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The Mentor Sessions | He Left Corporate to Build a Watch Brand From His Dining Table · The Mentor Sessions

• Dave Moggio: I liken watches these days to art. It's art on your wrist. And you know, it's always gonna have a place. But the thing that I like about watches is that you typically get them because it's for a a milestone or an achievement or it's to mark something that happened in your personal life generally. BigMike Coyle: Welcome back to the Mentor Sessions, everyone. I am your host, Big Mike, and I am joined by a very special guest, someone that I consider a friend. We've met on social media. I've been following him for a while, harassing him. And now I got him on the show. he owns La Terrain watches, which is a watch brand that we're gonna be talking about. And they make great watches. I've got three of them myself. I will be showing them throughout the show. Dave Maggio, welcome to the show, man. Happy to have you. Dave Moggio: Thank you so much. It's great to be here. BigMike Coyle: why don't we just start out one of the questions I like to start out and ask people are what do you consider your your four core values that guide you? Dave Moggio: Ooh, that's a good question. So one of them has to be just being honest and transparent. you know, I I am what I am. I try to be as direct as possible with what I you know, what I say, just because I don't want to try to hide or be dishonest. So honesty's a core tenant of my personality. Also just trying to do the right thing. you know, I believe in trying to be as good of a person as possible. You know, obviously, you know, I I I sometimes fail that, but I try to set the bar high of like what would be the right thing to do in this situation, especially when you're talking about customers and customer support and service. I want to do you know attention to detail is another one, making sure that what leaves the what leaves the brand is you know to the right quality level to the right look and feel of what I want you know because it all matters to me. And then also just family. you know wanting to be able to provide and protect and help my family you know be happy, healthy and safe. So those are a lot of what drives me as the four card core tenants. BigMike Coyle: So let's talk about the way you described honesty, I almost interrupted you, but where does that stem from? That honesty and transparency. And the word I like to use for that, if you don't mind, is like accountability, that recognition of being accountable for what you say and what you do. Dave Moggio: Yeah, accountability's huge. so from from my career I think that that really helped me a lot was that, you know, with my teams and with my directory ports with my you know, stakeholders and bosses and everything like that, like you know, just trying to communicate as well as I could so that they understood what was going on at all times. They weren't surprised. and W the way I look at it is if I'm not spinning a tail, you know, or I'm not like stretching the truth, I can sleep really well at night because it is what it is from the aspect that I didn't I don't have to remember what I told this one person at one point in time. Like telling everybody generally the same thing and it it's the truth of what I know at the moment. So I don't have to really worry about trying to cover up for anything. Makes life easier, frankly. BigMike Coyle: that it does. That it does. so how did you how did we get to where you're you're building this micro brand, this micro watch brand? Like what's your background and even before your work background and work, like tell us about Dave and and what led him to this point? Dave Moggio: So talking about myself and the third person here, okay? BigMike Coyle: Yeah. Dave Moggio: Dave grew up in Allentown, Pennsylvania, to a single parent home. He went to some schools in Allentown that public schools, they were not the the greatest schools. He went to BigMike Coyle: Anyone who knows the song knows how hard life in Allentown is. Dave Moggio: Yeah, it's it's gotten bad. it's gotten really bad. It's a bit of a dead end place to to grow up. you know, you either went to No, it wa BigMike Coyle: It was was it a it was a coal miner town, wasn't it? W or a minor town? Dave Moggio: it wasn't a coal miner town. Bethlehem was the neighboring town that was the steel mills. So BigMike Coyle: Dill Mills, that's right. That's what it was. Dave Moggio: Allentown had Mac trucks, so we had you know, we were building big trucks there. We had air products, which was like a bunch of chemicals, and then we also had PPL, which was Pennsylvania Power and Light, and a few other industries, but a lot of them started to leave over the last, you know, 20 years. But growing up there, it was very blue collar. you know, and when you were in school there, it was you went to prison, you went to community college, or you went to Penn State. so that was pr that was pretty much your path. and so I was in that environment of you know Struggling through high school and you know having issues trying to focus on schoolwork. going to college, being completely unprepared for the workload of college, bounced around a little bit in college to try to find myself and find what my strengths were, graduating college a little late, and then getting into a management training program with Mac Trucks back home in Allentown because I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life. Graduate college, had the degree. Degree was in polypsci, which was not really gonna work for me for a career. So I was kind of bounced around a bit and I was just working on my car in the garage in the driveway, and my neighbor worked for Mac and she knew of this program and she got me, you know, an interview. And next thing I know, I'm in this management training program, and over the course of two years just learning different areas of working in a global manufacturing, you know, automotive business. And I found s you know where some of my strengths were. you know, I got to work in the factory a little bit, which was fun. I got to work in HR, I got to work in marketing, got to work in like health and environmental services, you know, I got to work in the engine plant. So I had a lot of fun there. But I I landed in product management. And that was where you really started to think about you know, market needs, what customers are telling you, what competitors are doing, pricing, positioning of the product, how it's being talked about, the messaging of it, and what it needs to do from like a feature perspective, benefits, outcomes, all the things that go into what make people want to buy something. And that became the beginning of my career. so I was in automotive from Mac. I went to work for Daimler, which is Mercedes-Benz and Freightliner for a little bit there. Then I went and worked for Volkswagen on the car side, because I always wanted to get into like cars cars, not heavy-duty trucks. And worked for Volkswagen and dieselgate hit. I saw the writing on the wall with them and I was like, well, what other industry could I take my skills into? transfer it to and you know seeing where automotive was going to end up with you know the EVs and all that stuff and the consolidation that that was going to require I was like let me go into tech. So I went into tech and I started working product management again the entire way through applying the concepts that I learned from automotive into technology and cybersecurity and then software. And I was you know mid management, just you know, doing doing everything I could and after about fourteen years of it, I was like, Well what's next? 'Cause I've been doing the same PM work for over a decade. And you know, I'd worked on weaknesses, worked on strengths type thing, and I'm like, Well, what's next? And it what next was maybe I should try leadership. So I you know, went and got a director job. That position required me to take over a a organization or a department, I should say, that had recently had everyone in it fired. So I had to start from scratch. BigMike Coyle: No pressure, no pressure. Dave Moggio: No pressure. I had to start from scratch. Actually I take that back, one person who was with that former team stuck it out. But then the other person that was left from that former team quit within like a week or two of me arriving. So I was really starting over from scratch. And one of the things I focused on was accountability. I focused on transparency because I want everyone to know what the department was working on, what was coming next, why things were prioritized the way they were, so that we could have conversations around instead of just hiding behind stuff. And I hired a team based around those those those and you know, obviously the product management doctrine though I was brought up in it. And we built out a really damn good team, I gotta say. who We all worked together for almost seven years, and two different companies after that because we got along so well. but that was really where my career started to take off of like, okay, maybe leadership and running a department is more my speed as opposed to handling the everyday some of the everyday tasks of PowerPoints and you know, presentations and sitting in lot of those project level meetings. So I took over a I applied and got the job to run a software division as part of a larger corporation. And I built out I rebuilt and built out the team and you know changed all the roles and responsibilities, put in new processes, put in new frameworks, everything. you know set up new cadence of meetings, set new meetings up. To once again bring transparency, bring honesty, and also get be more proactive with what we're working on instead of reactive. And that ran. We increased sales, we increased the success of the department, but ultimately I couldn't get funding from the board for the next year. So what we were able to do was did such a good job that I got promoted to be CTO essentially, head of technology and product, where I oversaw the global IT operations team. As part of that, I was able to bring along a lot of the people that had come with me from the prior job and were in the SAS division and now I brought them over to that. And we we really radically changed the way that things were being done. they had like a three year backlog, nothing was moving, nobody knew what was going on. We turned that around and we increased velocity like seventy percent. Like we started bringing in AI tools for the developers to use, like it was night and day difference. We led a full tech stack re redo, rebuilt the entire tech stack to something a lot more modern. It hadn't been touched in decade. So we were, you know, really flying high, but it came at a very steep personal cost. I was working sixteen to eighteen hour days, I was on Microsoft Teams all the F and time. I was heading into meetings every morning with a migraine. Wasn't sleeping well, put on a ton of weight, was stressed out beyond belief. I'd come home from work and I'd immediately just collapse on the couch and fall asleep. Like I was worthless to my family, constantly stressed, and I could tell that this was not the right fit for me. so in March of twenty twenty five, after we had completed the tech stack replacement and things were we had still some outstanding stuff, but it was smaller stuff, things were ready to go, team was on top of it. You know, I was like I got Step down. it's time for me step down. I had just reached the point where you know mentally I just was burned out and I was done. So I stepped down around the same time that the job market for tech and white-collar professionals basically went into the toilet. So a lot of people on the way out were like, BigMike Coyle: You you you saw the writing on the wall there. Dave Moggio: Yeah, a lot of people on the way out were like, You are making a huge mistake. And I was like, Yeah, I probably am, but I can't do this anymore. you know, my health isn't gonna survive this if I keep doing this. And I got a five-year-old son, I can't, you know, I can't stroke out, right? So I left and I bounced around a lot. I I was interviewing, some startups were asking for me to come and help them out. So I started, you know, working for a startup without compensation just to help them get off the ground. I was building mobile apps, learning AI tools to build mobile apps, and I'm not a coder by trade, so I was really happy that I could get stuff published in the app store. I wrote a quick book about some of my experiences and was really just interviewing over and over and over again. I was kept reaching the final rounds and I kept being rejected because they were telling me that, you know, they had to they were gonna hire someone cheaper than I was. in another country or they were you know just selecting somebody different so i was locked out of the corporate world that i had spent 20 years building a career in you know it must have happened about a half dozen times and after a while i started questioning the whole process So I during this time I just was like, what else do I got going? Like what other cards can I play to help provide for my family? Cause we have been living off of my savings. And that was when, you know, La Train had been running in the background for many years, and I saw that it was starting to kind of suck wind a bit. So I was like, all right, well let me let me start focusing on this for a little bit. Try to bring it back to where it was before. Cause before it was generating, you know, a f you know, it's generating a decent side hustle income. and it was covering all of its own bills. So I was like, let me start focusing on this again. And around, you know, maybe a month or two into doing that, you know, face on camera, which was the first time I started doing that, because I had nothing left to lose. it started to really take off and change. And it took off in ways that I never would have ever in my wildest dream have expected. And now I can use it, you know, as my full time my full time position and my full time career for my family. So it's been a really crazy ride the last year. to go from you know the burnout the brink of burnout and just terrible you know experience to basically living a dream here where I get to work on watches and talk to people like you and other other supporters of the brand and customers and friends and like man this is this is amazing. So that's that's the story. BigMike Coyle: And and your family knows who you are. Dave Moggio: Yeah, I'm getting to spend more time with my son than ever before. I'm getting to spend more time with my wife than before. we're able to take vacations again because I'm not tethered to my phone with you know, teams meetings and messages from work. it's really it's liberating, it's freeing, and I'm even able to go back to the gym. I have time to go to the gym again. which has been a challenge in its own right, but a good one. BigMike Coyle: Yeah. I I know about that. I wanna go back. You talked about how as you were trying to figure out what to do after college, where did you go to school? Were you did you hit that third category of community college or did you go Penn State? Dave Moggio: I went to No, I didn't go to Penn State. I actually went a different route. I went to Northeastern University in Boston for one one period. They trimester, I guess, because they don't do semesters at the time. So I was in Boston for like three months and I knew it wasn't for me. and then went and followed my girlfriend at the time down to Clemson University in South Carolina. and spent a couple of years there. but rather than going to class I was racing cars or working on cars with my friends and I was like, okay, after two years I need to get serious. I transferred to Hampton Sydney College in Virginia, which is the exact opposite of Clemson. very small college, you know, not predominantly sports focused and class sizes were like ten to twelve kids. Like I couldn't sit in the back and, you know, ignore the lessons anymore. So that really turned a switch on in me to take things more seriously with my education and I did much better there. BigMike Coyle: something that really stuck out when you were talking was that neighbor that came and talked to you. I think you said you were working on the yard. Tell me about that neighbor and and if you remember that conversation and how that impacted and benefits you in the long run. Dave Moggio: So BigMike Coyle: And do you still keep in contact? Were you like closest neighbor or? Dave Moggio: No, I wasn't a close neighbor. they worked in HR for Mac for you know, I mean this was the time period when people would stay at one company for twenty to thirty years. So BigMike Coyle: Yeah. Dave Moggio: she was with them for her whole career. And she saw me like you she she basically was lived there long enough to see me through kind of high schoolish into college. You know, so she'd see me like playing basketball or working on my car. And, you know, when I was nearing graduating college, like she knew because she'd talked to my mom and stuff like that. And so she was like, we got this really great program. I think he could he's mechanically inclined, he might be into it. And that's really where it took off. Now, I didn't have the easiest time because much like my transition to college from high school, my transition from college to corporate was really rough too. but after, you know, two plus years I started to Yeah, I found a spot, started to contribute a little bit and gradually got better at it. And we don't stay in touch now, because I moved away from Allentown many years ago. But I mean she was the one who found me, to get me into that position. Or not she found me, but obviously I had to go through several rounds of interviews to get that position. But yeah. BigMike Coyle: Yeah. We when you were growing up in Mac and trying to find your place, did you have people that like you leaned on to help you and that you could trust to get in there? 'Cause that's you know, when you go from Trying to grow as a kid. I mean, even when we finished college, we're still kids. And go into big corporate world, and like you said, that was a time where people stayed there. It's nice to have those old timers say, Y I'll show you how to do the job. Dave Moggio: I I was very lucky in that I got there before the Great Recession hit and before like a lot of things there changed. Like they moved their headquarters, a lot the old crowd got cleaned out as part of the, you know, restructuring. so during my first few years I had three, four four product managers who had been there for just decades. And so they were really able to help me with like learning about the engine systems, the transmissions, putting me through training so that I could do the calculations for gear ratios and understanding what grades would need what gear ratio for what type of application. You know, application engineering essentially was something that I they spent a lot of time with me on because I I understood it. And then from the product management side, it was less training and more of you know, here's who our customer is, like here's who buys this, you know, from us, here's why they buy it. And A lot the rest of it was figuring it out through trial and error. A lot of error on my part, 'cause I'm a kid in the twenties, I'm in my twenties and I'm being made a product manager for a you know, a global one plus billion dollar revenue company, you know, with multiple product lines underneath me. It's kind of ridiculous looking back on it. you know, trying to figure out what to do next against like all these competitors that were savvy and well funded. So a lot of it was trial and error, but I would go back to those first three years, four years with those guys and try to remember what they had taught me as much as I could. 'Cause by the time headquarters shut down, we relocated to Greensboro, I was the old guy. So I went from being the newbie that no one, you know, no one trusted, no one liked, you know, wet behind the ears to well Dave said this, so we have to do it and it's like I don't know if what I'm saying is always right, but I'm I'm basing it off of what these guys taught me and what I'm hearing from customers. So that's as good as I can give you right now. BigMike Coyle: It's a scary feeling, isn't it, when you look around the room and you're like, wait, I am the old guy in this room. Dave Moggio: It's I am the yeah, it's like, wait, I'm the one making the decision and you know, I could easily see one of those I I would always hear those guys in the back of my head, like, you know, trying to coach me through it, because of just how many conversations and times we spent together at work. And every now and then I would run into them and, you know, ask a couple of things, gain a little bit more advice. But those early years were really important to help get me that that foundation at Mac. And even towards the end though, like I didn't have the the mentorship that I probably needed to be as effective as a PM as I could have been. but that was part of the story. It's part of what, you know, I cut my teeth on. BigMike Coyle: How about how about when you started stepping into leadership roles? do you feel like that Dave Moggio: Yeah. BigMike Coyle: was kinda like the same thing? Like they just gave you the horse and said cowboy up? Dave Moggio: No, not quite. By this time I was 14 years into being a product manager. I knew how to be a product manager. there's some things I was good at, some things I wasn't good at, but I knew how to do the job. And so from running my own department, it was I need to find other people that know how to do this job, right? So I hired for personality I you know, from a teamwork and fit culture type of thing, but I also hired for, you know, how do you answer this question? And are you thinking of second and third effects? So I would give them case studies that would force them to think more than surface level, like surface level is I increase the price, we make more money. You know, but secondary and third effects are okay, well, how's that impact resale? How's that impact warranty? How's that impact service? You know, you go through all the different things that are off stream of that conversation, off that decision. And I hired people for that type of testing, and they were amazing at what they did. They're better PMs than I was towards the end of it for sure. So you know, my leadership really came from background knowledge of what the position required and then I had an amazing boss when I was a director. he had a military background, he was still younger. and he just he was came from a sales background so he was good with people and how to message things. And he was excellent at sniffing the bullshit and f you know getting right to the heart of the matter. And we worked really well together because I wouldn't with my nature, I'm not gonna be spinning up a bunch of, you know you know, dreams. I'm gonna tell what exactly I see and what a you know, what my my thought is on it. So we worked really well together. So as a leadership team, it was you know, we had we had conflict, we had stakeholder management and all those things that come along with it, but it was a very good way of seeing, okay, here's how this guy would handle a problem. I've seen him do it like this and that rubbed off on me a bit. So it was very helpful. leadership was a little bit easier from that aspect. BigMike Coyle: think you brought up some some points you you learned the job as a PM and and I think when we're in those subordinate roles even though like a you're project manager right you're so you're over a team but you're still Dave Moggio: Mm-hmm. BigMike Coyle: subordinate to the directors and stuff like that we learn okay and and I have a lot of guests that talk about this it's by seeing What we're gaining and what we're not gaining from our leaders ahead of us that we can Okay, that's not what I'm gonna do. I liked what you said about thinking about the second and third the downstream effects of something. Because I feel like that that's something that gets lost. But I'm sure that's something now you have to do as a self employed business owner, a small business owner. You're looking at costs of the supply chains going up. You're looking at costs of tariffs and shipping, which are something that somehow you have to distribute through the prices of your of your product. Dave Moggio: Mm-hmm. BigMike Coyle: But You're you also have to take into account like how do I do this, still recoup my losses, still make a profit, still provide for my family, but also not push myself out of the market. Dave Moggio: It's I mean it's like most things in life, right? You you have trade offs and you have balance that you have to strike, right? Like, you know, there's the secondary and third order effects I think are a great mental exercise to run when you're making a decision. But there's two things that there's also two things that I like to remember as well when I'm doing those things. Number one, you know, any decision you make is based upon the knowledge that you have at that time. Yeah. So maybe the decision you make today, six months from now, you'll have more information. You're like, oof, I I might have done that a little bit differently. You just have to live with that as a leader. Like you just have to live with that. it could be the wrong call. You have to be okay with that. And that type of courage I think is you know, it's difficult when the higher up you go in the ladder because more and more people depend on you to make the right decision. you make the wrong decision and some people could lose their jobs, right? So you you take the gravity of that situation. I think some leaders get stuck in a little bit of analysis paralysis, or they go the extreme other direction where they don't even think about those things and they just you know, shoot it off the gut. And both are equally as dangerous. So, you know, for me it was always just you have to live with what the decision you made, but take in mind that it's the best one you probably could have come up with with the information you have. Or if not, what did you learn from it? And then you you try to re implement that next time so you think about those things differently. but yeah, I mean when you're running a business, it's basically taking that approach and then times it by ten because you don't have a support team behind you. You know, you don't have a back office, you don't have, you know, all these other departments to kinda, you know, clean up your mess if you make one. so yeah, there's definitely there's the pace to it. There's just a pace to it of like how fast you can actually d run without it causing issues in other areas of the business and you kinda learn what that pace is the more you do it. For me, this year has been at a different pace than I've ever been at with Lacherine because the business is up thirteen hundred percent this year. So thirteen hundred percent in it BigMike Coyle: That that's crazy growth, man. That's crazy growth. Dave Moggio: I mean thirteen hundred percent in Essentially starting in March and now we're in September. So six months have done thirteen hundred percent growth. And you know, I I liken it to you're on a treadmill and you're walking on a treadmill and then somebody comes along and just says, Okay, now you're doing a full sprint. You know, and that's basically what the year has been like. And I think that that's where a lot of like the inventory issues of stress you know come from because they've really stretched what my setup was for ordering and planning and logistics of inventory. And that's the type of stuff that, you know, you don't know until you're in it. So decision making. Once again, like if I went back six months and I was like, I need to order all this inventory. Well, number one, I couldn't have afforded it. You know, number two, how would I have known that the demand would have been there? And it could have been the wrong decision. I would have a garage full of stuff that I couldn't sell if it didn't work out. So those are all the things that you just kinda adapt and you know, learn and you know, go with as things change. BigMike Coyle: So let's talk about La Terrain. In the age of tech, you know, smart watches, Garmin's, Apple watches, what made you decide that a watch is what you wanted to invest in? Dave Moggio: Well, when I first started La Terrain it was twenty eighteen. So the the Apple Watch, I don't know if it was consuming as much of the the market yet. However, you know, just because technology makes advances doesn't necessarily mean that, you know, everybody's gonna use it or everybody's gonna want it. And I think You know, much like how we look at pictures on our computer, it doesn't mean that it's gonna replace painting. You know, if you really like a good painting, you're gonna hang it on the wall. And I liken watches these days to art. It's art on your wrist. And you know, it's always gonna have a place. But the thing that I like about watches is that you typically get them because it's for a a milestone or an achievement or it's to mark something that happened in your personal life generally. Yeah, obviously sometimes it can be tied to I just liked it so I bought it. But generally you attach memories to these things they to these these personal objects that are on your wrist. And I was thinking you know in that time period of like legacy and like what would I be leaving to the next generation? Now I didn't even have a son yet. I had just gotten married. But like I was already thinking like what What is my story gonna be? What is the family story going to be? And what can I pass down? And I saw this really great quote, because I'm still in you know I'm still product manager heading into director of how you cannot pass down your job title. Yeah. So no matter how high I achieved in corporate world, it wouldn't matter for my son. Like he wouldn't be able to just step into that role, right? Like he would have to start off entirely at the bottom doing something else, right? So I was like, Okay, well, that's not a great way to leave my son or who my child. what else can I do? And that's where it's like, Well, I've always really liked watches, I've really had a always had a passion for business, and I always want to learn more. So why don't I give this a try and you know that started to f basically give me what I needed from a knowledge perspective, an exp experience perspective to apply to my corporate career. So now I started thinking more h more holistically than I ever had before. And I started thinking more about those downstream effects that I probably wasn't thinking about as much in my earlier days of being a product manager. So they kind of just kept feeding off of each other. Like as I got better at my corporate career, I got better at La Terrain. As I got better at La Terrain, I got better at my corporate career. And it reached that point where you know doing watches or selling widgets, you know, it it really just be made me stronger as you know a business person. BigMike Coyle: You know, you you brought up the point of the legacy of a watch and I I believe in that too. You know, I mean I have certain pieces that I know I want you those of us that are collectors, right, you have those things that if you could flip you're gonna flip. But then other pieces they're so tied to core memory you wanna make sure that they get passed down and you'd never flip So there were times Being a cop, I always had to have a watch on. It was actually in policy, I had to have some sort of timekeeping device. so you could mark the time for your reports and stuff like that. Dave Moggio: Mm-hmm. BigMike Coyle: but then I shifted to an Apple watch and there were times that it was convenient, especially so my last assignment was that as a bailiff. And Dave Moggio: Mm-hmm. BigMike Coyle: s you can't be pulling your phone out and we would communicate a lot on text messages, so we're not tying up the radio. So you could just glance down at your watch and you know, get a get a text about something, someone's walking to the courtroom or since we got the eyes in the sky, someone seeing something in a part of the courtroom I can't exactly see. So it it turned out handy. And great for fitness tracking too to a point. When I ch got out of that and went to corporate world, like a phone and it became an anchor. You now you're jumping every time your watch buzzes. I still get phantom buzzing from my Apple Watch, for lack of a better word, Dave Moggio: Any? BigMike Coyle: where something will move on my wrist and I'm thinking I'm getting a notification. It's starting to break. My connection to watches along with legacy to a degree, but not so much, is as I took my tech watch off and focused on to me the watch symbol symbolizes that moment in time. Be present in that moment of time. And you know, don't worry about what's in the past and the future. Just watch the second hand, breathe, and think about that moment in time. And that's why they're becoming my favorite gift to give people is like our time, because I tell people, like you say, you can't pass on your your job title. But one, the biggest investment we share with people. Is what we're doing right now. It's why I got into podcasting is that investment in time and time with people. time is the most important thing you can give someone. money, you know, I I I was talking to my football team and I said, You give me a million dollars, I can spend that in an hour. I mean, realistically buying stupid stuff. You give me your time and you sit down with me. That says more to me than any financial amount you gave me. Dave Moggio: It's true. time is the ultimate luxury. It's the one thing we don't get back. Yeah. So how you spend it is is everything of about life. 'cause we're not here forever. So the Apple Watch thing you brought up though is really funny 'cause I for a time had that too and I had text messages, emails from personal email as well as work email and then also teams all running through that through that watch. And it would not stop it would not BigMike Coyle: Yeah. Dave Moggio: stop beeping and vibrating and I was I was in a meeting one time with my team and I just took the thing off and threw it in the trash in my office because I was just sick and tired of it. It just would not stop. And that was yeah, that was probably the last time I wore my Apple Watch. And I still would get those I would see I would get those things too. BigMike Coyle: Yeah. So let's let's talk about the brand. Let's talk about like what got you going and how you got started and the meaning behind Law Terrain. I I know it because communication and stuff like that. But let's share this with the audience, the brand and and how you got started. Dave Moggio: Yeah, so I started back in November twenty eighteen with just the idea that I bought my first watch when I was fourteen years old. I paid sixty-five dollars for it from like a Sam's Club, I wanna say. I still have it, it's a Victoronix, and I just I just loved how it looked. And I wore it every single day from fourteen years old all the way through high school. This thing is seeing everything. And I just back in twenty eighteen, like, I was seeing what you could buy for a hundred bucks, you know. And there wasn't a lot of great options at the time, that were popular at least that I was aware of. What I was seeing were watches that were, you know, rebadged AliExpress you know, watches that were minimalistic. And, you know, I saw that that the company did really well financially and sold itself off and That was that, right? So I was like, well well damn, why don't I try my hands at this and see if I can build a better watch for that money? and you know, maybe someday I can build something like what I wore when I was fourteen. So that started the long journey of catalog watches, working on them, trying to make them better over time with what I could afford. I started the company with three hundred dollars worth of catalog watch inventory on my dining room table. BigMike Coyle: Explain explain to the audience what a catalog watch inventory is. Dave Moggio: Yeah, catalog watches are pre-bait pre-built watches done by watch manufacturers that allow you to, you know, customize it a little bit, but you're using their case and you know, you're using their their design. but you're trying to start out in the business, it's a really cost effective way of learning, you know, how how you could design a watch, what you can change on it, and what you can afford. So if you don't have a lot of money, it's the great way of doing it. You can change the dial, you can change the hands, glass. engravings and it's relatively affordable to do and that can get you started. So that's how I start. with a proven platform that worked well and yeah 300 bucks worth of it. BigMike Coyle: How many pieces did three hundred bucks get you at that time? Dave Moggio: man, back then, I I think I got I think I got close to like twenty or thirty, you wanna say? BigMike Coyle: So was the Maritimer your first catalog watch that you built? Dave Moggio: No, no. Maritimer's just the best one I've built. no, I started off with really really Just not good watches in my opinion. Like, I hate to say that about a watch that I have my you know, a lot training on it, but some of the early stuff, like mineral glass, you know, zinc alloy case, you know, it wasn't three ATM, like it wasn't to the standards that we have today. so it was really just getting my feet wet, learning about how to market, learning how to build a website, learning how to drive traffic and all of those things, while I was selling those watches. I think I sold like fifty bucks each. You know, just Cheapies to help to see if I can do it. And then from there, each iteration they got better. You know, we started adding sapphire. We went to stainless steel. We started using better materials and better, you know, better watches. And then, you know, eventually after doing enough of it, was able to start releasing my own custom everything. So heritage, BigMike Coyle: Yeah. Dave Moggio: you know, heritage racer, seafair, ultra, upcoming cartographer. These were all ground up my own originals with the original case and everything. So but it, you know, it was a subject. Side hustle, a side project, and it didn't wasn't my main focus. So I was just slowly, you know, getting it bigger every year. We had a a 53% compound annual growth rate year over year. So what I was doing was working on the side, but you know, it wasn't ready to take over from my main source of income. But it was kept it kept growing and the brand kept getting bigger and better, and we get kept getting, you know, really awesome customers that w saw what was going on and really wanted to support, and they would start building. community around it. BigMike Coyle: So let's talk about the birth of the Maritimer. Where did the Maritimer come from? Dave Moggio: So it was 2023 and I just had had a month where I actually had owed money. So for the entirety of July of 2023, I had negative $27 in sales. And at that point the brand, you know, it was floating around $10,000 a year total of sales as a side hustle. And I was just like, I need to either cancel this and quit this whole thing, shut it all down, or I need to find something that people are gonna want to buy. And so looking at the market, everyone wanted to buy a subhomage. I mean sub hom everybody needs a everybody needs a like nice quick black dive watch. And that's where I started. I was like, okay, well, if this is what's moving, let me see if I can put my own little spin on this watch. I too don't like the Mercedes hands, so that was an easy thing to do. I also really like the Rolex reference, I think it's like 1609-3 or something where it has the red subtext. So I wanted to bring that to it. And then I also had as one of my brand like continuity things, I always had a red secondhand. So I wanted to bring that red secondhand tip to play off of that text on the dial. And then the sub was born. you know, the the Maritimer is born was basically, okay, let me try a sub homage that people wanna buy because we know the market's there. it's gonna be in a color that people buy the most of, which is black on black. And we're gonna add, you know, these these cosmetic changes to it. We're gonna add sapphire glass to it, we're gonna improve the bracelet, we're gonna improve the clasp, so that this feels and wears like a more expensive watchwood. And I wasn't quite sure if this would work. It was like kind of my last ditch gamble for the brand because up until then it just wasn't getting traction. And I posted about it in like the League of Microbrands group on Facebook and like everybody hated it. They were like, What's so different about this versus all the other ones on the market? And I'm like, I I made it look different. You know, like it's an homage. Like I made it look a little different. I'm BigMike Coyle: Yeah. Dave Moggio: not charg you know, I'm not charging arm and a leg for it. I was charging a hundred bucks. And People got it and they absolutely loved it. And that's really what helped to turn the brand around a bit was that watch. because now I started to have cash flow for the brand by selling these. And with that cash flow, I was able to invest into Subnautica, which was another one that people really loved. That was an Eur Catalog watch. I was able to invest in Commodore, which is another catalog watch that people like. And slowly but surely I was starting to generate cash flow for the brand and basically tripled the size of the company off of those three models and then rolled those profits into Heritage Racer, which really set the tone for the brand going forward. BigMike Coyle: Tell me about that. Dave Moggio: So at this point BigMike Coyle: Because Heritage Racer watch. I know you're a racing dude and that's probably why you were excited to put a racing that together, but talk about like what you were trying to get out of having a a racing watch, if you will. Dave Moggio: So I was thinking about so when I actually this goes back to twenty nineteen. When in twenty nineteen my dream was to have a mechanical chronograph. Like I really wanted to build my own mechanical chronograph. I I grew up, I I loved the Speedmaster. I just couldn't afford one through that at that point in my life. And so I really wanted to do a mechanical chronograph. So I was shopping around trying to find out how to do one and at the time I couldn't afford it. The brand could not afford to do a mechanical chronograph, it just wasn't big enough. So I did a quartz one and we called it Compass. And it was kinda like a tag catalog watch, lookalike type of watch. Fifty dollar watch. And that one actually was the biggest seller in company history. And so I used to say the compass leads the way for the brand. And that's why there's a compass on the seafair. but the the mechanical chronograph dream of mine just never died and it got the brand got to the point where I was like, I can I can take out a loan and I can make this work, but I want to do it my way. And be a legitimate like mechanical n no nothing held back. So we did the custom case for it. We made it as thin as we could 'cause I like thin watches. We used the mechanical movement that was available for the price range, which is the Seagull, which looks wonderful with that exhibition case back. We did the dial design ourselves. We did a ceramic bezel, which is and then we also did DLC coating on everything, so it was highly scratch resistant with the sapphire too. And the purpose of this was let's build a chronograph that will last. It won't be like easily scratched up, beat up, and it will look good ten years from now. And I threw everything into it. The packaging is custom. The you know, the watch is custom, the bracelets and everything for it were made for Heritage Racer. and that was really where I started to get some traction with social media, 'cause people really loved how it photographed. And I got a lot of reviews out of that too. And that's really where the brand started to kinda come into its own. So that was the thinking behind Heritage Racer was I'm gonna go for it, I'm gonna take a risk, I'm gonna take a gamble on my very own, and I'm gonna fulfill this dream I've had for at the time, I think it was like five years, and finally bring it to market. BigMike Coyle: I think that's what everybody wants. Like we all, especially as kids, right? Like we all picture that race car that has the engine that we want. It's fun when you get to put your signature into something and Dave Moggio: Yeah. BigMike Coyle: what that means and and your signature. And that's what you did with the Heritage Racer. Starting a brand and and it goes to the theme of the show, the mentor sessions, there's there's a lot of like, okay, well I'm gonna try this and see what happens. So who ha who has helped you along the way, to get to where you are now and to keep building and and developing. you have your great business background and resume, but when it comes to watches, who's like help you navigate the world of timekeeping and and timepieces? Dave Moggio: So this is where I took a page out of being a product manager. You know, it was listening to what customers are telling me, seeing what competitors are doing, seeing what else is on the market, seeing what's popular right now. you know, that that's gonna lie into what I should do next, what changes I should make to what I have, to help guide me a little bit. Now, from the aspect of learning the business of watchmaking and all that stuff. It was a lot of trial and error in those early years. Like I tried different factories. you know, there's there's you know, a handful of factories to try, so I was trying a different factories, seeing what their quality levels were. I was I met early on my friend Elliot. and Elliot was a Seiko modder, so he would build modded Seiko's. And he got really into the NH series movements, repairing them, regulating them. And I l I met him back in like twenty twenty. So really early in L T L T time period. And he helped educate me on like time graphing. He helped educate me with, you know, some of my choice of materials on some of the earlier watches, like what I should do differently for better reliability. Because he was having to service them, you know, like if something went wrong. So we learned through the servicing route, we learned through compet competition and customer route of what comes next. And then there was also So like I think of things like a product portfolio. So if I have a portfolio, what am I what's the pricing ladder for each segment? What segments do I cover? And you know, you'd I think you'd done the video about that, like how I have a price step ladder. And I did that. Mm-hmm. BigMike Coyle: Yeah, I was actually just gonna talk about that. How, you know, you've got your maritimer, which I think right now just over a hundred dollars. Then Dave Moggio: Mm-hmm. BigMike Coyle: which was the sub was the next one the subnautica, and now it's the Atlantica. that's kind of filling in that role with some different movements and stuff like that, of giving different options at to the customer base. You Dave Moggio: Yeah. BigMike Coyle: know, for someone that may not be able to jump right up to The submariner or you've got the heritage racer and then you have the Dave Moggio: Yeah. BigMike Coyle: here's what I think I had to learn I think watches are just a cool part of growing up as a kid. You know, my grandkids, they love my watches. I I buy them cheap Amazon watches and they get to wear them for till they lose them or you know, something happens. watches are just a cool it's like your first grown up piece of tech equipment, is what I find. And but For your first automatic watch being a sub or a Omega C master or something, you you're kind of taking a chance 'cause there's a big risk you're gonna do something that messes it up. You know. So that's why I like that you're like, hey, here's our here's our maritimer. It's the quartz movement. It's over a hundred it's just it's around a hundred bucks. ship to your house and learn how these things learn work. Learn why dive watches have the bezel that they have, why they're unidirectional. and then, you know, now we're gonna get you the Atlantic or the the subnautica and you'll learn how a mechanical movement works and how you can damage it by winding and and treating it you know, making sure if you're gonna go in the ocean, how to take care of it and and get it rinsed off and make sure your crown is screwed in I want you to talk about the Seafarer and where it came from because I think I know kind of the story behind it from social media, but it's I was so stoked to g as stoked to get this as I was my Mito or my Henry Archer, and when you send it out with that mesh bracelet, which I didn't think I'd like, and I can't take it off I know in a way we're being a sales pitch here, but it also goes into what you kept doing of like, okay, how can I make this profitable but at the same time give my customers value. and I I think that's so important because you could easily s be selling these at you know within that nine hundred to twelve hundred dollar range. Dave Moggio: Mm-hmm. BigMike Coyle: especially everything you're offer or just on the Jubilee bracelet. But you put it at a price point that people can afford. that's what I think is awesome. And I think that's one of the things about La Terrain that you do You could have scrapped all when you're like, okay, I've got to go out and make my money at this because this is what's supporting my family, but you seem to still have wanted to be true to that. And that's what I want to know is like, where does that come from? Dave Moggio: That's a great question. I think honestly what drives a lot of that was you know I I'm not the biggest guy, right? Like, you know, I'm I'm five nine and you know like I played basketball, so I was height disadvantaged. And the way that I would do well out there was to use all the tools I had available to gain an edge. Whether that was you know my shooting, whether that was my quickness, whether that was just being stronger for my size, playing it playing in the post if I had to, try to throw different looks at you know any way I could to gain an edge and try to do it in a way that would allow me to compete hard and win. And with watches and this particular thing here, it's really me trying to figure out all the different ways that makes a good watch and put that into it. and try to do it in a way that people can, you know, afford it. 'Cause I've Because of my corporate career and how, you know, blessed I was to be able to continue to, you know, do well with that for a time period, I was able to buy some Swiss watches. So I know what the best looks like. You know, I have it in my hand. I'm able to understand like articulation of the bracelets, how the bracelets are constructed, what the cases look like, what the movements will do in a time grapher. Like I I know what I'm looking at. Like under a loop, how well they fill in the loom on the hands and you know what debris is in there. There's none. so you know, to me it's really just like how can I maximize the what I have so that it is able to provide a very compelling reason for people to buy it. and to be happy with it and to be able to afford to last for decades. Because these watches should outlive me. And with proper servicing they should be able to. And that's kinda how I take it. but I think a lot of it comes from just starting off with like Alright, well you don't have a ton to work with height wise, but what else can you do, right? So I don't have a ton to work with from a a capital perspective where I can invest in a plant, I can invest in exotic materials and you know all that stuff, right? But I do have enough knowledge to be able to to add some things to these watches that you're not gonna normally see at this price point. BigMike Coyle: we get so much further with collaboration than just competition alone. I know you do a lot of stuff with Monterey watches, with Dufrain watches, you've talked. How is that working with those guys and and sitting down with them and and some of these other micro brand owners? How has that helped you build your brand? Dave Moggio: Well, you know, going back to the the competition angle, right? Like, you know, me on a basketball court is a different me than me in the watch world, right? Like, you know, it you know Yeah. Yeah, it it goes from BigMike Coyle: Right. And that's the thing. You know, me on a football field is different than Dave Moggio: it goes from being raised on Jordan and Iverson To win, to I'm now working in the watch world and I'm a business person, I'm professional, and these guys are my friends, you know, so it's not cutthroat at all. There and you know, with Tim Monterey, you know, it was Tim is one of the low-key most supportive people I know. he won't advertise it, but he's he's in your corner. And It was March or April, I put a video up on TikTok where I g I h I was I had imposter syndrome, right? 'Cause think about what I had just been through. I had been through, you know, walking on a treadmill to suddenly hitting run. We had this incredible traction of Maritimer. We had an incredible traction with the first wave of seafarers. I'm doing numbers I'd never seen before on a sheet for La Terrain. And I'm like, what the hell's going on? Like I don't know how to respond to this, right? Like, is this real? Like could this go away tomorrow? I had no idea. He calls me up and he's just kinda like, You're not an imposter. You you have a legitimate brand, you have a legitimate business, and you need to start acting like that. And it was like a big brother moment, right? And he's like, How many people did you have pre-order the Maritimer Sport? And I I told him and he's just kind of like, Brother, you don't have this isn't this is a business now. Like you have a real legitimate brand. And you know, he's been there to like, well, took a look at your, you know, how your email flows are working, you know, maybe you could try this, you know, thing to tweak it a bit. And so, you know, you're not gonna compete. Like that's that's someone that's in your corner trying to help you help you out. And I would help him out too with the thing. he needed help with. So, you know, it worked both ways. And you know, low-key, you know, he's not he's not out there on social media talking about this stuff. And yeah, I don't know how much of this he wants me to talk about, but he's he's been that like that big brother kind of ish type of person that I I you know I I'll text and you know we'll catch up on. And I think it's really helped to make the the community stronger is that there's you know, see on Watch Talk alone, they have people don't just buy one watch, you know. They buy multiple watches. And if they do buy one watch, eventually maybe they'll buy another one. And it's okay if they don't buy mine today. You know? so it's it's just understanding that it's not a zero sum game. And I think if you're playing a zero sum game, you're you're kind of missing the the benefit and the the better side of the community, if you're doing that route. Because, you know, if someone buys a Monterey tomorrow, I'm happy for If they buy an Omega tomorrow, I'm happy for You know, if they buy a La Terrain, I'm happy as hell for But all in all, like, we're we're here for watches. It's they're cool BigMike Coyle: competitors are also trying to make sure your customer base are getting great values for the money. Dave Moggio: Yeah. Yeah, it's true. I mean you know, there's there's things like we cannot you know, we can't talk about or share, obviously. BigMike Coyle: Obviously. Dave Moggio: but, you know, I think that it's also nice having someone else who's on that side of the register with you, like that understands like Hey man, are you getting a ton of cancellations this month? Yeah, me too. You know, it's like, okay, so this is more of a industry thing than, you know, my site suddenly stopped working, right? you know, or hey, who who who I saw you did a really good job on that website. Do you could you refer me to, you know, who helped you with that? And you know, networking is just powerful like that. And with Dufresne, you know, I I'm not gonna claim that like you know he's my best friend or anything. We literally just yeah, we literally just met. We literally BigMike Coyle: No, no, no. I I know that's yeah. Dave Moggio: just met. But he's someone I've looked up to from afar for many years because BigMike Coyle: Beautiful watches, beautiful watches. Dave Moggio: he's an artist. I mean he's an artist. And you know, I think with him, one of the things that's really been fun is you know, you kinda see the you kind of see a little bit of the like the the way of balancing running your own watch brand without it running away from you. You know, he has he now has his son working with him, which is a dream of mine, to have my son eventually work with me on La Terrain. You know, he has a shop, you know, he he lives a you know a good, comfortable life, goes to these events, well respected. And, you know, once again, like man, I would love to to get to that point too, you know, and You know, he's he's a v he is exactly as advertised too. He's just a very down to earth, nice nice person and I really enjoyed the chat that I've had with him so far and you know, one of those things I just asked him some questions too, like, Hey, how do you how do you manage your pre orders and how do you manage expectations around you know? Like when do you decide that you're gonna go live with the pre-order versus just hold on to it for a little bit before so you can work through some production errors if there are any. And you know, we just stuff like that, you know, that someone who's done it for a lot longer at scale would know. And I think that's a lot of microbrand owners out there right now that they're they're willing to share that knowledge. you just have to ask and you have to, you know, come from you know, not from the position of like Jordan, but from the position of like just a fellow community, you know, collaborative person and you know, I think that that's the right approach for all of it. BigMike Coyle: there's there's no denying that you're establishing yourself. You I think you said you've had thirteen hundred percent growth. you know. Now you are getting into those positions like the the Thames and the Dufresne, and I know it's on a smaller scale. Have have there been other newer creators that and micro bandowners reaching out to you or that you've reached out to? Dave Moggio: Yes and no. I have there have been micro brands that DM me. you know, one of them I'm I'm really proud of. I mean I'm proud of it. Anybody that's willing to to take the jump and take the leap. Like that takes that takes guts. I don't care what stage you're at, like it it's a risk to to start your own business. So when I get them when I get people asking me questions, like sometimes, you know, it depends. Like sometimes they'll just come right out and be like, who are you using for your manufacturing? And I'm not going to tell you that. You know, like that's BigMike Coyle: Right. Dave Moggio: that's part of my supply chain. Like I'm not telling you that. but other times they'll come like, hey, you know, when you were doing this one thing, how did you manage it? Or I've noticed this is happening. How do I what are the some of the ways you're handling this? And that's just like with what Tim and Steven, you know, helped me with, right? And I'm I'm totally an open book about some of those things. And there's been a there's been a micro brand on on Watch Talk that well actually two that you know really they they launched, they're they're doing well, and we've had kind phone conversations about some stuff and just helping them through that. And I think the biggest thing is you're not gonna ever know everything. and you're definitely not gonna know when you start. And sometimes the only way you're gonna know what you need to know is when you go through it. So and everybody's path is different too. So what worked for me might not always work for everybody else. And I think, you know, we're just having that those conversations helps with a couple of the micro brands that I've seen. one of them is you know spinning up a bit and doing their own thing. And then some others, they don't they don't message me at all, and I'm I'm fine with that too. BigMike Coyle: Yeah. Dave Moggio: you know, it's it's it's just Everybody's got their own their own path. BigMike Coyle: Yeah. I wanna talk about you've done a couple watches now where you've donated the proceeds to and you've done one that's finished. You have another one that is in the process of the pre orders, and cancer awareness and cancer research is very near to your heart. So talk about that importance to you and why you choose to do that. Dave Moggio: So So the the Jason is the first one and that was a member of the community that was a real, I think, positive influence on on the community. had a a lot of I can't claim to have been his like friend, you know, I didn't know him that well. we had some brief conversations, some texts and you know, but nothing where I would say like, yeah, I was his best like I would never just claim that. But people in the community were very close to him and when he unfortunately passed away, they wanted to do something to remember him and they asked me. and you know, when you are asked to do something like that, would have a really hard time of saying no to it, you know. 'cause I think once again, going back to the core tenets of just trying to be a good person and trying to do the right thing. And so we worked on this watch and we're like, well what would be the right thing here? You know, like we know that charities like to do a portion of the proceeds and be kind of like mysterious about how much is actually going to the charity. And we didn't want to do that because I would feel like that's just dirty money if I held on to anything like that. So we all agreed that all proceeds, anything that was a profit, you know, above the cost that we incurred by shipping and tariffs and production should go to the charity. And that's what we that was what we did at the Jason. So, you know, the first the first donation was ten thousand dollars, because, you know, calculating everything out is pretty comfortable that we could donate that much. And then whatever's left over after all those other costs come out, you know, we'll send that remainder in when the watch is ship. So that was that was near to me because it was, you know, an honor to be asked by the community to do that, for someone that was so important to so many people in the community. And hopefully, it will help people, you know, remember and, you know, you know, feel a part of it as well, 'cause that donation actually made a difference, for colorectal cancer. So that was huge. Then working with the the member of the community on that watch, you know, getting to know Michael Crane a little more. we both learned that both of our mothers passed away from pancreatic cancer. And my mom actually passed away from it on his mom's birthday. Which what we thought was like really you know odd. BigMike Coyle: Serendipitous in a way. Dave Moggio: Yeah. Right. So My mom my mom it only I think she got diagnosed in like January She got diagnosed in March of 2015. She was she passed away by June 2nd of 2015. It was very fast. I was 33. Yeah, I was alone. So to be able to do that watch means a lot 'cause I think you know, it's it's his way and my way of kind of helping to like tend to repay some of that. And Yeah, that's that watch is extremely important to me to get that right. So we're working really hard on sourcing. We wanted to spend a lot of time to make sure that the movement that we selected was correct, we got the right one picked, and yeah, we're gonna go live with that. As soon as we get to the sampling, we'll be able to show everybody what that looks like. and we're gonna really spend a lot of time on getting that dial correct and making sure that the watch is going to be Perfect. And with that watch, we're going to be making a donation you know, to pancreatic cancer research as well, which we've just seen a a major breakthrough as part of the treatment for it over the last couple of months as well. So hopefully the donation from these watches will help provide some funding towards the next breakthrough so that we can hopefully make this thing less of a death sentence for people. BigMike Coyle: Yeah. it's nice that you can put your skills and your talent into doing something positive for people's lives. that's one of the things I'm really excited about and and appreciative about you and like supporting you and your brand is you see a good person who is one first and foremost trying to take care of his family, provide something that people do like and enjoy, and then also give back to the communities and stuff like that. Dave Moggio: Yeah, and I think that that's that's really the beauty of micro brands is and I I've talked about this before, but like as the company gets bigger you start to hire employees, right? And the employees have specializations. They might have a marketing degree or they might have, you know, a production background or they might be a watchmaker or something like that. But you know, how many of them are w enthusiasts of watches versus just Here's a good company that I wanna work for and you know, I like watches but you know, I'm a marketer or I don't mean to p pick on marketing, but you know what I mean? Like they have the they have their role BigMike Coyle: It's 100%. Like you got into trucking, you weren't a trucker. You know, you didn't grow up around semis Dave Moggio: Yeah, exactly. Yeah. But BigMike Coyle: and trucks and say, I want to go work for Mac Trucks. It was an opportunity, helped you build skills and things that you needed, and then you took it into tech and software. Dave Moggio: Mm-hmm. BigMike Coyle: And when you're Dave Moggio: Mm-hmm. BigMike Coyle: enthusiast about watches or anything else of that matter, it's I want to have this as part of my life. I don't think a larger brand company would like angry angry watch guy yelling about his watches Dave Moggio: No, definitely not. Yeah, one hundred percent. And you know, I think that that's been one of the the best things about the journey is like, you know, sales in an isolated vacuum, you're always like, Okay, well what's the data telling me? Why is this happening? Where's it coming from? etcetera, right? But when you're a part of the community and you see everyone so excited to get your creation, and talk to you about it and send you ideas about things that they would would love for you to do, you know, f you know, work on with them. you know, it feels a lot, it feels a lot different. It feels much more like elevation as opposed to just numbers on a spreadsheet. It feels a lot more like, you know, friendships and relationships than just the invoice. And I think that that's been the benefits of the entire thing is that I'm having fun doing it because I get to talk to people like yourself, I get to talk to my other friends in the community. And I'm totally cool with, you know, poking fun at things, you know, poking fun at the situation because at the end of the day it's a watch. Like they can't be they i you just you can't take it as seriously as I've seen some people take it. You know, it's a watch. It's a luxury item, in today's day and age. It's not something we need anymore. It really is a decision that we have, that we want something cool on our wrist, that we like the look of it, we like how it makes it us feel, it's attached to a memory or something, but you know, it's a watch. You know, there's so many other more much more serious things going on in this world that I look at this as kind of like an escape in some ways, you know? BigMike Coyle: Yeah. working in a high stress industry like law enforcement and being in jails and being in courthouses where you're like gear geared on all the time and Dave Moggio: Yeah. BigMike Coyle: and now being able and being blessed by a wonderful wife, I I have to make sure I shout out all the time. The only reason why I'm able to do this is her support, just I'm sure your situation, you know, having Dave Moggio: yeah. BigMike Coyle: a partner who's who believes in your dream and and what you're doing and and that support. And then able to take that load off so that way you're available for the family and that you're available and your relationship grows and it it stays strong and it doesn't fracture how important that is to have fun and enjoy what we're doing. What's coming down the pipe for Law Terrain? Dave Moggio: Yeah, so this year has been one of rapid expansion, to try to fill those pockets in. next year we got some finishing touches coming in as well. you know, the cartographer is a good part of that. But we have a c couple other things that help round it out a bit. And you know, over the next few years I think it's going to be you know, maturing that product lineup so that people are more aware of what LT does and what La Terrain is known for. you know, like right now if I go to a a watch a watch fair, aside from the people that follow me on TikTok, not it no one no one knows who the heck I am versus any other brand, right? And I think being able to have them pick up the watch, try it on, and see what we're about is part of the strategy. for the next couple of years is going to these shows, meeting people, shaking hands, getting them to have the watch and the wrist and see what we're about. you know, just to try to build up that you know, to build up that awareness and to make sure more people know about what we do. So, you know, my my goal for the next few years is to continue to tell the brand story, continue to get out there, talk about, you know, what we do, why we're different. And continue to just keep working on the watches and making them better and better. I believe in the iterative process, so next watch is my best watch. And you know, three years from now I hope that the watches that we have are ones that would compete with, you know, the much larger heavy hitters out there. and I think we're on the way to that. BigMike Coyle: Have you been hit up by stories about getting your watches in their showrooms? Dave Moggio: I have. smaller stores, mainly. You know, no no like I've gotten in you know, a agency reaching out to get me into like chain stores and re you know, all that stuff, but you know, the realistic realistically BigMike Coyle: Yeah, I I get kind of the same thing reaching out about, you know, wanting to get me in front of people and of course it's a very Dave Moggio: Yeah. BigMike Coyle: big cut they want to take out of it, but Dave Moggio: yeah. Yeah. The economics of retail don't make sense for the price points that I'm at right now and the margins that I have. BigMike Coyle: Yeah, I I can imagine that. Dave Moggio: And that's been the biggest stumbling block is like, sure, I would love to have law train I'd love to have law train everywhere. But it has to make financial sense. And you also you can also scale too much too quickly. So I think at the rate that we're at right now to a a good run rate that we can continue to work on things like, you know, shipping and, you know, logistics and delivery and all of those things that really make or break you on the back end so that when the time is right, you know, maybe retail will be something that we can look forward to on some models. BigMike Coyle: I appreciate all your time, Dave. What's what's a message you want to leave with the audience today? Dave Moggio: just thank you for listening. you know, this has been this has been a really good interview for, you know, questions that normally don't answer. so I really appreciate you taking the time to have such thoughtful questions for me today. And if anybody wants to learn anything else, you know, on TikTok, DM me, Instagram, Facebook, and check out the website. you know, we plan to be here for a long time. BigMike Coyle: Yeah, check him out, guys. He's got great watches, great value. So Dave, totally appreciate ya. And I look forward to talking and and creating with you some more and thanks for your all your time. Dave Moggio: Thank you for having me on. I really appreciate it.