Sara Sheehan’s guest in this episode is R.T. Custer, co-founder and CEO of Vortic Watch Company and Colorado Watch Company. R.T. transforms antique American pocket watches into one-of-a-kind wrist watches through Vortic Watch Company, and with Colorado Watch Company, will be building the most American-made watches at scale available today. Sara talks with R.T. about how he identified his calling in converting pocket watches, surviving a crippling lawsuit early in his entrepreneurship, loyal customers, and where he’s headed next.
R.T. discusses launching on Kickstarter and shipping watches to customers a year and a half later. Vortic scaled from shipping 100 watches to 200, and R.T. realized due to how the restoration of antique pocket watches works, he would face a maximum capacity of roughly 400 watches a year. This led to the formation of his Colorado Watch Company brand to address the ability to create quality American-made watches at scale. He and Sara talk about sourcing the antique watches, the market for wrist watches, and the triumph of surviving the 2017 lawsuit that he calls the hardest thing he’s ever done.
The lessons R.T. has learned from his entrepreneurial ventures are many and varied. He shares how he learned that people want to invest in momentum and how he realized that momentum and being the visionary for his company can only come from him. Sara learns about R.T.’s Angel investing, plans for the Colorado Watch Company scaling, why R.T. feels such a connection to military service, and the intricacies of antique pocket watches. This episode is a fascinating glimpse into a very niche entrepreneurial venture that is being scaled through an additional brand without sacrificing the original vision. Sara takes listeners deep into R.T.’s inspirational journey.
About R.T. Custer:
R.T. Custer is a multi-passionate entrepreneur, speaker, and guide supporting founders through community, connection, and mentorship. As the CEO of Vortic Watch Company, the Chief Revenue Officer of Carter & Custer Agency, and the co-host of Fast Foundations Mastermind, he knows what it takes to build a successful business and drive impact. He wholeheartedly believes that you can live a life of wealth and freedom when you’re not afraid to take risks, and he uses his platform to empower founders to step into their worth.
R.T. is also deeply passionate about his work as an Angel Investor and Advisor in consumer product companies through his video podcast, “Products Worth Talking About”. He is a sought-after speaker and podcast guest, especially after launching a 2nd YouTube show called “Custer & Wolfe, Building a Watch Company” with his business partner, Tyler Wolfe, to document everything that goes into building an American manufacturing company. R.T. has proven that it is possible to enjoy life to the fullest while building wealth, and he wants to share everything he’s learned so that you can enjoy the same freedom.
Most importantly, R.T. is a partner to Lindsay Roselle and the father of two boys, Sawyer and Wesley. They live in Fort Collins, Colorado, where they run their collective 5 businesses, chase their kids and two dogs around, and spend their (minimal) free time golfing, working out, drinking whiskey, and hanging out with friends and family.
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Contact Sara Sheehan | Sara Sheehan Consulting:
Contact R.T. Custer | Vortic Watch Company / Colorado Watch Company:
- Vortic Website: VorticWatches.com
- Colorado Website: ColoradoWatchCompany.com
- R.T. Custer: Website: RTCuster.com
- LinkedIn: RTCuster
- Instagram: @rtcuster
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Transcript:
Sara 0:02
Hi there. I’m Sara Sheehan, and welcome to my podcast, Transformational Thinkers with Sara Sheehan. Today, I’m talking with R. T. Custer. He is the co-founder and CEO of Vortic Watch Company and Colorado Watch Company, a passionate advocate for American manufacturing. R.T. leads two ventures dedicated to preserving history and proving that Made in the USA is not only possible, it’s powerful. At Vortic, he transforms antique American pocket watches into one-of-a-kind wrist watches. Every Vortic watch is a one-of-a-kind creation that honors US craftsmanship and industrial heritage. Alongside its sister brand, Colorado Watch Company, Vortic is redefining what it means to build American from scratch with integrity at scale. With Colorado Watch Company launching at scale in August, he’s building the most American-made watches at scale today. R.T. also hosts the American Dreamers podcast and YouTube show, sharing stories of entrepreneurship, craftsmanship and legacy. RT, I’m so glad to be talking with you. Welcome to the show.
R.T. 1:22
Thanks for having me. I’m excited to be here.
Sara 1:24
Excellent and so R.T. Let’s start with how you and your business partner, Tyler, knew that you wanted to create a watch company that converted pocket watches into wristwatches while you were in school, how did you know that was your calling?
R.T. 1:47
The whole story starts fairly simple, and it was on a golf course after school one day when we were both studying at Penn State, and we took this journey through his passion initially for wristwatches. And I just thought it was fascinating that he was so interested in watches, especially as, you know, we were in our early 20s. We didn’t have a whole lot of money, you know, we were not really able to collect many things, period. And he had this little collection of watches, and we were talking about it just as we were playing golf, because he was wearing a watch while playing golf, and I thought that was interesting. I had never really worn a watch before, and at the end of the conversation, we had these questions, and even Google didn’t have the answers, and it was, why don’t we make watches in America? Why are all watches made in China or Switzerland? And we just started going down that rabbit hole. And about a year later, after doing a ton of research and having all these other ideas surrounding that, we stumbled on the history of the American pocket watch and how millions of old pocket watches were made in USA back between about 1850 and 1950 and the light bulb went off and we realized, well, if we upcycle these old pocket watches, you know, we take the inside out and we make all the outsides here in America, then we’d have 100% American made watch, and that would check the box, and we’d be one of the only, if maybe, the only company making watches in the USA. And so we put that idea on Kickstarter back in 2014 and we just said, Hey, we want to make a watch in America. We use old pocket watches, and we turn them into wrist watches, upcycling at its finest. And a bunch of random people from the internet pledged money to bring it to life. You know good old crowdfunding and the rest is history. That was 10 years ago.
Sara 3:44
That’s very impressive. Since you’ve been doing this for quite a while, can you talk a little bit about your business’s growth trajectory from where you started to where you are today? And in doing so, if you could share a little bit about what was interesting in your journey, what it’s been like, what your challenges or big victories have been, it would be great to learn.
R.T. 4:14
When we started, I mean, it took us probably a year and a half from launching on Kickstarter to actually ship watches to customers, which was very unexpected. You know, we thought, I mean, we were kids when we started the company, we had never made anything before. We never started business before. So, I mean, it took us at least six to nine months just to figure out how to run a business and source components and stuff like that. But once we really got started, we started actually shipping watches in 2015, 2016, we started with maybe 100 watches the first year, scaling to a little more than 200 watches the next year. And then sometime in the first few years, we realized how hard it was going to be to scale that, that idea of Vortic and taking an antique American pocket watch and restoring it, and turning it into a wristwatch. First of all, restoring it. You need a watchmaker, which there’s not very many watchmakers in the world. And you need a very specific type of watchmaker that’s not just fixing a, you know, a modern watch, like a Rolex. There’s a lot of people that can do that. Sure you’re restoring something that’s 100 years old. You need to find parts for it, or make parts for it. And nobody really does what we do. And so we’re doing everything for the first time, trying to source all this stuff, trying to figure it out. And at a certain point, we realized, you know, somewhere in that three to 400 watches per year is, is the max capacity of the business.
Sara 5:42
Interesting.
R.T. 5:44
Which was at that time, okay, it’s like, 2017 2018 I was just like, okay, well, let’s just start, let’s start increasing the price, right, high demand and low capacity, you know, we can, we can increase the price. And so the price started going up. We started doing custom orders. You know, people sent us grandpa’s pocket watch. That was, that was kind of a cool thing that we learned is, Oh, that’s interesting. We never thought about that. But now we, you know, we’re really the only company that we can take your, your family heirloom, and restore it and turn it into a wristwatch, which is just a super, super fun part of the business. We call it, convert your watch. And when the pandemic hit in 2020 we were doing all custom orders. We had this really cool watch builder on the website where you could visualize where you’re going to order. You upload a picture of the pocket watch, and then we show you what it could look like as a wrist watch. But in the pandemic, nobody wanted to wait six months between when they purchased something and when they got it. And I figured out, like, okay, we’re making about one watch every day, you know, 350 watches a year, close to 365 so we just flipped the business model on its head. We made our, you know, a big pivot there. And now, since, you know, mid 2020 we do this thing called watch of the day. And right to my knowledge, the only company that can even do anything like this. We make one new one of a kind watch every single day, and it comes out at 12 noon.
Sara 7:13
Which is fascinating. It’s fascinating that you can do that. And it’s very enticing. It’s wonderful for marketing, I think.
R.T. 7:23
It’s fantastic. And one of the best ideas I think I’ve ever had. And so we kind of went all in on that, and we still do that. I mean, that’s been about five years of watch of the day watches, you know, it’s not always been seven days a week. You know, we’ve kind of averaged out about five days a week now. So we, right now, we do Monday through Friday. Next year, I want to try to get back to seven days a week, and truly do 365 watches a year, all one of a kind, because we’re the only ones that can do that. And so that’s, that’s kind of cool, and just going all in on that niche of, okay, if we can only make a few 100 watches a year, let’s, let’s just make one a day, you know, and there’s always something new on vorticwatches.com, and that’s really cool. And in the middle of all of that, so like 2017 we got sued by the Swatch Group, the largest watch company in the world, a massive foreign conglomerate. And that was, that was a six year legal battle ended in, I guess it was 2016-
Sara 8:22
That is a very long time. Yeah, that is a very long time.
R.T. 8:25
So that was intense.
Sara 8:26
And by the way, your interview that you did with Fox News on that, I think that story was just fantastic,
R.T. 8:36
Yeah, that was, that was probably one of the biggest wins from a PR standpoint, and the long and short of that is we won the lawsuit. It took six years, but we won. But in the middle of it was the pandemic at the same time. And so at that news story, I think it was 2019 it was Veterans Day 2019 I got six minutes of national TV on Fox and they told the story of the lawsuit and making watches America, and how we donate to veterans, and we’re trying to start a school and help support a school in Delaware called the veterans watchmaker initiative. That’s still going. They teach US military vets heavy watchmakers, you know, solving the skilled trade gap. And it was, it was a great piece of editorial that turned into a giant advertisement for us, and really saved the company from a marketing standpoint, because I couldn’t afford to do much marketing while also defending from a lawsuit.
Sara 9:33
That’s right, one of the things I just want to make sure that we’re really clear on in the lawsuit, it was because you used a Hamilton watch in an ad. That is the reason that you were sued. The parent company of Hamilton saw that the watch had been converted into a wristwatch in your ad, right?
R.T. 9:59
Yep. Yes. So they accused us. So the Swatch Group technically sued us, but the lawsuit is called Hamilton V Vortic, and Hamilton is one of swatches brands in the conglomerate. And yeah, they accused us of trademark infringement and counterfeiting. And basically, basically, you know, in layman’s terms, they accused us of using their brand to make money. And we zoomed that out and said, Well, if taking a Hamilton pocket watch and turn it into a wristwatch is illegal, then taking an Elgin pocket watch or a Waltham pocket watch or or zooming even farther out, you know, taking a Coca Cola bottle and turning into a lamp and selling those you know, would be illegal, right? It’s, it’s upcycling, right? And yes, part of the value is because it has this other brand on it. But there’s a lot of legal precedent. Well, there wasn’t a huge amount of legal precedent, but there’s a lot of legal ways to protect ourselves. One of them was art. You know, what we do is considered art, for sure, especially because they’re all one of a kind, and so the federal government and the legal system protects art and artists. So that was nice. And then the other one is something called the first use doctrine, and it’s like Hamilton and Swatch Group. The initial first use was as a pocket watch. They got their money. They already got paid for it, and now we’re creating a second use for this thing. We’re recycling, and we’re giving it something else, a new purpose. So that’s a little legal ease in there, but it’s very interesting. And we cited other cases like, you know, people refurbishing Titleist golf balls and recycling and with trademark infringement. So counterfeiting was easy. We just had to prove that we weren’t typing their name on our product, right. So that was pretty straightforward. We proved that we never did that trademark infringement is all about consumer confusion. So all we had to prove, which is hard and took years, but we had to prove that our consumers, our customers knew what they were. And if you go to vortexwatches.com, I mean, it’s always said this, because I start with why and building a story brand, and I applied all of those, you know, learnings to my homepage, and it literally says on the homepage who we are, what we do. And so my consumers were never confused, like it was just all my customers know what we do.
Sara 12:24
Especially someone that might want to convert their own watch.
R.T. 12:28
Oh, they were never confused.
Sara 12:29
They’re totally gonna understand what you’re doing.
R.T. 12:32
One of the biggest things we had was on our side, was the modern day Hamilton brand sells watches for the high hundreds to the low 1000s, let’s say $800 to $2,000 and a Vortic watch right now, in general, is 3000 to 10,000.
Sara 12:50
right? So very different.
Speaker 1 12:52
That is different, and also what we shared, from a legal standpoint, is our customers, in order to be confused, our customers would have to go over some big hurdles. You know, you’re typically not clicking on an advertisement, going to a website, not reading a single word and clicking buy on a $5,000 watch, in 30 seconds.
Sara 13:16
Oh, exactly right. That’s exactly right. This is a big decision.
R.T. 13:19
You’re reading every page, you’re going on Yelp. You’re like, okay, is this? Is this? Right? You’re finding a podcast like this. Like, okay, this is a real person, absolutely. And then you’re like, Okay, now I’ll buy a $5,000 watch. So we just had to prove our customers A. are not confused, and B. our customers are very educated. Like, it’s hard for someone that knows what they’re buying.
Sara 13:43
That’s exactly right. And so one of the comments that you made earlier was about how hard it is to actually convert a pocket watch into a wristwatch, and I can only imagine it is really hard to do. You know, I’m holding my grandfather’s watch in my hand right now. And it is hefty. He used it every single day, but there are tons of parts in there and it still works.
R.T. 14:12
What brand is it?
Sara 14:15
It’s a Waltham.
R.T. 14:17
You have to send it to me.
Sara 14:20
I need to open the case. Watching your video about the cases. I believe this is a screw off case, but it’s really impossible to do. So I’m gonna have to go to one of my friends that’s a wholesale jeweler that has a lot of watch parts.
Speaker 1 14:41
Or just send it to me. I mean, now that you know who I am, you know we can, we can help you out. We get, I mean, at this point, I get two or three emails like that every day, 24/7, 365, there’s, there’s a few emails in my inbox with, I’m holding grandpa’s pocket watch. I can’t get it open, or I watched your YouTube video, which, if you google how to open a pocket watch, you’re gonna see my hands. You know, we have the biggest YouTube video on, just like, trying to answer all these questions that we get all the time. And so people are like, Oh, I got it open, and I went to your website,I Googled convert your watch, and I figured out how to do it, and I’m very interested in converting it. Or we also, you know, we do restoration services. So if you want to keep it a pocket watch and put it in a glass dome or whatever, you know, we help people with that all the time. And it’s, it’s so cool because a pocket watch, first of all, there were millions of those made, so it is possible to restore it and get it working again. Unlike a lot of things that are 100 years old, you know, it’s like, we can totally fix it, which is amazing. It’s just like a feat of engineering from that standpoint. And then also, it’s something like most heirlooms, I feel like are are difficult to literally pass down. You know, it’s, it’s big pieces of furniture.
Sara 15:58
They’re hard. There’s no question.
R.T. 15:59
It’s stuff that your kids, your grandkids, might not actually want. And a pocket watch. It’s small, it fits in a drawer. So fortunately or unfortunately, millions of people have them, right? They’re, they’re in a drawer, they’re in a safe deposit box or whatever. But today, nobody really has any use for a pocket watch. Our pockets are full, and so it’s like, well, let’s make it a wristwatch, and let’s make the family heirloom, you know, usable. And so from those, from those two or three requests, we get a day, we do one or two conversions every week. We average about 50 plus of those services per year, and we charge 1000s of dollars for the service. It takes months to do. But I hear it all the time, what else are we going to do with grandpa’s pocket watch? Now, it can actually be passed down. And I’ll tell you what, young people that you know, we’ve done that for a few people like saying, let’s get grandpa’s pocket watch and let’s give it to the grandson on his wedding day, you know, he’s in his 20s. It’s really cool I mean, everybody cries. I mean, we’re over here, you know, tearing up. We don’t even know these people. They’re just our customers. It’s so, so cool to just be and, yeah, just a total honor to be a part of that. But, like said, it’s, it’s very hard, it’s labor love, and it’s all all down to that skilled trade gap, you know, just like we need more plumbers and electricians, we also need more watchmakers, you know, people that people that know how to fix things are a dime a dozen right now.
R.T. 16:46
And are you making parts where you have parts that are broken that have to be replaced? Are you actually making them yourself? So how does that work?
R.T. 17:41
If you sent me that pocket watch, and let’s say it’s very rare and we don’t have any spare parts, then we do have to make a part, and we can. We might have, I have master watch makers that sit right through this right through this wall, and they are experts and all that stuff. So if we have to make a part, then we do most of the time. Though, we’re able to restore it using either original parts that we have in stock, you know, Overstock parts from that time period, or just the parts that are in there. We can just fix it.
Sara 18:12
That’s good. And so there are a lot of parts still existing, original parts?
R.T. 18:18
I mean sometimes we have to use parts from another one, like we did back then. I mean, if it was made somewhere between 1900-50, that was when interchangeable parts were being made. If it was made before 1900 then typically we have to make a part or, you know, something like that.
Sara 18:39
I would definitely think both of these are from that time period. The other one is an Arnex, oh, yeah. And this was his dress watch.
Speaker 1 18:48
Arnex was a Swiss brand, so that was right in the 1920s or 30s, probably.
Sara 18:53
That sounds about right. It’s pretty, yeah, it’s got a real pretty case.
R.T. 18:59
Arnex was Swiss made, and so we don’t do a lot of those. Periodically, we’ll do an Arnex or a Swiss watch, but yeah, a lot of times they have those little floral patterns on the dial.
Sara 19:10
It’s pretty.Anyway, it’s that. I do love the Roman numerals on the Waltham, though it’s really cool.
R.T. 19:18
Yeah, Waltham was the second largest Watch Company, and they made 40 million pocket watches just outside of Boston. And I mean, that was 100 years, you know, 1850 roughly, to 1950 roughly. And the factory still stands so it’s correctly pronounced Waltham, that’s if you’re, if you’re from the area, you know, that’s how you say it. And the factory is still there, and they still call that city Waltham, Massachusetts, called watch city, because, I mean, if you live there, you probably worked for Waltham.
Sara 19:42
It’s hard for me to understand quite how it just totally fell apart. You know, I did watch some history, you know, on some of the companies, just to kind of understand the rise and fall a little bit. And I do find that very interesting and fascinating.
R.T. 20:08
It is interesting. And my theory is because it all happened in the 1950s and 60s. And my theory is that during World War One and World War Two, all of those watch companies were mandated by the federal government to make things only for the war efforts, which we made, you know, all the pocket watches and wrist watches for the soldiers. You know, we’re pumping out millions of watches and keeping the battlefield on time. But also, there was no, you know, research and development being invested in. And so the Swiss were neutral that whole time, and the Swiss watchmakers were inventing all these great new things. And in the 1950s you know, Rolex and Omega, and those companies started coming out with really advanced wrist watches that the American companies, you know, were still trying to pivot from pocket watches to wrist watches, and they couldn’t keep up. And so they started dying off one at a time. And I’m sure that’s not exactly what happened, and you can’t pinpoint it all on that one thing, but R D is expensive, and so if you can’t keep up-
Sara 21:08
It is. And it sounds like with Waltham, it was definitely a leadership thing at the end, where the leader that helped them rise to prominence was not involved anymore. But I do find it fascinating how it really shaped the city and the area. It is just very fascinating, and also how our tastes have changed. You know, obviously, even just wearing a wrist watch for some people, is something they don’t do because they’re so used to carrying their smartphone around.
R.T. 21:44
Totally. Oh yeah. I mean, you know, when I started a watch company 10 years ago, people were like, Why? Like, no one’s gonna wear watches in 10 years. Like, what are you doing? You know, like, you’re like, you’re gonna go out of business. And, I mean, to some extent, I guess maybe. But like, now-
Sara 22:01
No, there are plenty of people that will wear your beautiful watches.
R.T. 22:04
The watch industry is bigger than it’s ever been, and now Apple is a watch company, which is fascinating. And so my theory is especially young people. I mean, my kids are six and eight right now. They want a watch, and not just because I run a watch company. They want a smart watch, like they want to be able to talk to their friends on their watches. And of course their friends are using watches to communicate with their parents and stuff like that. It’s wearable technology and then I’m seeing people in their 20s take off their Apple Watch because it’s vibrating and it’s telling them all this stuff they don’t need, and put on their first nice watch, which is, you know, maybe high hundreds, early 1000s of dollars. And so that’s one of the reasons we built another brand, you know, Colorado Watch Company, to get into that entry level. You know, if you want your first nice watch, and you want it to be American made, you know, we got you.
Sara 23:05
Okay, and so let’s dive into Colorado Watch Company, because you’re launching at scale in less than 40 days. Is that right?
R.T. 23:13
So we launched it also on Kickstarter last year. And again, you know, with any new company, it took us about a year to kind of figure out how to build it all and scale it all. We’re making a couple 100 watches this month, but by next month, we’ll be somewhere between four and 500 watches per month in scalability, which, compared to the Swiss watch companies, is nothing you know. For instance, Rolex makes a million watches a year. That’s just Rolex.
Sara 23:41
And it’s still hard to get.
R.T. 23:42
And they’re still hard to get. Oh, yeah, it’s fascinating. Yeah, that, I mean, that tells you the scale of the whole, the whole idea. But for us, you know, 500 watches a month is a ton, because of Vortic Watch Company, you know, is three to 400 watches a year. And so now with Colorado Watch Company, yeah, 500 a month is, is 10 times it’s a big deal. Yes, huge deal. So, yeah, we came out with, I mean, what we call and what is the most American watch today. So we’re almost 90% American made. I have a field watch for $1,400 and a GCT watch for $1,900. We’re doing pre orders on them right now, but probably by the time this comes out, you know, they’ll be just available and in stock and right by and that’s our thing, is, why? Let the Swiss have all the fun, you know, let’s make watches in America. Let’s make them at a, I don’t want to say affordable, you know, but attainable price, right? A more scale, low to mid, 1000s, but a watch that’s, you know, made in the USA and built to last a lifetime, right? Like we were going to do a five year warranty on everything that we made, that’s great. It’s been fun building, building a second watch company, and scaling up now.
R.T. 23:42
And so the military edition now, will you still restore the master navigator watches with the military edition?
R.T. 24:59
Vortic Watch Company, the military edition is our most famous product. We launched that in 2019, actually, at that point, I launched that product to save the company from the lawsuit. We were going out of business and I couldn’t afford to do it. And ironically enough, I found these pocket watches made by Hamilton, the company that was suing us. And they were – yep, you could call it ironic. You could call it the universe, you know, speaking to me of like, putting this in my hand and saying, hey, here you go. You can save yourself and that’s what I did. So we, I found this. Somebody sent me, you know, grandpa’s pocket watch, and it was this really cool black dial, a 24 hour dial. The face of the watch was, it took, you know, 24 hours for the hour hand to go all the way around, sure. So it was very clearly a military watch. And I did all the research, and they called it the master navigator’s watch, and it was used by the navigator on a B, 17 or the other bomber aircrafts from World War Two. And the navigator was, you know, that the watch plus the navigator was the GPS at the time. That’s how we knew we were bombing the right cities, right?
Sara 26:05
So different.
Speaker 1 26:06
Totally different. And so it’s a piece of history. And then, and then I found out Hamilton made 120,000 of these in Lancaster, Pennsylvania for the Second World War. So I was like, Okay, well, I can probably find more. And I found 50 of them. And at that point, I decided, okay, we’re going to make 50 pieces a year. And the only way you can buy the military edition is you go to vorticwatches.com/military, you put yourself on a wait list, and at 12 noon Mountain Time on November 11, which is Miller, I’m sorry, Veterans Day, just one one day a year, you can buy the military edition. And we only make 50, and when they’re sold, they’re gone.
Sara 26:43
And 50 is a small number.
Speaker 1 26:45
It’s for us, it was a big number, you know, because we’ve only ever made, like, one watch at a time. But yes, in general, 50 is a very small number. And so I’ve done that for six years. And so we only have 300 of those floating around in the world. The price is really massive, you know? Yeah, I mean 50, times, times six, that’s it. That’s as many as we’ve made so far. And it’s hard, it’s hard to find 50 more pocket watches every year. But we did it. We did it again. We have our seventh one coming. I got 52 of them, so I have some extras this year. It’s the coolest watch on the face of the earth. It’s a true piece. It really is history, you know, it’s a big watch I wear. It’s my thing. I think it’s great looking, but, yeah, it’s the watch that won the war, and so that’s, that’s the product that saved us back in the days of the lawsuit. And also, it’s our big launch, you know, every Veterans Day. And with that watch, we donate to the school I mentioned, the veterans watchmaker initiative, and they’ve since named a building after us. And, you know, scaled that.
Sara 27:48
That’s wonderful. I love what you’re doing to invest there, and that’s a great way to influence good things for veterans that served us so well. It’s a great way.
R.T. 28:02
I strongly believe that the one of the only reasons I get to wake up every day as an entrepreneur and do whatever I want is because we live in a free country, and that’s because someone, somewhere is risking their life for my freedom. So I can never say thank you for your service enough.
Sara 28:16
Incredible. And so what would you say your biggest business challenges are today?
R.T. 28:22
Today. I mean, I struggle with, I think the thing that almost all business owners struggle with, and that’s, you know, one, is cash flow. It’s just making sure that, especially now, starting another brand, you know, we’re scaling up massively. I mean, to make 500 watches a month, I have to put out a lot of overhead and inventory capital. I’ve lived with machines and so always making sure that we’re bringing in more than we’re spending, and if we’re not, we have debt partners or investors that can help us out and help us float. And then, you know, I think, like a lot of other entrepreneurs do, especially after 10, now approaching 11 years, it’s like, am I,philosophical question, like, am I working on the right thing? You know, is this, is this really what I’m supposed to do with my life? Kind of looking, looking at the sky and saying, like, Okay, why am I here? And the universe keeps giving me lemons. And those lemons are pocket watches, like, all right, well, I’ll keep making lemonade!
R.T. 29:23
That’s fascinating, yes!
R.T. 29:25
What those lemons are, is those are, those are customers. You know, we have, we’ve really not done much marketing. I just hired an ad agency for the first time to help me grow Colorado Watch Company, and I’m finally worthy of, you know, doing that kind of scaled marketing, but for the most part, I make a watch and we sell it right away because people find out about us, and people think what we do is cool. And a lot of my customers have 2,3,4, watches. So I’m very grateful to you know, get to do this right and work through those scaling problems that everybody has. But mine might look a little different. You know, making it in the USA is kind of hard, but I wouldn’t have any other way.
Sara 30:06
It’s really hard. And so talk with me a little bit about your personal growth as a CEO, and what it’s been like leading the company since its inception.
R.T. 30:16
Yeah, I mean, I’ve gone through a lot. You know, getting sued was probably one of the hardest things I’ve done, in general. Here they call me the director of hard conversations, you know, which I feel like as a CEO, you just, have to be good at.
Sara 30:30
It’s really awkward, important,
R.T. 30:32
So I, you know, hiring, firing, all the good, all the bad, it all comes through me, and so I’ve had a lot of difficult conversations in this almost 11 years, some of the most difficult were with, you know, surrounding the lawsuit. We started the company with four of us. There were four business partners. We went down to two pretty quickly, you know. And by two years in, it was just just myself and Tyler. And last year, I purchased Tyler’s ownership in the company. So for the last nine months or so, it’s just been me, you know, so Tyler helped me get, you know, through, really, 10 full years almost of running the company.
Sara 31:11
It’s hard to be the owner and leader. It really is. It’s hard.
R.T. 31:17
Well, and the number one thing that keeps all of this going. And I think the number one thing that people want to invest in, whether you mean invest literally or figuratively as even just a customer, is momentum. And momentum comes from me. No one else can be the visionary for this company. No one else can provide the passion and the momentum to my team. You know, I can delegate everything else. But someone has to stand out in front of the army and point towards the enemy and say, Okay, that’s what we’re doing. That’s where we’re going. You know, come with me. So that’s really the thing that I’ve learned how to do. I mean, I was definitely, I was born an entrepreneur, for sure. I was a fourth generation farmer, but you either get better at it or you fail. So I’m just actually on that journey, and I do all the things. And also, I think becoming a father really helped me with a lot of that mindset stuff, because you could say the same thing about parenting, all of that energy and passion and joy of life comes from you. And you know, my kids were born with an inherent curiosity about the world, and I don’t want to condition that out of them. You know I want to answer their questions and keep them asking more questions, because that’s how I got to where I am, is curiosity.
Sara 32:49
And having a growth mindset will always serve you well, because that means you’re always sharpening the saw and trying to show up as a more authentic leader every day.
R.T. 33:01
Well, if you’re not working towards something, you’re just treading water, and that’s boring and not gonna make a whole lot of money. And unfortunately or fortunately, money is the fuel that all of capitalism is built on. So here we are.
Sara 33:17
For certain. And so clearly it sounds like you and Tyler have taken investments along the way.
R.T. 33:24
Yeah. So I’ve, in the last decade, I mean, I’ve raised several million dollars from investors, you know, Shark Tank style, mostly angel investors. One, private equity like, group, smaller, I guess private equity isn’t. It’s like venture capital like a club. And then also, I’ve used every form of debt financing known to man, every single SBA loan, every credit card you can possibly get, every line of credit that exists for small business owners, you know, the eidl loans and the PPP grants. And in the pandemic, you know, we did it all. I’m currently, you know, talking to the state of Colorado about advanced manufacturing grants. We’re, you know, we’re looking at, there’s a bunch of opportunity now for American manufacturing, and some federal grants that are being discussed, and at least loans, or federal backed loans, to help people like me make more make more things in America, but more importantly, create more jobs in the USA. So that’s, that’s really the momentum that I have right now. And what keeps me going today is there has never been a better time to manufacture things in the United States, and that is really exciting. And so as tiring as the last 10 years it’s like, all right? Well, there’s a new horizon, so I believe I can triple the size of this company in the next 12 months. And there’s never been a time when I could say that. So that’s awesome.
Sara 34:53
That’s pretty tremendous. And so Colorado Watch Company will be a big part of that. Clearly, because you’re producing more at scale.
R.T. 35:04
Colorado Watch Company was built from Vortic Watch Company, and all of it, everything I do, and really what I have built, is a manufacturing company that can be the backbone of watch brands. So currently I have two brands, you know, Wortic and Colorado, but there’s no reason I can’t have more brands. I can help other people. I can acquire other brands. I can start more myself and this building we’re making everything, you know, or almost everything we need to manufacture a watch in America. So really the only thing standing between me and that level of success is me.
Sara 35:42
Mm, hmm. And so when you think about that, what do you think? How can you get more insight at this point, when you say, the only thing standing between me and that level of success is me?
Speaker 1 35:59
First, you know, I’m always trying to be a sponge, trying to learn from everybody all the time. I learned a lot from my kids, actually, mostly curiosity, just asking questions and like, oh, I actually don’t, I don’t know the answer to that. So let’s learn that together. But also that saying of it’s, it’s not about what you know, it’s about who you know. I found that to be immensely true, and so that’s why I started my own podcast like this, where I call it American Dreamers, and I interview other visionaries and absolute crazy people like me that are, you know, having that American dream and, you know, pursuing the dream of, let’s try to make things in America, and I can learn so much from them. Next week, I’m flying out to Detroit to visit Shinola, which is my biggest competitor. They’re friends of mine, and so, you know, there aren’t many American watchmakers, and so I pitched to them like, well, let’s be friends. And they accepted. And I’m really excited to go hang out. And we’re gonna, you know, maybe collaborate on something. Maybe just be friends. Doesn’t really matter, but I can learn a lot from them, because they’re 100 times the size of my company. But all of that, you got to put yourself out there. You got to ask questions. Some of those questions might be perceived as dumb questions, but I ask them anyway.
Sara 37:16
No question is dumb, that’s for sure. And so your company has a lot of connections to the military. It reads very connected to military service. Have you been in the military? Is there an underlying family connection there?
R.T. 37:38
Yeah, so I did not serve. My last name is Custer, and I’m related to General Custer about seven generations ago. And so my parents, specifically, my dad, made sure that I was aware of my famous last name and what that meant. Both my grandfather served in World War Two, and they told me stories about that when I was little kid. And you know, like I said earlier, I have an immense respect for those who serve, you know, I think it’s what our country and our entrepreneurship is based on, and has a foundation in, is just freedom, right? And, and besides that, you know, I’ve just tried to give back in whatever way I can. And so I’ve aligned myself with the veterans watchmaker initiative, and, you know, with the military edition product, and now our Colorado GCT product, where we’re donating to that school, we have a ton of veteran customers who support that mission and who support our country and our company. And you know, it’s the least I can do. So I think that’s a perception, but it’s also totally real, because I like to surround myself with great people, and those veterans that are our customers, and the people that we support through the schools are some of the best people I’ve ever met in my life. So why change?
Sara 39:01
That’s fantastic. I think that is a wonderful story to make sure that you’re sharing, because having that history in your family, it sheds a little bit more light on who you are as a leader, too.
R.T. 39:22
We’re all here for a reason. I don’t want to squander the opportunity that I have as an entrepreneur, as an American, and I feel like, I did not join the military, but I can serve my country by creating a ton of American jobs and opportunity through those who did and paying my taxes, you know, making money that I can donate or give to the government. Absolutely, you know, it’s all fun, right? That’s, I feel like somebody said, if you’re doing it right, like, if you’re doing this whole entrepreneurial thing, right, you’ll trip over a bag of money on your way to go have fun. And, yeah-
Sara 40:06
That’s a wonderful thought.
R.T. 40:07
I would love to trip over some bigger bags. You know, that would probably create a little more fun. But right now, I’m having fun every day, and I’m not tripping too much, and I’m tripping just enough, I guess.
Sara 40:20
Well, I think that since you have so many repeat customers, especially on the Vortic side of the house, that those people that are repeat customers are probably talking about what you do, and they’re sharing their timepieces with their friends and talking about the fact that, hey, that was my grandfather’s watch that I converted and look at how great it looks and how current it is for today.
R.T. 40:49
Most of the time when you read reviews on websites, they’re one or two sentences, like, if you go to our review page, they’re paragraphs long. They mention my name, or one of my sales associates names, or something like that, like our customers are very passionate. They love what we do, and they definitely tell all their friends. And I think that’s one of the reasons I’ve been able to spend less on marketing and just ride that wave. And I don’t know I believe in karma and integrity and just doing it the right way the first time, and so far so good. That paid off massively for us.
Sara 41:25
Excellent. RT, is there anything else that you want to share today? Is there anything on your mind or anything that’s upcoming that you want to make sure to highlight?
R.T. 41:35
I mean, you know, I think we, I think we covered it all, you know, as far as my, my journey, entrepreneurship, what I’m working on, if somebody wants to reach out to me and connect with me after this. I mean, I love, you know, continuations of this podcast. I love, you know, talking about like, hey, what, what resonated so the best way to find me is, is R.T. Custer without the periods, R T, C, U, S, T, E R on Instagram or LinkedIn. And then my two websites are vorticwatches.com that’s V, O, R, T, i, c, watches.com and then Coloradowatchcompany.com and if you forget all of that, we’re the only one. Just google search Colorado Watch Company, and you’ll find us all.
Sara 42:15
There you go. Fantastic. Well, I cannot tell you how much I appreciate your time today.
R.T. 42:43
Yeah thanks for having me, Sara, this is super fun.
Sara 43:00
Thanks. Here are my top three takeaways from today’s discussion. Niche innovation drives success. By upcycling antique American pocket watches into one-of-a-kind wristwatches, Vortic Watch Company has carved out a space where heritage meets modern craftsmanship. This unique approach not only honors tradition but also sparks a powerful value proposition for customers. Resilience through adversity. Whether it was a six-year lawsuit with a global conglomerate or shifting business models during the pandemic, R.T. emphasized that adaptability and staying true to your mission are crucial for long-term success. The future of American manufacturing. With the launch of Colorado Watch Company, R.T. is proving that made in the USA is possible at scale. His dedication to creating jobs, training new watchmakers, including veterans, and fostering community impact demonstrates what purpose-driven entrepreneurship can achieve. Finally, if you’d love to buy a field watch or a GCT watch, check out Colorado Watch Company as they’re launching at scale this August. And if you have a family heirloom pocket watch that you’d like to convert into a wristwatch, by all means, check out Vortic Watch Company. I’m super excited about what the future holds for both brands, and I foresee great things coming R.T.’s way. Thanks so much for listening and subscribe and never miss an episode.
