How David Lindahl turned a Twitter account into a thriving Shopify brand, the hard lessons he learned, and what you can take from his journey to build something of your own.
“Rainier Watch started as me shouting into the void about whether the mountain was out. Now, it’s a brand in REI. Didn’t see that coming.”
David Lindahl started Rainier Watch as a simple Twitter account—just a guy posting updates on whether Mount Rainier was visible that day. No business plan, no grand vision. Just a love for the mountain.
But then people started following. They started asking for stickers. And suddenly, David found himself running an e-commerce brand. What began as a hobby turned into a business selling apparel, getting into retail stores like REI, and building a loyal community of outdoor enthusiasts.
This week, we follow David’s journey—from side project to full-time business. How he scaled his Shopify store, navigated wholesale partnerships, and made every mistake possible before finally getting it right. Along the way, we look at what happens when an entrepreneur outgrows their own operation, the challenges of building a brand rooted in a specific place, and what it really takes to turn a passion into a sustainable business.
🛍 Shop Rainier Watch: https://shop.rainierwatch.com/
💡 Cleverific – Smart order editing for Shopify: https://cleverific.com/unofficial
🚀 Zipify – Optimize your Shopify store with Zipify: http://zipify.com/KURT
📍 Address Validator – Prevent shipping mistakes before they happen: https://www.addressvalidator.com/
🔹 Grow your Shopify store with me: https://ethercycle.com/apply
📈 See our recent client successes: https://ethercycle.com/work
Kurt Elster
This episode is sponsored in part by ViralSweep. When was the last time you ran a sweepstakes or giveaway? If you're worried about staying legally compliant or figuring out fair winner selection, meet Viral Sweep. the best viral marketing app for Shopify stores. With ViralSweep, you could build, run, and manage all kinds of campaigns that drive traffic and boost your brand's visibility. Want to engage your customers? Use ViralSweep's Instagram giveaway picker, or save yourself time with automated winner selection and prize distribution. ViralSweep also ensures your promotions stay legally compliant so you can run campaigns without a hitch. Plus, you'll get impactful analytics and seamless integrations to keep everything smooth. Need help? ViralSweep support team has you covered with options for managed services too. Supercharge your customer engagement today. Download ViralSweep on the Shopify App Store. and start creating contests that grow your brand. New customers can get 50% off of Viral Sweep's annual plan. Just tell them in the live chat that the unofficial Shopify podcast sent you. That's viral sweep. Today on the unofficial Shopify podcast, how a simple Twitter account became a thriving Shopify brand. Yes, a mountain, an idea, and a Twitter account. Now is a line of products you could purchase in REI. How did that happen? Well, we're gonna find out when we hear from David Lindall of Rain Your Watch. David, how are you doing? Welcome to the show.
David Lindahl
Good, good. Uh stoked to officially be here. But I'm I'm a little ill, but I'm doing great. Doing great.
Kurt Elster
Actually, you know, it's it's that time of year. It's it's Q1. We're all it's cold out. We're all a little sick. But okay. Tell me what Rain Your Watch is. Because I know it it started as a Twitter account over ten years ago.
David Lindahl
Not a watch company. Let me get that out there right away. Although I may have plans for April Fools. We'll see. I don't know.
Kurt Elster
So not a watch company yet.
David Lindahl
Yet. I get that all the time. Which makes sense.
Kurt Elster
A Twitter account called Rainier Watch that doesn't sell watches, but is instead about a mountain
David Lindahl
Yeah, it's basically how I describe it is kind of a fan club, fan fest, sort of community-driven love affair for the mountain. It's the it's this landmark that you can see on the horizon when it's sunny out and clear, which being the Pacific Northwest, the rumors are true. It rains quite a bit, so that's only fifty to seventy five days a year, roughly, that the mountain is out, quote unquote. So it's a local phrase. It's a local sort of awesome thing that people love and they look forward to. And so years and years and years ago, I was commuting into downtown Seattle on a bus and wanted to know like, is there some sort of way for people to know if the mountain's out? Back then there wasn't, so I started tweeting and then it kind of just snowballed from there, kind of went up and down different peaks and valleys, but Now we're here today and I'm designing and selling merchandise that's all inspired by the mountain. I get back a portion to the national parks because that is kind of core to the mission of the brand. Um, but it's been quite the journey learning pretty much everything myself as I go.
Kurt Elster
And am I was I correct? Can do you have products in REI?
David Lindahl
Yeah, I think it's eleven stores in Washington at last count. Um Which there's a lot of REI stores in Washington, so it's a good state to be in.
Kurt Elster
So really this it it starts as a hobby on Twitter where you're you're posting photographs. How does that become a brand? Like that's a hobby. It sounds fun, but why build a whole store about it?
David Lindahl
It wasn't right away. It definitely took many years. And there's a couple of years where I didn't tweet a whole lot if you were to look at like a Twitter timeline. And then I don't know what kind of sparked the idea, but I'm sure some people asked about stickers. How can we, you know, let's get some mountain stickers and that sort of thing. So I built first couple of versions of the store were terrible. First couple versions of all the products were pretty bad. Um and it just kind of grew from there, but it's been really, really fun to be able to design and make physical products. Like I come from a background in uh web development and before that financial services and so like it's all kind of like computer things. And so it's really cool to be able to go, hey, look I'm gonna design this and then uh make it and touch it and hold it and wear it. And one of the coolest things ever, I know a lot of brand owners will say this, but like one of the coolest things ever, and it still blows my mind to this day to see other people That have spent their hard earned cash like purchasing my products and wearing them out in the wild. I usually just go like white and like, what? That's that's a real human over there wearing my shirt. Do you ever approach them or is it too weird? I haven't yet. I've been one of my favorite stories was like early a couple years ago when the brand wasn't as big as it is now. I was walking down the aisle on an airplane flight with my wife, and I was holding like the hat in my hand, one of the original hats, and someone said as I was walking down the aisle, Hey, is that a Rearwatch hat? And I didn't know what to say. I was just like shocked that someone else in the world knew about the little tiny thing that felt like I was shouting into the void all the time. I was like, yeah, it is. And I kept going. And I regret, I regret not saying, oh yeah, that's my company. I do it a little bit more um I've sort of broken through that wall a little bit, but it feels, I don't know, very uncomfortable and very awkward for the introvert in me.
Kurt Elster
I've learned to keep my mouth shut. over the I've been doing this over ten years and we've managed some pretty big Shopify brands. And so it's not uncommon for me to encounter them in the wild. And I used to just blurt out. I'd be like, oh my gosh, you know, Hoonigan, Harney, whatever. I managed that website. And every time they would stare at me like I was the biggest liar in the universe. And so I just was like, oh you know, you're a fan of that, cool. And then I'd move on with my life.
David Lindahl
No one cares, Girl, no one cares.
Kurt Elster
Yeah, nobody cares. So I learned the hard way. But yeah, it it is weird. You know, obviously this would have started as a side hustle. I saw on Twitter, have you you've moved this into a warehouse?
David Lindahl
Yeah, started in my spare bedroom a couple of years ago, the shop when I launched it. I think I officially launched it in 2018. And then It outgrew the spare bedroom and my wife was like, we need to be able to walk down our hall. Like, what are you doing here? Like, okay. So I built this. Yep, exactly. This is not fire department approved. Uh so I built this backyard office shed that I'm in now, which was probably two, three years ago, and it's two hundred square feet, so it's a good size, but within a year or two boxes were spilling out onto the the lawn. Like it was over filled with product. And product like t-shirts and sweatshirts and that sort of thing. They take up a good amount of space, hats and beanies. And so now I'm in a local warehouse that I have that I found. Um and I have someone helping ship my orders. Like I'm slowly I'm being pretty lean as I go, but slowly kind of diversifying the tasks a little bit so it's not just me doing everything, which is how it started.
Kurt Elster
What's the turning point where you start to feel like Renee Your Watch could become a sustainable business as opposed to hobby or passion project?
David Lindahl
That ha that sort of thought realization hit me in the last year or two. And for the longest time it was more of just like this is a fun little passion project. It's something I do on the weekends or whatever. It's like what I do I remember spending my lunch breaks on Instagram and that sort of thing, like super getting up at 5 a. m. and working on it before the day job, like all sorts of the typical side hustle kind of activities. Um But it's really felt like over the last two years it's got a lot of momentum. Getting into REI was one of the biggest tipping points, I think. There's there was just like a a multiplier effect from that where there's a legitimacy of being in there. There's obviously the wholesale revenue that's coming in from that, but Um, I think there's been huge steps if you look at the growth charts from Runner Watch from going from like the little side hustle revenue to like, okay, this could be a real thing. Obviously the TAM isn't very big, it's a very niche, kind of geospecific brand, but I've got thoughts and ideas about that as I look forward, look at the future, and think about the one to five year plan for the brand. Um So it's been it's that's been something that has really hit me over the last two years. Well it's like, hey, this could be this could be a job. Which is fun because I love it. And like I'm sitting here all day doing things that I would rather would I'd rather be designing new jackets, for example, like working on new products and designing out new stuff. And that's just it that keeps me going.
Kurt Elster
So getting into REI is a big moment. That's a big deal. W how did that partnership come about?
David Lindahl
With the coolest email I've ever gotten.
Kurt Elster
They reached out to you?
David Lindahl
Yeah. Oh my god. It was unreal. It was unreal. So I was sitting there Uh and this email came through that was like, hey, I'm a store manager at local REI. I saw your brand. I'd love to carry it in my store. Can we chat? And I was like, is this fishing? Is this real? I showed my Y ran inside, like, oh, it's an REI. It's a brand, it's like a it's a company I've looked up to for many, many years. My dad would drag us hours away to the closest REI growing up and Um, so it's been just unreal to think of them as a partner. And it's a little bit different than their typical wholesale process. Like I'm not in their national chains, I'm just in the local stores here. in Washington, but it started with one shop, um, and I know the store owner, she's awesome and it grew from there, basically it kinda just snowballed and other stores were like, Oh, that's cool, that's selling well, like let's carry it and then one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, I think it's I think it's eleven, like I was saying earlier.
Kurt Elster
No. And you even with that that local presence that's still significant, being in one REI store would be nice. Being in eleven is great. So I I wouldn't undersell the impact of that. Cause you mentioned the the REI ripple effect, right? Where people are discovering it in store and then they're buying online. You know, what's your your perception of the impact of having that that retail partnership?
David Lindahl
Huge. Yeah. I I mean I don't have exact numbers, but I I do have a a post-purchase survey set up. Shout out Kano. Um and so there's people that will respond in those surveys like, hey, I saw an REI, and I get people all the time that will mention that and the I feel like it's a huge it builds so much brand equity. It's like a a um like a cornerstone of the brand be like, hey, we're an REI. And it also helps being a foundation for other wholesale accounts too. Hey We've got products in this store. This is like the biggest name for outdoor retailing in our region, if not like top five in the country kind of thing. Like it's it's a huge name. And so people seeing it there, people love to be able to touch apparel products and see them in person. I've done many pop-ups over the years, and that's like a huge takeaway from that experience is People want to touch the things. And also my shirts are like the softest t-shirts that you'll find, according to my customers. And so them being able to touch and hold those.
Kurt Elster
You were the stores on Shopify now, and that's part of why we're here. Prior to Shopify, you know, when you were just doing stickers, it wasn't on Shopify, was it?
David Lindahl
Oh man. V1 was on hard, like C A R R D, the single page web builder. Horrific website. Yeah, I would that's my reaction. This was before I was in web development. So this was like many, many years ago, and like I didn't know what I was doing, and it was so ugly and terrible, and it was linked to I don't even remember how the payments were processed. Gumroad, maybe? Um couple stickers. That was it. After that I moved it to Big Cartel when I got a couple t-shirts and And then after that I moved it to WuCom. It was on WoomCom for a couple of years because I was like So you tried them all. Oh yeah. I was a web developer at that point. I was like, I can manage a server. That sounds fun. Who loves DevOps? No one. No one loves DevOps. Yeah. Don't do it. That's one of my biggest regrets actually for running my store is not being on Shopify from day one. Um after WuCom, I went to a headless Shopify build that I built. Also a big mistake
Kurt Elster
You're like, all right, no matter what, let's just pick the harder tools. So once you once you finally get around to adopting Shopify, um, and you know, truthfully I'm in the same boat. Our agency site, we've been managing our own lamp stack. for over a decade and I am finally moving it to Shopify. So I'm looking forward to that. But once you once you you saw the light, you moved it to Shopify. How did that over like what was that experience? How did that fix some of your challenges?
David Lindahl
Amazing. It was amazing. So before that I was using Square is a PUS for a lot of the pop-ups. I was having to sync orders between WuCom and Square and having to either pay for an app to do that or it was just a giant headache and it didn't work. And there's inventory issues all over the place. And it was also just hard to use. You know, you spend half of your time in Wukom updating all the plugins to make sure there's not some sort of security vulnerability.
Kurt Elster
Neither hacked.
David Lindahl
Yeah, exactly.
Kurt Elster
You'd get those emails weekly. They're like, hey, I got hacked again. You're like, okay, let's figure this out.
David Lindahl
Yeah. And being a UIUX guy, like the Shopify UIUX just blows away Wukam. Like it's a thousand years in the future, better, way more features, the system the like the the environment and the feature set, everything's more robust. I remember being off put by the price, like the monthly fixed cost, but you know, at that point when you're managing your own server and then adding then things. It is cheaper actually to use Shopify. There's more things out of the box that you can do. The app ecosystem is like insanely powerful.
Kurt Elster
And that documentation. Oh my gosh. Consistent, coherent, generally up-to-date documentation.
David Lindahl
Yeah.
Kurt Elster
You I you mentioned you When you went to Shopify, you're like, hey, I'm a nut. So I uh or I'm sorry, developer. Uh and so you did a headless solution. Tell me about it for Someone who's not experienced with this, you know, what advice you would give someone considering uh a headless solution on ShopDock? Don't do it.
David Lindahl
Don't do it. But why? Being a developer, oftentimes you fall into the trap of like, I'll build it myself and it'll be better. And I'll have more control that way. And that's so the headless, that was one of the allure of the headless. I was also like, oh, I'll experiment and try this out and see what happens. Um it wasn't from scratch. I was using like a package basically on my favorite CMS platform. And so the CMS itself was like really powerful and it was really good for content, but it was definitely lacking when it came to e-comm. And It got to the point where it's just maintenance was too much. And I would recommend like how this is great if you have enough budget to pay for at least one or two full-time developers, which is not cheap. And Like there's other advantages maybe there, but like overall, there's I feel like very small situations where how this would make sense, especially in today's world where Shopify, this was like three years ago at least, I think, four years ago maybe now. And so Shopify's the like the hosted platforms fantastic. Like there's not a lot of uses. I think a lot of the big reason people reach for headless is speed, but that's I don't think an issue anymore. And it's not even that big of issue in general. Like it's uh sort of a People look to that as like site speed is like the end all be all, but it's not really that that important when it comes to a website. There's more important fish to fry in terms of the grand equation for conversion. So I would yeah, I would say like for the vast majority of merchants it's not definitely not worth it uh unless you want lots of payment.
Kurt Elster
I agree with that. I mean we haven't and you said like hey Shopify's you know the Shopify core, those tools have gotten better. In Headless's defense, they're the tools that one would use to build a headless Shopify site have gotten better as well. But it is a series of trade-offs where like you're giving up convenience to get just more significant control. Yeah, w yeah, we still have yet to build a headless site, but I have moved people from headless back to Shopify. And often they're like, just hey, the trade-off there wasn't worth it. Um but you know I know there are there are people who defend it and enjoy it.
David Lindahl
Um there's always people.
Kurt Elster
Yeah.
David Lindahl
For anything, there's always people.
Kurt Elster
Ever wake up to customers canceling orders? Maybe they said, I shouldn't shop when I'm high. This was a gift we broke up. Those are all real customer quotes. And they're all a real hassle for your customer and you. Why should the customer have to ask you to edit their order for them? What if they could do it themselves? Enter Cleverific! With Cleverific, you can empower your customers to make their own changes through a self-service portal. Cleverific is designed to reduce customer support tickets ship orders faster, and even reduce returns and lost packages. Don't just take our word for it. Menswear retailer Peter Manning New York cut their order support queries by 99% with Cleverific, and they're not alone. Exclusively For listeners of the unofficial Shopify podcast, get 50% off Cleverific's Pro Plan, now just $49 a month, giving you full access to everything Cleverific has to offer Just go to cleverific. com slash unofficial and use the promo code KERT50, that's K-R-U-T-50, at checkout to claim your discount. Take control with Cleverific and watch your customer support tickets plummet, shipping speeds increase, and package returns decrease. And all of that means happier customers. Back to your brand, back to reading your watch. It's very local, right? You have to Do you have to be familiar with this with the local landscape to appreciate this? Um, you know, is that pro or con? Like you've got this regional identity that is core to the marketing. Is there challenges to that? Give me your thoughts.
David Lindahl
Yeah, being super niche is there's trade-offs, but like it is it's really nice because people love love the mountain and people are obsessed with it and that's where the brand draws its identity, obviously, and the origin story and everything like that. So there's people that will be like super fans because of that and get behind it. And that's been really, really awesome to talk to people. Obviously, some of the limitations are smaller TAM and not having like as accessible target market.
Kurt Elster
Uh TAM, totally addressable market.
David Lindahl
Yeah, sorry. Throwing on acronyms. Um what's really interesting with that though is like I before I looked at the data, I was thinking like most of the orders would be in Washington. That makes sense. Like it's a Washington thing. Over half the orders come from out of state. So it's a lot of people that have visited Mount Rainier or been in the Seattle area and seen Tahoma or Mount Rainier out and thought it was really cool. or used to live here, grew up here, I get messages and ri people writing in reviews and all sorts of context around that where it's like, hey, my grandpa grew up on a farm and I visited him when I was six years old and we could see the mountain out from our cow pasture and it was the coolest thing ever. Um so it's a lot of like hearkening to that.
Kurt Elster
Um thinking out loud here, but If you visit a tourist town, right, you're gonna find lots of gift shops that sell lots of very local stickers and apparel. Could that be a a lucrative in-store expansion effort for you? Like are those opportunities out there? Have you thought about it?
David Lindahl
Yeah, I've tried a little bit. Um wholesale's tricky, especially as a founder, because it kind of feels like a thousand slaps in the face until you get one yes. Store owners, small store owners like that are so crazy busy. Like they get 20 emails a day from people that are like, hey, put my stuff in your store, it'd be perfect. And so they're just inundated. And so a couple of years ago I tried to put more of an effort into that where I'd be sourcing and searching and emailing and calling and and all this and visiting all these local shops. And I just kind of got discouraged by it all because there was such a high rejection rate of like 90 plus percent. And so I think there are there are there is some potential there. And I've gotten into the national park like last year, which was really cool. And so I'm definitely focused on the high traffic areas, um, but there are dozens of little boutiques and that sort of thing that have the more touristy kind of things that there could be some ROI there probably to that's untapped.
Kurt Elster
Yeah. And at the same time, it may not be worth the effort. It's hard to know. You know, it's easy for me to suggest it and spend your time for you. Yeah. But I don't you have done pop-up markets, in-person events. In other interviews, the businesses that have done those have been very successful because they're able to connect with people face to face. Tell me about your experience.
David Lindahl
Yeah, I definitely recommend doing pop-ups and in-person events with people because I think that the that close feedback loop is is so key. Like being able to see what people are touching and gravitating towards and And feeling and answering those questions and connecting with people in person, especially when it's around a shared love for the mountain. Like I've shared so many stories with people in person about talking about their experiences and their stories behind talking about Mount Rainier and also their interactions with the brand. A lot of the brand was built up. about sharing on Instagram and Twitter when the mountain was out. And so people will come and be like, oh hey, like you reshared my Twitter post or my Instagram story that one time. Like, oh no way, that's really cool. I don't remember that. But it is awesome. Sometimes I do remember it though. But that personal connection, the brand is very, very community driven. And so having kind of boots on the ground and talking to people in person has been super important. And I did a I don't know 30 plus pop-up is for the last couple of years. I took I've taken the last year or so off because I have two small kids at home and weekends are for chasing them around and not chasing around customers in a marketplace. Um, but it's I would definitely recommend it to any founders out there because you can have that like really close personal connection with people and see exactly what they're looking at and touching and that's not something you can really tell on a website as much.
Kurt Elster
And so that leads me to Community. You it seems you've managed to build a community around this, and that's been you know part of the journey, but also you know a part of the the success. Tell me about what's worked for you for fostering that engagement or helping keep that community uh engaged.
David Lindahl
Yeah, it's that's community's been huge. And that's been One of the better parts over the years, especially on Instagram before they changed their algo, but like the Instagram community was massive and people were really involved with the brand and Now Instagram's sort of a struggle because they don't like to show posts to followers anymore. It's not about that.
Kurt Elster
I know, it's just like reels keep you swiping. And even if you do get a successful reel, You know, it's so fleeting. Like what's really the value there? I don't know anymore. I Instagram's still fun, but Yeah.
David Lindahl
I can rant a lot about that. 'Cause that built a lot of the brand. Like Instagram the Twitter or the Instagram account has like sixty thousand followers or whatever. And a lot of that was built around a community of people who wanted to see more about the mountain and just like share that love for Mount Rainier and that's and none of you know, now the algorithm and all the likes and follows and like that sort of thing is so low compared to what those numbers are. And so that's been sort of a challenge. Like I have a private Facebook group and that's been somewhat successful, not as high as I'd like in terms of success. I'm a perfectionist and so I judge everything by a very high standard and that hasn't been up to the standard that I want. And that's one of my focuses going forward. And that's why I built the Facebook group was like, hey Let's get back to the core concept of this and kind of just build a community around Mount Raidier and how do we do that? Facebook group was one of the best options, I thought. And so it's a focus. It's a challenge.
Kurt Elster
So that is one of the problems, you know, you build an audience and build a community. on a social media platform, but then years from now, you're you're always at their mercy. And so if you have a situation like Instagram where one day they just up and decide, guess what? We want to just rip off TikTok's formula. and suddenly your posts don't show to people anymore or you know Facebook which essentially like remember Facebook pages we all had to have them we all had to post them And now it it's not even a discussion anymore. Like okay, Facebook groups are still a thing. H for how long? And it is sometimes it feels like you know you're building building a house on quicksand with these social media platforms. Maybe that's just what we're we're supposed to expect is these things are fleeting.
David Lindahl
It's definitely hard. There's I don't know if there's really like a really good answer to where to build the community going forward, but it does feel like things are More splintered than usual nowadays. And obviously with TikTok going bye bye. Yeah, email's great and TikTok's going bye bye, so it's like, who knows?
Kurt Elster
Yeah. Product development. I want to talk about that. Because you start with stickers, t-shirts. That's just fairly easy. It's it's print on demand. But since then You have expanded this product line. You've got a broader range of items. You're wearing a fleece jacket, which looks nice. How what's your criteria? How do you decide what's getting added?
David Lindahl
That's tough. I thought about hiring sort of a merchandising expert because I think I'm at the point where that like that will be a useful sort of c consultant to come in and take a look at things, but it's because it's I don't know as I don't know what I'm doing there. But basically, I do try and look at like what works and and it's a lot of testing. I feel like that's what's tricky with an apparel brand because you're not sure exactly what's gonna stick. And so it's a lot of me testing out different types of designs, different products. But essentially it's like it's pretty you know, they're all kind of apparel. It's like t-shirts, hats, beanies. Uh this jacket was my best selling product ever, so I'm gonna be leaning into that a little bit more. Maybe a lot more into the future. Um, and going back to like the Tam, like this is something that people that don't know about Montranier aren't you know, they're more apt to buy something like this rather than a hat that says Mount Rainier on it. And so it is kind of the brand expansion in my mind. So product developments it's sometimes it's just kind of what I like. In some ways. And it's a lot of trying to figure out what people want. And that is hard. It it definitely at the beginning I was doing more print-on-demand t-shirts, print-on-demand sweatshirts, and trying to figure out like what was sticking and did it have viability there. That was sort of the MVP model at the time that I was building. And it things were doing well. So I I moved on from there. And that's kind of what you have to do is like take these baby steps to figure out like, hey, what's working, look at what's working, double down on that and keep going and push that pedal and s try and find try and find those gas pedals which are often very elusive.
Kurt Elster
And so you that approach where you're it's iterative, you're working through revisions of products or product lines. I was curious if you have an example of how customer feedback has changed a product over time.
David Lindahl
Oh, the t-shirts. So the t-shirts are interesting. I basically made these I guess it's more of this is more of an example of how marketing's changed based on customer feedback, but it's it's very interesting because the t-shirts that I started with a couple of years ago, I call them the eco-tees, and I landed on using them because they're the most eco-friendly t-shirts out there. There's like five different hugely cool things about them that from an eco standpoint, eco-friendly standpoint. It's like hundred gallons of water saved by each t-shirt, six recycled water bottles saved from the ocean, carbon neutral. um sustainable trees, like all these ingredients that go into it that are really like sustainable or um ethical manufacturing, all these things. And I've s evolved the story around them a little bit because when I look at a lot of the customer feedback and the reviews and talk to customers, the number one reason that people buy them is that they're butter, smooth. Uh they're super, super soft. And so And they're comfortable. And like that's been really interesting because it's sort of a evolution in how I do marketing and how I'm thinking about products is hey, listen to your customer a little bit more, David. You know, the people say that, but it's true. And so That narrative around this product line has shifted a little bit more into the comfort arena and like this is gonna be the top t-shirt that you grab in your drawer because it's the most comfortable and that's what people are saying. And and leaning into those reviews and that's evolved a lot of the storytelling around those products and it's kind of also shifted my grand thinking process when it comes to products. Like I want to focus a lot more on perhaps comfort. Eco friendly is still gonna be important to me 'cause that's uh that's like one of my values and it's what I want the brand to be and it also makes sense as sort of a mission driven company to have a focus on sustainability and making sure that the earth is around in its current state for my daughter and my son. Like that's those are important elements of the brand that I want to involve, but like that might not be important to anyone else. Or it might just be the underline that makes them feel good after the purchase.
Kurt Elster
And so I would suspect though for an outdoor focused brand that sustainability becomes more important more often for your customers. Um are you familiar with Shopify Planet?
David Lindahl
Yeah, is that the carbon offset program? Yes. Yeah, I use that.
Kurt Elster
Okay. Cool. Yeah, we just we did an episode about Shopify Planet, and that's that's what I asked. Yeah, they have that that cool badge that tells you like this is how much it's offset. Um I like Planet. But the So you do you you there is some cause marketing here. Like you donate a portion of your sales to national parks or or wildfire relief. How how has that The how has that social impact influenced, you know, the the brand, your marketing, or or benefited you?
David Lindahl
Going back to like what I was saying, it's a lot of I haven't really tested conversion rates, but from what a lot of what I read and a lot of what I hear from people that are smarter than me, like it's it is kind of that underline that makes them the customer feel good about the purchase. And that makes a lot of sense to me. And it's it's kind of more of like These are things that tie directly. Like you're saying, it's an outdoor brand that's focused on sort of this shared love for Mount Rainier. And so donating back to the mountain just makes sense. Like it's kind of supporting the parks, giving back. I think that There there are people that definitely care about that, and there are customers that definitely care about that. And that's been part of the brand for many, many years and being a member of 1% for the planet. And so Using those USPs as sort of the underlying after the purchase or during the purchase, I think helps, but I don't think I think in the past I've fallen into the trap of thinking that it's like the number one reason why people buy And I'm not sure that's entirely true. I think it's it's more of like a secondary supplemental sort of like this is this is good, so I'm gonna purchase it. Or I'm gonna purchase it, but oh I'm really gonna purchase it now, kind of thing.
Kurt Elster
Hey, aren't you forgetting something? If you're not using OneClick Upsell, you're leaving 10 to 15% of your total Shopify revenue on the table. OneClick Upsell is the number one upsell app. for over 15,000 Shopify stores. Listen to these brands, Tushy, Dr. Squatch, Buffy and Victoria Beckham, and guess what? It's already made sellers, just like you, an extra $750 million in upsell revenue. With one-click upsell, you can add AI-powered upsell funnels to every product on your store. including upsells on your product pages, shopping cart, checkout, and thank you page, even on the shop app, so you increase your average order value automatically. And getting started as a breeze. You can install the app, launch your first upsell, and start making 10 to 15% more cash from every customer beginning on day one, as in today. Don't leave behind another dollar in free upsell revenue. Go to zipify. com slash Kurt and try one-click upsell free for 30 days. That's zipify. com slash K U R T. It sounds like customers are more likely to buy because of these social impact initiatives, but also it reinforces the brand's values and adds all important authenticity. Do you ever get challenged on transparency or authenticity because you have these, you know, uh social values as part of the brand?
David Lindahl
Um not that often. There are people that challenge some of the different initiatives that I've done. I've done initiatives to help diversity support diversity and inclusion in the outdoors and giving back to nonprofits and organizations that support LGBTQ and BIPOC initiatives in the outdoors because those are folks that don't feel safe. And a lot of people struggle to understand that who aren't part of those communities. And so that's been There's been a lot of pushback, especially in Facebook ads.
Kurt Elster
Facebook ads are where uh the Facebook comments though. What do you Yeah okay? So when you get when you get a crappy Facebook comment on an ad, because that for a lot of people I uh they seem to get some joy out of leaving crappy comments on ads, right? They're like, ha, you tried to make me buy, but I outsmarted you. You know, good job, buddy. Uh how do you handle those? What do you do with them?
David Lindahl
I feel like there's 1% of humanity that's just sitting in there on Facebook ads like, I'm gonna get him, I'm gonna get 'em! They're just gonna drive him crazy. Got it. Um Yeah. For for a little while, like it kind of needled me because I was responding to all those myself and it felt like little kind of jabs because it's this is my brand, this is my passion project. Like I care a lot and deeply about this, and it's like all these little things where it's like Blah blah blah. I'm like, oh, ouch, ouch. But I've got a thicker skin, and one thing I've done over the last couple months is I've started to use AI. Here's the big buzzword everyone's talking about over the last couple of years. But I've used ChatGPT to answer a lot of these Facebook comments. I feel like it sort of has added a protective layer to my ego, I guess, because It's not me answering it. I'm like, ah, you go right on response because it it took a little bit it took like more effort to answer that the ad comment when it was negative and felt like it was hurting me or hurting the brand when it was myself responding, but when it's someone else writing it and it's like, oh yeah, that looks good. Here we go. Boom boom. That addresses all their concerns and was very nice and not as snarky as I would be, so we're cool. But there's been countless times where I have hide block deleted wait. Hide delete block. I think that's the order. To people that leave silly, like obviously not gonna be a customer. Goodbye, kinda comments.
Kurt Elster
Yeah, I think there's a a lot of stuff that like you you look at it and you know immediately it is not worth engaging with. This person is not here for They're yeah, they're just a troll. They don't want you to convince them. They but they they certainly want the the engagement. Um so yeah, those you just dump. And then some, you know, you could kind of tell like, oh, they're they're pushing back, but not necessarily in a mean-spirited way, you know, or maybe like a place of genuine curiosity. And those are are worthwhile to respond to. But ChatGPT as a writing partner can be, you know, garbage in, garbage out. If you tell it like, look, this is the situation, this is the context, this is what I'm trying to say, you know, be my editor, be my writing partner. help me do this without being emotionally involved, invested. That's where it really can shine in situations like that. 'Cause you are, you know, it is not emotional, right? In the same way that you are. It could kind of empathize a little bit. Um, but yeah, no, it it takes this thing out of it. And it honestly it'll keep you from saying something stupid.
David Lindahl
Yeah. What I want to say versus what Jack Dributy said.
Kurt Elster
Yeah. And yeah, yeah, when it has the context. It's funny, like I've I've given it situations like that, and it'll be like, oh boy, tensions are are really hot here. We c we gotta We gotta smooth uh cool things off. That's kind of funny. For a lot of Shopify brands that are starting out, you know, they'll get everything right. the look, the the brand, the product, you know, they they'll start to reach an audience. But then the thing that's always missing, that's hard, that because it's such a soft skill is brand storytelling. And that's a thing that you have really you have mastered, you're able to communicate because you've you this came out of a genuine love and hobby over a decade. And so tell me about that that that storytelling aspect of this brand.
David Lindahl
I'd say mastered used lightly in that context, but I'm still learning. I'm still learning a lot about storytelling. I think that it is Especially these days with running a brand, like I feel like there's so many brands out there. It's so easy to throw like a website up and the cool template and that sort of thing and make some sweet products or whatever. And Sometimes the the brand is just kind of empty or void when you peek behind the curtain and that's the story and telling brings the humanity to it and it it kind of is able to make it more of a real thing rather than just kind of a website or a cool veneer kind of thing. Um I wouldn't say I'm great at it. I'm definitely learning a lot better by watching other brands that are doing more storytelling. Uh I short form video obviously is super hot these days, and I'm trying to lean into that a little bit more, even over the last couple weeks, where it's Me making a video about going to REI to do a restock, for example. Like that did pretty well the other day. I want to lean into more of my own sort of founder-led company persona. Um For marketing reasons, because people buy from people these days. That's why influencers have been so huge over the last few years is you know, people will still buy from brands, but I think that that will we're seeing a decline of that where it's like people buy from people, and that's that's kind of Putting that humanity behind the brand and telling the story of, hey, this is the brand. This is like I started tweeting, I started with two or three hundred dollars and and built this brand into something that's Like hopefully gonna hit seven figures in the next year or two. We'll see.
Kurt Elster
Um but Yeah, I think Kiss of Death is when you the customer goes to an about page. Because like they're interested in the product, but they don't know the brand, they're not familiar. And they'll go to the about page to get a sense of it. And there'll be an about page, but it will be in a generic story that starts with here at ECME Corp. We val and then there are no photos, there's no names, and I immediately that reads to me as suspicious. Right? And I don't buy.
David Lindahl
Like, drop people don't like dropshippers, like, and that's kind of what some of those could be possibly. And There was a brand the other like literally in the last week or two I bounced from a website because I did that same thing, went to the about page. There's a couple sentences, no pictures, like okay, so see you later. I'm gonna go check out someone else.
Kurt Elster
The f the photos, the person behind it, like that's the thing that's harder to fake. An about page. All right, I can rip that off from anywhere and then have ChatGPT rewrite it. It's not like okay, you did the easy part. Yeah. So with your your experience in this journey has been really entirely self-taught. What do you wish you knew when you started?
David Lindahl
So many things. How much time do you have? Um I think that it's really hard. So I've been, for those that don't know me, like there's a or know about this. There's a space of Twitter where it's called DTC Twitter where it's like A very niche part of the internet where there's a bunch of people in the e-com D to C space that share tips and help each other out and all sorts of stuff, for better or worse, and fight about cost caps and bid caps and no caps and all the things. But um I've been in that space. Like I check Twitter daily almost during times when I shouldn't probably. And I'm trying to lay off and more. But anyways. But it's been really fun. And that's taught me so much. But also. I think that if I could go back, I would tell myself like, hey, don't pay attention. Don't look at the shiny objects. Like, there's a lot of advice out there that gets shilled that Doesn't make sense for your brand or your context or the life cycle of where you're at in your brand. Like you you don't need this. I've fallen prey to this so many times. Like I've I've had way too many apps installed in my Shopify store. You don't need all the apps. You don't need to focus on like your post-purchase after sell conversion rate and like optimizing that because that's not the biggest gas pedal to push. You need to focus on margins, profitability. And what's gonna push the brand forward the most. And I think that's something I've tried to incorporate a lot more over the last two years is not focused on the little tiny, shiny object things, the fun, sexy things, but Focus on a lot of the core fundamentals that will build a foundation of being able to push the brand forward into the next level, which for this brand is like the seven-figure range. And that is gonna be Facebook ads or whatever like for this brand it's probably Facebook ads, but for a lot of other brands it's probably something else could be something else. A lot of brands I do think Facebook ads are the bread and butter, but it's it's focusing on a lot of those fundamentals that are like Don't build a hell the site. Just go to Shopify, build a Shopify site. Doesn't have to be pretty. Like you look at brands that don't have pretty websites that are doing way more in terms of revenue, and it's it that's not really the most important thing. Product market fit is Super super key margins are super key. That storytelling aspect comes like is woven into all of this in the context of the brand. Like building the brand is way more than installing a couple new Shopify apps. It's about getting out there and figuring out what people want. And finding those people and figuring out how to acquire those customers and how to get them back in the door.
Kurt Elster
It is excellent advice. It is not obvious to people who are new. Right. You know, it could be counterintuitive and but I I think it's important. You gotta avoid the stuff that is the shy the distractions. There's a lot of things that feel like work and positive uh reinforcement, like especially social media and organic social and that stuff, uh, that you know absolutely is not necessarily going to get you far. And you're right, thinking about contribution margin is hugely important. Especially for our payrolls, it's entirely possible to discount yourself into a death spiral of like high revenue, no profit. Um it's early in the year. You got big plans. Looking forward, what are some of the uh the future projects or goals for Ridier Watch?
David Lindahl
I'm most excited for jackets. This is something I'm gonna be leaning into like I hinted at earlier. This thing was amazing. It was my fastest selling product, like including the pre-sale, it sold out in less than a week. And I'm gonna be making a lot more jackets in the future. It's Interesting because it's taken me so long to realize this, but like I love jackets and my friends in college would call me the jacket master, which was a little silly. But and I have way too many in my in our closet kind of thing. Like my wife has told me many times you have too many jackets But it's interesting because you want to lean in I feel like as a brand owner, like it's important to lean into what you're good at and like what you know. And I know jackets really, really well, and like I know a lot of the details and I will To build this thing I tested and um looked at like half a dozen other jackets and tested over six plus months and got to a final state where it was pretty awesome. And so That's something where I'm really excited. Like I want to spend all my time just designing new jackets and I'm already laying out all these different ideas for different seasonal drops and that sort of thing. Um and there's a lot of different criteria underneath the hood that why it makes sense in terms of like margins are good and all these other things that where it does seem like a really good product product and a possible like I'm excited because I feel like I finally found Maybe a hero product that does pretty well. My ads were doing super, super well for it. Like best ads I've ever had, consistently performing like really good ROA ads and everything. Um So that's probably like the biggest thing I'm looking forward to over the next year. I think I'm also been over the last year been focusing a lot of con core concepts underneath the hood, foundational stuff that's like margins and sort of trimming out fat in operational things that are not sexy and not fun, but I need to get better at. And I've also been using a VA a lot more over the last couple of months as well as ChatGPT as sort of force multipliers to make me and my tasks faster and speed up things and I think that will help lean itself to be a better operation over the next year. I think because there's been Like it's been a really cool journey the last couple years for the brand and it's been awesome, but there's been very low lights and there's been like near-death sort of situations where I overbought on certain things and had maxed out Amex like my Amex my business Amex got frozen a couple times over this last year. Like there's I think that there's a lot of times that I think social media is a highlight reel and It's too often easy to compare yourself to the highlight reel and fall fall into that trap of like, oh, this other brand's doing amazing and blah blah blah. They're doing super cool, but There's could be a lot of things that are broken underneath his underneath the surface and um trying to keep it real and just trying to like focus on fixing a lot of those things is definitely something that won't be as fun, but I'm hoping that once I start to get a lot of that figured out going forward, like it'll help to
Kurt Elster
Build the brand better. I I agree with you. It's a breath of fresh air to hear someone be honest and admit, like, hey, it it's not perfect and social media is not real. I think we all I'll need that reminder. And it's e like when you see people post about their personal lives, I think we all know like, oh yeah, that's the highlight reel. You know, they're not telling you about the time like they got in a fight with their spouse. Like a speeding ticket. Like that stuff doesn't make it to social media. But in in business, I think it's especially true. Because there it's like, well, I I have to show how successful I am to create more opportunity. Sometimes being vulnerable is the thing you need to do. The we're starting to figure that out in personal branding. I wish business branding we could figure that out as well. My final question for you, other than where can I get one of those fabulous coats, is what advice do you have that you want to impart to other Shopify entrepreneurs?
David Lindahl
Just just go out there. I don't know. There's so many things that you don't know until you try it. And I think doing it and having that you know, you'll fail a lot. There's a lot of things that I've failed at and a lot of low lights and highlights in the roller coaster of running a brand of the last couple years and um I'm better for it like having had those experiences and it's been super stressful and I've had crazy hard moments in running the brand, but uh you don't know until you do it and and it's it is can be really fun, but it's also can be really, really hard.
Kurt Elster
The Yeah, for sure. But you live for you know when it works and when it's fun. And solving the challenges also, you know, when you you break through feels great. It's That success can be could be addictive. And that's what we live for with entrepreneurship. Man. All right. David Lindahl, ring your watch. Where do I go? How do I get one of these fabulous codes?
David Lindahl
Uh well they're basically sold out. So No!
Kurt Elster
I would well I need to get on the list then.
David Lindahl
Yeah, you do. You do. You definitely do. Uh shop. runeierwatch. com is the website. Uh the fleece jackets will be on there. There's a sign up notification you can get in case one happens to bubble up from the internet or return or that sort of thing. But there will be lots of epic more things coming very, very soon. So stay tuned on that.
Kurt Elster
And you do have like a ton of great hats and stuff.
David Lindahl
Thanks, Kurt. Appreciate it.
Kurt Elster
Crowdfunding campaigns are great. You can add social proof and urgency to your product pre-orders while reducing risk of failure But with traditional crowdfunding platforms, you're paying high fees and giving away control all while your campaign is lost in a sea of similar offers. It can be frustrating. That's why we built Crowdfunder. The Shopify app that turns your Shopify product pages into your own independent crowdfunding campaigns. We originally created Crowdfunder for our private clients. And it was so successful, we turned it into an app that anyone can use. Today, merchants using Crowdfunders have raised millions collectively. And With Crowdfunder, you'll enjoy real-time tracking, full campaign control, and direct customer engagement. And it's part of the Built for Shopify program. so you know it's easy to use. So say goodbye to high fees and hello to successful store-based crowdfunding. Start your free trial and transform your Shopify store Into a pre-order powerhouse today.
David Lindahl
Search Crowdfunder in the Shopify App Store to get started.