’re down, you can really only look up. And when you look up, you can see the blue sky, you can see the opportunity. It also teaches you to be malleable and to roll with life circumstances and that this too shall pass. And you know, the trials haven’t stopped. Recently, my house burned down. What? Yeah, three of my children were diagnosed with autoimmune diseases and, you know my wife’s had some struggles with health and but it’s funny because we’re just like, okay, what’s next, what’s next? And you know, a lot of these things would cripple people.

Todd Bertsch: 7:32

Yeah, and it’s not that I’m stronger.

Scott Hubble: 7:34

It’s just that I’ve had the privilege, um quote unquote, to go through them and be developed that resilience and the ability to bounce back and be elastic develop that resilience and the ability to bounce back and be elastic.

Todd Bertsch: 7:48

Wow, oh, there’s a lot to unpack there. Wow, and I’m sorry to hear about what you had to go through, unfortunately, and we’ve all been through something, right, it’s just a matter of what degree of adversity we’ve gone through, and a lot of people on this show have been through quite a bit and they’ve transformed. But you know, we always I always talk about just finding the gift and the opportunity in every scenario, just being open, right, there’s a gift there. Hard to find the gift when the house burns down or when you’re on life support, but it is there, right, and then turn that into an opportunity to rebuild a new home or a fresh start. Right, a fresh slate. So, yeah, that’s wow. That’s quite a bit. Going back to childhood. I understand your father was an FBI agent. He was, yeah, I was not aware of that when we first spoke.

Todd Bertsch: 8:37

So, how did that? That definitely had a major influence on you. Well, obviously he’s your father, but, being an FBI agent, I would have met. What was that like?

Scott Hubble: 8:46

growing up. So he was not an agent when I was, say, you know, 10 to 15 years old. He was an agent when I was younger, so I didn’t take in a lot of, you know, those experiences at that time. However, the fact when he was in the Air Force and the FBI and then he grew up in the household of a Baptist- minister when you take that combination, here’s how it impacted me.

Scott Hubble: 9:13

I grew up in an extremely strict household a lot of rules, a lot of regulations, a lot of performance to come up with, so that helped ingrain a lot of responsibility and discipline. So I don’t have any cool stories to share with you, you know, with respect to him being an agent, but I do have all that by-product from the environment that he fostered.

Todd Bertsch: 9:39

Wow, wow, that’s crazy. So let’s, let’s talk a little bit about your journey through your career. Once you got through college and you’ve got all these degrees and you’ve kind of figured out okay, business is my passion and I can pull all this learning together to help me, to help me take us through these companies. So you really embrace the RV industry and what that looked like, from little guy to new camp, and then we’ll talk about your new business.

Scott Hubble: 10:14

Sure, yeah, I’ll back up for a second. So you know I’m. I’m leaving college. I had a host of leadership experience. I was student body president, I had all these degrees and I thought the world would be waiting for me. And I stepped out to the world and I was like all right, guys fight over me.

Todd Bertsch: 10:33

Isn’t that funny how that works.

Scott Hubble: 10:35

Yeah right, crickets, crickets yeah.

Todd Bertsch: 10:38

That’s humbling.

Scott Hubble: 10:39

Yeah, it was. I’ve had quite a number of humbling experiences in my life and you know they’re fantastic.

Scott Hubble: 10:45

I’ve learned to really embrace them. But instead, what I had to do, I had to pivot Right and I took a couple jobs that technically I would be overqualified for. I worked for the state of, or the auditor’s office for the state of Ohio. I worked for a marketing firm for a year and the thing that actually helped open the door to pursuing RV is that I started doing things before work and after work, and at first it was sorting packages at FedEx and delivering pizzas, managing a pizza shop. But then it started being like hey, you know what, why don’t I be a little smarter about this? And a buddy of mine and I started doing some marketing initiatives little small things for small companies.

Todd Bertsch: 11:32

Like freelance work yeah.

Scott Hubble: 11:34

And one day he came to me and he said hey look, I opened up a conversation with a company called Little Guy Worldwide and they are the world’s number one distributor of teardrop trailers and I said okay, and he said I sold him a website and I told him that we’re going to make their web traffic just explode. I said, all right, he said you’re going to make their web traffic explode. So that was the door, that was the opportunity that we walked through and, you know, fortunately we were able to make that happen. The Internet was sort of the wild west still in that period of time, you know the 2008 period. Oh yeah, not a lot of algorithms in place in social media SEO.

Scott Hubble: 12:22

Yeah, so I just drove traffic like a madman. They loved it. They said what else can you do?

Scott Hubble: 12:26

So then I was able to dip in on some of my skillset, and it was a very small organization and just a handful of people, mostly sales and bookkeeping type. So I came in with a skillset that wasn’t there and I was able to look at. You know, oh, what are these marketing programs? What’s your pricing structure look like, who’s your manufacturer, what does the product look like right now? And then do some assessments of the market, assessments of the product, assessment of adjacent markets, so on and so forth and what we realized was that the product we were receiving was really just bereft of innovation. It was bereft of quality, and if we really wanted to take the next step and be something of significance, we needed to up the game, and that’s when we had the one.

Scott Hubble: 13:13

I actually had the opportunity to meet a man named Joe Mullet who owned a company named Pleasant Valley Teardrop Trailers that was in Sugar Creek, ohio, and I had seen a couple of his trailers and they were very retro, great looking, high quality, and I said this is the type of manufacturing that we need in order to take the next step.

Scott Hubble: 13:33

So we entered into some conversations with him and then the two companies little guy worldwide and pleasant Valley teardrop Trailers came together into an agreement for a manufacturing distributor and it was a really fun time for me because I’m being able to do all these marketing campaigns that I just loved. It was fun and driving a Facebook account to over 100,000 followers and feeling good about that kind of stuff. But then learning some of the manufacturing side and I would work a couple of days down in sugar Creek and then a couple of days up in the Canton area and, um, you know, the business just exploded. It just went crazy and the contract was running out in around 2017 and the owners of both companies really enjoyed the success. But I let them know. I said to guys this is, this is fantastic. How are we’ve grown too big to just stay in the same same structure because the end user is going to end up footing the bill for an extra unnecessary layer. You guys either need to merge or one of you buy out the other one whatever.

Scott Hubble: 14:49

An agreement was not able to be reached. So at that point in time I had to make a choice. Do I want to stay at a distributor, where we’re marketing and selling which is fun, but we’re not creating, or would I go on the manufacturing side, where we can create and innovate and then start fresh with the marketing, the sales, the customer support? And that was the option I chose. And when I chose that, I knew we needed to have a real name, not Pleasant Valley Teardrop Trailers, because you made teardrop trailers on Pleasant Valley.

Todd Bertsch: 15:27

Road.

Scott Hubble: 15:29

But rather, hey, new Camp. And why New Camp? Well, it’s a new start. We spelled it N-U with an umlaut on top to tip our hat to the German heritage of the Amish. And then camp to basically say, you know what? We’re honoring, the industry that we’re playing in. And so, you know, a side hustle opened the door to get into little guy. And then the little little guy success with Pleasant Valley opened the door to me to step into that role which became, you know, far more encompassing than what I was in, and we had a team of 200 people. We made over 3,700 trailers, created a lot, met a lot of people. You know the vision never stopped and, um, you know that prepared me for the opportunity to where I’m at today. So I don’t know if you had any questions along the way. I always leave things out.

Scott Hubble: 16:28

Yeah, no, there’s different versions of the story.

Todd Bertsch: 16:31

No, that’s great, yeah, and we’ll go into kind of where you’re at now. I love the story. I think it’s very interesting. I love how it was kind of by happenchance. But do you believe in faith that everything happens for a reason? I’m a man of faith, so yeah.

Scott Hubble: 16:47

So, even when I’m going through all those scenarios, I’m like, hey, you know what Am I going to? Let my circumstance define me and my circumstance control my view of God.

Todd Bertsch: 16:57

Right.

Scott Hubble: 16:57

Or do I know something?

Todd Bertsch: 16:59

more than that Right.

Scott Hubble: 17:00

Yeah yeah, right place, right time. Luck is created. Right time Luck is created Right, sometimes ordained Right. Yeah, absolutely. And when you came into New Camp, did you analyze it? No, I wasn’t doing all those things that I should have been doing, sure, but growth.

Todd Bertsch: 17:37

You grew into it. Yeah, yeah, wow. And you did that for what? Eight years, yes, yeah, yeah, okay, best eight years yes, yeah.

Scott Hubble: 17:44

Yeah, okay, best eight years, loved it. I would always tell people I’ve got the best job on the face of the planet Dream job, loved it. And we all have chapters, we all have seasons and it was a great, great time.

Todd Bertsch: 17:59

Yeah, that’s awesome. Let’s talk a little bit about it, because I don’t think everybody knows what a teardrop trailer is. Right, it’s, it’s still. They are somewhat rare, right, only, I don’t say only, I mean it’s still manufacturing a little under 4,000. Is is a lot locally, but I camped for a little while and you didn’t see a whole lot of them. When you saw them, you’re like Ooh, that’s cool. Yeah, right, they were very different and I and I will say the design is incredible, the engineering is incredible. Like these, if you ever get a chance, if anyone’s interested in camping or owning a trailer, a small trailer, and I believe you probably don’t need a heavy duty truck to pull these things, which is the beauty of it you know one of my early trailers back when I was younger was a Coleman pop-up.

Todd Bertsch: 18:49

You know that I pulled on my, my Cavalier, my Chevy Cavalier, you know, which looked a little ridiculous but hey, it worked. I pulled that thing down to Florida a couple of times but yeah, I think telling the audience a little bit about teardrop and really you know how you took this, because I think it was understated that you took a kind of a dying industry, right, an underserved industry, and infused new life into it and made it really successful, which is pretty cool. And I think you’re a guy you love challenges, right, you walk into the face of a challenge and you’re not afraid, and I think that’s a beautiful thing you know for people to do. You know if you can, right, not everybody can do that, not everybody is open to risk, but you were and you went for it. So, sorry, tell us just a little bit about Teardrop and just a little more in depth about the history and what you did to that industry.

Scott Hubble: 19:54

Sure, like you said, most people don’t know what it is. I used to say one out of 100 people knew what it was. I certainly wasn’t one of the 100. I was one of the 99, right? I think those numbers are probably down to maybe one out of a hundred people knew what it was. I certainly wasn’t one of the hundred. I was one of the 99, right?

Todd Bertsch: 20:09

I think those numbers are probably down to maybe one out of 50.

Scott Hubble: 20:10

Yeah, there’s been a lot of education over the last 15 years, a lot of growth in the space. When I first came into little guy, I think they had distributed 341 units that year and that was their best year ever. And when you looked around at their competitors quote unquote it was a bunch of trailers being built in garages across the country with no more than about 50 or so from any one operation, so not really a lot of competitors. Yeah, I would tell you that the market probably was in that five to 700 range in terms of being consumed and most of them were retail direct. There wasn’t anything you know like dealers, um, you didn’t see them on RV lots. So that’s really emerged over the last you know 10 to 15 years. You know we were able to to grow that, I think, a lot organically right Through community, um, through social driving. That and then slowly that word of mouth building it the right way with the innovations that people wanted in a high quality fashion, just really helped get that rolling.

Scott Hubble: 21:15

So a teardrop trailer actually originated after one of the world wars where they were using scrap from, you know, jeeps and sunken ships and all kinds of stuff just to get out there in a cheap way. So essentially they’re called bet on wheels, a lot of times Teardrop, because it’s sort of the shape of a teardrop. Turn 90 degrees and put a pair of wheels on it, right, you know? Really neat, it’s absolutely exploded. Here I’d say I was telling you around five to 700 was probably the ceiling of the market when I first got exposed to it. And even now in the down market the last couple of years in the RV industry it’s been that four to 5,000 range. There’s been a lot of players lately.

Scott Hubble: 22:03

I will tell you that the definition of teardrop trailer has evolved over the past five years. So you know, just like in life and other areas, the name teardrop, which was fashioned from a shape, no longer hearkens to the shape, it hearkens to the size. So now you’ve got a bunch of square drop trailers. So same size, same weight, more cubic feet actually, because you know they’re not slim lined in the back, but that’s it’s. You know, tenfold from what it was, wow and uh, now you do see them, um, at the general RVs and camping worlds of the world, in the world. So yeah, just a lot of growth. I think you had. You had asked another question in there.

Todd Bertsch: 22:47

Just the engineering. The shape is so unique it has to be right. Every camper wants the basic necessities right and to fit that in there. Looking at it honestly, I would say how did you do it? You know, cause I’ve been in other campers. Even the little Coleman that I bought during COVID, it was, you know, to get everything in there in a way that you could sleep comfortably, eat, cook, use a restroom, take a shower. You know, all those things in this little tiny teardrop is interesting to me.

Scott Hubble: 23:20

Yeah, and that was an evolution in and of itself. When I first, you know, saw one, it was you open the door and there was a floor where they had a trifold mattress and some overhead cabinetry and a roof vent. So there wasn’t electric, there wasn’t even a power fan, and then there certainly weren’t some of the things that we ended up putting in sinks, stoves, fridges. Eventually, we actually grew the teardrop into a larger um you know shape and um we’re able to put in wet baths, so you could get everything you needed within a really small footprint and then hook it up to your RAV4 and take off.

Todd Bertsch: 24:04

Right, that’s cool and they’re beautiful. The craftsmanship Talk a little bit about that Because that, like I said, I had a Coleman. I bought a Coleman camper during COVID which was phenomenal.

Todd Bertsch: 24:16

I think a lot of people did that and obviously the RV industry boomed at that time, right, and when I was one of those that added to that boom and the family and I traveled, you know, ohio and it was great just to be able to get out of the house, right, we definitely got a great return on investment on that. But we definitely got a great return on investment on that. But when I get inside, it wasn’t really built with quality. Honestly, nothing against Coleman. A lot of the campers are like this just shoddy. If you moved one way or bumped this, something would fall off. But when you look at the new camps, I mean these are wood. We’re talking real wood in the craftsmanship. So talk just a little bit about that. Was that because of the Amish influence? Because we know that they’re well known for top-notch craft.

Scott Hubble: 25:09

So a couple different levels, right. Those first units that I saw that were being built out in Indiana, um, you know they had wooden floors, wooden sidewalls. You know, skin the roof with aluminum and skin the sides with fiberglass, but there were wooden in their infrastructure and the cabinets were MDF. Well, when we started working um down in sugar Creek with the Amish, you know there is that furniture, rich tradition, and we’re going to bring in real wood cabinetry. And while we started with some wooden walls on the sidewalls and the floor for the infrastructure and whatnot, we also said you know what, we are people of integrity and we want to build with integrity and we want to build things that last. And so we started looking at composites.

Scott Hubble: 26:01

And then, you know, when I left new camp, we’d been using cup composite um sidewalls, floors, roofs for for several years. So now you’re not dealing with the rot that a lot of the traditional stick and tins are Um. So, yeah, you’re bringing it and then you’re fusing it. So, right, I can’t remember how I used to always say it, but we would take European designs and fuse it with Amish craftsmanship. So we would take all the sleek lines, we take the composite materials and then we bring in the beautiful cabinetry and just make a real premium product. You know, something to really be proud of.

Todd Bertsch: 26:37

Yeah, boy, yeah, that sounds, that sounds like a winner right there Combining those two. So, scott, let’s, let’s talk a little bit about your leadership. So you, in the culture that you built at New Camp, how many employees did you have when you guys were in kind of your high time there?

Scott Hubble: 26:57

Yeah, we had crested just over 200.

Todd Bertsch: 26:59

Okay, that’s a lot of humans to be responsible for right.

Scott Hubble: 27:02

Yeah, there was a sort of a running joke. You know that I wanted to know everybody’s names, but there was probably a good 30 or 40. I just didn’t know, so it was hey, how you doing. And that’s where some of that leadership comes in, Right, Because you need to care genuinely. And the question is can you care genuinely if you don’t actually know who they are? So a little bit of a struggle, a little bit of a balance to achieve there Something I absolutely worked on, but yeah.

Todd Bertsch: 27:40

How did you build a culture of success? I know you guys probably went through some, some difficult times, you know. How did you build resilience with the team? How did you cultivate a culture of growth and opportunity?

Scott Hubble: 27:54

Yeah, I’d say, first and foremost, I was never alone. I guess the patriarch who founded Pleasant Valley, teardrop Trailers with Joe Mullet, former Amish minister, just a shepherd’s heart, just a fantastic guy. And then, of course, there was other leaders along the way that helped supplement the journey. But one thing that I guess sort of evolved in me over the years, you know, coming out of academia, using my analytical and assessment tools and the systems that were provided, you know I was able to do things, that little guy. But in those first few years I realized, you know, something’s more important than the product, cause I was always like, you know, I had the product, product, product, that’s. That’s what’s going to win it and what wins it is people. And it really made me, you know, reflect and develop the idea I people matter most.

Scott Hubble: 28:49

And you know the level of care. When you tell and show your people that you care, then they care and now you’re caring for them, they’re caring for the company and you’re all caring about the product because you’re caring about the end user. And I think that level of care is infectious, right, when you feel wanted you act in a different way, right, the level of care instills trust, which then creates an environment where there’s psychological safety which, um, you know, really enables or empower somebody to take the autonomy that they’re granted and to act with confidence. So you’ve heard all these things and it really is a domino effect, and sometimes the dominoes can fall in different ways.

Scott Hubble: 29:41

For me, it was really just a journey of discovering that people matter more than profit, than product, than you know possessions or it doesn’t matter what it is, you know, life’s about people, they’re the driver. Talk a little about the success Like hey, you know, the success was, you know, largely in part to the products and the community. Well, I always thought it was a product and it actually is the community. The community can kill things, it can propel things inside. It’s the same.

Todd Bertsch: 30:31

People can propel the growth. You’re the fuel to the fire. I might start the fire and people start hollering up and getting warm, but they’re the way that I run my business, or at least I try. Certainly that was an evolution over time. Running a business, a marketing agency, 16 years take a risk or fail, but being open and learning from it. And that’s really what I’ve done. Asking for 360 feedback and really being genuine and earnest about it and then taking that feedback and taking action. That’s what the employees want to see A lot of times. They just want to be heard, they just want to be noticed and it’s it’s time, right, it’s it’s time. So how do you devote that time? And obviously, two 300 people you’re not going to be able to.

Todd Bertsch: 31:30

as much as anybody would want to know John and Susie and everybody’s name and their family and you know what they love to do know John and Susie and everybody’s name and their family and what they love to do. It’s just not feasible, right, but the caring piece is feasible.

Scott Hubble: 31:50

Were there any strategies that?

Todd Bertsch: 31:51

you put into place that related to that caring piece.

Scott Hubble: 31:52

I don’t know if I’d call them strategies per se, but it was. Yeah, I think I had to be very intentional with my time. I would actually get on my calendar and schedule time to walk out in the shop. You know, hey, go visit line one or go visit the mezzanine, go visit the repair shop, go hobnob down with the marketing team. And you know, authenticity is super important. But just because I’m intentionally forcing myself to go somewhere doesn’t mean that once I’m there I’m not authentic, right? So I think, number one, being intentional about that, you know, visiting.

Scott Hubble: 32:27

And then the second thing was really just sort of like reinforcing it with myself, reinforcing the idea of people do matter most. People do matter most. And you know, because you can grab onto do matter, most people do matter most. And you know, because you can grab onto anything and it’s great for a season, and then you find something new and you grab onto that and you grab onto that. But this is timeless.

Scott Hubble: 32:47

It really is so reinforcing that truth, that eternal truth, through different voices. And you know there’s servant leadership voices uh, greenleaf uh. And you know there’s servant leadership voices, greenleaf, modern. You know Cynic Maxwell. And you know, just talking and learning more about, maybe, the scientific elements of empathy, where it’s not just feeling bad for somebody or understanding what they’re going through, but going that next level and saying, okay, I get it, how can I help you? Next level and saying, okay, I get it, how can I help you? Like that’s the last part of being empathetic that is so often left out, like being sympathetic is not anywhere close. That’s having pity on somebody or oh, it’s too bad but I don’t know. So reinforcing some of those principles, just through different voices and hearing it packaged in a different way, and keeping that truth fresh all the time. So I was keeping myself honest, you know, to that end.

Todd Bertsch: 33:46

Yeah, I love it being intentional, scheduling and really mastering their calendar and setting aside those blocks, those chunks of time and again it’s time, but the day goes by quick and if you don’t have a cadence right, and again you have to show up in an authentic way, like you said. But the first step is just being intentional, knowing that this is important. Yes, I have 15 other things I need to do and I’m sure as CEO, you wore a lot of hats, but people matter most. I need to go out there, I need to be seen and I need to see my people and talk with them and let them know that I care. So I’m sure that that was a huge part of the success and I appreciate that that servant leadership, which, which you went to school for as well I’m interested to learn more about the program at Columbia that you went through right Was that?

Scott Hubble: 34:49

Yeah, it was actually Columbia Southern.

Todd Bertsch: 34:50

Columbia Southern. Yeah, I wish it was Columbia. Yeah, sorry.

Scott Hubble: 34:54

No, it’s fine. So, like you know, lifetime learner, what’s next, what’s natural, what makes fit sense, the best fit, what can elevate my thinking? And I had an opportunity to start on a doctoral degree, so I started some of the coursework and then, as I entered into, you know, the writing phase, you know as chapter one, that’s when the house fire started and that’s when my kids got the diseases and inevitably I was unable to finish it.

Scott Hubble: 35:23

You only have a certain period of time before the door closes. But what drew me obviously was that, you know, I was in this environment down in Sugar Creek, ohioio, and my thesis was actually on, you know, amish manufacturing and how that, I guess, played into servant leadership, because I think it’s a different dynamic in any atmosphere that you go to. So the principles remain the same, but how is it accomplished? In central ohio, los Angeles, you know El Paso, texas, it can look differently but being accomplished differently.

Scott Hubble: 36:04

So no, I was just I was, it was just the next natural step for me to pursue. And you know I I have been mulling, you know, is this something I want to start over with again? Or is there something else that’s related and close, because, again, I do want to keep pursuing new knowledge and new understanding. But yeah, no, I gave it a good go for a few years and I’ve kept what I’ve written Good to look back on. But we’ll see if I resurrect it or not. I do like to resurrect things.

Todd Bertsch: 36:39

You do yeah and good to look back on yeah, but we’ll see if I resurrect it or not. I do like to resurrect things. You do yeah and you do like underserved. It’s kind of the I don’t know rocky story, if you will just starting with little, or nothing and making something great out of it. I love that, that sense of accomplishment not just coming in to a winner, but making something a winner. Speaking of which so you have some big news to share You’re starting your own business. Awaken RV.

Scott Hubble: 37:05

Yes, yeah. So you know, several months ago I stepped away from New Camp, something I honestly thought I’d never do. I thought it was just I’m going to ride into the sunset with New Camp and live happily ever after. Funny how that works right yeah it just is, and you know there’s a couple of things there, right?

Scott Hubble: 37:25

I woke up one day and I was like I’m not having fun and that might sound shallow, but the bottom line is I had, I was just having a blast for so long, and so I sort of dug into that a little bit and I was having a conversation with ownership and, you know, at the end of the day I just I came to the realization that there’s some things I want to do that I’m not going to be able to do here, and so I made the decision to leave. And it’s funny. We talked about calendars, right, and you know, have a good, nice, tight calendar, make sure we get everything accomplished and have that good cadence.

Scott Hubble: 38:00

Well, the last several months have been sort of you know, I don’t know what to call it all over the place Right. But what I’ve decided to do is something that was very similar in some of the other you know, I guess previous experiences. I had started with the teardrops. I had started with the teardrops, you know, from 500 to 5,000, when we were in it for several years. We pivoted and looked at the truck camper industry, which had a very strong community aspect to it and was also very dry, and so teardrops were sort of just under the radar. Truck campers were not, but they were white and brown and blocky Excuse me Straight lines, and I was like you know what, let’s liven this thing up, let’s bring in that great cabinetry, let’s bring in the European modern aesthetics, let’s do everything composite. So we did that and you know we went from an absolute nobody to you know second and third largest truck hamper supplier there was. So what I realized was I need to find a new niche and I want that niche to have those similarities. I want there to be a cult-like following, I want a strong community and I want this niche to have something that’s been unredeemed, something that is just ripe for going after.

Scott Hubble: 39:32

And I was introduced to the molded fiberglass trailer, I guess industry or niche, and it’s the scamps of the world. The casitas Oliver’s the premium product in the space, but as I assessed it I saw a lot of vacancies from form to function and even the finance element. Here in the US there was nobody catering the middle of the market. You had Scamp and Casita. Two companies have been around for decades and basically you know owning that whole market selling things between $ and $40,000. And then Oliver. They’ve been around 17, 18 years and they’re making a good deal less but they’re premium products. But they start maybe around 70 and go up to $110,000.

Scott Hubble: 40:32

That’s a huge chunk. So there’s this $40,000 gap and I’m like there’s a massive opportunity. You don’t need to be a rocket scientist to see it right. And then, looking at the form, a lot of the form are very capsule and pill-shaped and they’re all white. And I’m coming from sort of these European-inspiredans and you know, full of windows and different sleek lines and and there just wasn’t any of it and I’m like why not they all have like a belt line?

Scott Hubble: 41:05

Why? I was like you know what I’m going to investigate, that I want to. I want to do something different in this space. And then when you look at the function, you know I want to bring something that’s just not there. So right now, if you look at it, there are trailers from 13 feet to 25 feet. If you look across all the different suppliers, nobody’s doing anything above 25 feet. Why? And then, within the units that are currently being made, nobody’s offering something like a dry bath or like a beautiful front picture window that stretches up onto the roof.

Scott Hubble: 41:42

Why? And frankly, asking why? And sometimes just out of curiosity, right, and sometimes because I think I might know something but I don’t have any real standing to ask the question. Asking dumb questions has really helped me a lot. So that’s why I decided to look at that niche and pursue it. So it’s been a little bit of a journey, right.

Scott Hubble: 42:09

Once I figured out where I wanted to go, I had to start, you know, calling on some of my network and figuring out how am I getting started? Along the way, I’ve come across three different engineers. One spent a lot of time in Europe, did a large number of RVs here in the US. In the early 2000s he started the project with me. He’s still, uh, you know, working walking alongside as an ancillary partner. You know I was able to dip into somebody who works at Google. He’s been there for over a decade. Um worked on the balloon project and, um, he actually owns one of the high end fiber fiberglass trailers, the oliver. He also actually owns a new camp and that’s how I met him, so he has interesting yeah, and um, you know, avid avid camper and I just said yeah, let’s talk.

Todd Bertsch: 43:07

What’s missing, right, what’s?

Scott Hubble: 43:08

missing for you. So then you know, he was big, he was able to provide tremendous feedback. And then I had a um. So then you know, he was able to provide tremendous feedback. And then I had a you know, a former employee of Winnebago, and he was able to provide a lot of expertise in ways that you know those gentlemen didn’t. So we had this collective that we’re able to start with with.

Scott Hubble: 43:38

And you know, we, just a couple of weeks ago, we’re able to get our exterior shell milled out by an aerospace technology firm down in North Carolina and get it shipped up to our fiberglass facility, and we’re working on getting that converted into a mold. We’ve got quite a number of molds to make after that. And that’s the external mold. We’re going to have an interior hull as well. So then there’s the interior, and then we’re going to have an interior hull as well. So then there’s the interior, and then we’re going to do something again, something that’s not really being done in the space, and we’re going to make individual components within the interior mold. That allows for flexibility.

Scott Hubble: 44:09

So now I don’t have to own 25 different types of molds to change a floor plan. I have one mold, but then I can change the pieces and parts and this kind of dinette, these kinds of this kind of bed set up, so on and so forth. So a lot of fun there. Engineering team um, my fiberglass partner is he’s located outside of Fort Wayne, indiana, and then I’ve started to form my team here, my production team. You know, we’re not building anything. Probably for another month or so we’ll we’ll get into the first prototype Um, but I’ve got my finance and compliance guy, got an operational consultant, and then I’ve got a ton of people just cheering me on um former dealers, suppliers, just cheering me on um former dealers, suppliers, former partners, you know stepping up to say you know what can I do?

Scott Hubble: 45:00

So it’s, it’s been a great journey A lot of unknowns, um again learning a lot new space, but I think that some of the lessons I’ve learned over the years I’ll be able to lie and avoid those pitfalls. One thing I say is you know, hey, a forward failing observant leader. And the thing is, when you fail, fail forward because when you actually stand up you’re a little further ahead than where you were, because you’ve learned a lesson that you didn’t know before. So I think I’ll be able to avoid some of those things that you know, some of the rocky times not that they are not going to come here and there, but learned a lot over 17 years in this space, so really excited about what this is and what we’re going to be able to introduce. That’s awesome.

Todd Bertsch: 45:46

Well, first off, congrats.

Scott Hubble: 45:48

Well, thank you, you know.

Todd Bertsch: 45:49

I can see the excitement in your face. You know it takes me back to when I started my business. Face, you know I it takes me back to when I started my business. You know, you see a problem and you have an idea of how to solve it. You know, or you see an underserved market or industry or an area and you know geographically and you’re like, okay, I’m going to go there and I’m going to work my tail off and create something really special and hopefully it works out. But good for you, if, if anybody could do this. If I’m a betting man, which I’m not, but if I were, I’d put my dollars on you because you’ve been in the industry, you love a challenge, you love learning, you love building a great culture, you appreciate and respect the community piece. I think that’s important for somebody to come into something new. It almost reminds me of Subaru-ish right Probably the same types of people.

Todd Bertsch: 46:42

Absolutely, you know you gotta, you gotta be honest, you gotta be authentic, right the message, the marketing and the product you know and it sounds like you’re doing everything the right way. And, interesting enough, all these you know. I look at your path. It’s been windy right, but it’s led you to this and it sounds like it’s going to be incredible. What did your wife say? I’m curious.

Todd Bertsch: 47:04

You have this very successful, stable job five kids and you come home and say hey babe, uh, you know, I think I’m gonna, I’m gonna quit and start my own thing. What was that conversation like?

Scott Hubble: 47:19

Yeah, um, you know, again, I walked through it, um, with her. The same way, I walked through it with the owner at new camp and it was, uh, a few conversations right, and it’s just like, hey, this is what I’m feeling Really. Why, what are you going to do? How are you going to do it? We can’t leave, you know. You know, and hey, I could go to Indiana. We’re not going to Indiana, we it’s Ohio or Florida or nothing.

Scott Hubble: 47:45

Oh, you know so you know I started creating some guardrails and you know I don’t want to uproot my family per se. I didn’t want to go to Indiana per se.

Scott Hubble: 47:52

You know just throwing the options out there, it’s just. But at the end of the day, she, she put the fear aside and she’s like no, scott, I want this for you. She’s like you deserve this. You know, for everything that you’ve ever done and the way that you think and the way that you care about people, you need to just start fresh, um, with a brand new thing and make it happen again. And um, she, you know she’s, uh, a proud wife. She, you know, I say that humbly Um, I, I reread some of the cards she writes me um every now and again. Or I see my Facebook memories and I see these posts that she’s made you know, I’m so proud of you.

Scott Hubble: 48:39

You’re this and that and all that kind of stuff and and I never really let that register on a day-to-day basis. But you know, hearkening back on some of those conversations, you know she was grabbing the pom poms and just saying, hey, go for it.

Scott Hubble: 48:52

So, yeah, I mean it’s great, Cause you don’t want to fight your family on something. You know, look I, I spent all my time either at work or my family or with my family. My hobby is my family, right. So you know there’s gotta be harmony and alignment and we’re going together forward.

Todd Bertsch: 49:10

Yeah, that’s awesome, man. Good for you. You gotta have that support at home home. And when I tell my story, my journey, my wife is the one that pushed. She planted the seed and said, hey, you did this for somebody else, why don’t you do it on your own? I believe you can do that and you know to be an entrepreneur and to put yourself out there and your family right, you’re putting food on the table.

Todd Bertsch: 49:34

You got to have that support. You got to have that strong foundation at home. So I figured that was going to be the answer, but I wanted to hear it anyhow, and I love the notes. My wife and I joke. When we first met she would and early on in the marriage she would leave me like literal written notes. She’s not real tech savvy, which is great, and I’ve kept many of them.

Scott Hubble: 49:55

And.

Todd Bertsch: 49:56

I actually have them around in my office so that every now and then I’ll see them. I’m like, oh, it’s just a nice piece of inspiration, and we talk recently and I’m like I miss those notes.

Todd Bertsch: 50:10

Feel free to leave me one here and there. It doesn’t have to be a novel, but I like them. So it’s cool that you recognize them, appreciate them and go back and reflect on them, Because they are great pieces of inspiration, especially as this journey is going to take you into some unknowns, which you’re not afraid of for sure. So I appreciate just you as a person, the way that you operate, and it’s funny, like with all the academia, and the way that you grew up. You know you would think that you would be this very tight and calculated person and there is that analytical side that I can definitely see. But uh, you know you’re a, you’re an optimist, you love positivity and you love people and you’re very authentic and I can just it just oozes through.

Todd Bertsch: 51:01

I can see that you’re just a caring guy. I’m blessed that we got to meet each other and have this conversation and I’m super excited for you and this journey and I’m going to be watching from the sidelines and, who knows, it might be time for me to end up with another camper. I love, I miss it. There’s a lot to it, it’s a way of life and we needed to buy a truck and you got to winterize it and summarize it and store it somewhere and there’s a lot to it, but to get out on your own and just go, especially we have so many beautiful national parks and local parks that have campers.

Todd Bertsch: 51:37

I mean the places we went I probably would have never gone had we not had a camper. And the people, everyone. It is a very tight-knit community. Strangers you’ll meet tons of strangers and some of them you’ll become good friends with. And there’s nothing like sitting around a fire making s’mores for your kids that they don’t eat.

Todd Bertsch: 52:01

Right, exactly, you know 15 different ingredients and you know, sweating over the fire and then take one bite and like I’m good, I’m going to bed. But no, this has been great Scott. Any, any wisdom you want to leave with the audience I know you’re a lifelong learner Is somebody who’s young and getting into management, or has potential or an opportunity to get into a leadership role. Any guidance, advice, staple books or podcasts that you would you want to share?

Scott Hubble: 52:38

Yeah, there’s so much right. So I guess I’ll give you just two things that more recently for me right? A friend of mine just came back from a leadership summit and he took a picture of a slide when it was up there and he said I saw this and I thought of you and it was. The answer is always yes until it is no Right. So the part of being a pragmatic optimist is that it’s not blind hope, it’s calculated risk and it’s pushing through Right. But it’s always going to be, this is going to work and I’m going to make it work. And you keep doing that until you hit the dead end and say, well, I guess it wasn’t yes, right, sometimes you’ll get that.

Scott Hubble: 53:24

The second one is a book creating things that matter, by David Edwards, and you know he’s a professor, a researcher, a scientist and at the end of the day he basically is saying hey, look, you know, when you’re creating and innovating, creativity is about embracing uncertainty and pursuing curiosity and challenging the status quo. And you know, doing that for me was really enabled by, you know, having all those interdisciplinary studies coupled with my life experiences. I wouldn’t tell anybody to sign up for my life, but it’s been fantastic and it’s fashioned me, obviously, into who I am. So, yeah, I just like embracing the uncertainty, pursuing curiosity and challenging the norm. That’s how you’re going to create something that matters, something that lasts, something that brings you passion.

Todd Bertsch: 54:24

We’ll leave it at that. Alrighty, that was well said. Thank you, my friend.

Scott Hubble: 54:29

Thank you, absolutely no, thank you.

Todd Bertsch: 54:49

Thank you for listening’s my pleasure For show notes, resources and to subscribe to the weekly Motivational Monday newsletter. Please visit ToddBertsch.com and don’t forget to follow us on social media at the Bolt with Todd B for more inspiration. Remember, real change doesn’t happen overnight. Start small, stay consistent and watch as your growth unfolds. See you next time.