Hello everyone, and this Interview Episode of Architecture, Coffee, & Ink! In this episode, It’s time once again for for us to kick back with our sketchbooks and coffee cups, as we Interview Jeff Kutas, Co-Inventor and Founder of MB Sentinel Enterprises, Entrepreneur, and Published Author. On this episode, we talk about his company – which focuses on designing parcel safes and mailboxes. Additionally, he gives advice as a CEO, and tips and tricks for young designers, and those interested in potentially kicking off their own businesses. Please enjoy the episode! MB Sentinel Enterprises can be found at: https://mbsentinel.com/
A quick update, the podcast is now also on RadioPublic, and Simplecast as well! If you have a podcast platform that you would like for the show to be added on, head over to the contact page and let me know!
TRANSCRIPT:
Don’t return this to sender, as it’s time for Architecture, Coffee, & Ink.
20 second Intro Song
Hello, this is Hollywood C. and you’re listening to Architecture, Coffee, & Ink. A podcast dedicated to introducing concepts, detailing out designs, and tackling the architecture you might not realize the meaning behind. I’m your hostess and I am here today to start introducing you to the designs that make you wonder why.
tag line: So, I ask you to brew your coffee, grab your sketch book and pen, and let’s begin.
Hello everyone! And welcome to another episode of Architecture, Coffee, & Ink. I am excited to bring yet another episode. The summer is slipping away at an incredibly fast pace, and I still haven’t finished unpacking all my boxes yet. It seems like getting settled in a new place always gives you so many new opportunities, and so many new places to explore. I probably sound a bit like a broken record, but that really has been my primary focus lately. But just as the season starts to change, and we head into my favorite time of year, Spooky Season, slowly my to do lists whittles away. And with that, I am excited to announce some upcoming exciting new episodes for Spook Season, that I have been working hard on.
But first, let’s focus on today’s episode, A very Special Delivery, an Interview with Jeff Kutas. Of course the hardest part of this episode has been the avoiding the potential for mail puns. The thing about mail puns is, it’s all about delivery.
Before we begin the show, let’s introduce our guest, Jeff Kutas, co-founder of MB Sentinel, an entrepreneur, CEO, and published author. In this episode, he discusses ways that he and his company utilized design to make package delivery safer as well providing some interesting tips if you yourself are interested in becoming an entrepreneur. And with that, please enjoy the episode.
Interview Transcript:
Mr. Kutas
Hey, Hollywood.
Hollywood C.
Hey, how are you?
Mr. Kutas
Doing fantastic and yourself?
Hollywood C.
Good. Thank you.
Mr. Kutas
Thanks for having us on the show.
Hollywood C.
Thank you so much for joining us. First and foremost, welcome to the show. I’m excited to have you join, but before we dive into the details, perhaps you can introduce yourself and your company to my listeners.
Mr. Kutas
Absolutely. Well, first and foremost, thanks for having me on the show. My name is Jeff Kutas. I’m the Co-inventor and founder of MB Sentinel Enterprises, we’re a modern mailbox and parcel safe manufacturer located in Stephenville, TX.
Hollywood C.
So, all the way in Texas, you’re pretty far from me. I’m up in the Philly, so.
Mr. Kutas
There you go, spoke to someone there this morning.
Hollywood C.
Oh, really? So now of course we have to talk through your back story. What led you to where you are now and how did you recognize the need for your product?
Mr. Kutas
OK. So, you know, going back to my early years, I’ve worked in craft a lot, which means, you know, sheet metal fabrication. Just always was intrigued by, you know, anything that I could just put my hands on. I just love creating things, you know? Fast forward a little bit found myself working in public utility for about 10 years. Thought I wanted to work for a large corporation. And that seemed like a perfect fit for me at the time. But you know, once I was inside there, immersed myself, had sponsors and started to open up my world to, you know, joining the corporate side of the business, I’d figured out very quickly that that wasn’t me. So, I went back and rejoined our family business, my family. Started a Natural Health Products Company, which is more, you know, small chain of health food stores back. In the 80s. So, you know, somewhere in the mid-90s here I joined the family business and say, well, I’m going to figure out who I am and how I fit into this world and I found myself inside of natural products retail for, gosh, almost 17 years. And then, you know, as we all know, gosh, Amazon starts to come on the scene and, you know, back in the day, I’m sure you were, I don’t know if this is probably, you know, before your time, but you know, when Amazon first started selling books, you know, it was OK. It’s like, wow, border books and, you know, all these other bookstores, well, you know, wonder how that’s going to impact their business and we watched that happen. And then one day I remember when Amazon started selling diapers or one of the first things of like, what are they doing? And I thought to myself, it won’t be long before they start selling more than just diapers and more than just books that I could really understand. You know the magnitude of how the internet was going to change shopping, I mean back in that period of time we’re more familiar with mail order businesses, and things of that nature. And the days of dial-up things were moving a little bit slower, and not as many people were comfortable shopping online. But I thought to myself, wow, we’re going to have to really work hard to embrace this new way of shopping. And we have to work hard to make certain that we can compete.
You know, so I worked through that and probably spent about the last 10 years of my retail, wholesale career in natural products, retail, working hard to diversify my business, to maintain a foothold in the marketplace and to take care of our customers and, you know, just to keep that company going well.
Through all that persistence, I determined that while it’s time to make a change, there’s no way we’re going to compete at this level. And you think about how many stores, brick and mortar retail stores have closed since, you know, everyone gravitated towards online purchasing. And as well as, you know, since COVID as well also. So, I chose to close our stores in 2016 and I thought, well, I’m gonna have to reinvent myself and figure out what I’m going to do or go to work for someone, right? So, I start, you know, just processing that and had some ideas and then one day I had, you know, someone come to our home to deliver a package and I had been home and gosh, like 17 years, Hollywood. During that period, I was always busy at our brick-and-mortar retail locations, right? So, I never was really familiar with the home delivery experience or what how that had changed. And then it seemed like the next day another package came, and another package came. And then I thought, wow, someone needs to reinvent the mailbox cause it’s like this is just crazy. My Mail Carrier was having to not only deliver our mail, but now come to our home, and I was just watching how much her workload had changed. I felt so responsible for some of that that there’s something needs to change there.
I just recognized that cause. I’m always the type of person when I see things. I’ve worked hard. I don’t know why, but I just always think, how could we improve this? It’s just the way my mind works. So that resonated with me. And you know, a little bit later I thought, you know, I’m going to look into that and see cause it just wouldn’t leave me, and I thought, I wonder if anyone you know working in this space to develop, you know, just to see what they’re doing. And I’ve figured out that very quickly that there was no one really doing a good job of that. And I thought, well, there’s a place for us to develop a consumer products company, possibly. And I felt like you know the place to start, since I was starting over my business. I’ve got to find something that’s sure to work. What’s the least path of resistance and what’s going to develop the best assurances for us as a new company, to survive in this new marketplace? I mean, heck, I’ve already spent 17 years working with third party products and realized I did not want to do that again. So, if I was going to do something else, I was either going to. You know, shake it or bake it, right? I was going to. So, I decided I’m going to, I’m going to start this consumer price company. And I thought, well, I have the experience from my earlier trades careers and worked in sheet metal fabrication a bit. Not enough to be proficient in it at this point, you know, in time when I had the idea, but I thought, well, I’ll work to discover more about that. So, I developed the first prototype, you know, with, you know, with the first idea that I had. And then I took that idea out there and started to understand what people thought of my product.
And from there we’ve evolved into this manufacturing company that provides a variety of package delivery safes depending on what the requirements are that people have. So, it’s pretty exciting. We we’ve been doing this since like 2017 now is when we actually formalize the business, but it really didn’t start to develop as a business until like 2020, you know, that was it took us a little bit which you know, gosh over two 2 1/2 years to develop all the ideas for all the different types of products. It’s not like you just go to market with a consumer products company and an idea, it’s like you have to lots of homework and lots of preparation to develop all the supply channels and things like that. So, in a blend of all my business experience as well as craft experience, yeah. I find myself in this place now where I’m in, uh, in the middle of a huge opportunity to develop, you know? One of the nation’s fastest scaling, you know, startups with our products and we’re just having a great time.
Hollywood C.
Yeah, it’s interesting that it started in response to another company. I mean, yes, the Amazon Switch from books was a little bit before my time. But I do remember my parents talking a lot about how much it impacted them, like this idea of digital and like delivery service. So, it’s very interesting that it was done in direct response. But listening to your story, I feel like you have a lot of experience both as a CEO and a leader, especially through all of your variety of careers. So, for all of our young designers, dreamers, and everyone in, hat advice can you give about starting over or taking a chance on a new opportunity?
Mr. Kutas
You know when it comes to that I think what people have to understand most importantly, is likely their difference, right? So where do you where do you fit in? You know, what is it that you like to do? What are you most proficient at? You know, so I think once you understand that about yourself personally and then you start thinking about, you know, starting something new it doesn’t necessarily have to be something that you love to do. It just has to be something that you can immerse yourself in and maybe you just love the results of that. Like it was never my idea to be I want to build these really cool mailboxes. You know, building, building our products was it was just something that was just a byproduct of an idea to build a great company. It’s you know, I and just fortunately I have you know, the intuitiveness one to recognize that there’s a need for that. So most importantly, when you have an idea and if it’s something that you know you’d like to do. You need to measure what what’s going on in the marketplace? If you’re building a product company or a service-based company, you just have to work hard to try to understand what type of impact will I have as a new company and what is the longevity of that? And ultimately, at the end of the day, this is the most important thing and I had someone, I spoke with early on that really helped me, you know, makes certain that that this was a huge priority for myself to understand about starting this new venture was you have to make certain that it’s built to be bought, right? Can you sell it at the end of the day? You know, you think about it. And if you can’t, you have to understand, well along the way, what can I what can I harvest from the business that’s going to support my lifestyle? As well as all these other ideas that you have that maybe you want to have an impact on the world with, right? So, you have to look at it from a variety of things. One you know, do you have to love the idea of what you’re actually doing? No. But do you have to love the idea of maybe what you can accomplish with that idea.
And then also understand how can I grow and nurture this opportunity, whether you want it to be a generational business-you know, with your family or if you want it to be something that’s built to be bought. Either way, you really have to try to look at it from all perspectives of from where you start to where you would like to see yourself finish. Even if you don’t plan to ever quit, it’s just. But you still need to, I think, go through that thought process.
Hollywood C.
OK. That’s very good advice. Especially the difference between built to buy or and generational. I think there’s a lot of assumption depending upon where you are in the world, like how you’re going to do that and that kind of builds into it. Do you have you noticed that? I’m not, I can’t quite remember. Did your product ship? Are you mostly America based or you also overseas as well?
Mr. Kutas
You know currently most of the American based, we have shipped Canada and you know we’ve shipped Hawaii, which is also the US, but still logistically speaking it’s you know it’s like shipping overseas, right but. So, we do have our patents. We’ve already applied, made application for those in trademarks internationally. You know some of the key countries that we feel like are great targets for us from the UK to Australia and so on.
Hollywood C.
Well, I wish you luck on your growth. I hope it happens for you. So, looking at your designs show, a lot of thought and ingenuity went into them. Can you talk us through the design process?
Mr. Kutas
Yeah, so the first design it was relative to my home experience, my home delivery experience, and we had a mailbox at the end of our driveway. So, I mean, it’s not like a standard driveway in a community. We have maybe six homes on our street and it’s a cul-de-sac. Driveways a little bit longer. So yeah, hence I noticed you know the extra work it took for the for the carrier you know of UPS/USPS to bring that package to my house. So, I thought well, we need to make a combination mailbox and package delivery box, something that you know managed both of those challenges that carriers were having at that time and as I started that process and went through the motions of building the first prototypes. I took that prototype out to builders and architects to, you know, discover what they thought and started going to, you know, home and garden shows and things of that nature, just to get feedback to further understand, you know what else people were looking for. And that’s how we went. Through the integral portion of the business.
Yeah, so, the first builder and architect I met, there like ‘you know Jeff, we don’t need that. We’ve got both delivering mail systems in all the communities that we develop. Now why would we need this? It’s.. we don’t even place mailboxes any longer.’ And so that, you know, made me think, well, gosh, I think. The parcel box is going to replace the mailbox. And that’s when I decided, well, we need to remove these components for letter mail and maybe just have a straight parcel box, but it doesn’t mean that we needed to discard the mailbox combination package delivery safe. It’s just lead us to the thought process that not everybody, even though they have the same challenge, it doesn’t mean that they have the same requirements. So not everyone required the same solution, you know, just depending on how they lived, whether they had a gated property and they needed something outside, you know, where the carriers could deliver without entering their property or if they live in the community development where they just needed a wall insert on the side of their home so packages could securely go into their garage and everything in between from you know we’ve done very well with the you know the estate luxury side first, which is honestly where we cut our teeth in this business. It would just it’s like it’s just we started creating something of quality. It’s like all these high-level architectural firms started calling us going like, ‘WOW, can you help us develop this, you know this placement for this estate’ and next thing you know we were just enthralled with the opportunity to work with some of these high-end architectural firms. We’ve done a lot of great work with them. And it’s really helped us understand just by listening to our clients. You know, what the needs and the challenges are that they have to help us further develop the features and the options that we offer.
Hollywood C.
So, following up on that, does MB Sentinel identify and address architectural and/or client concern and do you differentiate between those two?
Mr. Kutas
You know, they’re really all very synergistic that go together. So, the architects, they’re working hard to make certain they come up with a solution, in my opinion, based on my experience, that that also is very aesthetically appealing, right. They want to work within the confines of traditionally, what an entrance looks like. For an estate, for example, where, you know you start looking at you know trying to develop a wall insert for a wall column, well that’s all easy enough to do and we’ve actually completed those custom types of model opportunities for us, but where I think that architects need to look at this differently is that for the volume of package delivery that people are getting nowadays. It really it goes beyond the confines of what you have to work with the wall column, right? So, a lot of times in these applications you have you know, property management people and others that are, you know, managing this activity. But I think that where we’re leading trend right now is for our large package saves. It’s a 48-inch-wide package safe we call it our Excel 48. So, you can imagine columns aren’t 48 inches wide. They’re typically, you know, between 2 and somewhere under 3 feet depending on the type of entrance. So, I think that you know through the opportunities that we’ve had we’ve helped other architects develop placements, either maybe at rear entry delivery locations or something you know, outside of the wall column entrance, you know. Adjacent left typically, you know, for our package delivery systems, you know, it just really depends on what they want. Do they want rear door retrieval access, or do they want it to be something drive adjacent? So, there’s a lot of small variables in there where we work to accommodate, you know, the, the, the passion of the architectural people and those involved in trying to develop in design the actual experience for those homeowners. So, it’s both. And have an opportunity to work with them. When people in architecture, if they have, if they would just take the time to maybe understand what our experiences are that we’ve had an opportunity to develop with others, we could help them maybe further expand their thoughts on how they could incorporate a feature like this for their home or commercial application based on what we’ve already discovered. It’s just a new way to start thinking about things, I believe.
Hollywood C.
That’s very well said. I guess that kind of answer is what I was going to ask you is what do our design students listeners need to consider, but you kind of covered that already. But what the architects- did you have any additional advice just for students or?
Mr. Kutas
You know, gosh, I would say yeah. We really work hard to make the effort to speak with those that, you know, have interest in developing replacement, and really, there’s not a dumb question. And if there is, I can probably answer that most easily, right? So, I know, but it’s I think it’s just more about. You just have to think outside the box, you know for example, where things started to you know, become visible to me and what the requirements were so when you think about a mailbox. You know, you think about the location of that box and usually whether it’s in a right of way on a farm to market road or a country Rd or if it’s, you know, curbside, you have to think well. Is that there’s a curve in the mail, this curbside mailbox- of course, it probably makes more sense for letter mail and packages to be delivered there. But when you think about, you know, right of way placements, it’s more important to me you start think about safety and where would those placements best be located for both the homeowner and the carrier to make those deliveries. Cause we’re delivering more than mail. You know it’s like yeah there’s, it’s, it’s, it’s just it’s great to have a perspective for you know, additional safety. You know opportunities by just moving the placement. Not being stuck in your ideology, well the mailboxes here. This is where the parcel box needs to go. I see that happen often. It’s like you know you really need to likely maintain your traditional mailbox and likely just go with a package safe you know that’s you know drive adjacent or those types of applications. So just because you’re used to thinking one way, it doesn’t mean that you don’t need to think outside the box when it comes to package delivery.
Image from: https://www.bimobject.com/en-us/mb-sentinel-enterprises/product/box-gobbler-1428-package-only-wall-insert
Hollywood C.
Alright, so from the research I’ve done on your company, I’m interested in learning more about some of the innovative solutions that you have provided. Could you explain just a touch more about the various ways that your mailboxes can be used? I know you mentioned like side inside of the building directly versus like standalone or?
Mr. Kutas
Sure, sure. And that’s, that’s a great question. But I’d like to point out first, when we think about, you know, manufacturing our products, we always think about ergonomics and ease of use. You know, especially for the consumer you know that’s purchasing the product, but also for those that you know they have to work on them as well provided there’s a maintenance issue or say in time they want to add additional features that come available. For example, say you know if UPS or FedEx says hey we want to integrate our, our technology with yours, they may eventually have a scanner on a box to help you know unlock a box. So, so we work really hard to make our solutions where they’re very adaptable for, for new opportunities and technology. But when it comes to working to understand how those how to develop a placement for a specific type of application, they really just evolved on their own just by listening to our clients. I had a condo association in California come and say, hey, could you make this wall hatch? Well, we’ve had the idea for some time. We haven’t. We haven’t really executed on it, and if you’re willing to do that, we’d be glad to work with you on that project. So just by listening to others and what their needs are that that’s really helped us develop all of our solutions. But you know from a from a I guess something that’s more visible to an architect. Say they have a project when they when you just look at the landscape. The project, how is this project going to evolve? Is it is a commercial placement? You know that it requires a, uh, wall hatch? Or maybe is it a you know, in aviation placement for parts that maybe they don’t want people coming into restricted areas, so maybe more for a fence in location where they want to keep those carriers out of an authorized location. So, it really just depends on the delivery requirements one then to the security requirements that the that they’re looking to achieve through those placements.
Hollywood C.
As someone who listens to my podcast knows one of my favorite topics to discuss is sustainability, so I would be interested in learning how MB Sentinel addresses this topic.
Mr. Kutas
You know, that’s an awesome question. I really didn’t think about it so much until we actually submitted application for the Amazon Products of Tomorrow Contest, which we’re still waiting to understand if we’re finalists for that or not. And they ask the same question, which is very good. So when you think about it, you know, it really just gave me chills to think about this. Imagine if everyone had a secure place for their packages. Now imagine how fewer packages would be stolen. And how you know and think about the resources saved by not having to make the re-deliveries or you know all the materials that go into replacing those items? It’s the, you know, to not have to make a second delivery. There’s like 210 million packages stolen last year. So, you can think about that and the impact that by having a secure delivery solution for those packages, how that would impact not having to, you know, expend those resources a second time for something they already worked, accomplished once.
Hollywood C.
No, that’s a great way to address it. I guess I never really knew the statistics of stolen packages. I mean, I didn’t know it was quite so high.
Mr. Kutas
It’s mind-blowing, yeah.
Hollywood C.
Do you think that COVID played a huge role in that. Like since we did start shipping more.
Mr. Kutas
You know it. COVID, it was crazy when that came out of it -oh wow. You know what’s going to happen now? We don’t know. Are people going to be staying at home more so now? Maybe they don’t need the security of a parcel box, and maybe that’s going to affect us, but really? What happened, in my opinion, is people just became more comfortable shopping online. It’s amazing how much that grew. And it grew what a, you know, almost a decade worth over that period of time and so now the, you know, the demand for our products is, is even greater than it ever was before. So, it really helped us accelerate our business, you know, due to the unfortunate, you know, Pandemic of COVID.
Hollywood C.
Yeah, you would have you said you like really kind of took off in 2020 so that would have been like, right?
Mr. Kutas
Oh yeah, it was. I mean, yeah. April was like April Fool’s Day. We moved into our we moved out of our Incubator shop into our Accelerator here in Stephenville. It’s like the pandemic hit. You’re like, wow, you know? So here we are. We’re in a new space. You know our fixed cost are gosh quite a bit higher now. We’re wondering what’s going to happen next, but yeah, the way this has all come forward, it’s just it’s an incredible opportunity. And, you know, we’re certainly in the right place at the right time and have uncovered a need that people are just excited about.
Hollywood C.
From my understanding, your company has partnered with St. Jude Dream Home. Can you tell me a little bit more about why this appeals to you and your involvement?
Mr. Kutas
Oh yeah. So, you know, going back to my back story a little bit, I wasn’t, I was healthy guy. You know, I was Vita-man for almost 20 years and during that period I I actually had a brokerage where I was helping this company develop awareness for their immune health supplement, right. So I ended up taking this product into some of the local hospitals here is like Cancer Treatment Centers of America. They were hospital and I worked with the folks there and got all the PHD’s lined up for how our product would actually help people overcome the treatment side effects of cancer. And at that point in time, I thought, well, this is going to be amazing cause, through to my personal experience working with, you know, parents and people that would come to our stores. They had the hardship of helping, you know, family members overcome, you know, those types of diseases. Uh, I had my heart at that time, I really wanted to get this product to St. Jude’s, and this is like back, you know, 2012, you know? It was like I felt like, well, there’s a huge opportunity to work with St. Jude’s provided I have great success and as it turned out. That that didn’t work out so well with the first treatment Center for a variety of reasons, but I thought, well, I’ll just have to come back to that and then, you know, fast forward 2020. You know, I have a call from a gentleman in Vancouver, WA that says, hey yeah, I’d like to develop a placement for your product in our St. Jude Dream home. And I thought to myself, well, what’s St. Jude dream home. You know, how does that? I never heard of the Dream Home Foundation. And from there I got my start and developed the first placement with them. And just a week or so ago we were at the- we were invited to the building summit for St. Jude’s in Memphis, TN, where we were actually launched as a regional supplier for St. Jude. So yeah, we’re excited to grow our relationship there and you know, that’s such a great foundation we’re super excited to be a part of.
Hollywood C.
No, that’s really awesome. I mean, congratulations on that.
Mr. Kutas
Yeah, thanks. It’s funny how it’s all full circle, you know, it’s like, it’s like a blend of passions that that come together with everything seems like when you’re in the right place with the right ideas and you get the green lights, right. So here we are.
Hollywood C.
No, that. No, that’s really that is true when you get all the green lights and it all lines up in a row.
Mr. Kutas
It does. You know, you really have to, you know-for young entrepreneurs, you have to really think about where you’re at and what you’re doing and it honestly. It all comes together at some point, you know, if you just keep working on things that you’re passionate about, it’s funny how they’ll all finally just find synergy together if they’re supposed to, you know, if you’re fortunate just to continue to have an opportunity to work with that.
Hollywood C.
No, that’s, I mean, I can’t imagine putting like- that sounds like a lot of effort and kind of get it all together and stuff and for all of our young listeners, we’re dreaming about it.
Mr. Kutas
Oh yeah, yeah, I’m. I mean, I know why Elon Musk lives at his office, right? Most of the time it’s like that’s really start up. I mean, that guy still is a startup lifestyle. It’s crazy, but you know, it’s it takes a lot of effort, you know, it’s just it’s just something you have to immerse yourself in and you know, you have to really consider. Who you have, you know, in your in your family group. If you have a family cause it’s, it puts a lot of stress on a family when you’re trying to do something like this. But so, it takes a lot of support. You know, it’s you can have a great idea to do all these things, but you know, you better check your support systems, you know along the way cause you’re going to need them.
Hollywood C.
So cut out the haters before you start a business.
Mr. Kutas
Yeah, or find a way to overcome them, right, so they’ll always be there, but.
Hollywood C.
No, I totally understand well. I do have to ask my one silly question I ask all my interviewers. And so, if you had an unlimited budget and a client who is willing to give you free reign over the scope and parameters of any project in the world, whatever you could think of, what would it be?
Mr. Kutas
You know, I thought about that and, uh. I thought was to make a really cool mailbox. I mean, I’ve always, always loved making those. We already do. But you know, what could I do to make that better? And I thought, you know, further into that question, and honestly, I’d love to make a mailbox for Warren Buffett. This guy? Yeah, I would, I would and there’s, you know, the reason for that is actually we’re a vendor. For ACME brick. Which is a Berkshire Hathaway Company, I thought. If I could just have him experience our product. I just think that likely that would ignite a fire underneath, you know, ACME Brick to further develop placements for our products. And I think that would just help us proliferate our business, which would help us, you know further expand the opportunity to help organizations like St. Jude’s and so on. So really it’s not, it’s more than just developing a cool placement, it’s. It’s more about developing a really cool company that has an opportunity to share, you know the, you know all of the fruits of our labor with others cause. I just think it’s it. You can just imagine when you think about this, this, the opportunity to scale a business like this is incredible. So anyway, yeah, I’d love to develop a replacement for Warren Buffett cause I think he’s in a good place to help me grow the business.
Hollywood C.
All right. Well, I do have to ask, what does the future look like for both you and the company?
Mr. Kutas
Yeah, for gosh, the future, I mean, I, I see nothing but a vertical opportunity and it’s just it’s going to be interesting to see how the business scales. I think that likely what will happen is when we have our future product like the box gobbler. That product, the demand for that could likely exceed our ability to manufacture it ourselves. So, we already have third party manufacturing lined up for our hero products. So that way we can continue to focus, you know, with architects and the builders for our cabinet placements which are definitely more comprehensive in their builds. So, I see, you know, how do we? Continue to accelerate our business and scale our business. You know one either through it may not just be to continue to build a larger company, which I know we will physically ourselves, but we may have to work to partner in that opportunity with some of the larger manufacturers, which means, you know, somebody going to have to probably make a move and live somewhere and just make sure we’re on top of that. Ensure we meet all the requirements that we have to ensure you know the quality of our products are maintained.
Hollywood C.
Awesome. Well, how can anybody find you if they are interested in either purchasing the product or talking with you or anything like that?
Mr. Kutas
Yeah, absolutely you can always. I’m active on LinkedIn. Just look up Jeff Kutas on LinkedIn. I’m pretty easy to find. You know, we have our company page there as well, which we’ve recently started. Go to MBSentinel.com which is M as in mail B as in box, Sentinel like the guard. You know or just search boxgobbler.com and you’ll find us, which is so much easier, right? That’s likely the best way to reach out to me. I’d love to connect with anyone that you know that we can help.
Hollywood C.
Well, thank you so much for joining us today. Is there any last-minute end of word advice you would like to give to anybody, or an entrepreneur, or those listening?
Mr. Kutas
You know, I would just say, you know, follow your passion, work hard, and try to look ahead. You know, make certain that, you know, understanding persistence is one thing, right? You can persist, but, you know, take a look at what you’re doing with your time, and it might mean that it’s time to pivot, but that doesn’t mean that it’s always. You don’t live your life on knee jerk reactions just because things get going tough, but really work hard to measure the opportunities and whether or not that’s you’re in the right place at the right time, you know, with your ideals.
Hollywood C.
Thank you so much for joining me today and we look forward to seeing where you guys continue to grow.
Mr. Kutas
Yeah, Hollywood. Thank you so much for having us on.
Thank you once again for joining us this week! And if you are interested in speaking on the show, whether it’s yourself, your firm, or just a topic that you are particularly passionate about-Don’t hesitate to reach out to either the website or email address. All of which is Architecture, Coffee, & Ink. Please rate, review, and subscribe if you want to see more content. I am excited to meet with all my designers, dreamers, and DIY enthusiasts next week, but in the meantime
May your coffee mugs be full, and your ink wells never run dry.
60 secs end song re-looped.
