YouSaid · the spoken record

Tim Leatherman

lines on the record: 80
first: 2022-01-31
most recent: 2022-01-31
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

“I think that it's about ten percent luck. and about ninety percent pluck I've persevered, I've worked hard, I've had great people working with me. Obviously I'm privileged to born into a life of privilege in the United States and growing up in a middle class household. I've been so many places in the world where life is not nearly as good as I've had it. There have been things where in life where I've beaten the odds, the fact that leatherman tool became successful of products that are patented. I've read that only about 5% of or less of products that are patented that get on the market. So I feel like I've been a lucky person. I've never bought a lottery ticket because I feel like I've already beaten the odds and it's not going to happen again.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I'm quite proud that about 30% of those sales are export sales. And for an American company, 30% of sales being international is pretty good.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yeah, I've admitted I'm quite ready willingly to admit because it is pretty well publicized that we're in the very low nine figures of revenue.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“By that point, I was a bit tired. Earlier on I had set the criteria for my leadership of the company, two criteria. One that the job remained fun and the other that I'd be an asset, not a hindrance. And all those many years from the garage even, but from 1983 to 2005, the job was fun. But near the end it was fun most days, but not every day. And also, when I would go home at night and Joe would ask me, what did you do today? So often my answer was I processed paper. And there was one other factor. At that point, I was 57 years old in calendar years. But in terms of all the hours I'd put in, all those previous years, I was 67 years old in work years. And I thought I had earned the right to be able to cut back a little bit.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“We bounced around in that low nine figure revenue number for quite a few years. In the last few years, we've been able to introduce some new products. We've been able to take a little bit better control of the market. And after the pandemic hit, we thought there will never sell another tool. We did make a few adjustments. Then a few months later, a couple of months later, we started getting orders again. And by the end of 2020, we had had our third best year in our history.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Really, we had no choice. You have to, it's better to have most employees employed rather than have no employees employed.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“So then they stopped carrying them, they stopped using them. Other people didn't see them using it. And we lost that word of mouth advertising that was so valuable to us.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I wouldn't hurt business at all. But it turned out that maybe some of them did buy another one, but then they stopped wearing it because they were afraid that if they went to the airport again, that they would forgotten they still have it and they'd lose it again.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yes, they were still carrying him when they got to their airport. And to use the euphemism that the TSA Was using that they were voluntarily abandoned.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Right, we get testimonials of The leatherman tool saving lives. We get testimonials from leatherman tools from a couple of soldiers who said the leatherman tool has stopped a bullet. We've received testimonials of the Leatherman tool being used as a surgical instrument saving a life in an emergency. We have many testimonials of a leatherman tool being used to rescue someone out of a burning vehicle, another one out of a fallen helicopter. There's many, many, many different markets where everyone finds the leather material to be of great value.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yes, it's true that you can buy a knockoff of our tool of made in China for $10, whereas our leatherman tool might be $100. We used to fight the knockoffs. We used to file lawsuits against the importers and the retailers that were selling the knockoffs. It really wasn't possible to go after the manufacturers in China. And we were quite successful in those lawsuits for quite a few years. And of course, our labor costs are higher here in Portland, but we do have some advantages. We sweat the details. I think it was Mr. Sears of Sears and Roebuck long ago said quality is remembered long after price is forgotten.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yes, as a result we were required to label our tools, a proper label and our tools could be made in the USA of US and foreign components and assembled in the USA. Actually, that lawsuit, it could have spurred us to, say, the heck of it, we'll just go all the way and make our tool abroad. But the opposite happened. It spurred us into being more resolute and seeking more. Domestic suppliers and adding even more U.S. content into our tools so that we can. Most of our tools now we can label them as made in USA.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I was born in Portland, I was raised in Portland. The jobs created were created in Portland. And among the things I'm most proud of in the whole Leatherman journey is that I've created all these jobs and that they were not a cannibalization of the world's supply. They were in addition to the world supply because this was a whole new product category that added jobs. It didn't take away from companies that were selling other things. So it's one of my everlasting goals is to keep do everything I possibly can to keep these jobs here in Portland, Oregon.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yes, we do all assembly ourselves, and the vast majority of the manufacturing ourselves in our own factory in Portland, Oregon.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Almost entirely. After about three years we finally found a young banker who shouldn't have been willing to talk to us but did and was willing saw that our balance sheet was strong and agreed to give us a line of credit.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“In that first partial year, we did manage to sell 200 tools, and we had revenues of $6,000. And with that money, we were able to start launch the business and eventually be able to make and sell some tools. In that first year of 30,000 tools of sales, we had about 680,000 dollars of revenue and actually made a few dollars.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yes, it was by then it was quite evident that there was a market for this tool when we were able to go from 200 tools to in 1983 to 1 million tools in 1993 Those were really exciting years with growth rates of 50% per year compounded.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And Steve and I, rather than saying, you idiots, we sent you a letter. You said, no, you could have had an exclusive. You didn't even reply. No, no, no. We didn't say that. We said, yes, sure. We'll be happy to send you a sample.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Right. Two weeks later, they called back and said the order is now 1,000 tools. And then it turned out that the catalogs were all monitoring each other. And if they got a sense there was a hot product, then they all wanted on board.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Everyone's like, Is it? Yes. We were lucky that in those days people had a little bit more tolerance for how long it took to ship an order. But the catalogs didn't add very little tolerance. They wanted their product in stock. And when they got an order, they wanted to be able to ship immediately. So they weren't too happy, but they said the 250 have been sold. Here's an order for 500 more. And a week after that they called and said the five hundred are gone. Here's an order for seven fifty.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Late December arrived much more quickly than we thought About two days after Christmas, we got a call from early winters. I asked our tools, our 250 tools, where are they? We need them really badly because they've all been sold”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“During that period, I was basically totally neglecting my sales job. I was pretty much spending all the time in Steve's dad's shop.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“So we quite consciously added the term survival. In our tool with the thought that maybe that would trigger a response from them. Well, as it turned out during that seven-month period when we were building the tools for Cabelus and anyone else we could convince by them. Early Winters called and said anything happening. We said, yes, we're in production. Said, put us down for 250 tools. Also for delivering in late December 1983”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yes, and we were surprisingly astute at considering And we finally settled on knife enthusiasts as one category. And back in those days, there were people who were building bomb shelters because they thought the Soviet Union was going to drop the big one on us.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Well, if you think of the labor hours those days, labor like pretty good wages and manufacturing jobs were like $5 an hour. So we had two or three hours of labor in every tool”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Well, we were very lucky in that Stee's father had a metal working business, and Stee's father agreed to let us move the equipment I'd accumulated in my garage into his shop, and he let us use his machines and his employees on a subcontract basis.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“You can't believe how happy I was. I was climbing the walls, and I called Steve. He was so happy. And then we both settled down and realized, well, this is only five hundred tools, we wanted two thousand.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And one day in late May of 1983, eight years after I had first slotted the concept, I got a letter at my business address, which was really my home address. I opened it up, and inside was a purchase order twelve thousand dollars For five hundred tools.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Well, so once Erdie Winter said, sorry, we don't think we can sell 2,000. Steve and I then took a picture of this latest prototype, wrote a cover letter, mailed it to the remaining 279 catalogs. Do you want to see this prototype?”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“My hopes are rising. So I said, so you're ready to order 2,000? And they said, No, we don't think we could possibly sell that many.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“That's correct. So we drove to Seattle, showed him the prototype, and they said, hmm, looks good How much I have to admit, I hadn't really thought yet, so I thought quickly, and I said, your price forty dollars. And they said that means we have to sell it for eighty. Sorry, don't think anyone would pay eighty dollars for this. But early winters did us a big, big favor. Instead of saying go away, don't let the door hit you on your way out. They said, how could you make the tool less complex, less expensive? I said, okay. So Steve and I got back in the car, drove back to Portland, went back into my garage, and about six months later, I came out with a new prototype. We showed it to him. They said, we like this, how much? I said, your price, $24. They said, that's fine. Yeah.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“But the two hundred eightieth catalog was in Seattle and was close enough to call and ask for appointment to come up and show them our tool in person.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Well, by now Steve and I were already partners. We thought that if we could make and sell 4,000 tools in our first year, we could pay back our cash investment, but wouldn't pay ourselves anything for our time. So Stephen and I were looking for someone to order 2,000 of the 4,000, and we thought who could that be? And our first thought was the U.S. Army. Said we approached them. I said, no. Our next thought was AT&T, the telephone company before it broke up. It had tens of thousands of people repairing telephones. They said, no. And then we thought mail order catalogs. So we found a list of 280 different mail order catalogs. We got Zero responses from two hundred seventy nine”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“To buy a knife that I would go back and make in my garage for him. And he mailed me a check, and that was my very first sale.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“He was a German immigrant. He had moved to San Francisco, and he had started an auto repair business, repairing a high-end German automobiles. His name was Wolf Schultz Totten Potch. And he agreed to pay $175.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“When people walk by, I'd say, you, sir, have you seen my new pocket knife? And I'd shake their head and turn around and look, who was that? What was that? And I'd actually be able to talk to him a little bit.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“So Skeet comes up to my table and says, What are you doing? And I said, I'm sitting here waiting for someone to stop and I'm going to want to show them the prototype of my new type of pocket knife. And Skeet says, you can't do that. The people walking by the aisle, they're like zombies. They're in a daze. They don't see anything. You got to get up. Gotta talk to him. You got to stop him. And so. I went back and I sat down and I started looking at the people walking down the aisle. And Skis was right. They weren't absorbing what they were seeing. True, they were like zombies. So I thought to myself, I'm at a nice show. Why are people here? They want to see new knives. What do you have, Tim? So I stood up.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Well, after I tell you my story, you might agree that you might not have stopped. And the reason is that down at the end of the aisle, there was a man selling magnesium fire starters. And being at the end of the aisle, he would get up on a podium so he was up a little higher than everyone else. And he created this well-honed sales pitch that kind of you'd use it by a barker at a country fair. And he would go through his dog and pony show with sparks flying and him starting fires and drawing a big crowd. And every once in a while he would take a break. And to this day, I don't know why, but he came up to my table. And his name was Skeetz Hauchens.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yes, my very first sale was by going to a knife show I add a table and I add an exhibit on my table called the evolution of an invention where I had compiled the prototypes that I had created over the by then seven year period that illustrated my progress or lack of progress in trying to reach the tool that would be marketable.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“No, Steve and I did agree to become partners. It was 75% me and 25% Steve. And so then we were smart enough to recognize that before starting to manufacture the tool, we should get an order for enough tools to justify going into business”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yes, we were fellow tennis players. And Steve's father had a manufacturing business, so Steve grew up with that environment. Steve's education in university was on the business side.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“A friend of mine from University Days named Steve Berliner had been following my, let's not say, progress, but lack of progress all this time. And he stepped in. And said, let's be partners. There's still a few things you haven't tried. And he stepped in and offered to become partners to try to see if we could get it on the market.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Put in a lot of time. I felt I had more time than money. And about seven years after starting the project first going into the garage, I was about to give up.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“There is a fine line between persistence and failure to accept reality. And I was determined to try to go on too long. Before giving up too soon.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yes. If you try to sell stuff to people, they get their antenna up. If you ask them for advice, they're plenty willing to talk to you.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yes, their headquarters was in Switzerland. It was actually a perfect job for me in a lot of ways. I was calling on businesses where they could, they had equipment and they had processes that could be used in the manufacture of my tool. So I would show my prototype. And that was also a way of getting rapport with my prospective customers.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And I wasn't too much different. My wife and I had a conversation and we decided it was time that I get a real job. I look through the want ads and I found one that said wanted salesman welding products and was offered a job and I accepted it.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yes, I would send him a letter and all of the answers were the same. Sorry, we're not interested. And then I finally got the message and said, okay, if the knife companies aren't interested, I'll go to the tool companies. And when I wrote to them, the answers back was sorry, this is not a tool, it's a gadget. And gadgets don't sell.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I'm a little more stubborn than that. I said, well, there's other knife companies, so I'll approach them. So I did. Ultimately, I think I contacted every knife company there was.”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yes, I approached Gerber, I called them and said I have a new kind of pocket knife I'd like to show you. They said, sure, come on in. They agreed to borrow my prototype and do an evaluation of it and get back to me. After a couple of weeks I hadn't heard from them and I was getting really anxious. So I called them and they said, sorry, we decided to not take this on. It's not a knife, it's a tool”
2022-01-31 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Leatherman Tool Group: Tim Leatherman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT