PROCO360 | Best Podcast for Entrepreneurs and Business Owners

Leaders say, “Somehow we never have the money to fund change management on our first try, but have a blank check on the 3rd try making the same change.” Scott McAllister, CEO, Prosci

Alpen High Performance Products was cheaper to fill the entire Empire State Building with our windows than to get a new HVAC system big enough to heat and cool it with its old windows.” Andrew Zech, Alpen High Performance Products

I said to everyone who joined the firm: "You're not joining the legal profession - you're joining the energy industry." Michael Beatty, with Michael Wozniak, founders of Beatty & Wozniak

“We’re curious, if you invest in women the same as men, especially in sports, can you get the same results on the field and for a business.” Rob Cohen, Lead Owner, Denver Summit Football Club

“You’d be surprised by some of the people coming to us who are working multiple jobs and are still really struggling.” Pam Brier, CEO, The Action Center

“We realized that it’s the communities that take care of us.” Kyle Peters, Co-owner, Sexy Pizza

“The industry has done a phenomenal job in gaslighting us.” Mike Chambers, Founder & CEO, Ridley

“Our goal is to have every teacher maxed out on their pay scale.” Jen Cooper, Founder & CEO, Happy Teacher

“We’d rather be on the side of governments stopping human trafficking and with international communities working to stop drug trade.” Dan Smoot, CEO, Vantor

“3 Rows… thousands of plants at a time are growing in that space.” Jake Savageau, Co-founder, FarmBox Foods

  “(I recognized that)… having machines see stuff could now be more lucrative… I started to think about trash as an underappreciated problem.” Matanya Horowitz, Founder & CTO, AMP  

“The branding connotes the positive image of the quality of the food inside.”  Jane Hartgrove, Owner and “La Jefa,” Tres Picosos

“The world is based upon small ball and squabbles – things that aren’t important – none of that matters.”  Dylan Taylor, Chairman & CEO, Voyager Technologies 

“Blind spots are when we’re not aware of ourselves – most of the time that works for us but sometimes those normal behaviors become problems.” Martin Dubin, Author, Blindspotting – How to See What’s Holding You Back as a Leader

“The largest pickleball age demographic is 24-35.”  Adam Kahn, co-Founder, 3rd Shot Pickleball 

“My advice to anybody: be extremely careful about who you’re bringing in.” Landon Mossburg, CEO, Peak Energy

"We are the official sausage of the Colorado Rockies, DU Pioneers, Ball Arena and the Colorado Avalanche.” Melodie Polidori Harris (and Steve Polidori), Polidori Sausage

"We thought: it makes sense – maybe we should keep trying.” Eric Davis, Founder & CEO, Pretred

"I’ve always wanted to surround myself with entrepreneurs who think differently, do differently.”  Jaime Zawmon, Founder and President, Titan CEO & Titan 100

"If I’d known then what I know now, I think I could have accomplished what I accomplished with a little more EQ.” Dan Caruso, Caruso Ventures & Author of Bandwidth

“I think we were one of the inventors of the breakfast burrito.” Carmen Morales, Founder & Owner, Santiago’s Mexican Restaurants

"If this works, we might be able to solve the biggest health epidemic of our generation.”  Sami Inkinen, Founder & CEO, Virta Health 

"This is the time for us to strike while the iron’s hot.”  Rick George, Athletic Director, University of Colorado  

"We are doing something that may not have been done before in this country: almost doubling capacity while remaining open.”  Phil Washington, CEO, Denver International Airport 

"We bypass our lawmakers and put our pet issues on the ballot...”  Dave Tabor, host, ProCO360 

"I am a very strong person... If you think that I am done because I lose one business, just wait!”  Dana Rodriguez, Chef and Restaurateur, Carne, Work & Class, Casa Bonita Executive Chef 

"A lot of brands are shipping from a ping-pong table out of their garage...”  Irene Scharmack, CEO, QuickBox 

"Actually, there was a light bulb moment where the combination of chemical reactions to make the whole process occurred to me...”  Laura Lammers, Founder & CEO, Travertine Technologies 

"Even before we had a business, we talked some people into letting us do some catering for them – just on our good word.”  Jeff Kennedy, co-founder, Moe’s Original BBQ 

“I reached $17 million before I hired my first employee.”  Leah Garcia, Founder & CEO, Nulastin 

“We fix attitudes all day with better golf swings.”  Joe Assell, CEO, GOLFTEC 

“An automotive company would have hundreds or thousands of people to build an entirely new vehicle – we're doing it with 75.”  Toby Kraus, co-Founder, Lightship RV 

“Changing the trajectory of someone’s life is the most contagiously happy thing you can imagine doing.” Helen Young Hayes, Founder & CEO, ActivateWork

“When you empower physicians with those test results you really are playing a pivotal role in the treatment going forward.” Scott Hutton, CEO, Biodesix

“Consumers have the hardest job here – they are carrying the guilt of what to do with the package...”   Ian Jacobson, Eco Products 

“...and those are the times when you go all in... what’s portrayed in the media, in TV shows – that's REAL.”   John Nellen, Founder & CEO, Todyl     

“People are willing to ignore security policies in order to gain the productivity benefits (of AI).”   Steven Walchek, CEO & Co-founder, Liminal 

“Owning the stratospheric data layer is where the majority of our revenue will live.”   Andrew Antonio, Co-founder & CEO, Urban Sky   

“Our goal is to flatten the methane curve, and we can actually achieve it.” - Craig Rieker, Co-founder & CTO I had no idea how exciting this episode would become while I was preparing for it. LongPath is the story of a company that emerged from Nobel Prize winning technology developed at NIST and University of Colorado.  You may have never cared about what a “frequency comb” is, and you WILL after listening to how this now little, soon to be big company enabled by a $195 million loan guarantee from the U.S. Department of Energy, can have a massive impact on climate change.  Listen now – and you’ll be able to tell your friends, “I’ve been watching them since this all started!”

“We wanted to change the company from a closure system to a high-performance fit system to change the way athletes perform – and prove it scientifically.” Shawn Neville, CEO, BOA Most guests on ProCO360 cut me some slack.  Not Shawn Neville of BOA, and not even in front of a live audience at BOA’s world headquarters.  From the start Shawn showed how determined he is that the world recognize that BOA technology is NOT to replace shoelaces, or even to be a better closure system.  It’s a “PERFORMANCE FIT SYSTEM,” period.  If you really want to be intrigued, listen to why BOA is choosing to not maximize profits. Several in attendance at this LIVE event were discussing BOA’s strategy around this afterwards – add your comments about this!

“Give someone who wants to work hard a chance and they will give you everything they’ve got.” Jamie Repenning, CEO, R&R Head Labs

“The default for most manufacturers and retailers before we came along was to destroy returns.” Kristin Langenfeld, Co-founder and CEO, GoodBuy Gear My expectations were completely wrong entering this episode with Kristin Langenfeld.  I’d expected she would tell me the story of a woman who started selling her own used baby gear, then slowly expanded the activity into a basement enterprise, and so on until it was a real company.  Nope.  And she’s out to dominate a market sector with those whom I’d have expected were unlikely partners. 

“I sent them an article, Vangst raises $2.5M from a Tier 1 VC in New York, and people started to not laugh at me as much.”   Karson Humiston, Founder and CEO, Vangst   

“If you love a band that’s coming to Red Rocks and you’re 21 years old, I'll find a way to give you that time off.”   Tom Luersen, President, CoralTree Hospitality    This episode came together because a longtime friend, Dani Stern, now an executive at CoralTree told me over beers recently that he quit his last job to come to CoralTree.  In fact, that he’d told his prior employer, before taking that job, that if Tom Luersen called, he (Dani) would quit to go work for Tom.  Dani was EMPHATIC that the culture at CoralTree is THAT different, that special.  Of course, I wanted to do this episode!  And during it, I told Tom, “YOU CAN’T SAY IT’S YOUR PEOPLE.”  I thought he’d argue – he didn’t.  Have a listen! 

“We’re building homes in about 9 days at 20 stations, so every house stays at a station about 4 hours.” Charlie Chupp, Founder and CEO, Fading West This is the second recent episode about a Colorado company building alternatives to traditional single-family homes (see also Studio Shed – Still Leading the ADU Industry).  It’s because the lack of attainable housing is such an important issue and Colorado companies are addressing it with innovation and value.  This episode with Charlie Chupp of Fading West describes the problems and challenges, and how applying Charlie’s LEAN manufacturing background is effectively driving a fast-evolving industry.  I was fascinated by some surprises about workforce in this episode!

“I EXPLAIN TO CUSTOMERS HOW I WORK, AND THEY TRUST ME.” Fernando Ledezma, Ledezma Concrete This episode is out of my comfort zone – and refreshingly so.  Generally, I’m with high-flying entrepreneurs leading business that have raised tens of millions of dollars and are pursuing hockey stick growth.  Tia and Fernando Ledezma charmed me when they replaced a sidewalk at my house.  They reminded me of my great grandparents who came to the United States with a trade (tailors) and having to learn the language, assimilate, and make their own way.  Ledezma Concrete is a wonderful story of initiative, risk taking and hard work.

“Community engagement is really looking to the future… what do I want my city and community to be and how can I help that happen?” Rob Cohen, Chairman and CEO, IMA Financial

“It’s fun to be in a business where you have to decide where to pursue the opportunity.”   Jeremy Nova, co-Founder, Studio Shed    Jeremy was my guest via Zoom during the pandemic.  Sometimes it’s fun to circle back with a prior guest to see how they’ve evolved – either the leader (see this focus in the episode “Starting from Skratch, Maturing as CEO” with Ian MacGregor of Skratch Labs), or the business and market as is the case this time.  I was eager to explore this because after Studio Shed was an early innovator in its space, it was followed by large and notable companies like Tuff Shed and Home Depot that evolved their product lines to compete with Studio Shed.