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

PenniJo, appreciate you joining us today. We’d love to have you retell us the story behind how you came up with the idea for your business, I think our audience would really enjoy hearing the backstory.

Everyone starts their business/hobby differently.

It wasn’t as much as an idea for me but rather something that just happened.
I had gotten my first crested gecko in February of 2021, and instantly fell in love with them. Crested geckos are probably the reptile that is considered the potato chip of reptiles. As you can never have just one. After my first one I had gotten another one and from there I kind of just went down a small rabbit hole. After I had gotten my 5th one i had stopped for a little while. And i had also gotten some eggs from some of the females I had bought. After hatching my first babies is when I realized this was something I had truly loved and enjoyed. From there is when I started to think of business names for my breeding.
I absolutely love the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and so I had kind of played off the idea of the phrase “COWABUNGA”.
Crested geckos are arboreal climbers and they jump as well. The way they jump makes it seem like they are jumping off a tall building like the TMNT and saying “COWABUNGA” as they are jumping. Which is part of how it came to be the name for my business Cowabunga Cresties. I was also brainstorming with a friend of mine and its the one that rolled off the tongue the best and fits it best as well.

Breeding isnt all sunshine and rainbows like people think it is. There’s unexpected complications/issues/problems that can happen. Not everyone talks about the bad things that can happen so alot of it is things you find out for yourself, and you just do your best to deal with these issues.

The crested geckos I breed are much different than alot of other breeders because nobody really works with them to the extent that I do. Which is what sets me apart from the rest and makes my animals unique.

PenniJo, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

What is Cowabunga Cresties?

Cowabunga Cresties is located in Southern Minnesota. Primarily focused on breeding Correlophus Ciliatus, commonly known as the crested gecko. My 3 main focuses on breeding crested geckos are Olives, Tigers, and Dark Phantoms.
What sets me apart from others in this hobby is what my focuses are. There are not very many people in the hobby that works with these morphs or colors. I also work very hard towards making sure my animals are happy and healthy.

I really love to take pictures of my animals as well. I’d like to consider it one of my passions along with breeding the crested geckos. I really like to think they go hand in hand with each other as they both help intensify the beauty of each other.

We’d love to hear the story of how you built up your social media audience?

Social Media these days is everywhere. Everywhere you look there is social media and technology. Knowing how to navigate through these platforms is beneficial to making a name for yourself. Vending shows and expos are also beneficial to networking as well because people meet with you face to face and get to see your animals in person. While pictures are good seeing them in person makes them even better as pictures never do justice for the animals.

Building social media is probably one of the least difficult things as far as starting it.
Making content that is enjoyable by other people and fits into others interests is what helps make it smooth sailing into creating an audience.
People are also into funny reels and pictures as well as captions so being able to do these things will also help reach an audience as well.
Biggest thing is trying to find a common ground and trying to see how that fits in with other people, as well as trying to follow others in social media as well.

Any stories or insights that might help us understand how you’ve built such a strong reputation?

I think for me building a reputation was throughout social media being the biggest impact. Being able to consistently be active on social media and post has been a big part of building my reputation. Another big part of building my reputation was vending my own shows and getting out there. Getting out there and connecting and building interactions with other people has also made it so people know about what I do and be able to give them the information to be able to reach put later if they want to.
While not just vending has had an impact on meeting people interested in what I do. Going to other shows to meet other vendors/people has also had a huge impact for me as well. Finally being able to put a face to the name after talking with people on a social media platform for a while also helps.

Just get out there and network and show people who you are.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cowabunga_cresties/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/CowabungaCresties
• Other: Morph Market account: https://www.morphmarket.com/stores/cowabunga/

Image Credits

Logo designed by Noah Bounds Studios

Pictures taken by Me