Starting a Business After the Military: How I Built Alpha Country From Nothing | Ep. 10

Most veteran-to-entrepreneur stories skip the actual origin. The couch. The surgeries. The $25,000 you just sent to a manufacturer with no guarantee any of it works. The hours sewing patches onto hats one at a time in your living room because the orders are coming in and you don't have a manufacturer yet.In this episode of Beyond The Beret, former Green Beret Spencer Lewis and his wife MJ go all the way back to the start of Alpha Country — the supplement, apparel, and coaching brand he built from nothing while medically retiring out of Special Forces. Spencer was sitting on the couch recovering from SI joint fusion, hip, and ankle surgeries with no plan, no social media, no product, and no idea what he was doing. This episode is the real story of how it all got built.Spencer breaks down every part of the journey: the first time he sold a training program as a PDF in the DMs, the brand deal that took advantage of him and made him go all-in on Alpha Country, how he found a supplement manufacturer with zero connections, the $50,000 first production order that was every dollar he had, the 16-to-20-week supplement production timeline nobody warns you about, sourcing apparel on Alibaba and losing money learning, the years of late nights packing orders out of his house, and the standards he holds for every single touchpoint with the customer.If you're a veteran thinking about starting a business after the military, a service member with a brand idea, an entrepreneur trying to bootstrap a real product company, or someone curious about how Alpha Country actually got built — this episode is for you.Topics covered:Why Spencer started Alpha Country while still medically out-processing the ArmyBare Performance Nutrition (BPN) as the brand he studied to learn the playbookSelling training programs as PDFs in Instagram DMs to make first revenueThe brand deal that taught him to never give his work away againBuilding the first supplement formula (Bangalore pre-workout) without white-labelingThe $50,000 first production order and what it actually buys youThe 16-to-20-week supplement production timeline nobody talks about40/60 payment structures with overseas apparel manufacturersSewing hats in the living room: 20 minutes per hat, then 10Building relationships with USPS and UPS when nobody at the counter wants to helpThe standard for fulfillment, packaging, and the customer experienceWhy the last physical touchpoint with the customer matters more than anythingHiring, the three-strike rule, and why "sexy" jobs are the wrong goalPrevious episode (Ep. 9): Spencer covers losing his identity after the military and how to build a new one. That episode is the why. This one is the how.Hosted by Spencer Lewis — former Green Beret, ultra runner, founder of Alpha Country — and his wife MJ. New episodes weekly. Already Decided.