From Sweeping the Floor to Steering the Ship - Moxie Sozo

From Unpaid Intern to Owner: The Moxie Sozo Journey

What happens when you bet on yourself, move across the country, and work for free. All just for a shot at doing meaningful work? In this episode, Derek Springston, Partner at Moxie Sozo, shares how that bet paid off, leading him from an unpaid intern to co-owner of a 25-year-old agency. You’ll hear what it really takes to grow into leadership, maintain culture through change, and figure it out, even when you’re not sure how.

Inside this episode:

• The mindset shift required when you lead the people you once worked beside
• Why trust, not title, is the real foundation for leadership
• How to build a culture people want to return to, even after they leave
  
  

Chapters

• 0:00 Moxie Sozo
• 0:41 Toilet Cleaning in the Early Days
• 8:53 The Unpaid Payoff
• 17:11 Employee Turned Owner
• 26:26 I'll Figure it Out
• 28:14 Born or Made?
• 32:07 An Office Kegger to Remember

Transcript

0:02

Welcome to An Agency Story podcast where we share real stories of marketing agency owners from around the world. From the excitement of starting up the first big sale, passion, doubt, fear, freedom, and the emotional rollercoaster of growth, hear it all on An Agency Story podcast. An Agency Story podcast is hosted by Russel Dubree, successful agency owner with an eight figure exit turned business coach. Enjoy the next agency story.

Russel: 0:41

Welcome to An Agency Story podcast. I'm your host, Russel. What do keg parties, cleaning toilets, and typography obsession have in common for Derek Springston? They're all chapters in the unexpected journey, from unpaid intern to agency co-owner. In this episode, Derek now partner and chief executive officer at Boulder based branding agency, Moxie Sozo shares how a bet on himself 16 years ago turned into owning a 25 year legacy agency. And what it really takes to lead a team you once worked beside. We cover Derrick's evolution from just a designer to the person responsible for building one of the best experiences of someone's career. He opens up about the difficult transition from employee to owner, the power of doing uncomfortable things, and how his grandfather's leadership style still influences him today. This is an aspirational and inspirational episode for anyone looking to create an exit plan and a legacy. Enjoy the story. Welcome to the show today everyone. I have Derek Springston with Moxie Sozo with us here today. Thank you so much for being on the show today, Derek.

Derek: 1:44

Russel, thanks for having me. Really appreciate it.

Russel: 1:46

I'm excited. So many parts of your story I really enjoy and probably will want to talk for six to seven hours, but I'm guessing your family might not appreciate that, so I'll do my best to keep it concise today.

Derek: 1:57

Family, clients, you know, some folks. Life, those sort of things.

Russel: 2:01

Life, what's all this life getting in the way? We'll listen to the universe. Just start us off, out of the gate. Tell us what Moxie Sozo does and who you do it for, and we'll get to the early days of your journey.

Derek: 2:10

Moxy Sozo, we're actually celebrating our 25th year in business this year. We're a branding agency out of Boulder, Colorado. We're most well known in the CPG industry, so, uh, beer, wine, spirits, food and beverage. Really have been building brands all the way from strategic foundation, visual identity, packaging and activations, um, now for really, yeah, over two decades. We're around 32 people right now with teams. Everyone's in house, everyone's on the front range of Colorado, and we've got strategic team, creative team, production team, development team, uh, and now advertising team as well. It's, um, a great group of people that, uh, I couldn't ask more for.

Russel: 2:54

Nice. 25 years. That sounds like you guys got some cool things planned to celebrate that, which, that's a big milestone. Are you doing something? What are you doing for your 25th anniversary?

Derek: 3:03

Leslie, who you met helps, uh, brand manage the agency. We've got a lot planned. We're having an event next month, uh, in, on the front range for agencies around here bringing them in. We're talking about ourselves, planning, how do you use that, those, those marketing messages, uh, as well as you can, but I mean, really it's, it's about continuing to do what we've been doing for the last 25 years. I can't take credit for all those 25 years, so I'm like a little different maybe than some of your other guests where I didn't necessarily start this agency, but I've been here, uh, for around 15 years now and have seen us evolve and change over the years. I took over the agency along with my partners, uh, about six years ago. Last six years have been kind of, um, navigating that, that new role and guidance. 25, it is, it is pretty crazy. Agencies getting to five to 10 years now is always a feat so it's, uh, I don't stop and reflect enough.

Russel: 4:00

It's like dog years.

Derek: 4:01

Oh, yeah. Oh yeah.

Russel: 4:02

Yes, you do have a unique origin story that I want to get to in a little bit here and uh, uh,'cause I don't often come across necessarily unique origin stories, so I'm really excited about that part of the conversation. Before we get all things agency life and agency stuff, I wanna go back to your origin story and talk to us about young Derek. What was he playing with at home? What kind of toys? What did he want to be when he grow up? Tell us all the good stuff.

Derek: 4:25

Oh, toys. Oh man. Lots of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, we'll do that. I grew up in southern Indiana, uh, rural Indiana. My grandpa actually started a printing company, uh, in a small town of Holland, Indiana back in the day. He did that around the seventies so I always kind of grew up where my grandpa had this company. My dad who, who is his son-in-law, not his son. He ended up leaving his job as an engineer to go work for him and help him run the business, eventually taking that over. So young Derek spent a lot of time at Woods Printing in Indiana. Shout to my sister who's running it today. It's was a lot, I, I started working there pretty young, honestly, too.

Russel: 5:08

I was waiting for this child labor moment. I just knew that had to exist.

Derek: 5:12

Oh, definitely, definitely. There's levels to it. 8-year-old Derek, he cleaned the toilets and, uh, then like 10, 12 you mopped and you did weed eating and you took care of the yard and all that stuff. Eventually started working in the back room. Doing collating. The reason my grandpa started the printing industry or printing business in the area was there's a lot of furniture companies in southern Indiana and, um, the, they all needed price books, they all needed all these things back in the day, in the eighties and nineties where not everything was digital. I started in the back room collating. Having the, the ladies, you know, boss me around as a teenager and then eventually I was the delivery guy at 16, 17, 18. Which that's not a, that's not a good hire, but, you know, my dad let me do that for a while. The thing that, uh, you know, that relates maybe to where I am today is the pre-press department. Always having access to Mac computers and being able to dabble around on some of the programs that they had at the time, whether it was Photoshop or Illustrator or Cork, if you guys remember Cork. There was some dabbling that I was allowed to do. I would play video games on their computers too, but there was definitely like some intriguing interest there. Around the like kind of, the swatch books were always fascinating to me'cause they were always the coolest thing that was in the office. That was kind of how I started understanding even what a design role could be. These were pre-press people, but, um, not necessarily saying, oh, that's what I'm gonna do, but I at least knew of it, knew, knew what it was, and was kind of interested. That's how it kind of started.

Russel: 6:46

Very cool. This is a classic nature versus nurture question of just do, did, do you feel like the environment created this, this design interest for you, or did you already have that and just in the right environment to expand upon that as you were sharing?

Derek: 7:02

It's a great question. As I think I mentioned to you before, I, I'm not great at introspection and why I've, I've made the choices that I've made or I've done the things that I've done, but I, I think that piqued my interest. They certainly weren't doing and printing things that were mind blowingly creative. That wasn't their role. And, um, I was good. I was decent at art kind of in, early on in school and those sort of things that, again, I'm not an illustrator. That wasn't necessarily my passion, but there was always curiosity there. I don't know if I ever put my, my finger on it until like college, so it, it was definitely in the back of my head somewhere. It wasn't necessarily at the forefront. I thought it was gonna go into engineering, I think, uh, yeah, I was a math major at one point. That was not gonna happen. Stuff like that. I think it did lay some foundations, but it was probably recessive for a long time.

Russel: 7:57

I feel you on the math major thing. I think like day negative 50, I declared math major right before I even got into college. Then I remember going through orientation and seeing the first, uh, like the, the kind of rubric for all the classes you'd have to take for math major and really decided real quick, no, that's not gonna be my major. When like, calculus 10 is like the second semester of freshman year, and it's like, okay, yeah. Bad choice Russel.

Derek: 8:21

You can get humbled real quick in calculus for economics. That's where you can get humbled real quick. That first D minus, you're like, hmm, maybe I shouldn't do this.

Russel: 8:31

I say that, why I even thought this'cause I remember in high school I took one day of calculus, got like one right on my homework and said I'm not taking calculus my senior year of high school. That really should have been the wake up call from me. But clearly I was, loved math. I don't even know but yeah, I love math. But anyhow. Get us to some of the early days of your career and, um, and then I know, I know we're not gonna be too far away from, uh, your agency life.

Derek: 8:53

In school, like I bounced around majors, was always kind of taking some art classes on the side, um, and eventually applied for a BFA, uh, in graphic design. Found my people there. I was like, oh, I don't have to draw all the things. I kind of just became obsessed with typography and that was really when I knew, okay, this is like the thing, like why do I care, uh, you know, who designed Bodoni? I don't know but I do. There was this really deep research that that's, that was kind of, I was like, okay. I found it and found some great people. Eventually came outta school around'08,'09. The history buffs know what was kind of going on there, so no one was hiring. I would always kind of thought of like, well, I'm not, I'm in Indiana. I went to Indiana University, so I was still in Indiana. I knew as soon as I got outta college, I didn't wanna be in Indiana. No shade on people in Indiana. I still go back a lot. My family lives there. I love Indiana. Love how I grew up. But there were other places like, okay, if no one's hiring, I'm just gonna apply to the places where I wanna live. I think I applied to, you know, some of, some of the standards like San Francisco and New York and those sort of things. But my dad had always taken me to Colorado as a kid. We came out here and learned fly fishing together back when I was young, so I only knew Colorado Summers. Everybody thinks Colorado's cold, it is not. Incredibly sunny all the time. I only knew summers and it was one of those places where I was like, well, if I could live anywhere, you know, just take a shot. Might as well apply some agencies in Colorado. That's where Lee Steiner, Moxie Sozo's founder, uh, emailed me and said, hey. We're not hiring, but you could totally come out here and be an unpaid intern if you want. I like your book. You can come out here and work for free. I'll take a shot. That was kind of the start of me moving out here.

Russel: 10:33

That was just like your first job at a, at essentially college or, or, I don't even know. Can you even call it a job?

Derek: 10:40

That was my first job outta college. Nowadays you can't call that a job. It wasn't necessarily my first job in the industry. I did some internships throughout college for some children's museum, and then I worked for Indiana University, um, in one of their departments, uh, where I designed all the event flyers and those sort of things. I had some, some work experience, nothing, nothing like agency experience, but bounced around some internships there and some jobs throughout college. This was really my first real agency gig coming outta school. I moved out here. I had some savings where I was like, I could make this work for a few months. If it doesn't work out, I'll figure it out. Took the risk, you know, and now I'm here. But there's a big, that's a big leap.

Russel: 11:24

Okay. I got a lot of questions about this.

Derek: 11:27

Yeah. Yeah. I was like, there's some questions in there.

Russel: 11:28

I mean, right, not just an unpaid internship while you're living in your parents' basement, an unpaid internship while you're moving to a completely, I mean, granted very beautiful place you knew that you wanted to live. Sounds like a crazy risky move. I gotta just understand more about who you are.

Derek: 11:43

Again, not an introspective person. I don't know if failure really crossed my mind. Honestly, it was an in for an agency that I admired their work. As a career, at that point in time, it was really just about getting better at being a designer and wanting to kind of learn from people that I admired. Not knowing like it was a five, six person agency at the time. Two people who I, are still, my partners, um, are doing most of the greatest work, uh, that comes out. I think you, you kind of touched on something there. It was like, well is like, I'll, I'll put my head down. I went to work at my parents' place at eight, like I really did. So there's a lot of like, put your head down and put the effort in. You are gonna make mistakes along the way, but yeah, I don't know that I thought about what happens if this doesn't work out? I had the support from my family too. If I would've picked a different state, maybe my dad wouldn't have been so stoked.

Russel: 12:38

They say, yeah, you should do that, son. As long as you got an extra bed in your, uh, in the apartment, uh, we're good.

Derek: 12:44

But I think he was like, great. Yeah. So, you know, I was definitely fortunate there where, um, I had, I had some savings that I had built up to, to be able to do it and make the choice, and then the family that was like, yeah, go see what happens. I don't think my dad was, like, thought that much of a graphic design, uh, degree at the time or, you know, a BFA degree. It was, where can I go that I can, I want to be, and um, learn as much as possible. That was really it. I was like, oh, if something changes, I'll just go with the flow there. I still act that way even today where say there's a problem that comes up and we're talking about it, inevitably I will always say, we'll figure it out. Because we will. We will. I've always had that mentality as like, oh, I'll figure it out. If something else has to happen, um, I'll put in the work or the effort or the thought and, and figure it out.

Russel: 13:33

So it's really kind of a, a bet on yourself. What's the worst that can happen and if I, I just put my head down and, and charge hard at it, and as we'll quote you, I'll figure it out.

Derek: 13:44

Yeah. I think it is, it is a lot about self-belief, but it is a lot, you know, some, some privilege in there too. Having a supportive family, having a support structure, having great friends, those sort of things like where you can bounce things off of. I've never felt like on my own necessarily. That also helps a lot. There's some backup things.

Russel: 14:02

That's such a great thing to recognize and we all have different levels of support that comes naturally, but even wherever we're at on that scale, I think it's just a great reminder of how important support is and get that for yourself. Maybe even as a first stepping stone, if you're gonna try something hard is what is your support system. That makes the hard endeavors more likely to turn out successful. Great reminder. Great introspection. You're already growing in the course of this podcast.

Derek: 14:27

Yeah, see, there you go. It just takes the right person to ask, like, have you thought about this? Do you want to?

Russel: 14:32

Cleaning toilets might, we might have brought up some traumatic, um, memories there.

Derek: 14:35

Hey, I'm still the cleaner in the family. I clean our house. That's maybe another issue where it's the perfectionism, those sort of things. That's another thing

Russel: 14:43

That's fair. How many, just so I can start to get an understanding as you already dropped how long, you know, you've been owning the business. How many years ago was this that you started your unpaid internship?

Derek: 14:52

That was'08,'09, so that was 16 years ago and throughout that, about five years in, um, so we were a pretty flat agency at the time. We were small when I started. Five or six with a, with quite a few unpaid interns. We grew pretty quickly those first five years. We probably got in the twenties there. But we were really flat structure and our, our founder, who was the creative director, he controlled all the creative and I wanted to go see what else was out there. I took what I always say is like a year hiatus to another agency called Interact. They're also in CPG space. They're a great agency too. Went there for a year to be their design director, another small team. But after a year, I really missed certain people back at Moxie Sozo. So much of it was about what I liked doing and why I would put as much effort into it or why I would stay late was who's surrounding you. Not that I didn't like the people I worked with at Interact, it was just that, if I'm gonna do this, I, there's, there's a few folks at Moxie that I want to do this with consistently. It's'cause they have the same, like, approach. We were working on something today and there's, now there's this shorthand that we've developed over the years and it's it became a lot more of like, well, if I'm gonna put in all this effort, I'm gonna put in all this time to probably be around the people that I want to be around. That led me back to Moxie. Came back, um, as a associate creative director and then kind of grew from there. We can talk about the role I have now, but it was, is that's really when I started getting more client facing leading teams and those sort of things.

Russel: 16:26

Okay. Clearly, just building up tremendous amount of experience as anyone that does that, um, works in a small setting, and even as that grows, I feel like everyone at home right now is just writing a note and maybe their only takeaway from this episode is gonna be get a lot of unpaid interns.

Derek: 16:41

Yeah, no, you can't do that no more. And Moxie Sozo, we pay all of our interns now.

Russel: 16:47

Yes. That was told to me very early on. It's like, you can do unpaid interns, but if you want to do it by the book, it's way more difficult than just pay'em, pay'em 10 bucks an hour and you know, you're, you're better off in the long run.

Derek: 16:58

Absolutely. There's none of that. There's been some evolutions here, especially since, since we took over.

Russel: 17:04

Good disclaimer. Department of Labor, do not listen to this episode. Moxie Sozo pays all interns. Don't report us.

Derek: 17:10

Absolutely.

Russel: 17:11

When is that moment or did that transition start to occur, or how did this all happen that you even became an opportunity to actually become an owner?

Derek: 17:18

Our founder, uh, pulled a few of us aside who'd worked together for a long time and been there and essentially wanted to keep it in the family and was like, hey, I'm thinking about stepping away. Would you all be interested in trying to make this work where you guys could purchase the agency and, and take over? Myself, uh, Nate Dyer, Charles Bloom, and John Supsic, the four of us figured it out. One of those, John Supsic is the CFO. If he wasn't involved in that purchase, it probably, it would not have happened.

Russel: 17:47

You gotta have a money guy, if you're gonna buy a business.

Derek: 17:49

The other three of us are all creatives. He was the money guy and, um, helped make that happen along with Leif Steiner who was the founder. It was incredibly a big honor and, and trying to figure it out. But that, you know, became a lot different. Owning the company versus being a contributor. That was about six years ago. We figured that out, and those first few years. And then, the pandemic and all those sort of things, it was some fast learning. I think that we will figure it out. It's kind of year to year, day to day sometimes. But that's how that came about. We were recognized for the time and effort in helping grow the business and we were able to scrap together enough dollars to make it work, get a loan, those sort of things that you have to do. Again, we weren't the original entrepreneur, but there's definitely some of that thinking that goes into it. That's how we put it together.

Russel: 18:38

Sorry, another introspection question for you. I have to imagine there was just a literal day when you were no long from on, on Friday, you were the contributor, and Monday you were part owner. Do you have any big instant memory oh, this is how it felt different, or this is now how my thinking was almost on a dime, like switching on a dime like that?

Derek: 18:57

Just how you have to think. Bringing up like those thoughts of do I need to act different? All these people who are my coworkers, are now my employees. That shift was interesting and I think it took me a while to really live up to what you need to be. Since I didn't start as the boss and now you're the boss. I still think there's a lot of work on how to, how you live up to that and how you support your employees and many of which I had worked with. We're a nice split where there's a lot of employees have been here 8, 9, 10 years or plus, and then half is more the younger crowd and doing those sort of things. There's some people I have a lot of history with and where I was just a designer for a long time that they, fed me work and I did the work and gave it back. It's an interesting dynamic when that changes. It's like, how do you make sure you're earning and garnering their respect and, how are you supporting them? I think it's something I've had to learn in the last, uh, last few years especially. Though a lot of that's having some frank and honest conversations and hearing from them and, and not being overly reactive. I think the first few years there's a lot of reactive of, well, this, you can't do that'cause of this, and now I know more about how the business is run. There's all these little factors that you, you learn about as you get handed over the reins. Especially from a financial perspective that gets in your head and you have to continue to think about it from, from the employee perspective, in a lot of ways. I try and balance that as best as possible.

Russel: 20:25

No, no. I was just gonna segue, then. What intentionally did you feel like you had to do to navigate that? I think you shared, right? It sounds like maybe even had to go a little slower than you might have, your instincts would've wanted you to go. I'll do some introspection for you, maybe, you can tell me if I'm right or wrong. That I don't know what I don't know and there's personalities and, you know, it seems like culture is really important to you, so I'd rather play it slow and navigate some of those dynamics. I guess we'll go back to your age old quote, we'll figure out the rest along the way.

Derek: 20:51

Not only having to go a little bit slower, but not avoiding it either. You can't just dive back into what you're comfortable with or what you've always done and think that everything else is gonna be okay. Just because you thought that way as an employee doesn't mean everybody else does. Does that make sense, where it's, you know, you are not them. How you felt as an employee, just'cause you were okay with it, doesn't, doesn't matter. Getting out of the comfort zone of yes, you're good at this and you can make yourself as busy as possible with things that you're comfortable with. I still do that to this day. What can I do versus what do I need to do? so Having those conversations more and more, how do people work? Understanding that. I think I learned a lot of it. Going back to my grandpa and then my dad, seeing how they treated their employees, um, and how like my grandpa, like people really wanted to talk to him and enjoyed talking to him. So I think part of it over the last few years is like trying to retrospectively look back at that and seeing how how I want to help people and manage people. That's a good introspection I guess. I think it comes down, comes back to some of that, of what I saw as a kid. My grandpa and my dad both played a huge role in just how they really cared about the people. Part of that is being in a small town, there's not a whole town, there's not a whole other, other jobs.

Russel: 22:05

You got no choice in some degree, in a small town.

Derek: 22:07

Yeah. But it's all like, you put in what you get out, and that's the same I think for how you, how you treat people as well.

Russel: 22:13

Absolutely. I'm gonna butcher the quote, so I'm not gonna say it exactly, but it, but it made me think of, you know, just asking yourself the question as a leader, how do you want to be seen by people and, and meeting them where they're at essentially is, seems like the question you're asking and it is such important question. Then the other thing that I, I found pretty profound in what you're saying is just this idea that obviously you had a pretty big event that kind of forced this transformation, this different way of thinking in you. I don't think it's in, any different than a lot of agency owners just when they've been, you know, their business's kind of stalled out or they're just really not where they want to be. Probably requires some transformation of yourself, your approach, your way of thinking in order to kind of jump those hurdles, break down those obstacles, and not just relying on kind of the whole, what, what got you here won't get you there mentality, um, is, is not always a good, is not something good to rely on, I should say.

Derek: 23:05

The last couple years, you know, having some outside mentors, um, that have done this before because yeah, I have some really limited experience and so do my partners. We have kind of the same experience where we're at this agency for a long time and yeah, we've seen us change and we've seen the agency change. Being able to accept like, hey, this is how, this is who I am, this is how I want this, this agency to act and be and, and all those sort of things. Bringing in some mentors and having those conversations where they can say, they can the cliche, like they can show you a mirror and say, well, here's where you're, you're gonna stall out. Here's where I see some bumps in the road that if you, if you don't address these sort of things, like how are you gonna grow? How are you gonna affect the team? And if the team is wanting something, how are you gonna reach that? You have to have some level of success to be able to, support them continually. That's where the last couple years have come in of really growing and thinking much more about the future, as much as it pains me and planning for it. Having that ambition to get there, and sharing that with the agency and saying, this is how we're gonna get there together.

Russel: 24:12

Wonderful. I feel like you've given some tremendous amount of advice for someone that, um, might be in your shoes at some point, stepping up, whether it's actual outright ownership or stepping into a strong leadership position within an agency. Any words of advice for someone, and it might be a tougher perspective, but I guess you can say it from your perspective on, um, someone that's maybe looking to sell to team members or let someone take over the business. Anything in your own experience you could share from that side of the table?

Derek: 24:38

From my point of view, my retrospective, I had so much trust in who I was doing it with, my partners. Retrospectively I wish I would've dove into that experience a bit more and understood really what, what we were doing. Kind of taking the, hey, is everything good, what do you need from me approach. I would've switched that a little bit. I would've been a little bit more, uh, upfront, but someone looking to sell or someone looking to sell internally. How are you setting that transition up? I think really, really matters, like in, in really identifying the roles and can people live up to those roles. That's where we all, we've also just had to adjust and move and say, okay, where do we really all fit? What makes sense? What do we wanna do? What are we the best at? What's gonna make us better? What sets us up for the future? So. You're looking at that moment in time, it's really hard to think five years out. Because you're just trying to make it happen where they're on either side, right? You're just trying to make it happen. My point of view now is just like really think through what those next phases are. And ask more questions, ask a lot more questions. Yeah. I learned on the gig a little bit more like everything.

Russel: 25:41

We all gotta pay our tuition to the school of hard knocks. I think of that in my own journey of, you know, actually selling an agency. It can be very similar on both sides of the table, right. It is such a heavy lift to, to make a business transaction occur.

Derek: 25:53

Just to make it happen.

Russel: 25:54

If you look, yeah. But how important it is to just keep your eye on the ball out in front of you while you're going through that process as much as you can. It is so important. I really can't stress it enough and I, I think that's great that you shared that. If you actually look at a line graph of the entire history of the company's revenue from, from when we found it from nothing to where it even is today, the only dip in revenue that will actually show up on that line graph is the year we sold the business. That was literally because of that, just so much effort and mind, this mental capacity that it was taking to do that.

Derek: 26:25

it's draining.

Russel: 26:26

Sounds like similar in your case. Cool. You got through it, you figured it out. If that's not a tattoo on your forearm, then it better be after this episode. That's all I'm gonna say.

Derek: 26:34

No, I know, I know, I know. They get sick of hearing it.

Russel: 26:37

It's all right though. It is a very, can be a very comforting thing, especially in turmoil and chimes like, hey, let's not worry about that right now. We can have some time to ask some questions so we're not oblivious, but just know that we're doing something hard and we'll figure it out if we, as long as we're committed to it. I'm inspired.

Derek: 26:51

Appreciate that Russel.

Russel: 26:52

I can dig it. You've alluded it to a little bit, I feel like in how your approach to the future is, but I don't know if there's any more to add to that question of just what is the, what does the long-term game plan look for you guys?

Derek: 27:01

Like most agencies, we're really looking at growing and improving as an agency, but what that entails right now for us is a lot about what that next phase is gonna need. Where are we insufficient? Right now where it's coming down to is like, okay, processes and those sort of things, because we've always fluctuate, fluctuated around 30, 40 people. We've hit like upwards of 45. 50 always seems kind of daunting for a lot of agencies and do, do I want to be 50 people? Do I wanna be over 50 people? Maybe, I don't know yet. But in order to grow and just, support the clients that we have, it's gonna be a lot about making sure the bright processes are in place to support said growth, and we're making the right, decisions on how to support the team, whether it's through processes, tools, people. All those sort of elements that we, I haven't dug into as much, uh, in the first couple years that I have in the last two. That's what I think is gonna help us start targeting, bigger budgets, bigger clients. A more full suite of services that we do really provide. You want that ongoing revenue as well. It's how do we make sure we're supporting that ongoing revenue, uh, as a team and everybody kinda understands how we think about prioritization.

Russel: 28:14

Love that. I love that. And get to your 50th anniversary, the, the golden anniversary. The real, the one that we celebrate for couples. well, Very fascinating. All right, one last introspective question for you, Derek. Are entrepreneurs born or are they made?

Derek: 28:28

If you're asking me, I, I was, was made into one. My grandpa was an entrepreneur. I don't think I ever woke up one day and said, hey, I want to be a CEO. I think I was definitely reluctant in that way, but there's something about, like, I go back to the people part of it where, wanting to see a, a large group of people that enjoy each other and want them to succeed. That's maybe what's continued to draw me to this and, and how I can affect it. I was definitely made, I wasn't, wasn't born. But you might have a different point of view. There's a part of me that just like, yeah, it feels strange sometimes to continue to reflect on what my role is and those sort of things. There's some reluctance there, but I, you know, I'll figure it out.

Russel: 29:11

Of course you will. yeah, no, I mean, That's why I love the question. There's no, There probably really is no right or wrong answer. It's all some really mix of, of things and based upon the individual, the circumstances, et cetera. And, and Opportunity and support, going back to the beginning of our conversation. I was maybe just a tinge surprised as someone that came from a very entrepreneurial background for some, you know, that, that they wouldn't have leaned a little more into that. But I can appreciate it all the same either way.

Derek: 29:36

I have like 14 cousins. I'm the only one that doesn't live in southern Indiana, so I was a little bit of like more, a little bit black sheep. I'm the only one that doesn't live like 30 minutes from where my grandparents grew up. I don't think I ever thought of it as like, oh, I wanna own something, build something. Being kind of an art kid, uh, at a certain point in time where you're just like, that's everything to you. And now it's become more about how do I make this, you know, I'm not expecting everybody to be a Moxie Sozo lifer, but how do I make this one of the best experiences of their career? Is how I'm starting to really look at it that way. Where it's like, how do, how do I help them grow, get where they want, they want to go. There's a lot of people I want to continue to work with, that's, not everybody's gonna be like me and just stick around or leave and come back. How do I make it enjoyable when it's, when, when they're here and they felt it was valuable?

Russel: 30:24

What a great question to ask and almost challenge to give yourself and, and with the realization that it won't be forever, but make it meaningful for while it is. Probably couldn't do a more noble thing in this world. To that end, if people want to come work for you or become an unpaid in, no, sorry, not an unpaid intern paid intern.

Derek: 30:41

Pay, we pay,

Russel: 30:42

Be a paid intern at Moxie Sozo, where can they go?

Derek: 30:45

But you can go to moxiesozo.com. That's M-O-X-I-E-S-O-Z O.com. Or you can email me at derek.springston@moxiesozo.com. Look us up. Hit me up. I'm always open to chat. If you're ever in Boulder, Colorado, look us up. We've got a great office here. We're a hybrid workforce, but we've still got a physical office and those sort of things, which I know is, um, hit or miss these days.

Russel: 31:09

Very cool. Thank you so much for taking the time to share your journey today. Happy 25th anniversary to Moxie Sozo, and such great perspectives on someone that had a very unique journey into where you're at today. Seems like you're approaching this amazingly, and thank you for sharing all those wonderful insights with us today, Derek.

Derek: 31:27

Thanks, Russel. I really appreciate it.

31:31

We hope you've enjoyed this episode of An Agency Story podcast where we share real stories of marketing agency owners from around the world. Are you interested in being a guest on the show? Send an email to podcast@performancefaction.com. An Agency Story is brought to you by Performance Faction. Performance Faction offers services to help agency owners grow their business to 5 million dollars and more in revenue. To learn more, visit performancefaction.com.

Derek: 32:07

This is probably a year or two in, I was getting paid. But this is probably a year or two in at the agency and myself, uh, my sister and one of my partners who's upstairs right now, we went to a brewery, had a few drinks, but they were having some games that you could win a keg.

Russel: 32:24

Sounds like trouble already.

Derek: 32:25

We're like, well, we're gonna participate clearly. See if we can win. We participate in this egg. I think it was an egg race or whatever. We crushed. We won easy, easy peasy. So like, oh, cool, you can come by tomorrow and pick up your keg. Tomorrow was a Friday. Who has codes to the office? We do. Without telling our, our founder, and maybe this is how he finds out, but without telling our founder, we tell everybody, hey, we're gonna throw a kegger in the office tomorrow. And, uh, we threw a kegger in the office the next day. Had the code, hauled up the keg, invited everybody we knew downtown Pearl Street, Boulder. We hung out. We didn't tap it. I can't remember. We might have tapped it the next day, which again, in your twenties you can, you're like superhuman, but could not do that today. That one was just like, yeah, throwing a party in the office without your boss knowing, probably aren't doing that so much these days. Anybody that wants to try it here, I, I welcome it. It'd be fine. I wouldn't care.

Russel: 33:24

The funnest activities are not always the smartest. We did some pretty silly, stupid stuff, and this is, as an owner even, um, back in our early days. Things that no way in heck would I have ever done. Ever again.