YouSaid · the spoken record

Mike Pfotenhauer

lines on the record: 68
first: 2023-02-20
most recent: 2023-02-20
sittings or episodes: 1
sources: podcast

Every line below is reproduced as it was said and linked to the record it came from. Nothing here is summarised or generated. Directory · Search · Corrections

“Whale backpacks, but I did other strange custom things, for example, I recall once making a A harness case for a climber who was rescuing Peregrine Falcon eggs Off of one of the walls in Yosemite, and I would do climbing gear for climbers. They kind of liked the fact that I throw in a lot of extra stitching where they had concerns.”
2023-02-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Osprey Packs: Mike Pfotenhauer · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“It was on a main street, a thoroughfare from the highway to the I never spent any money on advertising until perhaps twenty years later And I had an industrial sewing machine. I borrowed $1,000 from my parents. And people would come in and either they would bring their gear that needed repair or they would explain to me what they were doing and I would draw out a design and build that product for them, probably like a five-week waitlist.”
2023-02-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Osprey Packs: Mike Pfotenhauer · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“It's actually very simple. I started the company with my girlfriend, Lori White. And we decided to find a location. We looked in the paper. There was an adumber company in downtown Santa Cruz that said they had a house for rent. I wrote them a letter, got a reply very quickly. The rent was $150 a month for a retail house and shop. Were much easier back in those days, it was affordable to start a business.”
2023-02-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Osprey Packs: Mike Pfotenhauer · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Well, I realized that making art was going to be a tough proposition to make a living doing. And I think I also felt like I needed to contribute by making something functional, let's say, rather than... Than simply artistic, something more practical”
2023-02-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Osprey Packs: Mike Pfotenhauer · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I opened a retail shop in downtown Santa Cruz, which was And started out by repairing product for people and custom making gear for them for their whatever trip they were going on or activity.”
2023-02-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Osprey Packs: Mike Pfotenhauer · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yeah, to make money, I would occasionally build things for other people, which led eventually to it dawning on me that I could start a business that way. I was working in a restaurant at the university, and I had done some work. Work in the restaurants to make money as a young person. And I quickly decided that I really didn't want to work for anyone else. I wanted to start my own company. And I gravitated towards what I knew how to do.”
2023-02-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Osprey Packs: Mike Pfotenhauer · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“They did. There were kits you could buy that would send you all the cut parts with instructions. Or you could learn how to do it yourself my mother taught me how to sew and I have always built my own gear. It's, I don't know, I guess it's a feeling that if I'm out in the wilderness, I know what I'm using, I can rely on it. I know what's right and what's wrong with it. And I love making things. Even built my own bicycles brazing and putting those together. So it's just something I'm always doing. I feel more comfortable when I am surrounded in my environment by things I've made.”
2023-02-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Osprey Packs: Mike Pfotenhauer · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yeah. A lot of photography and some etching, drawing, and printmaking, which was something I was always quite interested in. And I had my own dark room anyway. It allowed me to learn more about that art. To this day, I've always loved to do art. I still do it.”
2023-02-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Osprey Packs: Mike Pfotenhauer · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Was a little bit scared, but I at the same time I kind of appreciated the challenge of. To navigate the terrain, I did see some Basque shepherds up in those mountains and knew that I could probably get help if I needed it.”
2023-02-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Osprey Packs: Mike Pfotenhauer · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“They argued a bit about it, but my father prevailed and said go off, do it. And I had a ridiculous map, I think, about. Perhaps state of California map. And somewhere along the trail without paying attention, I lost the trail. It just sort of petered out and I was lost And it was growing dark. Scrambled through manzanita brush. And for several hours came out exhausted into a clearing threw my sleeping bag down and fell asleep and woke up and found that I was on the trail.”
2023-02-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Osprey Packs: Mike Pfotenhauer · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I forgot all about that. That's true. We were camping in the Sierras, the whole family, up at a lake at about 7,000 feet high. And we were camping and we were going to return back to Tahoe. And the drive to get to that lake was horrendous. It was perhaps a five hour drive along windy dirt roads. And I refused to go in the car. I wanted to have an adventure so I announced that I was going to hike there.”
2023-02-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Osprey Packs: Mike Pfotenhauer · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yeah, they would. We would drive long distances, stop late in the evening, and pitch tents in the dark. Horrible old smelly canvases. He was a marine in World War two, so he had a lot of gear from that old backpacks and things that he continued to use for his whole life.”
2023-02-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Osprey Packs: Mike Pfotenhauer · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Oh, Actually, I think I was usually the guy in the back trailing everyone else. Of enjoying what I was looking at and wondering why everybody was hustling so fast, but continuously being behind and also wondering why was I doing this? What was the point of all this? But as I grew older I definitely fell in love with backpacking and being in the outdoors.”
2023-02-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Osprey Packs: Mike Pfotenhauer · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“We had an old Ford ranch wagon and we would fit somehow we would fit Nine of us I recall I had the wheel well. The back of the car as my own space.”
2023-02-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Osprey Packs: Mike Pfotenhauer · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Money was very tight. We didn't really understand how tight it was. I think we probably went out to dinner maybe once a year. My father was born in Canada, grew up in Canada, and so every summer we would go up to Canada on vacation.”
2023-02-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Osprey Packs: Mike Pfotenhauer · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Past the time. I mean, I'd probably heard several thousand sermons of my father's. Fascinating on one level, but on another level probably too much for a child.”
2023-02-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Osprey Packs: Mike Pfotenhauer · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I think it was something I never quite understood. And I would sit in church and I would look around me and go, do these people believe what they're hearing? Actually, that's probably the place where I gravitated towards designing things in my head just to. Keep awake”
2023-02-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Osprey Packs: Mike Pfotenhauer · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“We just simply could not deliver enough product on time Just could not grow the manufacturing enough simply because there were not enough skilled sewers. We've found it very difficult to find people to do that kind of work in Santa Cruz. It's pretty much a retirement or university town and you just never knew when your employees were going to show up. If the grateful dead came through town, they would be there, not at Osprey.”
2023-02-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Osprey Packs: Mike Pfotenhauer · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT