Reframing Failure as an Entrepreneur: Conversation with Mitch Case-The Pickup Project

Summary

In this episode of the Do Life podcast, Layla Dawn interviews Mitch Case, founder of The Pickup Project. Mitch shares his journey from a traditional engineering career to embracing entrepreneurship, highlighting the importance of failure, mentorship, and building connections through competition. He discusses the lessons learned from his first venture, More Than a Meal, and how they shaped his current project, which focuses on fostering human connection through basketball. The conversation emphasizes the value of community, personal growth, and the drive to help others succeed.

Takeaways

Embrace failure as part of the entrepreneurial journey.
The question 'If not now, when?' can be transformational.
Taking time to process feelings after a setback is important.
Learning from past experiences is crucial for future success.
Building connections through shared activities can enhance networking.
Mentorship can provide valuable insights and perspectives.
Surrounding yourself with motivated individuals fosters growth.
It's essential to consider what you bring to the table for others.
Creating a supportive community can lead to collective success.
The Pickup Project aims to connect people through competition and camaraderie.

Sound Bites

"If not now, when?"
"I want to help other people with that."
"You are who you surround yourself with."

Chapters

00:00 Embracing Failure in Entrepreneurship
02:51 The Journey from Engineering to Entrepreneurship
05:47 The Impact of Support Systems and Cost of Inaction
08:39 Navigating the End of a Business
11:27 Lessons Learned from Failure
14:25 Finding Motivation After Setbacks
17:21 The Birth of the Pickup Project
20:05 Connecting Life Lessons Through Sports
29:06 The Power of Self-Discovery
30:55 Finding Purpose and Meaning
32:10 The Pickup Project: Building Connections Through Competition
36:45 Networking in a Natural Environment
41:04 Prioritizing Personal Growth and Relationships
46:26 Expanding the Pickup Project: Opportunities Ahead

Links

https://www.linkedin.com/in/mitchellcase

https://www.thepickupproject.com

Transcript

0:00

Hi friends, welcome to the Do Life podcast. I'm your host, Life Coach Layla, and today I have a special guest for you, Mr. Mitch Case, the founder of The Pickup Project. He is a husband, he is a father, he's a serial entrepreneur, and he is an amazing man with an amazing story to tell. So help me welcome Mr. Mitch. Thank you so much for being here today. Thank you, Layla. Thank you so much for having me on here. I'm excited to kind of dig into the story and see where it leads. Yeah, so Mitch and I were discussing part of being an entrepreneur as failure and you have to be ready to fail more than you succeed. being afraid of failing is it comes with the territory. So I wanted to kind of dive deep into that because I know you've you've come to terms with this and you've almost embraced it so much. So if you want to give me a little bit of history and kind of walk me through your story, that'd be awesome. Yeah, just to kind of lay the groundwork, like I went more of a traditional route where, you know, I found out I was good at math and science pretty early in grade school and all the way through high school, which kind of naturally led me more towards the engineering approach. I went and got my degree in mechanical engineering and that's what brought me to the Kansas City area and started working for a manufacturer. But I think like a lot of us, you know, the... title that we go after or the degree that we go after sometimes is more of the prestige or more of this thing that we think we should be doing. But then when we're actually doing the work, we're like, oh, this is not what I expected at all. So I got into, you know, it was more of a engineering slash sales role that I was in and the lifestyle, the day to day process was very sit in your cubicle. Everybody walks in at 8 a.m. Everybody leaves at 5 p.m. And I did that for eight months, five days a week. And it just did not fit my personality, my lifestyle, my activity level that I wanted to be. I needed to be out more face to face and moving around a lot. So I found an opportunity to go to a sales organization that actually sold that piece of equipment. And what I essentially was handed was a laptop and a list of things that I could sell. And they said, go sell it. I didn't really have much traditional sales training. You know, I had the technical background to be able to have the communication of the conversations with these other individuals about a highly technical piece of equipment, but I had to go learn to have conversations. And throughout that 10 year career in the sales world, it really started firing this like entrepreneurial spirit of I had to get creative. I had to go out and sell myself. I had to be competitive. I had to build long-term deep relationships so that it would continue to be successful over and over again. And I think that's where my entrepreneurial drive really like sparked. so after a handful of years of that, deciding to get involved in real estate investing just from a long-term retirement approach. But then I really wanted something that I was more active in. And when my wife and I had our first kiddo in 2017, we had a rough birthing experience. And just through the experience of people bringing food to us, it just really had a huge impact on us. And I thought there might be a space for us to be able to provide really simple meal kits to individuals. that had gone through a tough birthing experience like us, but six months down the road and everybody had kind of moved on to the next one. So my first true like in the day-to-day entrepreneurial experience was a company called More Than a Meal where we really tried to show gratitude and appreciation one meal at a time to organizations, employees. That was in September of 2020 when I decided to leave the engineering degree behind and go out and do this taboo. You're crazy. Why are you going to give up your engineering degree, your career that you've been so successful in and go after this thing that is just unknown? And everybody was right. I felt like I was pretty crazy to go out and do some of that. But there was a turning point for me when I had kind of sat down with my wife and we really discussed like, what is it that we want to accomplish? Why are we even considering this? And ultimately, you know, my wife asked one question that was really, transformational for me and it was just this idea of if not now, when type of question. She literally asked me, if you look back in 20 years and you haven't done this, would you regret it? And it wasn't just more than a meal. It was like, if you don't look back or if you look back in 20 years and you hadn't bet on yourself, you hadn't gone out and tried something on your own, would you regret it? And I was that point in my life and you know, it was the answer that I needed to or the question I needed to hear to really take that leap of faith. And it was truly that change from, I wonder if I can do this to, all right, let's go all in, let's bet on ourselves and go and do this. So we started the company more than a meal and it ran for about four and a half years until it no longer ran. So towards the end of last year, we officially tied a bow on it and let it set sail where it needed to go. And over the last 18 to 24 months, I have continued to build in whatever capacity that looks like. And we can dive into that in a little bit, but ultimately it was, you know, you got hit hard, your ego got destroyed, your pride got destroyed. And I took my feelings for a couple of months and then out from the ground, I decided, look, here's what I learned from it. Here's what I'm never going to do again. Here's what I'm going to do better moving forward. And these are the things that worked. So let's apply that to the next thing that I go out and do. so. That kind of brings us to the current time where, you know, I'm the founder of the Pickup Project, where we elevate human connection through competition, through a really simple game, or we play pickup basketball as a networking opportunity to get to know people on and off the court. So that's what keeps me busy right now. There's other things in the works, but that catches your audience up a little bit on kind of where I was, what I had, what I gave up, where I failed, and now back from the ashes and excited to apply everything that I've learned from the other to take it on to the next thing. you know, it's still an unknown. There's still no idea what it's gonna turn out to be. that's awesome. There's a couple key things that you said that I want to kind of circle back to because I think they're very, very integral uh as far as anyone who's, you know, maybe interested in building a business or going into any kind of entrepreneurship is first one was you were leaving your your big boy job to do something unknown and everybody tells you you're crazy. Everybody tells you not to do that because they're afraid for you. And the one thing that holds most of us back is that fear. so being able to overcome not just your own fears, but the fears of everybody else, that's really hard to do. So the fact that, I mean, I guess you have a really good support system. Your wife was like, let's pros and cons. Let's weigh all of our options. Let's see what you hear in business a lot, your ROI, what's your return on investment. Something I think is even more important that you don't hear often is your COI. What's your cost of inaction? What happens when you don't take action? And that one really sticks with me. And I think that one needs to be more a household phrase than your ROI is what is your cost of inaction? So the fact that you were able to take that leap of faith and dive headfirst into a project that you were very passionate about. I think that speaks volumes. So I wanted to kind of pinpoint that. You've got everybody on the planet telling you that this is a bad idea, but deep in your inner knowing, you were like, no, I have to do this. And you move forward with it. so I kind of want to talk a little bit about the end of that project. So when things were... kind of dying down and you're going into debt, you're putting your own personal money into trying to keep things afloat. Were you concerned with, my god, everybody was right, this was a bad idea, what was your thought process then? Every one of those thoughts definitely appeared of, man, they were right. Dang, I just don't have it in me. Like I was wrong. So the self doubt was probably one of the biggest challenges was like, I failed. And, you know, I have a pretty strong presence on on LinkedIn and like the ego and the pride side to show like, I got to remove myself from being the founder, co-founder of More Than a Meal. And that's going to announce it to everybody. And then I'm going to have to the same conversation of like, what happened? Why did it go wrong? You guys look so good from the end. When I look back at it, it was a huge success from having absolutely nothing to close to 20 meals, being able to ship to 21 different states. But throughout that process and the question that you asked, how did it feel throughout that ending? The writing was probably on the wall about 12 months before we shut it down. I still kept a strong front on what needed to look and be perceived as we were moving because we needed more clients and I didn't want it to look like we were dwindling down and I was trying to go after big clients. you put on this front and then all of a sudden you turn around and you're like, wow, I've racked up a lot of debt on this credit card. Wow. dwindled into my savings. Wow, I used other people's money. Like all of that just really hurt me. And like one of the things that, you know, I had kind of grown up in a very conservative family and money was a lot of like self-worth and value. I don't mean to diminish anything that my parents did, but like money was very important and it was just kind of perceived that way. And I still have those roots inside of my body. And so the fact that I wasn't making anything made me feel like less of a person, the fact that I wasted other people's money made me feel even lesser of a person. So all the downs, all the feels, the failure, the let down, the pride, the ego of just they were right and I was wrong really brought me down into a, you know, I'm never going to say that I was depressed by any means, but it was definitely a gut check on trying to figure out like, all right, what are we going to do? And, know, I'm a believer in, in God. And one of the things that really showed up in our lives in that moment was just little things popping up here and there from a money perspective that helped us kind of get through here and there. But ultimately we just decided to come to that indecision where my physical health, my mental health, and just my lack of desire to keep going with it really brought it to the end. And we just decided as a family that, you know, for my own mental and physical health, we needed to make a change and yeah, we just, we brought it to an end and yeah, I had probably about two months. I had a lot of people reach out to me cause I stopped posting on LinkedIn. I stopped doing all this type of stuff. Cause I was like, man, I gotta, I gotta come to terms that this just didn't do what I thought it would do. And, uh you know, it's really cool to kind of see the support that came through that. And, you know, one of the reasons why I felt like I was able to rise back up was the individuals that reached out and said, this is what I saw you accomplish. So I know you're using the term failure, but let me show you from the other side of the table on what you took from absolutely nothing to what it was. And the fact that, you know, it's in the entrepreneurial world and the sense of I'm going to stop and go build a business. There's not a lot of people that will take that opportunity. And so failing at something that very few people will try, you know, I guess gave me some sort of sense of like, well, at least I got out there and I got in the game and I tried something and maybe it didn't work, but. The lessons that I have learned from a business acumen side of things is far more than any four-year degree I think I could ever learn for a master's or any sort of business degree or anything along those lines. But what my wife showed me was the non-financial things that I was present for. ah I missed my first kid's first steps. I missed his first words. My last two, I was there for every single one of those things. ah We got to take some some trips because I could work remotely versus Having to be in an office like there were just so many things from a husband and a father perspective That and this is probably the thing that like really grounded me was like I did not even know I was missing I remember specifically sitting on a couch I had called it quits for the day around four o'clock and we're sitting around and at the time it's just my two boys ones you six months old, these little potato on the ground and my three year old is running around kind of crazy. And I'm just sitting with my wife on the couch and we're just looking at the boys and she would look over to me and she's like, you realize you wouldn't even be home for another three hours. And it just hit me like a ton of bricks in the sense of like, this is what am I doing? Like why haven't I done this earlier? You know, and there's downsides to it. You make a little bit less money when. You get things started, but the things that you do gain is just, they're invaluable and it's things that I will never be able to pay for or ever get back. Yeah, no, I think it's kind of funny. I had a conversation with a coaching client earlier today and we were talking about there's a book called Conscious Uncoupling and I had referenced it and she did a deep dive into it and was like, my God, this is so profound. And it talks about how, you know, when a relationship ends, so many people look at it as a failure. I have a failed marriage. I have a failed long-term partnership. you know, there was a while me and my partner had split up. about a year or so ago and I never looked at it as a failure. We had an amazing relationship. We had an amazing partnership. We raised three beautiful children that are decent humans and we created careers and none of that is a failure to me. Just because it didn't end the way we expected it to or wanted it to, I don't see it as a failure. And I think as entrepreneurs, seeing a business end the way we didn't anticipate it to or ending it all when we didn't ever want it to, to look at that as not a failure. Like you said, you brought back all of the moments that you would have never got back from being an entrepreneur. So is that kind of what the catalyst was to motivate you to move forward? Because so many people will sit in that failure and I'm guilty of that. I've definitely had some things happen that... I'd prepared for, I knew were a possibility, but you never really think it's gonna happen to you. And then it does. And then I'm glad you didn't go into a deep depression because I certainly did. And it was hard for me to get out of that. Like, what did I do wrong? I should have done this and you get stuck in the shit of what it could as. And finally I was able to like, you know what? This was a lesson. I learned a lot. What did I learn? What was this moment meant to teach me? started. taking on that mindset of, everything bad happens for a reason. What am I supposed to learn from this? And when I looked at the situation and how much I had grown from going through that, like you said, was way more than any kind of textbook scholarship credit certification. The real life experience of having that moment was like so profound. And you just, grow leaps and bounds through that. But I'm curious, like, What motivated you to keep going? You've got a whole nother company that you started. Where did that motivation come from? How did you get out of the, oh, I'm a failure, everybody was right kind of mindset? What was that catalyst? I jokingly say I got it from my mother because she always has a project that she has to get done. So then once that one is done, it's on to the next. But at the same time, my wife is very obsessed with the Enneagram uh system and I am like a number three, which is a performer. And so it is always, my motor is always on and looking for that next thing, which can be a blessing and a curse. For me, being able to like have that moment to feel literally all the things that you had just described and self doubt. I think the lowest I ever was, know, and this gave me a new perspective on, on financial life for a lot of individuals is I remember my wife saying, Hey, I got to go fill up the gas tank in the van. And I had to tell her, was like, you can only put $10 in because we don't have enough to go for groceries or pay, you know, the house or the more like those things started to really become serious situations for us. And I just like, I sat there as I was talking to her, was like, how did I let us get into this position? Like it was just really a wild experience. Like I, grew up a white middle-class male, like let's just say it. I didn't get told no a lot. And so the oppo, the situation that we were in that, that space and feeling that it just had me really take a look at like, wow, there are a lot of individuals, like remove me from this situation. There are a lot of individuals that are doing amazingly hard work that nobody else wants to do. There are individuals that are busting their butt 80 hours working two, three jobs a week to try and get by. the system side of things, it's hard to get ahead of debt. It's just really, really hard no matter how hard those individuals really work without some outside help or finding a way to get around that. And that was the first time I had been in that situation and I had the option to say, I'm out, I'm going to go back to the engineering gig and all of my problems would go away. so realizing there are so many more human beings out here that are doing really hard work and good work and just don't have the same opportunities that I've been presented. It just really changed my perspective on like, wow, okay. So if and when we do get in a position where we have money, we can be good stewards of that. And I want to keep my eyes out for other opportunities to help and support other entrepreneurs that are putting their energy, betting on themselves to go out and help and support them. That's a big piece of my motivation today is like, man, I wanna get out there and do this and help other people with that. But to answer your original question, what got me out of that? I do kind of attribute it to my threeness. is always, know even though I took a gut punch, the statistics are that I was gonna fail. So I'm a part of that statistic. Now, the other option was to just stay down and, you give up and go back to what I was doing. Or the other option was, let's stand back up, let's dust ourselves off, put a couple of band-aids on and see if we can go another route. And like, that's the way that I have always operated, whether that was playing soccer or baseball or drumline, like my days in high school doing that to where we go play pickup basketball. Like my goal is to be the fifth best person on our team because I am not great at basketball, but. you better believe I'm gonna be pushing myself every single time to be that best person for our team that they can count on. And you know, that's, we always jokingly towards the end of the, play four games and the first one is a high energy is fun. Everybody's kind of waking up in the last one. Everybody's like, it's not about how you start. It's about how you finish that last game because that's the one where your knees are hurting more. You can't breathe. You're tired. You're thirsty. Like everything is coming against you, but that's the last game. Like that's the last thing somebody's gonna remember from that morning. So I think it just really kind of comes down to like my internal drive to just say like, I will not fail overall. There might be little battles within that I don't win, but overall will come out on the other side. And I mean, I still don't know what that looks like right now, because we're still in the throes of it. But you know, it's, I do attribute that to the threeness inside of me that's just like, I can't be held down. I love that. That's amazing. And I think there's something that you said there. So your new company is the Pickup Project and how you show up in your games, in your basketball. Like you said, it's not about how you start, it's how you finish. Where was the mindset? Like what happened? I'm trying to think of how the best way to ask this question is how did you transition from like you saw you found a correlation from playing basketball and how you show up for the game and how you show up for yourself and how you show up for life is also how you show up in your career in your business. So you created the pick up project. What was the connection, the synapse in your brain that connected those two and then maybe tell me a little bit more about the pick up project itself. Yeah, yeah. So I'll kind of go a little bit backwards on this just to kind of hit on that and then I'll dive into kind of the catalyst of it. But the Pickr project started from a need to differentiate myself when I was selling commercial HVAC equipment in the engineering days. So this has been something that just kind of grew out of an opportunity to how can I have better conversations with individuals on a personal level versus a business level? So my whole goal and what made me really successful was I could care less talking about business. I wanna know how your kid's swim meet was. I wanna know how the soccer game was. And it allowed me to build real friendships with these individuals, which, shocking, led to more opportunities and business. It's what helped me become very successful in what I was doing. And so the opportunity for the Pickup Project was literally born out of I don't wanna take somebody to a happy hour where I don't know if I'm enabling this person that's struggling with alcoholism. I don't want to go out to a dinner and take them away from their spouse and children. All the things that like I'm trying to fight within myself, I don't want to put on somebody else. So I wanted to have something that really was different and know, quote unquote unorthodox and pickup basketball was that. The way that it became what it is today with the Pickup Project was because of a mentor of mine, which I had a love-hate relationship with this man. He owned a very well-known coffee brand in the Kansas City area, very successful. And he was the one that kind of talked to me about this, you're not all in. And I remember sitting down with him and I was talking about what could be more than a meal. And at the time I was working my full-time job and he's like, Mitch, I can no longer help you because you're just not all in. And at that point, I was almost mad because... Like I'm working a full-time job, 60 plus hours a week. I'm trying to make these meals and hustle and do all this. I'm like, what do you mean I'm not all in? Like I am trying. And it finally came to the point where his conversation was, I'm not talking about you being all in on your business. You're not all in on yourself. And that was a real big catalyst for me to understand like, okay, so what does that actually mean? What is being all in on myself? And we went through an exercise where he had me write down all the things that I enjoyed doing, which he's like, just write down anything that is either paid or unpaid. Like what would you do if you could wake up in the morning and say, that's what I'm gonna do today. I want you to write down all those fun things that you would love to do. And that was easy. Like I'm very big into sports, obviously. So basketball and soccer and football, snow skiing, wake surfing, like all these different activities that I just, I love to be out and about and doing things. Then he's like, okay, that's a pretty. That's a pretty long list you got there. And he goes, all right, now tell me what you're really good at. And like embarrassingly, I had to sit there. And I mean, it was like a 10 minute, this is awkward, please say something type of moment. And you know, this is where it really got hard. was like, all right, what are you actually good at? Like the only thing I had written down was math and science, which I had known that since fifth grade. I couldn't come up with anything else. And he goes, Mitch, let me talk to you about what I see that you're really good at. And one thing that he wrote that was, or two things that he mentioned to me is like, I have a really unique way of connecting dots with individuals. So something that I've always enjoyed is when I'm networking, I'm always trying to figure out how can I actually help this person, not necessarily with my product, but with what they need. And is that an HVAC repair person for their home? I gotcha. Is it a lawyer? I gotcha. Is it the best grocery store on your block? I'm gonna give you some options. So that's really where I tried to get that and I was able to connect those dots. The second thing that he said is you have a very unique way of building trust faster than most people I've ever met. And like that was really, really cool to hear from that individual where what I've always believed and what my parents instilled in me was to trust first and then if they fail on that, then you know. So I like to give people the benefit of the doubt by trusting them first and it has led to a lot of opportunities. And so we were going through this exercise. He basically came down and he was like, all right, now let's see where these two lines can actually interact with each other. So he was like, let's start drawing arrows and see how we can do that. And ultimately it came down to this idea that if you do what you enjoy and you are good at it, you're going to be able to endure a lot of really challenging days. Cause he called BS on that idea of like, if you do what you love, you never work a day in your life. He's like, I love coffee. But I've thought about burning this building to the ground four days this week and we're only on Tuesday. So it was really, it was comical in that sense that, yeah, like there are days where being an entrepreneur and building this business sucks and I want nothing to do with it. And sometimes I just shut down for the day and go take a nap and try to come back the next day. But the idea that I could find things that I really enjoy doing, whether paid or unpaid, and the things that I am really good at, if I can find a way for those to collide, I'm going to have a lot of fun." And he said, the most difficult part of all of that is to try to monetize that. So many people that go into business try to monetize this thing, these two things that come together. And sometimes they fail because it's just not something, it's not a need that the market wants. It's more of your own desire. And so he really focused in on me and my career, meaning ... hey, don't just try to make these two things intersect and make a business out of it. It is, if you work a day job, you're a W2 employee at XYZ organization, and it allows you to go snowboard on the weekends and connect people, then you're gonna be able to endure those bad days, because this opportunity here allows you to do what you really want to do. So I looked at this, and this is kind of where the Pickup Project came along, was I had a unique way of building trust very quickly, and I was able to connect people. I love competition. It just so happened to be basketball because honestly, it's easier to get five people on a court than nine baseball players or 11 foot or 22 football people together. Like basketball was easier from that perspective and there was enough interest in that. And so I just found a way, which when I started this, it was free. I didn't charge anybody for it. It was provided by the company that I worked with at the time and it just created a lot of joy. And I woke up. Early on Friday mornings when we play at 6 30 a.m To go and play basketball with people that were literally trying to make themselves better Whether that was through basketball whether this through networking whether that was through their physical health and so fast forward to today That has just continued to instill and I found that Maybe I am fortunate. We'll see but there is a way for that to be monetized and you know provide for my family and the joking piece of it is, is I do call myself a professional basketball player now because I do get paid to go and play basketball. I still don't have my big time contract yet, but we'll see where it leads. the intent behind it was always, we're here to connect first. We just happen to play basketball and leading with that has allowed this, you know, what is now the pickup project to have, you know, 50 weekly players come out and hoop. And some of us are good and some of us are not. But at the end of the day, it was never about, you know, the talent that you showed on the court is about who showed up and that they continue to show up. So yeah, that, helps kind of get to the catalyst of why I, I kept the pickup project going and how it was kind of an easy transition. And there were some things in between that helped pay the bills that I did some contract work and stuff like that. But it was just a really natural lead into that. Once I had some downtime with more than a meal closing. to look at the different things that I've got going on and see if one of those is worthwhile putting a little more gas on the fire or is it something else? Yeah, I think you said a couple things that I want to circle back to is the point of having a mentor or coach. I piss off my clients on a regular basis. Like I feel if I'm not making them mad about something and a lot of times they get mad at the amount of silence because if I ask a question. You have to sit there in silence until you answer it. I don't know is never, never an accepted answer. And and it's the one thing that frustrates me most about my coach and my mentors. They do the same thing. And it's like, man, I get so mad at these revelations because it's like I'm very analytical and I want to think about things and figure it out. And when I think I have something figured out and they show me a new perspective and I just like this light bulb moment happens, I'm like, I've been wrong for 40 years. Awesome. Cool, thanks. It's so hard not to get mad at these things, but it's that anger that just catapults you in the right direction and to do the things that you're like, okay, well, now that I know this, everything changes. it's such a profound moment. I think something else that you said that was really profound was... was something I've taught to a lot of my clients is, you I try to help find purpose. What is your purpose? What do you want to do? And we talk about, you know, some of the things that make you happy and the things that you did in childhood. And when my mentor asked me, what did you like to do as a kid? I was like, I like to eat dirt. How is that going to help me? How am I going to monetize off of that? It's like you don't necessarily have to monetize off of your purpose. You can keep your day job. Like you said, you can do. this job and something else that I like to kind of think about when you're doing your day job and you're like, I hate this place. I hate this work. This is not, I don't feel good about this. It's, it's paying you, it's supporting you to do the things that you do like, and you do want to do and support you. So just having little tweaks in that mindset. But I do think it's so important to have a coach and a mentor to see the things that you can't see. Because if you weren't having this conversation with someone who, who shared what they saw in you. And same thing, if I didn't have a coach or mentor to share what they see in me, you we wouldn't be where we are doing the things that we're doing. And I just think that's so amazing that they were able to help you with that insight that you've now turned into this amazing solution. So not only are you doing what resonates with you, you're living your purpose, but you actually are monetizing off of it and still giving back. Like when you think of what is your why, like that should be most people's motivation is remember your why. Why are you doing what it is that you're doing that should help pick you out of the ashes when things crumble is, you know, your why is to spend more time with your family and to not miss out on these milestones and, to be the best version of you that you can be and show up for your family and in ways that you couldn't in a nine to five. So I just, I love that and thank you for giving back and for doing the things and bringing people together. But what exactly is the Pickup Project? You guys are just a bunch of guys, you play basketball together and you introduce people. How does it work? Just a bunch of meatheads and wannabes that used to, no. This is like the going joke around the Pickup Project is everybody thinks that I started this because I'm really good at basketball. I was five foot tall my freshman year in high school. I shouldn't have even stepped on a basketball court at that point, but I did finally grow to be 6'2 by my senior year and I just didn't really have any traditional basketball training at that time. But when I was at school, we... a bunch of the guys that I was friends with, we would just run down to the rec center and play pickup basketball. And you know, I, you know, I still can't dribble very well with my left hand. If I do a layup on the left side, I'm using my right hand. Like I am not a great basketball player, but I love to get out and compete. love to try new things and just be out there with the people. It's one of the best ways that I connect with another human being is in competition, whether that's uno flipping quarters, like I want to win. But I can get to know you through that and who you are as an individual. it's, uh, I think it was Barack Obama said, like, I can get to know more about one person in an hour of pickup basketball than a whole year of coffees with that individual. Once they're this individual is between the lines and in competition, their natural instincts come out. And I was having coffee this morning with somebody. was like, I can tell within the first five minutes of somebody on a basketball court playing with a group of potential strangers to them. if I'd be willing to let them watch my children or they could never meet my children. Like it happens very, very quickly in those lines. And I'm, you know, it's very fortunate that we've had an eight year run where we've had zero altercations. So the thing with the pickup project, my goal from that was what I mentioned earlier was to meet new people in a different, unique way. And there's pickup games going on. all over the place. ah Sometimes you gotta know the right person to be able to go in place. Sometimes you have to bring a squad. Sometimes you have to have all these different things. And there's just a lot of barriers and then it windows out and it fizzles. One of the things that I really wanted to make in this was like, I'm going to be consistent. So the pick up project, as I mentioned, like our goal is to elevate human connection through competition and allowing them to connect on and off the And the only way that I can do that in a very consistent way is just convince people to show up every single week for the first couple of years and to make sure that they saw that this was so much more than just basketball. Like these are opportunities to meet friends that you might go to a football tailgate later. These are opportunities to meet individuals that maybe can coach your kids on swimming or something else. Like these are all real scenarios that have presented itself. And there's a business aspect to it that You do business with the people you know, and trust. And if you show up continuously and you know this individual and you see the work that they put in on the court, and then how that can translate into business, business will be conducted. And, you know, we ran it for three or four years and we took a survey and we had had over a million dollars worth of business that had been conducted directly with inside the individuals playing basketball. Today, we have over 50 people every single week coming out just in our Kansas City location. to better themselves mentally, physically, network, business-wise, anything along those lines. I mean, what it looks like is a lot of individuals coming together that have been playing together for a couple of years, some a couple of weeks, and new individuals coming in and feeling seen, heard, loved on the second they walk through, because it doesn't matter what your skill level is. It doesn't matter what your... physical shape is like we're all here. We're going to throw on the same jersey. We're going to be on the same team with a common goal and watching that play out in a real sense on the basketball court and off of the court is pretty powerful. And I believe that's what's allowed the pickup project to go outside of just Kansas City and starting to spread nationwide. So my goal is to have 10 locations by the end of this year with big time goals to be like over a hundred locations where people are getting together because they want to meet new people in their city. They just happen to bounce this orange leather thing on wood. Like it's such a simple concept, but at the same time, a lot of pickup games that I've come across don't lead with the idea that this is here to meet new people first. It usually is led with, we want to play basketball. And so that's been a contribute to our success and it's continued to grow and stay steady and We'll see where it takes us. Wow. So it's like, it's like network networking, but on steroids, not literally, only metaphorically in the sense that you actually get to know the real people, the real versions of themselves, because I love, like you said, you know, when you put somebody in an unnatural environment, know, anybody can pretend to be whoever they want you to think they are when you're at a desk or speaking on a stage. But when you're in front of a competitive situation and you're one on one, your instincts kicked in, like you said, you're just all natural at that moment. And there is no representative, there is no fake facade, you're just you, you can't pretend to not be you in that moment. So it's definitely a big exposure, but you get deeper connections because you've got that camaraderie, that team members, like you're already in a team before you even know their names most of the time per se. Right, right. And so I love because I've been to some networking events and they're super boring and I'm not a very sports... I'm not coordinated enough for sports. I love to watch them, but as far as playing them, that has not been anything I've ever been good at. But I mean, I'm excited about this. This song is way more fun. out there. I'm serious. I'm serious. Like I would love to just come spectate and interact with other people and just, and you know, it just sounds like a fun networking event as opposed to just sitting at a desk and getting to know a couple of people. And like, this is just so much more interactive and fun. So I love this concept and I can see why it's spreading. as an introvert, like my biggest nightmare is walking into a room where I have to force a conversation with somebody. It's just not my style. I'm not interested in doing that because it feels fake. It feels like I'm already, before I even introduce myself, I have a goal in mind. And with the Pickup Project, like the goal that I have in mind is the exact same goal as the other four people on my team. And we do, I force them. And sometimes it gets awkward. saying, you have to introduce yourself to your team before we play. What is your name? If you're looking for a job, tell somebody. If you have a job, tell them what it is. Like that part makes it weird and awkward because it's different than the other pickup games you would come across. But by the end of it, you've probably met 10 people at the end of the day, new people or individuals you've played with a few different times. And you start to remember names. You start to interact with them afterwards. There are lot of fun things that come through that. And it's what's brought me a ton of joy and why we still wake up early. That's the other component of it is you're not surrounding yourself by other individuals at a luncheon or anything like that. You are surrounding yourself by somebody that voluntarily pays to be around other people like you before the sun and the rest of the world is even up to go run around with other people to put a ball through a net like. The individuals that wake up consistently to go and do that show me commitment that they're trying to make themselves better. And again, that's physically, mentally, their relationships, their business, like those are the other people that you want to surround yourself with. And why I continue to show up is not just because it's my thing. It's cause like, I want to show up to be around this person who's better at this than I am. Like that whole concept of iron sharpens iron is very real. And I get a lot of Comments of hey, I like can you do this on a weekend or can you do this at night? Can you do it at this time or that time and I flat-out tell them like No, it brings out a different individual that's most likely looking to take out their anger on some stranger versus Maybe they're stressed that they have at their job because all they want to do is come out and dominate But also it's a different caliber of individual that's not willing to wake up on a consistent basis to say I'm not only showing up for myself, but I'm showing up for the other people that are there too, because they make me better and I want to help them be better. it's, I'm still obsessed to wake up early. You know, we're two days away. We're getting ready to launch in Omaha this Friday, August 29th. We'll be in five locations by the end of September. And I have very high hopes and goals for what this could potentially be as well. That's awesome. That is so, so awesome. You said something that kind of that resonated do think it's amazing that you're not willing to budge and be like, no, know, if you're ho-humming around about it and you think about it and you want to do a weekend or a Friday night or something, no, show up first and foremost. And the people that are showing up, they're showing up, like you said, not just for themselves, but for the team, for the other people. And I just, think that's... Such an amazing way to network. Yeah. That's, and I mean, maybe this is just the, like the performer inside of me is I get that sometimes mornings are hard. Um, you know, I've got three young kids. I know this is a burden on my wife every Friday that I go and play because she has to get all the kids ready and get them to school. Like that is harder than playing an hour of basketball for those 15 minutes. of getting those kids ready and out the door, it is so much harder than an hour of basketball. But she understands that this is a priority for me and my mental health and my physical health. And I prioritize that over my wife and being present for my wife and children, which I've already mentioned is like the reason I left my job. And so this like sacred moment of being able to get up and be active and keep myself healthy for my family and get out there and help other individuals. So That's part of the thing when people ask me to change to different times, I'm like, look, you have the option to prioritize this in the morning and you're gonna surround yourself with some amazing, amazing entrepreneurs, blue collar workers, white collar workers, age ranges from 21 to even 52 to 60 years old that has to have wisdom as can be and as green as can be and excited about what's about to happen in their lives. There's not a lot of places that you can go and do that and have real conversations with them. So my conversation with them is just like, prioritize it. If it's not easy for you, you have to change certain things. And if this is something that you want to prioritize, then you'll make it work. Yeah, two things there. You are the sum of the five people you spend the most time with. And even if you don't spend time regularly, you're not spending the same time with the same five people. You're spending time with a different group of people, but they're the same caliber. Those are the people that show up for themselves, that show up for for each other. I wake up two hours early before my first meeting. If my first meeting is at eight, I'm up at six. If my first meeting is at nine, and it's those first two hours I show up for me because you can't pour from an empty cup. I need those two hours. I work out. I journal. I meditate. Whatever I need to do some days, I wake up and I tune into the energy of the day like, what do we feel like doing today? Sometimes it's go back to sleep for an hour. If that's what I need that's what I need, but those two hours that I show up for me are so integral in how I show up for everybody else the rest of the day, the rest of the week. And I feel like this is kind of the same thing. It's how these you guys are showing up for you when you show up on Friday morning early before everybody else. You're not willing to compromise that. That's integral for how you show up for other people and how you see the people that show up. You know that they're They're just as willing to commit to not just themselves, but each other, their future, their networking, their relationships. And that's so important when you're working with someone or thinking about forming a partnership or a business or even just recommending them to somebody that you care about. uh the recommendations and referral side, like really quickly, uh I will refer you, I will not type of scenario. Like sometimes it can be that blunt. You you mentioned the, you you're, are who you surround yourself with or the five people you surround yourself with. This last like 12 months, I've really kind of flipped that script on the idea of like, why would four other people want to hang out with me? What am I bringing to the table that makes them? be better. And so like, I've been working a lot on that. And like, I kind of think of that as, all right, now I'm not just showing up because, you know, I need to be there because I'm running this thing. I'm thinking of, all right, I know these people have shown interest in what I've done. And I, you know, I know that I'm better at this, this little tiny area than they are. They need me to show up so that they can surround themselves by me. And I'm looking to the individuals that are better at the things that I want to be. And now I'm showing up to be a around them, like it's this ecosystem of like humbling yourself to say, what am I bringing to the table that can help this person become better at that while I'm looking at this person be better at that? And everybody is sharing from that side. And so I love the, you are who you surround yourself with, but I also want to look inward and say like, how am I showing up for the other four people that are saying they, that they want to be around me? Yeah, that's amazing. That's uh such an awesome perspective to have. I love that. I love that so much. I am going to steal that 100%. ah please do. Maybe it'll be a title on the book. Like, why should they hang out with you? Hahaha! Awesome. Well, this uh has been super, super informative. I love the idea behind this. I love the Phoenix rising out of the ashes story. Is there anything else that you want to let my listeners know or any last words, anything you want to just share, anything I didn't cover or ask? No, I guess the only thing that I would say is just like maybe a humble pitch here is that I am looking to grow to more metros across the US right now. So if there's anybody that's in that space and they're like, man, I really need a network like that. I want to lead something like that. I would love to have a conversation with you to see if this is a fit between the two of us and if we can get it launched in your city. Like there are a lot of opportunities and we're looking for those individuals that are driven. You know, they're self motivated, they're humble, and they know that they can be better at different areas. And I would love to be able to potentially partner with you in that capacity. So if that resonates with anybody and you know, basketball isn't something you don't want to do, it's something that you can maybe be okay at. I would love to have a conversation with them. Amazing. Thank you so much. Can you let my listeners know what do you have coming up? I mean, I know the expansion, but where can they find you? How do they get a hold of you? Yeah. So, I mean, we will be launched in Dallas, Omaha, Overland Park, Kansas City, and South Chicago by the end of September. So if you're in those areas, go check out the Pickup Project in your local area and we'd be happy to host you there. You just simply go to the pick up project.com and you'll just find your easiest location. You'll find my contact information there, but I am very active on LinkedIn as well. So If you want to connect with me on LinkedIn, I do look at all of those messages that come through as long as they're not too pitchy. And I would love to have a conversation with you around the things that you see that I could be better at and you have that talent or vice versa. I'm always interested in learning about other people's stories and what's made them who they are. Awesome. That is amazing. So yeah, if they want to connect with you, LinkedIn's probably, that's where we met. So amazing. So thank you so much for being here. This has been a wonderful conversation, super informative, very insightful. I love what you have going on. I love your story. I appreciate you for being here today. So thanks again. And to everybody listening, like, share, subscribe. Follow me, follow Mitch, do all the things. We love you, we thank you for being here and let's go do life competitively. That's good. I like that. Layla, thank you so much for having me. I cannot thank you enough. I really appreciate the opportunity to hear from you and hopefully this provided something to your audience as well. Thank you.