#215 – Carey Smith's Big Ass Fan Journey

Carey Smith grew Big Ass Fans from zero to $300 million over 18 years without outside investors.  He shares key parts of his story on this podcast. It's interesting to note that when he sold Big Ass Fans for $500 million, the company's stock appreciation rights program paid out $50 million to more than 100 loyal employees who shared Carey's work ethic with 15 becoming overnight millionaires. Every year, American entrepreneurs start more than 500,000 companies, but only 200 will ever reach $100 million in revenue.  Even many that succeed will later fail. One valuable tip from Carey is that he personally called each new customer to hear first-hand what they liked about their Big Ass Fan, and more importantly, learn what they thought could be improved.  Why did he do that? Because Carey believes in a "fail-fast" approach to drive revenue quickly.  He learned a valuable lesson that you can usually tell within a short time if an idea's going to work.  If it doesn't, then make the conscious decision to fail fast.  Carey tells his employees, "If you're not making mistakes, you're not working."  Growth comes only from taking risks. Before Big Ass Fans, Carey spent more than a decade trying to grow another company, but its annual sales never rose above $1.4 million.  Carey admits he ignored warning signs and thought he should persevere a bit longer. Today, Carey leads Unorthodox Ventures, an Austin-based investment company he founded to provide everything venture capitalists lacked when they approached him near daily at Big Ass Fans.  Carey's team consists of experts who help founders become serial entrepreneurs by providing support for everything from engineering and marketing to customer service and logistics. Join this conversation to become introduced into Carey's success model. Spotify  Apple Podcast  Google Podcast  Manage2Win   ------- This Manage 2 Win Podcast episode is brought to you by Habitly.  I (David) review Habitly best practices regularly, and teach these essential people skills to clients weekly.  This advice has changed my life, and made millions for our clients. I started developing Habitly content in 2004.  Habitly's powerful best practices have now been taught to thousands of people worldwide.  For instance, you can learn how to Create time in your day;  Get more from meetings;  Stay calm;  Achieve significant targets;  and Become a great leader.  Simply study and apply the expert knowledge provided in Habitly courses and micro-learning episodes. Whether you're just out of college, or someone with over 20 years work experience, learn the habits of highly successful people on Habitly.  Test drive Habitly for 7 days on us!  This includes full access to the entire Habitly knowledgebase – www.habitly.com.