When it’s your third attempt to bring your product to market, you need to get it right. Through gaining clarity, knowing his skill set and continually improving his product, Frank Green Founder, Benjamin Young is a real hustler in every sense of the word.
What follows is the full interview on how Founder and CEO of Frank Green overcame his toughest moments bringing his idea to life.
Can you talk about a time where you thought about giving up? What made you think about doing that?
Over the last five years, you could pretty much split it up between two main components. The first three years was all about design and creating the right partnerships to bring Frank Green to life. During that time I had a job and that job was a 12-hour a day job and at the same time I was still managing and bringing together frank green and I found that really really difficult because at a point that you can’t do everything every day. Therefore you end up cutting corners short and you make some pretty big mistakes.
Could you tell us a bit more about that and what the mistakes were?
The number one mistake wasn’t partnering with the right companies and not actually doing the due diligence behind who those companies were. I’m not saying for 5 seconds that their performance wasn’t Frank Green or my doing. I wasn’t doing the right amount of work and understanding what their capabilities were.
Over time, particularly when you’re not an industrial designer and also a manufacturer and understanding the intrinsic natures of what polymers perform in what way.
Making a reusable cup that you can put boiling hot water in and then leave the lid next to the cup for five minutes and then put the lid on and make that marriage work and still having the performance of what our products are – that was really really difficult.
What were some of the other challenges you’ve overcome as a business?
Well making a reusable cup that you can put boiling hot water in and then leave the lid next to the cup for five minutes and then put the lid on and making that marriage work and still having the performance of what our products are, that was really really difficult.
We had two goes at actually making full tools in production before we used our current design and the materials that we’ve landed on now. Over the last two years since we’ve been in the market, we’ve actually made continual improvements to our product so they become bulletproof as what they are today.
To see the rest of Benjamin’ story, head to Shippit.com/Hustle.
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