We recently connected with Trevor Davis-Dressner and have shared our conversation below.
Hi Trevor, thanks for joining us today. Crazy stuff happening is almost as certain as death and taxes – it’s technically “unexpected” but something unexpected happening is to be expected and so can you share a crazy story with our readers
One of the craziest stories while owning sky riders has been when I got a trademark infringement when I first started. Prior to having the name sky riders, the business initially went under a different name which ended up causing some issues. I was 17 years old about to turn 18 when I got an email from a much bigger business informing me that I needed to change my name or they would be taking legal action. Being the kid that I was at the time, I had no idea how to handle the situation. I was not old enough to legally register the business as an LLC and my previous business name did in fact have a very similar name to the bigger business. The business owner left his phone number for me to call him and made sure I knew to call him in a very timely manner. I was extremely stressed out and I was borderline having a panic attack knowing that I risked getting sued by a bigger business and I had little to no protection. I called the owner and we had a long conversation which ultimately ended up in an agreement for me to rebrand from my previous name to Sky Riders LLC. For some, this may seem like a tame bump in the road. However for me, this was the first time as a kid I was encountering real world business issues that I was required to handle alone. In hindsight it made me become a much stronger entrepreneur.
As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?
I’ve always been a business savvy person from a very young age. I got into business at 7 years old starting “Trevor’s Trash Take-Out” where I had nearly a block of residents paying me in exchange for having their trash taken in and out every week. From there I became a math tutor as well as a reseller for various products that I could purchase for low prices and sell for much higher with the proper marketing. I realized as a teen that I was keen to problem solving and I had a unique talent when it came to business. When covid hit at 16 years old, the idea of sky riders came to me and I made it my mission to make this business successful.
What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?
One major lesson I had to unlearn was the concept that everything requires planning. Prior to opening my business I put an immense amount of work into planning out logistics, marketing strategies, and various business processes I could automate. Many of these projects were rather time consuming and not essential for the opening of a business. When I started selling sky riders, I realized that 80% of the planning I was doing was unnecessary and that time spent was actually costing me considerable money in lost sales. When starting a business, actually building out a product and getting in the field to sell it are the two major steps. The other administrative projects I found myself working on were items I easily could have taken care of down the line after I already had sales flowing through the company. Unlearning this lesson has allowed me to be more confident and understand how to prioritize tasks in a startup.
Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?
In late 2021 I had a video go viral on tiktok driving over a hundred sales in one day. After preparing and shipping out the orders I got a call from my shipping provider that the van holding my shipments was involved in a car accident and caught on fire. This was a problem I was completely unequipped for. I had mostly sold out and was awaiting a new shipment of raw materials to produce more sky riders and all of my current inventory was lost in a fire. I could not afford to have hundreds of customers fail to receive orders on time without risking significant backlash. My response to this was pivoting to find a local wood supplier. Overnight a friend and I produced 250 sky riders to be shipped out the following morning. This story gave me a “this is what its like being an entrepreneur” moment and really opened my eyes to how resilient one has to be to run a successful business.
Contact Info:
- Website: skyridersadventures.com
- Instagram: skyridersadventures
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/trevordavisdressner/