Driving Fortitude & Dominance for U.S. Manufacturers Through Supply Chain Clarity

Curt Anderson  00:01

Hey, Damon. Happy Monday, dude, how are you?

Damon Pistulka  00:04

I’m doing great Curt ready to go?

Curt Anderson  00:06

How was your weekend?

Damon Pistulka  00:08

It was very nice.

Curt Anderson  00:10

Very nice.

Damon Pistulka  00:11

Good weather. Good weather. Good people good. Get out in nature. It was good.

Curt Anderson  00:17

What more could you ask for? So I did you get a good night’s sleep for this one?

Damon Pistulka  00:22

I did. Man. Is

Curt Anderson  00:24

this going to be good? So I want to introduce my dear friend, the one the only Britteny Gardner. Britteny, happy Monday. How are you?

Britteny Gardner  00:33

Happy Monday, you guys, man is a great day. I’m just living the dream out here. You know, one day at a time. Oh,

Curt Anderson  00:42

it’s just it’s a great day to you know, Damon like our friend Eddie Saunders says it’s a great day to have a great day, is it not? And it’s just a wonderful day to be here with Brittney, Brittney, we’ve got so much uncovered. Let’s you know what, let’s David. We’re not going to monkey around like we’re gonna dive right in. You’re ready.

Damon Pistulka  00:58

Let’s get going.

Curt Anderson  00:59

Let’s get going. Alright, Britteny, first question for you, my friend when you were so we’re just talking about a bunch of things. So now for folks, just join us. drop us a note. Let us know you’re there. First off, secondly, Happy Monday to you thirdly, connect with you, our dear friend Britteny. You may I’m telling you’re just going to pick up like a new best friend. She makes it. No wonder your whole worry for fishing meet Britteny. She’s just an absolute amazing human being. And we’re going to talk a little bit about a boat thing. So we might get to that. But Britteny, before I go there we talk about how you know you were raised in in Idaho and just this magnificent, wonderful, just slice of paradise that you live in here in Idaho. When you were a little girl growing up. Okay, when you were a little girl growing up? Who was your hero? Oh, and who was your hero? So

Britteny Gardner  01:48

cool. Well, I’ll give you a little bit of context, you guys. So I grew up here in Meridian, Idaho, when the population was just around 20,000 It’s really cool community to give you a little more context right now Meridian, Idaho is pushing close to 250,000 people. It just incredible growth. Yeah, as a little kid, my hero was Jane Goodall. I grew up on a farm in Meridian. So we raised sheep and alpacas and just any type of animal you could think of. We had a little a little miniature farm. And Jane Goodall was an inspiration for me because I had this obsession with her studies in monkeys. And I really, you know, it’s outside the box. And I was just really empowered by her leadership to you know, break glass ceilings and do her research and not be fearful of, of the outcomes of that. So she was always somebody that inspired me with life on the farm. Wow,

Curt Anderson  02:47

what a demon. We

Damon Pistulka  02:49

haven’t had that one. Oh, we have not. That’s awesome.

Curt Anderson  02:54

Brittany to do that.

Britteny Gardner  02:56

Never know what you’re gonna get.

Curt Anderson  02:59

Especially with you with when it comes to Britteny. I never know like, you just have to expect the unexpected. Britain. I was in a movie about her. Was there a movie

Britteny Gardner  03:07

about? Yeah, yeah, it was called Gorillas in the Mist. Yep, with with sporty Weaver.

Curt Anderson  03:13

I’d say it was a heartbreaking. I don’t spoiler alert, but demount if you saw but it is, if you’re an animal lover, it is a powerful powerful wrench. It’s that’s a good movie. Scoring Weaver entered. Yeah. So rate hero for you? What did so just I want to take that a little further. How did that impact you as a person? Or how did you know? Just share with that?

Britteny Gardner  03:36

Yeah, you bet. Well, you know, growing up, there’s always there were always barriers for me, is, you know, as a woman growing in business, to being able to overcome those hurdles. And you know, just finding those inspirations to be able to grow and really connect with people. And in her case, animals, but you know, that translated into the connections with humans, you know, originally, I thought I wanted to be a vet, and entry animals. And as I, you know, grew through college and grew through different courses, I realized, like my true calling was connections with people and being able to help and serve. And that started in my life with serving animals and just translated into, you know, the different leadership roles and opportunities to, you know, grow and learn with people. I’ve always, you know, been proud of being a servant leader. And I think that that translates into all the work that I’ve done throughout my career and now, you know, my, my career with Vessel. You know, like I said before, breaking those glass ceilings, not letting anything really stand in my way of being that true leader to help serve people and that’s what we’re doing now. That’s what which is really fun. It’s really a lot of fun.

Curt Anderson  04:53

So, alright, so first off, phenomenal, man, just I’m going to be Yeah, I’m gonna be thinking about that one all day. Today so Britteny, great answer there as far as who your hero was appreciate it. I know you’re just a wonderful, incredible family person. As we before we went live as you shared your little bit introverted, right, just finally coming out of your shell just getting so just I want to dive into a little bit of your journey, but we’re gonna do a super wonderful explanation of vessel, how Vessel is just doing amazing work helping manufacturers throughout the Great States or the United States here. And we’re going to talk about it’s perfect. I’m gonna read the title here driving fortitude and dominance for US manufacturers through supply chain clarity, man, if we needed that since little thing that happened in 2020. But let’s I want to just share with everybody a little bit your background, you know, your Where did you drive your passions? How did you end up here at vessel?

Britteny Gardner  05:50

Let’s Oh, I love it. Okay, um, and also current, just cool connection that I work with vessel. And also we’ll share a little bit about life on a Vessel as well. So just a random connection there that will, you know,

Curt Anderson  06:05

intended. So, after you explain a little bit, little background of, of Brittany and her journey, Damon, I’m going to share with you my first phone call with Brittany.

Damon Pistulka  06:17

There we go. Well, yeah,

Britteny Gardner  06:19

you know, global competition right now. And economic uncertainties is kind of scary. But really understanding supply chain is more crucial than ever, for our manufacturing our manufacturing customers. And really, we want to restore those jobs and operations back to the United States, you know, vessels, a veteran owned, mission driven company, committed to that. We’ve been around actually, for seven years. I started with Vessel back in November. And but but you know, seven years prior six and a half years prior Vessel was really working directly with manufacturers, and understanding the gaps and opportunities to help them so more of a consulting role, if you will, from that vessel has grown with our primary client base, our our manufacturing extension partnership, and now we’ve been able to, from the experiences, consultants develop a software that is just revolutionizing the way that we’re doing business by helping manufacturers and our MEP partners connect the dots through AI, smart technology, smart matching, and it is rad, you guys to be able to present, the software that we’re developing it is solving a problem that is needed in almost every sector that we’re working with. And it’s inspiring to me to be able to work for a company that’s so passionate about taking care of our customers, and in the end, being able to free up more time for them to do what they’re good at, which is taking care of the manufacturers really serving them providing them with guidance. And so the software that we built and that we continue to build and refined to solve problems for these groups is just so cool.

Curt Anderson  08:11

Nice, Damon, like you’re ready to run through a wall right now.

Damon Pistulka  08:17

This one Yeah.

Curt Anderson  08:18

So let’s go here pretty I’m again, I’m gonna we’re talking we’re going to talk about vessel as you mentioned, there’s a couple of different Vessels and you know, you have a vast banking experience. Okay, so now banking, we think manufacturing is awesome. What attracted you to so you know, Wells Fargo many many years you know, you’ve just done amazing work working with you know, in the finance world fractured you to vessel What had you jumped ship putting?

Britteny Gardner  08:49

You have really good question, Curt. You know, I, with my experience in banking, and then developing people that’s always been a core of me is really being able to solve problems, being able to serve people and bring them up right I like to see myself as that launching pad you know, for people for their that next step. And so in banking, and although you have the banking you get all the you know, all the banking, language and all that fun stuff that comes along with it interest rates and yields on accounts and all that fun stuff, right rates of return. Although I’m a closet nerd, when it comes to that people at my core is is really what I was passionate about what I’m passionate about. So in banking, I drove programs around sales, how do we increase sales? And what does that sales really mean? And in my language, sales is connecting with people uncovering a problem and finding a solution. That makes sense. It’s as simple as that. We’re not going to just fling spaghetti noodles at the wall and see what sticks. We want to make sure there’s a need. If there’s no need. Then you make a friend right? In most cases, you make a friend then you way. But for me, what really drove me to come into vessel was they came to me a month before, almost a year before I jumped ship over to vessel and and talk to me about their vision and talk to me about where they want to go and just really good group of people. Really, really good group of people. I wasn’t quite there yet. I’m like, No, I’m not, I’m not there yet. And I made a promise to my husband. Okay. Now when COVID hit, my husband wanted to sell everything and go on an adventure. And I was like, dear husband, no, that’s silly. We’re not going to do that. I’ll give you two years. I’m like, let’s set two years, let’s set some goals. If we don’t accomplish those goals, within two years, I promise you, we’ll sell everything. And we’ll go on this adventure. Because that was when we were 38 years old. And we have four children. Okay. And we’re paying now Now moving along, we’re paying for college. We’re paying for daycare. It’s really fun, you guys. It’s really fun. Yeah. And, and so at that point, Molly from Vessel. So Molly is at Vessel. She’s the Chief Operating Officer there. And she comes to me, and she’s like, Britteny, really want you to do this. And I was like, Molly, here’s the thing. This is my situation, I’m going to be moving all over the country, you know, I’m going to be in a different environment. And she’s like, we’ll work with you. We want you on the team. And you know, what, really, what really sealed it for me curtain, Damon is that the people that are at vessel care, they’re good people that want to solve problems. They care about finding solutions. And it is fun. It’s so fun to work with people that are creative, that are innovators, that you know want to do better. And I wanted to be a part of the cool kids club. So I said, Yes, I will do it. And they’re actually along for the ride too, with all of our adventures. So to put a little bow on it, we did sell everything in, in, you know, last year, bought a boat. And now we live on the boat pretty much full time with the exception of now because we’re in hurricane season in the Caribbean. So that’s our current state. That’s

Curt Anderson  12:24

your current state. So David, so I just wanted to give a shout out to the team of Vessel My dear buddy, Derek, and just and shout out to Molly, what a great judge of character they have for you know, talking about putting together the you know, David psyche, remembering you’re a kid you’re like, you had to pick, you know, get the all star kickball team together. You know? It’s like the all star kickball team, right? Is that?

Britteny Gardner  12:43

So yeah. My dad would always say my dad would always say surround yourself with people that are better than you. Yeah, surround yourself with people that are better than you. And that’s what I did when I joined vessel. The entire team there, Derek, Molly, the other Derek, Jared, gosh, we’ve got Germany, and we’ve got some Development Guides. They’re just on the ball. And it is really cool. You

Curt Anderson  13:06

know, and company developed by, you know, our veterans, you know, thank you for your service to our country. And these are manufactured guys with manufacturing background, helping manufacturers. Now Britteny, we’re gonna dive deeper into vessels before we do so Damon, let me just let me just kind of tee this up if I so I get on a call with you know, my introduction with Brittany. And she pops on and just this ball of energy, just you know, this beautiful soul. And I’m just you know, she makes you feel like you’ve a million bucks you like you’ve known her your whole life. And as I’m talking to her, I thought I saw five feet walking by behind her. And I’m like, Well, what room could like if feet I mean, that’s that’s like a deck and a boat. Like people are walking. I saw legs. And I’m like, it happened a couple of times. And so I’m like, pretty. Where are you? And so Britteny, can you please explain to Damon what what was going on there? Yeah,

Britteny Gardner  13:59

yeah. So my husband has an office. So he’s, he’s on sabbatical right now from work. And his office is the engine room. Okay. And so my office is our state room, which is below deck, we’ve got 48 rooms, and they know when I wear the vessel shirt, it is off limits, they cannot come in, they can open the door, they know. But there’s a little porthole that’s right behind me. And sometimes they just get this itch. So my kids aged right now I’ve got a five year old daughter. I’ve got a nine year old son, a 12 year old son and then a 20 year old son so three older boys and a little girl. And I will tell you, they just itch to reach their fingers through the porthole and peeking. And so I couldn’t begin but man though they were going back and forth. They were trying Kurt they were Wow.

Curt Anderson  14:48

It’s so it’s phenomenal. And so I want to I just want to for entrepreneurship. It’s out Damon entrepreneurships pretty easy, right? Just a piece of cake. For us what’s working But it’s making those hard life decisions, throwing caution to the wind, taking that massive leap of faith. Now, I don’t know how many people out there have the courage, stamina to say, hey, let’s sell everything we have obligations, or, or young children, right when you know those ones. But, you know, for children that were taking care of fact, financial obligations, family members, you know, Jen, you know, all sorts of things going on in Idaho with your family. And you’re like, hey, let’s Brittany, what was going through your mind? What were the emotions? Yeah, it could be just for thinking of the person out there. Maybe they you know, maybe it’s not going to cave, we’re gonna sell everything going to ship but maybe I want to leave my job and start a business I want to, you know, whatever it is, like how, yeah, sure, sure what you’re going through, please,

Britteny Gardner  15:46

I love this Curt. And Damon, this is such a good topic. Because, you know, when I when we started out with this conversation about, you know, how I was empowered to grow throughout my, throughout my career, and a lot of a lot of it was safe, right? A lot of it was safe, you get a paycheck, you know, you you have that security with insurance, like all these things, right? It’s safe, it’s comfortable. People are good at doing what they’re comfortable at. But not great, right? Not great. If you want to achieve greatness, you got to sweat, you got to get clammy hands, a little bit of sweat under the arms, and you got to feel the knot in your gut. When you’re doing that, you’re making moves. And it might not work out the way you want it to the first time. But you do it again. Guys, I will tell you I relate being on a boat so much to starting a business. So I also started an insurance business in my past role, and and let that paycheck go. And I will tell you driving, riding a boat is just like that. Let me give you some some storyline here. So my husband and I, he’s the captain of the ship, okay, he’s in charge of everywhere we go. He’s responsible for navigation, Storm tracking, understanding how big the waves are, making sure all the lines are in order. I am in charge with making sure we eat good meals, making sure the boat is tidy, and the children don’t fall overboard. I also do the homeschooling. Okay. But when it comes to the boat work, like the actual sailing that was for my husband and our oldest son Ashton. And the boys would help out too, you know? Okay, so we set sail for our second night sail. Now night sails are scary. They’re dark, and unknown. But you do as much preparation as you can. So you know that you’re going to have these obstacles. If you’re going to start a business, you or if you’re going to take this leap of faith and leave that paycheck. You don’t know what’s going to happen. But you can prepare as much as you can. You can save up, right? You didn’t get that savings account going, you can eliminate as much risk as possible. And that’s what we do. We check the weather windows, we make sure that Denise tied up really good. And then you do what you know. And you do the best you can. And folks, we we did that sale. And we had a storm. And the storm hit just as the sun was setting. So you could see the darkness of the clouds around you. And you could see that we were the only boat in this massive ocean with lightning. And you could see the tear on my face of thinking, is this a choice? Having a metal pole sticking up from your boat in a lightning storm? No, it is not a good choice. When you quit your job and you go out and start a business, you are going to encounter storms. It’s not a matter of if it’s a matter of when you are going to be terrified to all get out you’re gonna have chills and just you’re gonna cry. You’re gonna cry. And it’s okay. Because guess what? You put the kids in their own in the state room with the life vests and you stay away from the mast and you ride out that storm the best you can and stuff has fallen off the walls and it’s a seven hours of getting just the crap beat out of you in the middle of the ocean in darkness with pouring rains, winds out of nowhere. You’re barely fighting the winds. You’re like averaging an average of one knot and it is awful. But then the sun comes up because the sun will always come up. The storm stops. You see the island that’s ahead of you with a rainbow and butterflies and you freakin nailed it. And you drop a conquer. And that is what happens when you jump off to start a business or you reach outside your comfort zone, you go for that position that you don’t know if you’re gonna get or not. You do that you face those fears, whether you like it or not, and you make it. And that that is incredible. It’s an incredible journey and it’s terrifying, but I couldn’t relate it more to starting a business

Curt Anderson  20:33

might be the best moment moments on this episode to show ya ever man dropped the mic. That was

Damon Pistulka  20:46

one word for the correlation to is incredible. I mean, so real. Like said you prepare all you can, but you never know until you you’re done. Yeah. And you can listen to 1000 people that have become successful over time, they’re gonna tell you the same thing. I thought I was going their sweat. I was gonna make it this way. And it was like this.

Britteny Gardner  21:08

Oh my gosh, Damon, that’s so true. Those pictures of the bicycle, where you go on a ride, you’re like, here’s my goal. And then it’s like, that’s what it was. Yeah.

Curt Anderson  21:20

It was Britteny United spoke shortly, I think like within days of the exact trip that you’re talking about. And so that really stuck with me. And again, I cannot express how much I personally admire what you, your husband, your family have done, how inspiring it is. I think about it all the time. And it’s almost like, you know, do I have the guts? Am I making those uncomfortable choices? Am I you know, am I doing my you know, you know, my sell everything and jump on a ship with my family type move that you’ve made. And I just I can’t tell you how inspiring you are. For so many people so big.

Britteny Gardner  21:57

Yeah. Damon thanks, you guys. You know, if it weren’t for Casey, my husband. You know, he really set the tone. He’s like, hey, we can do this. I’m like, Okay, let’s. So sometimes you need that buddy in business to help push you. That’s why like, again, when you talk about growing yourself, you want to be with those people that push you that aren’t just like, yeah, you’re doing great. You know what, good job. No, you gotta have those people that call you out and be like, Brittney, do better. Come on, you know. And that’s, that’s, you know, that’s so good to have that. And that’s what’s fun about working at Vessel you guys. So from life on a vessel to actually work in a vessel. Here’s one last really crazy, just connection. My middle son’s name is crew.

22:53

My last my call my gosh, that’s so crazy.

Britteny Gardner  22:57  Vessel is what brought me to vessel.

Curt Anderson  23:07

Hi. So jumping ship for crew. That was absolutely that is hysterical. In which which son

Britteny Gardner  23:14

does that? Yeah. So that’s my 12 year old.

Curt Anderson  23:18

This was way back when and just you know, and and there’s so much that we could talk about kudos to you that the teamwork the relationship that you and your husband have the belief and trust in each other. You know, you believe in in him and this idea and vision. And you know, Damon, how many you know, anyway, we won’t get into a whole marriage conversation. Let’s go. Let’s dive in. So So dear friends if you guys if you’re just joining us big Hello, Happy Monday to you. We encourage you We invite you we welcome you connect with Brittany on LinkedIn. You want to check out this company vessel founded by our dear friend Derek who’s out there, you know, veteran, you know just a hero of ours. Let’s dive in. Brittany, please. curious minds would like to know what’s going on? What exactly do you guys do? What does driving fortitude and dominance for US manufacturers? What exactly does that mean?

Britteny Gardner  24:09

Yeah, absolutely. You know, if we are going to explore why fortitude, you think of fortitude, its strength, and resilience. And dominance is going to be leadership and market position. These are essential goals when we’re talking about really anything but if we’re going to focus on manufacturing, these are essential goals for manufacturers. Achieving and clarity specific to supply chain and having strategies and solutions in place is going to help define these companies future. And so if you if you scroll down a little bit, as I mentioned before vessels of veteran owned Derrick Ellis is a visionary behind this amazing company. And yes is a veteran. We’ve got Molly, Derek Jared journey and we’ve got some other folks on our development team And we uncovered the opportunity to serve what I call our, our real true partners, our manufacturing extension partners, they’re across the entire United States and Puerto Rico. And so if you’re a manufacturer, and you’re, you know, needing some direction on supply chain or anything like that you can reach out, you know, to me, and I can help you, you know, work with with your MEP center, we call them MEPs. But it’s about connecting Kurt and Damon. It’s really about connecting and providing solutions. So we’ve developed a software that, as I said, revolutionizes the way that you’re doing that they’re doing business by smart matching. And what I mean by that is really finding that gap in the business, we provide software that does an initial assessment, to find where those gaps are in these in these businesses to help match with AI solutions that those centers offer, or any any real true partner working with manufacturers. And so the assessment platform is going to do this automatic, I call it odd automatic matching, to make sure that they’re providing a real solution. And then it’s also providing a polished dynamic report that then you know that our MEP centers in this case can can use to work with the the manufacturing clients. So it’s really empowered, go ahead and move to the next one, we’ll do a quick overview of what this is. And, um, you know, this is really it’s important that that people understand that this software is, you know, this tool. But really, what we want to do is we want to do these assessments that are meaningful for our customers, and a lot of cases that supply chain, but sometimes its workforce, sometimes it’s industry, 4.0, cybersecurity, and so much more. What’s cool that we’re doing at vessel is we white label, everything, and we customize it based off of their needs. And that’s one of the reasons I truly curtain Damon, why I love working at vessel. Because if we’re not quite sure that we can deliver a solution that we need, we go back to our development team, we’re small enough that we can go back and say, Hey, can we build this for them? Does this make sense? Is this something that we can do across the entire country? And so this is go ahead and go to the next one? Well, we’ll get through this pretty quick. You know, this smart matching is really where we gather that data from the assessment to accurately determine what’s going to be the next step, the next fit for that interaction. So it doesn’t matter if you’re a consultant, or if you’re an actual, you know, Manufacturing Extension Partnership, or maybe you’re in an economic development, you’re going to provide this assessment to whoever that client is. And then you’re going to be able to use that data and make a data driven decision based on our AI matching. And so you can see here, this is just a snapshot of the assessments that we offer. You can go to the next one here, Kirk’s I know, we’re getting close on time. And I want to just give you a

Curt Anderson  28:15

quick, I just want to point out in you know what, and you’re so inspiring. We might we might have to drag this out a couple more minutes. So no, so I just wanted to I want to touch base on your menu over here, because a big thing is cybersecurity. You know, I mean, that’s, you know, that is such a massive indictment, we probably need to do a better job, but, you know, so I love your menu of items, you know, generally, of course, what’s that? Damon? No,

Damon Pistulka  28:44

I like those that menu, they’re the one that hits hits the real important topics, that’s

Curt Anderson  28:49

for sure you’re scouting. So I mean, the value that you’re bringing here is just so tremendous. You know, it’s just such a huge asset for manufacturer. So I didn’t mean to interrupt, but I just wanted to interject and just point out and again, over here, you know, mapped opportunities with a go forward plan, you know, you’ve got location current, so there’s just, you know, gaps. There’s just a lot of meat on the phone here, Britteny, right. And again, don’t feel rushed. I want to make sure that you’re going through this.

Britteny Gardner  29:15

Oh, you’re so good. Thanks, Curt. And Dave. Yeah, I was like, oh, I want to get through. This is so good. Great. If we can drag it out a little bit. I appreciate the pause there. I will tell you what’s neat about the plethora of assessments that we offer is that these are the high ones. These are the ones that we find the most need. What’s really cool is when we when we launch our general assessment, when we do that first assessment, we’re going to touch on a lot of different categories. From that initial assessment, then we’re able to drive an additional area of opportunity, whether it is cybersecurity, or maybe it is supply chain. What that general assessment does is that deep dives into where we need to go next. So it really serves itself. The dynamic report though this is powerful. And this is where we have saved, on average 26, up to 26 hours of compiling, preparing, putting together polishing the data that you collected from this interaction into a report that has a go forward plan. This is an in depth report that’s going to touch on, you know, the primary concerns that you may have as a consultant that the MEP Center has as their primary focus, or for economic development, you know, their focus. So we we customize this dynamic report to be exactly what you want it to look like. And that way at a moment’s notice, at your fingertips. After you’ve provided this assessment to your client, you now have this information, this matching where you can go in and edit things as you think fit. Maybe there’s some grants opportunities that you want to include in there, or you know, you check the AI matching, make sure it aligns, maybe there’s a workshop that you’re offering, that you want to add in, you know, with updated information. And then you hit submit, and this report is generated. So you can do it on site with your customers, you can, you know, if you’re doing a site visit, and you’re doing it, you know that that initial interaction, this is generated in moment, you can do it on your iPad, it doesn’t matter. So this is that consistent branding to this is right up your alley, right, like making sure that everything is branded appropriately, that you’re marketing yourself the way you should. I mean, certainly they should reach out to you both, you know, for that expertise. But at least we have consistency within this report. Yeah,

Curt Anderson  31:52

thank Thank you, Britteny. But you know, this is, this is super powerful. A couple of things that I want to just recap there, you know, you mentioned those grant opportunities, right. And so for friends out there, and manufacturing, the manufacturing extension partnerships, as Brittany said, There’s one in all 50 states, plus Puerto Rico, if you have not started engaging or you haven’t worked, or you’re like, hey, what does this strongly encourage you invite you welcome, you definitely reach out to your local manufacturing extension, partnership, if you just Google and E P, or manufacturing expense Extension Partnership, it will pop up, you can reach out to Brittany reach out to myself, Damon, we’d be more than happy to get you connected to an MEP. And again, they are an incredible resource tool for manufacturers to take advantage of. So you mentioned grant funds, they are just relentlessly looking for grant funding opportunities to help our manufacturers be more competitive. Brittany, you mentioned things on workforce supply chain is, you know, big, you know, one of your main things here. And of course, cybersecurity, you know, just take us one step further on, you know, our can so can manufacturers themselves, you know, if they do a search, would they come to you to like how would they apply to vessel or like, would they get involved with with vessel? Or is it just strictly to the MEPs? What does that look like?

Britteny Gardner  33:09

Yeah, Kurt? Really good question. So at this point in our relationship, we want to be that advocate for our MEP centers. So if they reach out to us, absolutely, we would love to connect them through the MEP, and then they can, you know, complete the assessment through their their MEP Center. We’re happy to have them communicate directly with us. But the key here that we want to do is work. We’re a collaborative partner we want there, you know, when it comes to subject matter experts on cybersecurity, you know, workforce, we have that. But we know we partner with our MEPs because they have a plethora of resources that are available. And they’re the ones that can help, you know, we would funnel through so I would say yes, reach out to us. Because if they don’t know their MEP, guess what we do? So they can reach out to us? Or like you said you or directly to their MEP and let them know that they heard you know about the MEP from VESL or from your podcast, so that they have some context there, but absolutely.

Curt Anderson  34:13

Excellent. Okay, what’s going on on the screen here? Yeah.

Britteny Gardner  34:16

So what’s pretty cool about this part here is that if you take an assessment through vessels platform, you now have a login that you can then track and benchmark your performances. So let’s say you take a cybersecurity assessment, and in 2024, and you take the cybersecurity, cybersecurity assessment 2000 or 2025. So you’re going to be able to benchmark that manufacturing customers and be able to benchmark their impact improved. I’m gonna we’re gonna assume positive intent here, improve performance over time. What’s really powerful about this too is by by using this client port All, they’re gonna see those grant opportunities that the MEP Center has right there. They’re going to see what classes are coming up, what grant opportunities are available, what classes are coming up that they want to participate in. All of that’s right at their fingertips through this login. All right, just

Curt Anderson  35:17

Yeah. Right, just great value for manufacturer. How about this? I will disagree.

Britteny Gardner  35:23

Yeah, so really similar. This is actually what a user, so if you’re using the vessel software, this is like an account manager view, or a manager view. So if I’m in charge of, you know, a team of five that is doing assessments, this is my view, to be able to see how many assessments are out there? What’s the pull through rate? What is our go forward plan, how many assessments then translate into projects that are potentially revenue generating, or if our you know, the goal is to have event participation or grant funding participation, all of that’s tracked and measured through here. So now you’ve got some data that you can be, you know, taking to your economic development, say, Hey, look at the impact that we’re making in our state. Look at how powerful this is. This is cool.

36:17

Yeah.

Curt Anderson  36:19

Love it. And you know, and on top of it, you just, you get the energy, you get Brittany’s energy with the whole process. Yeah. Which is just your, uh, your, your enthusiasm is just so contagious. I just thought. So, Manufacturing Extension Partnership is out there. Now, with that being said, you partner. What other type partners? Do you align with trade associations? Anybody else that you that you partner with?

Britteny Gardner  36:43

Oh, yeah. Great question, Curt. So right now, we definitely have a strong partnership with our MEP centers, we are exploring with, with our economic development and trade, we are going out we’re growing really fast, too, which is also very exciting. We just hired an MEP account manager journey to our team. So she’s just focused on onboarding our MEP centers, which is so so fun. Yeah, if you scroll down, you’ll see a little a picture here. So, so gosh, this, this is me, obviously. And then Jared, he’s our product manager, really awesome guy. I mean, talk about making sure you understand how to use the software, how it interfaces, he is really brilliant. And journey, our newest team member, we’re training her up to speed we’re growing, which is a good, good place to be in. And it’s like I said before, it’s a lot of fun.

Curt Anderson  37:40

Well, absolutely love it. And we’ve got a website right here, vessel scale.com. And again, you can connect with Brittany connect with anybody on the team through LinkedIn, they will be more than happy to have these conversations with you. And just, I’d say your mission to help manufacturers and just really unique niche that you guys have carved out, you know, this is a big need that just hasn’t been filled in. I just love the vision that you that your team had at vessel has to help manufacturers Damon What are your thoughts? Yeah, I

Damon Pistulka  38:11

really, I mean, when you look at this, you’re helping the MEP, it’s helped the manufacturers. And that’s, and it’s giving them a way to do a comprehensive assessment with the manufacturers in their, in their area to really go okay, here are the areas that you could use improvement over those areas you had on the page there. And the cool thing is each MEP can customize that to their experts, their grants and all the programs that they have currently going on. So this thing would be for a manufacturer, if I’m in this area, I can log in, and I might have new grant opportunities. I may have all these you know, it’s really a way the long term be able to make sure that I as a manufacturer and connecting with the MEP on what’s going on. How do we keep keep abreast of programs they have that could be helping us go?

Britteny Gardner  39:04

Wow, I couldn’t have said it better. DAVID Yes, you get the gold star for the day.

Curt Anderson  39:10

Hey, David, Mom’s gonna be proud of you for that. That was fun. Again, you know, because what’s going on with manufacturers in your corner girl Damon, you know, very heavy in Aerospace is dramatically different in say, Michigan, Detroit, you know, with auto versus, you know, other states, you know, maybe more heavy agriculture or whatever it might be. So those MEPs have different needs different programs, different grant opportunities, Illinois iMac they do an amazing job helping their manufacturers. And so you know, Purdue we can go on and on you know, all 50 states are just doing great work. Britteny as we start taking things home, what other anything else that we want to tie it up with a bow anything else that you want to share here as far as your program goes?

Britteny Gardner  39:52

Yeah, thanks, Curt. I would say you know, just reach out where we’re, we’re friendly. You know, we’d love we’d love to do a deep dive I’ve demo if it makes sense. And really go through how the platform can serve, conserve you. Just send us an email, call me, you know, my email is right there, Britteny at vessel scale.com, you can visit our website, send a note there, too, that will go directly to me. And I’d love to connect with you. So if it’s through LinkedIn or email, just please don’t, don’t hesitate to reach out. I’m here to serve. And that’s what I love to do best.

Curt Anderson  40:24

Absolutely love it. Okay, I’m going to stop sharing. So Britteny, we’ll get you back full screen on stage here. And so we’ll start winding down. So again, thank you, guys, for joining us here today. Britteny, as we as we round down, I love you know, phenomenal. What a great preach as far as taking that leap of faith comparing you know, your your family’s journey, literally, you know, living on a boat, you know, through the Caribbean, just so inspiring. And how you compare that to entrepreneurship. Yeah, I’d love to ask, as, as a longtime professional banking and now helping manufacturers. Here’s a question for you. business advice that you’ve ever received, or that you would love to share with our audience today? What’s the best business advice that you feel that you’ve ever received?

Britteny Gardner  41:14

Man, this is this is deep, Curt? Oh, I like a good question like this. I would say the best business advice that I’ve ever received is that you are the only boundary setter in your future.

Damon Pistulka  41:37

There we go.

Curt Anderson  41:39

That’s coming from a person that sold everything and

Damon Pistulka  41:43

thought about it. Yeah. Can

Curt Anderson  41:44

you say that again? Can you repeat that?

Britteny Gardner  41:46

Yeah, you are. Your boundary setter?

Curt Anderson  41:52

This is it. You are your own boundary setter. You are only and I’ll say for us, we’ll speak for anybody else out there. You know, I’m only going to achieve what I feel that I’m capable of achieving. I set my own boundaries, and maybe others feel that same way. Brilliant, brilliant advice. Brittany, I put it out to both of you. How do we conquer that? That’s a whole nother episode. So Damon, what are your thoughts on that one? I

Damon Pistulka  42:18

I’m really not even gonna weigh in on it. Because it’s so true. That’s I mean, it is it is it really is. It’s great business advice. Truth

Curt Anderson  42:25

hurts. Brittany, what, what? You took such a dramatic leap of faith, what helped you go through that process?

Britteny Gardner  42:33

Having a trusting partner was a big one, somebody that I could, you know, really trust and count on? And then referring back to what I want those boundaries to look like for me. What do I what do I want my kids to see, as we go through life? That was a big one. That was really big. And knowing that I’m the tone setter for my family, I would say those three things, having a trusted partner. You know, what I want my kids to see. And, and being the tone setter.

Curt Anderson  43:11

I’d say, You know what I want to thank you for today because you are a gift. I cannot express what a blessing you are. What a what an incredible. Just, I’m almost at a loss of words, David, how often my utter loss of words. What a gift that you just gave us with your brilliance, your your wisdom, your inspiration today, you know, trusting your partner, setting the tone for your family members. Just I couldn’t have loved this session. Enough. Damon? thoughts, comments?

Damon Pistulka  43:39

I’m with you there, Curt. Thank you so much for being here today. Brittany is wonderful, wonderful.

Britteny Gardner  43:45

You guys, thanks for the platform, you know, I I really appreciate being able to, you know, have these conversations. And you know, if anybody can take even just a sliver, even just one little piece from the goodness that you guys are spreading. Keep up the good work. I see too. You guys are having a workshop coming up just around the corner, which is awesome. Starting August 1. Yeah, we do.

Curt Anderson  44:07

And it’s matter of fact, let’s grab a couple of comments. It gives you a rounding clause here. And so Daljit says, she explained it so beautifully as I can read it resonate whatever she shared as her experience after leaving the job to start your own venture. So again, thank you for the comments here. So let’s let’s wind down on this. So Britteny, yes, thank you for mentioning we we Damon, we’ve come up with a little little course that we’re launching on on Thursday. And it’s how to stop being the best kept secret with live streaming. So I have a link in the chat in the comments down below. Go to my website and you can learn more about it. We would love for anybody to check that out. Thank you for bringing that up. But I also would strongly encourage you to connect with Brittany on LinkedIn, connect with her team at vessel. These folks are just people of integrity. Just working relentlessly helping maintain factures helping our manufacturer extension partnerships and just dedicated to making us manufacturers as competitive as possible. So we’re gonna wind down Brittany, thank you. I kept you over time. So thank you. Thank you. I appreciate you sharing your story, your family, your inspiration with us today. And Damon as I always love to say, just go out there and be someone’s inspiration just like Britney. Hey, let’s give a big round of applause for Britteny Gardner for just absolutely crushing it. So we’re gonna be back here on Friday and we have another a wonderful, amazing guests. And it’s gonna be hard to top this one but they’ve been we’ve got our work cut out for us, do we not?

Damon Pistulka  45:39

Well give it a try?

Curt Anderson  45:39

Well give it a try. So Britteny, hang out with us for one second, guys. Have a great rest of your week. God bless you. And again, connect with Britteny man if you’re if you’re if you’re on a rough day, man, she’s just gonna pick you back up. So yeah, I will. Have a great Monday. We’ll see you soon.

46:02

Okay,