We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Joshua Esnard a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Joshua, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Let’s kick things off with talking about how you serve the underserved, because in our view this is one of the most important things the small business community does for society – by serving those who the giant corporations ignore, small business helps create a more inclusive and just world for all of us.
This email changed our company and allowed us to define out mission.
Hi, I just wanted to thank you for creating such a wonderful product. I take medication that makes my hands shake and because of that I could never make a straight line or a nice curve. With the Cut Buddy I can make straight lines and beautiful curves without error. Because of you, even people with disabilities can have nice haircuts, thank you again and I hope you become wealthy with the Cut Buddy!
Veterans with disabilities, mothers with autistic children, and people who suffer from injuries which limit their dexterity.
These are the forgotten and we aim to fix this.
We are very intentional about developing our tools with accessibility in mind from fine motor skills to sensory disabilities. When you focus on ergonomics and helping those who struggle then you kill many birds with one stone.
Imagine being a person without a disability using a tool designed for those with disabilities. It would be even easier for them to accomplish their goals without mistakes.
Joshua, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?
The Cut Buddy started as a practical solution to an everyday need. And now, thanks to Joshua’s accidental stroke of brilliance, home grooming has never been the same.
Joshua Esnard, the Inventor, Founder, and CEO of The Cut Buddy, came up with the original Cut Buddy Shaping Tool idea when he was a 13-year-old kid in Ithaca, New York. Being a part of an immigrant family originally from St. Lucia, Joshua’s parents did not have any interest in paying a barber to give him a haircut. Instead they gave him buzz cut after buzz cut until he decided he needed a change in order to impress the girls at his school. He attempted to cut his hair himself, but his early DIY attempts all ended in disaster.
Out of any solutions, he took matters into his own hands and spent years (and years) trying to find something that would make DIY cuts easier. After testing out different haircut & beard templates, he finally found the perfect design that could work on any head size or hairline shape.
Fast forward to January 2015 (15 years later), now 28 years old, Joshua went on to patent the original Cut Buddy Shaping Tool design (along with personal grooming tool designs).
The rest was history. Now 38 years old, Joshua has multiple patents, was on Shark Tank, 11 products in over 5000 stores (walmart, target, CVS), and still dedicates his efforts to helping veterans with disabilities.
Let’s talk M&A – we’d love to hear your about your experience with buying businesses.
When we launched in 2016, a similar product launched but for a different part of the body. Our product and the other item went viral at the same time. Combined we may have gathered 100s of million of impressions in a single month off our tools. Initially both of us thought we were copying each other but turns out it was pure coincidence. My product served hairlines and his product served beards. China attacked when we both went viral and killed most of our sales from knock offs. Cut Buddy was able to survive and fight legally. However, our competitor was not able to survive.
Since they had a strong utility patent we acquired it with the promise to control infringement and allow them to financially benefit form their great invention. The benefit for us was that is closed a door that was allowing others to steal market share from our company as well. By joining forces, the castle could not be penetrated as easily.
It has been 7 years that we have been fighting the IP war for these patents and we do it well!
We’d love to hear about how you met your business partner.
In order of joining company:
Pima – Pima was the little brother of a good friend who would open the door when his older brother and I would sneak back in from a long night of partying. From then, i knew I could trust him.
Alex Kresovich – childhood friend and most loyal person. We worked together in music industry where he became a multi platinum producer. His transferable skills for making connections and getting contacts was legendary for our marketing growth.
Jason Battle – Battle went to college with Alex. I met him later down the road. If Alex trusted him, then it made it easy to trust him. He is now my right hand. Or “hand to the king’. I am the scrappy loud weird inventor Joker guy, he is the calculated assassin.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://thecutbuddy.com
- Instagram: @thecutbuddy
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thecutbuddy/
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joshuaesnard
- Twitter: @thecutbuddy
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@TheCutBuddy
Image Credits
Shark Tank ABC