The Keri Croft Show
The Keri Croft Show
The Pursuit of Meaningful Entrepreneurship: Nate DeMars on Building a Business You Actually Love
The secret to success isn't about scaling at all costs—it's about still loving what you do 5, 10, 15 years in.
In this episode, I sit down with Nate DeMars, the founder of Pursuit, a Columbus-based custom suit shop that started as a project in business school—and turned into a purpose-driven brand that suits people for life’s biggest moments.
But this isn’t your typical startup story. Nate doesn’t chase venture capital, viral growth, or Shark Tank glory. Instead, he’s built a business on intention, integrity, and the wild idea that staying true to yourself might actually be the best strategy of all.
We talk about what happens when your business starts to drift from your values, and how Nate course-corrected to build something that aligns with who he really is. Think: partnerships with the Columbus Crew, indie bands playing in the storefront, and a suit donation program that’s changing lives.
Nate also gets real about navigating entrepreneurship in a dual-career household, the pressure to say yes to every “good” opportunity, and why going all in on community is the best marketing tactic in your toolbox.
Nate’s story might just be the permission slip you’ve been waiting for—the one that says it’s okay to build a business that aligns with your passions, your lifestyle, and your definition of success.
#TheKeriCroftShow #Entrepreneurship #PursuitSuitStore #ColumbusOhio #StartupStories #FounderLife
Hey there you beautiful badass. Welcome to the Keri Croft Show. I'm your host, keri Croft, delivering you stories that get you pumped up and feeling like the unstoppable savage that you are. So grab your coffee, put on your game face and let's do this thing. Baby Ready to elevate your self-care game, bosco Beauty Bar is a modern med spa offering everything from cosmetic injectables, lasers and microneedling to medical grade facials and skincare. Conveniently located in Clintonville, grandview, powell and Easton.
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Speaker 2:The word Jacquard does not get used in my presence very often, unless it's us saying it, so I appreciate that you know what that word is, nate.
Speaker 1:DeMars, welcome to the Keri Croft Show.
Speaker 2:Thanks for having me, you know, you're just a handsome guy, but the suit levels you up a little bit. Yeah, I find that I'm often the most overdressed in the audience, wherever I am.
Speaker 1:I mean when you're, when you're selling suits, you know, but as you say, you know it's so much more than suits, like, if you think it's just suits, you're missing the point. Yeah, so let's just kick it off with, like what. I love to hear the entrepreneur pitch because everybody's so passionate about what they're doing. Sure, so give it to me, like first time, where I'm like what is this pursuits that you're speaking of?
Speaker 2:Well, I've said from the beginning, there's millions of places you can buy suits, and the world didn't really need another one when we started in 2011.
Speaker 2:So, you know, what we think is special is that when people come to us, it's typically for some major milestone moment in their life. They're excited to dress for whatever the biggest thing perhaps they've ever done is, and our job is to help prepare them for that. So, certainly, the clothing is the medium that we use, but we get to work with people who do the most interesting, powerful, creative things in the city, and it just kind of allows us to bring that perspective to all of our other customers too. So when you work with thousands and thousands of people who are all doing really amazing stuff, it just helps you. With people who are, you know, they're nervous about the thing they're about to do, you can help them feel confident in how they're going to dress. But more so, just hey, we know how this goes, because this is what we do every day, and they walk out the door feeling excited about whatever they're going to do. That's special.
Speaker 1:Do you think? I know that you discovered this came about from your entrepreneur class, right, but going way back to when you were a wee boy and you would see your great grandpa and he would come up to the table with his suit on, and then your grandma and your aunt or as I like to say, aunt, your auntie they made wedding dresses. So this was very much steeped in kind of the history of who you are and subconsciously you saw this. How much did that play into all of a sudden in your mind in that class you're like, oh bingo, there it is, it's all. It all just came together.
Speaker 2:No, it really didn't. So I think I'm a business person. That's how I see myself, and when I first launched Pursuit, we were focused on a college guy. That was the avenue we were going down. Our store was on campus. I really did not write a business plan that included weddings. So it was many years, a few years at least, into the business, before I was like, oh wow, this is what my family did I'm dressing grooms and groomsmen primarily and it's like, oh wow, I'm in the wedding business. But it didn't occur to me until a couple years into the business. So, subconsciously, I'm sure it did.
Speaker 2:My great-grandfather, my parents, were super young when they had me, which means he was around until I was 18. I got to be very close with him. He was from a generation where just wearing a sport coat around town when you're a retired person was a typical thing to do. So I think trying on his clothes and when he would let me take whatever vintage things out of his closet I had an interest in fashion. Let me take whatever vintage things out of his closet. I had an interest in fashion. But I don't think if you asked the people in my world in 2011, like, what type of business would Nate start. I don't know that fashion would have come from anybody's mouth, because that's not necessarily what I was. I will say I was best dressed Ashland High School class of 2001 in northern Wisconsin and that's like the only fashion resume thing I had when I started the company.
Speaker 1:That's funny. And so you were super close with your great grandpa, to the extent that they asked you to do his eulogy just at the ripe age of 18. Yeah, Do you? I mean you have to remember that like it was yesterday.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's, that's become this weird but really special thing that I've gotten to do. I was close with him and I think nobody else in my family, you know, was super eager to get up and speak. I think there's a little distance when it's your great-grandfather, when you lose somebody, than if it's your parent or something like that. So, yeah, I was asked to speak, I did it and it was just a really special thing to get to, you know, talk to your family about what was special about their relationship with that person, and then to feel like you know, this is your chance to like, honor somebody you know in a way that's like, you know, hopefully encapsulates their life Like anything else in life.
Speaker 2:I did it, I think, because I was young. People thought it was great. I don't know that it was actually good, but I was young enough where they were like, oh, the bar is low and you exceeded it. So then now, every time somebody in my family has a funeral, it's become the thing that I do. In fact, I just in January did that same thing for my grandmother hit that. Same my great grandfather's daughter, the one who made the wedding dresses. I did that for her as well. Same my great-grandfather's daughter, the one who made the wedding dresses. I did that for her as well. So it's kind of a weird thing on my resume is that I speak at funerals.
Speaker 1:Yeah, maybe you could like parlay that into you. Know marrying people too.
Speaker 2:If I stick around at Pursuit long enough, it went from selling college students their first suit to doing wedding suits. Now we've kind of moved on to, you know, more of a grown-up crowd getting their clothing for work and important events. So I think you know, at some point funerals will start to become a bigger chunk of what we do.
Speaker 1:Fantastic. What's one thing that you can look back on, though, with your great-grandpa and, whether you said it or not in the eulogy like what's one thing you carry with you where you're like. I want to make sure I do this.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so we have a family cabin in northern Wisconsin that he bought in like 1962. My dad was just a little kid and that has kind of been a place for my family to gather, like all of my aunts and cousins and everything spent the weekends there together. So we had this very much of a clan type of family that was together all the time and he would be sitting there. He had macular degeneration so he was legally blind the whole time. I knew him. He was, you know, kind of shuffled and was very much an old man the whole time I knew him.
Speaker 2:But he would sit in his chair at the cabin full of people and just tell stories, and like stories of an era that you know I'm sure his daughter would kind of roll her eyes I've heard these stories for 50, 60 years at this point but it was like talking about an era that you know was so foreign to all the young kids and he's just an amazing storyteller.
Speaker 2:So I think you know, I always have hoped to be able to, you know, tell interesting stories like he does, and I don't know there's a history to that. Like keeping the history alive seemed like kind of part of his thing. He'd talk about the heyday of Duluth, when the Great Lakes were like the most booming place and Duluth was this city full of all these wealthy folks that were shipping and logging and mining and all these things that are like very early 1900s. And so I don't know, I just think, being around, that I see a lot of that in my dad. You know, skips a generation Maybe. I see a lot of that in my dad and he's kind of now become the historian and the one who tells the stories about all the history of everything around. And it's kind of funny to see because you know, my dad is, he's a young guy, he's only 65, almost. So a young guy he's only 65, almost.
Speaker 1:So when I asked how you would describe yourself, one of the things you said is critical of yourself and others. How so?
Speaker 2:Well, I tried to make sure I included some negative things in there so you didn't think I was full of shit. But I think part of what has made me a good entrepreneur is having a critical eye, maybe being able to see things that are lacking or missing and, you know, incorporating those into what I do. And you know it's a fine line, when you are critiquing things, from being critical and being negative. So I think if I stray from that and it applies to myself too I always say that to be an entrepreneur, you have to be really optimistic, like you have to be able to believe you're going to figure things out or you can get through this, you know, unknown period where you don't know what you're doing. But you also have to be critical enough that you realize, like I'm not very good at this, I don't really know what I'm doing, cause if not, then you're just kind of delusional and you know it's tough to get better.
Speaker 1:It's powerful when you can call your own baby ugly. It really is. Yeah, you know, not a lot of people are self-reflective. The ego gets in the way. Yeah, so to be able to you know, clearly be externally critical around things like that need fixed, but then internally be like whoa, this isn't. I'm emotionally connected to this. This isn't right. We need to move on.
Speaker 2:A lot of people can't do that and I think if you have the two together, I think a lot of people are self-critical. They know like, oh, I don't know how to do that, or that's not me, and it holds them back from, you know, doing the types of things that we would do as entrepreneurs, small business owners. There are a lot of people who are optimistic without this, you know, and they may be, snake oil salesmen or you know people that very quickly you're like I don't know, if there's any substance here.
Speaker 2:So I think to have the balance of the two of I don't really know what I'm doing, but I believe in myself enough to to know that with enough time I will get there, I'll figure it out is like the right combination of things that you need to do something for a long time.
Speaker 1:And I think you referred to it, as you might have said, a ridiculous amount of confidence or delusional amount of confidence. And it's true. You have to have this mix of this unwavering belief in yourself when no one else sees you or even understands which is hard and then also be self-aware enough that you know you keep that balance going. I think that's a really magical place to be.
Speaker 2:I think what I found, that in the early days of Pursuit we focused on a young customer.
Speaker 2:We were on campus at the Gateway, selling to a group of people that primarily had never thought about or bought a suit before and I maybe in the back of my head had thought like I'd like to be in the short North where all the other cool kids are, where the brands I really love are the businesses I love are.
Speaker 2:And I knew that like I didn't know enough, we weren't sophisticated enough, like I didn't feel confident that I could go open a store in the cool neighborhood and be ready for that. And the funny thing is a lot of my peers who own clothing stores they started with that. They were fashionable, they knew they wanted to be in the business for a long time and for them maybe they built the business around it. For me I started as a business guy and then had to figure out the fashion and the technical parts of the fashion. So it took me a couple of years before I felt like, ok, I can be down there and like that crowd walking in is going to like what we do and we'll be able to serve that audience.
Speaker 1:Well, you had mentioned in the beginning of your intake form around entrepreneurship and sort of where your headspace is versus where it may have been in the beginning, where it's like, ok, when you start something, you want to scale it and you want to grow it and you want to, and, of course, all that's important. Those are all necessary components, to a degree, of having a small business. But then you were also talking about letting go of some of that and focusing more in on like what really is the purpose? How am I spending my precious time? What kind of ripple effect am I creating, not only for myself, but my core people, the community and the values that we have? So talk a little bit about that. For a young entrepreneur right now, who's listening?
Speaker 1:and trying to figure out like who am I? What am I trying to put out there?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think if you are interested in entrepreneurship, you start these days listening to podcasts. You start, you know, reading stories about very successful people and you get maybe a pretty skewed view of what that means. So it typically involves growing really quickly, becoming a household name, raising venture capital or some kind of you know, outside funding. And I started Pursuit in a class, in an MBA program. So there's like a built in bias that comes with that where, like they're not, you don't go get an MBA so that you can own a lifestyle business Like the. That's just not the typical path.
Speaker 2:So I think, just kind of by default, I presumed this is starting the way that it's starting. It's going to look like the Harvard Business Review case studies that we're reading in classes and I think for a long time, one I picked a business that doesn't very much fit that model. So like I picked a thing to do that really isn't a logical thing to grow quickly and raise money for. But also I found over time that like that's what I thought I should do but I wasn't comfortable with what that looked like. So I've never taken any outside investment and I've never really seriously considered it and like just that fact alone means you're probably going to be a small size and or you're going to grow very, very slowly. And it never really clicked in my head that like, stop comparing yourself to these other businesses that raised a bunch of money and grew very quickly when you haven't done those things.
Speaker 2:But I think that's what the default a lot of times is like. This is what business looks like. You have a good idea. In order to be worthy, it needs to consistently grow. Growing means things that you could put on a bullet point on an intake form. You know how many?
Speaker 2:locations, how many employees, how many million dollars in revenue, tens of millions, and it's like, like, and those are also the things like. I haven't been on a podcast in a long time. I used to get asked to do this kind of stuff all the time. I used to be in like the local news all the time for all the stuff that we were doing, because there was like tangible growth things. It's like well, pursuit did this and did that. You know it was, it was a factual thing that you could say like there's another marker on the.
Speaker 2:I think too often that gets conflated and I speak for myself as the point as opposed to like, I don't know, might be right, might not be right, but I found myself we opened a second store that was probably one of our big milestones and it was 100 miles away in Cincinnati, because I had this vision that we were going to open stores in neighborhoods like the short north around the Midwest. It was cool and we had really, you know it worked a little bit and I had a great experience with parts of it, but, like, overall, I liked my job a lot less. I was doing things that perhaps were, you know, were less motivating to me and I overall was probably a lot less happy because I made that decision, but it felt like I need to do that. You know, like I owe it to the people that have followed along on my journey to like push myself or try new things, and so I don't know, I think COVID maybe gave me a chance to reevaluate a lot of that. When it was like, oh shit, you got to put it all back together from scratch. You start to think about like what do I want my life to be within this business?
Speaker 2:And I think the other part that that I've seen is I have a lot of peers. I think you've been in business about as long as I have. There's a lot of people who have done something really cool and don't do it anymore, perhaps because that was the plan, perhaps because they soured on it because of some decisions they made, or because the world told them they had to close it or whatever. But I looked around and, like a lot of my friends who had a cool thing aren't doing it anymore or they hate what they're doing, and I was like shit. Maybe what's special here is that I like it more now than I did 10 years ago, 15 years ago. And how do I maintain that, like if I'm, if I'm going to do this for my career, because it's the only idea I have at this point? How do I make sure that I'm continuing to be excited?
Speaker 1:and what I like about it is that it feels to me like you're creating spokes off of your center or what is important or that you like. So you've got this angle where you're working more with these sports teams, and then you've got another angle where you're doing concerts, with music, and then you've got this angle for good, and so I see, like I love that and I feel that deeply, because when you look at my show, that's exactly what this is. There's just there's extensions of my heart and what I love, and I think that there needs to be a bigger shine on that and a play for young entrepreneurs to be like hold on a minute. At the end of the day, you're doing this all the time. You're going to be doing this more than you're doing probably anything, and so make damn sure that it feels and it fills you, as opposed to just trying to hit certain metrics and marks for external whatever that is, you know, because I think so many people miss that. So I think I feel like that is success being able to grow something in a beautiful way that totally reflects who you are as a person and what makes you feel good. So what about? Like the sports team? So how did that come about? So now you're like suiting them up. I mean, what's happening there?
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Speaker 2:Yeah, I think one thing that we've always done is try to reach customers in ways that are non-traditional, you know, so that we don't really do any advertising or anything like that. But one thing that seems to always have been has come naturally is putting our suits on people in the community, and I think the very first time we did that in a big way would have been in 2017. We signed a partnership with the Columbus Crew. That's something that we are doing these days as well, but it gives us a chance to take something in the community that has its own brand, its own loyal followers, its own culture, and kind of come alongside that and put our suits on people who are interesting, people, maybe have a different career lifestyle than what our customers have. So that was the first time we tried that, and then it turned out with that partnership.
Speaker 2:Like three weeks after we launched, all the drama started. They're going to move the team to Austin and like now we just launched this partnership and this is the number one local news story for like a year and a half was like is the crew moving? For like a year and a half was like is the crew moving? And we got to kind of be along in the middle of that like messy situation and all the saving the crew stuff.
Speaker 2:That was such a cool Columbus community thing, I think with that partnership it was like, oh wow, this really has zero to do with suits, but like we have a voice, we have a different perspective as a corporate partner, as a business, in all of this. That is different than others in the conversation and it was like, oh, this allows Pursuit to kind of have a voice in the community in a different way. And you know, maybe people will think about Suits when they see us speaking at something or tweeting about something, but it's just like, yeah, this is a way to get involved. That isn't just hey, we got some new fabrics in.
Speaker 2:It's not just the same over and over the same things over and over again, talking about technical things, about fabric.
Speaker 1:Where's the concerts? Like where does that come in?
Speaker 2:The concerts are another. Like you know, my wife jokes I just try to take whatever it is I'm excited about and find a way to make it my work. The very first concert we had was 2014. We were still at the Gateway.
Speaker 2:My favorite band is a band from Duluth, minnesota, called Lowe. At the time, a friend of mine was the bass player in this band, so they were coming through town and I was like, hey, would you want to play in the shop? I'll give you some suits, I'll invite some people. It happened to be our third anniversary, so I was like this is a perfect timing. And they said yes and they did it and it was just a cool thing, because you think about a suit company. You wouldn't expect an indie rock band to perform in a suit shop. That's just not those. Things don't really go together.
Speaker 2:And my personality, I think I always kind of enjoy the quirky and unexpected things. So, yeah, that was the first one. It was cool, but it also was my way of having a direct connection to my favorite band and I was like, oh, there's something there. Like it turns out that I can, and at about the same time we did our first sports partnership and it was with AJ Hawk. So I'm from Wisconsin, I'm a Packer fan, I'm a Packer shareholder, you know like that's the culture I grew up in and AJ was a Columbus guy and Ohio State alum and was the middle linebacker for the Green Bay Packers and got connected to him and that was a way of bringing the Packers into my business and there's just been so many of those things where it's like here's what I'm interested in. Can I find an excuse to get to know these folks, work with these folks be?
Speaker 2:associated with them and also bring them into you know our brand and our world, and that's I mean still, that's pretty much what I do all day, every day.
Speaker 1:Your wife's right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think so.
Speaker 1:She knows me well, we'll get to her in a minute. So what about the good the part? Is that the like? What's the name? Good Intentions Program. Good Intentions.
Speaker 2:Program. Like many things, that was an idea I came up with as a placeholder that I just never replaced. So if you've got a better name for that, we've been doing it about a year, but the idea was we found that we can't really have a huge impact in terms of writing checks to causes.
Speaker 2:My name is not on a building at Fisher or anything like that, because that's just not the world I live in. But we get asked constantly like oh, will you donate this to my—typically it's a silent auction at a charity event and we've done a ton of that and I've always kind of felt like this is the least impactful way that I can give back. It's like here's a, here's a $500, $1,000 suit that you can put in your silent auction, sell to a rich person for $350.
Speaker 2:And then that money goes to the. You know, just like it's like the least efficient form of money laundering. So, and you know, and I get those emails still probably once a week and they're all very well intentioned, but it's just like I don't want to do that, like that's that's not really help, that's that's not really helping directly. But we found that we've done some partnerships where we put people in suits who never dreamed that they could own a suit, and it might be that same five hundred thousand dollar suit, but the level of impact of that is five5,000, $10,000 worth of benefit and I'm like that is the opposite. That is magnifying what this means to somebody.
Speaker 2:So for years I've been trying to think about how can we do that, how can we fund that so that we can do a lot of it? Finally got to the point where the business was just healthy enough, where it's like I don't need to go out and ask nonprofits to pay me for this, I'm just going to dedicate some money to this. Hopefully my customers will support it financially. And so we did that last year and we're like we're just going to create this program, we're going to work with nonprofits, we're going to put people who could never otherwise shop at Pursuit in one of our suits and we don't have to pick who those people are, because the nonprofits already do really cool, powerful programming. They have those people and so that was the idea and we started doing that about 12 months ago. The most, I mean. It's the most meaningful, powerful, best thing we've done and it started in year 14 of having the company and it's honestly, it's been the most powerful thing for us. Like my employees would say, that's the best part of their job.
Speaker 1:Have you heard of ICE Mentors? I have.
Speaker 2:We have not worked directly with them. I think perhaps we donated some ties to the program way back in the day.
Speaker 1:And this reminds me this is probably the universe saying I should get back with him and his wife. I actually did like a little thing with them one night with some of the kids, and they were so great and what they're doing is so awesome, but I totally feel like an ice mentors connection with you.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that'd be cool, and they probably are somebody we should we should work with as well.
Speaker 1:Absolutely so. Let's talk about your wifey, yeah, so she's a little powerhouse of her own, isn't she?
Speaker 2:She is definitely an impressive woman and, uh, we live, you know? Know, we have very different careers, but I think the level of intensity of both of ours are pretty similar.
Speaker 1:So how does that work when you have two high vibration, hard-charging humans? How do you like give each other space and kind of like yin to the yang?
Speaker 2:Yeah it's, it is evolved quite a bit. We've been together 10 years. We've been married almost seven now and you know, I think in the early days we were both like full bore in our career. We don't have children still, so, like you know, we have a little bit of space that a lot of our friends don't have. But I think we probably influenced each other in the same direction. You know, like we were both. We'd come home from work excited but wound really tight, and we would just kind of feed off of each other's energy.
Speaker 2:And I think you know, as my career has evolved, you know I've had very intense periods of time where, you know, I was perhaps burning myself out. My wife has certainly had that as well and we find that like if we both happen to be at those high stress working too much, sleeping not enough type of it's not the best times for our marriage. So I think what we've both learned is, as we've gotten my wife will be 40, I'm 42. I think we both have realized like we need to find a better balance. She got there before I did, and I think we've now have influenced each other Slowly. We've started to influence the other direction where it's like all right, you know she's got a lot of things she does to decompress, manage stress. You know she's worked out pretty hard for years and that's one of her outlets that.
Speaker 2:You know I'm finally starting to take to in my 40s but I think at the very least you can relate to each other. You know, like I think, understanding the intensity and why maybe you are so fixated on something, it's easier to see that when you both kind of have it in your work, but it's definitely, you know, can be difficult to have enough space for. Hey, you had a stressful day. It's eight o'clock. I had a stressful day, can I tell?
Speaker 2:you can I get all this off my chest and, you know, does she have any space to absorb that or not? So we've, we've had to get good at like I don't think I have the energy for this tonight, you know, like is this really important? Because I'm not sure I am going to be much of a listener, and but that's an ongoing thing. Where you're like the solution is to maybe not be so wrapped up in your work and I think we're both just trying to instead of learning how to cope together, or like could we just maybe dial this down a little bit?
Speaker 1:yeah, I mean it's being like in the entrepreneurial world, like there is no on and off button and that's, I think the hardest thing for any, really any external relationship that you have at least that's I think the hardest thing for any external relationship that you have At least that's been my experience where it's like the expectation is well, it's five o'clock and like there's this I wish there was. I would give anything for this tortured, mental fuck situation in here to be able to have a switch. I would love that, love it. But to try to explain that to another human being who's very on and off and wired in that way and I don't know if that's your wife, that's my husband you have like training yourself to be like look, carrie, no one cares about this as much as you and other things exist outside of you and your brain and this thing like you have to figure out a way.
Speaker 2:I think of myself much more as a dimmer switch, like it's always on and maybe I can, you know, turn it down to nearly off. And I think with my wife's work I mean, she's an attorney, she's done the law firm life before and I've been. You know we've been together through that, which has been great but intense, and she's been at Chase now for over five years at this point, and I think the challenging part is how hectic is my life often is a consequence of a decision I made, maybe not cognizantly, but like you know, how busy am I? How many of these projects did I take on, you know, did I time it strategically around the seasonality of our business? And have I? You know, how busy am I as? How many of these projects that I take on, you know, did I time it strategically around the seasonality of our business? And have I? You know, have I done this to myself? Am I willing to take on more?
Speaker 2:And with her work, being an attorney is often much more reactionary. It's like, well, things have been relatively calm and then, oh shit, here's a new ruling issued by the federal government or here's this crisis that comes up and I get a phone call. So for her. I think she doesn't get to plan the chaos as much as perhaps I could. So I've tried to get a little better about leaving some space.
Speaker 2:But my problem is I get excited about this. It's not as much these days as I have to. It's like I want to do that. But should I do one more thing?
Speaker 2:And it's easy to say no to things you don't want to do. Actually it's not it. It's easier to say no to things you don't want to do, but it's really hard to say no to something that you definitely want to do and you probably shouldn't do. And that's at least a luxury I should have. But yeah, she's. She is, I think, far more thoughtful and strategic about how she approaches these things, because that's just the way her brain is wired. I'm much more like I don't really want to know what I'm doing tomorrow. I just want to have one thing on the calendar and then go where the spirit compels me the rest of the day. And she's planning her life far more. You know, I look at her calendar if I go up to the home office and it's like 17 conference Zoom calls a day and some of them are at the same time, and I'm like how does this work exactly?
Speaker 1:No, thank you and.
Speaker 2:I'm like well, I got this podcast this morning and I think I'll probably work on this other thing, and then, you know, somebody is going to call me with something that I need.
Speaker 1:I don't like to plan Right, hey, I mean, listen, you got to do what you got to do, so any last minute advice for a young little fresh entrepreneur out there who's sitting there listening to you like what else you got.
Speaker 2:I think it certainly seems daunting and you got to kind of find the. You know I'm inspired by this story or that story. I'm inspired by this story or that story, but you got to know that whatever it starts out as is probably going to be just OK at best and probably bad in other areas. And I think for me, my, my approach has been to to get comfortable with this is a slow and steady process. I'm OK with, I'm not happy with this or that. Today, if I'm seeing improvement or I'm, you know, I have a path to getting better at it, and I think in the early days there's not a lot you're going to be looking at saying, oh, this is really great.
Speaker 2:And every year, you know, these days I do, you know, I like to say we do the coolest shit of any suit company in the world and that's what gets me excited and I believe that to be true in my definition of what cool shit is. But these opportunities I have now in year 15 are things that seeds that were planted 15 years ago, 12 years ago, people I knew before they are what they are today. I mentioned Taylor from camp is playing in the store on Sunday. That's awesome. One of my favorite bands, great person, but also in 2017, before camp was huge. They played in my store.
Speaker 2:And now the people in our orbit have opportunities for us to get involved. That are just so much different. So I think playing the long game being okay with like this is just okay now, but it's getting better when it gets tough. That will keep you from feeling like you want to throw in the towel.
Speaker 1:Anything else about Pursuit or anything you want to put out in the universe before we close out.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we sell suits. I don't know if I've actually said that at this point, but yeah, people usually come to us for, you know, suits and professional clothing. We sell suits to everybody, which I think is our Good Intentions program is filling the last of that gap of people without the financial means, but we really do sell suits to everybody. So if one more person walks up to me and says, oh, do you sell women's suits? My head's going to explode, because you know our partnership with the Fury and many other things that we do are intended to let people know we do that.
Speaker 2:You know I don't talk enough about like what I actually do for a living or like what pays my bills, but we do it in a very personal way where somebody can make it easy and make it fun and help you through the process. We have a shop in the Short North. We do things by appointment. We appreciate that people plan ahead because a lot of the things that we try to do are not instant things. So if you have something that you're excited about months in advance, we would love for you to come down and have an appointment and look at things and start to put a plan together.
Speaker 1:I love it. Thank you so much for coming in.
Speaker 2:Yeah, thank you for having me. Oh, my God.
Speaker 1:Of course, and if you're still out there following your girl, follow me on YouTube, spotify, apple or wherever you get your podcast. And until next time, check out Nate. Check out his business.
