Dormant Industries and the Opportunity to Innovate with Deck the Door Decor | EP. #183

Tucker Hiegel 00:03
The way that we decided how a kick plate should be turned out to be better than all the other ones on the market.

Andrew Maff 01:02
Hello, everyone, and welcome to another episode of the E comm show as usual. I'm your host, Andrew Maff, and today I am joined by the amazing Tucker Hiegel, who is the CEO and co-founder over at deck the door decor. Tucker, how you doing, buddy? You ready for good show?

Tucker Hiegel 01:16
I'm good, man, I'm ready. How about you?

Andrew Maff 01:17
Doing good. Super appreciative of you doing this with us. Super excited to talk to you. Obviously, you and I have been talking for a little while so so everyone knows I've I know you a little bit more so than some of the guests I have on the show that just surprised me that day of so I know a little bit of a background, but I still kind of like starting these off pretty stereotypically, and kind of give you the floor. Tell us a little bit about your background, how you got started with Deck the door, and we'll take it from there.

Tucker Hiegel 01:42
Cool. Yeah.So I'll try to make sure I don't ramble, because, as you already know, I have a tendency to kind of

Andrew Maff 01:50
it's good, man. It makes my job easier.

Tucker Hiegel 01:54
Well, so there's, it's a pretty wild story how we got started. And there's a full video about the whole story. If you want to hear all the nitty gritty details. Since that exists, I will try to keep it short. Essentially, we got started. So deck the door decor is our company. That's our brand name. We're a small door hardware manufacturer in St Louis, Missouri, and so we make everything in house right here, just on the other side of this wall, ship all over the country, and we're launching internationally. I'm thinking in June. That's the goal, at least. Who knows nice the way that we got started. We focus primarily on door plates right now. But hence the name, the brand name. We intend to move into more lines of hardware, but we ended up focusing on door kick plates, mainly because my mom is kind of an eclectic like designer, had this idea to customize a kick plate and just did it willy nilly with stuff she had laying around the house. She was actually prepping the backyard for featuring Better Home and Garden magazine, and so she was trying to cover up at the bottom of the door. That was, like, the garage entry. Yeah, she was, like, all worried about it. Didn't want it to be on camera. So that was the inspiration behind this kick plate that she made with, like, paint and stencils and stuff, right? And it just turned into, like, we would have company over. People would ask her where she got it, which turned into, will you make me one? And and then we had a lady who actually owned a custom lamp shade company. Who was like, You guys need to turn this into a business. So that's kind of the long and short of it is, at the time, I was kind of graduating college, so I put we started in 2013 and it was a lot of R&D to figure out how to make a good kick plate, how to all the manufacturing processes. How do we modify plates in a uniform way so that we have a, you know, reliable, repeatable product that consumers can expect, quality, all that kind of stuff. And then a lot of stuff happened along the way. I brought on a new business partner, finally, in 2020 and we had our whole range of struggles, but when I brought her on, Monica, as our Chief Operations Officer, it was just night and day difference, and so we ended up having to carry all this back stock of just like regular blank kick plates ready to be modified by modifying like we engrave people's home address or a monogram or family. You know, Hiegel family established in 2019, that kind of stuff, business logos for corporations, car dealerships, stuff like that. But we ended up having all this blank inventory. And I was like, man, like, this stuff is just sitting here. We got all this money and wrapped up and all these plates that are just sitting here. Yeah. I was like, so let's list it on Amazon. Right? I had put all of our R and D into figuring out how to modify kick plates, and kind of I did not realize I didn't do any, like real research into how to make a kick plate. And it turns out that we make the best kick plates,

Andrew Maff 05:40
happy accident,

Tucker Hiegel 05:42
The German or, like, weird, you know, that comes from growing up. You're going to do something, do it right? But like, just in the way that me and my brother, who's a master fabricator, he's our Head of Production, the way that we decided how a kick plate should be turned out to be better than all the other ones on the market. So, and we didn't know, man, that's not what we were setting out to do, yeah. But so anyway, we ended up listing all of our back stock inventory on Amazon, and that's what really started to scale for us. So yeah, where we're at today is, you know, riding the Amazon train and then, yeah, ways to expand above that, which hopefully you're going to help us do. I think we got a good plan for that.

Andrew Maff 06:28
So that's the goal. For context, for some of the listeners we've been talking about helping with diversification, because obviously everyone and their mother knows that I'm not the world's biggest fan of being reliant on Amazon. But so family run business, man. So, you know, mom comes up with the idea more or less accidentally. You run the business. Your brother's the fabricator. What's, what's that like? I've worked with family before. I don't know that I would do it again

Tucker Hiegel 06:55
Yeah, so I've heard that we've got, we've got a long lineage of family businesses in our on both sides of the family, my mom and my dad's side, and both, both of them have, I would say, like turbulent and tumultuous for those companies, For extraneous circumstances and then the the obvious of working with family and egos and that the power struggles and poor communication and just all the stuff, right? Yeah, our family is kind of in a weird mix, because just timeline wise, like when I was born, my family had like a farming empire in Arkansas that collapsed. So my mother grew up with a way different lifestyle than what I grew up with. So, like, I started this whole company with nothing on credit cards, whereas, you know, her family, she was supposed to have an inheritance, and you know, it was a farm, so it collapsed, and there was nothing left. And so, like, you know, she grew up with a certain kind of lifestyle that I have yet to see, hopefully. So so that kind of made a different setting, where, I would say, internally, our family had a whole lot of struggle outside of business, before we ever started to work together and in, again, not by just by proxy, we ended up working through a lot of those struggles, and we work together very well now at the age we're at, so I would say that we have worked on stuff that most families never will. You know, yeah, and that's probably the leg up on working with family. Now here's the other thing. If we're all first. It's me and my brother, so we're all of the same generation. There's no like dad built the business, and he thinks it should be this way, and my brothers are young and dumb, and we think we should do it this. We don't have any of that also.

Andrew Maff 09:17
Yeah, that's good. One of the things I was thinking about, especially when you and I first started talking the, you know, it's a kick plate, like, you see them all the time, but you don't really think anything about it. You don't like, I never walk by one and go like, Oh, why isn't that better looking like? It's just never. One of the things that you think about. I know that you more or less coined that term, like, was utilitarian art, right? So, like, where do you kind of, where did you figure out that there doesn't necessarily need to be a line between functionality and design, and that you can have it kind of both ways?

Tucker Hiegel 09:55
Well, that may just be like, again, like an odd. Mix of the people who started the company. So my mom's super eclectic, yeah, and my dad's side is very analytical. And I'm kind of a weird mix of the two. So, those are two different trains of thought, schools of thought that are mixed together within there. But some we started the company with the focus more on the artistic side, yeah. And as we grew and as we were figuring out how to do stuff, we and it, we initially started off subcontracting manufacturing to other local companies, like we've always made our products have always been made and sourced in the USA, but not always by us. And I have a degree in business life. More familiar that was, like my area when I was starting the company with my mom, was like, figuring out how we do this, yeah, which initially just turned into plates that people would want, you know, and like when we first started, black hardware was really in. Nobody would touch brass, you know. So it was like trying to figure out what people wanted and how kick played should be. It's a weird niche that was just a big gap in the market that we found out. So one of the things that we designed was the 3m That's trademarked as the stick and kick adhesive mount, door kick plate, yeah, and those are really hard to find. I think there's a couple other companies that offer them, but they're real hard to find. Not too many companies even offer it, and if they do, they use, like, cheap, off brand adhesive. And you know, it's, like, made in China type stuff, yeah. So that's one of our best selling products. Is the 3m adhesive mount. Another one of our products is this, these dog scratch door protection plates, I don't know, yeah, like, that's some of the paw prints engraved on there.

Andrew Maff 12:07
And so that's, that's for the people that are just listening. That's the, it's like, the part that goes, like, directly under the door handle for the most part, which tends to be where most dogs just go to town, if, if you're leaving them locked in somewhere,

Tucker Hiegel 12:23
yeah, yeah. So it's vertical. It goes right under the doorknob. We sell it in all different sizes, but it's got, you know, it's kind of hard to tell, but so it's got radius cut corners and beveled edges so dog can't catch their paw on it. It's adhesive mounts. You don't have screws, smart screw heads sticking out. So all of that is kind of utility baked in on like, what's the best product? Because all these other people are just flooding the market with overseas junk. That's all low cost leader, so we can't compete with that. So really the only option was like, well, we have to make the best one then, because we can't meet price, yeah. And so those different manufacturing steps have helped cross that bridge between, like, utility. It's strange because the whole product started off as it's just a utilitarian, like, it's almost a commodity. Like, if you're going to have a door, you have to have a door knob, you know, if you're smart and you don't want to replace the door or repaint the door, because repainting door sucks, then you should get a kick late too, right? Yeah. So it's, it's one of those weird products, like you were saying that everybody knows what it is, but not off the top of their head. It's like a background tertiary, unaware of it. But if you've ever seen a kick plate on a door, like it's kind of a statement piece too. I mean, it takes up a big piece of the door. They work great. They save the door from damage. They do all this stuff. But it's like it's this big billboard thing that it could be so much more than what it is. Man, like our the first set of kick plates I ever sold, I have the check framed on our office over here is from a local Volvo dealership that I actually helped build, and so they bought some all for the showroom, so that I was like, if you know utilitarian, commercial, industrial, kick plates are always just to make the place not look bad and hide, yeah, areas. And it's like, well, you could always put your logo on that or use it for like OSHA signage they require, yeah? Well, if you're already paying for this thing to put on the door, why buy a separate sign that says exit and clutter everything up? So like, yeah, yeah, it's just an opportunity to do things a little bit different.

Andrew Maff 14:58
Yeah. You know, it's, it's interesting. Thing, because, you know, this, all this stuff kind of ties into, like, I end up just beating a dead horse with saying this stuff over and over again. But like, you know, to your point of, you're a clear example of a product that there's just so much overseas competition coming in with, like, cheap versions of them that just don't last and but doesn't really come off that way, as obvious on something like an Amazon so they're, you know, they're getting the sales, and they are the least expensive. But then you get the product, and you're like, Great, I'm going to have to order this damn thing again in a month, because it's going to break like, one of my favorite terms is cheap is expensive. You get something cheap, you end up having to bind it over and over again, and so it ends up just becoming a waste. And I really believe that over the course of the next, like five to 10 years, if Amazon keeps trending in this direction, it's just going to get worse and worse and worse. Brands are going to start to get away from it, and everyone's going to have to really lean into quality and, you know, differentiation and really being, like, a premium product. So to your point of it, not only being like, it's not a piece of crap, but it's also something that you can make a statement piece for B2B, it makes a ton of sense. It's also really interesting for the home, I know, like, you know, to get a kick plate of just, you know, if you want it monogrammed, or you want to have your address on it, or something like that. Like, it's a really nice way to kind of elevate it. And I know one of the things like you and I talked about is, like, a lot of these influencers that do, like, you know, both kind of interior and exterior decorating, like they love to make the entryway just this beautiful, stunning, like, welcome to my home kind of thing. And sometimes you see these videos of these influencers with these beautiful doors and these awesome flowers, and then just this scuffed up junk kick plate at the bottom of it. So it's a very interesting, it's an incredibly interesting market that, like, does anyone, in fact, that kind of start spins, I got it. It kind of stems another question. Do you have, like, competitors in terms of, like, the customization element at all, or is it? Is it mostly just people just doing the it's just a blanket, flat thing?

Tucker Hiegel 17:08
Yeah, it's, it's just, it's an afterthought. So, no, we don't have any direct competitors. There's a few people that have seen our products and, like, have tried to recreate some of it on Etsy with, like, a vinyl monogram, but at scale. You know, no, can't do that and so, so all the products that we sell are unavailable everyone. They're pretty exclusive, like they have hammered copper kick plates, like you can't buy those anywhere else. Engraved kick plates, you can't buy those anywhere else. Dog scratch plates, at least for the next 17 years, until my utility patent runs out, you can't buy those anywhere else. It's funny to speak to your point. You're talking about with quality with Amazon. So to this day, like I said, like in the movement of startup fervor, I was like, Let's list all these kick plates on Amazon. I didn't do any like, what you're supposed to do, product research, look at the competition, or any of that stuff. But by selling on Amazon, we started to get returns, and we would get stolen stuff. I'm like, they even say this because I don't want to give people, uh, ideas, but whatever. So people would buy, like the Chinese one for $30 and then ours for 78 and compare the two. And then we would get, I would get to compare what the competition is selling out there, because people would return the poopy kick plate and our package, right? But yeah, like, what would show up with sharp edges and just everything's wrong about it, like the diameter, the kick plate holes, everything that's supposed to go on the quality of, like, making a kick plate, yeah, is not there. And people see that if you compare it, if you hold both products in your hand, it's really obvious.

Andrew Maff 19:08
Every Amazon seller is probably screaming right now just thinking, like, I hate when that happens, like the amount of times I've heard that it's that's got to be so wildly frustrating, of like, because you also can't Amazon does nothing about it. Like, if you turn around, you're like, hey, this isn't ours Amazon, just like, tough. Like, they returned it. It is what it is. You got it back, and it's like, dude, like, that's another platform. Is ridiculous. Sorry, I digress.

Tucker Hiegel 19:38
It's tough. It's tough. We have a love hate relationship with Amazon, because, like, I said, like, we wouldn't be at the point we're at today without the scale that they've offered. But like, it's been a brutal fight because, man, like, Amazon makes a lot more money on the products I sell than I do, and so I. You know, thank God that there's scale there, because without scale, like the break even to sell on Amazon, and our category is astronomical. Yeah, I don't know how other people are doing it, honestly, I really don't, yeah.

Andrew Maff 20:18
I mean, look, it's, you know, in my opinion, it's the overseas sellers have bigger margins, so it's justified. There's the ones that do it the way that I think is usually the best, at least for certain product lines, which is like, you just use it as, like, a customer acquisition channel, but then you find ways to, you know, convert them off Amazon eventually. And then you have the other ones that are just like, you know, they're totally fine with single digit profit margins. And you know, it is what it is some brands, you know, you can get enough volume on Amazon that you kind of build your own little brand on Amazon so that people are searching your brand name. And so that kind of helps the CPCs and things like that. But it's also the brands that like it happens a lot I see with apparel where, like, apparel brands, you know, they'll have a ton of different stuff, those seasonal things, things like that, so it kind of is what it is. But then they'll have, like, their evergreen stuff that they sell a lot of all year, and that's the only thing that they sell on Amazon. And they're just there to protect their brand name, so they're not running ads. They're typically shipping stuff on their own. They're not dealing with, you know, all of the extra bells and whistles of Amazon, but it's still like to benefit from Prime, to benefit from all of the stuff that Amazon offers. It's like, yeah, you can benefit from it, but you're not going to make much. You're just paying them more.

Tucker Hiegel 21:38
Yeah, yeah, yeah. For us, realistically, the only reason why Amazon makes any sense is because we are building a brand outside of that. If the end game was just to sell door kick plates on Amazon, that would have been, well, it'd just be a waste of time. Yeah, it's not a career, you know?

Andrew Maff 22:01
Yeah, no, it's not. But yeah, Tucker, this was, this is awesome. Super appreciate you having the show. And I want to take up too much more your time. I know you're super busy. I'd love to give the opportunity let everyone know they can find out more about you, and, of course, more about Deck, the door decor.

Tucker Hiegel 22:19
Yeah, I appreciate you having me on. It's been fun. And, yeah, maybe we'll have to do it again sometime. I was like, I'll be here, yeah. So as far as all of our products are all available at Deck the door decor.com, our social media handle is @KICKPL8. So it's also our phone number. So K, I, C, K, L, number eight gonna be seven digits. But yeah, you can find, find us all over the place, out there, on the interwebs, and I don't know, I personally am not very, not a very large footprint online, but my company is so.

Andrew Maff 23:06
We'll get you out there. Cool, cool, beautiful. Thanks. Tucker again, obviously everyone that tuned in, thank you as well. You know the usual rate review, subscribe all that fun stuff and whichever podcast platform you prefer, or head over to the ecom show.com to check out all of our previous episodes. But as usual. Thank you all for joining us. We'll see you all next time.

Narrator 23:26
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