Joseph Watson: I tell my product development department, we're not creating products. We're creating solutions.

James Lacey: In 2010, Joseph and Jen Watson adopted Daisy, a dog rescued from a dumpster to ease her separation anxiety. They came up with an innovative backpack that allowed her to stay closed while they were on the move.

This simple yet powerful idea led to the creation of the first K9 Sport Sack with thousands of bags sold each month and a portion of every purchase supporting animal rescues. Joseph's journey is all about lifting pets and making a difference. This is a story of compassion, creativity, and success.

Joseph Watson: Just keep on striving to do better and learn more. Eventually you will end up with a solution that is viable enough that helps enough people.

James Lacey: Stay tuned as we welcome the man behind K9 Sport Sack

Joseph Watson: My name is Joseph Watson and I am one of, three co-founders of K9 Sport Sack, the other one would be my, wife. She's not here today, but she's been involved in just about everything else. And then this is Daisy. We consider her kind of a co-founder. And, in about 2010, we found Daisy in a dumpster, and that's a whole the where the whole story started. We were going to school full-time. We had each of us had a full-time job, and then we had a part-time job that we worked together cleaning offices at night.

So we were in a terrible position to have a dog, like it was the worst possible time of life to have a dog. But, at the same time, we had gotten into a cycling hobby. We had borrowed a couple of bikes from my older brother. And, every day we'd come home from school or work, and we would put on our cycling gear and go for a 25 mile ride.

And we were training for a bike ride called the Lodezha. It is, It's a 208 mile bike ride that goes from Logan, Utah to Jackson Hole, Wyoming. And, every day we would hop on our bikes and Daisy would just, look through the window at us with these will be low windows in her living room.

And she'd stare out the window and the guilt just gnawed at us. And we did what, any normal person would do. And we're like, she can run alongside. and she made it, about a mile. and then after the mile, she, laid down on the weeds, with a look on her face, it was like, I'll just die right here.

You don't need to take me any further. I just come pick me up on your way back, back by. So I picked her up and I was holding her under my arm. And of course I'm, right handed and. The front brake on a bike is the left hand. And so I almost went over my handlebars about eight or 10 times. So it was a harrowing experience, but, then, we, started looking around, at different stores and online to see what kind of carriers we could find and we were actually blown away about how slim the, the options were.

We found a front carrier and we put her in the front carrier. And of course, for specifically for cycling and. These other carriers, I'm sure they have other value that maybe the K9 Sport Sack doesn't provide, but for us, they just didn't do it quite right. the front carrier bounced.

And it jostled Daisy around, which was absolutely hilarious, but, a scary deal. and then, we tried a sling, which threw my balance off. We tried a rear facing carrier, which, I guess made her motion sick. Who knew that dogs could get motion sick? And, and then we, we even put her in an enclosed carrier, like it's really nice, beefy, enclosed carrier.

And she just threw her weight from side to side, absolutely hated it. So all of these. We didn't know at the time was that we were creating kind of a list of things that we needed, like criteria that we needed for our own, like we needed it to be a backpack carrier. We needed it to be forward facing. And, it's an overlooked part of the story that, we didn't just find a dog.

We found the dog, this dog. when we drive down the road, she wants to stick her head out the window. She wants to look out the windshield. She wants to be a co pilot. She doesn't want to be luggage. And so we built this Carrier around her. It started when we got home from below the jaw and we had these little drawstring.

They give us a little drawstring swag bag with some literature in it. And the kind of bag you put your shoes in to go to the gym. And I laid it on the floor and I turned around to do something turned back around and Daisy was laying on top of that bag with her tail just wagging like crazy.

And, she was making it very clear that she thought that we had brought home another carrier for her to try on. And so I looked down and I'm like, that would be a terrible idea. And then I'm like, why not? So I stuffed her into it. And I've got pictures of that day where, I've got Daisy on my back in this, drawstring carrier.

And I actually went for about a 10 mile bike ride. and I came in and I took off my cycling jersey and had these purple marks down my, collarbones. And my wife's Oh, gross. And then she went and took a, like an old school backpack. We had laying around and cut the straps off of it. And. cut the cinch strap off of the, the, little, drawstring bag and, that worked better, but there were, the balance was off.

And so we added the arm holes and the collar enclosure, and then it was hard to get her in. So we put the zipper on the back and, it evolved into, around this, 1 dog and, we didn't really. We weren't really intending to start a business with it. We, I was going to school to be a history teacher.

Jen was doing dental hygiene. it was just we had our life path set and, and then people started stopping us along the side of the road and saying, hey, that's exactly the carrier I've been looking for. It became very clear that we had found something, that had brought us a lot of joy.

And by keeping it to ourselves, We started to feel selfish. I guess if that doesn't sound too trite, but that's, the truth of it. We started to feel like, if we kept it to ourselves much longer, we just weren't. We're going to deprive the world of something really, fun and fulfilling.

And so we borrowed some money from my father in law and we went and did a little show in Las Vegas, which is where I was going to graduate school at the time. And, we signed up late, we were over by the porta potties, where they, stick you when you signed up late. And, I wish I had, I wish I had kept this lady's information, but this one lady came over and she had a dog that was exactly Daisy size because we.

I guess it hadn't crossed our minds that, dogs come in different shapes and sizes. because, so we only have one, maybe two sizes. And, and this lady came wandering over. She's Oh, what's this? And we told her what it was. We put her dog in a K9 Sport Sack and she bought the very first K9 Sport Sack ever.

She turned around and she walked back over to where the crowds were. And, we thought, that was pretty cool. We sold one. the, reality is, your friends can tell you, you've got a great idea. You've got a great product. You've got, they, you can get all kinds of, reinforcement from people, but the reality is until a perfect stranger pulls out their wallet and pays you their hard-earned money for it.

You just don't know. So that was validation. wow, this is something else. And then she walked over into the crowd and we watched her. she walked through the crowd and people's heads started to turn and we watched her stop, turn around and point at our booth and the flood just came. We were just slammed.

And so we, the show went from 8 to 4 and by noon, we had sold out of every bag and we're like, okay, we're on to something here. This is, we've we have come up with something. That the world really wants and, over the next 5 years or so, we picked at it and, tried to, to figure out what we were doing, learned a lot of lessons the hard way and, but from that point on, it just expanded and, our customers told each other about it and, here we are in 2024. And, we have a 20, 000, 27, 000 square foot warehouse in Lehigh, Utah. we're sending, thousands of bags out every month. We're working on the next wave of stuff and it just, it's been a wild ride for sure.

James Lacey: Wow. This is, one of the coolest stories I've heard. it's not often that you hear of two people fairly set already, especially these days, fairly set already on a career path. That is disconnected from, starting a business entrepreneurship in many ways. Not so disconnected, but, but it just wasn't, yeah, in your view line by the sounds of it. And so I think hearing you share about something that is interesting Built out of passion is and out of genuine, like you said, you felt selfish almost if you didn't continue. I think that's so beautiful.

And I'm curious, what is the step or the steps from realizing that you should continue to be passionate about what you're doing? Maybe actually turn this into a product and a business, from just a drawstring that Daisy seemed to want to have a look at. what is the steps going from? I know you mentioned that you go to the trade show, you test it out and you realize, but for me, it sounds and I'm just thinking of the listeners out there.

You have an idea, but now you're actually building prototypes is did you have any understanding how to do that? How do you go from this concept? Zero? You're making things to actually now, let's say, 10 years ago, and you actually start, you open your online store or whatever that what does that process look like?

Joseph Watson: It's a painstaking process. And of course, if I knew then what I know now, it would have been a lot smoother. But, yeah. the first, prototype just evolved organically. and that is really the reason why we're still here today. I, tell my, product development department, we're not creating products, we're creating solutions and the more, the, bigger a problem, your invention or your discovery or whatever, what the bigger a problem it solves, the more marketability it's going to have, the more people are going to want it.

And we just happened to stumble into, a, solution and it dawned on us very, slowly. the first prototype came organically. and then we, had hundreds of people, if not thousands of people stop us along the side of the road. And from there, the question became, okay, now what? now what do we do? How do we, get it from this weird-looking prehistoric, prototype into something that, that is, attractive and sellable and stuff. So we actually, Jen, to her credit, she, she went down to, she went down to Joanne fabrics and she bought a couple of different types of fabric.

And she, she drew up a pattern. she knows how to sew. I can, sew something back together, but I can't create a prototype, not like she does, but she created a, clean, pretty prototype. and she ended up, making a design out of it. It was, a standardized. We didn't use like whatever professional materials they use. We just did it with notebook paper and either back of napkins type of things. But we had we she created 3 prototypes in different sizes. And then we hop onto Google and we started looking around, obviously, if you manufacture overseas, you have to end manufacture in quantities of thousands.

And even if you're paying 10 back, that's 10 or 12 or 15, 000. And of course. a couple of poor college students are not going to have, so we found a U. S. based manufacturer in, in Spokane, Washington. I think they called something like the last U. S. bag company. I think they're still around.

But we sent them one of our prototypes, and We found three companies that were in that vein, they would make us 100 bags or so. but these people sent back a, what their interpretation of our prototype was a sample, like a professional sample. And it looked really good.

It looked nothing like the K9 Sport Sack looks today, but it looked really good. and so we said, how much is it going to cost us to make, 50 of these. And then, of course you have, to figure out how to pay for it. and I went to my father in law and I said, we need to do a show.

We're going to, make about, 50 bags there, about 20 a piece, which is, relatively expensive. And, and he cut us a check for, I think 3, 000. And as he was handing, us the check, he said, no, I would be remiss in my responsibility. In my, as a father in law, if I didn't say out loud that I do not believe that there are enough people in this world that will want to carry a dog on their backs to make this a viable business, but if there's anybody who can figure it out, it's gin and he hands me the check.

I'm like, thanks for the vote of confidence, man. but we, we had to borrow the money from, we paid for the bags and we got the booth and everything. and then of course you. You get the validation, the market research, the, you realize, okay, we're onto something. and from there, the business came about, we set up a customer service department, we set up a website and of course the website flopped badly, because we had no idea how to market it.

But, we would go to these shows and we would sell out and then We would have kind of a halo effect for a couple of weeks after a show where people would take their K9 Sport Sack home and right around the neighborhood and tell the neighbors where they got it. And then sales would die out.

And we had no idea why this is working, when we're standing there in front of people. But as soon as we go home, there's no movement at all. and, every time we would have an influx of, revenue, we would also have an influx of customer feedback. this is the way it didn't fit my dog.

This is why we're returning it. And this is, it was too hot. It was too flimsy. It was too small. It was too thin. It was too. And of course you start to take that feedback over time and that becomes version two. You start going, okay, let's, make it more adjustable, make it wider, make it.

And so as the product was evolving and improving and stuff like that, we were learning how to do a little bit of marketing. We were learning how to run a website. We were learning, how important customer services, we were learning how important our customers were, our customers are our, they are our, commodity.

They, are, everything to us. and then, you just learn it over time. You make a mistake and patch the patch up your wounds and move on to the next thing. And, and then eventually, as if you just keep on striving to do better, if you refuse to be okay with what you have today, and you just keep, you do end up at a point where.

We're actually releasing a bunch of products here pretty quick that are pretty cutting edge. I'm not even sure where we're going to be able to go from there. our customers will tell us, but, we're starting to our solutions are starting to become really, wider and broader and We're You know, the customers are becoming happier and happier with our product.

We're getting less and less feedback. And while that's great on the one hand, on the other hand, it's worrisome. Like, how are we going to make this better? Yeah. and so as long as you just keep on striving to do better and learn more, eventually you will end up with a solution that is viable enough that, that helps enough people.

James Lacey: That, that was packed full of golden nuggets by the sounds of it, really why you actually turned it from just a personal solution out of necessity or desire into something that serves thousands of customers today and A lot of people, I think, especially now, with the ease of access to finding a product, starting a business or whatever that might be, people are going the other way around.

What would you say to understanding the wants or desire of consumers and that you actually have a solution? Versus just trying to find a product and then forcibly marketing it. Is there, anything you speak to people that are in the kind of middle of that decision right now?

Joseph Watson: Absolutely. People, they, know what you're all about and they, as, a As much as you'd like to think that a customer purchase or a conversion or whatever you want to call it, is a logical decision. Even if it's innate, there's still, an emotional component. They are still emotionally attached to your company. And, the one of the steps that I skipped in the early, the early days is, Jen and I, we had to become dog people. And so we had to understand our audience.

That was the first and foremost, we had to become a mirror to our audience. and then, we had to, realize that, if we focus on the customer's needs first, the money will take care of itself. we, the, we, first, probably five or six years, we thought, Hey, this could be a pretty viable side hustle, that's what we thought it would be.

Fortunately, we focused on our customers needs, we focused on the customer first and when they needed something better, we did something better, which has created a lot of customer loyalty. It's created a lot of, our customers are our best marketing tool because, they, it's when you say proof of concept, there's no better proof of concept than your neighbor.

Actually using the product and then riding by on their bicycle and saying, Hey, this is a cool thing. You have a little dog. How about you go ahead and grab one. And the best, we can market all day long. We can do Google ads. We can do SEO. We can do. But the reality is if we just have happy customers, we darn near can, can let our marketing take care of itself.

Now, there's no such thing as a product that sells itself. if there was something, this would probably be it's a visual product. And like I said, in the early days, we couldn't, we can give it away online, until we, we did get it in front of enough people. We did have to do the marketing. But. people can feel our mission.

They can feel our motivations and our motivations are not to, get rich off of this, our motivations are to sincerely share the joy that we found. what kind of horrible people would find something that, is that, that fulfills them so much and then keep it to themselves when the world could benefit so much from it.

And that's, a, a theme, a tenet that we've tried to imbue the company with everything that we do from product development all the way to fulfillment to customer service. it's, to, to prove to the customer that our motivation is to give them an experience that brings them joy.

And we've never had to worry about the revenue ever. So that's, my bit of advice, focus on the customer first. Now we have had, several times and I, I've tried to shy away from this, but, we, Within about a year and a half or two years after getting, getting into this full time and really, building K9 Sport Sack second earnest.

We have people knocking us off all over the world. and we got worried. We were really worried. We're like, Oh my goodness. we, The pricing, we can't compete with their pricing because some of them are, manufacturers that are doing it themselves. And they, knew that K9 Sport Sack had built theirs out of, community, love and fulfillment.

and we watch these knockoffs come and go all the time. you can tell that they are just trying to capitalize on what they view as an open market. It's a, we stumbled onto a dormant. Yeah. Market, that's nobody come up with the, the best solution yet. We did. And of course we've led a Renaissance of, pet carrying in a lot of different ways.

And there are a lot of different pet carriers that have, followed us that don't look anything like K9 Sport Sack, but the ones that do, they come and go all the time. because customers realize that, there's value in. Having getting a product from a company that actually really does care about their experience, not just their money

James Lacey: that's huge that quote or a quote that I'm thinking of from what you're saying is caring about the customer will always win or actually caring.

We'll, just always win. It'll, beat out any, like you said, any copycats or anything else, just because you're so motivated by serving the people that are coming to you. And I think, with an origin story like yours, it's hard to compete with that because it's so rooted in love and passion.

And it's funny, I was actually going to ask you the question of. What, inspires you or motivates you during challenging times. but really, I feel like you answered that in, in that it is sharing the joy that you've experienced. And that keeps, I'm, guessing if, I'm right in saying that, that's what keeps you going during challenging, times.

Absolutely.

Joseph Watson: Look, I, I'm human. I love my job and I love my company, but I get burned out. I, get tired. I have a to do list that never ends and it does start to weigh heavily on a guy like me who likes to finish a project. But, when I start to get burned out or when I.

I have to, confront an employee that just doesn't isn't buying into our culture or anything like that. I focus on, I'll give you an example of 1 specifically that I focus on. we have been doing this for about 2 and a half years. and we had, I don't think it was even like a full time job for me and Jen yet.

It was still, we were still at our other jobs and it's still a side hustle, but, We had a lady, write us an email and she said, my dog died last night. And we're like, Oh my gosh, did we kill your dog? And she said, I bought a K9 Sport Sack. I pulled it out of the box brand new. I put my dog in it and we went on one last hike.

We took one last hike and I brought my dog home. And she died quietly in her sleep. And I want to thank you for giving us the opportunity to do that one last hike. And when I talk about, I start to choke up. But, if I ever start to get burned out, if I ever start to, start to think about too much about, the revenue or the finances of it all, those.

Customers, the ones who, we, and we've got hundreds of them. That's just, the one that sticks in my head. We've got hundreds of thank you notes. I've got a whole, notebook of thank you notes for people that are like, thank you so much for creating a product that, allowed me to, do this one last thing if I got, or, I was sick of leaving my dog home and every day I was sitting there at work thinking about my dog and you created a way for me to take my dog to work through busy New York traffic when I ride my bike and you know those that is what keeps me going in those moments and it is more than powerful enough to keep me going for sure.

James Lacey: That's just, I have goosebumps with what you were sharing. That is truly amazing to hear. I think there's probably no higher prize than receiving and remembering the impact you've had on customers that, become that community and to keep you going, like you said, in those, tough times is, there anything that you would recommend You know, talking about moments of burnout, is there anything that you found that helps as far as day to day hacks or, just, you've been in this over 10 years, just perseverance over time, anything that you would share to encourage someone if they're experiencing that and not seeing what they can do or don't know what to hold on to?

Joseph Watson: Yeah, there are a couple of things that I've, I have found that, that helps. first and foremost, I would say, decide what your objective is. what are you going for? Can I sport sec? We chose to, grow as big as we could so that we could help as many people as possible. And that, meant getting some help.

The only way to add more hours to your own week is to buy them from someone else. And so we have surrounded ourselves with a good team of people, good team members here. they have. they've taken a lot of the workload off of me. So surrounding yourself with people, but not just with anybody with the right sort of people.

and then I am, this is something I struggle with. I don't pace myself very well at all. I really struggle with, it turns it hits 5 o'clock in the evening and I don't have, I don't have, everything on my list done, even though it would take a year to do it all. And I go home and I stew about it, but, having to learn to leave the office of the office.

When I go home, I've got 3 kids. I've got, and they're young. they're not gonna be kids forever and focusing on, that being as important as this and balancing that has become a really big deal. I work with my wife, she works right through the, this wall over here. We used to take the work home and then talk about it deep into the evening. We've made a patch, let's leave it at the office. We'll talk about it tomorrow at the office. Wow. and, that has allowed us to pace ourselves to balance our lives, to, ease the burnout.

We still get burned out. we still have moments of frustration, but. surrounding ourselves with good people, pacing ourselves and balancing home and work that has been a trifecta for what has helped us

James Lacey: that I'm here and building boundaries that's speaking to me and I think a lot of people, especially the ease of being able to take everything with us everywhere. Building boundaries and setting those limits. It's challenging, but it sounds like there's, a tremendous value, especially yeah, I have a young, daughter myself and another one on the way. And so I think about similar things of how can I be present, at work and not take things past there and be present at home.

So that's, Yeah, encouraging to hear. I have a few last questions that I'd love to ask you. and one, I know that you may have a prototype that you can show us with what's next to come, prior to maybe seeing that if we can, I would love to hear if you have a favorite quote or piece of advice that you've received, that you'd want to share.

Joseph Watson: Yeah. I think so. my, my dad, he used to say, he used to say, you learn far more from failure, when you succeed at stuff. You just take it in stride. You don't really learn from it, but you learn more, more from failure than you do from success. and, I think that has, become a mantra at K9 Sport Sack, it's only failure.

If you stop right there, failure is only failure. If you stop right there. and so we've made plenty of mistakes. Yes. Our product was powerful enough to, outweigh our ineptitude. But it's okay to fail forward. It's okay. Failure is not a bad thing. the, we, get negative feedback all the time from customers.

And at first I took it personal. Oh, I hate that. Oh man, that's really annoying. now we put it in a folder of stuff to, to get better on, we put it, this is, what we need to improve upon. and what looks like a stumbling block actually becomes a springboard. failure is not a stumbling block.

It's a springboard. And that is the biggest piece of advice I could give anybody who's starting business. When you reach a, when you hit a wall, keep going, you'll get there. you'll learn what you need to from it. Take the next step and you'll be all right. I love that.

James Lacey: I love that. That kind of ties in nicely to the last couple of things I wanted to ask.

But before I do, what is next for K9 Sport Sack? You've been working on some innovative products. I know you just said you're not even sure what you might do next, based on how innovative it's getting at the moment. Yeah, what's next?

Joseph Watson: We have stumbled upon some innovative approaches to the K9 Sport Sack and, really in the future, what we're going to do is we're trying to break out of the stripped, narrow.

forward facing backpack, dog carrier, before we do that, we are, we've taken all the feedback that we've gotten from customers in the last, last 5 or 6 years. And we have built some amazing products. We have a product. I'll give you an example. the, and I wish I had 1 here to show you, but it's called the sky pack.

basically in order for a, a pet carrier to be airline approved, you have to, the dog's head has to be entirely enclosed in the bag. So we've created a K9 Sport Sack where the, where the, sides pop out and it becomes a duffel bag. So it looks for all practical purposes, it looks like a duffel bag or for a K9 Sport Sack, then the sides pop out. But this right here, let me show you this. So this is the new model we've got called the Cloud. So it's all mesh. It has a, like a rain fly in the bottom. This, bag right here is the most cutting edge technology we have come out with yet. we're replacing about three of our existing models with this right here. But yeah, this is how it works right here.

James Lacey: Just this is a live demo. This is awesome.

Joseph Watson: Yeah, this is where it's at right now. This is bag. It's a little bit big for her. It's easier to get her in a bigger bag than smaller bag. Yeah, this is, the one right here.

James Lacey: How many, How many products has DAISY modeled?

Joseph Watson: All of them, except for the Colossus. We have a bag called the Colossus. Our customers came to us and they said, Oh, why does this bag top out at 45 pounds and then 55 pounds and we basically, just went for broke and we created a bag that, that, did it all.

and that was the, that's the Colossus. That's the only one that she doesn't fit in.

James Lacey: I love that name. This right

Joseph Watson: Here, this bag has a, pump. So it pumps up an airframe on the inside. So this is the cloud right here. It is the, replacement for almost about three models that we're consolidating into this right here.

So that's the K9 Sport Sack right there. So we have ridden Daisy and I, Oh, probably 30, 000 miles with her in a K9 Sport Sack. And this right here is the best, bag that I have ever put her in. So what's next for K9 Sport Sack? A lot. We got a lot coming out.

James Lacey: That is super exciting to hear and to see my goodness. That's just the coolest thing that we got that live demo and the Daisy sits so comfortably right there in the cloud. Oh man, I, this is. Thank you so much for making this time and sharing. I wanted to ask you one final thing that we love to ask people and I'm going to tie it in with, a connected question as well that I really wanted to hear you share, what does full fulfillment?

What is real fulfillment mean to you along the journey? What have you learned about that? And how does faith, if it does at all, play a role into kind of everyday life or the past 10 plus years of persevering through the company,

Joseph Watson: I tell my kids, I say, if you work hard, if you're honest and you're kind, you do those three things, be honest, be kind and be industrious.

Really everything else falls into place and I, I, have faith in that, people who, work hard, people who, are not afraid of a little hard work, people that are, straightforward and honest and people that are kind. Those are the people that we recruit for K9 Sport Sack and if you do those, those three things. you end up sharing joy, but getting joy, I guess true fulfillment in my mind is a symbiotic relationship. It's reciprocity. It's, I am, I, impart joy by, by sharing the joy that I have and my joy grows. Your joy grows.

And we both are more fulfilled. So it's a, everybody in the relationship gets added value and that's the fulfillment.

James Lacey: I love that. It's like generosity and sharing and you just giving to one another. Everybody wins. I love that. thank you so much, Joseph, for your time and sharing.

I know it went a little bit over, forgive me for taking too much of your time, but, thank you. Is there anything else that you want to share before you head off? And also, where can people find more about K9 Sport Sack and yourself?

Joseph Watson: We have a website, k9sportack.com, you can read our story, there on the website.

We have, kind of an about us page, ask us any question you want, and we do shows all over the world, so if you want to come try out a K9 Sport Sack, the best, part of this job is watching people's eyes light up when I put their dog on their backs, so we do a lot of shows, and if you ever want to catch up, at a, local show. We'll let you know that we're going to be there. Come see us. and we just, we love our customers and meeting them face to face is the best part of the job.

James Lacey: That's awesome. Thank you so much, Joseph, for being on the fulfill podcast, sharing all your insights and your passion for, bringing joy to people and making their lives and their pet's lives better.

Yeah, we'll catch up soon, I hope. And that's it from this episode of the Fulfilled Podcast. 

Joseph Watson: Thanks, James. Appreciate it.