Ducks Unlimited Podcast

Matt Harrison: Hey, everyone, and welcome back to the Ducks Unlimited podcast. I'm your host, Matt Harrison, and today we're in Atlanta, Georgia at the Dallas Safari Club… They're so fun. It is tough. Atlanta, Georgia, Dallas Safari Club Convention.

Chad Ledford: It's tough. It's a long word.

Matt Harrison: All right. Dallas Safari Club Convention, and with me, I have Director of Development here in Georgia, Mr. Chad Ledford. Chad, how you doing?

Chad Ledford: Matt, doing well, buddy. Thank you for having me.

Matt Harrison: Absolutely. So we are super excited to be here for the next couple of days, buzzing around, getting content, shaking hands, seeing corporate partners, and just spending some time learning a little bit about the DSC. But I want you, you know a lot more about it than I do. I want you kind of just to talk about a little bit about what Ducks Limited is doing here and kind of the opportunity that we have.

Chad Ledford: Absolutely. Absolutely. Well, this is a really unique opportunity for Ducks Unlimited. And especially here in the state of Georgia, DSC or Dallas Safari Club historically has their event every year in Dallas, Texas. Well, their organization and the location that they do their event is going through a remodeling phase. So for the next four years, they're actually going to be here in the Southeast, here in Atlanta, Georgia. So we're excited, you know, as an organization, Ducks Unlimited We're super proud to have other partners in conservation, and DSE is one of those. And although they have a little bit different mission than we do, it's important to show the collaboration between our mission and focused on wetlands and the enhancement and the protection of these vital areas. And then what they do, not only in conservation, but through education, advocacy, and other different items that pertain to what their folks believe to be important.

Matt Harrison: No doubt.

Chad Ledford: We're excited to be here.

Matt Harrison: No doubt. So we have a booth set up. We have a booth set up with DU volunteers, which we're super thankful for. And like I said, just going to enjoy the next couple days. What booth number is that that we're at?

Chad Ledford: So we're at booth 826. So we'll be here for the next four days, like you said. So it's Thursday through Sunday. We have lots of volunteers coming from all over the state to support our booth, to meet new people, to share our passion, our mission at Ducks Unlimited. you know, take advantage of such a cool, unique opportunity here for the Southeast.

Matt Harrison: And we want to shout out huge to DSC for giving us the opportunity to be able to come and set up a booth and share our mission, which is conserving wetlands habitat across North America. So, well, Chad, thank you so much. We look forward to spending the next couple of days here at the DSC and let's go have a little bit of fun.

Chad Ledford: Yes, sir. Thank you so much for having me. Perfect.

Matt Harrison: Strawberry Pop-Tart.

Jessica Byers : I like the cinnamon Pop-Tarts.

Matt Harrison: Oh yeah.

Jessica Byers : Or brown sugar. Brown sugar. That's what it is.

Matt Harrison: Brown sugar. I like the blueberry and the strawberry Pop-Tart. All right. Now with this, we have Jessica from Montana Knife Company, and we are super excited to kind of sit here and talk a little bit. about Montana Knife Company, what y'all have going and a little bit of history there. So Jessica, before we get into all that, will you give us a little bit of a background of kind of what you do for Montana Knife Company and how you got started with them?

Jessica Byers : Yeah, for sure. So, first of all, this is actually a really special time because a year ago at this convention is when I had my interview with Montana Health Company. Wow. That's awesome. Yeah, small world, good timing. I'm their brand relations manager, so I manage a lot of the partnerships, including non-profits like Ducks Unlimited, ambassador relationships, contracts. managing their deliverables and just relationship based of any kind. Anything that's brand to brand for from giveaways to donations to collaborations. Anything relationships. Wow. And just simply put just try to take as much off of Brandon and Josh's plate as I can, which is a big task. But yeah, it's been wonderful. So I'm coming up on officially my one year anniversary. Wow. Congratulations. Yeah. One year since my interview, but officially started into February because I wanted to finish out trade show season with my previous employer.

Matt Harrison: So how many shows do y'all do a year is it?

Jessica Byers : Uh man for this winter circuit it'll be about six shows. Oh wow. Yeah and then so we'll wrap up um March or April and then we'll roll right into our summer circuit which is going to be probably 10 or so.

Matt Harrison: Wow.

Jessica Byers : It's a year-round thing.

Matt Harrison: So now was the knife industry something you were in previously before Montana Knife Company or is this something new or

Jessica Byers : Uh, it's like knives specifically, yes, but I've been in the outdoor space for 10 years now.

Matt Harrison: Okay.

Jessica Byers : So, um, but yeah, I've known, I mean, I, I met Josh on a, on a mountain shooting bows during the summer one time. He was shooting behind me with his wife and I didn't know him. I didn't know him from, I mean, I never, never met him before. And we had a big group and we were going slow and I just said, Hey, you want to come shoot with us? And. shook his hand, never knew, I didn't know anything about him, but I've been obsessed with knives since I was little. Like, I've been collecting knives since I was tiny. My grandpa gave me, when he passed, they gave me his collection. So, I've always loved knives and I hit him up after I met him. We switched contacts. I said, I want you to make me a custom knife. He's like, very, very kindly. He's like, basically, you can't afford my custom work. I never knew he was like a master bladesmith, you know? So to roll into that a little bit, I think what makes Montana Knife Company so, so special, other than it's, you know, a hundred percent USA made material from material all the way through to production, assembly, all, every step we do. And we a hundred percent make our kydex and our sheaths in-house and We just have an incredible team. But what really makes us, I think, different is Josh Smith. So he's a master bladesmith. He got that title when he was 19 years old. It's very difficult. It's the youngest. I think there's a couple of people that have gotten close, but nobody's beaten that.

Matt Harrison: At 19?

Jessica Byers : Yeah. He's been making knives since he was 11. So we say that, you know, Montana Knife Company is a 30-year success story when most people just see the last four years of him launching it during COVID and, you know, it taking off. And it seems like an overnight success, but really it's a 30-year success story because he's just incredibly talented and his story is very authentic and, you know, he's the epitome of chasing the American dream.

Matt Harrison: Wow. So, of course, y'all are based out of Montana. Yeah. In the name. So, is it where y'all's, you said your production, everything is done in the U.S. How many employees do y'all have? Because I'm sure at the, you know, amount and quantity of knives that y'all make, you have to have a good bit of employees. So, how does that look right now?

Jessica Byers : Yeah, so we're sitting about 75 employees right now. To kind of put it into perspective, I think I was number 50 less than a year ago. So we've hired, you know, over 20 people. We're probably going to end up, so we're building a 50,000 square foot building right now. We're currently in a 10,000 square foot building in Josh's backyard as it stands. So we're still on his private property. We don't have a forward-facing retail store. You know, you can't just show up on his property and see the, you know, the whole manufacturing facility. So the idea is let's build this, you know, new building that's like, I don't know, kind of like the first thing you see when you come into Frenchtown, head into Missoula, and it sits really high up, right off the highway. It's going to be incredible.

Matt Harrison: Wow.

Jessica Byers : So, yeah, 50,000 square foot building, we will end up doubling or tripling our employees in the next couple years. Yeah, I mean, we're trying to keep up with demand. It's a beautiful thing, but it's… An overwhelming thing, too. Yeah, it's overwhelming and it can be frustrating because we've tried really, really hard to just increase our drops every single week and create more, and it just doesn't seem to be enough.

Matt Harrison: Is there a number, roughly, at how many knives y'all turn out, let's say, per week? Like, do y'all have kind of a… a quantity that y'all are shooting for?

Jessica Byers : It varies tremendously. We don't publicly talk about how many knives we drop every week, but I can tell you it's not dozens and it's not hundreds. We do that every single week. Wow. Yeah, we're cranking out. That's insane. A lot, a lot of knives. Like I said, our processes are continuing to get more and more fine-tuned and dialed. We have engineers just buttoning up, like taking minutes off of each. Yeah, it's really cool to see how they can tighten up the process and really maximize the space that we're in. We have a one-of-a-kind fulfillment team. You'll never find I feel very confident saying you're not going to find another fulfillment team that delivers in, you know, 24 hours. We shift every single order. You order today, your order goes out tomorrow. And that doesn't matter if we have 500 orders or we have 3,000 orders. We get them out the next day.

Matt Harrison: And that's unbelievable. I mean, of course, the number of employees that you just told me is still big, but it's still not. I mean, to be able to turn out you know, the quantity that y'all are at that time frame is insane to only have, what is it you said, 75 employees?

Jessica Byers : Yeah.

Matt Harrison: Like, I mean, that's unbelievable.

Jessica Byers : Yeah, and we're hiring like crazy right now. I mean, there's probably half a dozen positions open right now. There's a couple that aren't forward-facing too. Like, it's a… I, yeah, it's wild. I'm trying to soak up every minute, and even on the days I feel overwhelmed, I think we're literally writing a chapter in a history book. You know, one day we'll look back at this and be so, you know, humbled to have lived through the chaos.

Matt Harrison: Yeah, and I've seen, I mean, I've seen y'all's knives all across social media platforms. One of my good friends, Sydney Wales, you know.

Jessica Byers : I love Sydney.

Matt Harrison: Yeah, I know. We were actually just with Sydney in Great Salt Lake.

Jessica Byers : I love following her, I should say. I don't know her personally, but I love following her. I love what she represents.

Matt Harrison: Well, she speaks highly of y'all's brand. We've actually talked about it before, how amazing y'all's product is. It's been really cool just from my side of things, from the outside looking in. how big y'all have gotten and you know the progress over like you said really just the past four or five years has really seemed to really take off for you guys and that speaks though to the testament of y'all's product you know it's a product that's that withstands what y'all say it will and it's not just a product you're trying to turn out to just sell you know what I mean it's a product that lasts.

Jessica Byers : Yeah, I mean, Josh, I mean, from day one, it's always been quality first. Well, it doesn't matter how big we get. We're going to always focus on that and what he allows to pass versus holding back because he considers it a blemish. It's absolutely incredible. I'm like, what is wrong with this? There's nothing wrong with this. But no, he has a, you know, he has a very high I guess what he considers quality and he's not going to budge on that. But then also going back to the customer. Like at the end of the day, if we start putting things before the customer, then we're doing it wrong. And so one thing that we put a lot of time into is our, we call it our VIP program. You know, typically you're familiar with point systems, you're familiar with like, whether it's a brand or a credit card, right? You spend more, you get something back. We have that, but you don't know what it is. So it's only internal. There's no way to know where you sit in it. It's just, you're going to open your mailbox and you're going to get something from us as you hit these thresholds. And it's just our simple way of saying thank you for doing what you do, but we're not going to tell you how much you spent to get here. It doesn't matter. We don't want you to feel motivated by that. We just want you to know that we care about you.

Matt Harrison: That's really cool.

Jessica Byers : The other thing that I cannot get off of this without mentioning is our warranty on our knives. So we have a lifetime like sharpening and maintenance guarantee. So it's our generation's promise. It's this idea of you get a knife, whether you bought it, you were gifted it. That generation's promise follows the knife, not the person. So as you pass it down generation to generation, that next person can send it in as many times as you want. You send it in for sharpening, cleaning. If you have a paracord knife, we'll replace the paracord. We get knives covered in blood and fat and we clean them and retie them. It's so cool because they come through the headquarters and there's just stories around. It's like sitting around a campfire. Some people send in cards and letters or pictures of their first book. Um, but the idea is like, we'll take care of that for the lifetime of the knife. And I mean, even if, you know, even if you happen to like use the knife in a way it's not meant to be used and you chip the, the, like the whole tip comes off, we will replace that.

Matt Harrison: So that is awesome.

Jessica Byers : Um, I'm, I'm, I feel very strongly about that, about that. I'm really proud of that. We, you know, honor that.

Matt Harrison: No doubt. That's a really cool aspect.

Jessica Byers : All you do is pay for the shipping to get it to us, and then it gets turned around that day. So if you send a knife and we get it, we open it right then, send it straight to the sharpening room, they touch it up, it goes right back in the mail that day. So it's a pretty quick turnaround.

Matt Harrison: Do y'all sleep? I mean, drop shipping.

Jessica Byers : Some people do.

Matt Harrison: Now that's awesome. Well, y'all are actually going to be coming to our DUX Expo in Memphis in August. So we're super excited to have y'all there. You know, I know it's going to be a great time. We're looking forward to it. We talked a little bit about these shows and kind of how y'all travel all over. So you said y'all go to six shows. In the winter circuit, is that what you're saying?

Jessica Byers : Yeah, so like basically from NFR through March-ish. And then around April, our summer circuit will kick off. And so we do a lot of our outdoor archery shoots through the mountains around the U.S. And we might do a couple others here and there.

Matt Harrison: Yeah.

Jessica Byers : Yeah, so DU, that's going to be our first time going to y'all's show. We're pretty excited about it.

Matt Harrison: And y'all's knives, every waterfowler needs a good knife. You know what I mean? And our demographic at our shows, we, of course, have all types of outdoorsmen and such, but our main focus is waterfowl hunters, and I think it's gonna be a great expo, great advertising opportunity for you guys to grow even bigger than what you are. You know what I mean? So I think it'll be a good time, and we're looking forward to it, and I think it's just gonna be a lot of fun in Memphis.

Jessica Byers : Yeah, with us pushing, you know, I think it's around October, September, October, we released our first waterfowl knife. It's the freeze out. So pretty cool. It has like a custom MKC band on it. It's paracord, super lightweight, small. I, yeah, I just put it to work a couple of weeks ago on a duck hunt. And, um, not my ducks, by the way, I cannot shoot a shotgun worth of crap, but I just want to be transparent. I was cleaning other people's ducks, but, um, yeah, we'll definitely have that knife at that show. We've only had one drop of it so far. I'm hoping we'll have another drop in the next six months and then we'll pull from that and make sure we have some.

Matt Harrison: Make sure you have some. Yeah. Make sure you have some in August. I may have to get me one of those.

Jessica Byers : Yeah.

Matt Harrison: That's awesome. Well, Jessica, thank you so much for taking time out of your day. I know that you got to get back and man the booth, but we thank you so much for hopping on the podcast. And we look forward to seeing you in August.

Jessica Byers : Yeah, I appreciate it.

Matt Harrison: It's nice to connect with y'all.

undefined: Absolutely. Stay tuned to the Ducks Unlimited podcast sponsored by Purina ProPlan after these messages.

Radcliffe Menge: It's always the way it goes. It's the best part of the conversations before you press record. Yeah, she was like, uh, that sounds miserable. Yeah, she was like, man, I'm sorry. She's going to go back and tell everybody, like, I heard the Tom Vacpi guy is, uh, is horrible to work for.

Matt Harrison: All right, everybody, we are back. I'm going to restart that. Hey, everybody, we're back. And now we have with us Mr. Radcliffe Menge with Tom Beckbe. Can you give us a little bit of story about who Mr. Tom is? Because I was just informed with a little bit of information that who Tom actually is.

Radcliffe Menge: Yeah, so a common source of confusion that I either encourage or discourage depending on the circumstance. You know, Tom Beckbe is a company that I started back in 2015 with my wife. So, we're coming up on 10 years of Tom Beckbe. The name itself is the old French name for the Tom Beckbe River, which was a derivative of the original Native American name, Tom Beckbe, one word. And when we started the business back in 2015, we had a great product that ultimately became the Tin Saw Jacket, another river in Alabama. And we were looking for a name that had a great historical connection to Alabama. I grew up hunting on the Tom Beckbe River. So it had a personal connection. And, you know, we realized that there was this great name, you know, sitting out there on old maps that nobody was using anymore, Tom Beckbee. People ask about the evolution of Tom Beckbee into Tom Beckbe, and I don't know what the actual history is or the linguistics behind it, but I think it's safe to say that people in Alabama can say Tom Beckbe a little bit easier than they can say Tom Beckbee. So, I think just over time, it kind of evolved. And so, that name was just sitting out there. We thought it was a great way to have a name for a business that had a great historical and, you know, connection to Alabama, physical connection to Alabama, personal connection for us. And yes, it is a common source of confusion. People come by the booth, it shows like this, asking a Tom around. And I always tell people, well, prepare to be disappointed because I'm him.

Matt Harrison: I think that's awesome. I didn't even know that. And that's the coolest thing ever, just to hear a little bit about that. Now, you said you started in 2015, the company in 2015. Is this something you had always kind of had plans for, or is this something that just kind of came about one day? You're like, I'm going to start a company.

Radcliffe Menge: Yeah, no, it's, you know, it's what's the old adage about bankruptcy gradually then suddenly. I would say that that's the same way we got Tom Beckbe going. My wife and I are both, we met in law school and practiced law in New York for a long time, moved back to Birmingham. And I had this idea in my head for a custom wax jacket that ultimately ended up becoming the tinsel jacket. And what made it unique from jackets that were different on the market is that I wanted a jacket that looked and felt American, was made in the U.S. and that was designed both in weight, color, and character for the places that I grew up hunting and fishing in. And so that ended up being an eight and a quarter ounce waxed shelter cloth jacket with a nice stand-up collar that you can get out of the wind in. And then our signature, you know, piece for all of our waxed outerwear, you know, now we've got a lot of different jackets for men and women, but they all have a through line which is a liner on the inside that's dyed to look like the red clay in Alabama.

Matt Harrison: Wow. Now, He's showing it, the reason I just said, ah, is he just showed me the inside of his jacket, and it literally looks like color. That is awesome. How'd you even come up with that?

Radcliffe Menge: Was that just an idea that… You know, there's just so much evolution. In any product, you start out with a use case, like what is the product designed for, and then as you get into tinkering with it, it evolves. And the liner is something, you know, my wife and I have tried to go back and pull the full history on it. We knew we wanted something that had color on the inside, right? And a lot of traditional wax jackets have a tartan or plaid on the inside. Well, that didn't feel like a jacket from the U.S. to us. And so when we started thinking about, all right, well, how can I get something, what's the history of tartan and plaids? Those are textile patterns that are produced, originate from Scotland, that the color profile from them comes from the land and the trees and the water and all the little different elements in Scotland. And so we took that same idea and said, if you were going to follow that same idea, but you were going to make it uniquely American, uniquely Southern, something from Alabama, what would it be? And it would be cotton. and it would be literally dyed to look like the earth that, you know, gets on all of our boots and stains our clothes.

Matt Harrison: I love it too because it adds a little bit of pop, but it's not too much. You know what I mean? Like it has that classy, but also like it's got a little bit of flash. Like I love that color. That's a really cool color. Thank you. Yeah. Well now, You know, Tom Beckbe is a corporate sponsor of Ducks Unlimited and, you know, the relationship that we have there is amazing and there's something that's going to be coming out here soon, if I'm not mistaken.

Radcliffe Menge: Well, so, you know, it's a really an honor for us to partner with an organization like Ducks Unlimited. You know, I was talking to someone earlier and said that You know, if you're running a sporting company, and if you're a sportsman like I am, and like most of the employees at the company either are or are married to one, that if you're focused on supporting customers, you have to do something to support the resource. You know, what better organization to partner with than Ducks Unlimited? You know, the leader in wetland conservation, doing so much both from a grassroots level, through, you know, hundreds of thousands of volunteers, through corporate sponsors, through serious conservation efforts across three different countries, and probably more that, you know, I'm just learning the full scope of it. When we first started talking to folks at DU about how could Tom Beck be worked together with Ducks Unlimited to support wetlands conservation, what became clear to us is that the resources and tools that we brought were premium manufacturing, great materials, great fabrics, great design, US-based manufacturing, which allows us to do some things that are cool from that perspective, and crafting a collection of clothes and gear, you know, for the sportsman, you know, they've got a great traditional look to it. I mean, waterfowling is just a tradition-rich sport, and we make, you know, gear for folks who love that tradition. And so, we've designed, in collaboration with Ducks Unlimited, a capsule collection of new jacket, vests, shirtings, bags, that'll all be launching later. We're launching it all later this year at DUX in Memphis in August. And so we're super excited about that. But what's really cool about the collection is it's centered around what's a new jacket for us in an exclusive color just for Ducks Unlimited. So DU's getting their own jacket in their own color made in the U.S. And I think what's most exciting about that jacket for us, and I think for a lot of folks at DU, is we made the exact same jacket for men and for women. And it's a traditional waterfowling wax cotton jacket in this cool DU green with all the same great features for men and for women. And over half of our employees are ladies. And I know that, you know, I don't know what the numbers are, but at DU, I mean, we're talking about thousands of volunteers, employees who are ladies. And so we're happy, really excited to be doing something, you know, for essentially everybody.

Matt Harrison: And I love that too, because there's a lot of brands that don't offer the lady side of it, you know. And so you having that, offering that to the women's side is amazing because Like you said, even at Ducks Unlimited, you know, a lot of our volunteers, a lot of our employees, the whole nine, we have a lot of ladies as well. So, I mean, I know that that's going to appeal to a lot more eyeballs than just the male side of things. Yeah.

Radcliffe Menge: And you've seen the jacket now. Top secret. We had to take you into the vault.

Matt Harrison: I know. I had to sign. I had to… I had to sign a full non-disclosure, make sure nothing was put out there. I didn't know if you wanted me to tell that, but look, I'm telling you right now, I almost just grabbed the jacket and took off running. I almost just said, look, this one's mine. It is awesome. I got to see a couple of different items and I'm already chomping at the bits to get my hands on some. And like you said, y'all are releasing it at DUX Expo. in August. So, I mean, that's right around the corner. And people need to swing by and check it out because I imagine it's not going to last extremely long with as many, because I know I'm already, I'm getting some of it. So, I'm going to make sure I may get in trouble. They're going to be like, where is Matt? He's supposed to be, you know, manning the booth or something. I'm going to be in line getting me some. getting me some merch. But that's awesome. So, you know, y'all be there. Y'all are here. Do y'all travel a good bit to different shows? We do.

Radcliffe Menge: Yeah, we do travel a good bit. So, you know, Dallas Safari Club is traditionally the first show of show season year right out of the gate the first week in January. So, we're excited to be here. We'll be in Atlanta all weekend. The next big show that we'll be at that is open to the public is the Southeastern Wildlife Expo in Charleston. And we'll have two booths there, one in Brittle Bank Park and then another one in the Gillyard Center.

Matt Harrison: Yeah, Duck Summit has a big presence there at Seaweed. Yep, it'll be fun. That's awesome. Will y'all be also at NWTF or anything like that?

Radcliffe Menge: NWTF conflicts with Siwi, so we had to pick. That's right. We locked ourselves into Siwi a number of years ago, and then I'm trying to think of where… I know I'm forgetting something right now. A couple other shows around. Yeah, I think, but those are the two big ones where people can come and hang out. Yeah.

Matt Harrison: Well, that is awesome. Well, can you give our listeners maybe some social media handles? What's y'all social media that they can go and look and follow?

Radcliffe Menge: Yeah, so on Instagram, we're at TomBeckbe. That's T-O-M-B-E-C-K-B-E. And then our website is tombeckby.com. And then we own four stores. So, our flagship store in Birmingham, Alabama in Mountain Brook Village. Got a store on the square in Oxford, Mississippi. We've got another store at the corner of University and Lurleen Wallace in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. And then we're right at the main intersection in Middleburg, Virginia. So, can't miss us.

Matt Harrison: Holy cow. Now, is that something y'all plan on continuing to grow, the flagship stores?

Radcliffe Menge: Yeah, well, so this year we're celebrating 10 years of Tom Backby, and so the Birmingham store is going to get bigger. So that's something we're really excited about. And then, yeah, we're always looking to find great new locations for retail shops. They're fun. That's awesome. Great place to meet folks, host events, talk to the customer face-to-face, get new product ideas, hear what's working. hear what people want to see new product-wise from us. Wow.

Matt Harrison: That is awesome. Well, Radcliffe, we cannot thank you enough for hopping on the Ducks Limited podcast. I know you got to get back and man your booth and make sure Tom's doing his job.

Radcliffe Menge: I got to go guard that jacket apparently.

Matt Harrison: Yeah. I may beat you down to your booth. No, but thank you so much for taking time. We look forward to it and I guess we'll see you in August. All right. Thank you. Yes, sir. We just want to thank both of our guests for hopping on the Ducks Limited podcast to talk a little bit about their businesses and what they have coming down the pipeline. We also will have a part two to this Ducks Limited podcast episode, so y'all stay tuned. We also want to thank Chris Isaac for taking time to produce this podcast episode and y'all make sure to tune in to part two. Thank you all so much and God bless.