Discussing History and Personal Growth with Joe Dimino

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Transcript:

that's really exciting it it's the

beauty of Life man you just don't know

what's waiting there for you there's

nest eggs everywhere you know yeah so uh

but speaking of anest EG I I dig your

story I dig what you're doing and before

we get to your good work I want to know

first and foremost four years ago this

whole pandemic kind of turned us on our

ear how did you survive that time period

and how did it change

you uh that's a really good question I

actually started my business during the

pandemic and so it was It was kind of an

interesting turn of events I was uh

working in another startup and we were

relatively early on the um the kind of

going fully remote side of the pandemic

and everything and so um I found myself

very quickly getting stuck at home uh my

wife and I went and found a new

apartment that had some outdoor space

and uh allowed us to get some fresh air

and then uh I started Apollo 21 in April

of 2021 so literally about a month into

the pandemic and we've just sort of been

gutting it out and figuring it out every

step of the way so let's get to the

heart and soul of what you do on a daily

basis I'm going to put you in front of a

bunch of third graders it's career day

and one of the curious little mind says

hey what do you do for a living how do

you answer them I I build companies is

probably the easiest way to put that so

uh Apollo 21 I like to tell people sits

at the intersection of a management

consultancy and a product design studio

so we help companies uh understand and

evaluate problems that they're having

and opportunities for growth and we

usually either build new technology

products to help solve those problems or

we help those companies launch new

companies in pursuit of scale so when

you were in the third grade I think I

might know the answer to this what did

you want to be when you grew up oh man

third grade it was probably rocket

scientist or you know astronaut

something that just sounded amazingly

cool that I didn't want to say it but

that's what I was thinking I knew based

on the name of your company that that

had to be yeah it's it's it's been a

through line for a little while so yeah

right on is there an animal back there

because I every there is I love it no no

no dude listen to me was it a cat is it

it seems it was fast it was a dog it's a

dog yeah he's a little he's a bingi oh a

bingi I used to have a bingi um I

actually I had a bingi mixed with an

Australian Shepherd I just lost her in

November she was beautiful her name was

Coco and we got her around the time that

Conan O'Brien was going to The Tonight

Show so she was forever christened and

then we got a little terer bingi mix but

they we got them because they don't bark

and they're they're they're loyal

they're smart like Coco was the smartest

thing I'd ever been around in my entire

life but anyway every time I'm a cat guy

so sometimes cats come up to my voice so

I was like uh oh I'm bringing the cat

in this's a dog and he's just raring for

a walk right now so oh I bet he is I bet

he is so let me ask you this um who's

been an inspiration for you and in in

this journey that you've been on um

who's been kind of an inspiration or a

hero uh I've had the great Fortune of

coming across two specific folks in my

career that have kind of served the role

of Mentor for me and uh the first I met

right as I was shifting my career path

so I started in the of advertising and

very quickly realized that the most fun

you will ever have in advertising is

during school and so I took it upon

myself to find a way out of advertising

and I ended up working for a guy named

Tom aello at a company called poke like

poke and um he he changed the path of my

career full stop Tom was one of the

first people that I ever worked with who

was willing to say no to potential

clients if they kind of did didn't fit

the mold of the type of work that he was

excited about doing and he was the first

person who um I think really kind of saw

my potential and gave me the opportunity

to whatever euphemism you want to throw

you know spread my wings and really

explore how to become who I am in my

career today and so he was the first

Mentor that I had the the great Fortune

of working with and then uh the second

came as I was further progressing my

career into the world of startups and

Entrepreneurship and ended up um first

hiring me at uh legendary pictures the

movie studio to work on a little

technology SWAT team over there and then

uh was the CEO of a company that four of

us left legendary to form um which

ultimately then led to the creation of

Apollo 21 and so both of those folks

have been pivotal in my career and

helping me figure out um how to be who I

am so take me back to where you were

born and raised and how these initial

seeds of being an entrepreneur how were

those planted and how did they become

you uh interestingly enough it did not

started at an early age I you know I

always wish that I had some great story

about how you know I started the

lemonade stand out front and that just

snowballed into a career of

Entrepreneurship but um I grew up in San

Antonio and focused most of my time as a

kid uh on theater and on the outdoors so

I was big into rock climbing and

mountaineering and all of that stuff and

uh focused on acting all the way through

college and then um when I graduated

college I just sort of made a personal

declaration that it was time to quote

unquote grow up and stop focusing on

acting and go find a real job and so

that led me to the world of advertising

I got a master's degree in that uh as I

said realized very quickly that I did

not enjoy doing it and it was really in

the transition from advertising into oh

my God I'm a couple of years years into

my career I don't really know what I

want to do but I know what I don't want

to do um that pushed me into building an

understanding of business and how

companies and Brands relate to customers

and consumers um and then through my

experience at poke that I described

earlier under Tom was really the the

first opportunity that I had for

exposure to the world of startups and

Entrepreneurship and I got to a point

during that process where

um I realized that as much fun as I was

having helping big companies do things I

really enjoyed helping small companies

figure out how to establish themselves

and kind of make something of themselves

and so that led me down the

entrepreneurial path and open the door

to the world of startups where I've been

focusing my career for uh the last I

guess 12 years or so now so of all of

the business models that exist out there

of all the successes what your favorite

business model startup that has turned

into kind of a behemoth or a company you

admire man that's a really good question

um one of my favorite companies out

there and I don't forgive me I don't

know if this answers your question

directly but I'm gonna run with it

because the first one that popped into

my head um there's a company called send

cut send which uh in addition to having

an amazing name um basically is a laser

cutting and metal bending company and

the reason that I'm so excited about it

is um I enjoy making things and that's

inherent in sort of my work as a venture

Builder and my work as a product

designer and I've always wanted the

opportunity to extend that into physical

products but I've never had the

wherewithal and didn't come from an

industrial design background and what I

love about send cut send is they they

fall right at the perfect intersection

point of my design experience where I

can design something in two Dimensions

but then Envision it in three send off a

file to them and get I have pieces

sitting here get something sent back to

me that was cut from my design that is

now a physical product that I can hold

and sell and so on and so um they're

actually one of the primary suppliers

for a side company that I've been

running for about three years now where

I design accessories and things for uh

Adventure vehicles and camping vehicles

and uh really they kind of provide my

outlet for as much as I love building

digital things and building companies

sometimes I just want to hold the thing

that I'm making and they they allow that

to happen so that's awesome dude that is

totally awesome and it is a great name

makes total sense you know so speaking

of you know good ideas and and having

the gumption to do it what is the drive

for you every day to get up to do the

work that you do to help other

businesses and to also evolve as a human

I for me it comes down to problem

solving I I get that itch where when

somebody says if only we could whatever

it is um it just starts something in my

brain and I go huh how would we figure

out how to do or whatever it is and I I

find that I have trouble putting it down

until I have some sort of solution which

uh you know has its benefits and its

drawbacks but uh seems to work well for

our clients and the thing the ventures

that we're launching for ourselves and

so I love that moment of figuring out a

solution and figuring out how to bring

that to life and it's really been kind

of the through line so I started my

career as a visual designer and that led

into the world of kind of pushing pixels

and thinking about uh the design of user

experiences which is how we think about

um when you're interacting with a

technology product for example or an

application um how do we want that

experience to unfold and how do you

funnel somebody from step to step so

that they have an easy time utilizing

that product to accomplish whatever need

it is and so that sort of scratched that

itch further and then that grew into

well if I can do that at the level of

creating something uh digital how do I

then expand that into companies and how

do I take the thing that we're creating

digitally but then layer in the idea of

okay well if that thing's going to

support a business to your point there

has to be a business model around it

there has to be an exchange and a way to

make money off of it and a way to find

the people that have the problem that

that thing solves and so on and so forth

and so um it's a little bit roundabout

but I have found this kind of natural

progression from design of you know

pictures and images and things to the

design of experiences to the design of

companies that sell experiences and

ideally make money doing so what's one

of your favorite client success stories

so far uh one of my absolute favorite

clients and it's one that I I inevitably

end up bringing up on calls and

everybody seems to be interested in so

I'll I'll jump straight into it um we

had a client a while ago that was

focused on the western Sports space so

think Cowboys and rodeos and bull riding

and all of that which uh is super

interesting and I hadn't realized until

we started working with them is actually

I believe the seventh largest spectator

sport in the US so it has a huge

following but it's also made up of a fan

base that inherently tends to be a

little bit slow on technology adoption

and so um this particular client was

highly focused on bringing the world of

Western Sports to a uh younger more

technologically advanced audience and

figuring out how to enhance the

connection points between Western Sports

athletes and fans and so we had the

opportunity to work with them around

everything from um how to utilize their

data to uh software designed around

Rodeo event production to one of my

favorite pieces was building a mobile

app that was effectively ESPN for rodeo

and so it became a touch point between

athletes and fans that didn't previously

exist and it was it was so exciting to

go through the process and figure out

how to serve an audience in a fan base

that was hungry for that technology

touch point but didn't have anything to

fill that

Gap so of all the things that you've

done so far what do you the proudest

have probably that application uh that

app the the ESPN for Rodeo which was

called uh Teton Ridge plus became kind

of this touch point where athletes could

create their own profiles and fans could

connect with and follow the athletes

that they were most excited about and um

part of what was so exciting about that

process was we had access to both fans

and athletes to really um interview them

and understand deeply what the

underserved needs were that could help

change their relationship to the sport

and so we we were able to build an

application that really fulfilled on

those needs and created a connective

tissue between the fans and the athletes

and the events that didn't exist and so

we were live streaming rodeo events we

were creating athlete profiles we were

updating standings in real time and

doing a lot of um data oriented activity

that is inherent in the World of Sports

today and fandom of sports but wasn't

available for that particular space

until we kind of tapped into it so let's

say you have a dream tonight you ran

into the 18-year-old version of you and

you could give that young version of you

a piece of advice based on the life

you've lived the wisdom you've gained

what advice would you give your young

version and would that version of you

listen uh that version of me undoubtedly

would probably not

listen uh but the advice that I would

give uh would be to start exploring this

space honestly you know as I said I I

came into the world of Entrepreneurship

and Venture building and Technology

relatively relatively late in life uh

and into my career and I think that had

I had an awareness that that was even a

possibility at the time that I was 18 it

probably would have directed my

educational path and then ultimately my

career path in ways that I just at the

time didn't even understand existed um

you know I was so ingrained in theater

and doing the things that I had grown up

being excited about that I hadn't taken

the moment to um explore what the future

might hold and I guess the other major

piece of advice that I would give myself

is don't listen to your mom the acting

thing is going to serve you really

really

well right on so let me ask you this we

get off the phone here a time machine

pulls up in front of your house and you

can go anywhere back in time and see one

event with your own eyes or you can go

see what's up in the future where you

going I this is totally off the cuff but

I would love to sit in the audience the

day that Steve Jobs introduced the

iPhone because it has become such a

pivotal turning point in the way that

people interact with technology the way

that we think about um what something

that we carry around every day can do

for us and then of course just the

opportunity to hear him talk and to hear

one of those sort of famous uh you know

one more thing moments uh would have

been such a treat absolutely it would I

would love to be there too so everyone

out there has a perception of you family

friends clients colleagues but you run

the show what's your perception of you

who do you think you

are uh I might run the show but I'm

really the guy that sits here to enable

other people to do amazing work um I

have I have a small but uh very strong

team that I absolutely adore working

with that is made up of a number of

folks that came from past companies who

I'd worked with in the past and so we

have a long-standing relationship and I

love being able to see how they're

growing as our efforts in building a

company together are sort of progressing

and um I really like figuring out how to

get out of the way how can I enable them

to do the things that make our clients

happy that uh make them excited and that

help make our company successful so if

anyone wants to reach out they want to

see your company learn more or reach out

to you what's the best way to do that uh

best place to find us is our website at

apollo2 doio we have a ton of case

studies we have a ton of great articles

and white papers that expound upon sort

of our perspective and view of the world

and uh we're starting to starting to

layer in a lot more video content and

things like that so that's a great place

the other place where I'm very active

right now is on LinkedIn uh you can find

me there and on all of my socials under

the handle among many am m o n g m n y

and uh that's pretty much the best place

to find me I love it man what a great

story thank you sir thank you for your

time thank you for the the entire

timeline and best of luck with

everything I appreciate it thanks for

having me it's been a pleasure yes

absolutely

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