In this episode Josh & Dane chat with "Sunglass Rob" the CEO of San Diego's based SportRX. SportRX is an online company focused on prescription eyewear for multiple sports with biking being one of their biggest markets). Sunglass Rob is an avid mountain biker and an absolute savant as it relates to eyewear. In addition to learning a ton about active eyewear and optics, the episode covers a bit about Rob, his riding, and his company.
Special Note
Josh has been testing out SportRX's Huckson prescription sunglasses on mtb & gravel rides and can honestly say they are the best sunglasses he's ever worn on the trail. SportRX did provide the shades to Josh free of charge but the MCP is not getting any compensation for this podcast or recommendation from SportRX. In fact, Josh likes them so much that he just ordered a pair of non-prescription Huckson's (paid full-price) to wear when riding in contacts.
The Huckson: www.sportrx.com/sportrx-huckson.html
More About SportRx
SportRx is a San Diego-based company that was built by active opticians who ride their bikes, run their races, push their jogging strollers, and bomb down slopes. Since 1996, we've been on a mission to help people see better while doing the things they love. For over two decades, we have specialized in custom prescription sunglasses (and prescription snow goggles!) for athletes in virtually every sport and have mastered the art of prescription wrap around lenses. We strive to create the best prescription sports sunglasses, prescription glasses, and Rx goggles that are tailored uniquely to your sport and vision needs – no matter how extreme your prescription (or your sport!).
SportRX Links:
Web: www.sportrx.com
YouTube: www.youtube.com/@sportrxeyewear
Listen to Mountain Cog
Apple Podcasts
Spotify
Other Podcast Sites
Socials
Instagram
Facebook
Email
mountaincog@gmail.com
In this episode Josh & Dane chat with "Sunglass Rob" the CEO of San Diego's based SportRX. SportRX is an online company focused on prescription eyewear for multiple sports with biking being one of their biggest markets). Sunglass Rob is an avid mountain biker and an absolute savant as it relates to eyewear. In addition to learning a ton about active eyewear and optics, the episode covers a bit about Rob, his riding, and his company.
Special Note
Josh has been testing out SportRX's Huckson prescription sunglasses on mtb & gravel rides and can honestly say they are the best sunglasses he's ever worn on the trail. SportRX did provide the shades to Josh free of charge but the MCP is not getting any compensation for this podcast or recommendation from SportRX. In fact, Josh likes them so much that he just ordered a pair of non-prescription Huckson's (paid full-price) to wear when riding in contacts.
The Huckson: www.sportrx.com/sportrx-huckson.html
More About SportRx
SportRx is a San Diego-based company that was built by active opticians who ride their bikes, run their races, push their jogging strollers, and bomb down slopes. Since 1996, we've been on a mission to help people see better while doing the things they love. For over two decades, we have specialized in custom prescription sunglasses (and prescription snow goggles!) for athletes in virtually every sport and have mastered the art of prescription wrap around lenses. We strive to create the best prescription sports sunglasses, prescription glasses, and Rx goggles that are tailored uniquely to your sport and vision needs – no matter how extreme your prescription (or your sport!).
SportRX Links:
Web: www.sportrx.com
YouTube: www.youtube.com/@sportrxeyewear
Listen to Mountain Cog
Apple Podcasts
Spotify
Other Podcast Sites
Socials
Instagram
Facebook
Email
mountaincog@gmail.com
someone made a comment that I shouldn't like suck my beer in anymore, so it sounds like uh is that the the um bong noise? Yeah, the bong noise. Yeah, they were saying I thought that was cool, I thought I think we should start with the bong noise, a real bong noise yeah, I was just kidding.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Work, I'm just kidding. Yeah, that's gonna go a different way. Yeah, you didn't think you didn't know all right.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):so it's wednesday night, is it wednesday? Yeah, I don't even know what day. I don't Just kidding work, I'm just kidding. Yeah, podcat's going to go a different way.
Josh (Magellan):Yeah, you didn't think, you didn't know. All right, so it's Wednesday night, is it Wednesday?
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Yeah, I don't even know what day it is. I don't even know, dude, today has been awful. I'm on vacation, you're on?
Josh (Magellan):vacation.
Dane (Suspension Guru):I don't even know.
Josh (Magellan):Yeah.
Dane (Suspension Guru):It's Wednesday go.
Josh (Magellan):You know what's hilarious is? We all go to San Diego for vacation. Yeah, and you came here and you came to Tucson. So why come to Tucson for vacation? My?
Rob (Sunglass Rob):wife's family has roots out here. Oh right, that's cool she wanted the kids to see Tucson.
Dane (Suspension Guru):You got to go riding.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):I heard about that I did go riding also. Yeah, that was fun.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Homegrown.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Shout out to homegrown Matt. Right, you guys went up to the 50-year, did you do?
Josh (Magellan):upper 52?.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Yeah, we did upper 52. What did you?
Josh (Magellan):think, did you clear everything? No, not the uphills. You cleared all the downhills.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):There was a couple of rock slabs that we skipped, but the third one we did.
Dane (Suspension Guru):The big long one yeah, he talked me into doing it when you can't see the bottom Exactly.
Josh (Magellan):But when you get there it's pretty cake.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Yeah, it was not that bad. You get scary. It's scary as you're coming up to it, but when you get to the bottom there was one other spot where we went. I saw him go up and then down. I was like I guess I'm going that way, yeah, and I went up this thing and then it was too late to not go down, but it was gnarly yeah, is it the one with the crack in the middle of it?
Josh (Magellan):and you have to kind of almost I just closed my eyes I know that's not true because of what you do for a job.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):I was about to say that I do that all the time, I think if I had stopped and looked at it I'd be like no, I'm not doing that. But since I was already in it, I tend to ride below my skill level, like my confidence levels you don't push it. No, I'm a dad, I'm 45. I've been hurt really bad a few times on the bike and I'm just like right today, walk tomorrow. I'm pretty conservative on the bike right. I could do more than I do and I.
Dane (Suspension Guru):You don't ride on the edge anymore I try not to I.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):The place I really let loose is on my home trails, like we said, black widow yeah like I've done that trail 250 times. Oh my god, and it's black mountain. Right, yeah, black mountain so there's like black mountain rob yeah, there's like Black Mountain Rob. Yeah, there's like Black Mountain Rob, where I'm just like my friends that are way faster than me on Black Mountain. Let me go first.
Josh (Magellan):But that's your home course right.
Dane (Suspension Guru):But it's like.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):I'm also that kind of person where I like doing the same thing over and over.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Like.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):I like a trail more, the more I do it.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Yeah.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):And that's maybe why I've been selling glasses since 1996. Like, I pick, I find something and I just stick with it. Yeah, I have the trail. I mean we joke that I know every rock on Black Mountain and the rock will move and I'll be like that.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Wasn't there yesterday I told you, I wrote in paper that we're best friends.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Yes, I saw that, yeah.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Because that's what downhillers do Like. We memorize the course, we know every single rock and we learn everything, everything about that trail and we'll even walk it to learn it right. And we do. Better is the more we know. Free riders can go do a trail with never seeing it and those guys are truly hardcore. There used to be races where they wouldn't tell you where they are. You'd load up in a truck this is in california, a lot and you'd go basically in this truck and they would take you to a trail that you didn't know and then completely blind, completely blind, kind of a level field, I mean it does but the guys with the biggest balls win.
Josh (Magellan):Wasn't it a lot of Enduro like that too, that it was completely? They wouldn't announce it until a couple of days before, in fact they still the race series I do in Nevada.
Dane (Suspension Guru):they don't announce it until a few days, so can't practice one in Temecula and they switch it up all the time.
Josh (Magellan):Yeah, so you're always guessing, yeah.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):You can practice like the day before, but not weeks in advance.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Yeah, that's about right.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Yeah, cause a lot of people come from out of town. So it's kind of not fair if the locals they're still locals?
Dane (Suspension Guru):Yeah, they still know. They know all those trails. Yeah, well, if we started.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):I think we're supposed to start with a dad joke oh yeah, I came prepared. Yeah, so go for it so what's the difference between a well-dressed unicyclist and a poorly dressed bicyclist?
Josh (Magellan):a well-dressed unicyclist and a poorly dressed cyclist. Yeah, I don't know a tire that's good. That's actually really good. I like that one did you guys, I haven't heard every episode.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):I wasn't sure if that was a repeat or not, so I think I went and looked at.
Dane (Suspension Guru):The only reason it seems familiar is I looked at a bunch to prepare for the podcast.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Yeah, I did the same thing. I think I read it yeah.
Dane (Suspension Guru):And I think I read it. Other than that I don't think we've done. All the time I get really excited and I get everybody excited and I'm going to tell you this joke and then I can't remember it or just totally mess it up.
Josh (Magellan):So it's pretty interesting how we got hooked up. Right so uh, so we did the episode with Susie um, who is the executive director of SDBMA.
Dane (Suspension Guru):No, sdmba. Sorry, I have to because we have an SDMBA here.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Yes, that's the only reason. I know it. I saw a sign up there.
Dane (Suspension Guru):yeah, yeah yeah, we have jerseys. I should have got you a jersey because, then you take it back, nobody would know.
Josh (Magellan):Yeah they'd be like you're missing the A. Yeah, what's going on?
Dane (Suspension Guru):Why is there cactus on your jersey?
Josh (Magellan):Saguaro's. Um but uh, you shot me an email and you said hey, I'm coming to Tucson. I talked to Susie said who, who, who the hell can help me in Tucson? And you're like you want to ride and I'm like, oh hell, yeah, I want to ride, but I couldn't work it out with work. It sucks. But I'm like, hey, talk to Tara at homegrown from another one of our episodes. And then you came here and got a bike fit and lots of new brakes.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Well, the podcast works because, uh, I was listening to the bike fit episode with tyler yeah yeah, and I'm prepping for this. Actually, stimba puts on a long ride, a once a year ride, a archipelago ride, and sport rx is the title sponsor. Okay, and it's uh, there's two versions there. There's a long and a short, full and a half. The full is 48 miles, 4,500 feet of climbing.
Josh (Magellan):It changes every year a little bit Is that, the one that connects multiple trails. That's like the whole idea Almost all the trails in San Diego or something.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Yeah, it connects a bunch of trails and then this year they changed the course completely. But I did it in 2019. I did the full in 2019. I've done the half, I think a year or two ago, but I'm training to do the full again. And I just got a new bike and the bike fit thing and I was like I used to be a roadie, so bike fit on a road bike I knew all about, but on a mountain bike it's like, oh, you slap it together and you just the seat goes a certain height, you gotta tighten it there, buddy I was drooping yeah, dane's getting limp over there.
Josh (Magellan):You need some nitrogen in your seat, so I we forgot to introduce introduce rob. Yeah, so you want to introduce yourself, my friend.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):So sure, I'm rob tavacoli. I'm the ceo of sport rx and a pretty avid mountain biker and used to be a roadie.
Josh (Magellan):Don't hold it against me, no it's good, it's a bicycl it's good he's a bicyclist, he came back a bicyclist.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):He came back to us in 2016.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Yeah, I was mountain biking in the early 2000s and then I took a long break from all bikes. Then I got into commuting and then commuting turned into road biking and then I was on a road bike for 10 years a lot yeah. And then I biking and then I was on a road bike for 10 years a lot yeah. And then, um, I got the mountain bike itch again. I put mountain bike tires on my old old giant hardtail and did a couple of rides and, um, just fell in love with it, yeah that's very cool then I got a full suspension trek and then it's been you know, along several bikes since then.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):But yeah, I'm addicted, I love it.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Which Trek did you get?
Rob (Sunglass Rob):I had a Fuel EX, it was a really weird one, because it was 27 and a half Yep.
Josh (Magellan):I didn't know. They made that in 27 and a half. Yeah, okay.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):I think it had a dual chain ring. Still, it was like right when things were changing.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Yeah, I had one too and and that bike like uh, that I feel like that bike changed a lot of people. It was a good bike. I was working at trek at the time and it was a good bike then I got a remedy yep, I got a remedy too, and then couldn't fit the remedy.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):So yeah, I didn't ever. I never got along with the remedy that. Well then, I got a pivot 429 and my life changed. Yes, and I was like it was a 29er. It fit me way better was that your first? 29er. That was my first 29er and my first pivot and I will only ride 29ers and I will only ride pivots yeah, I got.
Dane (Suspension Guru):I was. I was gonna say you mentioned you came in for a bike fit and you got a new bike and I was gonna ask you which bike? So which bike?
Rob (Sunglass Rob):I just got the brand new 2024 pivot switchblade. Yes, what do you?
Josh (Magellan):think about it. Did you have the? So you didn't have a switchblade before?
Rob (Sunglass Rob):I've had a switchblade before, okay, so this has got a pretty significant, like like geo change this year.
Josh (Magellan):Yeah, it's.
Dane (Suspension Guru):It's more subtle. Um, okay, the big thing this year is the limited edition 35th anniversary right and that's the talon. Yeah, the talon, it's, it's sexy. We got one sitting on the floor behind me and it's uh, it's pretty awesome. They. The new geometry is is significant enough for them to change it right. Not enough to make a change in the name or change the style of like, but I mean they went more slack right I mean that's kind of like yep, yeah, they shorten it.
Dane (Suspension Guru):The big thing that they're doing and they're probably going to carry this forward if I, if I'm pretty sure they'll do this is, uh, they're starting to do uh, size specific stays yes and's become a trend where they change the stay depending on the break and that I think that's going to be great because you don't have, like this huge long stay on, an extra small or this tiny little stay on an extra large Like what?
Josh (Magellan):what other companies are doing that right now? Do you know of any?
Dane (Suspension Guru):Oh God, A quiz. I don't remember which other ones are but it's not commonplace. It's not. I know of at least two other ones, I just can't remember who they are.
Josh (Magellan):Right, it'll come to you later on.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Yeah, and it's probably going to be a competitor. If it's somebody we carried, I probably know better.
Josh (Magellan):but we're not going to mention it. It's not since, it's not something you carry. It's not worth talking about. Well, you?
Dane (Suspension Guru):know, you know a tangent Okay, we, we go around.
Josh (Magellan):He, he's listened to a few podcasts.
Dane (Suspension Guru):He knows about the tangents I miss inner bike.
Josh (Magellan):So do I.
Dane (Suspension Guru):And I miss it because, as an industry person, I got to go ride the bikes we're going to sell and tell people from a firsthand experience. But I also got to ride the competition. And so when a customer came to me and said, hey Dane, I'm looking at a bike and I'm looking at I'll give you an example transition. I rode transition. It was one of the last bikes I rode it. Uh, outer bike right, which are um inner bike dirt demo. Sorry, because outer bike's a different thing. Yep, um dirt demo. And I'm riding. At bootleg canyon. They had the one of the last ones. The last one was at north star and uh, last one.
Josh (Magellan):Yeah, well, that wasn't in vegas, right?
Dane (Suspension Guru):no, yeah you know, or whatever, but I'm riding this transition great, great bike, by the way but I was pedal striking like crazy and they have a low bottom bracket and they're known for that. And I came back into the pits and I told him you know, I liked it, but you know, pedal striking he goes. Oh man, it's just too rocky here.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):You probably won't have that issue where you're from.
Josh (Magellan):Little did he know.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Yeah, little did he know that our train is exactly the same.
Josh (Magellan):So you're the first person I know from outside of Arizona that has a pivot and I know that the pivots are awesome here and, just like Jeff Kendall-Wheat, I was watching and he's working like Jensen's selling pivots now and he's sponsored by them.
Dane (Suspension Guru):I saw his video with the SL. Yeah, so he had the SL and then he did a couple on the.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Switchblade as well. He did a Firebird. A while ago too, he did a Firebird as well.
Josh (Magellan):yep, he came out here and rode it and said he loves it here but that he had to put like for where he's up in the Pacific Northwest he had to put like an angle adjust on it to like to change the Slack it out a little bit more. Slack it out a little bit more to make it match those steep trails.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Yes.
Josh (Magellan):So you're in San Diego, isn't it? It can be, yeah, yeah, so straight up.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):But you love the switchblade I love the switchblade I have, I've had the 429, I've had, I've have a firebird still and I just feel like I always wanted to grab the switchblade, like it was always the right bike and I know it's like, well, if you have a fire, that's the idea of the switchblade is you have one bike and it works kind of for everything. Yeah. But I still found a lot of times the firebird felt a little too big, the 429 felt a little too small, the Switchblade I just don't know it just works great.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):I still have my Firebird. I'm keeping it as my park bike.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Yeah.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):And mainly also to just keep my Switchblade running because I break things a lot.
Josh (Magellan):Yeah.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):So I always have to have two bikes and then.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Only two.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):And now I have a third e-bike and I have another bike that's for sale, so that one doesn't count Like that's out of the table, so I keep three bikes in rotation and that's kind of my.
Josh (Magellan):That's respectable. What e-bike did you get?
Rob (Sunglass Rob):I had the switch, not the switch plate. Sorry, I had the LT, the long travel shuttle LT, which was basically like a electrified firebird okay and then that's for sale and I have the new am. I just got the new am a few months ago you like it. That's before I got this switchblade I. It was the funnest bike I've ever ridden in my life.
Dane (Suspension Guru):It's the coolest bike I've ever ridden ironically, the am and the switchblade are almost identical. I think they were just. I think that's just my geo. Yep, yeah, yeah, so you found it so I found it.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Yeah, and now that am that e-bike is so fun it's almost too fun. I was riding e-bikes mostly for about a year, and this archipelago ride has reminded me to ride a pedal bike yeah, I've been pedaling a lot because you're not going to be able to ride an e-bike in that archipelago, right? You can, but I don't think you can make a battery last that long, maybe if you go on the app and boost down the eco as low as it'll go and leave it in eco, but that's not the point.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):To me, that archipelago ride is type 2 fun. It's like can you make it and I've done a lot of road centuries and a if I could make it right. That's just pain management really at a certain point I don't really have a stop button or an off Like I just go.
Josh (Magellan):Yeah.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Um so. I go slow but I'll go forever. I don't really give up on anything ever, Like I just you just keep it going.
Josh (Magellan):I can't. So this podcast is going to last for like six hours. I was worried about that because long, because Dane likes to talk Long-winded.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):I'm long-winded, we barely.
Dane (Suspension Guru):I mean yeah, we just said my name 10 minutes into the podcast. Yeah, I walked in the door when he was getting fit with Tyler and I'm like what's up, rob?
Rob (Sunglass Rob):I was here from 8 am till 1 pm with a lunch break.
Josh (Magellan):Me and Tyler went on lunch and then I came right back, so my vacation day today has been about guru bikes.
Dane (Suspension Guru):We have the comfy chairs, it might be the best day of the vacation. That's good. I love bike shops.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):And I knew I was going to love this place just from listening to the podcast and I'm such a Pivot fan. But this place is really really unique and fun and cool. Just the square shape of it all and how it's laid out is really cool, because some bike shops are like long and thin and like narrow. Some are like triangular, like it's like there's you almost can't see one side from the other it's like one big happy open space room.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Everybody that works here is like kind of upbeat and positive, which is weird for a bike shop it's that's the vibe your mechanics are like not mean yeah, we encourage that.
Dane (Suspension Guru):I can't figure out why that's so hard to do, because that's a top-down thing.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):That's probably how you treat the people that work here, and you treat them with respect, and I'm sure customer service is important to you. Buy them Oreos.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Yeah.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):If you weren't that way and they knew they can get away with it, maybe they would. And maybe they just know, like at our company, that's not an option. Yeah, customer is God, oh, so.
Dane (Suspension Guru):I did research. Okay, cool and one of the biggest things about your company SportX, sportrx, sportrx. Thank you, I'm sorry so sorry. I wanted to ask you kind of what you do, because I want to talk about that, sure, but um, the uh, the focus on customer service. Now they're not optometrists that people call opticians. Opticians, yeah, okay, is that a real word did you guys make? That is a real word in our industry. I wasn't sure.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):No, no it's, it's the three o's, and there's ophthalmologists, which are medical doctors that will, like, do eye surgery. Okay, we have optometrists that when you go get an eye exam and they give you your prescription and they help you with the contacts, but they can do limited health stuff as well. So they can help with health things, but surgery is going to go to ophthalmologists okay optometrists are.
Dane (Suspension Guru):They go to four-year school, but they're not mds okay, um, and those are who you'd normally go to for eye exam.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Yeah, like, if you go to like, costco and they have a eye exam center or your local are they diagnosing?
Rob (Sunglass Rob):like eye issues. They are, and a lot of if, if it's past what they can help with. They'll refer you to an ophthalmologist, but they're usually like the first line of eye health defense okay. So a lot of people don't want to go get an eye exam every year, every two years, because like, oh, I can still see great out of my old glasses, but the preventative things that they could find out and when they look in there it could really help, like okay. So I always recommend going every couple of years. And then there's opticians, which is what we do, okay, and we're the ones that are. It depends on the state but like, legally allowed to make glasses and sell glasses.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):So like in california, where we're from, you have somebody has to be certified by abo oh, that's, that was one of my questions.
Dane (Suspension Guru):What is abo certified?
Rob (Sunglass Rob):american board of uh optician okay, there we go, and then you have to be certified to be licensed, and then you have to have a medical license in california to be able to sell eyewear. So I have a medical license, okay, from california. It's a registered spectacle lens dispenser, I believe wow, so you, you run a dispensary.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Yeah, spectacle, what is this spectacles testicles, wallet and watch, yeah so I'm keeping it clean on my end. Yeah, oh, you don't have to.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Yes, I haven't made any references because my kids might listen to this. So so rabbit hole. I'll be careful. I talked to my daughter.
Josh (Magellan):She goes can I listen to this?
Dane (Suspension Guru):So, rabbit hole. I talk to my daughter, she goes, can I listen to it? And I said no. No you can't.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):And I go.
Dane (Suspension Guru):it's adult. It's not appropriate. I go in a few years you can listen to it and it'll still be available so you can hear how dumb your dad was.
Josh (Magellan):So we dove right into the SportRx. So we dove right into kind of like the… so SportRx. So what is SportRx so?
Rob (Sunglass Rob):we specialize in prescription sport eyewear. So we're like the…. Really, as far as I know, not a lot of people or places really specifically specialize in this niche of prescription sport eyewear. Now, of course, if you don't have a prescription, we can sell you rad shades, and if you want non-sport eyewear, we can make you prescription eyeglasses like you're wearing or like just driving and every day, like just cool casual glasses. But what we really specialize in, which is really unique a lot of people don't do it or don't know a lot about it is per your sport, per your prescription, per your conditions. We will make you basically the least compromising right Like everything's a compromise in the world but the best possible options for exactly what you're doing. We will, we know what it is and then we'll make them for you and send them to you.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):So so, Rob, give me some examples of the sports that you guys make If you're a golfer in Florida and you have early tea time every Sunday and that sun's like beaming in your eyes and you wear a progressive, like all right, what do I do? Like you go to the golf shop. They have sunglasses, they're not going to help you get a prescription. You go to the doctor's office. Even if the guy plays golf, he might not really have a lot of golf eyewear selection, Right? So we will talk with you or hopefully the website will guide you enough. You can always call and talk to one of our many opticians so that's what I was bringing up with.
Dane (Suspension Guru):This optician is like their customer service is their their opticians. That's their goal, yeah they're not you call in and they're not just taking an order. You know you're not just clicking an order. They're actually interviewing you, kind of like tyler with his they're. They're figuring out what's best for you, for what you do and how you do it. And I was like really amazed it's, it's the niche. You've won some awards, like I mean. I mean, it's great. I, my little bit of research we're really good at it.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):It's awesome. Yeah yeah, your prescription, and you know we can work with a lot of different budgets too. It doesn't have to be a crazy expensive thing, but, um, that's what we do so cycling is huge.
Josh (Magellan):What is the range? What is the range?
Rob (Sunglass Rob):like entry level fishing cost wise like from entry level to 99 and up yeah, 99. You can get prescription sport eyewear with polycarbonate, impact resistant lenses. Um with a hard case with a cleaning cloth free shipping for $99.
Dane (Suspension Guru):That's our in-house brand. That's the beginning.
Josh (Magellan):Starting point yeah.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):And then from there you can go up to $800, $900. I mean, if you're getting titanium Maui gems with the progressive lens and the greatest thinnest and lightest, you could probably hit a grand if you really wanted to Tyler's in for those.
Dane (Suspension Guru):He's such a Maui gym guy. We actually talked Maui gym today.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):So most people spend way less than $1,000 and a little more than $99, but, it just depends on the budget. But if you also think about it golfers, mountain bikers, cyclists, fishermen you know these are usually expensive hobbies.
Josh (Magellan):Yeah, yeah. So those people have a little bit of discretionary.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Prescriptions are usually. I mean, my wife wears glasses. She's she's always had to wear them. I get away with not wearing them as I get older. I should be. I just put together your fetish with glasses.
Josh (Magellan):Yeah, I just put together your fetish with glasses. Yeah, and I don't know, you probably haven't heard this yet, but he's got a fetish Fetish.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Yeah, honestly, I find glasses attractive and of course my wife wears glasses. Did I tell you that one time she wanted laser surgery?
Josh (Magellan):You told her no way and I was like no, no, you don't need that. Nope, it's all good.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Wow.
Dane (Suspension Guru):We are going, friends. I told you yeah, I told you no, I, except you, drive a two-wheel drive forerunner and I'm just I'm, I'm coping with that right now.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):You know, it's really weird that a foreigner would even be too why?
Josh (Magellan):right, yeah, what is it? I didn't know they made.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):I didn't know they made it's less expensive, it gets better gas mileage and there's less insurance. And I don't really go off-roading.
Dane (Suspension Guru):But I know it's kind of a weird thing, it's not a bad thing.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):So yeah, and it's still pretty capable even at two wheel drive. Yeah, kind of like the Tacoma pre runners. Can you lock the rear diff? No, no, okay, but I don't go off roading, yeah, um, and San Diego weather's pretty good. The trick with the forerunner is the back window goes down, so you got four bikes on there. You want to get something out of the.
Dane (Suspension Guru):You just hit the back window, it goes down and you grab it Like that's the game changer, deal breaker. If you lower the windows, you can get that wah, wah, wah, wah sound. If you lower the back, it goes away. Yeah, have you ever done?
Rob (Sunglass Rob):sunroof open.
Dane (Suspension Guru):I don't have a sunroof, so I have a sunroof and all five windows down and sunroof open.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):It's basically a convertible.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Yeah, that's pretty rad, so tangents we can talk about.
Josh (Magellan):Yeah, yeah, we've gone on tangents all the time, okay, so back to SportRx.
Dane (Suspension Guru):SportRx Iowa.
Josh (Magellan):What is your most popular sport that you guys service.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Cycling.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Cycling. Is it Really? That's cool.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Cycling, road cycling and then mountain biking is creeping up there slowly but surely, as a lot of people are getting. That just means there's more people that have needs. I think a lot of people are moving off of road and into gravel and into mountain. Maybe you guys I mean you might see that more than I do.
Dane (Suspension Guru):We're starting to see that a lot. You know the choice of getting a road bike or a gravel bike. It's getting really muddy because you can get one that does both. Yeah, and Tucson streets suck it. Streets suck it's like gravel. You know, you might as well have a gravel bike and uh, and the gravel bikes are super comfortable, capable, and you just run a little bit narrower, smooth tire and you've got a road bike. So, yeah, we're definitely seeing that.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):So yeah, um, all kinds of motorcycling's always been big for us. Fishing, golfing, ski and snowboard is huge for us. I noticed the goggles.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Yeah, we make an insert that sits in the goggle motocross is also big for that do you just glue it in?
Rob (Sunglass Rob):no, it's it's got tension, so it's like made out of this plastic material that's a little bit flexible and okay so this is the actual lens, the lens itself, it's it's, it's, no, there's like a. The lenses go into this insert and this insert kind of has like these arms that come up and down so if you get flex and then they go in the goggle just kind of spring-loaded it's kind of spring-loaded, but we also have like seven or eight different inserts, depending on which goggles you have?
Dane (Suspension Guru):yeah, um so to get it really, so you can still change the lens on the goggle you can still interchange your outside shield okay.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):So like if you're snowboarding and it's a low light day and you have like an on goggles, they're magnetic and you can switch and release. A lot of times you don't even have to take the insert out. You leave the insert in and then you switch the outside shield, um, and we put a great anti-fog coating on that and that's. That's a game changer for people that have been stuffing their glasses inside of goggles.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Oh, that's like your life has changed yeah and that's really why I mean I've been into glasses since I was nine and I've been selling glasses since I was 17 and being able to that quickly change your perspective on the world, like you instantly put on glasses and everything looks different. Yeah, and you know a lot of people rely on their eyeglasses. To me, it's a really special thing to help people see better, like I'm in it for that. Yeah, I think I've always been in it for that. It's really cool and you really can't have a good day if you're wearing the wrong prescription or if you're wearing glasses that don't fit you.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):If they're too tight or they can start falling off constantly, like bad glasses pretty much means bad day, and I don't know if good glasses automatically means good day, but it it's a great start right, like not seeing, well, not having a headache. Your glasses stay in place. They're doing the right thing at the right time um to be able to help people with that part of their life, and if you wear a strong prescription uh, like I do you rely on your glasses.
Josh (Magellan):A hundred percent.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):And there's some people that their prescription is so strong they can't find their glasses without their glasses.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Yeah, my wife's almost there yeah.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):It's like where am I? So you know it's an integral part of your life and you know I think we can help people have a better life if they can see better, especially while doing the thing that they love. So there's a lot of us probably everyone listening to this podcast, kind of live and breathe mountain biking. And if you go to a dinner party and you just meet somebody, they're probably going to know what your hobby is pretty quickly.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Like those are the people that shop from us, and then if there's two mountain bikers at a party, they'll find each other and they'll start talking Right Um. And so it's like, yeah, we have nine to five jobs, you know we run businesses, or whatever we do, and families. But what are we doing late at night? Watching YouTube videos, yeah, and then you know, training. And why do we go to the gym? So we can ride better.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Yes, right.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Yeah, no-transcript during that time. Why not see better yeah?
Dane (Suspension Guru):Yeah.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Like if, if you can see better while doing what you love, do you? Is that more enjoyable? Now I think if you wear the right glasses while you're mountain biking, you probably mountain bike better and be safer and be more comfortable and have a better ride. And if you can have a better ride, do you have a better life? Maybe I'm, you know I'm the chief Kool-Aid porter.
Josh (Magellan):I'm the chief.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Kool-aid porter I'm the chief kool-aid drinker. But to me like and then how do you go faster on a bike? What's the first thing you have to do to go faster on the bike? Look farther up, yep that's what every coach will tell you. That's why just look farther up, and if you don't have the right prescription or your lenses are too dark or they're just not the right glasses, you can't see as well, so you can't't go as fast, so I take it really personal.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):That's why they call me Sunglass Rob. If you cut my arm off, I bleed. Sunglass tint, I don't have blood in me anymore. I've been doing this since 1996.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Wow, that's awesome Two-thirds of my life. Yeah, so it said 20-plus years and I put the plus because, again, I did my research by watching your About video. Yeah, I did my research by watching your about video. Yeah, it's 20 years and I'm like I'm pretty sure. After reading the rest of the website, I'm like I'm, this is longer than 20 years yeah. Cause it was like 90.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Coincidentally I did not start sport. Our export art started in 1996 in San Diego. Yeah, uh. I grew up in the San Fernando Valley right outside of LA and I started started working at Sunglass Hut after school, coincidentally in 1996.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Yeah, so, Okay, I got a question on the business because I, as somebody who doesn't wear glasses normally, I'm starting to and, and so I was trying to figure out the business, like what it is what you're doing. So Sunglass Hut is that thing in the mall that we always hung out at. That's where I got my Oakleys, you know things like that I used to work there for five years. Yeah, and they don't do prescriptions so much.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Well, back then back then.
Dane (Suspension Guru):anyway, I don't know how it is now, but um, so Sunglass Hut is like. What I think of is like you guys are kind of like an online Sunglass Hut, but then as I read the website more you're you're much more than that, cause you're actually doing. You have your for making lenses, is that correct?
Rob (Sunglass Rob):We have a small in-house facility. We have a. We work with a partner lab and then we also work with, like the Maui gym lab, the Oakley lab, the coastal lab, the Ray-Ban lab. Okay, we're trying to start making more lenses. Yeah, like literally in our building.
Dane (Suspension Guru):But you're like making, you're not just designing lenses, yeah. You have your own line, we have our own frame line, yeah.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Historically we've had a frame line for years but it was like lower end, it was open mold where, like we didn't design them, you would just like put your name on them. We kind of took those off the website and really rethought about what we wanted to do with the in-house line.
Dane (Suspension Guru):You wanted more of your own part.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):We designed those in-house A gentleman named Kevin that's in our office who's like multi-talented. He literally did it on the computer. And then me and another gentleman named Tim worked closely with Kevin and kind of got to help him Was. Tim, by any chance a wizard, tim, a wizard, do you get it? Does anybody get that? No, I don't get it. I don't get it.
Dane (Suspension Guru):The wizard Tim. All right, you got to be into Monty Python.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Okay.
Josh (Magellan):There will be four people that listen to this. They get that.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Yeah, so oh, I haven't heard anyone mentioned Monty Python in about 15 years. God man, we used to have a club and to get into the club you would get hit in the face with a fish, which is a Monty Python thing. I'm not kidding. I'm not even kidding One of the girls that was here today while you were getting fit. She was in here. She's been hit in the face with a fish at one of our club meetings because we used to just hang out, talk about Monty Python. It really turned into what we do here.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Which is just sitting around BSing yeah.
Dane (Suspension Guru):But to get in you had to get hit by a fish, and Tyler is the one that hit her.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):You're a multifaceted gentleman. He, I told you we're good friends, right this morning, when I met you, I didn't think we were talking about people getting hit in the face with a fish.
Dane (Suspension Guru):No, bernice. Shout out to Bernice. She was here and she has been slapped in the face with a fish. So yeah, and if you're into Monty Python at all, you'll know exactly what I'm talking about.
Josh (Magellan):These fetishes just keep getting weirder and weirder, monty.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Python is canon. That is canon. That's not a that's like, that's not a fetish. Yeah you gotta. That's a big deal at the shop here. We do have things that are required, so you have to watch office space. If you haven't seen office space, you have to go watch it there's you expand on that? Uh, have you seen the movie office space? No, uh, so expand a little, do you get it? Oh yeah, do you?
Josh (Magellan):get it you've seen the movie maybe have you seen the movie?
Dane (Suspension Guru):maybe you didn't get the memo and we're going to need you to come in on Saturday.
Josh (Magellan):Yeah, yeah, I'll be there. You go to TPS reports in our last podcast too. Yeah, I told you, I told you, yeah, so there's some things that you just have to do.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):But that's because we sit around and banter like Glasses. So, yeah, our in-house line we've designed. We started with three models and we've expanded that. I believe we have about nine models now and they're actually selling really well. They're growing in popularity. They are. Those are the ones that start at $99. So you know it's a value play.
Josh (Magellan):But also I mean you yeah so I've got the Huxons, you've got a pair, I got a pair. Yeah, so we came on Monday. We did it in a week. Yeah, I don't even think it was a week. I couldn't believe it. Yeah, I think I.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):We usually quote two weeks, but I put a little.
Dane (Suspension Guru):You know that Super fast to alter that. Do you know that?
Rob (Sunglass Rob):I was hoping you would have them in time you um later about my eyeglass issues.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Okay, I can help. They're like I could be your eyeglass therapist. Yeah, my, so I got bifocals for the first time. I thought you said later uh, okay, yeah, because it's going to take up too much time. But yeah, you got to remind me because it's it's, it is a problem and I would love your expertise on it. So I will help so these so those are the huckstons.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):These are the huckstons and I wear like I wear oakley holbrooks, I wear tofosi swanks and these are pretty similar, I think at least similar family of type of con, so that those are called six base okay so full wraparound glasses are like eight base or more, your everyday eyeglasses that you're wearing.
Dane (Suspension Guru):What is the base? What is that's?
Rob (Sunglass Rob):the degree of curvature of the lens.
Josh (Magellan):Okay, gotcha.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):So eight base is more wrap.
Josh (Magellan):Okay.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Four base is like what normal everyday eyeglasses are. Those are four base. So, like when you think of Tour de France sunglasses, those are eight base, sometimes even nine base and when you think of everyday eyeglasses those are four base. But like you're you know, the most popular Ray Ray-Ban Wayfair in the world like just everyday sunglasses are like six base. Okay, so there's been a trend of sport glasses being less wraparound but still trying to be as functional as possible because the wraparound has some function with the wind and the debris and the size of the lens. But there's been a trend of having glasses look less Lycra-y if that's a word, yeah.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):And even the Lycra guys are kind of like it's kind of cool to wear like more casual looking glasses right that's like you're so cool, you know they don't have to be yeah, you know, I don't have the guys, that's snowboarding jeans like yeah, they're so cool right or at the bike park, yep and jeans, so it's that kind of vibe.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):so these that you're looking at are, um, six base, so they don't have a full wrap. They kind of look like everyday shades but they have a lot of little secret features that make them really good for sports. And mountain biking was heavy on my mind when we designed these. So the nose it has a rubberized nose pad. That's kind of a secret, it's not obvious.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):And then it has rubberized temple tips. Also, the geometry of the you know a lot of people here understand the geometry of them is they kind of hug you a little bit more than regular eyeglasses would, so they don't fall off when you're sweating.
Josh (Magellan):And not enough to give you a headache though.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):That's the hope, right? Yeah, I mean, it depends on your head and we have different shapes and sizes and models, right? So that's the idea with those. And then you actually got, in my opinion, a very special lens that I got to design that lens. That one has a brother, so that lens is called Pedal Perfect. The brother is called Hero Dirt, hero Dirt. The only difference is the aesthetics. The outside of the lens on the Hero Dirt is rose gold.
Josh (Magellan):Okay.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):And the outside of the lens on Pedal dirt is rose gold, okay, and the outside of the lens on pedal perfect is silver. The reason why I did the silver on yours is because the lab runs silver way more often and I was in a rush.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Yeah, rose gold, rose gold, you gotta wait for a little bit.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):I love the rose gold because I'm a. I'm a little gaudy and flashy, but not gaudy enough to get the uh talon the talent I went with black, I went with black.
Dane (Suspension Guru):35th anniversary I went with black.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):So functionally they're the same and that lens is photochromatic, so it gets lighter and darker with the sun. This one's more than $99, just as a disclaimer for everybody listening so this one changes, tint, that one changes tint. That's so cool low light in the shadows in the trees. It's like this bright vermilion color, yeah, and then, as you are in a sunnier and sunnier condition, san Diego, arizona, even more, as you know, exposed, not exposed, like you're going to fall off a cliff, but there's no trees, right?
Josh (Magellan):Right.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):The sun's bright and in your face they'll darken and they'll just become a darker and darker vermilion. So pretty much they're never too dark and they're never too light, except if you live in, like the pacific, northwest. Clear lenses might be better, right or a different lens that we've created might be better, but any kind of like sedona, saint george, san diego, orange yeah, anywhere you're getting lots of sun yeah, sun, but you still don't want gray, dark polarized lenses.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):That's not right for the bike so this is like the lens, that'll work if it's an overcast day, if it's a sunny day, if you're going to start early Not good for night riding, in my opinion. Probably would get you by if you got stuck at night. But if you're purposefully going night riding, that lens is too dark. But any kind of regular mountain bike conditions, that lens is perfect. Hence pedal perfect, this Perfect.
Josh (Magellan):Hence pedal Perfect. This is one of the things I was thinking about. Let me talk to you about the night riding, cause one of the things I was excited about is sometimes I'll go out, you know, after work and it's light. And then I have to cut my ride short if I didn't bring lights or whatever or or change my glasses and I was kind of excited that I think you know, if I get a half hour darkness, I'm not going to die no-transcript.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):But if that the beauty of that lens is, minus night riding, any mountain biking condition you're in, you're good, you know, as long as you're not in a, you know, in Vermont or Colorado where it's like a lot of canopy.
Dane (Suspension Guru):And so is it, the transition from light to dark. It's hard for transition type lenses to do that right.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Like to switch from dark to light. Dark to light. Yeah, it's like a chemical reaction with UV light that it does that. But that lens isn't a stock standard transition lens. We dye it a certain color and add the coating to it to like recipe it into that.
Josh (Magellan):Yeah, that's your like we call those sport optimized lenses.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):And if you go on the website and you pick a frame and then you pick that you want sport RX lenses, it'll say do you want sport optimized lenses based on your sport? And you can give it um running, you can give it fishing, you can give it whatever sport you know, about 40 or 50 different sports, and then we have three or four lenses that we've designed for that sport. That's as thought, well thought out, as that is for whatever sport biking but for like we have a 26.2 lens for um runners.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):We have um advantage clay for tennis players that play on clay. We have a shallow water fishing lens. We have a deep water fishing lens. We have a deep water fishing lens Like there's nuances If you want the perfect lens for exactly what you're doing, which is my goal in life.
Josh (Magellan):Yeah.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):There's nuances even within a sport.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Um so we designed the lens for that, and that's probably my favorite part of that and shooting YouTube videos is probably like the dessert part of my job.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):That's like the part that it's like.
Josh (Magellan):I noticed you guys have like a little studio in here we have several studios.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):We have a huge. Youtube is a big part of our business. We have like 74,000 subscribers.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Oh wow, Are you doing like tutorials or doing showcasing new products? Yeah, all of that reviews.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Okay, we'll do like best cycling glasses, best snow goggles of the year. We'll do best oakley's new oakley release. Um, if there's two models that are similar that you're not sure which one you might want to get, in our opinion, yeah. Or when we hear customers like, should I get this one or this one, we'll do a versus video. Right, sometimes it'll be the same frame in two different sizes, or there's like a new version of a wayfair and an old version of a wayfair and there's a way for two which is newer than the new wayfair.
Dane (Suspension Guru):It's weird, so like it gets complicated so we'll do like a breakdown video yeah, so so this is one of my questions I had for you, um, because I'm wrapping my head around this business and how you do it, because I'm retail but we're brick and mortar, so people come here, yeah, we're 99 online online yeah and you have a brick and mortar and we do a beautiful showroom in san diego. I want to check it out next time I'm there. Is it downtown or?
Rob (Sunglass Rob):uh, we're right on the cusp of pacific beach, so you don't have to go deal with the pacific beach traffic, but it's the same exit, so I'm gonna have to kind of like a weird area like bay hope, uh like pb border yeah there's a in and out out in PB and we're like down the street from it.
Josh (Magellan):We're actually. We're actually down the street from um in 2001,.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):I bought my first mountain bike. Um and that bike shop is on the same street, that sport RX is on Nice and the gentleman, rob, who sold it to me then, carlos.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Oh, by the way, it works there.
Josh (Magellan):We have. By the way, we have to talk about Carlos why? Because every episode I promised Carlos we would talk about him To make up for the fact that you told him no, just to mess with him Is that the guy with the cool spy glasses that's from San Diego.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Yeah, yeah, nice guy.
Dane (Suspension Guru):In one of our episodes I talked about the smell of Carlos, and it wasn't meant to be a dig on him, because he cooks food in the microwave.
Josh (Magellan):So it depends on what Carlos is eating. Everybody like jumped on that, you know, and they were like oh.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):And.
Dane (Suspension Guru):I turned it into the.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):He was a very clean, dapper, well-tried oh dude, Especially for a bike mechanic.
Josh (Magellan):He's like the farthest away from someone who smells the amount of money that he spends on a t-shirt is insane.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):He had to look to him.
Dane (Suspension Guru):And he's an industry guy. So, he was at Specialized and he was at Marin, he was at Giant he's a cool guy. It was a very positive bike mechanic. Yes, yeah, he's, he's our marketing guy, so, if you know. But he fixes bikes too, because we don't marketing, yeah, all day long. So a lot of our, our, uh, facebook, and mostly I'll do facebook, but he'll do a lot of the instagram. So, and they keep me from being too old on instagram because I'm pretty old- yeah, you're not no, uh, so uh, but um, so I, we just have to mention them, which we did.
Dane (Suspension Guru):So my question uh was okay. First thing I wanted to state, cause I just want to talk uh, but uh, there you've got tons of brands. So, like I noticed, you had Tifosi, so we carry Tifosi. I used to sell Oakley so you've got Oakley. You've got Maui gym, you've got a hundred percent. My uh, my cousin worked a hundred percent.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):I was telling you about that.
Dane (Suspension Guru):And uh, so I I have a few of those that I like, and so, just so, like you aren't a brand, you are a uh we're a retailer of many brands and we also have our own brand and you have your own, which is great, kind of like REI ish.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Yeah. Now here's the question. When I was selling oakley, I would have a lot of issues with you know, I got to try them on, I got to see what they look like. How do you do that? Like asian fit? We actually sold a lot of asian. We do too. Yeah, yeah, and like how? So that's not a dig on asians, that's what oakley used to call them.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):No, a lot of brands call it asian fit or omni fit or universal fit basically it's a low bridge fit is another way of putting it okay yeah, yeah, if you have a low bridge, not a lot of meat on your nose, which I don't have, the opposite problem I have a lot of meat on my nose and then also low cheekbones and just the way that your face is shaped and like getting the.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):You know the distance the lenses will when you have that type of face structure, a lot of sunglasses will not sit on your nose, they'll sit on your cheeks. Yeah on your cheeks. They're uncomfortable, so brands have figured out ways to change that. It's a little interesting because our main business is for sports, so fashion is not as important, and a lot of glasses have adjustability, which is cool and we have this interesting way of helping every customer.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):So most you know, most of the orders are done online. About 80% of the orders are done online, but every single order is looked at by a certified optician with a fine tooth comb and if there's anything we think might go wrong with this order before, we started, or it's weird yeah.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Or like they have a large pupil distance, which generally can mean you have a larger head, and they ordered a small frame. Or they told us they're fishermen and they live in Florida and they got like yellow lenses, which you know usually want dark polarized lenses. Just for the reflection, yeah, we'll call them and they're like no, I do a lot of night fishing with a spotlight or whatever We'll call or no.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):I've tried this frame on. It does fit me, or oh? I ordered the small one. I didn't. I thought I ordered the larger, it was like 2 am Right. So every single order gets looked at by an optician. That's that customer service, and we try and like you get kind of like, optical work is art and science. Just to begin with.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Yeah.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):And that's like the art of it and the feel of it. It and you know the you kind of have to graduate to have that job at sport rx, to be the the web optician is what we call it that goes through the web orders, um, and a lot of people we contact and we go hey, we just want to talk with you, want to make sure we think this is going to work well for you and people. You know that was one of my first jobs. When I first got to sport x I was like I'm going to call this person. They placed an order. They don't want to hear from me, but you'll get this amazing response like an optician in San Diego looked at my order and just wants to make sure it's going to work well. Selfishly, it helps with our exchange and return rate but, also that level of service and that level of involvement.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):We also you know that 80-20 rule in retail. 80% of your orders are 20% of inventory. Ours is like 92, eight. So like we sell the same 150 frames all day long even though we carry like 6,000. Um, so we intimately know those frames and, you know, can have a discussion with somebody, ask a few questions or if they ordered online. You know, from the information we get, we try and figure it out but it's not perfect because you're not trying them on.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Yeah, so um, so you're, you're understanding if somebody gets it.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Yeah, we have no questions asked, really Like we'll send you a return label, send them back. Um, then you'll go to a different team that will, you know, work with you and get more involved and they're really technical and like those are like trying to trouble crazy experts. Right, they'll troubleshoot with you and then send you back something and if you still don't like them, we'll give you all your money back. That's I. I so you're not, even though they're custom prescription eyewear and sometimes we get burned. But I don't let a couple of bad apples ruin, ruin the barrel because people want the glasses to work. Yeah, we want the glasses to work.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):So we usually find a solution so we have a rule at SportRx. If you have to say no to a customer, you have to ask your supervisor for approval. You can't say no on your own. I like that that's interesting and then it'll go to another and it eventually will get to me and I will say yes. So they all know that.
Dane (Suspension Guru):So I mean so if you want.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):like you know, if you have a minus 12 prescription and you want the most wraparound frame, it optically is not going to work and we're not going to say no, we're going to say this will work better instead. Yes, so they could say no to that kind of yeah, If it's not physically. But if it's like 47 days and we have a 45 day return policy, they all know to do it. I did.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Somebody had them for eight months and I was like yeah, give him his money back.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Like whatever any. No one is allowed to be upset when they talk to us. Every rep has a 10 to 100 discount code to use at any time for any reason, to make sure that whoever's on the other side of the phone is happy and can thinks highly of us, even if we got it wrong.
Dane (Suspension Guru):So sometimes you know we strive to get nothing wrong, but that's impossible when you're doing custom wraparound prescription eyewear for a sport yeah it's so across across the country, right, so like eventually something's going to go wrong it said on your thing like you never make the same glasses, we've never made the same thing twice.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):So it's not so much about not getting it wrong I mean, we strive to not get it wrong but it's about what you do when something does go wrong. It's how you take care of it and how you make it right.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):And a lot of our lifetime customers started because something went wrong and we to me it's like it's like all right, I get excited and they're like why are you excited? I was like you get to show them who we are. This is your opportunity to show what kind of customer service we can give, what kind of company we are. Show them who you are. Like all the regular orders that work out great, awesome. I'm stoked that they do. But when something goes wrong is when you can flex that muscle. It's like the Olympics. It's like this is what we've been training for, it's the Super Bowl. Like how do we make this right? Like find a creative solution. There's no, no.
Josh (Magellan):Like find a way to make it happen. It's super interesting. I think most online retailers like that.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):They have to go up to their supervisor to say yes, yeah, no, that's the opposite for us, and you do the exact opposite. We're a very different company. We're a very, very unique company.
Josh (Magellan):Okay, so I rode with these frames twice.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Oh yeah.
Josh (Magellan):Twice since you sent them and first of all, I was super impressed. I don't know how you picked them or how you figured that out but huxson's kind of a magical frame.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Okay, so so I love the huxson.
Josh (Magellan):Thank you, kevin. Kevin really, really appreciate it. There's something going on with clarity of the obstacles yeah that I can see better. Is there something? Is there something you can explain there? Is there something with that lens?
Rob (Sunglass Rob):I would say possibly. I'd like to know what you were wearing.
Josh (Magellan):Writing before yeah so and like okay, yeah, prescription, nope, uh, contacts, contacts okay um, it could be that your vision is better with glasses than contacts okay especially.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):I think you have an astigmatism, yep, and your contacts. Sometimes, if your astigmatism isn't strong enough, they just make your regular power a little stronger to accommodate the astigmatism or you have to weigh you. If your stigmatism is strong enough you have to wear contacts that kind of have a weight in them, because the angle of the stigmatism is the whole thing of the astigmatism.
Josh (Magellan):It's at an angle, so and then they can move, they can move around, you know when you're going down.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Yeah, which is a black diamond rock garden. If A black diamond rock garden, if he's using good contacts and then he puts on sunglasses that are non-prescription, that don't have the best optics, can that be?
Rob (Sunglass Rob):It could be the optics Tifosi makes great stuff especially for the price.
Dane (Suspension Guru):We sell them in the shop. They're great. We work really closely with them. I know the owner well.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Yeah yeah, very nice guy. Not a lot of sunglass companies out of Georgia, so you kind of got to love that too.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Yeah.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Joe, early is the main guy. That's awesome. Yeah, him and his wife run it Like we do it because of our rep. Honestly, we pick a lot of products because of our reps but it could also have been the tint of the lens, like if they were dark, if they were polarized. Yeah, so they might have not been the right tint, but we made super high quality digital Tri-Vex lenses in your exact prescription, with a photochromatic lens that's made for these types of conditions. It was pretty amazing.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Yeah, and a lot of people don't love contacts, but they only wear them for their sport because they think that's the right move, and they just don't know they can have awesome prescription sunglasses and they don't have to deal with. Like you know, the worst thing to me, it's like at the end of the ride you shouldn't be thinking about taking your contacts out. You should be thinking about if you're going to have a beer or a. Coke or a Seltzer right Like the contact, shouldn't be what gives out before your legs do.
Josh (Magellan):So I will. I will typically wear my glasses throughout the day, like for work or whatever, and then I'll put my contacts in to go ride, probably for that exact reason. Now I feel like I want to take my contacts out before I go ride and put these glasses on. Good Right, well, it's also dry, dusty.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):You're moving fast, even with super wraparound glasses. The things that contacts lenses don't like is dry, windy, dusty dusty altitude the altitude. Yeah, um, you know so altitude yeah, like the pressure, like it's just really. Yeah, like ski snowboarders, a lot of people don't like contacts with altitude interesting that might not be a medical fact, that's just my experience yeah, I have no idea so.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):so there could be a lot of reasons, but I think the thing if we want to talk about glasses a little bit the thing that I see the most that people get wrong is lenses that are too dark. So for sports, what I always say is you want less stop and more pop. That's my kind of cheesy way of saying um, it's a lighter colored lens. A high contrast colored lens is usually going to be better for a lot of sports, and as much as I love love polarized glasses, I don't love polarized glasses for mountain biking why not?
Josh (Magellan):um, because I do wear polarized glasses when I'm out like.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):So that might be also part of what's going on, especially I've. This is like not everybody but polarized glasses can affect depth perception. Okay, my experience has shown that people have an astigmatism. Even when the astigmatism is corrected, get more of an issue with polarized and depth perception than people that don't. But like companies like Oakley that are so high tuned into sports, their golf glasses are not polarized, their road cycling glasses are not polarized. Their mountain biking glasses are not polarized. Their baseball glasses are not polarized, but their fishing ones are. Their driving ones are their. Everyday ones are Like. When I drive to the trail I wear polarized glasses. When I get there I take my polarized glasses off.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Because polarization cuts out glare. It technically cuts out the horizontal wavelength. So when the sunlight comes down from the sun, it comes in a vertical wavelength. When it bounces off of sand, water, chrome snow, it vibrates horizontally and vertically so it causes like a second wavelength and that vibration is that really harsh glare that you get like when you're driving and the sunlight hits the chrome bumper in front of you and you're just like blinded from the glare. Polarization cuts out that glare, so it cuts out that horizontal wavelength.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):There's not a lot of glare when you're mountain biking right it's not a lot of glare when you're playing some sports, um, and that that when it cuts out that second wavelength for some people not everybody, some people don't have this issue as much um, get depth perception issues. And if you're going down a rock garden, it's, and you may or may not have depth perception issues. Probably pick the one that you're not going to have depth perception issues. Also, a lot of times polarized lenses are darker, because polarization is made for brightness protection, glare protection and for mountain biking. A dark, gray lens is not the answer, because you're not trying to make everything darker. You're trying to see more, you're trying to get a pop, you're trying to get contrast, you're trying to see the ruts and the rocks and you know as much detail as you possibly can, as fast as you can.
Josh (Magellan):Right.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):And, um, dark polarized glasses are usually not going to help with that, especially in places where there's a lot of shade on the trail and then sunlight, and then shade and then sunlight. Like, um, you know, even for road cycling, polarized can work well. For road cycling. It's a little different of a game, but you still want to get a lens color that's going to give you more vibrance. So, like, I'm a huge fan of rose lenses, uh, amber lenses, brown lenses over gray lenses for a lot of sports, but for driving on the way from san diego to tucson, I want a dark gray polarized lens.
Josh (Magellan):So right but not everybody has 200 pairs of sunglasses, so if you're gonna have, if you're gonna have what I've been doing, this a long time if're going to have one pair for mountain biking, I think a rose lens that's photochromatic, or a vermilion lens that's photochromatic is the way to go yeah, so I don't know if I answered your question. No, I think you gave me six different reasons. Potentially in all of them I can latch on to. But you see better, I am enjoying my ride more.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):This is awesome. This is the purpose of my career is to help people have a little bit more fun and feel a little bit more safe yeah when they're doing the things that they work hard and when they have extra time and money. This is what they choose to go do, or they make the time and money to go ride. My goal is to be be there with you, helping you see it a little bit better.
Josh (Magellan):This is exactly like the bike fit. I didn't even know I had a problem.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Yep, and then I found out and I never really thought about my glasses I've made friends on the parking lot and on the trail and I've seen people wearing really high end, beautiful per sole glasses, polarized, you know, on a in a $80,000 truck with a $ twelve thousand dollar e-bike, like decked out, everything decked out, like, you know, everything's trick on the bike. And those glasses aren't cheap. But they're the wrong glasses. And I start talking to them and they're like I told my doctor I'm a mountain biker.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):They got me acetate frames with metal hinges and a dark polarized lens and I'm like you want no metal on your face when you're mountain biking. Um, this is like a heavy metal hinge on the inside and then it's a dark polarized lens and I was like, try these on. And he looked at mine. He was like all right, he ordered two pairs, saw him again and he's like dude, I didn't even know that. I wasn't seeing as well as I could be like. So that's, that's. That's why we have the YouTube channel. We're trying to teach people, we're very much into the education of it and a lot of people don't know this. And, like, eye doctor's offices sell eyeglasses all day long. Once in a while they'll sell sunglasses. Sunglass shops don't really work in prescription or work for sports Bike shops as much as this is a beautiful bike shop.
Dane (Suspension Guru):You don't have a plethora of sunglass I wear. It's somebody difficult and somebody asked your your best.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Uh, salesperson here, can I get my prescription in these tofosis? You could be like huh yeah I don't know, so we know that you'll know the answer now.
Josh (Magellan):Actually, we know that you can?
Dane (Suspension Guru):tofosi has a program too, and we were talking about this with you and and rich um, actually, benjamin and I were talking about this cause, uh, we were like I w I was explaining what you do to him, and I was, we were talking about what you do, and so if a customer comes to us and says I want some prescription, we can't really help them. It's a program they do direct. Uh, so we're not really involved, which I'm okay with, cause I don't want to be in the prescription.
Josh (Magellan):I don't want to learn that part of the industry.
Dane (Suspension Guru):And so, really, that customer is now going to get a reference from us to either Tifosi or to you.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):We actually used to run Tifosi's RX program for them through their website.
Dane (Suspension Guru):And so I'm listening to us talk tonight and I'm just jazzed on glasses. I want a pair now.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):And I don't really wear them. And you'll find out later why I don't like my glasses and why I don't wear them very much.
Dane (Suspension Guru):I can fix it. If it's fixable, it's probably. I do have crooked ears. I wrote that down, uh. So I have uh uneven ears, so that's always caused an issue with sunglasses. So everybody does instantly. Interestingly, you know, my buddies give me a joke because I rarely wear glasses on the trail, sunglasses even non-prescription.
Josh (Magellan):In the desert, you know.
Dane (Suspension Guru):In the desert, yeah, and I think it's because they don't fit well and I'm not sure I've never put a pair of glasses on myself and just been like, oh, I want to keep these on forever, like it's always a fight to get rid of them. You know, for me Interesting. And after talking to you I'm like, oh jazz, now I want you know not only just glasses but prescription so I can see better, because I think my night riding has been suffering that's a yeah.
Dane (Suspension Guru):That's a time when and that's and and I do aggressive riding, so bug springs, we were talking about that's. The trail is pretty aggressive and we used to do that once a week at night. We would uh, we would actually get pizza before the trail, leave it in the van, in a, in a hot pocket, like one of those insulated things, so that we could go do our run, because we would get done at 10 and nobody's open. Yeah, so then we would hang out in molino basin and eat pizza and drink beer or soda or whatever and just have a party mountain biker's the coolest people.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Yeah, I mean, they are super cool yeah, tangent on night riding.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Yeah, every time I go on a ride for about 24 hours, I stand a little taller, my chest is out a little bit more. Yeah, things don't bug me as much, things deflect off me a little bit more, and I'm just kind of happier right yeah, and I just feel you know sounds weird to say I just kind of feel cool after I ride my bike. Yeah, if I do a night ride it's for three days.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Yeah, the stoke of like I'm a, you know I don't want. Well, yeah, and you tell people you ride at night. It's kind of a bad sport, right?
Rob (Sunglass Rob):So then you're like but the night riding is like so eerie. Do you ride by yourself? I will not night ride by myself.
Josh (Magellan):No, I won't either. It creeps me out. I totally don't do it. It totally creeps me out.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):And the trails by my house. I don't have to drive to do and I know every rock on the trail. If something moves, I'm like that moved. Yeah, I know every inch of it Every inch of that mountain.
Josh (Magellan):But I still won't do those alone at night because it's just something could go wrong and if you crash and get hurt and like it's just, it's probably really no more dangerous than the day rides, but there's, but there's people around during the day.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Yeah, it's kind of because Black Mountain in San Diego is like in the middle of suburbia, so it's like not you're not alone, usually completely there's other night riders. But if they can, I don't know. I just I'm never worried about crashing.
Dane (Suspension Guru):I'm creeped out by just people being out there, isn't that weird? People trick you out more than the yeah, mountain lions, so uh, cougars and leopards. So star pass is um. It's right on the edge of the urban, so that they're oh you have urban campers out there? Well, no, but. But the parking lot gets pretty seedy and the cars get broken into.
Josh (Magellan):Yeah, all the time.
Dane (Suspension Guru):All the time, and so there's people out there and so I get a little freaked out about that. I don't really worry about snakes, I just run them over. I actually like snakes. I don't like the spiders. Did you know that spiders' eyes reflect? So if you look around, you will see spider eyes with your nightlight in the desert. It's great and the wolf spiders.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Lots of. We get spider webs on our night rides.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Oh, so riding in San Diego, if you're the first one on the trail, you get a face. We send, we send Jacob. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah yeah. Youngest goes first. Definitely need a Grom to ride in front of you.
Josh (Magellan):I think, who was it? The guy from Burn Peak. He had a product that he had developed which was like a stick that went down in front of your face.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):No, it was on the fork. It wasn't on the fork. Yeah, okay, yeah, I saw that. I never thought about it. I think that was when it was still Seth Spikehats.
Dane (Suspension Guru):That's way back. Yeah, one of my personal heroes. Yeah, because here do those 5 am rides. So we go with our family and the way that I get to ride is I do a 5 am to about 8 am ride. That's all you can do. And then we go to the beach and so I'm spending my family time, which I love, but I'm also getting to ride, which I love. Well, and then you're tired at the beach, which is the best.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Which is okay. It's like to bury me in sand. Anyway, I'm kind of weird at the beach. I don't know what to do. I love night riding.
Dane (Suspension Guru):I think, I ride more at night in Arizona just because of the heat. Right now we have just this beautiful weather.
Josh (Magellan):It's amazing. Are you going to ride?
Rob (Sunglass Rob):tomorrow. Yeah, if I could find someone to ride with. I don't know, I ride alone a lot, but I have to know the trails a little bit. I get lost very. I have zero sense of direction. I may go with you, I make up for it in charm and I make friends, but I you should take him out to Star Pass. I do not like.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Star Pass isn't too bad. It's unnecessarily bumpy.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):I do have a window in the morning, though, do you and I?
Dane (Suspension Guru):would do something mellow. I got to take Turner at 7 am and and if I sweet talk the guys, I did get them Oreos. I can come in late.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Yeah, I have to be. I can leave anytime in the morning. I have to be back at the house by 11.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Oh, that actually works. We open at 10, so that's not too bad, we'll talk, we'll talk.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Yeah, so I don't know, do you have more eyewear?
Dane (Suspension Guru):questions. Let me see we talked about ABO.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Go to OC you guys don't go in order on this podcast.
Josh (Magellan):We just go on, it's completely all over the place.
Dane (Suspension Guru):We've gotten actually more of the questions out than we normally do. That's great I mean there's less rabbit holes.
Josh (Magellan):So you're doing this pretty good, you're keeping us on, I'm trying. Okay, so what are your top three most popular frames for mountain bikes? That's a good question.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Oakley Flak.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Yes, I love the Flaks 2.0 XL which is our most popular frame. Xl means the lens is farther down.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Yeah, it's funny because Frames are the same. It's very weird. The nomenclature of names is really weird. But you're right, the Flak XL doesn't mean a bigger Flak, even though the Holbrook XL is a bigger Holbrook all around. Flak xl used to be called the xlj and it was extra large jack, I don't even remember.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Yeah, because it's just a taller lens, okay, yeah so the flak 2.0 and the flak 2.0 xl are the same chassis, just the lens has a different shape and it's a little bit bigger, which most people like. That's kind of more of a sport full wraparound. But it's two separate lenses and they're interchangeable and we actually had the opportunity a few years ago to do a collaboration with oakley, which they're very um that doesn't happen often with that's very it's very rare.
Dane (Suspension Guru):That was one of your questions. It's in my notes.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):We have our own color, uh, that we can only get at sport x. It's called matte carbon. It's like a dark gray with, like all matte black accents which. I think is the best color in that frame period. But I also helped pick out all those colors along with Kevin, kevin, yeah. So that's our best selling frame. The Huxon is actually up there. It's growing quickly again in that gray frame, in the gray color.
Josh (Magellan):What different colors do you have the huxon in?
Rob (Sunglass Rob):right now it's only black and gray, um, but we're expanding it because it's doing so well. Yeah, um, I think we're thinking about doing like a satin clear oh, that'd be interesting. Yeah, yeah, super I also I'm kind of personally interested in like a dark burgundy, okay, and then I'm like a dark blue, like a dark stealth blue, limited edition pink, maybe lenses, maybe I can do a pink.
Dane (Suspension Guru):I'm telling you right now you may have limited edition pink ones.
Josh (Magellan):You'll buy one.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Number one I'll buy one, but I half a pivot will buy them.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):But back to your mountain bike question.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Yeah, most popular.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):There's another Oakley called the portal X, which is really popular for mountain biking. It's also just a great frame.
Josh (Magellan):What classes do you mountain bike in?
Rob (Sunglass Rob):I've been pretty much exclusive in the Huxon since it's come out.
Dane (Suspension Guru):It says the Sport Arc logo on it, so I love it.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):I'm a huge Oakley fan. The first logo that I remember in my entire life was the Oakley logo when I was nine years old.
Dane (Suspension Guru):It's a great logo.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Yeah, my, my um basketball coach rolls up and this guy was like the coolest guy. He's like six. Four blonde blue eyes drove, uplifted uh, toyota truck, like from back to the future. Nice, his name was mark and he you know, he's zinc on his nose flipped up bike hat. It was the 80s right Hypercolor tank top.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Did he have a hip?
Rob (Sunglass Rob):bag. I don't remember a hip bag, but he rolls up one day and he's wearing these Oakley razor blades with a pink stem. Oh yeah, and this guy was like my basketball coach.
Josh (Magellan):I'm nine years old right.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):I'm like staring at his glasses, like, oh my God, the next day he comes with a green stem. Next day he comes with a green stem. Have you?
Josh (Magellan):heard me tell this story. I have no way Next day.
Dane (Suspension Guru):He comes with a green stem and I'm like what.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):So that original Oakley logo from the 80s was like always imprinted in my brain and so I'm a huge Oakley fan. I have watches, I have like X metals. I have three of the cabinets at my house. I came home one day and my smallest cabinet is on my work stand with all my mountain bike glasses in it, cause that's like the garage one. And I come home and it's missing and I was like what's going on? And my wife's, like your son wanted your small Oakley cabinet so I put it in his room. I was like I can't be mad at that. I love Maui gym. Maui gym lenses are just just on pretty. On Um lenses are just just on pretty pretty mountain biking now, not for mountain biking?
Dane (Suspension Guru):No, no, no, cause they're more metal frame.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Um, no, they have some sport frames. A lot of people like them for golf. They're really popular for golf. Um, but like my daily sunglasses, I love me somehow we Jim red sands.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Um what makes a good lens? Uh, like what? What makes you, as a lens guy, go this is a good lens. Like? Is it the material?
Rob (Sunglass Rob):material can make a difference. There's several types of material, anywhere from glass, cr39, tribex, polycarbonate. Also the quality of the material, right um the optics and how the lenses are tapered. So in the non-prescription world, um, when you add a curvature, the curvature adds, bends the light, and bending the light is what optics is. So you can bend the light and distort the lens. So one of the magic things with oakley has done is they figured out when and where to taper the lens to like basically take out the prism effect that the wraparound gives, so it gives it better optics yeah um, the type of polarization or the type of coatings that they use, the quality of the coating where they do, if they use a polarized film or if it's actually within the lens.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):So a lot of nuances, I guess I never knew.
Josh (Magellan):I never. I sold the same thing as like somebody going.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):You know, I could buy a whole bike for the price of your the saddle at your store.
Dane (Suspension Guru):It's like it's kind of like a Walmart bike versus yeah, yeah, yeah. So yeah, I sold Oakley, so I got.
Dane (Suspension Guru):I got a little bit of what you said because, we, we had to do that and we always said we always sold them on the optics that you know, put them on your eyes will relax your eyes. You know, put them on your eyes will relax your eyes aren't straining and you don't even know it, you know, until you have them for a while. And driving I loved driving in my oakley's. So talk about glasses that I would wear a lot were my oakley's.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Yeah and they did really. They were, you know, known as the masters of like fit geometry yeah, they also fit.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Better glasses fit really well. They would come. For how long they last? A little easy. They scratch material.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Unobtainium, the Unobtainium, the hotter you get, and the more you sweat, the stickier and tackier it gets. Oakley doesn't have a regular word for anything. The nose pads are called nose bombs. Everything's got an interesting fun they have a tank on their campus.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Is it still one icon, one icon. Yeah, they were talking about that.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Jim Gernard, who was the original founder of Oakley, is one of my personal heroes and, uh, he said something that I believe in is um, everything can and will be made better, and you know, it's just the progression. And you know, bikes keep getting better, and sometimes big leaps, sometimes small leaps, but I'm just about getting, I'm just about progress.
Dane (Suspension Guru):The biggest fight we had selling Oakley's was the comment that they're just plastic. Why do they cost so much? And and you'd have to go into the lens technology and stuff, but it's it's, it's hard bikes just plastic.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Well, so, and it's very true, you're exactly right. Once you dig down into the yeah, you're not paying for the worth of the material, you're paying for the hundreds of hours of engineering that went into it today I'm talking to a customer about the pivot sl, the shuttle sl.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Yeah, and it's more expensive than a specialized, you know sorry and and a used kia, yeah, yeah, exactly, but yes, and some cars, um, but you know, I I told them about our tour in the factory and their QC, their laser alignment, their design of the pivots so that they actually, when you tighten and torque the pivots they don't bind anything, they take up tolerances, there's precision. And then I can relate that to our experience in the shop for 10 years selling pivots and having, on one hand, the amount of warranties have you?
Josh (Magellan):have you been to the pivot factory up there?
Rob (Sunglass Rob):yeah, I've been there, okay, yeah I've, I've ridden uh south mountain right on yeah, yeah, my friend's the president of pivot, so oh, right on, yeah, yeah.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Yeah, we were talking about that, yeah chris or no chris? Is uh.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Chris is the ceo, yeah and brian mason is the president, who I think about a year and a half ago, if I remember Took over the role. Yeah, I took over the role which is about when I became CEO and we've been friends for like 10 years and our careers have kind of laddered up together at the same time.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Oh, that's cool, so we talk a lot about business and coworkers and having a team and managing people and finances and cash flow we get each other really well and yeah, um, I love bikes and he wears prescription glasses, so that's all yeah we actually met at a party at interbike nice and I tend to like at parties.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):I mean, I'm not an introvert, so I'm okay at parties in general, but I tend to strike up conversations with people wearing glasses because I know I can take it somewhere. Yeah, yeah, um, and then he immediately was just the most generous person I've ever known. He just wanted to help me and I couldn't. For a long time I was like is this guy like? So he introduced me to a editor that he knew that wore prescription and then that guy did a big review on sport rx right and I was like so he's just always been so cool and generous and helpful for me and he's a confident like.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):if I'm having a problem and I need advice, I'll call him.
Josh (Magellan):You call him up and say hey, how would you do it? Or if I?
Rob (Sunglass Rob):need a new bike. I call him up.
Dane (Suspension Guru):You talked about our team here and that's how Pivot is. When I go up there they're like family. But when you talk to the customer service.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):When you chat, when you call, like whoever might put my order together for me that I talk with, like they're just all super rad. But that's top down like if, if customer service and positive attitude is important, yeah, the leaders of the company, then it can trickle down yeah, it might not always yeah but it's.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):It's when you go somewhere and you're getting amazing service. There's a reason why it's not. It's not. They might have one or two outliers that are just, it's in their personality, but they usually won't work at a place that doesn't support that type of personality.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):But, yeah, back to SportRx. We, you, you, you have to be that way at SportRx. Like, like I said, I don't like offend, you know, I don't want to make it about religion, but I literally say customer is God, because if the customer doesn't exist, we don't exist. We exist because the customer exists. So to me it's like wow.
Josh (Magellan):That's your most valuable asset.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Yeah, so if you have a customer service person who just got off a call with somebody whose glasses didn't go well and the person was upset because they wanted to use them for something, and rightfully so so we messed up and I'm like, and they're I'm like, listen, we sell enough glasses that enough of them go wrong, that we need one more person to help when something might go wrong. So just be stoked, because if that we you know not be stoked that something went wrong ever, but that's why we're here. We get to help them. Like we get to help them, not not that we have wrong ever, but that's why we're here. We get to help them. Like we get to help them, not not that we have to help them. Like it's an honor to meet a, it's a medical good at the end of the day. Um, so to me it's like an honor to help people see better, and when we mess up, we got to fix it, and being positive about it is is really, really important.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):I think, um, that ethos is a good way for us to wrap up, man. Okay, well, hey, man, do you have any final thoughts?
Josh (Magellan):for our listeners. Life is better when you see better. Oh, that's great, and I think so. Is that your tagline for SportRx?
Rob (Sunglass Rob):No, I don't think it is. For a long time I've said helping people see better while doing what they love.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Yeah, that's kind of what we do.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):But I think if you can see better, if you can enjoy your sport a little bit more, if you could be a little bit safer, if you could be a little bit more comfortable, if your contacts aren't bothering you or if you just choose not to see, we can find a better solution. There is a better solution. We know what it is, we guarantee it. Give us a shot and also I love this job and I'm so glad and I'm really glad I got to find your podcast through that weird way through Susie. Yeah, Cause I've been listening and it's really good and it's helpful and your guys' banter is good and you don't talk over each other and the quality of the audio is good and it feels small enough that it's not like this big company production. But yeah, I felt like I kind of knew you guys a little.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Yeah, I kind of knew you guys a little. It was cool.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Grassroot, yeah it's like a cool grassroot podcast and I think it's working because I think somebody came in here while I was getting a bike fit because of the podcast, to talk about bike fits.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Yeah.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):And that guy is having major problems with his feet.
Dane (Suspension Guru):Yeah.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):And I think Tyler fixed it in like 20 minutes oh that's awesome Without even doing a full bike fit, so like maybe one per one rider now is more comfortable when they ride because of your podcast.
Josh (Magellan):If you can help one person. If you can help one person, it's worth it, right, yeah?
Dane (Suspension Guru):That's the truth, I mean, I think we all do stuff that we love and we want to have people come along with us. You know, like Tyler said he goes the best feeling in the world is making people just love what they're doing, so and that, and you're doing that too.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):I hope so. Well, let's go get some Thai food.
Josh (Magellan):Thanks a lot, man. Thank you.
Rob (Sunglass Rob):Thank you.
Josh (Magellan):Hey, what's up. This is Josh from the Mountain Cog Podcast. You got questions, comments or feedback. Well, we'd love to hear from you. Shoot us an email. You can send it to mountaincog at gmailcom, digging the show. There's a couple things you could do to help us out. First, you could tell your friends about Mountain Cog, and also it would be great if you'd give us a good rating and review over at Apple Podcasts or Spotify or wherever you listen. We appreciate y'all. Go ride, keep.