Today we're talking with Terry Lin, the co-founder of Outer. The first DTC fully recyclable outdoor furniture line based out of California. We first interviewed Terry in Fall 2019, as the company's outdoor furniture line was ramping up for an appearance on Shark Tank. We talked about recycling, innovation, and how he came to create a company that exemplifies both, alongside sustainability.
After the COVID pandemic set in, we reached out to hear how Outer was faring in this economic climate. In the 2nd part of the episode, Terry shares how a renewed appreciation for spending time outside and at home has increased interest in their product, and despite the hurdles all business are facing right now, he's hopeful that Outer furniture will continue trending up.
Enjoy this episode, and make sure to stick around for both parts!
Mentioned In The Episode
Today we're talking with Terry Lin, the co-founder of Outer. The first DTC fully recyclable outdoor furniture line based out of California. We first interviewed Terry in Fall 2019, as the company's outdoor furniture line was ramping up for an appearance on Shark Tank. We talked about recycling, innovation, and how he came to create a company that exemplifies both, alongside sustainability.
After the COVID pandemic set in, we reached out to hear how Outer was faring in this economic climate. In the 2nd part of the episode, Terry shares how a renewed appreciation for spending time outside and at home has increased interest in their product, and despite the hurdles all business are facing right now, he's hopeful that Outer furniture will continue trending up.
Enjoy this episode, and make sure to stick around for both parts!
Mentioned In The Episode
Monica Olsen (1s):
Hey guys, it's Monica here. I wanted to tell you about a new podcast that I've started with my very good friend, Jennifer Walsh called biophilic solutions. Our last season of Serenbe stories, building a biophilic movement was so popular that we decided to dedicate an entire podcast to it every other week. Jennifer and I will sit down with leaders in the growing field of biophilia. We'll talk about local and global solutions to help nurture their living social and economic systems that we all need to sustain future generations more often than not. Nature has the answers. You can find biophilic solutions on apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts, subscribe and follow us today. So you don't miss an episode.
Monica Olsen (41s):
All right, now let's get back to Serenbe. Stories. Serenbe is a place where people live, work, learn, and play in celebration of life. Speedy in we're here to share the stories that connect residents and guests to each other and to nature. This is Serenbe <inaudible>, We're talking with Terry Lynn, the co-founder of outer it's the first direct to consumer fully recyclable outdoor furniture line.
Monica Olsen (1m 31s):
That's based out of California. We interviewed Terry last fall, 2019 as the company's furniture line was ramping up for an appearance on shark tank. We talked about recycling innovation and how we came to create a company that exempt replies both alongside sustainability. After the COVID pandemic set in, we reached out to hear how Outre was fairing in this economic climate. So stick around for the second part of the episode where Terry shares, how a renewed appreciation for spending time outside and at home has increased interest in their product line. Despite the hurdles all businesses are facing right now, he's hopeful that outer furniture will continue trending, enjoy this episode and stick around for both parts.
Monica Olsen (2m 13s):
But first Serenbe stories is brought to you by the, in it Serenbe. The Inn is nestled in the rolling countryside, a bucolic Serenbe where guests can walk on the 15 miles of trails through preserved forest land, the wildflower meadow, and the animal village. You can relax by the pool hot tub or in rocking chairs on the wraparound porch, play on the croquet lawn swings and in-ground trampolines connect with nature and each other all while staying in luxurious rooms on the in in-ground or within the community of Serenbe, book your stay today at <inaudible> dot com. So hello everybody. I want to welcome everybody back to Serenbe stories, Steve Nygren, and are back in the recording studio, otherwise known as our conference room. And today we're very excited to have Terry Lynn here from outer furniture.
Monica Olsen (2m 56s):
So Steve and Terry. Welcome.
Terry Lin (2m 58s):
Welcome Terry. Thank you for having me.
Monica Olsen (3m 0s):
We may not have heard of outer furniture it's been around for what? Eight months now. I think it's been out spring. Perfect. And Terry is the co-founder and outer is a direct consumer furniture line. A hundred percent sustainable. Is that fair to say, okay, good. Why are you here, Terry? What's going on? How do, how do we bring you into our circle?
Terry Lin (3m 20s):
We were really fortunate cause we, we crossed paths because we shared the same PR agency. And as our agency got to know us, they said, you have to go talk to Serenbe, because you know, as we've learned about outer, like the values that you talk about align so closely what Serenbe is.
Monica Olsen (3m 43s):
I love that. I know Steve and I are always looking for common sense solutions,
Terry Lin (3m 47s):
Right? You gotta say, you know, that's your furniture, you know, it's incredible. And it is. So this is your first visit to Serenbeay. How do you feel it is for walking the streets? I certainly have always had biases I've I grew up in suburbs of Delaware and now I live in San Francisco and you know, when I go visit family, it's usually like in suburbs of somewhere. And there is a look that I have in my mind's eye that I kind of thought about and, and, you know, Kerryn, our head of marketing came and was just talking about how amazing Serenbe was so, you know, I was like, okay, it looks pretty cool. And when I actually came here, I came at night.
Terry Lin (4m 30s):
So I didn't see much, but I can say like the way I was greeted, I was, he was a little kitten named Meow. And I was like, wow, I know this is going to be a good trip. And then, you know, I got up early this morning, I walked among the farm animals and then I got to see the architecture and got to hear a lot more about it. And it really has blown my mind. Like the word that I think of is magical and it is not a word that I would normally associate when I think of about a planned community. And just like, as I think about like what's happening with this country and the whole like new urban ism, like this is like such a perfect example of how it should be done. So just incredibly impressed.
Terry Lin (5m 11s):
That's a real compliment coming from a creative person. Like you. Thank you.
Monica Olsen (5m 15s):
Yeah. So your background is pretty impressive. You went to Rizzi, which is the Rhode Island school of design, right? And then you did, you immediately go there to San Francisco and work for pottery
Terry Lin (5m 25s):
Barn. As soon as I graduated, I moved out to San Francisco. I wanted to work for industrial design consulting companies. And the company that I most wanted to work for is called IDEO. And they said, if you want to work here, you have to move out here. So I moved out sight unseen. When I got to the airport, I had a 20 piece set of plates and a backpack for backpacking and a guitar. And that speaks a little bit about the things I cared about backpacking. Cause I wanted to go backpacking in the Sierras, the 20 piece set because I couldn't pass up a great deal at the department store at the time. And in my, my love of like the home and the comforts of home I'm in and guitar because I just like music, but I got to the airport and I asked how to get in the city.
Terry Lin (6m 15s):
And that was the start of when I started living in the
Monica Olsen (6m 17s):
Bay area. It's amazing what a neighborhood to live in, in San Francisco.
Terry Lin (6m 20s):
I live in the outer sunset of San Francisco, so right by the Pacific ocean. Beautiful.
Monica Olsen (6m 26s):
That's great. And so how long were you at IDEO
Terry Lin (6m 29s):
Know? So it took me eight years to get to IDEO. My first interview was my first, my first year there and I showed them my portfolio and they were like fancy looking designers in my interview. And they, they looked at my first case study and then they flipped and then they flipped faster and faster and faster and they pushed it back. The interview lasted maybe five minutes and they said, ah, come back when you have relevant experience. And so at that point, it was really about developing that relevant experience. And you know, my first job was a $5 an hour internship at a one man design firm. And that eventually led to me eight years later, getting to, okay,
Monica Olsen (7m 12s):
That was pottery barn along the way or was Potter been posted yet. And
Terry Lin (7m 14s):
So, you know, the whole idea of industrial design is that you, you do product development and you know how to bring products to market. And I realized in, you know, the eight years that I was doing consulting a consulting is all about like coming up with really cool ideas, presenting even cooler presentations. But when it comes to like, okay, great, we love it. Go make it. If they ever asked that, which they never did, I would not have the foggiest idea how to make anything interesting. I would know how to design something, but if it comes to manufacturability, I didn't know. So I realized, you know, as, as you know, I wanted to progress in my career, it was about how do I not only come up with good ideas, but actually how to bring them to market as well.
Terry Lin (7m 60s):
And that landed me at pottery barn where I knew that I would be developing products that would be in the market in 12 months. And I would know quickly if my designs were successful or not based on the sales. So, right. So pottery barn came after my time of consulting and you know, the last consulting company I worked at was IDEO. And then I jumped over to the client side and, you know, spent another eight years at the Williams-Sonoma cinema brand. So it was pottery barn, teen, and then, and then pottery barn, the main brand learning how to design furniture.
Monica Olsen (8m 35s):
Oh, that's amazing. Yeah. And so the hard goods today, right. That makes sense that outer is where sort of you've landed. Did you have any other in between, I think you did a little bit of e-commerce.
Terry Lin (8m 46s):
I did. So I've had a bunch of twists and turns in my career path. I did some consulting pottery barn with Calvin Klein, helping them try to develop their entire furniture line. After that, I actually went to Walmart e-commerce, which was like a complete like diversion detour of my career. I went there kind of leveraging a lot of what I did in my past with idea, which is like design strategy. And while I was at my first role at Walmart e-commerce was, it was a skunkworks team. And the mandate was that, you know, they say we're a $466 billion company, what's it gonna take for us to get to a trillion dollar company?
Terry Lin (9m 35s):
And if you think about Walmart and all the things they sell, they do sell everything from birth to death. So from diapers to caskets wow. And everything in between. So they've got, you know, like services, they've got everything. So it was a great, great time. Cause I really wanted to get back to like what I cared about. So to go back a little bit, when I was at Calvin Klein, trying to develop their line, one of the pieces of furniture was a $20,000 bed. Wow, exactly. That was my reaction to, wow. And then, you know, the question I asked myself is who needs a $20,000 bed?
Terry Lin (10m 17s):
And the answer I came up with was nobody. Yeah, nobody needs a $20,000 bed. It's not going to extend your life. It's not going to actually give you more joy. A bed makes it, you know, is supposed to be comfortable. So it came down to no one really needed $20,000 bed. The people that own $20,000 beds just have too much money and they don't know where to spend it. And you know, as, as I think about my career, I actually wanted to do something where I'm actually solving problems. And I realized I really wasn't solving problems. And I was feeling bad about myself. Like I'm going down this path where it's such a materialistic direction. I need to change. And at the time I actually was living in New York city and my wife and I moved there.
Terry Lin (11m 1s):
She changed careers, was getting changing from finance to healthcare. And she was going to be a midwife basically, you know, while we were there, we realized our lives were on hold. We moved back to San Francisco. I got this job at Walmart. So you can imagine the household income of someone that can afford four to $20,000 bed versus the average household income of a Walmart customer, which is like $40,000. So yeah, I was actually quite excited because anything I was doing in terms of thinking about services, products, solutions would have a profound impact on people. Sure. So that's actually why I joined lots of people. So going back do like how do you actually solve problems?
Terry Lin (11m 42s):
A lot of what I was doing was thinking about like what the problem is with these customers, unbanked customers, parents who want a better life for their kids. You know, these parents that didn't have college degrees hoping that their kids would get college degrees. So those are the things that I was thinking about. I was thinking about like education. I was thinking about technology to, to get access for these customers to additional services. I mean, there was certainly a, a portion that had to do with revenue, which was with Walmart. Like the average customer that goes to the store goes once a week. But for the online customer, it is like one time, 1.2 times a year.
Terry Lin (12m 22s):
So there's lots of great problems to solve. Did that for awhile eventually moved over to the business side and was working on the business, thinking about how to hit revenue numbers, thinking about the data and analytics and how to actually make sure we hit those numbers. And it is a good experience, but not really what I was passionate about. So eventually that led me to move on. I did some time at Casper, which is a direct to consumer outdoor furniture or sorry, direct to consumer mattress brand. And I won't talk about that too much, but basically like my experiences with mass retail to specialty retail, to lifestyle, retail, to direct consumer led me to like realizing there was an opportunity with everything I learned to start over.
Monica Olsen (13m 10s):
Right. Well, and I think I'm throwing stuff up in the air and rethinking how consumers buy product, right? All this direct to consumer that's been happening with Casper and then all these furniture companies, but maybe you're the first outdoor furniture company that's doing it.
Terry Lin (13m 26s):
So as, as Jake Lew, my co-founder of when we started talking, there's a big insight that we came up with, which was, if you look at these companies that are disrupting these incumbents, they're doing it in these sleepy categories, these categories where companies have been around for 20, 30, 40 years. And they're, they're used to doing it a certain way and they can't change it because of shareholders and what shareholders demand. And you know, like once you start looking into it, you realize there's a lot of excess that's happening in these businesses. So it's not hard to disrupt an industry. So what's exciting about a mattress, right? Not a whole lot. What's exciting about socks. What's exciting about two specialist glasses, you name it, there's all these categories.
Terry Lin (14m 9s):
So, you know, as, as Jake and I were talking, we got to outdoor furniture. And the first question we asked was, what brands can you think of when you think of outdoor furniture? And most people can actually think of a brand, I think of lifestyle retailers, but they can actually name a brand and two. And you know, there's certainly are brands out there that have been around many years, but what they haven't done is applied like a different approach to design marketing and branding. And what we realized was even though we were a challenger brand, the playing field is level. So for us to be able to become like a top of mind in the category, wasn't that farfetched.
Terry Lin (14m 53s):
So that's what we really focused on, which is there is no brands. We want to be the brand that customers think when they think outdoor furniture. That's great. So for those who have not seen it, can you describe, you know, what, what's your passion? What does it look cloudy? Yeah. So, you know, the out outer that we started with, we, we say the perfect and the most comfortable outdoor sofa, and it's quite different the way we're doing it. And I am like taking a lot of the learnings from Casper, which is do one thing. Do it really well, take your time when you design it, as you design this brand it's so that you have the right and the permission to design that next product you've developed, the trust you've developed, you know, a base where people know like the way you think about how you design is very thoughtful.
Terry Lin (15m 40s):
So our design, you know, I like to think it's actually quite like refined it's restrained. There's nothing that I would say is super flashy about it. Maybe your legs are flashy because our legs are, are cast stainless steel. But you know, the design itself is I like to think it's timeless so that anytime I'm designing anything that is of value or expensive, I think 10 years, it's almost like a tattoo. Like when you get a tattoo, like the best way to think about it is in 10 years, am I going to be happy with what I actually put on my body? And if you're not, then you probably shouldn't do it. Same thing with furniture. Like as you design that piece of furniture, you don't want it to be dateable.
Terry Lin (16m 21s):
You don't want to be timeless. So like the design is transitional in nature, it's a modular design so that it helps us in that it's configurable in many ways. So like it simplifies our supply chain. So we basically have two skews that can be configured into multiple configurations. It's a shelter arm design, which it's done that way so that it can be configurable shelter. Arm design means the arm in the back are the same height. I made sure to design it so that the height is comfortable for both leaning back, but also putting your arm on I've designed the depth of it to be, I have a golden rule about what the, the, the dimension should be from your heel to back of knee, back of knee, to like your hip.
Terry Lin (17m 8s):
And there is a number that I designed to arrange that actually helps with comfort for someone from like five, three to like six feet. But the design is a shelter arm design that's modular. It's an all weather Wicker sofa. The color of the sofa of the Wicker is I'd like to think of it as a sun bleached, teak, and it comes in two colors. It comes in a, a gray and a white, and a lot of what we've talked about when we designed it was we don't want choice overload choice overload is, choose this, then choose this and then choose this. And at that point, like when you have 15 fabrics or 20 fabrics, no one knows what to do. So we just wanted to try to minimize for the customer to make it easy, but also for us, in terms of our, our, our, you know, not having too much of a supply chain issue for outside furniture, I love the way you've built in the covers is that nude is, has anybody yeah.
Terry Lin (18m 4s):
You ever done that? No. So I should have brought that up. It's funny that I forgot to mention that. So, you know, the way we designed the furniture before we actually sketched it, we asked customers that owned outdoor furniture. You know, how, how often do they use it? And the answers that we got was once or twice on the weekends or a few times a month, and that was about it and very little on the weekdays. And then the next question was why, and the answers we got was look at it. It's gross. See that bird poop there. It just, it just happened. And now there's the other bird poop from the week before I need to clean my furniture before I even want to sit on it.
Terry Lin (18m 45s):
So like, I don't like that is a project that is in my backlog of things to do the second is that the there's a cover on it. So to uncover it, that actually takes time. And if I want to go out for five minutes before my day starts in the morning and have a cup of coffee, the efforts too much to actually take it off and then put it back on. And the last is that for many, they will actually take their cushions and store them inside in their garage, in their basement, in a hallway, in a storage shed. So to actually take the effort to do the three trips to put your cushions out was far too much. So we realized, you know, where are we focused on comfort? There was a bigger issue with protection, which is protection today was a barrier to actually being able to enjoy your outdoors.
Terry Lin (19m 31s):
So that was kind of one of the requirements when we were at our factory designing it. And surprisingly, when we were, when Jake and I were there, we said, we know we want to do something. And I asked one of the workers to cut me a piece of non-woven fabric, the width of the chair or the, the cushion. And then I told them a certain length. And, and then I just started playing. I took some, some office, those, those binder clips. And I started playing and I clipped it on. It's like, it's going to be something like this. And that was the seed of the idea we've captured on film. And, you know, like we finally refined it, got it to what we thought made sense. We, after we did that part, we realized it would be great if we were able to carry it off like a suitcase, because typically when you carry cushions off, it's like a pizza box.
Terry Lin (20m 18s):
Like, so it's just, it's just unwieldy to do so if you can carry it off like a suitcase, you can do multiple trips in one trip. So it really was like rapid prototyping and designing, like on the fly, we brought it back to the U S we socialized it with our friends in investors and, and family, everyone loved it. And it was amazing to see like the light bulb go off in people's heads. Like, oh my God, that's exactly what I need. And then, so that's the most common thing we hear. And then the other thing we hear is why didn't I think of that? And it's because it's not that hard. It is, it truly is a zipper on a piece of fabric with some Velcro. So when people saw that, they said, you need to go see if you can get this patented.
Terry Lin (21m 1s):
And, you know, we weren't actually going down that path. And we did, we, we did a patent search and found out no one's ever done anything like this, which was like amazing to us because how simple it was that no one thought of this. And it just highlights the fact of, you know, like furniture that a lot of what we do is copying what other people have done. And like any industry, like it's like, how do you actually break the norm and actually think a little bit differently. And then Steve, as we talked about common sense, like there's so much about common sense that we fail to, to actually think about as we're designing these things. It was common sense thinking about how we did this and it looks so great. Just sitting there covered. Yeah.
Terry Lin (21m 41s):
There's a simple solution.
Monica Olsen (21m 43s):
Yeah. And you'll actually use your furniture. Now, one of the things I know you told me was about the materials until you had said at one point that you felt like you were a material scientist. Talk a little bit about that because it was very important to you not only the fabric, but everything on there had to be recyclable. And so tell us a little bit about, because you had not worked in textiles before. So tell me about that process.
Terry Lin (22m 6s):
So like the backstory is I have a five and a half year old and a nine month old. And, you know, we see every other day about the doom and gloom of what's happening with plastics. And I think they say by 2050, the plastics in the ocean are going to outweigh the fish. And, you know, there is basically microplastics in every fish in the ocean today. And that's just a really startling statistic. And, you know, as, as we're designing this outdoor furniture, like there's very little that can withstand all that nature has to throw it at us. And the thing that can withstand it is unfortunately plastics. Like I think they say the first piece of plastic that was ever created is still around today.
Terry Lin (22m 51s):
Cause I think the take 450 years to break down. So like knowing that we are going to be working with this material because we have to, you know, our next thing was we have to make sure that we are using plastics that are the most commonly recycled. So we, as we started thinking about materials palette, I did research on the international recycle codes, one through seven. And then from there looking at what materials would actually work for what we were designing. And it ended up that we could work with recycled codes, two, four, and five. So it's polypropylene high density, polyethylene, and low density polyethylene.
Terry Lin (23m 36s):
That's what we stuck with. And, you know, from there, as I started designing the product, the next part we looked at was the fabric. And we wanted to design a premium product. And you know, this happened a little bit later, but I wanted to use all premium brands and there are two premium brands out there and both premium brands use a solution, dyed acrylic. It's a great material. It withstands like fading for five years, but it actually fell into recycled code seven. So it didn't fall into our two, four and five. And recycled code seven is a catch all for all of those plastics that most of your waste management companies won't recycle.
Terry Lin (24m 20s):
So it will end up in a landfill and it's because to actually get it back to like a Virgin state is too expensive. So because of that, it, it was a forced mechanism for us to say, well, we actually need to design our own fabrics. And then it basically, it was like another education for me to learn all about textile design took almost a year to design or fabrics, but we, we started with, you know, basically a polypropylene, right? And then from there we had to figure out how to make sure that he could actually withstand the same fade resistance as the other premium brands. And then from there, like we had other requirements that we wanted to have, like the hand feel of linen and slug that you see when you think of artisinal quality fabrics.
Terry Lin (25m 6s):
So a lot of it was like, these are what I wanted. These are the things that I want to do. How do we actually do it? So it was, it was a lot of trial and error talking to textile makers, making some hand samples of these weaves and like rejecting revising. And eventually we got to what we needed to get to and I'm that much smarter on textiles design.
Monica Olsen (25m 30s):
Well, and I think he had said that it took you something like eight months just for the fabric or, you know, you really spent the time. And that reminds me a bit of, you know, when Steve would tell me stories about, you know, the lampposts, nobody would let him do the lampposts he wanted. He wanted him to be, if you will, artisinal lamppost. And so you waited, you waited until they would approve it. And when you, they wanted to trench to put in, I don't know what electricity or utilities they wanted to take down 20 feet of trees on either side, but he waited until somebody could come with the right trencher that didn't have to do that. And I think that that is something that people don't do these days. So I was totally commend you for like looking for the solution, waiting for the right solution and not just doing the easy answer with again, beautiful, fabulous, fabulous materials that exist, but you actually created something new.
Terry Lin (26m 21s):
A lot of what we are doing at our company is like, we we've, we've, you know, we talk about our values and we want to live our values. And the last thing we want to do is like, if we talk about wanting to be sustainable, like if we're not doing it, then we're not going to do it. And we need to either not do it or find a new way of doing it. And that's where, you know, like where we need to partner or figure out new of developing better materials out there that are more sustainable, more eco-friendly.
Monica Olsen (26m 48s):
And you were going to tell me about at my concrete too. That was really interesting that I think you'll be interested. I don't know. I kept thinking that, can we build out like a artist cottage out
Terry Lin (26m 57s):
Of it? Yeah. It's funny. Cause a lot of when we started out or it's, it's taking us on this journey of these twists and turns that we would have never thought about. So for the country, like there's a, a limited palette that I believe works in the outdoors and it's, you know, for what it's teak, I don't believe other woods are actually, there's like EPA, there's very few woods, but teak is the one that I liked the most there's aluminum because it doesn't corrode. There's stainless steel. There is all weather Wicker. There is basically plastic and then there's ceramic glass too, I guess, but basically, and the concrete.
Terry Lin (27m 40s):
So when we were thinking about like our palette, concrete is like a color, it's a material that is like long, long lasting and durable. We want it to use it just because it kind of fits our aesthetic. You know, as, as I've been thinking about tabletop, like as I think about like our product development strategy, it's that it solves a problem. There's some sort of innovation to it where like, and it's sustainable. So it's like one, two or three. We have to actually solve all three of those things or at least two of them. So I've been hesitant to actually design any type of tabletop things. So whether it's an accent table, a coffee table, a dining table, and it's because there really are no problems with any of those things.
Terry Lin (28m 22s):
They, they function as needed. You put something on it, as long as it doesn't fall off, then it's good. Right? So, you know, like we know it's a big category. We know that people would buy it, but for us to design something just didn't feel right without actually doing that. So I've spent the past year thinking about what we do and you know, where we landed was there may not be a lot of innovation with like a pain point, but there is an innovation that we can do with sustainability and durability. So, you know, we're going down this path where we're working with a partner to develop a unique concrete that is very different than all the other concretes out there.
Terry Lin (29m 5s):
So the most common concrete out there is Portland, cement it's. And then, you know, prior to that there, the concrete that they used to make was called a magnesium cement. It's the same cement that we're used to make, like the great wall of China or the stupids of India. And they moved away from it because it's too expensive. And you can imagine like with all the development going on globally, they needed to find a better solution. So that's where we started, which is magnesium cement, because it's basically half of the carbon footprint of Portland cement because of like how it's made lighter weight, stronger like weight per strength, but that's only part of it.
Terry Lin (29m 47s):
So if you look at concrete, it is one of the biggest contributors to greenhouse gases and the carbon footprint in this world, you can imagine how much concrete is getting made. So like, we like, okay, we want to figure out, at least if we're going to do this. Cause it makes sense because it's durable. How can we do it? So we are working on a formulation of concrete that actually captures CO2. So like the whole point is how do we, like everything we do is how do you actually limit our carbon footprint and with what we're doing, it actually makes it carbon neutral. What are you doing? What, what are the components that I can have that to happen?
Terry Lin (30m 27s):
So, I mean, it's a, it's a magnesium oxide and there's another component to it that we can't talk about yet. But like, you know, as we do this, it's, it's that? Yes, you're right. It's like the whole idea. Like, you know, we always hear that the lungs are the, sorry, the trees are the lungs of the earth. Yes. What are other things out there? Like we are, we know that there's like deforestation going on. We are trying to plant trees, but can you actually use buildings to do it? So as you know, as we do this, it was really a test to be like, we're a small company trying something that we know, like there's big conglomerates that are saying, no, you're not going to do this. And we don't have to worry about that. Like, we don't know any better, but we just want to try to be a role model to be like, this is how we think we should do it.
Terry Lin (31m 11s):
And the whole idea of like the butterfly effect, which is, you know, one small company, if they can do it, we have limited resources. It just can show like big companies can do it too. And, and kind of like the whole thing with like, like these direct to consumer brands that are coming out, they're realizing there's a lot of margin that can be had. And with these big producers of cement and like, if we do it, we know it's going to cost more, sorry, it's going to cost more and we're going to have to charge about the same. So we're going to lose out on this. So like they're foregoing, like caring for the planet over profits. And I think, you know, at a certain point, like as we do this, it's a, hopefully like this loud, our, our little mouse voice turns into like a loud roar and it changes the way people think about things starting to buy.
Terry Lin (32m 1s):
According to that, I mean, exactly. We need to start really looking at true costs of things. And so if it's long-term costs, long-term costs, if it's negative on the planet, if it's negative on planet hell or on individual health, we should start looking at how we charge for that. Exactly. Yeah. Like this short-term thinking needs to stop and you know, like anyone with kids, like my values changed when I had kids and it's like, we're where we're going. Like everything I need to do, I have eight years to figure out how to actually either teach them what I know, hopefully get them on the right path to be able to make wise so that as they get older to make their own formulations of the world and what they need to do, that they can do this.
Terry Lin (32m 45s):
So like, it's just kind of like, how do we start getting people to think that way? And then for my kids, it's like that long-term thinking, which is, you know, I ask myself, am I leaving this world a better place or a worse place for my child, my children and future generations. And if we all ask that same question, I think we would make different choices. That's right. And no one has asked those questions in the last several decades. Exactly. So like, you know, again like a small company, but at least we're trying to be role models of like how you think responsibility as a brand. That's great.
Monica Olsen (33m 21s):
Yeah. I love that. And I also love if you'll just share your mission with us, which I think is great because your mission isn't about creating furniture. Your mission is something different.
4 (33m 32s):
We I'll, I'll
Terry Lin (33m 34s):
Start back. Like, you know, as I, as I talked to like friends, customers like any investors, I asked them, I asked them a question. I say, where were you on 4th of July of this past year. And they typically were at a barbecue is as most people are. And my next question is, do you remember what you were eating? Probably like burgers, hotdogs, maybe a steak. Do you remember who you're talking to? Yeah. Okay. Not great conversation with so-and-so and then I asked, do you remember what you were sitting on? And like no sitting on I'm like, that's the point? It's like, yes, we are trying to create great furniture that is durable and is comfortable.
Terry Lin (34m 17s):
But in the end people aren't going to think about it and you know, any great design kind of blends in the background and really what matters is those experiences that you enable? And, you know, as we think about our company, like, what we care about is like, we talk about like, like creating adventures in your backyard. Like getting outside is hard for a lot of people. There's that statistic of we spend 90 Americans spend 93% of their lives, indoors and indoors is where all the free radicals are. It's where like, you know, your cells break down and you get sick being outside, being barefoot on the earth, where it's a big, negatively charged ion, where it reduces stress, it improves your immune system.
Terry Lin (35m 0s):
It changes the viscosity of your blood. So like, we, we just want people to get outside. Whether it be a minute or five minutes, it doesn't matter. Like start little and then you build up. It's not about getting into national parks. Yes. We would love you to get there, but it's about baby steps. And all we care about is getting people outside to start with. And, you know, it comes back to like my childhood and I'm sure people in my age, their childhoods of how much time they spent outside. And it's because we didn't have alternatives, we didn't have devices. We didn't have instant on-demand anything. We had a TV that I watched Saturday morning cartoons from like eight to 10. But after that, I didn't want to watch all the other stuff. So I would play outside because this is what I wanted to do.
Terry Lin (35m 41s):
And there's just too much choice out there today. And there's too much that kids are so interested in doing that. Actually, I'm trying to be a role model for my kid. And I should say more of an experiment because I fail all the time of getting them outside more.
Monica Olsen (35m 55s):
Well, that's great. Is there anything else that you want to share with us about outer, but besides the, we should all go sit on it. Oh, we know we didn't talk about, we didn't talk about the neighborhood show rooms. I mean, that's, I guess that's the main reason that you showed up here originally is that we had Serenbe we had the original neighborhood showroom for Atlanta. You also opened one, I believe in Sandy Springs, maybe Decatur. I think we're going to open another one here, but that is your other center of innovation. And so tell us that as we wrap up this conversation is phenomenal.
Terry Lin (36m 24s):
Durham is our response to like physical retail. We know that our product is a high price point and with a high price point plus a new brand, you're not going to trust them. So it's important to be able to see touch and feel this. And, you know, our option was to open up a store. And basically we immediately wrote that off because we didn't have the money to do it. The other option was to figure out another way. And what we've done is created this peer-to-peer neighborhood showroom network, where we crowdsource from our customers who become hosts and in doing so potential customers can come see touch and feel the furniture before they decide to buy.
Terry Lin (37m 5s):
And then on top of that, the whole idea of connection and community, like, you know, you're going to trust your neighbor, your friend, more than you're going to trust a sales person. Yeah.
Monica Olsen (37m 15s):
I love it. And it's working, you have even been open eight months and you have 3000 inquiries.
Terry Lin (37m 20s):
You have 3000 applicants. That's amazing. We are, we are, we are being thoughtful of how we, we, we roll this out, but we're really excited about like being able to actually get it across the country.
Monica Olsen (37m 32s):
Okay, perfect. And we need to go to outer.www.live
Terry Lin (37m 37s):
Outer.com. Great. Well, thank you so much for sharing your furniture about and our various open spaces. I know,
Monica Olsen (37m 45s):
I know we'll have to get more. Well, thank you so much for coming in and we look forward to hearing more about your success. Thank you for having me good luck with Stay tuned for the second part of the episode. After this message from our sponsor, there are two rubrics in building a city, you can follow the sprawl mentality or you can preserve land while boosting economic development, tsunami builds and designs to be both beautiful and environmentally sustainable. If you're a city planner, developer, Landa, and or a policymaker, there come some solutions you can take to build a biophilic center community, attend the Nygren place-making conference this fall to learn more details. And Nygren place-making dot com.
Monica Olsen (38m 25s):
That's N Y G R E N P L a C E M a K I N g.com. All right. So Terry, thank you so much for joining us again and taking time out of your busy schedule to come back and tell us sort of what's happened since we recorded in the fall. And I think the biggest thing, well, there's two big things, obviously there's the pandemic that has affected all of us, but one of the interesting things that you mentioned was shark tank. And so now we can hear what happened. Yeah, of course. Thanks for having me again. Well, thanks.
Monica Olsen (39m 5s):
Good to check in with you in this interesting time and all, you know, like I live in a pretty small house with an even smaller backyard. I can't imagine how lucky you are and Serenbe and all of the extra space. I think you have plenty of space to do some social distancing. So you're really lucky and fortunate to be where you are. It really is. It shows you how the way the community is built for times like this isn't nearly as much of an interruption. It was really fun this weekend, a nine-year-old I think Tucker's nine. Maybe he had a birthday and of course, none of the things you could do.
Monica Olsen (39m 50s):
And so his folks decorated their golf cart and drove it down the street and let everyone know, and everyone was on their porch in their front yard waving and hollering happy birthday. And it was really kind of a special thing set up with the porches in the streets. It was real easy to do that. So there's an article about portion place. So, you know, there's shelter in place. And now there's portion place that I've heard of where there are people that have skills, whether they're playing instruments like guitars or a banjo where they're actually doing things on their porch to entertain their neighbors. So I could see it being, you know, like a big part of Serenbeabout the front porch, isn't being able to entertain people.
Monica Olsen (40m 32s):
So I could see you actually doing something fun on Easter Sunday, Casey Cooper, who is lead guitars for west, for Katy Perry sang amazing grace or plated. And again, people were in the trails, he put amplifiers out. So you could be in the trails or anywhere on the streets and sidewalks and that area. And it was just amazing. We have a video. That's great. We'll put that up on the podcast. I'd love to see that it's been a crazy time and I definitely want to hear sort of like how you guys are handling it out there just with your family. Outer is dealing with it because some of us may have watched it, but if you're listening to, and we mentioned it and you knew what had happened, but you couldn't tell us.
Monica Olsen (41m 23s):
So give us that. Yeah. So I, when I had done the interview with you and Steve, back in the fall, we were just a few away from actually going live on ABC. And so the outcome of the show was that we had two offers. We had an offer from Mr. Wonderful. And we had an offer from Lori grader. And the funny thing is when we were trying to guess who the offers were from, I won't say who it was, but we weren't thinking it was going to be from those two. So yes, we, we made an verbal offer with them.
Monica Olsen (42m 5s):
And, you know, we're still kind of in discussions as you know, like verbal is different than actual written. So like going through the due diligence takes quite a long time, you know, like in terms of, you know, the outcome, like we knew that the most important thing that we cared about was just getting that extra exposure, because I don't know what the number of people that are actually watching the show is, but it's quite high in the millions and even more, a big part of how people watch TV is through over the top. So on demand through Hulu, through CNBC, where you can basically watch it anytime in anywhere.
Monica Olsen (42m 46s):
So, you know, like as we were doing it, it was at the end of the year where we were coming upon Thanksgiving, the holidays. So we knew that the most important thing was, you know, getting, getting the seed of the idea planted in people's heads. And w that happens. And as we were planning for this year, what I can tell you this, this spring, we had planned for a certain amount of sales. And of course the pandemic happened. There was a lot of uncertainty. So come March leading up to the pandemic. Our sales were on track. We were showing that we had forecast well, and then the pandemic hit.
Monica Olsen (43m 29s):
And then we all said, oh, what's going on? We know that there's going to be something. And it's probably going to be, you know, everything's slowing down as with many categories outside of your CPG categories, like toilet paper and your basic staples, like flour. A lot of companies saw a drop in their sales. We saw a pause in our sales for about a week, and then they kicked back up and March ended up being a really strong sales month for us, where we had our strongest day of sales, strongest week of sales, strongest month of sales. And our strongest strongest quarter of sales blew blew us beyond expectations.
Monica Olsen (44m 8s):
And in addition to that, as we are now in the middle of April, we are trying to renegotiate with our factory, our partner factory on how we can actually increase our production by threefold. So like where, you know, we know that there are companies that are struggling for some reason we are doing quite well. And you know, there's definitely a lot of assumptions that we're making about that. A big one is that we are all sheltering in place, which means like we can't go anywhere. Spring break, we've had to cancel our plans. And then even more like with this ongoing, we don't know when it's going to end. We know that schools are probably canceled too for the rest of the year.
Monica Olsen (44m 51s):
And then up until the fall, that summer plans are probably on hold as well. So people that had plans are probably going to be doing things nearby their homes or in their homes. So with that, if you look at just what's happening in the industry, the companies that are doing well, other than like the grocery stores are DIY. So like the home depots and the Lowe's, so people are investing in their homes, they're investing in making their spaces more comfortable. And then we are fortunate to be part of that. So people are investing in their backyards where they may never be able to go to parks because they're closed that they're making the best of it and making their, their backyards as comfortable as they can. So, yeah, we've, we've had a, quite a strong spring and continuing to hope that it will stay there.
Monica Olsen (45m 36s):
Yeah. What what's happened with your showrooms. Cause I, you know, you have such an innovative model of, you know, no actual commercial retail space, but if their rooms are people's homes, so how have you pivoted in that space? Yeah, it's a, that's a great question. And, you know, I think, you know, when we started the company, the interesting thing was we always knew that there was inefficient inefficiency in retail in that once you actually begin to have brick and mortar stores, there's ongoing costs to it. And then the more you grow, the more bloated you get, the more you have in terms of trying to get to profitability. And so we know that there's always been this retail apocalypse that you see in the media.
Monica Olsen (46m 19s):
And I think with what's happening right now with non-essential stores being closed, it's just accelerated that. So even the profitable companies are going to be having a hard time because they have a lot of stores, they are forbearing on their, their monthly rent. So like, it just makes sense that while we saw retail changing, it's going to be changing faster than we thought. And not to say that we have the perfect model, but we do have a model where we are able to, you know, have physical locations where we don't have the risk of having these ongoing costs. And in addition to that, like, we know that malls are closed, but if you need to, you can still go to your neighbor or, you know, to see them.
Monica Olsen (47m 1s):
So it's easy to do that, but we have shifted where for the time being, we are doing virtual visits. So this morning I was doing a virtual visit in my backyard sharing, like what I can about our furniture, the details of it. So that's been another nice tailwind which we've had, which is we don't have the weight of retail stores right now, or kind of, we have the idea of physical locations, but not the way to actually take care of the operating costs of those. But right now we are doing virtual showroom visits. Yeah, no, it's interesting. I think today, it's, you know, we're recording this on April 15th.
Monica Olsen (47m 43s):
And so all of the retail came out and everything was down considerably, I think, close to 9%. And I haven't looked at that might be an aggregated number since, you know, again, the targets and the Walmarts rough. But I do think it's interesting to think about as our habits change, you know, you already had like a really cool idea of connecting with your neighbors, right. And going into the showroom near you now, as we have this whole different trend in how we shop, what's going to happen with, is the mall really? Is this the nail in the coffin for the mall? Yeah. Like if Amazon wasn't already the leader in e-commerce, I think they've proven that they will be with the amount of staff that they need to hire to fulfill demand.
Monica Olsen (48m 33s):
So where e-commerce was continuing to grow in terms of share between physical stores and online, I think it's going to accelerate. And at this point, just because that's the only way you can really shop these days, especially for non-central items. So yeah, I think I agree. Like it's interesting to see how retail is going to shift, and this is the catalyst that's going to make people figure out like what they need to do to, to kind of follow with this trend of how consumers shop. Of course the next disruptor is going to be 3d printing. Are you looking at, we aren't looking at that, but it's funny that you mentioned that because, you know, while we are an outdoor furniture company, there's a couple of things that have impacted our business, but everything from raw materials, but, you know, we're, we're doing our part.
Monica Olsen (49m 26s):
Like we know that there is definitely a gap in terms of protection for healthcare workers and in doing so, like we, as a company, as a team have come together to figure out what we can do, even though we're a furniture company, to be able to help in this. And I, for one have purchased a sewing machine, I don't know how to sell. I'm learning now to just make cloth masks, not for the healthcare healthcare workers, but because, you know, we can protect our neighbors to our head of engineering does have a 3d printer, and he's actually been printing 3d face shields and distributing the pieces that he makes to, to doctors and healthcare workers in the local hospitals in LA.
Monica Olsen (50m 10s):
And then three, one of the things, and this doesn't have to do with 3d printing, but GE glue, my co-founder and the CEO of the company is actually started a go fund, me campaign. We raised $60,000 so far among the startup community to actually purchase masks for, for the healthcare. We, we hit that number pretty quickly, but we're actually, no, we doubled that number to believe in $150,000 that we're trying to raise. So, you know, I think the point is that, you know, it doesn't matter who you are, what you do. We can all kind of do our part to like, you know, like protect these frontline workers, but with 3d printing, that is an interesting thing. Like there's a lot that you're seeing with how you can help with that.
Monica Olsen (50m 53s):
We haven't done much with that in terms of the development of our products, other than potentially thinking about prototyping. What about your office? You guys are a little bit decentralized, right. But, but has anything changed? It sounds like your sales have been good. So you probably haven't had to furlough anybody, but have you, like, what is it like? I mean, we're all working from home. We're doing this on a zoom call. What changes have you seen? So like, I have been remote since we started the company I'm in San Francisco. Our headquarters are in Santa Monica. And then probably the third week of March is when governor Newsome announced that everyone in California is going to be sheltering at home.
Monica Olsen (51m 35s):
So we effectively shut down our office. We do have a distributed team. We do daily calls on zoom. We do daily stand ups. So we were already doing that in terms of partially, probably for me, because I am remote. It really was a benefit for me. So we are continuing to do that. So not much has changed in terms of how we work. You know, there are other things that do happen, where we do have people that have to go into offices where we actually have to shift things off like every few weeks. But in terms of efficiency, it seems to be like, we haven't lost that much inefficiency.
Monica Olsen (52m 16s):
Other than those that have kids where you're trying to balance Ms. Stresses of working. I have my daughter where she is now in choice time. And the choice times mean she's on her tablet and she's probably a Netflix wasting away her brain right now. But I'm sure anyone that has a parents, we know that is kind of the last resort, but you know, as I'm doing this call, that was my last resource. So she doesn't bother us. I like that. You call it choice time. That's what she can do. Anything. She can do whatever she wants, whether it's Legos, whether it's arts and crafts, but as of late, it seems to be she's really into the tablet.
Monica Olsen (52m 56s):
Like most kids. Yeah, no, no, no, no. It is. It is, it is a common thing. Do you, I know that you've seen, you know, a big bump in traffic and I know you're increasing your, your forecast for April, for the virtual. Are you guys looking for more showrooms? Like, are you looking for, as people come online, right. They can become a showroom, but are you guys still looking for more? Are we know that what's happening right now is only temporary. We know that at some point, hopefully in not the, not too distant future, that things will begin to ease.
Monica Olsen (53m 37s):
And you know, like our sales have been coming from all over the country. There really isn't like a really localized area. In fact, there's some areas where it's, I don't think it's that warm yet, but people are already buying it. I think it's just anticipation of going outside and getting that brush a breath of fresh air. So yes, we are continuing to accelerate that. We know that the more we have the easier it is for other potential customers to be able to see touch and feel our products. In addition to that, like I was on call for the past hour with a customer, that's going to be a host. And you know, in the end she said something like this. She said like, I am a, I am, you know, at heart and introvert.
Monica Olsen (54m 19s):
And I don't like talking to people and we spent an hour talking and she said, you know, I enjoyed this call and I could keep on going. And I just feel like, you know, especially now as we're doing kind of, this is social distancing. It is a way for people to connect virtually. But in the future, like a lot of what we're doing is like when we connect customers with hosts, it is like, like-minded people just like we connected when Kerryn connected me to you and Steve, like I think Steve, one of the things that most resonated with me in something that I read was that you said something like, if we want to change the world, start in your backyard.
Monica Olsen (54m 60s):
And that was like, oh my God, I needed to meet Steve. I need to meet Monica. And that's kind of how our relationship started. And you know, this is our, you know, our second interview and it really comes down to like shared interests, common interests, things that we all value. And that's kind of like what we hope, which is most connects with other customers and they have shared values and it doesn't feel, it feels like a really authentic experience, even though it is, I wouldn't even call it transactional because they're not responsible for selling. They're just responsible for talking about a product, thinking, talking about like what makes, what they love about it, how they use it, maybe some things that they don't like about it. And that's what helps us our products.
Monica Olsen (55m 41s):
Yeah. I think, you know, Steven, I've been talking a lot about, you know, sharing, right. And that's communicating as well as, you know, this sort of loneliness epidemic that, you know, even Jennifer Walshy met had dinner with us at night, you know, I I'm going to talk to her this afternoon and she's like, oh, you get to see people. And it's like, she lives in New York, you know, she sees, but it's a different kind of scene, right. You're being seen versus this autonomous I'm walking down the street with people. And so that's, I think probably a real benefit of sharing the product with people is that you're both being seen and we need that.
Monica Olsen (56m 23s):
Yeah. So that is, like you said, that is a really important piece. And maybe I've mentioned in the past, but like, you know, I live in a relatively dense area. I live in a home where my next door neighbors house is maybe a half of an inch away from mine. And I don't really know them like, and part of that is because I don't know what they care about. What's important to them. And I think what's interesting about, you know, the day and age we're in right now. Like I can talk to anybody. It doesn't matter like what their interests are. We all have a common thing that we can talk about. And unfortunately it's not the most pleasant of topics, but it's this and how it's affecting all of us. So we all have this thing that doesn't matter who you're talking to.
Monica Olsen (57m 4s):
You can talk the same thing and to a lesser extent, it's the same thing with outdoors. Like being outside the importance of being outside. Like once you know that there's something you have some interest to talk about. It's easy to actually start conversations. And Steve, I know that you, you know, are, I should say, Terry, you had asked me, you know, what's different at Serenbe. And I thought that was kind of a good question. Yeah. What's changed Steve at Serenbe since well, not as much as one would think is the curious part. I mean, our restaurants are all still open, but it's only to go.
Monica Olsen (57m 48s):
So the chairs are either piled up or pushed in a corner. People are really watching to be 10 feet away or six feet. And so they'll see one person enter and the other ones wait until they, they come out to get their food also has picked up the, the side window so people can not even just pick up. They're not even coming to the restaurant, so that's adjustment, but the trails are more active. People are discovering new places that they hadn't had time to go to. And so in, in some ways there was more activity out and about than there was before, it was just kind of curious, but of course everyone's adjusting to this new life, but we still have good food.
Monica Olsen (58m 39s):
We have fresh air and we're still out in the bough. So, so that piece is very much the same. Our hospitality is course we've cut a lot of people that have had to be furloughed. So that's, that's always difficult, but we are bringing several on doing different things, clearing trails in the woods that wouldn't have been cleared currently, you know, we're adjusting to it. You know, it's interesting. I was gonna just kind of add on like what, you know, when I went there and just from what you said, like, it makes me think that the community at Serenbe is, you know, slightly.
Monica Olsen (59m 20s):
And I say that because, you know, people go there have like a conscious choice of why they go there and why they go there is because there's like the health and wellness. There's the agricultural and there's the arts. And like a lot of what I've been thinking about lately is how everyone's habits are now in flux, right? Like the routines that you had in the past are different now than they were before. And the things that drew me to Serenbe, as well as the people that live there are like, like things that to me have to do with the slow movement. Like it's not about going so fast and it's not about like, sure you care about being successful, but you know, you care about gardening.
Monica Olsen (1h 0m 8s):
You care about the arts, you care about being healthy. And you know, you look at what's happening today and it's funny cause you know, Monica and I talked earlier, Monica, you mentioned like you were back, you, your space is very well weeded. And you're thinking about like new things that you're going to plant, you know, like I'm working on art projects with my kids. We're, we're, we're picking up these habits that are really, to me, part of the slow movements. And it's like, we've all been moving so fast in this world and I'm sure it's much worse in kind of, of the denser cities, the metropolitan areas, the coastal cities and you know, while it's not good, it has, you know, made everyone in this country like pause and think about like they have, maybe they have more time on their hands.
Monica Olsen (1h 0m 58s):
I'm guessing they do. And yeah, sure. Some people are watching way more of Netflix than they should, but others are actually doing things like there's a big rise in yeast and baking right now, right. People are becoming Dakers, they're, they're picking up old habits that they loved picking up new habits. But to me they're all habits that have to do with the slow movements. And when I think about Serenbe like, that was what was really special. Like they're doing things that are really like, you know, like something that is like, like this inner motivation. So that's, what's really cool. So I'm actually not surprised to hear that things haven't changed that much. And it's, it's going to be interesting to see how we are permanently affected companies that resisted employees working remotely now have been forced into it.
Monica Olsen (1h 1m 49s):
And so when you're talking about more time, just imagine traveling in these freeway destinations. And so if we see that there's more quality time and possibly more productivity at the same time, possibly permanently change our habits. And I think in addition to that, like there is the benefit to mother earth, which is there's less pollution in the world right now because nobody's driving and you know, with what you said, I think it is kind of like a catalyst to like we were, we were moving this way with the distributed workforce and now it's like, we are forced to do it.
Monica Olsen (1h 2m 29s):
And you sure, like I know like with my daughter doing homeschooling, it is not efficient. It is quite hard to do so we're trying to figure out how to do it much better. So like, I think in the next few months, the pace of innovation across the board is going to accelerate and probably the pace of innovation with productivity tools in the workforce, you're going to see like move faster than anything. So I agree with you. And I actually do hope that, you know, it gets better because it is better for the environment. It is better. Like, I think I've heard that the average worker is productive for four hours of their eight hour work day. So if you're able to condense that to four hours in your home, you know, you've got like, let's say the average drive time is 30 minutes to an hour across the country.
Monica Olsen (1h 3m 16s):
Like all of that time saved, you can actually dedicate to other things that you care about and you can have a better quality of life and in doing so, it makes you more productive in those four hours that you're working. I wonder if some of these people that are seeing blue sky for the first time, will they realize that that is possible and will there be a bigger movement? Yeah, I think so. Like you can imagine, like it really comes to like, like a movement starts small and it goes big. So even like people in, in Asia where we know there's a lot of pollution, like you said, in Beijing and Shanghai where the particulates are lower than they ever been, like, it's going to be them saying, we need to figure out what we need to do.
Monica Olsen (1h 4m 1s):
So yeah. I agree. Like there's lots of, you know, while it's an unfortunate situation, I'm sure like, you know, if we look at the back half of this, it's a rebirth of how we think about, and hopefully it means a rebirth in a way that we are smarter and we treat the earth better. Well, I think that's a great place to end. That is wonderful. That's still going to be going on. Cause we can put up a link when this comes out in a couple of weeks. I think. So I will share that link with you. We can't wait to have you back.
Monica Olsen (1h 4m 43s):
I'm excited to come back this time with my family. Cause I think once I do, I'll convince my wife, why we need to move there. I need to be in San Francisco. I know. I know. Thanks for having me take care. Thank you for listening to Serenbe stories. New episodes are available on Mondays. Please rate and review the podcast and make sure to email your questions for Steve. Nygren two stories@Serenbe.com may even get to hear them on the podcast.
Monica Olsen (1h 5m 25s):
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