So what, again, what was your, what was the Genesis behind like starting it?

Well, first of all, you know, everything starts with the brand.

Right.

And if you have a great brand, so, of course, creating the ION brand and then the ION network, it needed to be a methodology in order to succeed and scale.

And so that's all in play.

And, you know, it operates with the playbook.

Sure.

it would

hanging out at the beach? You see this void? How do you spot this?

So I don't know if you can say hanging out at the beach per se.

I mean, figuratively speaking, it was always around the coast.

on what it is, you know, because how West Coast trends go east, and it's interesting, you being in the Midwest, with all due respect, it was the Midwest states besides California and Florida that comprised the largest sales, because essentially you want to emulate what is the lifestyle on the West Coast, if you will, on the beach.

And we definitely did a nice job with that, with all the persona and personality of the brand, but at the same time, yeah, it wasn't an inspiration beach other than saying, gosh, here's this fast-growing sport at the professional level, which certainly was continued through the youth athletes, which it's now, beach volleyball is now, of course, a NCAA sport.

And so we were definitely involved in pioneering what was the lifestyle of the beach, beach time there was not a leading brand in that sport with essentially millions of athletes at all levels besides a pro level you know professional beach volleyball that was on national television and at that point you know just it then became infrastructure and and creating a great brand that people wanted to wear and have on their backs and represent And so we had fun with that.

Stephanie sold, you know, the whole lifestyle.

What are some of the valleys that you went through? Most entrepreneurs have to pivot at some point during their journey, right? So you had a lot of peaks, but maybe what's a valley or something that you've learned along your journey?

I love it.

We are talking about everything from attraction to cooperation to collaboration, competition.

And there's a lot more vernacular related to that, of course, but it's part of our guiding principle.

light so creating that with any of the brands directions you're going in I mean you're talking you're talking about who are you and what do you represent so people can get to know you personally and what you represent and it doesn't have to be it's okay if it's singular and you know like if you're a solopreneur or someone who is just working on not thinking of real scale but you still have to have that kind of that personal brand and those attributes that relate to who you are and what you're made of.

So, I mean, that's, from my perspective, and it's continuous work, right? Because sometimes you do have to pivot.

And for those just getting rolling, whether it be a business or a personal situation, even a personal relationship, right? Those things, as you know, have to be assessed.

Those things, you know, again, where are you today and what do you want tomorrow? And then it's that roadmap, that playbook.

Dave, what are some of the things that you're currently working on?