Jeremy Weisz 13:53
I’m curious with the first client, how do you decide, Julie, how much to charge? Right? This is like, you’re learning this, you’re basically saying, I’ll help with this, and you’re learning it, and it’s HP, you’re on your own. You’re like, I’m thinking at the time, like, I want this client because it’s a great start to a company. How’d you decide to charge?
Julie Olson 14:22
That’s a great question. Well, because I was in the industry, and I knew some of the agencies, and I asked the question, how much were they charging per package, and it was unbelievably expensive. And I knew, with my team and my expertise, that if they even gave me one chance at a cost that they could not refuse, that I would earn the business. So I went back and determined how long it would take us, what we had to do, how many options we would give them, and part of our strategy is we owe on a new design. And basically, for new designs or new concepts, we always give a minimum of three different options, if not five, because we listen to them intently and we say, okay, we understand the sanctity of the brand, but we also understand that we need to push the envelope a little bit in terms of design and creativity.
So we have one of exactly what they want, one of us pushing the limits, and then we have one in the middle design. Nine times out of 10, they’ll choose either the middle or the high-end one, and that just helps us better, understand what they need and help us keep them on the cutting edge of things. So putting all that into the equation, I knew exactly how much I could charge to start with, and then as we ramped up the number of products, then I was able to pass on some cost savings because of the number and the volume of products that we were giving them. And so when you’re dealing with a large company like that, and you’re dealing with procurement, there’s always wanting you to reduce your costs. We were able to find a really good fit for each other.
Jeremy Weisz 16:16
I’m curious, because you help these companies streamline and be more efficient, and you’re streamlining and being efficient. What are some of the software tools or processes that are important for you as a company that you employ to make sure that that happens that other people should be doing?
Julie Olson 16:33
That’s a great question. We research for a very long time about different companies who did review and approval for artwork, 20, now, probably 15 years ago, I want to say roughly, we landed on a company called ProveHQ, which was then later bought by Adobe. So it’s Adobe-owned right now, but it’s an excellent tool that provides full transparency across all the teams. It saves all the artwork, but it captures everybody’s comments. And the main approver of the team has full access of what everybody’s comments are, and that person ends up being able to approve each and every one of those. So when you’re doing hundreds of products a day, you have to be able to track everybody’s comments and who has approved what, to be able to meet the timeline.
So we use that one for a very long time, which is a great tool that HP still uses. But we also have designed our own tools as well, based on our own needs as an agency and aspects of those tools that we weren’t able to get. So we created our own which allows us to provide some of our mid to smaller-size clients, it provides basically a portal that has all of their assets on there. Because as an agency, they would call us and be like, do you have that one logo, or do you have that one package? And then we’d be spending so much time looking for it. So this allows for us to have all of their assets in one place, and all of the past work and any new campaign ideas all together in one place for them, plus a review and approval tool, also includes all of their estimates, invoices and billing all in one tool. So we just actually finished that this year. It took us five years to make.
Jeremy Weisz 18:41
So basically, it’s this client portal that allows you to communicate much easier, more efficiently with the client, kind of asynchronously, so nothing’s lost.
Julie Olson 18:53
Correct, and it saves us time having to search through hundreds and hundreds of files because they have full access to it, so they can find whatever they need, and that frees up even minutes of our time. And when you think of minutes to us, that means a lot of money.
Jeremy Weisz 19:11
100% so I can see you start the company. You get HP, huge, miles. What was the next major milestone looking back?
Julie Olson 19:22
Gosh, for me personally, it was being able to work with the Golden State Warriors, and being able to visit their headquarters, to be able to meet their executive team and some of the players. It was just one of those dream clients. Who did you get to meet? Oh gosh, Steph Curry. I waved at and said, hello, during long dream, it was fun. I didn’t want to make too big of a deal out of it, but I was star-struck, for sure.
Jeremy Weisz 19:59
What kind of work did you do for them?
Julie Olson 20:02
We did some creative work in terms of the Make It Rain, customized posters we did for promotional events. We did design the executive staff’s business cards and kind of a new level of look for them. And then also customized cards, business cards and trading cards for the players. Also did all the T-shirts for like their different events? And that was really fun to do.
Jeremy Weisz 20:34
How did that come about to work with the Golden State Warriors?
Julie Olson 20:39
It’s networking, which I love and what you love as well. And being in the Bay Area, I had the pure blessing of raising my son there, who I named the company after him. When he was born, he was a week old, I started my company. So the name Turner Lee is actually his name. And raising your kids in the Bay Area, you get to know a lot of the parents. And I was able to meet a mom and a dear friend of mine who was the controller at the Golden State Warriors, and so she brought me in, and the rest was history.
Jeremy Weisz 21:23
I love it. And if you’re listening, there is a video component, and we are on the Turner Lee website. And you can kind of see here some of the cool stuff you’ve done, as far as, I mean, all types of companies. But specifically, there’s some sports ones here, health care, let’s check out this one. I like this logo here as well. Oh, here’s the Golden State Warriors. Here’s the Golden State Warriors one.
Julie Olson 21:50
I forgot we did that. That was cool.
Jeremy Weisz 21:54
Yeah, that’s awesome. And then that’s a big milestone as well. And then how long were you in San Francisco for? Because obviously I know that you’re not in San Francisco anymore.
Julie Olson 22:10
Yes, I was there for probably 20-plus years, yeah.
Jeremy Weisz 22:18
And then what caused you to move.
Julie Olson 22:23
Well, I’m originally from South Dakota, and so when I moved out to the Bay Area, it was a bit of a culture shock, and I can’t believe I landed some of the jobs I landed, but it was based on my, I think, upbringing here in South Dakota, and great work ethic that helped me earn those jobs. So the reason why I left was Hewlett Packard moved the packaging division to Colorado, and I had always been. Over the years, I had trained the worldwide packaging managers for HP, and they said, well, we’re moving the packaging division to Fort Collins. Oh, by the way, we need you to be there. So I moved. So I was in Colorado for four years, and, you know, being so close to home in the Black Hills and my family, I just kept finding myself always going back home and so right before COVID, I ended up moving back home, which was a great, great move for me. And since we have a virtual agency, I can live anywhere. And it worked out perfectly.
Jeremy Weisz 23:33
Julie, who are some of your mentors in business over the years?
Julie Olson 23:41
I would say, Gosh, a lot of my clients who have become friends over the years. With a 26-year relationship with HP, I’ve had a lot of the managers that I’ve worked with there who have since retired, but we’re still friends. They were great mentors, the friend that I mentioned at the Golden State Warriors and other agency owners, and the scientific world of the sensory evaluation, those were great mentors understanding the industry so well and helped me form my love and appreciation for products and packaging and the symbiotic relationship that they have.
Jeremy Weisz 24:27
What’s the piece of advice that sticks out with any of the people, whether it’s from people at HP you worked with or through the research?
Julie Olson 24:38
I think having a good plan that you understand their process, and you try to help them determine how you can continuously making it better for them. Always keep learning no matter what, after you think you know it all you don’t. So I think always keep learning, always keep striving to find a way to be better.
Jeremy Weisz 25:10
I know one of the things you do is you are an adjunct professor at the University, and one of the things you teach is helping students learn the art of personal selling. All right, talk about what you mean by personal selling.
Julie Olson 25:28
Well, it was interesting after I kept coming back to South Dakota, and it’s actually Black Hill State University is my alma mater, and so I love Black Hill State University, and I got a business degree in marketing and a tourism degree from there. And I always wanted to give back. So they had me speak a couple of times, and then they said, well, we’d really like you to teach the students about what you do and how you’ve used your education to become successful. And so they had this class, they said, we want you to teach a selling class, because you’re always selling, no matter you know, every single day of your life you’re selling yourself or your business or your ideas. So there was no curriculum, and I got to do whatever I wanted, but I decided that one of the things that I was lacking from my education was the opportunity to see businesses, to walk into a business, to meet a business owner and to network. And so I made my students go through Julie’s training of how you interact with someone and how you meet them and what questions to ask and how you represent yourself.
So they had to create their own business cards, be able to shake somebody’s hand correctly, look them in the eye, which is hard for students. They don’t even really know how to do that too well. But I ended up taking them to 37 different businesses in the Black Hills, and we had the opportunity for them to ask questions, how’d you start your business? How’d you come up with the idea? How do you create your logo? What were some of the biggest challenges? And then, if there were holes in our schedule, I would fill it up with people like, my clients and my contacts from Hewlett Packard, Apple, Amazon, the warriors, and they’re like, there is no way you have these clients and you know these people. And I said, well, it’s true. And they were so excited about this class and what they’ve been learning, and their confidence was so great. And it was also an entrepreneurial-based class. And they said, well, we want to go, we want to go to the Bay Area. We want to see it. Because we don’t believe it.
We don’t believe that you little country bunk left spirit, South Dakota, and went to the Bay Area and had all this success. So I said, all right, they challenged me. So I challenged them back and said, if you guys develop a business plan and make it compelling and you raise the money, I’ll take you for a week to the Bay Area. Lo and behold, it was such a success. We raised more money than what we ever dreamed of. I took them to the Bay Area for a week. We all had to have uniforms. We dressed the same. You know, every day we had a schedule. We got to see some of the things that they’ll never would have ever been able to see to inspire them. We went to the Hewlett-Packard Innovation Center. We went to the brand new Apple center that wasn’t even open yet. I took them to Hamilton. I took them to courtside game of the warriors and inside of the private chase lounge, where they got to meet Gaffe Eddy and some of the players courtside, to the oldest hotel in San Francisco, to some wineries that were my clients.
And, yeah, tour under the Bay Bridge and under the Golden Gate Bridge and back and I think that that was a gift that they will never forget, and inspired them that they can become whatever they want. Some of them are on their third business that they’ve created already in I believe it was two years ago. So they’re doing awesome.
Jeremy Weisz 29:36
That’s amazing. What was the original business? They came up with a business and they raised money. Was it like a collective business that they all –
Julie Olson 29:45
I made them develop a business plan that the kids were going to San Francisco, and this was part of their unique learning experience that they would never have again to that we went to all these businesses in the black. Skills, and now they wanted to be able to see real life, big business. Because I think when you can see it and you can experience it, it’s not a scary thing, it becomes something that you can achieve. And all these beautiful, wonderful people of my network that I know we’re so supportive of them, and so kind and so generous, and that left a lasting impact on their lives.
Jeremy Weisz 30:29
That’s an amazing experience. Wow. The next class wants to do that again. So you have to replicate.
Julie Olson 30:37
I don’t know that I can replicate.
Jeremy Weisz 30:38
Can’t top that. Julie talk about some of the challenges. From the get-go, it seems like you landed HP. You’ve had some big clients. I’m sure there’s also been challenges along the way.
Julie Olson 30:54
Yeah, there’s always challenges. But for me, that kind of spurred me on a little bit. One of the challenges was, because we were moving so quickly, how do we get people from all different ends of the world who are working on these packaging projects, and in the time challenge, how do we get them to approve it in the speed that we were working. So that’s why we found one of these tools that helped us with the track all of the different versions. Because, like I said, some people were looking at version two when we were already on version six, and then so we’d have to go back and implement their changes, because they relate. And so that helped us be exponentially more productive. So that was a big challenge that we solved, creating our own tool for the portal for our clients so they could have access to all of their materials at 24/7.
A lot of agencies don’t like to do that. They don’t like to give away what they created. And we say, here it is. It’s all of it. You can even have another agency come in and get the files that they need. I mean, we are that collaborative and that transparent, and I think that that builds a lot of trust and dependability, that helps you keep those customers for years and years and years and even decades in my case.
Jeremy Weisz 32:30
I want to hear your thoughts around niching, like when I first hear the HP, I’m thinking, okay, I could see them just going down. Different package goods, electronics, but you’ve kind of went there, and then also sports teams. And we’ll talk about epic for two but talk about your thoughts around niching for an agency.
Julie Olson 33:00
Gosh, we were blessed enough to land HP. And I think the electronics world we actually hope, I think them grow and expand too. I mean, it was just first monitors and PCs and notebooks, and then slowly started to expand, I think, because the packaging was so streamline and efficient. We were able then to expand the whole line of mice and keyboards and headsets and then into gaming and soft goods. And so I think through that collaborative effort, there wasn’t this barrier of, oh gosh, headache or packaging, they were able to really focus on just expanding the products, and we’d figure out the packaging part. So, yeah, from that standpoint, it was a great niche for us there in electronics, but also for us to realize that our niche as an agency really was understanding packaging and whatever box or substrate material or bottle that had to be in to make that product shine. That was our goal.
Jeremy Weisz 34:27
At that point, I’m just wondering, were you thinking, okay, we should just go after more electronics companies, or as far as you defining, obviously, of the kind of niche process, but what about from, like, a client perspective?
Julie Olson 34:46
We didn’t plan to just be in one particular market or niche. It was a lot of word of mouth through our networking that was like, for example, a funny one is, my VP of design, lived in Colorado, became really good friends with Todd Hilton, and for his 40th birthday, he actually gave Craig my VP of design, assigned first base, which is pretty epically cool. And then he was like, hey, I’m starting this company called Lone Star, and we want to build and manufacture emergency equipment like fire trucks and ambulances and things like that. And so we helped him launch that company, and we didn’t anticipate being in that company or that industry either. But it’s just, I think we’re so well equipped to work with any industry or any particular client because we’ve really honed in on the process of how we work with our clients and how we can help them from whatever it’s like in their case, we had to wrap fire trucks and make them look cool and help them with their whole website and all their sales materials that we created in a streamline process where the sales people could order any brochure or catalog that they needed on demand through our print partners, who printed just digitally.
So you’re not printing a whole ton of waste. You’re printing what you need, and it’s all customized for that sales rep. So understanding their needs and finding the best and most effective way that we can deliver it to them, I think, has just been those types of success stories that help us land new clients.
Jeremy Weisz 36:47
So how do you balance parenthood with business to this point, like you said, the company is named after your son. Talk about that.
Julie Olson 37:01
Gosh, that’s also a great question. Well, I was lucky enough to work from home, and that’s really the reason why I created the virtual agency. And Turner was literally a one-and-a-half-week-old baby when I started. And so I just got one of those little baby bjorn things and strapped him on and went to work. And then he got too big for that, and had to go on my back and it allowed me those hours to literally work almost 24/7 because he was keeping you up. Yeah, but that’s also the way that I designed my agency, was that there would be shifts in teams where, if we were monitoring what was happening in different parts of the world, we had somebody working on it, 24/7 which I think also set us apart. We didn’t shut the lights off at five. We were a 24/7 operation, so, yeah, it was challenging, but really funny actually.
By the time Turner was probably, I’d say, nine, and we were in one of the prototype Safeway stores in Danville, which was a pretty posh prototype store for them. And we were getting ready to go to a baseball practice or a game. I can’t remember which, but I have a baseball hat on and pigtails, and he’s in this thing, and he said, now, Mommy, you can only buy two things because we’re in a hurry. And so there was a big agency there in the spaghetti aisle that was, they had their clients there, and they were looking at the new product labels on the shelf. And so I’m standing there, kind of listening. And Turner said, mommy, come on, what are you doing? And I said, well, I’m eavesdropping. Give me a minute. And he said, mommy, what’s eavesdropping? And what are you doing? And so then I was so embarrassed, and I said, look, I’m sorry I am eavesdropping, but this is what I do my line of work. And then Turner goes over to this group of six or seven people in the agency world, who says, let me just help you.
You have no product differentiation, and you need a violating label to identify what these players are. Okay, let’s go. That’s what he said. That’s what he said to them and they were just flabbergasted. They said, how do you know these words? And I didn’t know that he picked up on all those years of listening to me or what I was doing, but it was a funny moment. So kids pick up what you do.
Jeremy Weisz 39:47
Osmosis, that’s great. What kind of work? Interesting, because you’ve gone across different industries, right? We mentioned Sports. You mentioned electronics, and then talk about Epic4.
Julie Olson 40:04
Epic4 is a new group of orthodontic specialists that decided that they wanted to form their own group. They had looked at a lot of different models in of the DSOs and OSOs, which is a group that gets together, and either you get purchased by them, or whatever the model is. And so they wanted to create a different formula and a different model of success, and what that looked like of specialists. And most of these orthodontists have been friends for quite some time, and just did not feel comfortable with the old model, so they created their own and we helped launch that company through designing what they stood for, designing the formulas, designing their logo, their content, and then helping them launch in every way possible.
So not only the website and their brochures and things like that, but through a really brilliant group of agency owners that I just joined last year of Jason Swenks, and that’s how I met you, Dr. Jeremy. And you just meet these really exceptional people. And so through that opportunity, I was able to meet a PR expert team who I brought in, also be bringing social media experts in things that I don’t specialize in, but bringing together a group of people that are exceptional just has been one of the greatest, I feel, accomplishments. I have fun. I love what they do. I respect what they do. In fact, we plan to have you help with this group as well, and it’s just been really a very rewarding and successful experience so far. And I think when you’re not afraid to bring other people in, that synergy of success is really brilliant.
Jeremy Weisz 42:27
Julie, it’s really an amazing journey. You have some fantastic stories. I really appreciate you sharing. I have one last question, which I’d love to hear any favorite resources, books, software that you have. But before we talk about that, I want to point people to turnerlee.com, they can learn more, check out more, and it’s turnerlee.com you can see some of their beautiful design and their work on that on the website, and you can check out more episodes of the podcast. But should I love to hear some of your favorite resources? It could be books, it could be software, whatever you’ve enjoyed throughout the years that helps on your business journey.
Julie Olson 43:11
Gosh, great question. I would have to say it doesn’t really relate too much to business, but I also was on the board of an organization here called The SURF Foundation. It’s a Sanford underground research facility, and I’m on their foundation board. And we really try to understand science two miles underground. And the reason that we do that is because there’s no cosmic rays there to interfere with science in the experiments that we’re conducting, and so we’re trying to figure out neutrinos, and we’re doing a long based neutrino study, where we’re shooting neutrinos from the Fermilab in Chicago to lead South Dakota underground, and it’s 800 miles. And that experiment that we’re conducting, we hope to really figure out how neutrinos morph into their three different flavors. What are neutrinos just for people? Neutrinos are some of the smallest, most unknown particles. They make up the largest Dark Matter mass.
So through these studies, we’re hopefully being able to figure out dark matter and how it reacts and acts. And through those types of studies, we’ll be able to produce better equipment all kinds of different things, even including, kind of far out there, but even things like time travel and the universe. So that’s a roundabout way of answering your question, but I’m just so taken by the universe and how it operates, and so I just find it fascinating. And so some of my favorite books are Gary Zukav of Seat of the Soul and Heart of the Soul, because he was a physicist as well, and he talks about the how physics works with the universe, and even universally, things that we don’t understand right now, but I’m just so blessed to be a part of that world. It’s a little out there in terms of the universe, but I love it, and I’m so blessed to learn about it. And I think that as we understand the universe, we understand humankind better than nature and the things that we just don’t even think about on a daily basis. So I’m blessed to learn about that.
Jeremy Weisz 45:55
Is there any research that sticks out of what they’ve done currently that’s interesting to you with the neutrinos. And by the way, when I looked it up, Julie, I looked it up really quickly just to say, what is a neutrino in simple terms. I don’t know if there is simple terms for neutrinos, but it does say our tiny subatomic particles often called Ghost particles because they barely interact with anything else. However, the most nutrients are the most common particle in the universe believe it or not, approximately 100 trillion neutrinos pass completely harmlessly through your body every second. Wow, that’s crazy.
Julie Olson 46:33
Yeah, it is really, really crazy. And when I explain it, even to kids, I go around and talk about it as well. And that’s what our team does, and we hold all these great scientific learning experiences in STEM education, and we’re one of the largest STEM Educators in South Dakota and the United States. So we teach children about what these wimps are, it’s weak interacting molecular particles. And so they love calling them wimps, but they are ghost particles, and part of all of those particles make up dark matter. And so we’re trying to understand how those particles morph through their different flavors. And that means, like what we call decay. So they live on, but they transform into different decaying particles.
Jeremy Weisz 47:29
It is, looking at the SURF, which is the Sanford Underground Research Facility, and it says the deepest underground laboratory in the United States and among the deepest in the world. It’s pretty interesting. It hosts experiments in physics, including dark matter, neutrinos. It’s fascinating. Some of the lessons I’ve learned throughout my life, innovation comes from outside industry, so I love how you kind of talk about physics and what’s going on here, because we could bring these into various aspects of marketing or business or wherever it is. So there’s certain concepts I always think of on a daily basis, because we’re talking about streamlining, right?
I always think of entropy. When I learned about entropy, that everything kind of goes to disorder. And so I’m like, okay, obviously what you do, I feel like you help combat entropy for companies, in a way, with streamlining the process, because it’s going to go to disorder and randomness if it’s not kind of kept under control. But Julie, I want to be the first one to thank you. Everyone should check out turnerlee.com and we will see everyone next time this has been fantastic. Thanks Julie.
Julie Olson 48:45
Thank you. Very blessed.
