In this episode of How to Scale a Business Podcast hosted by Hector Santiesteban sits down with John Roman, CEO of BattlBox, to break down how BattlBox went from a 2015 “outdoor gear subscription box” idea to a mature eight-figure business including the early days of acquiring customers on Facebook for under $5, the hard (and expensive) lessons of running a cash-intensive subscription model, and the hire that changed everything: bringing in a true finance leader/CFO to fix cash flow and decision-making. John also shares how the brand’s biggest growth inflection point came from a Netflix original show (Southern Survival) landing during the pandemic, why the company exited via a SPAC, and later bought the business back when the market turned, and what’s driving the next wave of growth today: diversifying channels (Amazon + especially live shopping on Whatnot). He explains the internal philosophy behind it all, content + community to lower blended CAC and why Whatnot works differently than TikTok: it’s “shopping in entertainment,” with high-intent buyers, auctions, and gamification.
Chapters:
- Live shopping becomes a major channel
- Welcome + who John Roman is
- BattlBox origin story (2015) and early growth
- Content + community as the top-of-funnel strategy
- Netflix show "Southern Survival" and pandemic tailwinds
- SPAC exit, market headwinds, and buying the business back
- Whatnot and why live shopping is finally "here"
- Hard lessons: cash flow, bad decisions, and the CFO hire
- How platforms differ: TikTok vs Whatnot vs Amazon
- Where to find BattlBox and John + the secret to scaling
Transcript from audio:
Live shopping becomes a major channel
Speaker 1: So this year, live shopping will be our second largest behind our website, which is absolutely astonishing to just we didn't know what we were doing 10 months ago when we launched it and here we are with it being a big channel. So just kind of diversifying sales channels and riding this one out to the next exit.
Welcome + who John Roman is
Speaker 2: Hello and welcome to another episode of the Hat of Scale of Business podcast. My name is Hector Santhi Esteban and I am your host for today. Our special guest is Mr. John Roman and he is the CEO of BattlBox. They are a direct to consumer e-commerce like awesome rugged outdoor, like cool shit brand. And so we're going to talk about all the things that came along with building that and some cool things with with regards to live selling. So, John, thanks for hanging out with us today.
Speaker 1: Hey thanks for having me. I love that description. Just cool shit brand.
Speaker 2: That's I was trying to bucket it or put an umbrella and I was like, as I was handing through the website I was like, oh, this is just a bunch of cool shit.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's accurate. We're going to trademark cool shit.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's yours. Send me a box of royalties and that's it. John, tell us the story of the brand because you guys have had a, I'm sure a number of downs too.
BattlBox origin story (2015) and early growth
Speaker 2: But it seems like some really cool things where, you know, a lot of maneuvers and a lot of acquiring and reacquiring and catch the listeners up on the highlights of that journey. And then a little bit about where you guys are at now.
Speaker 1: Sure. So, so yeah, it goes back to 2015, which was a completely different time in E com e-commerce back then arguably was a little bit easier. It's it's changed and it's become quite competitive in the last decade. So 2015 was also this period of time where subscription boxes were like the coolest thing ever and everyone had one if some people had multiple. And that's BattlBox's origin story was that my ex business partner, my Co founder, he wanted an outdoor gear subscription box because his fiance of the time was getting Birchbox, which was this golden child billion dollar evaluation back then. And it was Women's Health and beauty products. And he'd see her do this unboxing each month when she got it. And he was like man, I want that feeling. Went online, couldn't find it. Turned out he wasn't alone in in the want and desire for an outdoor gear. Cool, man, shit, cool shit subscription. And I came in initially just as an investor and invested and wrote a check about two weeks, 2 1/2 weeks after launch. And it was the right timing combo with subscription box, something that didn't exist in the marketplace with the ability to acquire customers back then on Facebook for less than $5 a piece. So it quickly became a tangible business. 2015, I think we did a tad over 4 million in our first year. So it was like pretty quickly we're on to something. I came on full time in 2016 and off to the races. So, so a little bit different than your traditional D2C brand that we have such a focus on content and community building. So really that serves as more of our top of funnel, while traditional meta ads and traditional ads at this point are more of our there's some type of funnel, but for the most part it's mid funnel getting people into that are already thinking about making the purchase and kind of knocking them over the edge.
Content + community as the top-of-funnel strategy
Speaker 1: So other highlights 2020 we got our Netflix original TV show Southern Survival, which is literally just a commercial for BattlBox every episode. Not sure how it got the green light to to be what it was. It's a great show, but I mean, it is literally battlbox front and center.
Netflix show "Southern Survival" and pandemic tailwinds
Speaker 1: The premise of the show is we're testing gear to determine if it goes in the box. So it's it really is just this amazing commercial for us of what we actually do. So that that helped the combination of that's pandemic time. So people were already stuck in their house and buying. So ecom is already kind of going up and to the right. And then we drop a Netflix original show, I think six or seven months after Tiger King to kind of give you that time frame of everyone was just in their house watching Netflix. So combination of pandemic and Netflix show, we just saw super growth when we were already growing. And at that point it was time for the exit. And one of our partners, the guy that came up with the idea didn't really want to do anything anymore, didn't want to work. It didn't make sense to buy him out because we didn't know how much further growth we were going to see getting a loan as a as just an individual and my other business partner paying a 6X EBITDA just doesn't make too much sense when we don't see like some kind of magic unlock that was going to quadruple the business for a better payback. So we found a partner that made sense. I was a SPAC. So we sold. He was my old partner was able to leave day one. He wasn't needed and we moved forward as a publicly traded company that comes with its own challenges and no fault to the SPAC.
SPAC exit, market headwinds, and buying the business back
Speaker 1: But 2021 time frame specs are beginning to have a little bit of trouble in the markets and that's what happened. They went to no fault of their own financials not really changing, but their market cap went from, I don't know, it was like 160 million to I think it, it might have gone down below 10, it might be below 10 now. And all of that just allowed the opportunity for us to buy the business back and it was a mutually beneficial arrangement. They got a cash injection and we got our baby back and now we're building it again. We're seeing great growth again. We had last year. We're mature. So it might not be as exciting as some to hear 10% year over year growth. But for us decently size 8 figure company that's significant revenue and we're on base to do 10% again this year. The membership, the original part of the business, the subscription box, which we don't even call a subscription box, just call it membership is still growing.
Whatnot and why live shopping is finally "here"
Speaker 1: It's not growing as fast as it's very matured, but we're getting the exponential growth on all these additional sales channels. So our Amazon business is getting great growth. It's significantly growing. We launched Whatnot in April of last year and it's already surpassed all of our other channels. So this year, live shopping will be our second largest check behind our website, which is absolutely astonishing to just we didn't know what we were doing 10 months ago when we launched it and here we are with it being a big channel. So just kind of diversifying sales channels and riding this one out to the next exit.
Speaker 2: I downloaded it and I found myself like very overwhelmed with how like out of place I felt from for a lot of reasons. And so I'm very excited to hear about that.
Speaker 1: Did you download it because of the Super Bowl and Mr. Beast and all that or?
Speaker 2: No, I downloaded it. I think it was actually Gary Vaynerchuk. I saw one of his posts and he'll members about something and so I hadn't heard about it though, So I was like, I'm gonna at least see what the fuss is about. So I want to come back to that. But I'm curious before we we sort of get off of the story of battlbox. It seems like you guys just I mean, like I'm saying from the outside and from the story, right so far as like you just went up to the plate.
Hard lessons: cash flow, bad decisions, and the CFO hire
Speaker 2: Oh, come run, like wrapped it up World Series home run. Were there moments where you guys were where there was uncertainty, or were there moments where you know things you had to make certain decisions that ended up either paying off or not?
Speaker 1: Yeah. So there there's, there has been a lot of hits, a lot of home runs or triples or double s. But yeah, there's definitely challenges along the way. We didn't have a strong financial leader in the organization for the first several years. And by by we had ACPA that was doing their taxes and super talented CPA, but my ex business partner to know not in a malicious way, but would give them the exports of the files, but not the full understanding of the business. So if they're making a decision as a accounting expert, but they're not given all the variables of data, they're you can't expect their advice to be sound. So we made some, in hindsight, extremely idiotic decisions when it came to building a property, getting company cars because the CPA is like, oh, you want to get your expenses down, get your expenses up and your profit down. Do this, do that, do this. And businesses aren't necessarily that black and white ones and zeros. So we made some questionable decisions that caused ridiculous cash flow issues that this whole membership, the subscription box, which is still 70, it'll be 75% of our revenue this year. It's still a large part of the business. We're having a forecast 6 months out and in go to production manufactured runs which cause which cost capital cash for we're having to put cash sometimes in when we're not even going to do that renewal for another four or five months. So 160 day floats, 7 products in each box on average like it's a very cash intensive business and we didn't do ourselves any favors. So we had a couple, a couple of times where cash was super tight, we'd have to do layoffs or anything like that. But there was definitely a time where we weren't making payments on stuff on time. We got lucky. We found a great hire that is is now actually one of my business partners at the time. He came on just as an employee into the CFO role and he whipped it into shape pretty quickly. And that was probably such a such an important hire that if we didn't do that, if we didn't find that hire, I don't think we would have made it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think a lot of entrepreneurs, a lot of founders, they have certain personalities and certain talents. And it seems like a lot of times that person ends up being distinct from the person who's innovative and problem solving or build product.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and that's what it was. My old partner was very idea guy, innovative guy. I'm not ever going to ask him to balance my checkbook, right? Like not that side of the brain. And it's not a bad thing, but I think it, it, it's typically it's, it is that right? The extremely creative idea, creative geniuses, if you will, they're really good at that. But there's going to be an area where they need, they need some help. And with certainty, that's where we needed some help. So it worked out luckily.
Speaker 2: Well, for sure, it's good. It's great to hear that you guys are finding the right people and sort of moving them up and in into higher positions than the company when we get back from break. I'm curious, we talked about Whatnot and live selling. I would imagine that over that time you guys have had to make a number of pivots and a number of adjustments with regards to technology and marketing and such. And so we're going to get into that a little bit more right after this quick break. Hey, today's episode is brought to you by Amplify Media. And we are a podcast and media production company. Well, we're actually like the fractional media arm of your company because chances are if you're listening to this, you probably have a product, a passion, a mission, a message, something that you're trying to get out to the world, but you might not have the time, the team or the tech skills be able to do it. If that's the case, we can help. Go to amplifymedia.com. That's a MPLAFY media.com. You can also check the show notes for the link. And with that, let's go back to John. So John, I'm curious before we get into some of the tactics. I'm curious as a, as an organization, you guys seem to be utilizing lots of, I don't know, that's the right way to, to say it, but utilizing different methods of getting the word out there and spreading awareness. You talked about meta ads and Netflix and what whatnot. What's the driving philosophy behind all of that? Because it's not like you guys are like Netflix people or Meta people or whatnot. You seem to sort of evolve as things do. What sort of things are you guys talking about internally that allows you guys to make those pivots adjustments?
How platforms differ: TikTok vs Whatnot vs Amazon
Speaker 1: Sure. So, so really any decision we're making for the business, there's two pillars that matter most and we take them always into consideration, often times when you when traditionally you wouldn't think that you would and that's content and community. So we're very unusual in the sense that we're a small team, small company, but we have 4 full time video editors, a content coordinator that that manages the team. We have two full time creators that are part of the team. So you don't, if you just take the four video editors, content manager, coordinator and the two creator having seven full time that are focused purely on just content is very unusual. So it but it's all done and the community aspect is obviously very important. But at the end of the day, if you're trying to break it down all into a metric on what we're trying to accomplish, we're trying to lower our blended CAC. We want our blended customer acquisition cost to be as low as possible. Do we have to advertise still? Absolutely. Will we probably always have to advertise unfortunately, yeah. But we want that blended CAC to be as low as possible because that just a lot that allows scale and it allows us to to get into in front of as many eyeballs as possible. So every everything is content driven, even whatnot, which we treat it like content. We run 65 shows a month there currently. We're hoping to double that soon with another channel, but we're taking the same approach of making it fun. If you look at our content, a lot of it's educational, most of it's educational, a little bit of funniness in there, but we're not really ever hard selling anything. We're just talking the talk, walking the walk of being avid outdoorsman and preparing for the worst case scenarios. And by just educating and talking through that, the rest kind of kind of falls together.
Speaker 2: Yeah. What have you guys learned about this whole live selling? I've been loosely following it and one of the things I see that when they're doing it in in Asia or China and Japan, I'm like, OK, it's probably coming at a certain point and it seems like it's already taken hold over there. What have you guys learned since sort of, I don't know if you'd say either dipping your toe or if you guys have jumped in, but since that's happened.
Speaker 1: Yeah. So to your point, like you, you hear and see and read about China and live shopping and it's been that way for 10 years, right? Like I would argue that where we are today is where they probably were about 10 years ago. And for the last half decade or longer, everyone's talking live shopping is happening this year. This is going to be a thing. And it just, it came and it never came. And this is the first time that I genuinely believe, and I started feeling this way in the beginning of 2025, that it's actually here now and we're going to see this ramp up of live shopping being, will we ever be the huge channel that it is in China? Possibly not, right? Consumer behavior, consumer buying is a little bit different in North America and other places compared to China. But I do believe that it's going to start growing and it's going to grow exponentially. I think just using whatnot as as the example, they there's other platforms, right? TikTok has even done a taken a couple shots at it and technically are there. I don't know if they're going to win, but what not raise money twice in 2025 in the beginning of the year, they raised a couple 100 million at AI think a 5 1/2 billion dollar evaluation. And then in I think October or November of the same year, last same year, 2025 they raised again at an $11 billion evaluation. So you've got to think when there's that much money being thrown around, there's some strategy you would hope around it. Someone sees something to write hundreds of $1,000,000 checks at an $11 billion evaluation, which is just crazy to. So surely they're reading something on the tea leaves that this is the opportunity. But it's, yeah, it's just an interesting time.
Speaker 2: I would imagine that most businesses look at that and go, you know, OK, that's not for me. For the ones that do, right, is there, what do you think is important for them to sort of understand the landscape of the platforms, whatnot? From my understanding, it's just like a very unique sort of experience. Obviously, TikTok has its own thing. I think Amazon has been trying. It's like, is it a landscape sort of thing? Is it that OK And well, actually live selling is the same regardless of where the platform is. But you know, here's some key principles. Are there some things that you've sort of taken away since you guys have started?
Speaker 1: Yeah, so a couple ways I look at this. One of the big things is so you're on TikTok and you're swiping, you're ingesting content for entertainment purposes. You're not necessarily in the mindset that I'm ready to buy that I want to oh, like I'm watching someone dance or someone with a prank. I'm not thinking, man, I really want to spend some money right now. And then TikTok sell goes like, oh, wait, look, here's this $20 TSHI, do you want to buy it? And then you swipe and it's like interjecting it in. And I'm sure the algorithm is at least like trying to find the right times to show it. But then you go to Whatnot. Whatnot is shopping and entertainment. There's you're, if you're, if you've downloaded the app, if you've opened up the app today and you're going, you're already so far further along in the buying cycle than just a random TikTok user. Like arguably, if you open up Whatnot, you're looking to buy something and be entertained. It's the flip flop, right? Arguably, if Amazon can never figure out on live shopping, they've done half a dozen iterations now and they keep missing the mark. But if they can figure it out, they have the same thing, right? You don't open up Amazon and be entertained. You buy Amazon, open up Amazon to spend money. So if they can figure it out, or maybe they acquire Whatnot, who knows? Nominee can acquire an $11 million company, but Amazon is absolutely one of them. So maybe that's the play you've got to think. So it skipped the our generation, if you will, this QVC Home Shopping Network, right. But our parents generation were a part of it and they'd watch TV and then pick up the phone and call and order something was these 8 to 12 minute segments. And then our generation was just like, I don't know about that. Like it's kind of weird. And this is the new generation, this is their QV CHSN and it's solved the problem because we've seen with TikTok, right? It's just brain rot, swiping and jesting, very short attention spans. QVC 12 minute pitch doesn't work anymore. But what not basically is incorporated the swiping that's YouTube shorts, Instagram Reels and TikTok into shopping credit card on file. You swipe like you would on on a dating app or a social media platform to make a purchase. And it's auction based for the most part. So it's competitive. It's a gamification with high intent buyers. It's they've, it's just it that is it. And that's not unique to what's working in China, right? It's the same thing. They just have more apps and it's already just further along in the behavior journey.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's it's so cool that you guys have really dove into dove into this in such AI think a smart way, right. I think you're one of the few I've heard talk about blended cat. But I'm like, Oh yeah, that makes sense because we're in the podcast world. That's where we and for us, the hardest thing to sort of, you know, was attribution, right? And it's like, if they're like, we know it's working, but we can't. And so that that idea of putting it all together, having a holistic view of how the content is coming together, I think is really brilliant. I've got 2 questions left for you. The 1st is if people want to find out about you, find out about BattlBox.
Where to find BattlBox and John + the secret to scaling
Speaker 2: Where's the best place for people to go?
Speaker 1: So yeah, you can just Google battlbox, spell it however you want. It is BATTLBOX no E, But if you Google it, you're going to you're going to find it. Go to any social media platform, you're going to find us too. We have over 1,000,000 followers on TikTok, close to 1,000,000 on YouTube, close to 1,000,000 on Facebook. We're on Instagram, we're on XI think we're even on Pinterest. So find us there. We're all channels me LinkedIn is probably the best place to find me. I post content pretty regularly and then onlinequeso.com is my blog. It's probably 8070% written by me, 30% by guest, guest articles. And really it's about best practices, e-commerce, entrepreneurship, But the big pieces that I think we have this almost toxic world where like people just post the wins and to what you referenced earlier, just the home runs. And the reality is, yeah, I might get a home run, but I struck out nine times prior and there were learnings in those strikeouts. And I think overall, people don't do a great job talking about the losses because that's where the gold is. So the gold is absolutely there and you can harness those learnings and find out what you did wrong and apply it. That's where the win comes. And I think people love to share the home runs, but there's not often times the recipe isn't in there to get the home run right. The recipe was left back with those 9 strikeouts. So very intentional with the content of kind of showcasing what went wrong and how we corrected to then go right. I on there there's seven or eight part series now. I was literally writing an article on every step of our whatnot journey from the first month where we didn't know what we were doing to we have a gentleman named Cameron, the runs whatnot for us and he has a full Time Team that supports him. So it's the whole journey of that for making and we made a lot of mistakes along the way.
Speaker 2: Yeah. We'll link that up for you listeners as well. You may have answered it and I appreciate that answer so much, but I'm going to at least give you the opportunity to change or adjust it. But in your opinion, what is the secret to scaling a business?
Speaker 1: Going just doing it, which I don't want to sound like a cop out, but I think so many times there is paralysis by analysis. People just want to make sure that they get everything right and that every, everything, every I is dotted, every T is crossed. And I think you just got to go and understand you're going to make mistakes, learn from those mistakes, pivot. You're not going to get everything right the first time or the second time. There's times you do, but I think you just have to go. I think scaling a business, at least, it's very cyclical. We care about scaling something profitably for several years and then we don't and then we do again. Right now we're in the chapter of scale profitably. By 2029, we might say, oh, just scale, who cares about profits. So right now it's scale profitably. I think you looking at blended acquisition costs is key to to scale effectively and profitably. I think can't think you can't look at just one platform or one source. You have to look at it holistically. It's attribution is tricky.