We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful David Kruse. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with David below.

David, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Risking taking is a huge part of most people’s story but too often society overlooks those risks and only focuses on where you are today. Can you talk to us about a risk you’ve taken – it could be a big risk or a small one – but walk us through the backstory.

I was studying to become a Catholic priest for 8 years. I was convinced that that’s what I was called to do, and that that’s what I wanted to do. In 2020, however, things changed drastically for me and I decided to discontinue in my studies, move back to my hometown with a few dollars to my name, an old Jeep, and some leatherwork tools. I did have a great education and was keen to get a job, but as I got closer to making the decision, I was inundated with leatherwork requests. I actually had to take a break from doing job interviews in order to fulfill my leatherwork request duties.

I spoke to my sister in law, who, with my brother, have run a company for the last 10+ years. She encouraged me to make the leap, to the take the risk and jump full time into the entrepreneurial world. It was risky since I had no idea what I was doing, had no money to work with, had no experience, no foundation, but only a product, a small clientele and my wits.

The risk paid off big-time as now the company is able to support me with a full time income, and I have the blessing of employing others and doing something meaningful and good with my time and my work.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

By trade I am an artist. My father was an artist, who defaulted to being a mailman, and then again to renovating houses. But at his core, he is still an artist. He thinks like an artists, experiences things like an artist, and dreams like an artist. My business has always been wrapped up in a dream of restoring the goodness of art and artisan craftsmanship in the modern world where it is severely lacking.

OréMoose therefore at its core is an art initiative. We have 3 branches: the leatherwork, a record label (Enemy Love Records) and a visual art initiative, which has not been founded yet. The leatherwork company’s motto is “Clothing the Word.” Our whole impetus is to make bible covers and covers for prayer books and religious goods. But we believe deeply in the Catholic perspective that not only is the bible important, but that the way we run businesses, the products we use, the resources we consume, the ideologies we promote, and the faith we adhere to, they all need to act congruently to form a wholeness of life. That’s why, for example, we don’t use machines in our shop. Everything is handmade. In a society that keeps speeding up production and saying “More, faster, cheaper”, we say “the best amount, the best speed, the best quality.”

We don’t slack on our manufacturing so that we can jack up the prices. We can compete with most machine made quality leather products, but we value the fact that this stuff is handmade, because there is something human, and you might even say holy about making something with your hands, with love, meaning, and conviction.

Can you open up about how you funded your business?

There was no capital. I believe that debt can be one of our worst enemies. Certainly it can pay off, but it is so tempting, so addicting, so easy to feel a false sense of success that I have been against borrowing money from the beginning.

Our initial capital was purely from either my personal earnings, personal savings, and the company’s revenue. At the beginning, I was operating with less than $3k.

It’s like starting a campfire. There are different methodologies. A poor but common way to start a campfire is to get a bunch of logs, throw lighter fluid on it and spark it up. But what happens is the the logs are too big to burn with the initial heat, and soon after you find yourself just throwing more and more starter fluid on it. Sometimes it takes off, sometimes it doesn’t. More often than not it doesn’t. This is like starting a business with massive debts.

The best way to start a fire is to imagine that the fire is only 2 inches tall. Start a tiny, miniature campfire, and then add only sticks and burnable things that allow the fire to grow at a steady rate. By the time you’re adding big logs, the foundation of the fire is so hot that it will burn anything. This is what it’s like starting a business from business capital. It might take longer, but it’s more solid, organic and long lasting.

How do you keep your team’s morale high?

Being on a team, just like having roommates can be the biggest blessing and the biggest curse of life.

I think what distinguishes the two is a person’s ability to be honest without being told that they are wrong. In a roommate situation, for example, when someone doesn’t do their dishes and leaves a mess all over the kitchen every evening, in order to maintain good health relationally and psychologically 2 things need to happen: the person frustrated needs to be able to say what they think (and be open to a legitimate conversation around it), and the person who is a mess needs to be open to actually changing. There is both honesty and a change of behavior needed. This is how we grow as people, by encounter someone different from ourselves who teaches us how to be more considerate, more responsible and ultimately, more loving.

All of us have shortcomings, but if we can’t own them, we’ll drive the people around us crazy. That’s the short and skinny of it. If we always think we’re right, or are stubborn on certain points, or drag our feet when we don’t get our way, it simply drains the life out of the team.

Teams should be fun. Teams should bring us closer together, not make us want to get away from each other, but if people can’t be honest, if there’s unresolved tension from ego or lack of communication, unwillingness to change, it slowly eats away at the joy that being together should bring about.      

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.oremoose.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/oremoose_catholicleather/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/oremoose/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@oremoosecatholicleatherwor3587

Image Credits
Betsy Landsteiner – Goldhouse Productions