Disrupting the RF Cable Industry with eCommerce

Curt Anderson  00:01

Hey, Damon, good morning, good afternoon. Happy Monday. How are you, dude?

Damon Pistulka  00:07

I’m doing great. Curt and ready to go, because I’m excited to talk with our guest today,

Curt Anderson  00:12

man, our good buddies in the house, and, you know, and like, you have, like, a little special glow to you today, which is your team, like, three and Oh, or something, or like, I don’t know, like,

00:21

I don’t know. Maybe we are, maybe we are not positive, but

Curt Anderson  00:26

hey, those are positive,

Damon Pistulka  00:27

but I could check again,

Curt Anderson  00:29

yeah, double check that. Why we do a little intro to our dear friend, Chuck. But so, yeah, you guys are bullies. Beat up on the dolphins yesterday. So all right, well, Damon’s in a great mood today. So let’s introduce our dear friend, the one, the only Chuck Coxhead, Chuck Happy Monday, dude, how are you?

Chuck Coxhead  00:46

Oh, amazing. Like, I told you, man, better than I deserve. Honest to God, the universe is kind. So better

Curt Anderson  00:53

than you deserve. That might be one of the best lines. You know, Damon, I always like Eddie Saunders, you know, he’s like, you know, it’s a good day to have a good day, but better than I deserve. Chuck, just, can you elaborate for folks, why? Is why? Just, why that answer?

Chuck Coxhead  01:08

Well, honestly, I mean, I’m like, human like everybody else. So it’s like, I can’t always swear that I was, you know, a choir boy in my whole life. And just sometimes you get hard work and luck come together, and the only way you can think about luck is that it’s a gift. Honest to God, you know, when hard work and luck come together, you get great success. And I’m back home, a place that I love, which we’re going to talk about, and thank the good Lord, my life is going well at home. And what else can you ask for, man? Just you know, I love the world. I love life. That’s it. This smile isn’t fake, man. All

Curt Anderson  01:47

right, dude, you’re just, you’re What a way to kick off the week. Chuck, what a breath of fresh air. Contagious enthusiasm. Chuck, let’s go here, since we’re on a roll right now. So question for you, my friend, are you sitting down? Are you ready for this one? Are you good to go? Yeah, I know you got a good night’s sleep after the Eagles won. So let’s go here, Chuck, you were a little guy growing up. When you were a little guy growing up, who was your hero? Who did you look up to admire, who, just like really, had that firm belief in you? Who was your hero?

Chuck Coxhead  02:16

Oh, my God. You know what’s really funny about this when I say that I’m doing better than I deserve. Because when I was little and when I was a teenager, I’m telling you, I mean, I had a good life and a good family, but I did not make a lot of good choices. And I didn’t really think that way, dude, like I didn’t do once I got past Spider Man, I didn’t really think like, oh, there’s a hero, honest to God. It’s a total cliche. If I could go back in time and I actually understood my dad, you know, 45 years ago, holy crap. I mean, I’d just be like, Oh, dad. But when I was a teenager, when I was a little guy, after the Spider Man cartoon went off. I was just a knucklehead. Yeah, right. I mean, plane is simple. I was just a knucklehead. And then, you know, thank thank goodness the, you know, the universe and the Lord turned me around and got me, you know, going to place. It makes me so happy. Well,

Curt Anderson  03:16

God bless you, dude, a great answer. And so we’re Damon, we’re gonna go with Spider Man. That’s a great hero to have is a

Damon Pistulka  03:24

good one when you’re a little guy.

Curt Anderson  03:25

That’s a great and, you know, and how about the the famous Mark Twain saying, you know, it was amazing. From the time he left his home at 18 and came back at 22 he was amazed at how smart his father became in those four years, right? Isn’t that?

Chuck Coxhead  03:41

Yeah, far as I’m concerned, he was dumb when I was a teenager, though. Boy anything, he didn’t know anything. Boy, was I wrong,

Curt Anderson  03:50

you know? And that’s all part of life, and so let’s keep the ball rolling so you have some new, exciting news. You had a wonderful, exciting career change, kind of like, went back a little little bit in time, what’s going to your what’s going on your world? What are you doing today?

Chuck Coxhead  04:08

Well, truth be told, guys, I went back home. I about, you know, well, just 13 years ago I joined Koaxis, and it, frankly, that became a journey that I never could have anticipated, and I didn’t know it at the time, but we put a few people together, and the circumstances were right where we business was probably going to go under, and we executed a turnaround. And I was there for a good long time, did some amazing things we’re going to talk about. And then I left. I got recruited by a customer. Did a couple of jobs. Loved my time to learn so much. But I came back home. I came back home to co access as the General Manager, because the business is going so well that we need to prepare it for scaling, you know, to really just keep the customers happy. And it’s. Just like, oh, the sky opened up, the sunshine came down, and I’m like, home again. I swear to God, it’s just the best feeling in the world. I’m done. I’m 58 years old. Like, this is it, right? This is the last corporate job I want to have, period. Nice.

05:15

Well,

Curt Anderson  05:17

Chuck, congratulations. This is just so inspiring. Please share with folks. So we’re going to be diving into Koaxis. We’re going to we’ve got a little demo plan, little demonstration for folks. Please explain who is coaxis. How do you guys make the world a better place?

Chuck Coxhead  05:34

Well, it’s pretty simple. So we make what are known, what are called RF, cable assembly. RF is radio frequency. It’s for high frequency electronics that most people don’t know anything about, right? And when we do the demo, you’re going to see what that looks like. You’ll see what one looks like by a lot of standards. It’s boring, okay? Because it’s just a cable, right? It’s two connectors in the end of a piece of cable. But nothing could be further from the truth behind it. So much of our business is defense related. It’s wireless telecommunications and all these amazing technologies that people will not hear about for a decade or two decades, if they ever hear about it at all, RF cable assemblies. They’re in. They’re in defense applications, radar signal jammers and signals intelligence to keep our war fighters safe. We got into RF cables for quantum computing on about eight or nine years ago, which was another incredible thing. Not everybody knows what quantum computers are, but they’re incredible. The capabilities are incredible. And we were on the forefront of helping to get that technology off the ground. And we’ve developed some capabilities inside that are like, you know, bringing, bringing sourcing to the US, where it wasn’t before, you know, things like that. So it’s just cables, right? But there’s so much more behind it. And I’m application geek, and that’s who we are. We’re just a little company, you know, with the cornfields across the street here in eastern Pennsylvania, and life is good for all of us.

Curt Anderson  06:59

Nice. Well, hey, speaking of eastern Pennsylvania, we’ve got Diane Byron house. Diane, Happy Monday to you, my friend. She’s an Eagles fan as well. Chuck. So hey, everybody out there, drop a note. Let us know where you’re coming from. Hey, Chuck’s got the the fireworks going and everything. So when you if you get a chance, drop us a note and also connect with Chuck on LinkedIn, you’ll thank us later just you can tell Hi, inspirational dude, contagious enthusiasm. Chuck, I want to go back in time a little so you’re sharing all this wonderful, exciting things going on at coaxis. I’m going to go back a little bit. So we talked about your hero, right, being Spider Man, as you started your career, what led you like, what? What was inspiring you, what was firing you up? Like, where did you see yourself going? What attracted you to manufacturing? Say, you know, post, post school, like, talk, talk to us about that.

Chuck Coxhead  07:51

It’s funny. Curt, that’s the only thing I’ve ever done is, yeah, something manufacturing related. I got out, I was an engineering manager for a company making pumping equipment, and I’ve continued to do that. And interestingly enough, I didn’t, obviously I didn’t stay an engineer. I’ve done dang near everything you can do in a manufacturing company. I’ve been a CNC machinist, an industrial engineer, a design engineer, a salesman, a marketer. I have been at I’ve had everyone work for me. I’ve set up information systems, I’ve done the shipping, I’ve driven the forklift, I’ve done, I’ve swept the floors, done dang near everything except be, you know, the accountant and the HR person, although, guess what, I’m the HR person now, but I’ve had all these people work for me. So it’s been a crazy, crazy, in a way. It’s kind of all I know so and actually, I kind of like, you know what? I got to the point like I don’t want to be in charge anymore. I’m done. I love growing businesses, doing all this stuff. And you know when you finally done, it’s like, I’m finally done looking for a wife, and all of a sudden you’re married, right? Well, I’m finally done wanting to be in charge. Holy crap. Here I am

Curt Anderson  09:05

again. I absolutely love it. And you mentioned, you know, at coaxis, you you know, use the word boring, you know. And a lot of manufacturers can say that, you know, like, you know, gee, our product’s boring. Our process is boring. But man, is there a better industry than manufacturing, just, you know, share a little bit What, What’s kept you in manufacturing, all this, all these years,

Chuck Coxhead  09:26

I, frankly, I’m fascinated by it, because I think that people oversimplify manufacturing. Yeah, the things that are out there that people are building our product, I would it looks relatively simple. It’s incredibly difficult. It looks simple, but some things are so complex, and the variety of things that you can do, and what keeps me in it, is that the stories that I hear once the product hits the streets, it’s I’m just an I’m just an applicant. Geek. It’s like, how can I make people’s lives better? How can I make their job better? I don’t think about it as making a product and selling it. I think that there’s a person on the end of every single order. It could be some young guy or some young girl, right? And they’re trying to make it in their career, and if they do a good job on this project, I have literally worked with companies where there was a young person who, if they do well in this project, they literally were up for a promotion. God’s honest truth. Guy’s Nick actually doesn’t believe it or not, doesn’t live too far from me, right? That actually happens. And I just think about it that way, and I love being able to do that, not to mention, for some people, I mean, like services and products. Oh, very. Vastly different. People can imagine buying something and just selling something, right? But to make something, it’s so different than providing a service, it’s tangible, and people can really feel it, you know, they really, they can really understand and wrap their brain around it a lot more easily. So in a way, I guess I identify with a lot more people, and vice versa, by talking about products, right? Although I love services too, so I’ve done that too. So all manufacturing related, all

Curt Anderson  11:06

manufacturing related. Now on your LinkedIn profile you have, are you still selling like it’s 1999 What do you and that was a great year, by the way. Damon, was it not that 1999 was a great year. So what do you mean by that, Chuck, and just because we’re going to dive into digital self serve, we’re going to talk about e commerce, yeah, we’re going to talk about a configurator. What do you mean when you have that line in your LinkedIn profile? What are you saying there?

Chuck Coxhead  11:32

Well, with all due respect to Prince partying like it’s 1999 right? Amazing guitarist. God bless him. God rest his soul. The manufacturers in particular, they’re stuck. So many of them are stuck. They have not evolved. They don’t recognize that the world around them has changed, or if they’re recognizing it, it’s way, way, way too late. And it’s not just selling. They’re doing a lot of things. Like it’s 1999 I’ve seen them. I’ve worked for them. And honestly, in this world today, it’s the acceleration continues to grow. And you, if you aren’t trying to have some forethought, some foresight, and look down the road of what’s coming and at least experimenting with things, you’re out of your freaking mind. Yeah, out of your mind. And that’s what it is. They’re stuck in a, you know, there’s, they’re stuck in a time warp or something like that. I don’t know what’s going through their heads. Yeah, yeah,

Damon Pistulka  12:31

you know, just like you said, it’s, it’s the mentality of, if we keep our, and this is in sales and marketing, if we keep our people out on the fee out in the field, talking to customers, trying to set appointments, trying to do that, will be just fine, and it’s not the case, because they’re their buyers are moving away from that, and they’ve got to move with it, or they’re going to be done. Yeah? Well, you

Chuck Coxhead  12:53

know, it’s like, I want to grow sales. So what do I do? I’ll hire a salesperson, because that’s what I understand. I start with a budget, yeah, okay, and a dream and say, go out, give them a laptop and make them 10,000 phone calls and 10,000 emails a year, and stuff’s going to get better. If I want to do it twice as much, I’ll put two people on the road, except for six or nine months later, these are frustrated. They start to blame work ethic. They start to do finger pointing. They start to make fun of an entire generation, right? You know, poor millennials that have been, you know, so derided, and in truth, they didn’t keep up with the times. Yes, all that stuff’s important, and work ethic, is it? But if it was only work ethic, if it was only work ethic, then honestly, got everybody be doing, everybody be succeeding. And we know that’s not the case. You have to be looking forward and doing something different. You just do, yeah, and so that’s the way I think I’m always looking down, down the road, always

Curt Anderson  13:49

well, and you’re doing an amazing job. And again, just, you know, as we before we went live, you know, just your dedication to customer success, making that process as easy as possible. Share a little bit about, you know, what you’ve been working on prior to coming back to co access, and then we’re going to dive in. I’m going to pull up the website, we’re going to dive into some of what the actual work that you’re doing.

Chuck Coxhead  14:11

It’s so interesting, you know, I I, as I said, when I left here for about four years and I learned so much I worked for some people who gave me the opportunity to experiment, look down the road, try some things, and what I learned in those four years, what I think is like eight years of My own independent education. I understand now that new world, that new buying journey that people are going on. Not only that, I now have the vocabulary to understand exactly why what we did, you know, 10 years ago, worked so well, yeah. So now I can continue to say, Okay, I can’t rest on my laurels. I have to keep going and. Did that by working for contract manufacturers. I did that by working for warehouse technology companies. I did that by working for ERP consultant, all the while doing sales and marketing and so many other things in senior leadership. And it all that just, you know, it just, it filled this head just with so much. It’s not just information. It inspired me and gave me so much enthusiasm about business again, I’m 58, years old, and I feel like I’m just getting started. I swear to God, it’s the best feeling ever.

Damon Pistulka  15:31

Yep, every day. Man, every day, every

Chuck Coxhead  15:34

day. Man, Mondays are I Mondays are not a drag to me? No, let’s get up and get started, right? Yeah, I’m ready to go. And people think I’m nuts, man, I’m like this all the time.

Curt Anderson  15:48

That’s great. I absolutely love it. And so Hey, have a couple of comments here. So we’ve got Diane saying yes, manufacturing touches everyone, and she drops a little lol account here as well. Yeah, manufacturing, we’ve got Hassan here. Happy Monday. Hey, how you doing? Skylar’s in the house. Hey, happy Monday. Skylar, appreciate you, buddy. And Diane says, so true. Manufacturing is stuck in the dark ages, leader, leaders and manufacturer need to embrace changing with the times. And again, Diane just getting started. So alright, Chuck, let’s dive in. I’m going to go to the website, and we’re going to do a little demo here. And so let’s dive in. So here we have, you know, let me ask

Chuck Coxhead  16:27

you a question. Let me ask you a question. First, tell me honestly, what do you know about RF cables? Curt,

Curt Anderson  16:34

what do I so? Very little. Chuck, so I run very little. Yeah, I’ve had a client that did some wire assemblies. So I could maybe speak enough to be dangerous, but, but that, you know, that might be a stretch. Damon, how about you? Nope, nope, no.

Damon Pistulka  16:50

It’s a wire with ends on it, a couple connectors and so, yeah, connectors that’s all got ends on it or some sort now, Chuck,

Curt Anderson  16:57

as we get into this, what I want to share, what I want to talk about is just the sheer dedication to helping that customer making an easy buying decision. You’ve dedicated yourself to separating yourself Karina, it’s a really a distinct competitive advantage. But what are we looking at here? Let’s go through the process

Chuck Coxhead  17:18

so it’s pretty simple, and the reason I ask you that question is, anybody could use this, anybody you might not know what you’re looking at in the end, but anybody can use this. I made sure of that when I originally built it. So by the way, it’s been about 10 years since we released but so what we’re looking at is, you got to pick a cable, and you got to pick connectors, right? There’s a bunch of features to it. I just assume you go and do it,

Curt Anderson  17:45

so and and Chuck. And what you did, you set the bar so low that even I could do it right. Damon, so, like, that’s if, if I can do it, anybody can do it. But this is phenomenal, because the thing is, who you’re speaking to is, though you made it as easy as humanly possible for that buyer or the engineer. You know, what you’ve done is for especially for the engineer that does know what they’re buying. You just made it very simple for them. I don’t have to call you, I don’t have to send you an email. I don’t have to, you know, I’m in a different time zone. I don’t have to wait for you to open up your office, right? Yeah,

Chuck Coxhead  18:19

I’m going to take it one step further. Not only that, they don’t even have to do in so many cases, they don’t even have to do all the engineering that they used to a lot of so many companies, they cling to it. They still make drawings, and they go through all that you’re going to see when you get done this that’s basically been eliminated. And there are literally billions, billions of possibilities that can be built on this, billions of different cable assemblies. I assure you, we are not stocking billions of parts. Well, yeah, we’re stocking millions of piece parts. We’re not stocking billions of cable assemblies. Yeah, right. So, and then the engineering goes away, yeah.

Curt Anderson  18:59

So let’s walk through Chuck. So let’s just walk us through so many steps here.

Chuck Coxhead  19:03

Okay, so you’ve pre chosen here before. When you brought it up, you picked a 2.92 millimeter connector on hand, formable o 47 diameter cable with an mmcx connector. It’s kind of funny, because, like, the chances of somebody using that’s pretty slim, but there’s rules built into this. Other people have tried to do, you know, submit a quote to me, and they do that. It has no rules. You know, you could, oh, yeah, put a connector on it’s, it’s like, this big and a connector on this, this tiny little thing. And sure, in theory, I could do that, but they won’t fit on the same cable. Nobody offers that as an opportunity, as a thing. So with every good configurator. It’s not just about slapping your parts up there and letting people choose. You have to put rules into it, and there’s a very complex set of rules here, the data schema and the logic that I’ve created that is simple from our perspective, but it really is a complex set of rules so that whatever you can build on here. Yeah, it, it can be built, if you will. Now you see you chose something there, okay, and it went back. Said, Oh, nope, can’t do that, right? So it literally un shows the cable, and it’ll do that for you. That’s actually really, really important, because, yeah, the only person can be disappointed is the end user, yep. Beautifully. As you build it, you actually get to see the product.

Curt Anderson  20:25

Okay, this is, this is wild, right? And

Chuck Coxhead  20:30

you can change it as you go. If you change your mind, the number of because of the rule set, the options that you have will reduce based on the other components, connector, other cable that you’ve chosen. So again, we don’t want you to be able to do that. Now I would ask for one thing for you. I’d ask you one thing, pick a really weird and I mean really, really weird length. That’s too big. There’s nobody’s going to do one that long, all right? There’s a rule there, right? So it’s going to be a maximum. I don’t remember, 6660 or 72 inches, but some make it fractional. Do something crazy, yeah, 32.390 that’s great. That’s great. Okay, now, oftentimes people want these things marked, okay, so as you go and build it, it’s asking you for something new. It’s actually for more features. Okay? This is why you end up with billions of features or potential, you know, combinations, if you will. So you always struck me as a delay match guy. Now, the at this point,

Curt Anderson  21:44

no, my parents said the same thing. You know, I know it rose delayed and so, yeah, but

Chuck Coxhead  21:49

hurt is a future delay match.

Curt Anderson  21:52

User, yeah, yeah.

Chuck Coxhead  21:55

So at this point, okay, you’re ready to view the cable. The reason I asked you to put in an odd length is because I guarantee you that this product is not like something that I pre loaded, right? Oh, yeah, just not. I didn’t choose any of these features. Curt did, and I asked you the question, you know very little about Coex cables, RF cables, right? So if you click View, okay, you know, view the order cable configuration.

Damon Pistulka  22:22

We can’t see. Did it change?

Chuck Coxhead  22:24

It might have changed tabs or something. There you go. It popped up instantly, instantly, instantly. Look at that. So behind the scenes, it actually does all the calculations, including providing a specification and calculating market pricing and providing a specification for the engineers and giving you a bill of material for everything that you just chose. From here it’s E commerce. E commerce takes over and the car, yeah, big bag, boob, yeah. Well, keep going. Now go check out after you’ve done that. Now check out your cart or go to your carton. That’s fine. Whatever you want to do. I

Curt Anderson  23:03

need a dozen.

Chuck Coxhead  23:03

I don’t blame you. Now. Just go to your cart. So here’s where it starts to get even fun. And what I’m telling you, we’ve got a we’ve got a lot more in store. We’re not going to stop where we are. You get to choose between lead time. Oh yeah, okay, two weeks or two days, okay? And you’ll notice that the price changes on the fly, yep. The thing is, it’s not just about providing e commerce. You can create e commerce for your business, and it may or may not move the needle. Yeah, it’s about understanding your customers. Remember, there’s a person on the other end of every single order. I believe that from the bottom of my heart, and one, I want to transform the way that people are actually, you know, designing, buying and receiving cables. And by receiving, I mean, dude, the RF cable industry will ship cables in 16 weeks. 16 weeks. Oh, my, this is awesome. I can ship billions of different combinations in two days. That requires a business model. It’s not just a configurator, it’s not just an E commerce system. It’s a business model that is deeply, deeply committed to making sure that you get what you want when you want it, right, which is one of my wife’s favorite sayings. So she just wants what she wants when she wants it. God bless you. Why does she put up with me? But that’s what’s behind this. We make it look really easy in terms of this and placing this order. But the real magic is, how do we get 12 pieces out? You know that I guarantee you were custom made to spec shipping up to 50 pieces in two days. Yeah. And the reality is, somebody might miscount. You said you need 12, maybe you needed 14 or 13. Right, okay. Or maybe you broke one, because that can happen. They can break them. Or maybe somebody dumped something, a requirement on your desk, and you found out that your cables aren’t performing. You need a quick and you’re not going to meet a customer schedule. Yeah, right. That is the reality in a world that we understand and so, but in order to do that, you’ve got to have inventory and all kinds of things. Well, nobody knows better than you guys that people hate inventory. Well, you know what they hate more than inventory? They hate not being on time. They really hate not meeting their schedule, yeah, and not meeting their deadline. So there’s so much more to this than just a pretty thing,

Damon Pistulka  25:43

yeah. But this is, this is like, this is like, putting a sexy outside on a really wild engine drive train combination in a car. It is because this just makes it, just makes it look like, oh, I want to get in that thing and and, you know, you got the the machine behind it to do it. Because when you can do this at this level, the the amount of organization for components, for work, all the way through workstation design to get things done and out the door, the order system that comes through your facility to get stuff out consistently. In two days, you got to have your poop in a group, otherwise you’re just going to fall on your face every

Chuck Coxhead  26:28

time. That’s the magic. That’s the magic. And the thing is, it’s one thing to be Amazon, where you’re for the most part, it’s all consumer, business, consumer, right? This is B to B, yeah. Okay. B to B is a very, very different animal. So, you know, again, I’m thinking about my customer. Guess what? B to B, they like to use purchase orders, not credit cards. I mean, there’s plenty of Credit card orders out there. We’ve made provisions for our customers that have credit terms with us to be able to use a purchase order. Okay? All these different things. So this is B to B, tail, right? That’s what we’re talking about. Yeah? This is B to B, E, commerce. This isn’t B to C. I’m not Amazon. You know, if you want to buy those pieces of garbage that are off of Amazon, RF, cables, God bless you. You’re probably not my ideal customer. Yeah. So this is a very, very different animal and all that, because we did, you know, all that is enabled because we decided to have an idea that was forward looking, yeah. So

Curt Anderson  27:26

let’s, I just want to kind of recap this process again. And so so many custom manufacturers out there, you know, and they might be, well, wait a minute, my process is, you know, a little bit more complicated, or this that the other thing, look what Chuck’s done, you know, yeah, he’s taken a, you know, there’s unlimited, almost an infinite, probably an infinite number of configurations that could occur here in what Chuck has done is just by sheer dedication and commitment to making it as easy as humanly possible to do business with him. He’s eliminated barriers. Damon, you always use that word friction. He’s removed the friction. Yes, of you know, the email, the phone call, the back and forth. Can you send me a drawing, all these things on my own time? I can sit here and create this own, a product that doesn’t exist anywhere else on the planet right now. So, you know, we and so we talk about, what a competitive advantage. So say, you know, there’s other countries that sell products cheaper, or, you know, there’s a price advantage, or what have you Well, good luck finding this specific SKU that you need. You know, the engineer needs a prototype tomorrow, or you need it on the product, on the on the assembly line by next week, and I can come in here and again, like, you know, play around with this. And as I keep clicking all these, Chuck has it. We’re like, I’m visually watching this product that doesn’t exist anywhere else. I’m watching it being built. It’s like, I’m at the lunch I’m at the my favorite lunch spot making, watching my own sandwich being built here, right? Chuck, yeah,

Chuck Coxhead  29:00

that’s, that’s exactly it. And, and the, the, again, the only reason that I’m driven to do this is because I just feel like this is the world that we were entering this world some years ago, and I had a vision for what this could be. I never knew. I never knew in my heart that was going to become what it has become. I mean, the truth be told, we’re talking about revolutionizing we’re talking about empowering business. I’m still only getting 10 to 15% of my sales through this e commerce site. But once you learn how to solve a problem, once you’ve proven that you’re innovative. Well, people believe that you can do so much more, and then they do, and then you do. And it’s, it’s about, it starts with an attitude. And, you know, again, I’m only one of three people that made this happen. So the, you know, I built the system. We have a business model that’s supported by leadership. We have an incredible engineering team that that helps to help us to realize and adding new products all the time, such that, you know, we just continue to try and stay ahead of the game. As I said, we’re, I’m still looking at what people need, and we’re going to continue to transform this even more.

Curt Anderson  30:21

Yeah, and what I love, on top of, you know, the engineer, purchasing, procurement, whatever department you’re in, you can come here now Chuck, even internally, somebody sends you a drawing, and you’re like, Oh, gee. Now we need to come up with a quote. You can use your own tool internally. So, hey, send us a drawing. If you don’t have time, you don’t know, you know, you’re intimidated by this thing or whatever. You know, life is busy. You send us a drawing. We’ll just put it in, we’ll plug it in here. And, like, now you can get that quote immediately,

Chuck Coxhead  30:48

right? So many times, right? I mean, like, so many times we’ve done that, yeah,

Curt Anderson  30:53

your internal team probably uses that on the time. And then what I absolutely love is, you know, coming back here is now, not only can I send that that purchase or the, you know, here’s what my quote is, here’s what my product that I just created. Chuck took it one step further and said, Hey, Mr. And Mrs. Engineer, Mr. And Mrs. In purchasing, procurement, pull out that credit card and, like, hit the buy button, and we’re going to get to see in two days. Like any easier, right?

Chuck Coxhead  31:24

We’ve, we’ve taken it even further. Remember, this is B to B, yeah, one of the realities is that the engine, the buyer doesn’t know what the heck they’re doing. He or she is not building it. The engineer may build it, but then the engineer may not have that card. It may not be able to place the order. Well, then we can share cart. You can see the buttons there on the top, on the right side, you can actually share the cart with someone. You send it to him an email, it’ll pull up this exact cart, yep, for him or her, the buyer, and then they can buy it. That’s the reality of B to B, yeah. Again, this isn’t just about e commerce. This is about understanding your customer. What are they living every day? What are their challenges? What are their workflows? And when you understand that, when you have that kind of empathy, okay, this becomes easy if you’re committed to it, right? If you’re committed to it.

Curt Anderson  32:16

Chuck for friends out there that are manufacturing, custom manufacturers in particular, they’re like, man, that’s really impressive. Good for you chuck, you know, Damon, seamlessly. We’re always like, you know, it’s hard for us to think of of a product line that should be using a configurator. So Chuck, for our our contract manufacturers out there, what would be any advice to like, how I bend metal, I cut steel, I manufacture circuit boards, I do 3d printing, whatever it is. What advice would you have for somebody that wants to go this direction, build their own configurator? Any tips or advice? So

Chuck Coxhead  32:49

this is definitely the kind of direction you would go for someone who was in OEM, okay, for sure, you have your own you have your own products. Okay, your own products have a set of rules. Now, there are naysayers out there who would say this is simple. It’s just two connectors on the end of a piece of cable. Okay, fine, but I will tell you that if you look inside your business, if you are an OEM, I guarantee you you may not have them written down. They may be in the heads of your talent. There is a set of rules. Yes, there are or how to build your product. Oftentimes it’s easier than you think, because usually it’s just add ons, okay? And if that’s the case, then you can build a configurator to some extent, okay? So that is my advice, is you have to this is what I like to say when you go into that meeting room, give everybody permission to erase the whiteboard. That means, let’s drop all of our preconceived notions, okay? And let’s just start saying, What could we do if we could wave the magic wand, you know, and just make it appear? And I will tell you, I’m going to recount the conversation that I had on LinkedIn. I was talking about e commerce some years ago, and a very good friend of mine, and I won’t name his name, and a very good friend of mine said, Yeah, but I’m running a machine shop, and you can’t do e commerce by machine, you know, for machine shops. And I want to tell you, this was some years ago, five, six years ago. I don’t know whatever it was, I went out and did a quick internet search, and by golly, there was an E commerce for machine shop. Guess what? I did that same search recently. There’s several now, yes, so you have to be able to give yourself permission to erase the whiteboard and say, every once in a while, if I’m gonna look forward, I gotta drop my, you know, I I’ve got to stop or drop my curse of knowledge and get out there and find what’s possible. So now that interesting law, interestingly enough, is not an OEM, okay, a machine shop is definitely some you know, if you think about the classic built to print machine shop, that is not okay. So there’s not even absolutes in that, and that’s my advice. Is. Just look inside yourself, think about your customer, and start seeing what’s possible. You might surprise yourself.

Damon Pistulka  35:06

Yeah, this is so powerful because, you know, you hit it well, Chuck something like these RF cable assemblies. This is a great thing. There’s a lot of rules behind this, a lot of I mean, and when people say, OEM. Say they can’t do it. I say, go out and look at some of the OEMs that are doing it. I mean, like I was on it was a couple months going on, on the Haas CNC machining site, you can configure 100 plus $1,000 CNC machine there, whatever size machine, whatever options you want. Blah, blah, blah, pay for right there. Have a ship to you. You can do this stuff. I don’t care if you’re making street sweepers or, you know, a pen. You can do whatever you want, custom, whatever you want, like this. It just takes that and that time and that, like you said, erasing the whiteboard. But the manufacturers that I think could benefit that, that it would be truly leading. Are the ones like, you’re talking about, the custom manufacturers that would say, this is, this is awesome. I mean, this is incredible. I do not want to downplay what you built here.

Chuck Coxhead  36:12

Those are my feelings. Let’s inspire the world. Yeah. I

Damon Pistulka  36:15

mean, because this is like, this should not stop at standard components that go together. I mean, really need to understand the way the world works now. Everything is designed in 3d software. Curt and I talked about this had to be two or three years ago. I was freaking the hell out when I saw a sheet metal manufacturer that said, just drop your 3d model in. It’ll give you a quote. And I’m like, whoo,

36:42

whoo.

Damon Pistulka  36:43

How big I’m gonna, you know, we’re talking about this, this, these configurators are incredible, and people that aren’t looking at them are are just going to be left behind Well,

Chuck Coxhead  36:53

and, you know? And when I say that I have more to go, you mentioned standard product, right? Great. Honestly, where I want to go with this next is I get to the point this is all quote, unquote, standard product, okay, but there is so much more that can be done that’s outside of standard that I, frankly, it’s the processing is just way too long to be able to do in two days. Once you get to this point, right? What’s wrong with adding a button and I’m gonna, as God is my witness, I’m gonna, what’s that? Oh, you know what? I want more. And now new stuff pops up. And maybe they can’t buy it online, but they can get a better visualization, or a better idea of what they want to get, and then send us that, then send us that button, then upload that drawing, right and, boom, I’ve already got it. I’m at work. It’s Friday night, all right, I’m hitting the ground first thing Monday morning or even Saturday because we got some overachieving sales people sometimes, right? That I can pop that out and get that done very, very quickly, all in a format that is very easy for us to understand, where we can pop it in, because, truth be told, once we got done building this, we have a person inside our shop who took this entire thing and created an offline version that is much, much, much bigger. And we use that to be able to generate those quotes. Not only that, when you talk about where you can go from here, the typical process is, I get a product, it’s custom. It’s got to go through my engineering, then it’s got to get it manufacturing instructions. It’s got to go out to the floor, all this serial processing, not at coaxis. At coaxis. The second we get it, the manufacturing and sheet, it’s all generated automatically. I enter the order I get the I get the instruction sheet with all the details, all the manufacturing details, everything, lengths, dimensions, marking, testing, all these different things that we need to know. We get all that automatically in the background that nobody even knows about, and we get rid of all that serial processing, while the rest of the world is committed to automating the back end of the business, the delivery that doesn’t work well, unless you’re making 100,000 a million of something. Frankly, when you have billions of possible combinations, that means I’d have to automate potentially a billion different things, right? And we’re vertically integrated, by the way. We’re making our own connectors. We’re making our own cable, okay, not just buying stuff and building it, selling it. So when you have that it, it doesn’t work. But what you can automate, or certainly semi automate, is the front end of the business, the things where you’re doing repetitive over and over and over. And I guarantee you, you listen to your business, you won’t not be able to unhear this. It’ll only takes me 30 seconds. How many times do people say that in the workplace? 30 seconds times 872 Okay, whatever that math comes out to be, okay, it’s hours and hours and hours you save every year. So all of this, when you create a new mindset that just came nothing from E commerce, it changes the way you do business.

Curt Anderson  40:19

Well, drop the mic there, Chuck. And so couple things I want to so guys connect with Chuck on LinkedIn, and when you do, you’re going to see in his banner, it says innovation is not just thinking outside the box. It’s realizing there was never a box to begin with Chuck. You’re just like, absolutely crushing that box. And Damon, I just want to share one thing that somebody said on Chuck’s LinkedIn profile, he has always demonstrated an infectious can do attitude works well in motivating the team. He is passionate about getting things done right, and has carried this on his professional career. And somebody typed that almost 15 years ago, Chuck, and here you are. You’ve mentioned it twice on the show, 58 years old, dude and like, I’m ready to run through a wall right now hanging out with you. So this is phenomenal. I know we’re like, Damon, we’re way over time, we’ll start winding down here, but first off, Chuck, I want to thank you. Thank you. Thank you for sharing this incredible tool that we have here. I’m going to stop sharing and come back to you guys. I didn’t I apologize I missed the chat box. Damon, is there any any comments that we need to get going here? There’s, there’s

Damon Pistulka  41:24

a few here from coffee is here. Good morning

Curt Anderson  41:29

today. Custom on demand is wild. Great workshop. You erase the whiteboard. Love it. And Diane says, If you are not utilizing e commerce as a manufacturer, you are playing by the old rules. The game has advanced and left you behind. Diane says, Teach me more. So

Chuck Coxhead  41:47

that’s the mic drop, right there. Diane has the Mic drop. Yeah,

Damon Pistulka  41:52

I tell you, it’s so great to be able to talk with you, Chuck, because if we don’t get manufactured, it’s cool seeing you, and I’m super excited. I’m wanting to talk to you you know more down the road as you start having fun with this and making changes, because you’re going to be leading, leading the industry even further ahead. The manufacturers that are not doing this are, are, are just they don’t know it, but they’re gonna die the death of 1000 cuts. Just gonna,

Chuck Coxhead  42:25

ain’t, no doubt, ain’t, no

Curt Anderson  42:28

doubt, ain’t, no doubt. So, alright, Chuck, let’s start winding down. And I think the one, one of the last things that I wanted to hit on, you know, again, here’s a company, you know, vertically integrated, making your own parts. But what you’ve done is, you, really, you’ve taken you a preparatory process, not necessarily proprietary products for those folks that are, are not OEMs and again, like, you know, sometimes the contract manufacturers feel left out of that E commerce party. They’re like, Oh yeah, you guys that have the finished good, good for you guys. Well, we’re always making stuff for somebody else. You’re making stuff for somebody else, but you have proprietary processes, and you can do the exact same thing. And so there’s, and there’s great ways to do that. There’s all sorts of experts out there. Man, get a cup of buy chuck a cup of coffee, or virtual lunch or something, and he can share with you, Chuck, what’s the best way for everybody to reach out, find you. We’ve got your LinkedIn profile here, coaxis.com, anything else,

Chuck Coxhead  43:23

honestly, that’s enough. I’m on LinkedIn every single day. I think you guys know that. You know I’m I talked to, I talk, I meet to everybody. You know, I’ve got a gajillion followers, or not a gajillion, but I like to, I like to meet with them, if I can. I have 100 meetings a year, just because I love people that much, that is the best way. And if you want to play and build a cable, go to quax.com you don’t know anything about RF cables, trust me, if you break it, just let me know. And I promise I way I can make it better, so

Curt Anderson  43:55

you can make it better. Well, Chuck man, dude, God bless you. Thank you. Appreciate you taking the time out of your busy schedule with everything that you have going. That you have going on. Congratulations on coming back home to this wonderful company, and we just wish you nothing but monster, massive, massive success. Damon, your thoughts as we close out,

Damon Pistulka  44:14

I just Thanks Chuck. I knew we were going to have fun and that this is just did not disappoint and exceeded in many ways. Thank

Chuck Coxhead  44:22

you. Well, thank both of you. I mean you both know I love you. You know it’s honestly and it’s just, I’m just grateful for the opportunity. Well,

Curt Anderson  44:31

Chuck, you know what I why you’re I have, I’m sorry. I have one last question. Oh, yeah. So all right, Chuck, long time manufacturer, just relentless, best business advice at your stage in your career. So so say for like younger, talk out there, best business advice that you’ve ever received

Chuck Coxhead  44:52

better doesn’t win different wins when you start comparing yourself, when you start comparing yourself. The competitors, you say, Well, I’m going to make something, I’m going to do something better than them. Okay, they’re going to catch up, and you’re going to be in an endless game of LeapFrog. But if you do something different, you will hear the world say, differentiated. You can do that three ways, something, a completely new product or service, a completely new customer experience or a completely new business model, and if you can combine multiple of those, okay, then I swear to God, you will capture a very high proportion of the available market. And you and people be like, where did they come from? I speak from experience, because that’s what happened to me.

Curt Anderson  45:45

Drop the mic. Chuck Damon, I couldn’t, I couldn’t wrap up without asking chuck that one dude, that was awesome. I had high expectations. You crushed it. So all right, let’s wrap up, Chuck again. Big thank you for folks out there in the chat room. Appreciate you. Thank you for your comments, anything that you miss. Man, go back to the very beginning. Chuck just dropped so much inspiration, so much enthusiasm, so much brilliance on how to take your E commerce to the whole whole new level. And if you just want to be someone, Damon, I can’t even get the words out, as we’d like to say, just go out and be someone’s inspiration, just like Chuck was today. How about a big round of applause for Chuck Amen

Chuck Coxhead  46:23

And you guys,

46:25

thank you. Thank

Chuck Coxhead  46:26

you.

Curt Anderson  46:26

We’re going to close out thank you. Appreciate you. Have a great rest of your week. Guys.

Chuck Coxhead  46:32

Dream big Chuck. Hang

Curt Anderson  46:33

out with us for one second, and guys, we’ll see you back here Friday. You.