Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: [00:00:00] that Friday, got a call from my general manager that there were storms coming. And I should tell you that in the three and a half years that I had been involved with the business, I got calls like that all spring long for three years, and nothing ever happened, so I didn't worry too much about it. then, um, later that evening, about 11:30 my time, about 1:30 in the morning Oklahoma time, calls me back and tells me it's all gone. said, "What do you mean?" know, "Why are you calling me at this hour?" You know?
Riley: Yeah
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: "No, it's, it's all gone, brother. It's all gone." I said, I said, "Well, what are you saying?" He's like, "The factory, the warehouse, your office, everything, and the rest of downtown Sulphur is all gone. It was a direct hit by a tornado." And I said, you know, "Holy shit."
You are listening to the Go Earn Your Salt podcast, brought to you by Salt Electrolytes. On this podcast, your host, Riley Rogers, explores the stories of people who get after it, get things done, and earn their salt. You will hear from high achievers who discuss what makes them tick, how they got to where they are today, [00:01:00] and where they're headed tomorrow.
Perhaps this podcast will help you go earn your salt
Riley: Today I have Adam Trenk of Billy Cook Saddles. I'm, I'm really excited to talk to you, man, 'cause we've... You don't meet very many people in the leathercraft trade, and especially when it comes to saddles, right?
It's a pretty niche, um, market there, if you will. And, and just thinking about that brings up a whole bunch of questions that, that I wanna ask you today. But Adam, I, I wanna welcome you to the show.
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Riley, thanks for having me on. I'm excited to be here
Riley: Yeah, man. So listen, talk about you for a second, um, 'cause you're, you're also an
entrepreneur in other businesses and you're an attorney. You've done some pretty big stuff in your life, but what, what was kid version of Adam like?
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Well, I grew up in the great cowboy state of New Jersey in the suburbs of, uh, New York City, and, uh, I had [00:02:00] a, a really great family that had, you know, its own bag of drama as every family does, which kinda helped shape my life. Uh, but growing up, uh, in New Jersey in the '90s and then being exposed to horses at a young age 'cause my grandfather had been involved in the thoroughbred racing industry before I was born and had a lot of friends and family in that world, um, really just kinda shaped who I am and, and how I get after it in the world
Riley: So when you say family drama, expand on that a little bit
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Uh, my parents divorced when I was young, and so, you know, that comes with, uh, you know, certain challenges that in hindsight aren't that significant, but at the time felt, you know, pretty major
Riley: Yeah. Talk about that a little bit, Adam, with, uh... You say in hindsight because I, I think sometimes we're able to, as adults, maybe look back and go, "Man, there was some silver lining there. There's some valuable lessons I learned." Is that kinda what you're getting at?
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: absolutely. I mean, I think that I am who I [00:03:00] am because of the experiences that I had when I was growing up. And so obviously at this point I wouldn't trade it, but at the time it seemed difficult, um, you know, being passed around back and forth between your parents
Riley: Yeah, man, I tell you that thing you just said about, you know, I wouldn't trade them now, th- but man, you wouldn't probably wanna go through them again. I can tell you I, I had that same experience where my parents divorced young and gosh, I re- yeah, I remember trying to convince them to stay married, and it was a really tough thing as a kid.
But in hindsight, man, there's some valuable life lessons that, you know, I wouldn't trade their divorce. I w- I wouldn't go through that again on, on purpose, but I sure, uh, sure value the learning experiences there for sure. But
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Yeah, absolutely.
Riley: yeah
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: for me in particular, it created an opportunity for me to really bond with my grandfather, which was a very important relationship to me as I matured. So, um, for that reason alone, I certainly wouldn't trade it as difficult as it was for a couple of years. [00:04:00]
Riley: Yeah. So New, New Jersey and horses, you kind of made a little joke about that, but that's not something we normally, uh, equate with each other, right? But, but talk about that for those of us out west who are used to just seeing, you know, the country living kinda, kinda thing. But we envision New Jersey as being all, like, urban, right?
But it's not
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Yeah. no, for sure. Well, a lot of New Jersey is urban and suburban, um, and it does have its countryside as well. But, you know, growing up, uh, there was a statistic that I loved to tell people when I came out west in particular, was that there was more horses per square mile than there were in any other state in the union. I don't know if that statistic still holds true. I haven't gone back and looked it up. But, you know, there are several racetracks, uh, in New Jersey, and they're-- the US Equestrian Team is based in New Jersey, So there's a lot of horseback activity, not a lot of cowboy stuff going on, and that was always the lifestyle that I sort of aspired to and gravitated towards.
So I had to, I had to leave the state in order to really get exposure to it. But, um, yeah, the horses are a big [00:05:00] part of the, of, of some of the subculture in New Jersey for sure.
Riley: Yeah. So when you, when you moved out of the state, that took you where? You know, I know you and I talked about it off air, but talk to the audience
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: I, uh, I spent several summers from the time I was 16 until I was 22, uh, in Montana and Idaho with the Davis family and apprenticing to be a horse trainer. Uh, and then when I graduated high school, sort of in the middle of that window when I was 17, 18 years old, I moved to Arizona to go to Arizona State University for undergrad.
And then ultimately, uh, got out of college, did a year in the workforce working in real estate development, and then went back to school both for a master's in real estate development degree and a JD, both at ASU
Riley: Dude, that's a, that's a very wide spectrum of of study. You're talking, yeah, from horse trainer to commercial real estate. You know, it's... What... Talk, talk, talk about that a little bit. Were those just things you were interested in?[00:06:00]
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Well, I, when I was in undergrad, I always wanted to be in real estate. I, I, my uncle Jeff, um, who passed away a few years ago, he was a big influence on me, particularly my collegiate years, and he got me into, um, buying, rehabbing, and flipping residential homes while I was in?
college. And that was sort of what I did, you know, to make money on the side, and he mentored me through that process.
So I wanted to be in real estate as a consequence of that. And then I'd worked for about a year, uh, for a guy named Robert Belcore, and I think he and my grandfather together convinced me that I needed to go to law school. So I applied to go to law school at ASU 'cause I wanted to, you know, go back to my alma mater. And what happened was I didn't get accepted right away. So I was told by the dean, and this is kind of an interesting story maybe for your, uh, for your audience. I didn't... I, I, I told my family that I got accepted, and I went back to Arizona full-time several months before the semester was supposed to start, and only after getting to Arizona did I [00:07:00] find out that, uh, I wasn't accepted. So I wasn't prepared to share that news with my family, so instead, I tried to get ahold of the dean of the law school at the time. Her name was Patricia White, and she wouldn't take the meeting with an applicant. So I had to set a meeting under false pretenses and, uh, I gave a fake name, and I told her that I wanted to make a contribution to the school. And as soon as she walked into the waiting area to meet me on the day of the meeting, she looked at me and she said, "Who are you and what do you really want?"
Riley: Oh, man.
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: So
Riley: Okay, there's some, some things to unpack there for sure
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: throw me out of your office." Uh, and I explained that it didn't make sense to me that I wasn't accepted to the law school because the published averages of the scores for both tests and GPAs of the kids that they l- were admitting were lower than what I had achieved. And she explained to me that there were, you know, various quotas that they had to meet and that, um, you know, it being my demographic, I was gonna have to have better [00:08:00] scores and better GPA. I said, "Well, how am I gonna achieve that? I've already graduated college." And that's why I ended up in the real estate development, uh, master's program, because she looked at my file during that meeting, and she recognized I had an interest in that, and she said, "This is a one-year program that you could go to where you could raise your GPA and then reapply to law school." So that was
Riley: Oh, so she gave you a path at that point
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Yeah. Yeah
Riley: So how did this work? 'Cause you, so you thought you were accepted for some reason. What was that? That, I mean, 'cause it obviously was a big enough reason for you to head across the country, right?
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Yeah, So I graduated ASU, I went back to New Jersey for a few months, and while I was there, I studied and, and took the LSATs with the law school admissions test and scored well on it. And the published averages of, you know, the, for the students that they had accepted the year prior were lower than the score that I achieved. o- the, the thing that really tipped the scales making me believe that I was gonna get accepted to ASU was my, my family had, was trying to encourage me to [00:09:00] stay on the East Coast. And so one of the schools I applied to was Seton Hall Law School, and that's a small private university, and I think their law school campus is in Newark, New Jersey. And, um, I had been accepted to Seton Hall, which in the national rankings was a better school than ASU. So I figured that if my averages, you know, my LSAT scores and my GPA were better than the average of what they were admitting to ASU, and I had been admitted to Seton Hall, well, I must be about to be accepted to ASU.
So I, you know, packed up and went back west, but didn't work out that way that quickly.
Riley: So you had some evidence, but you didn't have the final
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Right
Riley: final results of that. Shoot, man, the things we do as young men, right?
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Yeah. I was 21 years old, so I guess my, my frontal lobe wasn't fully developed or whatever, but, uh, it worked out okay. Ended up going to ASU for law school just a year later than I had expected. And in that master's program, I made a lot of good friends that I still have today. So, uh, it worked out [00:10:00]
Riley: Well, there's this, this other thing though that you, you talked about, setting this, this, uh, meeting under false pretenses, right? You... There's a part of us, and you see that a lot with entrepreneurs, man, where when we don't fit in the system, we work around. We, we come up with a workaround, right? Um, that seems to me very much an entrepreneurial way of thinking, so t- like, expand on that a little bit, what was going on in your head and what, what gave you that idea?
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Oh goodness, I couldn't pretend to tell you what I was thinking that I had that idea?
other than, you know, the embarrassment of not getting into ASU wasn't something that I was willing to, uh, go through. So, and I, and I just had it in my mind that if I could meet with the dean and explain to her what my grades were, she would see that her admissions department made a mistake and take mercy on me and help me get in.
I mean, that's what I was trying to do. I certainly wasn't trying to go back to get a [00:11:00] master's degree in the interim to bring up my GPA. That-- But it did work out that way, and I-- and, you know, in a roundabout way, it did kinda have the result that I had hoped for. I mean, she helped me get admitted to the law school.
She took-- She did take mercy on me in s- in some form because she didn't throw me out of her office immediately, and she kinda held my hand through the admissions, uh, uh, process to get into that master's program. So, uh, I guess it, it, it paid off in a sense.
Riley: Yeah, it's interesting 'cause she could have had two reactions to that, right? She could have been really upset that you didn't tell her the truth, but then...
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Well, she was initially.
Riley: Well, yeah.
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: She was, yeah. Oh, yeah.
Riley: Yeah, you kind of implied that, I guess, with her reaction, right? Who are you and what do you really want?
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Yeah
Riley: so in the conversation though, what happened?
What, what turned her? 'Cause apparently she, she started to like you
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Uh, I think that I, I, you
know, spilled my guts to her, right? I told her what I, who I really was and what I really wanted immediately. You know, I didn't try, wasn't [00:12:00] trying to, um, you know, operate undercover any longer. It was just so to get the meeting, to get her attention, I had to do that 'cause her office said that she wasn't gonna meet with, you know, denied applicants. Um, know, I was honest and obviously somewhat compelling facts, right? I mean, the, my grades were what I said they were, and they were above their published averages. So, you know, I think she understood the, the disconnect
Riley: Yeah, there, th- but, but she saw a larger picture that she had some other stuff in the background she had to abide by, right? Other, other rules and yeah. Which, yeah, could be a whole nother conversation. But, um, so move on from there. You, you, you go on to get your degree, and this one as an attorney. And when, when did all this...
What, what year did all this happen?
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: I started law school in 2007. Um, and I mentioned my Uncle Jeff had mentored me into buying and flipping some homes. So I had a couple of rental [00:13:00] properties, single-family rentals, and I had flipped a couple of houses, uh, and ended up wanting to move to the community of Cave Creek, Arizona, 'cause, uh, horses were always a very big part of my life, and I had a friend of mine who I had boarded a horse with through college who had moved up to Cave Creek, and I had kinda set my sights on living up there. So, um, I put some money together, and I bought a house in Cave Creek, I think at the end of 2008, and, um, decided while I was in law school... Uh, uh, back up for a second. I didn't-- I put all my chips into buying the house in Cave Creek. I wanted to live on a horse property and have my horse in the backyard. So when I moved into that house, I didn't have very much.
I had been living previously a house with two roommates, and we shared a lot of the furniture and stuff, and the TV wasn't mine and everything. So when I left and I moved to Cave Creek, I didn't have a television. So on Monday nights for entertainment, I started going to the town council meetings. And don't ask me why I was compelled to do that.
I really don't know. But I paid attention in those meetings, and after a couple of weeks of doing [00:14:00] that, I got it in my head that I was gonna run for town council. So, uh, that begat the beginning of my political career, and I ran for council my first year in town and got elected, um, in-- after a runoff election and a tied vote, secured my seat through a draw of cards, which made national news and actually the front page of The New York Times because it was going on, uh, at the same time as geopolitically Arab Spring was occurring.
And so for some reason, The New York Times thought that was a good, you know, juxtaposition to put on their front page. So that was pretty cool and pretty exciting. Uh, I sat, uh, as a council member, a single member of a seven-member body. Uh, I was the youngest by decades, and they treated me like an outsider.
The local, uh, political organizations and the local newspaper didn't like me. So those first two years, I didn't get anything done. Um, I then graduated law school and finished my term, and I did not run for re-election. I will say the one thing that we did successfully while I was on the council was we [00:15:00] prevented the implementation of a property tax. And as soon as I got off the council, they, uh, the, the next term, the next council people put a property tax, uh, ballot initiative in front of the voters. And a couple of friends of mine and I decided that we didn't wanna see that happen. So ins- I was off the council, and I thought I was done with that. I was gonna start my legal career, but ended up, uh, creating an organization called the No Tax Pack, and we ran a political campaign to defeat that ballot initiative, and successfully, we defeated the property tax.
Riley: Oh, dang
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: a consequence of that, there was a g-- there was a m-- now at this point, like kind of a grassroots movement to get me and some of the guys who were involved in that No Tax Pack elected and back on the council. So we ran again, and in 2013 to 2015, I served as the town's vice mayor. so I did that a couple years into my, my law career. was fun. Uh, I'm glad I did it. I learned a lot, made a lot of good friends, um, and connections and grew my network. Uh, but the-- my [00:16:00] political career ended after all four of us who ran as a slate in 2013 were recalled at the end of our term anyway. So we'd already served two years, but they threw us out of office like a day early or something like that. And, uh, You know, I, I, like I said, I'm very proud of the things that we accomplished for the community, and it was-- there was-- you'd have to have been there to understand it. It was kind of a microcosm of national politics where the, the quality of your ideas really didn't matter. It was a contest of personalities.
And so the, the people that we were dealing, operating against were in league with the newspaper publisher, and so very difficult to defeat their campaign against us ultimately. But, um, no regrets. I'm glad I did it.
Riley: So a recall, Mance, and you said it was at the end of your campaign, but what was that based on?
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: There was no solid basis for it. In Arizona, you don't really have to have a basis for a recall. You just need to collect [00:17:00] signatures. So they, they mounted that recall campaign against us predicated on a bunch of things, um, none of which were really true or relevant. Um, what we did for the town, uh, was we reduced the debt, we encouraged commercial development, we put in s- the first public art installations, we secured the horse privileges for properties that were, uh, zoned rural agriculture but were smaller than two-acre lots. Um, everything that we did in that term when we had a majority was, you know, something that I'm super proud of. But it was, it was just, you know, we weren't in league with the guy who ran the newspaper. He didn't like us, and he wanted his puppets to be sitting on?
that council, so he ran a very aggressive, uh, campaign.
He published a weekly newspaper and, ultimately they got us out. Um, but we did serve the full two years, so, you know, uh, he spent a lot of time and energy, I think, for nothing. '
Riley: Cause you had already served. So man, I'm seeing this reoccurring theme [00:18:00] here where you are, you see something new, it's interesting to you, and you just go after it. It's like, it seems like a common thread in your life. Um, is, is, is everything that way? Are you kind of that, that, that personality who just dives into whatever you're interested in at the time?
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Yeah, I, I have sort of, uh, begun to wrap my head around it in my late 30s and early 40s that it's like sort of a spiritual guide. Uh, it, I, it-- From the outside looking in, particularly when I was younger, you might have thought it was impulsive, but I kinda find now that any time that something is interesting to me and I do not feel, um, depleted or get tired working on it, that I know that I'm on the right path. And so I just kinda lean into that. Uh, I've always done more than one thing at a time?
I mean, when I was working as an attorney, early in my career I was on town council. Uh, when I got done with my political career, I began to work for an industry advocacy group, [00:19:00] um, that, uh, was involved with aviation in the Greater New York City area.
So I was traveling back and forth across the country from 2014 to 2019 once a month and doing that while practicing law full-time. Um, then in 2018, I got named a partner at my firm, Rose Law Group in Scottsdale, and then in 2019 I parted ways, uh, with the helicopter aviation, uh, business. Uh, it was called the Helicopter Tourism and Jobs Council. Um, and I had about a six-month period where lawyering was the only job I had, and that was when I found the saddle business, um, which, you know, kind of began this whole new adventure that has, know, slowly but surely taken over a much bigger segment of my daily bandwidth until now it's pretty much my full-time job is run the saddle company and trying to grow it into a, a nationally recognized lifestyle brand. But, uh, my point of telling you all that is, um, if it feels good and I don't, I don't get tired of the subject matter, but I actually get energized [00:20:00] the deeper that I dig into it, then I know that I'm on the right track. And if I'm doing something and it's like, "Ugh, I can't wait for this to be over," it just feels like a chore, then I know that that is not something that I was put on this earth to do.
Riley: That's a, man, that's a good point, 'cause I think you're ... There are those things in all of our lives, right, that do energize us. It's like the more we do it, the more excited we get, and the more fired up we get. That's, uh, something to really think about, you know, again, from a ... There's always things we have to do that are just work, that are part of any venture, the not fun parts.
But man, when the big picture of that, that thing, you know, you talk commercial real estate or, or attorney or running for city council or, or saddles or horses or whatever it is, you know, there's parts of those, all of those things that suck. But if the big picture fires you up, man, I, I do think you're right.
I think that's something that ... How did you put it? You, you, you knew that you were put on this earth for that reason?
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Yeah. I just, I, if it feels [00:21:00] good and it doesn't deplete-- You know, it doesn't like-- I don't feel like I need to go recharge my batteries because I did it, then I feel like I'm on the right path. You know, that's-- I'm, I'm doing something that I was put on this earth to do. know, and if I'm doing something that's just like, "Ugh, I can't wait for this to be over," then that's something that I don't need to rush into doing again. Um, and everything that I have done throughout my career and all my different business interests and everything, I mean, it, uh, it's all for a reason. It all got me here, and I'm grateful for all the experiences and the lessons. And interestingly enough, you know, like I never, never imagined that, you know, being in the saddle business, you know, something about the real estate business would apply or my experience on town council would apply, et cetera, et cetera. But lo and behold, I mean, we had to have an agenda item in front of the Sulphur City Council just this past Monday, and I had to, you know, deploy some of the things that I learned that I had never actually done, uh, professionally when I was in that master's program, um, following a tornado that destroyed our factory at the saddle shop in 2024. So it's just been a wild ride and, [00:22:00] um, you know, I feel like I've-- You, you pick up little breadcrumbs along the way, and you, you eat them when it's time.
Riley: Yeah. Excuse me. That, uh I, I, I wanna talk about the tornado as we kind of progress through here because that's, that's, that's just a wild story to me. But go to the beginning of the saddle business, 'cause I know you're in the horse world, so it seems like kind of a natural flow there. But this was an established company before you, before you came along, right?
All right, you sweaty buggers. That liquid dripping off your forehead and down your back contains minerals that are critical for high performance. If you don't put those minerals back, you're not gonna perform well. This is where SALTY Electrolytes comes in. Salt contains six electrolyte minerals, plus a touch of iodine to help you replenish after a hard workout.
Salt is the only electrolyte supplement to pair every mineral with its counterpart, giving you the most [00:23:00] robust mineral profile on the market, period. Head over to goearnyoursalt.com today to get some for yourself. Use the code GOEARNYOURSALT to get 15% off your first order. And now, my friends, go earn your salt
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Yeah. So Billy Cook, uh, founded Genuine Billy Cook Saddles in 1991, when he reestablished his brand in Sulphur, Oklahoma. But the brand Billy Cook has been around since 1953. So the name Billy Cook has been on saddles now for 73 years. Um, Billy passed away in 2019, and I gotta, I gotta sort of pause in the action and, and like go back in time for a second.
In 1976, years before I was born, my grandfather bought two Billy Cook saddles from Billy Cook at his original shop in Greenville, Texas, uh, for my father and my uncle, and those are the saddles that I grew up riding in [00:24:00] that sort of instilled in me the love of everything cowboy and Western. So, um, that shaped my life in a big way. So in 2019, I had quit, um, working in the aviation business, was just lawyering, but I had a lot of extra bandwidth, and then I found out that Billy Cook passed away in early October Didn't act on it at all. A couple weeks later, I broke my hand in a horse wreck. Ended up having to have a plate put in my, my hand, and was...
My hand was in a cast. I couldn't go in the gym, I couldn't ride, so I was, like, bored and in front of a computer more than I otherwise would've been, that's when I got curious about what was gonna happen to the Billy Cook, the company, once its founder, the man, had passed away. And I started making some calls to the company.
Um, had any conversation with Billy Cook other than once back in 2009 when we were doing an economic, uh, development initiative in Cave Creek. Because Billy Cook logo, uh, says Sulfur, Oklahoma on it, and I thought it'd be pretty cool if he would [00:25:00] do a line for us that said Cave Creek, Arizona on it to try and help establish Cave Creek as a western town, 'cause I recognized that, you know, having a product that was accepted by an industry that, you know, like, represented the values that your community wanted to espouse could be good for the town.
Anyway, he took my call and he s- told me, "Thanks, but no thanks." So I had no relationship with Billy Cook, the man or the business, other than that I was a consumer of the products, other than that one phone call. When he died, uh, I reached out. I, I called several times. Kinda the same story as the, as the law school deal.
Nobody wanted to take my call until finally the CFO of the company called me and it was basically the same question, although I, I'd never, I never, like, concealed who I really was. I was... Told her, you know, "My name's Adam Trenk. Call me back," blah, blah, blah. But finally she called me back and she said, "You know, what do you really want?
Why are you bothering us?"
Riley: Yeah.
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: know? And I said, "Well, I just wanna know what's gonna happen to the company, 'cause the brand has been very meaningful to me throughout my childhood and I think it's iconic, and I [00:26:00] just wanna make sure that, you know, it's not going anywhere." And I still hadn't put it together that I was gonna take over the brand yet.
I was really just curious and, you know, operating from this place of boredom and lots of extra energy because I wasn't outside riding my horses. My hand was in a cast. She told me that the company was over $700,000 in debt. His family had no interest in, um, trying to rejuvenate the brand. It had been going through several years of decline, and they were gonna close their doors at the end of the year. Well, it just so happened that that week a buddy of mine from college who lives in Brooklyn, New York, was in Arizona visiting, and he and I were taking a hike together, I told him the story, that I'd had this phone call a day or two prior. And I'll never forget this moment. We're walking. He's... We're on a trail climbing a mountain, and he's up above me and, like, 10 feet in front of me. And when I said that... When I told him the story, he stopped, and he turns around and he looks at me dead in the eye and he goes, "You're gonna buy that company." I was like And then it hit me. You know what? I think there's an opportunity here. And we spent the [00:27:00] whole rest of that hike talking about it. And, uh, as soon as we got done and I got back to the house, got showered up, cleaned up, I called this, uh, the CFO of the company back, and I started telling her, you know, that I thought it was possible to keep the brand ar- around if everybody who worked there was willing to, uh, stay on board and keep their jobs.
And she said, "Well, of course, everybody wants to keep their jobs. They're all worried that, you know, they've only got another couple of weeks of a paycheck coming in." that beget a series of conversations. Uh, ultimately, I met with her, uh, in Las Vegas in December of 2019 during the National Finals Rodeo in the cafeteria at the Las Vegas Convention Center, and we conceptualized the terms that, you know, I, I thought would work for me and that she thought would be fair and that the family would accept, and then we presented them to the attorney representing the estate. And I had to close on the business before the end of the year 'cause there was only enough cash in the accounts to fund payroll through December. so I ended up buying that business and funding payroll for the first week of January sight unseen. I [00:28:00] d- I didn't make it to Oklahoma, uh, for the first time until the second week of January in 2020. So that was a, a hell of a deal, but I was pretty confident that I could work out, uh, the debt that the company had just deploying the skills that I'd accumulated through my career in law and doing those types of commercial transactions. And I had a vision for what I was gonna do with the company that, uh, really has come full circle now because we were just named the official saddle of the National Finals Rodeo this year, 2026. And I put it in my mind that week that I, that I had the meetings with our CFO in December of 2019 that we were going to achieve that. So pretty remarkable.
Riley: So when you walked into this thing and you're looking at $700,000 in debt, what, well, what information did you get from them as far as why the company ended up in that, that position?
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Uh, [00:29:00] its founder, Billy Cook, had become accustomed to a lifestyle and had been doing a certain volume of business that slowly began to evaporate. And so he began to leverage everything and, and then ultimately stopped paying for materials, which, uh, resulted in multiple bank loans, one a line of credit and one a secured note, and then, you know, debt to a bunch of vendors over the last several months while his health was declining and, and he wasn't really there to operate the business, get the products out, and make sure that he was maintaining quality control.
But the reputation of the company through the early 2000s had really been in decline, uh, for two reasons. Um, one, their other saddle manufacturers kinda came on the scene and became sorta in vogue, if you will. And he decided that he was going to compete on price instead of quality. So he was gonna stop making the best quality product, and he was just gonna try and sell a cheaper product to capture, uh, th-that segment of the market. Of course, he's, he's defeating himself by [00:30:00] doing that 'cause he's squeezing the margins out of the business for himself. And so that-- the series of, of, you know, outside factors and bad decisions is why it ended up where it did. And Billy was a tremendous saddle maker. Uh, I never met him, and so I don't wanna disparage him.
Uh, but, you know, my-- least towards the end of his, his life and career, my perspective is he wasn't the most astute businessman. I think he was definitely a visionary in terms of saddle making process, and he definitely revolutionized the saddle making world. I mean, I, I like to think of him, and other people have said this to me, that he was sort of the Henry Ford of saddle making. The epicenter of the saddle making industry in our country remains in Greenville, Texas, and Billy Cook was the first commercial saddle maker in that geographic area. Um, but he-- there was so much economic activity that was coming out of the saddle manufacturing business and his methods that he trained people on who then went to start their own shops and later honestly become his competitors all remain in Greenville today, you know, decades later.
So, you know, he had a huge impact on the industry, [00:31:00] but, you know, towards the end of his life, he wasn't making the best business decisions. And, uh, you know, it's unfortunate, but at the same time, it is fortunate because I don't think I would have been in a position to take over the company had I not found it in the condition that it was in.
Riley: How did the conversation go, man? 'Cause this thing you're talking about is a common thing we talk about on our podcast here, is this, the technician who's super good at his trade, but then he decides to start a business. He's, maybe he's not astute at business at all, you know, and so they, they're kind of, um, they're not the same skill set.
How did the conversation go when you present the company and the family with this, like, "Hey, the company's not in a healthy position. You can either just close it and take nothing, or I can purchase it or take it over"? How, how, how'd that all look, man? 'Cause sometimes the value of family kind of holds is higher than what the actual value of the company is.
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Well, the only representative of the family that I [00:32:00] spoke to before we did the deal was the attorney representing the estate. And so she was not necessarily emotionally connected, which I think was helpful, right? Um, and, you know, the numbers spoke for themselves, and what I was prepared to do was give them a little bit of cash and, you know, manage the debt, which otherwise would have fallen with the estate to put the company through bankruptcy and have to deal with it, and it would have come with tremendous cost to them.
So it was a pretty big swing, uh, in their direction if I came in and took over. And the other super important part of that is I think his family did recognize that he had good relationships with most of employees who had been there for decades and decades, and if they didn't do this deal, all of those people were gonna be out of work. So, you know, I, I, I like to think that that was, um, part of the equation
Riley: Now, you just said something that just is a question I have, um, manage the debt. So when you purchased the company, it sound... It, it... [00:33:00] Are you saying manage the debt as, as in you, you didn't take that on yourself? You, you whittled it down as a separate entity? Is that what you're... What, what'd that look like, I guess?
I'm trying to sort that out. What, what... 'Cause it- it's a bummer to buy, uh, buy $700,000 worth of debt, right? That's, uh
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: yes, but I recognized that the intellectual property had some real value, and that using my skills and my vision for the company, we could really turn it into something. So I mean, that, that debt just basically got factored into my basis, my purchase price for the company, right?
So it wasn't a cash exchange, but I became responsible for it. And then I went to the suppliers and I negotiated with them. I said: "Look, you know, there's two options here. We can figure out how to pay this off slowly, and you can continue to supply us and help us get into business, or we're gonna just have to find somebody else.
If you're gonna refuse to service us because of this historical debt and the hole that you helped the company get into by extending this credit to Billy, if you don't take any [00:34:00] responsibility for that, then we're not just g- we're not gonna be able to do business together. And yeah, you may end up forcing the company into bankruptcy, or you may just not get paid. Um, I'd rather work together." And nine out of 10 of the suppliers, you know, all worked with me, uh, and we sorted it out, and some of them got paid off in full, some of them didn't. Um, you know, there's a few that we still owe a couple of bucks to. It's only been five years in, and some of that was in the tens of thousands of dollars. Um, we're doing our best. You know, the-- If we hadn't been hit with the tornado, I'd like to think we would have paid everybody off. But in 2023, the company had its first profitable year under my leadership, and four months later, a tornado destroyed everything we had, and we had to rebuild from the ground up.
So it kind of set us back in terms of, uh, cash flow and operations.
Riley: Tell me again when you, you just said you, you purchased the company what year? I know you said it already, but I f-
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: December 27th, 2019
Riley: Okay, a 19. So it took you four years before you saw, or three and a half years before you saw the, the [00:35:00] first profit.
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: years. Yeah, three
Riley: Yeah
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: before the company was, uh, you know, in the black, so to speak
Riley: Nice, man. I mean, that's a fairly quick turnaround for a company in that, that rough a shape, right? Um, when, when this thing started to go profitable again, then you get hit with this tornado. So, uh, yeah, talk that... talk us through that experience. That's-- This is wild to me
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Yeah. So, I had a bunch of interesting things going on in my personal life that we'll save for another conversation, but I was already, like, in overwhelm, if you will, in early 2024. And I hadn't been to Oklahoma since January. I, I left to go early April. I spent two or three weeks there. I got back to Arizona. Everything was going well. It had felt good to be there. I really love being in Oklahoma, I should say. I just love the people. I love the community. Um, I got my-- some horses in my yard there. I bought a little farmhouse on, on a [00:36:00] couple acres outside of town when I first-- a couple months after I bought the business, so I c- had a place to stay when I went there. Um, and I just-- I really love being there. It's my happy place still to this day. And, uh, came back feeling really recharged and, um, feeling good, feeling better. The first quarter of the year had been kind of a drag for personal reasons. And I started to try and get back into some sort of normal routine in Arizona. And that Friday, got a call from my general manager that there were storms coming. And I should tell you that in the three and a half years that I had been involved with the business, I got calls like that all spring long for three years, and nothing ever happened, so I didn't worry too much about it. then, um, later that evening, about 11:30 my time, about 1:30 in the morning Oklahoma time, calls me back and tells me it's all gone. said, "What do you mean?" know, "Why are you calling me at this hour?" You know?
Riley: Yeah
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: "No, it's, it's all gone, brother. It's all gone." I said, I said, "Well, what are you saying?" He's like, "The factory, the warehouse, your office, everything, and the rest of [00:37:00] downtown Sulphur is all gone. It was a direct hit by a tornado." And I said, you know, "Holy shit." Pardon the
Riley: Yeah
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: un- that's unbelievable. Um, so a friend of mine who lives in Oklahoma, who lives in Sulphur, became a friend of mine shortly after I started spending time there. I got on the phone with him He verified it, uh, and we came up with a plan. He flew to Ar- Phoenix that Saturday, like the very next day. Like within hours, he was on his way to Oklahoma City to get on a plane. He flew to Phoenix. Um, we-- he came to my house. We hooked up a horse trailer with s- and we went to Walmart, and we bought a bunch of supplies and stuff because we knew people in town were hit and they're gonna need, you know, things. And we got on the road, and by Sunday morning, uh, we arrived in Sulphur, and I was on the scene and saw the devastation firsthand. Um, it was terrible. Uh, there was over three hundred structures that were a total loss, hundreds more that were damaged. People were displaced. Um, all of the historic downtown corridor in Sulphur, Oklahoma, was a total loss [00:38:00] and is still trying to recoup, recov-recover, uh, to this day.
So it was a very surreal experience, and I spent, uh, about two months straight in Oklahoma. Uh, only came back to Arizona for a couple of days at the end of May, um, which is another phenomenal story because I met my wife that Memorial Day weekend. Um, and, uh, I, I like to think that God rewarded me with her, uh, for not giving up when things were difficult. But, um, any rate, uh, I don't, I don't really know where to go from there. I mean, that begat a long process of just trying to figure out where we were gonna stage our operations. Were we gonna rebuild? Where were we gonna rebuild? How were we gonna rebuild? And ultimately, uh, we broke ground in August of 2024, and we were in the new building, although we hadn't finished the grounds around it by May of 2025. And, um, pretty well finished the grounds around it by November of last year, just about a year ago. So, um, it was a hell of a run. I spent a lot of time in Oklahoma while we were trying to [00:39:00] get that done. Um, but, um, all while this was occurring, you know, just continuing to s-stay the course and stay on the mission and make sure that our saddles were the best quality products on the market at the fairest price and trying to get them in front of the right people. And, uh, shortly after we got into our new factory, uh, we invited delegates of the Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association to come and tour our factory and consider us to be the next official saddle of the National Finals Rodeo. And in February of this year, they announced that they were giving that contract to us, and that is just so validating, um, of everything that we've done with the brand.
Riley: So in this time, you said August you broke ground and it was May before you had an up and running factory.
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Mm-hmm
Riley: What, what did that window of time look like for all the employees and for sales and, I mean, what, what happened there?
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: In June of '24, um, about two months after the tornado, um, I got [00:40:00] a s- temporary factory set up in a garage space that we rented right there in town, sort of in between where our old factory was and where our new factory ended up being, just coincidentally that it was there. Um, it was a very small space. We were only at about sixty percent of our peak production under my ownership, and which probably represents about twenty percent, thirty percent of what production looked like when Billy ran it, 'cause he was doing a volume business, and I slowed production down when I took over the business to focus on quality.
So I cut our production in half, uh, in order to make just a much better quality product. Um, and so we were just limping along, but it-- I needed to do that in order to be able to fund payroll. I want-- I made a
Riley: Right
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: to my people that I was gonna keep them employed, and it was uncomfortable. Uh, that garage was not heated or cooled, so they had to spend the summer of 2024 and they had to spend that winter cold.
And, um, you know, to their credit, they stuck with me as best they could. Um, there were days where we had to close early or open early in order to work around the weather [00:41:00] because, you know, that was just what we had to do. Uh, we, we were using borrowed equipment while we waited for, uh, the insurance money to come through and the new building get built, and so we could reinvest in n- newer, better equipment, which we have, have now done. Um, and it was a tough year. It was a tough year for all of us, um, you know, keeping that, um, temporary factory operating and trying to service our customers while also managing the reconstruction of the new facility, which was no small feat
Riley: So you, was anything salvageable from, from the tornado? I mean, any of your equipment, any... Were you able to dig out any of that from the wreckage?
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: We, we took a lot of stuff out of there, and some of the equipment we were able to refurbish. Um, it all got wet. Um, so what happened was we had a little complex of six small buildings in downtown Sulphur. Five of them were on the north side of the street, one was on the south side of the street. On the south side was my office.
It was a total [00:42:00] loss. On the north side, five of the six buildings, I'm sorry, four of the five buildings were a total loss. Um, that means roof gone, walls caved in, um, and in order to get in there, you had to have equipment to move debris to try and salvage through it. Uh, and then one of those buildings, the one on the very west side, um, remained standing, but the roof was blown off. Um, and so, uh, everything inside got wet. So we had, you know, there were some things that we took out of there, some history. You know, we, we saved a lot of our record books. They were just water damaged. Um, some of the inventory that we had in work we were able to save was water damaged. Um, some of the equipment that was on our downstairs level we got out of there was water damaged we had to have refurbished. Uh, but very sadly, um, we didn't get to salvage everything that wasn't blown away, uh, because there was some looting that occurred in the weeks after the tornado and, you know, at night we weren't able to man it and keep it protected. So we did lose a lot of [00:43:00] stuff, um, to theft, unfortunately. But, you know, we've rebuilt, and we're better for it now.
Um, we lost some of that history, but, um, I think we preserved some of the most important stuff.
Riley: That's wild to me that people are willing to, in a disaster like that, go loot, man. That's, it's just irritating. Yeah, it's irritating so much so. Um, Adam, when you're
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: I just pretend that they needed it worse than we did, you know? And
Riley: Yeah.
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: what it is
Riley: What, um, it, gosh, I guess maybe there's some truth to that, right? 'Cause those people, a lot of them maybe lived in that town and lost everything they own too, right? So
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: You never know.
Riley: yeah, you never know. What did the conversation look like when, okay, to the team, right? You're, you're having this conversation about everything's gone.
We're pulling the little bits and scraps that we can together. We found this other little temporary location. It's not hot or [00:44:00] heated or cooled. You know, uh, from a leader, what, what did this conversation look like to your team?
We designed SALT Electrolytes with a very important concept in mind, something we call counterparts. Minerals have very specific functions in your body, but those functions are one-sided. For example, sodium allows water into your cells where it stays until potassium comes along and lets it out. You know this as the sodium-potassium pump.
Calcium and magnesium work in a similar way, so we put both in our drinks. In our research, we came across data that showed us that nearly ninety-eight percent of athletes are deficient on iodine. This fact prompted us to use iodine in our formula, but it turns out you cannot absorb iodine properly without zinc present.
So what did we do? You guessed it, we added zinc. Every ingredient in our formula is paired with its [00:45:00] counterpart. Authentic SALT Electrolytes is the only electrolyte drink that prioritizes counterparts. Get some for yourself today at saltelectrolytes.com and feel what proper counterparts can do for you.
Go earn your salt
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Uh, a few days after the tornado and before we found that temporary space, uh, I had everybody who worked for me get together in the, uh, Sulphur Chamber of Commerce conference room, and we did have a-- I think we had two or three of those meetings over a period of a couple of weeks. But in the first one, I committed to them that none of them were gonna miss a paycheck, um, and that, you know, those of them who were able to help us salvage some things out of the building could o- help us operate the heavy equipment that we were renting, um, to, you know, sort of move the debris around and get to the things that might be worth keeping, um, would, would work and get paid in that capacity. And, you know, we have some [00:46:00] ladies who work for us who do a really good job. They're artisans. They do our tooling, and they do some of our stitching. They're not operating the heavy machinery and getting into that, and I understood that, and we just paid them to stay home and to wait because we knew they have families to feed, and we-- they couldn't be without a paycheck. Um, we, we w-- you know, the community was very generous. The local ch- a local church there raised some money and gave us a few thousand dollars. Initially, we set up a GoFundMe, and then I ultimately funded payroll for a couple of weeks just out of my own pocket, um, just because out of commitment to them, I knew if I could keep the band together, so to speak, we would still have something. Uh, and then, you know, it was about a month and a half, two months later that we figured out and got into that temporary facility and got everybody back to work in some capacity. Uh, and you know, there were meetings that occurred during that eight-month window when they were in that temporary facility, and it was uncomfortable where we had to figure out, okay, you know, instead of opening up at seven or eight o'clock in the morning, we're gonna open up at five thirty, you know, to get through August and the early part of September when it's really hot, and we'll just close early because this building doesn't have HVAC. [00:47:00] Uh, and you know, similar conversations like that had to occur in the wintertime. We had to bring in some heaters and stuff like that just to kinda keep it going and work shorter hours. but we did it. Everybody's showed their dedication to their craft and to the company, and I'm very, very grateful for that.
Riley: You're working with leather, right? So describe for those of us, including myself, who don't know what type of tooling you need for this. 'Cause I, I'm, I'm picturing hot and cold probably matters with those types of materials. I'm picturing, you know, uh, I guess maybe having a hard time picturing what, what equipment you use.
'Cause saddle's very different than like small leather craft, right? It's not just punches and- Yeah
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Uh, we have s- s- The only two parts of our saddle making process that are mechanized are, uh, cutting of the leather and stitching. Uh, we use a sewing machine, and we have a clicker press that cuts out some of the larger parts. Um, it's just safer and faster than [00:48:00] cutting by hand with a knife. Uh, everything else is done by hand. is done one of two ways. It's either stamped or carved. Um, and I should add that more recently we bought a laser engraver so that we can do lettering on trophy saddles and stuff. Um, but, uh, everything else is done by hand. And, um, I don't know that the temperature, you know, heat, hot and cold... I mean, certainly if it was like freezing, freezing, the leather wouldn't tool well.
But as long as it's, you know, a, a, a temperature that you don't ne- you know, need to have a fire to
Riley: Yeah.
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: I think the leather tool's okay. The only part of the process that's really temperature sensitive is at the end of the process some of our saddles get a hot oil treatment, and the oil has to be heated up.
But it... We have a heating apparatus that actually warms the oil before it's applied. So it didn't... The, the temperatures in the building didn't really impact our ability to operate as much as, you know, the fact that it was uncomfortable for the people, and also it was a much smaller space than we had been accustomed to operating out of, so we had less room to work with. [00:49:00] the... As far as tools, it was mostly hand tools. Uh, and then we have, of course, like a saddle horse, which is think of like a sawhorse, you know, that, uh, they use in construction that you just set the saddle on top of while you're building. It sits on there. lots of workbenches and, and, you know, little mallets and hammers and, stuff like that.
Riley: So did, were you able to keep your entire team through this?
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Yes, sir
Riley: Everybody's... That's amazing, man. Was there, was there, did, did you have to deal with any complaining or any, or was it just... I, I guess I'm
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: we deal with, uh, you know, anytime you're managing people, you're gonna deal with that. Uh, and I don't think that it-- There's, there's no... The, tornado itself and the aftermath of it, I think more than anything, everybody was really grateful to still have work, and they recognize there's a lot of people in the town who are worse off than them who didn't. So I, I-- No, I mean, we didn't really get [00:50:00] a-- I mean, yes, it was hot, it was cold, and we had to have meetings, and we had to adjust our schedule in order to do our best to, to make it workable for those few months. But, um, there wasn't a lot of complaining, honestly, about that. I, I gotta give them all credit. Um, they stuck together and understood the mission and, uh, you know, I'm really grateful.
We got a, a phenomenal team of artisans who are amazing craftspeople. They do a great job. Um, and you know, we're just continuing to refine our product every chance we get to make the best possible saddles and, and tack and other leather goods and accessories on the market. And, um, you know, we couldn't do it without them, so I'm
Riley: Yeah.
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: them.
Riley: Well, that's something when I, when I was reading up on your bio and, and heard the very abbreviated version of the story, it reminded me, I have ... In my hometown here in Boise, Idaho, we have a, a gun holster maker, and they make super high-end holsters. You know, they're, they're a couple hundred bucks for one [00:51:00] holster, and they're all handmade leather.
And, uh, I don't know if you ever heard of the company Milt Sparks, but they're legendary in the, in the holster community, right? And
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: of it, yep
Riley: yeah, so those guys, they put out a, a thing, I don't know. They usually have, like, a six-month wait. If you wanna order one of their holsters, you're gonna wait six months for that thing because they're made according to your specific, uh, firearm.
They are ... I'm, I'm kind of a, a, a nerd and a fan 'cause they're such nice equipment, right? But their whole stance was they're not going to ... They're, they're only gonna grow the company as quick as they can grow the artists, the actual leather makers, right? Because that's a, that's a super highly skilled trade.
And so talk, talk about that a little bit because you're, you're in that, right? You're in it, and, and it's not ... Gun holsters are, are a, a ... Yeah, it takes some skill to do that, but a saddle's a whole [00:52:00] another monkey, man. A lot more, lot more to do, uh, with the skill of the, of the actual maker.
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Yeah,
Riley: So
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Well, I don't think we're ever gonna grow in terms of greater volume, uh, for saddle production. Um, some of the people who have been with me have been, like, there since, you know, before Billy moved from Greenville to, to Sulphur, so we're talking decades, 30, 40 years of experience. And so my big issue is, is finding new talent to help make sure that we're able to perpetuate the craft as these folks decide that they wanna retire. And we actually recently, um, started to have to deal with that problem a little bit. Um, but my goal for the brand is to maintain sort of this, this, this sweet spot that we're in of building about 85 to 100 saddles a month that are just exactly as they should be, and, um, uh, make sure that that business supports itself, and that we can create a reputation that is strong enough that we can then grow our other product offerings into the leather [00:53:00] accessories like belts and wallets, which the company never really made or marketed before.
But there's a significantly greater market, uh, for than saddles. You know, everybody wears a belt or carries a wallet, but not everybody rides a horse in today's day and age. Um, and also into apparel, things that maybe we don't manufacture in-house, but we have made for us, the things like this hat that I'm wearing.
Um, I don't think you can see, but I'm wearing a Billy Cook T-shirt.
Riley: Yeah
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: um, and we're making, um, t- in our debut at the Cowboy Christmas in Las Vegas this December, we're gonna have a line of Western wear pearl snap shirts, and a polo, and some sweatshirts, and, um, graphic T-shirts, and things like that that are sort of lifestyle products, aspirational.
Whether you use our saddles or not, you're a fan of rodeo, you love the Western lifestyle, and it doesn't get more authentic than Billy Cook. And so that's really my business model for the business is we're gonna always be a saddle company, and we're always gonna make the best quality saddles on the market.
But the way that we're gonna grow is gonna be in these other product categories, because [00:54:00] I recognize that we would lose control of the quality if we tried to make more of them. And even if we did make more of them, we would ultimately be doing-- making the same folly that Billy did years ago, which we'd be cannibalizing our own business by putting too many saddles on the market, and having to lower the price, and pushing the margin out of the, out of the operation. So, uh, these other products that I think every-- that has a much broader appeal, particularly... You know, I could never have imagined that what has gone on in the world around me w- since I took over Billy Cook would occur, but the Western lifestyle and country Western music have become cool again, and pop culture is really gravitating towards this stuff.
So the market is really ripe, particularly with our affiliation with the PRCA as the official saddle of the National Finals Rodeo, to merchandise and leverage the power of our brand to make products that have a appeal to people who don't, you know, more than those who just own horses.
Riley: Yeah, man. You, you, you've mentioned it several times that stripping the margin out of a, out of a company, [00:55:00] right, out of the product, and you're moving it back to this high quality, higher margin, lower volume kind of place. And, and sometimes business owners, man, I think that scares them. You know, it's, uh... We never like to have someone tell us no because, "Oh, your, your stuff's too expensive."
But that's the conversation, in my opinion, we should be having. We should be being told no, that we're too expensive sometimes
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Yeah. Well, you know, uh, there's an expression, same buddy of mine, Marcus, who flew to Arizona and drove back to Oklahoma with me immediately after the tornado, uh, he, he says it to me all the time, particularly when people are talking about our saddles. He says, um, what's the expression? Um, good, good shit ain't cheap and cheap shit ain't cool or something like that or something.
Riley: Ain't good? Yeah. Yeah, you bet
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: so, or no, cool shit ain't cheap and cheap shit ain't cool.
Riley: There you go
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: you know, we- we're s- we, we price our saddles so that they're as affordable as they can [00:56:00] possibly be and still have, you know, we can be profitable. Because again, for me growing up, the saddles meant so much that I don't ever want someone not to be able to have the product just because they can't afford it.
But of course, if you can afford to own a horse and feed a horse and maintain a horse, you gotta be able to afford a few thousand dollars for a good saddle. And we're making a saddle that is there. I mean, we're not making a 7 or $10,000 product. We're making a 4, 5, maybe $6,000 if you get all the bells and whistles. And, you know, that is, you know, pretty reasonable in today's market. For an American-made saddle that's made by hand, uh, and you know, is gonna last and do the job the way that ours do, fit a horse the way it should, be comfortable for the rider, uh, that's a, that's as good a value as is on the market today, and I think we're offering a better product than, than anything else out, that's out there.
So I'm really proud of that, and we're gonna continue to do that. And of course, you know, we have all these other cost pressures with the increase in diesel fuel, which increases all of our shipping costs for the materials that we bring in, um, et cetera, et cetera, all that inflation and all this, [00:57:00] our prices are gonna have to go up a little bit, but that's not unique to our business.
I mean, it's happening in every industry.
Riley: Every one of them, yeah. Yeah, we'll talk about that a little bit. So you hear that a lot in the business world about the lamenting of, "Oh, the prices are going up and it's stealing my margins." But man, what's your solution to that?
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Uh, we just have to increase our prices periodically. Um, I've tried not to do more than two a year, you know, one in the summer and one in-- at the beginning of the year. Um, and there have been several years where I didn't raise prices. I think 2022, 2023, I, I didn't raise prices at all. Um, or I'm sorry, 2023, 2024, I didn't raise prices at all because our production volume was so low.
I needed to make sure that everything we were building was getting sold, um, you know, while we were in that temporary facility. But, um, you know, we, we just try to stay dynamic, and we have dealers, you know, a significant portion of our business is wholesale, and it becomes challenging making sure that they're raising the prices that [00:58:00] they advertise when we do our price increases because we don't wanna dilute the brand by their aged inventory being priced less than what we're offering now because it's virtually the same product anyway. and so, you know, that's something that we have to manage, but, uh, it's manageable. It's just something that you have to do. It's business. And I saw-- You know, I know-- I am personally not on any social media, but my wife is, and she showed me a recording, I think it was on Instagram couple, couple of days or maybe a week ago, and it was a guy discussing how in business, uh, it's a series of problems, and if you're ever waiting for things to be calm or you get frustrated by those problems, then being an entrepreneur is not for you. And, you know, I just kind of intuitively have known that from all my experience doing everything that I've done in the year-- over the years, um, I just accept it. You know, there's new challenges every day. You can't always predict what they are, and you just have to stay dynamic and flexible and open-minded and learn to love it. Uh, and I do. Honestly, I do. I love running the saddle business. I love everything we're doing with the company. [00:59:00] Um, and before we run out of time, Riley, there's something else that I do really wanna touch on, which is part of the economic recovery effort for Sulphur, Oklahoma, is the Sulphur Stampede, uh, rodeo and concert series that we started.
We had our inaugural event in the May of 2026. It's gonna become an annual deal. And, uh, that's something else that I had never done anything like that before. I never produced a rodeo. I never produced a concert. But we built an arena adjacent our factory, um, for the purpose of drawing, uh, customers to our showroom because when we were in downtown Sulphur, we had a showroom, and we got a reasonable amount of foot traffic that we sold, you know, little trinkets.
Once I started, uh, with the business, we began to make coasters and belts and wallets and things out of leather that, you know, people who are visiting Sulphur might wanna take home as a, you know, as a tourist or whatever. But now that we rebuilt the factory outside of downtown and there's really no downtown left We needed to create a draw that would get people to walk through our showroom.
And so we [01:00:00] built an arena that ultimately cost us a lot more than I had initially budgeted. And so once it became a bigger project, I decided we were gonna do something even bigger with it. It wasn't gonna just be to bring, you know, traffic through our showroom, but it was gonna be to create a draw for all of Sulphur and be an economic, you know, driver for the revitalization of the entire community. And so the Sulphur Stampede is something I'm super proud of, and we're working on a pro- on a collegiate rodeo crossover program that will incentivize collegiate athletes to participate in our rodeo next year. So, um, super excited about that. And again, uh, the reason I bring this up at this part of the conversation is, like, you ta- wanna talk about challenges and problems that you hadn't considered, try producing an event like this with no experience.
Riley: No, so
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: I I, never imagined its, its bathrooms and its sanitation stations and its, its, uh, security fencing and its ushers and its, you know, managing all the vendors who [01:01:00] come into space and getting the band there. Once the band comes, you gotta rent a stage for them, and you gotta have generators. And, uh, these are all things that, like, I should have anticipated.
I didn't. I was learning on the fly, and, uh, very blessed the weather held out for us. We had a tremendous event in May. I'm expecting another tremendous event this coming May. I think it'll grow by leaps and bounds very quickly. Um, but yeah. I mean, you just have to, you know, embrace the suck, as they say.
Riley: Well, I'm... Yeah, man. So my daughter, she's a, she's a high-level fiddle player, right? So she cruises all over the country and, and plays fiddle in these contests, and lots of events like you're talking about. But she, uh, she, this last, or, well, year before last, decided to put on her own contest, right? And it's the same things, man.
All the stuff she didn't anticipate. The merchandise, and the vendors, and like you said, and the, the stage, and then all of a sudden the sound equipment, and renting a facility, and all the, the stuff that comes up with it. Talk [01:02:00] about the, um... That's a part of entrepreneurship, right? You said, "I should have anticipated it, but I didn't."
But you, you did this thing anyways, right? And, and you walked into it and realized there was a lot more to it than you had originally thought, but you weren't turned off by that. Talk about that experience.
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: not even a little bit. I mean, I think that, uh, you know, new things is part of life. Uh, it's part of growth. It's part of, you know, your own consciousness and your, your own experience on Earth. Um, it's how you make new friends. It's how you get better at the things that you like to do. So, uh, I don't shy away from that in any facet of my life
Riley: When this... So you've built this arena. Is it, uh, do you do one event there a year or are you doing multiple events there a year? Are you letting other people do events there? What's the, what's
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: I am only gonna produce the one event there a year. And initially, I [01:03:00] expected that we would rent the facility out for other events. But what I have learned very quickly is that if you let somebody come in and produce an event at your facility, and it's intended to draw spectators, you are diluting the, um, potential spectator pool that will come to your event later because for two, for two reasons. One, they've already been there, done that, and they may not distinguish one event from the other. And so if you do it, you know, multiple times a year at the same property, like somebody who comes to an event, let's say w- whoever did an event at our facility in February, why would they come again in May? It wouldn't be a priority for them. And two, you run the risk that they're going to produce a subpar experience, and that that would hurt you even more because word could get out that whatever goes on at that arena isn't cool, isn't fun, isn't safe, whatever. And so I have decided that we are doing other events, but not other spectator events at the facility throughout the course of the year. So we'll do like [01:04:00] jackpot ropings and things like that that are geared towards the contestants, and only people that I know and trust are gonna be, you know, have access to produce those events there. And there's a handful of people that I'm working with to produce some of these smaller things. But the Sulfur Stampede is designed to be as much for the participants as it is for the spectator.
It's really intended to draw a crowd. And I'm gonna, I'm gonna make sure that I maintain control over that so that we develop the reputation of the arena and the facility in such a way that it's something that people look forward to going to and wanna come back.
Riley: Yeah, that's interesting 'cause there you go again, right? You're, you're, um, taking the volume down, but the quality level up and making sure you monitor that pretty close. So again, common thread of sounds like just your personality, man. It sounds like that's a, that's a part of who you are, huh?
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: I guess.
Riley: It's... Well, we, we do that, right? We, y- you see that in people, and then the fruit of what they do tends to show who they really are. And a lot of times [01:05:00] people have claims about, "Well, I'm this, I'm a high quality this, I'm a high quality this," but everything they do is crap, you know? And you're, well, you can say the words, but, uh, put your money where your mouth is.
And it sounds like you've done that. I mean, I'm hearing that again over and over and over again. That's what's happening. So fascinating story, dude. I, I just, I dig it. So what, what now?
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Uh, right at the moment we are on two tracks. We are p- beginning to prepare for the Sulfur Stampede event in May, the second annual stampede, which, uh, we are expanding from a two-day to a three-day event. Uh, and then all of our energy in the factory... I say we, my wife and I are working on planning the stampede together with, uh, the rodeo production company that we worked with for the first event. But inside the factory and everything that's going on with Billy Cook Proper right now is geared towards getting to Las Vegas. We're building those national championship saddles. We're building those average winter saddles that we have to deliver to the PRCA for, you know, to maintain our status as the official saddle of the National [01:06:00] Finals Rodeo. And we are building our inventory and sourcing those things that we're not building ourselves, like the hats and the jackets and things that we don't make in our leather shop, uh, to go to Cowboy Christmas and make our debut at that shopping expo that coincides with the National Finals Rodeo in Las Vegas at the Las Vegas Convention Center. And, uh, again, learning a lot. Never been to a retail, uh, trade show before. Uh, the company has never been. I have never been. We've been to wholesale trade shows. It's a much different animal. The volume of inventory that we have to bring is exponentially greater, which has impacted our cash flows throughout the course of this entire year. Um, but I'm hoping that it really pays off for us. I think that this is our opportunity to show the world that we're gonna be more than just a saddle company, because it's more than just the horse-owning demographic that attends the rodeo and goes to Cowboy Christmas. And as I mentioned earlier, I really think that the time is ripe for it. Um, the pop culture is moving and gravitated towards the Western and country lifestyle. And, um, the-- I, again, [01:07:00] I couldn't have imagined it, but like I said earlier, I know that I'm on the right track because all of the indicators are, you know, as, as in the Matthew McConaughey book, "Green Lights," it's like these are just green lights, man.
Like, just keep going. You're getting it right. This is-- You're onto something here. So, um, that's what I'm doing.
Riley: It's cool as crud. Will you talk about marketing, man? 'Cause you're, you're doing some things that folks wouldn't, they wouldn't intuitively think of, right? This arena's got me-- It's fascinating to me because it's this project that you've built. You put a lot of money and time and invested into building this thing, and it's, it really is a marketing ploy.
It's a long game though, right? 'Cause it's-- Man, it created its whole other, this whole other, um, whole other arena, no pun intended, pun intended,
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Yeah
Riley: of, of business that you can produce through that, right? It's, uh, it's the same reason that, that this podcast exists, right? It's the long, long game for me to get my electrolyte product, [01:08:00] to get the message out for that.
But
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Sure
Riley: I'm sitting here like, man, I'm rubbing shoulders with all these really cool people. I might as well be talking to them and learning some stuff from them, too, and that's, you know, that's why we're talking today. But it's a,
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: I
Riley: it's, the long play. It's the other part of the marketing that I, I think people overlook sometimes.
And instead of just selling saddles, you've got a whole another thing going there.
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Yeah, absolutely. You know, for me, the Sulphur Stampede is about creating a destination rodeo to help, you know, bring in tourism dollars to Sulphur and help encourage people to reinvest and rebuild that community. Um, it's definitely gonna pay off for the Saddle Company long term, I have no doubt. Um, same with the National Finals Rodeo.
I mean, it's, y- you-- it's, it's a marketing exercise. It's as much a branding exercise as it is a marketing exercise. We don't do a lot of, like, paid advertising, which is what I think of when I think of marketing. But what I am doing is reaching out to people like yourself and trying to get exposure this way through podcasts and other, uh, you know, sorta earned [01:09:00] media rather than paid media, and, uh, tell the story 'cause I think it's a story that's worth telling.
I mean, per-- you know, my story may or may not be interesting, but the Billy Cook story as, you know, an undeniable American legacy is, um, something that I want people to hear and know about and appreciate and know that, like, in small towns across America, there's per- people who work really hard to build products that are really cool, and that's something that every American can be proud of.
Riley: Yeah, man, I think, I think you're, you're just onto something there 'cause I... Everything from, again, lower volume, higher quality, I think people are hungry for that these days, man. There's so much just cheap Chinese bullcrap out there that we,
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Yeah
Riley: see, and you just get sick of replacing it every so often when you can buy something like what, what you guys are building, and it's a lifetime thing.
You pass it on to your kids and their kids, and I think, again, I think people are hungry for that.
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Absolutely
Riley: yeah, man. Hey, this point in the podcast, I generally will switch [01:10:00] to some questions that are a little bit, little bit more personal about you, a little bit, uh, kind of a rapid fire type of a, type of a setting.
Are, are you game to
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: But
Riley: do that with me?
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: to do it.
Business owners, I wanna talk to you for a second. Do you have a retail space inside your location? If so, I want you to think about something. Your customers are buying electrolytes. You know that, right? The problem is they're not buying them from you. Well, Salty Electrolytes can help fix that with their wholesale program.
They can bring these sales to you in-house so that your customers get the electrolytes they love from the company they love, you. All you have to do is head over to goearnyoursalt.com and scroll to the bottom of the page and click Apply for Wholesale. Do it now before you forget. I know your type. I'm one of you.
Once again, that's goearnyoursalt.com. The link is at the bottom of the homepage. There will also be a link in the description on this video. And now, my friends, go earn your [01:11:00] salt
Riley: So the title of this podcast is the Go Earn Your Salt podcast, just like my shirt says here. When you hear that term, go earn your salt, what comes to mind?
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Uh, get out there and make it happen for yourself
Riley: Yeah. What, uh, what advice would you have for other people to help them earn their SALT?
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Uh, I would say that anything in life worth doing is gonna be difficult. So if it, if it's tough, uh, just kinda keep your head down and keep moving forward and have some patience and trust the process. you know, I'm a, I'm a gym rat when I'm not riding my horses. That's the only other hobby I have, is working out.
And so, you know, I think earn your salt like your sweat. Like, you gotta, you gotta break a sweat in order to earn the benefits are of what you're trying to achieve
Riley: Yeah, man. Your favorite pastime. You've mentioned horses a [01:12:00] lot, but do you have anything else there that you, you, you like to do?
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Uh, I love horses. I love hiking, uh, like camping once in a while, particularly if I get to tie my horse to a tree and, or turn them out in a, in a pasture somewhere near with a campsite. Uh, love spending time with my wife and with my son and, uh, yeah, I guess that's about it. Hanging out with my buddies and busting each other's chops is always fun too.
Riley: It's always a good time, man. Um, what is something quirky about you that, that people don't know?
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Oh, goodness. Uh, you'd have to ask my wife that question. I don't know. Something quirky about me. Uh, I don't know. I watch a lot of Seinfeld. I, I
Riley: Yeah
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: asleep watching Seinfeld reruns almost every night. I think the best day of my life was when Seinfeld came out on Netflix, and you had access to all of them
Riley: Man, there's some freaking fantastic one-liners in there that you can steal and use forever, huh?
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: But I love it
Riley: [01:13:00] Oh, that's awesome, man. Uh, Adam, what's your, what's your favorite naughty food? You said you're a gym rat, so you're paying attention, but what's your favorite naughty food
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: ice cream, although I eat-- Now they make these protein ice creams that you can pick up at like Sprouts or Whole Foods that, uh, I get down on. Um, and I like to eat pizza. My son is a big pizza eater. He's three years old now, so that's sort of an indulgence that he and I get into when-- every time I, uh, every time I have visitation with him
Riley: Oh, man, I agree with both of those. Those are both, both good. Do you have a nickname?
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Uh, I've got several,
Riley: Yeah
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: in the hor- in the horse community that I grew up in, they call me Flash
Riley: Flash. Okay, tell us, tell us about this. Where'd that come from?
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: I wish I could tell you how I got that nickname. To this day, they won't tell me why they gave it to me. I s- I suspect it was because the first couple summers I was there and I had s- chores to do, I did them really slow, but nobody's ever fessed up to how I earned that nickname
Riley: Or did you just have the largest belt buckle that people, people [01:14:00] called you Flash for that reason?
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: that, that
Riley: I love it.
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: it. Uh,
Riley: Adam, what's-
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: my law firm, uh, in, at the Rose Law Group, they call me the Law Horse.
Riley: The, the wild horse?
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: No, the, the Law Horse.
Riley: The law horse. Well, that had to come from somewhere too. Is it just because of the interest in horses?
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Uh, yeah, I, my, my law practice, I marketed myself pretty heavily in the equine community, which was just a natural for me because it was where, you know, I was living in a reg- a relatively equestrian-dominated neighborhood in Cave Creek at the time, and obviously horses were my personal interest, so I was just trying to pick up law clients in, in that realm. Um, and my colleagues gave me that nickname
Riley: Man. What, uh, what's been the most valuable learning experience in your life?
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Mm-hmm. Uh, the most valuable learning. Goodness, there's so many. I don't know. Uh, to-- That's a relative question. Uh, but probably, you know, s- [01:15:00] po- post-tornado, uh, really trying to understand the mindset that my grandfather had that made him so successful both in business and in life, and trying to understand what traits that he had that I have, it, you know, naturally. And then, you know, through some spiritual exploration and readings and listenings, um, trying to, um, figure out what his formula was beyond those traits that I h- that I was born with, and how I can cultivate those other traits. And that's just sort of some self-teaching because, I mean, my grandfather was just really good at life. Uh, he, he maintained close friendships with lots of great people. He had incredible charisma. He was successful in all of his endeavors. Uh, everybody looked up to him and relied on him. And so, you know, uh, he was my, my biggest role model, my biggest mentor. And so the last couple of years, I've really just been trying to cultivate more of that in myself. And so, um, that journey has been an [01:16:00] interesting one. Um, and I'm very grateful that I have a wonderful wife now that I told you I met just shortly after the tornado. Uh, took a long time for me to find her. I'm gonna keep her forever now, and she's very supportive of all those things. And sometimes she laughs at me when I take myself too seriously, and she's sure to point it out when, uh, I get it right.
Riley: Oh, man. Good answer. You, uh, I, my next question was gonna be who's influenced you the most in your life? That sounds like your grandfather
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Oh, without a doubt. Uh, my grandfather, Alvin Trank, was the single biggest influence on my life. And as I mentioned at the start, you know, my parents' divorce was rough on me when I was younger, but if it hadn't been for that, I don't know that he and I ever would've gotten as close as we did. And, uh, he was just-- he was, he was the best
Riley: So cool. Adam, what's a, what's an item on your bucket list? Something you wanna, wanna do before it's all over?
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: I wanna go ride horses and eat steak in Argentina.
Riley: Yeah?
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Yeah, they
Riley: What
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: cool ho- uh, horse and [01:17:00] ranching culture down there in South America. I've never been. Uh, it's someplace I really wanna go. And, uh, if I do it right, I'll bring a bunch of saddles and either hand them out or sell them while I'm down there.
Riley: Oh, that's cool. That's cool, man. Uh, favorite book
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Uh, Bill Bryson's Brief History of Everything is a, is a good one that sticks with me that I read many, many years ago. Um, but I also really like The Alchemist. I don't know if you've ever read
Riley: Yep.
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: I
Riley: You're like the fourth person to recommend The Alchemist on the podcast
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Yeah, that's a phenomenal read. Um, trying to think anything else that I might have read recently. Honestly, for the last year or so, I haven't done nearly as much reading as I did for many years before that. I've just been so busy, and as my son has gotten older and more mobile, what, you know, it's n-not as much downtime, particularly when I have him. Um, but yeah, I think those, those two books stand out both as a nonfiction and as a fiction book.
Riley: That's good stuff, dude. Well, listen, man, um
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: I really, really, [01:18:00] like Jack London for fiction reading, uh, White Fang and The Call of the Wild, uh, Steinbeck's The Red Pony. I like some-- I like those classics that, you know, are about animals, I guess,
Riley: I just read Call of the Wild
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: relationship. Did
Riley: Just
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Any-anything about animals or, or and their perspective or people's relationship with animals, I, I really like that.
In fact, listening to, uh, with my son, we haven't finished it yet, but the audiobook for Black Beauty, um, and, and surprisingly, he's, he's pretty into it. We listen to it when we're in the car. So I gu- I guess I've always kind of gravitated towards those kinds of stories.
Riley: Sure. That makes sense to me, man. Well, talk about, uh, tell, tell us this, where, where can you be found?
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Uh, and @genuinebillycook on Instagram to find us online. Uh, our shop is in Sulphur, Oklahoma. If you Google Billy Cook Sulphur, Oklahoma, our address should come up, but it's 2632 Kohler Road. The Sulphur Stampede will be occurring from May 6th to May [01:19:00] 9th, 2027, and if you live anywhere in the country, please come on out.
If you're gonna s- stay somewhere, stay at the Artesian Hotel & Casino, which is one of our sponsors. Uh, we're gonna have some of the best rodeo action that you can get in rural Oklahoma or anywhere for that matter, uh, and we're gonna have some great music playing and a kid zone and all kinds of fun stuff. And then, um, more importantly than that, if you are a fan of rodeo and make your way to Las Vegas for the NFR, which occurs from December 3rd to December 13th of this year, 2026, then come and find us. Uh, our booth will be at the Cowboy Christmas event at the Las Vegas Convention Center, and we're super, super excited to be there. Um, very anxious to roll out all these new product offerings that we're gonna have that haven't hit the market before, and we hope that, uh, they're very well received. And, uh, yeah, like us on, on Instagram or follow us on Instagram or whatever you're supposed to do.
Riley: Whichever one of those things it is, man.
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: But,
Riley: Well, there's...
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: or
Riley: It...
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: go to the website and shop.
You
Riley: Yeah
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: buy a wallet if you don't have a horse. If you got a horse, look for a [01:20:00] saddle. If you don't see something that you like, know that we have a full, uh, custom capacity, so anything that you can dream up in terms of a Western saddle for any Western riding discipline, we will make it, uh, exactly to your specifications in terms of tooling patterns, colors, size, shape, et cetera. Um, we've got a great team, and, uh, we would love to have your business
Riley: That's amazing, man. Did you-- Fascinating story. Really enjoyed the interview. Thank you for coming on the show, man. It's... I'm glad you approached me, 'cause I, I, I really enjoyed
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Riley,
Riley: it. Yeah
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: Uh, I really appreciate you taking the time to speak with me and giving us the opportunity to tell this story, and I hope that our paths cross again sometime soon. And if, uh, you make it to Oklahoma for the stampede in May, you'll be our guest. Reach out to me and I'll make sure you get in and get a good seat
Riley: Oh, that's awesome, man. Appreciate you, Adam. Go earn your salt, my friend
Adam Trenk, CEO Genuine Billy Cook: All right. You too, brother.
Hey, you've just finished up this episode and I wanna know, are you or someone you know a getting after it, go earn your salt type of person? If so, [01:21:00] message me directly on Instagram at the Go Earn Your Salt podcast and perhaps we can have you on the show. Also, if you like this content, leave us a review, subscribe, and share with your friends, and perhaps this podcast can help you and them go earn your salt