From Disney to Saylor: Will Trowbridge’s Creative Journey

Justin Levinson (00:10)

Hey folks, welcome to the Agency Side Podcast. I'm your host Justin Levinson. Today I'm joined with Will Trowbridge, the CEO and founder of Sailor, an LA based creative marketing agency he launched in 2021. Sailor has been known for its entertainment led social first approach, crafting award winning campaigns for clients like Disney, Netflix, Prime Video, Paramount Plus, Hulu, and Tubi. Before starting Sailor, Will spent time at Disney and later at Netflix where he helped build the streamer's comedy brand, Netflix is a Joke.

Drawing on those experiences, he set out to build the agency he wished existed when he was on the client side, and it's clearly paid off. Under his leadership, Sailor's grown from two people to more than 80 employees in four years, earning recognition from Adweek's number one fastest growing agency on the West Coast and Adage's 2025 Small Agency of the Year. Will, it is so great to have you on the pod today.

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Will Trowbridge (01:01)

That was an amazing intro. You stole all my lines. I don't know what else to say. Those are all literally my little lines. There's nothing else. Yeah. No, I'm so happy to be here, Justin. Thanks for having me on and nice to meet you finally.

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Justin Levinson (01:07)

Nothing left to say in the public.

I'm excited. I've been following Sailor for some time and there's definitely been a lot of buzz in the agency space. So I'm excited to speak with you. And the first thing I would like to ask guests is, and I know this can kind of be long winded, but how did you get into the agency space?

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Will Trowbridge (01:30)

Yeah, I mean, you kind of touched upon this when in your intro, but I, my, my first time working at an agency was, was founding one. So I had a very unique kind of story compared to a lot of my colleagues on the founder side of agencies who worked at agencies for decades or sometimes longer where just they figured it all out and then they think they can do it better. So they hop.

from the shop and start their own. In my case, I didn't know anything about the inner workings of an agency, but I did know of course, what I liked about working with agencies and production companies. And of course, as you mentioned, I was on the brand side of things prior to starting Sailor at places like Disney and Netflix and had worked with, you know, 50 or so agencies over the course of my 10 years of working on the brand side. Jumped into agency land knowing that I needed

a partner, someone who brought the energy, who cared as much as me. I knew all of, and of course had an incredible creative work product and, and work ethic. You know, those are like things that as a client, I always looked for in a creative agency partner. And so I ultimately jumped into agency land being like, I can do those things. I know that all of my friends back at Netflix really value the same things as me. I've seen what I.

who's out there, I know the types of shops they're hiring. I feel like I can do those things, but I of course didn't know all of the back of house operational know-how required to even make those five, whatever core principles of an agency possible. So yeah, the early days of Sailor was me jumping into this very new territory and figuring that stuff out on the fly. I knew I could.

rely on my network and I knew I could rely on my, you know, gross extroverted personality. And I knew I could make great work, but I didn't know the kind of inner workings of what an agency really was. And it was been what has kind of kept me inspired and curious ever since really figuring that out.

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Justin Levinson (03:41)

Yeah. So you mentioned a partner. did, how did you find this individual?

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Will Trowbridge (03:46)

I actually did not start with a partner. was just said, I wanted to be a partner. When I, when I, when I think of partners, you know, partnership, it's a meme on the agency side of things. I'm looking for a partner, not an agency. It's like, yeah, but it's real when you're on the client side and you feel like your agency partner is not actually showing up the way you expect, or maybe doesn't care about the work as much as you do. You start thinking you can do it better.

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Justin Levinson (03:52)

partner. I'm sorry. Yeah.

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Will Trowbridge (04:16)

And so you fire your agency and you start doing it yourself. You find the time because guess what? You have so much more context than an agency partner will ever have because you were there in the room when that project was decided on, when that idea was sparked, when that strategy was built. So if an agency isn't showing up as a true partner and like showing up at an equal level of excitement and energy and just, ⁓ caring.

as much as you do, you can sense it, you know, and you, it's not as valuable.

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Justin Levinson (04:48)

What was like the first, I guess, wasn't a part of it, but what was the first sort of hire that you made when you were on your own?

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Will Trowbridge (04:55)

Yeah. So I was solo for the first like eight months or something, smoke and mirroring my way through lots of pitches. I took on a lot of kind of the creative and strategy work myself in the early days of Sailor. was during 2021 end of pandemic. Looked a lot like this. I could be in my living room and I could look like the biggest agency in the world. You know, it was like, you could fundamentally lie your way into rooms.

and sell big ideas and then go call all your freelance friends who were out of work at that time anyway, and build teams really quickly. So that's what I was doing over the first eight months until we landed our first retainer business with, it was actually with Last Prisoner Project, which is a nonprofit that works to get folks incarcerated for marijuana offenses out of prison. That was our first, it was like this little project, one-off project that then turned into an ongoing retainer.

through a dear friend who trusted us in the early days. Shout out to Sarah Gerstin. ⁓ And then fast forward a few months, we got called on by another former Netflix exec who went and ran creative at the likes of Postmates. And we brought on, we jumped on and started as their social AOR. And then soon a month later, won the Prime Comedy business at Prime Video. taking a lot of my Netflix as a joke knowledge and packaging that up for Prime Video in a way that obviously

was unique to their brand and their positioning, but ultimately was there to super serve the comedy audience on social. those three things allowed me to, of course, justify the first hire, if not the first five, which allowed us to really grow into a formal agency and get it out of like kind of hire will pay sailor land, you know, which is where we were for the first half of year.

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Justin Levinson (06:45)

That's cool. It's great that you had sort of like, were able to sort of creative resource everything in the beginning, because you sort of had a network of people that were already out of work that you were able to use to service the client's needs. And then once the work started coming in, you were able to scale and bring more people in. That's really great. That's really exciting. I guess before some of that work started coming in, how were you feeling just like terms of like jumping straight from like being at a studio? I mean, obviously there's a lot of unknowns, but like.

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Will Trowbridge (07:01)

Exactly.

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Justin Levinson (07:15)

You know, what was sort of going on in your mind when you made that jump?

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Will Trowbridge (07:18)

Yeah. I mean, the jump was just for context. I didn't leave Netflix by my own volition. I essentially told them at the time that I had worked my face off over the course of the pandemic. mean, you're doing like 13 hour days sometimes and you're just like, there's no beginning and end to anything. got to...

G chat in the middle of the night and you're expected to respond to it. ⁓ just a neat, unique time. I'm sure that wasn't unique to Netflix, but it was just like the edges of work and life were completely blurred during that time. Right. And I just had worked so hard for this company and I just was, they opened up the role I'd been working towards and I was like, hell yeah, I'm going for that thing. And then I learned that they were looking elsewhere to fill it. And I just told them like, you gotta give me that job or let me go.

And they showed me the door. so I entered the job market kind of with my severance, the iconic Netflix severance. I quickly came to the realization that I learned something about myself through the Netflix experience I didn't know I had, which is I had this entrepreneurial spirit. They essentially gave you a budget and threw you in the deep end and told you to make a bunch of value for the company.

So I left Netflix being like, what else will allow me to do that? You know, and I was like, I don't think it's at NBC universal. I know it's not at Disney. I was there before. Where else am I going to go? And quickly came to the conclusion that I got to build something of my own to feel the level of like validation, know, and value back from my employer that I was felt like I was giving to it. I felt like I needed to build something of my own. So I didn't ever have to question that again.

and you know, it was, it was gnarly to make the jump, quickly as those wins start happening, my God, the satisfaction is insane. Like it's all riding on you, which is an immense amount of pressure, but it's incredible, incredible feeling when things start lining up and when you start knocking down these opportunities and get more from it. my God. The feeling of like chaining work together. It's like addicting.

You know, and I think that's why a lot of founders find a way to get through those dark days. Cause they're always optimistic looking for the next like, you know, bone to chase.

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Justin Levinson (09:51)

Yeah. How has your role changed from the beginning, from those early days to now with this, with a larger team? Thanks for tuning in folks. This episode is brought to you by Coming Up Creative, a relationship first boutique creative recruitment agency.

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Will Trowbridge (10:34)

Yeah. I mean, I think that I, my level of care, like the amount of I care about this business has not wavered. am like still so much. mean, I don't think it worked when I left Netflix and was hoping for more work life balance. There's absolutely zero. It is like one steady stream of work and life. actually think people ask me that a lot where they're like, how do you, how do you find the time to do all this? And I said, I don't have.

There's no such thing as work or life. It's just, it's just life. And it makes sense if you treat it in that way. So you don't feel like you're giving something up for the other, you know? And I do think that like, I care deeply and I more than ever about this business and the people who work here. I mean, the fact is we do have so many people who work here. I mean, that's, there's so many people who are helping Sailor and me achieve our goals every day that my job has fundamentally.

shifted from doing all the things and hiring freelancers to execute them to now supporting people who are even going out and winning the things and then engaging in turtle teams and polishing internal operations and booking locations and signing leases and all the crazy stuff that comes with a business. yeah, my job is definitely more.

fractional in so many different ways. Like I try to hit everything still. And I'm still really focused on the creative side of things at Sailor. I work with Nicole Stetter, our head of creative on that every day. And then I'm really kind of obviously on the new business front and help everyone else the best I can. I've definitely hired a lot of smart people who are much better than me at other things. And I defer to them whenever possible.

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Justin Levinson (12:16)

Yeah, that's a whole other art to scaling a team and doing all that stuff. It seems like you've done a really fantastic job. What's your favorite part to do? Is it the strategy or the creative or do you like the BD or what's your favorite?

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Will Trowbridge (12:28)

Yeah, I actually think that the back to your first question, I love this sort of like building of this business. really, it's, think it's because it's the thing that's inherently. Like I liked a lot doing a lot of the strategy and creative when I was at Netflix. I would find production companies, et cetera, who could bring my ideas to life. I didn't always rely on agencies to do that strategy work, et cetera. So I like doing that stuff and I.

used to doing it, but the kind of new thing for me here is like, does it all work together? And how do I help kind of like find ways to connect and connecting kind of people or just operations here to help us achieve what we want to achieve. So the building of the business is something I really love. And, you know, I think that all starts with great creative. That's what they're buying when they buy Sailor. And so I'm incredibly invested in that and I really love it.

But I think that it's like, I see it as one part of the larger whole that really brings me joy.

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Justin Levinson (13:34)

I love that. I'm interested in what your, if you have a favorite campaign that you've done or any favorites.

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Will Trowbridge (13:41)

I mean, on the, not so much campaign, we have a, we have a client that is just really incredibly, the way they work is amazing. The folks at Tubi, we manage their social every day. I mean, for anyone who's just aware of Tubi, they know that they're like the work they put out into the world, both on the branding, brand side of things, and even the content side of things is just fun. And the people behind the scenes at Tubi are incredibly fun people to work with. Not to say our other clients aren't, but it's just Tubi is like.

They have a well-oiled machine. seem incredibly aligned strategically behind their internal goals and their leadership. And as an agency partner, that just gives us absolute confidence in what we do every day. And we can really execute that at the highest level and the highest level of weird. Like the stuff that we put out into the world just, it just like is incredibly off kilter and bizarre and something truly ownable for Tubi. And it's been really fun to watch the team here.

just kind of grow within Tubi. We've grown year over year with them. And of course, just the excitement grows. It seems like daily here as we're continue to continue to explore all that's possible within that world.

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Justin Levinson (14:53)

So super cool. It's gotta be great when the client, ⁓ when you're really seeing eye to eye and able to level up the creative like that.

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Will Trowbridge (15:01)

Yeah, it's just like in lockstep. There's like not a lot of question marks, you know, and it's like, that's the, that's the perfect type of client for an agency to be successful. Yeah.

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Justin Levinson (15:10)

Totally.

What kind of, you guys have won some awards too, right? noticed you guys won a Shorty, a Shorty award. can tell us a little bit

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Will Trowbridge (15:19)

We love shorty. God, I actually don't remember what we won a shorty for. Wait, I think this is it.

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Justin Levinson (15:26)

You guys did maybe I'm not doing I haven't done my homework

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Will Trowbridge (15:28)

Yeah,

we won one for DreamWorks, Bad Guys Holiday. Nice. The Bad Guys Very Bad Holiday, ages, I think that was like two years ago. But yeah, we've won some interesting awards. We just got nominated for a bunch of Clios. ⁓ We got, you know, of course some more agency-wide recognition from the likes of Ad Age and Ad Week. And yeah, just we're, I'm like so proud of the team and everyone here I think feels it.

when we win those things, I know it's kind of funny in the ad world. It's like the game we all play that gives us our little pat on the back. But I think it is really meaningful to, of course, the team behind it and gives us some level of like resolution at the end of the rainbow. know, it's like, holy crap, we actually like that project is officially finished. Proof is that we have this award in hand. So I'm incredibly proud of the team and excited to continue chasing.

The award game, it's a fun thing that agencies can do. It's the brand side of things. They care about it, but not as much.

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Justin Levinson (16:30)

Yeah, it's a great thing. I also noticed you guys were getting into AV a little bit.

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Will Trowbridge (16:34)

Yeah. Yeah. So we actually brought on this two incredible creative directors in the editorial space, Anais Bimpal and Michael Meehan. These are two folks who are, have cut their teeth cutting trailers literally for the past decade or two and are some of the most prolific editorial minds out there. You know, funny enough, I think that there's like on the entertainment marketing side of things. One, we have like an incredible editorial team outside of those two folks that are, you know,

clipping and churning and cutting stuff every single day. But, you know, just more so I'm noticing we're in this sort of cycle on the entertainment marketing side of things where social campaigns look a lot like they did probably seven years ago, where it's like heavy AV. Then you have social creators and then you have like social strategy, community management, what we call like engagement strategy as an undercurrent. But that's the prioritization where like

When we got into business in the first place, it was flipped, where social strategy was winning social craters, then came second and then AV last. It was like a different time. And so we've of course invested in our AV side of things to continue delivering at an incredible level for our entertainment partners. And it's been really fun even deploying that talent on non-entertainment brands. So we just had Anais and Michael, for example, oversee two of our latest campaigns for Hilton.

And they have just done an incredible job bringing that kind of like editorial taste and touch to a brand that ⁓ isn't used to deploying entertainment marketing strategies like that. And so I think it's been a really interesting way to evolve a campaign like that.

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Justin Levinson (18:19)

That is really cool. That's fascinating. I got to check that out. Yeah. Do you have interest in ever getting into key art or anything like that as well or?

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Will Trowbridge (18:30)

I don't think so. I think that like the reality is like we're, our roots are in our, in entertainment, but we do not think of ourselves as an entertainment marketing agency. Like we don't, we're not, you know, I think the folks that have like built their roots in trailers and key art and then have found their way to social after, which is a pretty common story in the entertainment marketing side of things. You know, like they are, we're different from them in that like social is a, of course.

platform, it's a type of behavior, it's an audience, it's all these things that are kind of like deliverable agnostic. You know, it's not about just making one type of art over and over and getting better and better at it. It's about shape shifting your campaigns and your creative to of course the brand's goals, but also to the evolving social behaviors of these people. And I think that's been our, that's our route and that's where our roots are. And of course, like.

Entertainment is key to winning on social, but it's really as we see it, like entertaining strategies is more important than just working with entertainment brands. Entertaining strategies can get you to be a valuable partner to the likes of Hilton. Hilton probably doesn't need a trailer, you know? It's like, so we're, we're, we're evolving as a company. We believe every brand is an entertainment brand at the end of the day. And we, as a

agencies should employ entertaining strategies wherever we can to help brands be successful, but that doesn't mean just making one thing.

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Justin Levinson (20:02)

Yep. I totally get that. Another thing I'm always interested in is technology. Yeah. I'd be curious to understand what, ⁓ you know, what's in like the sailor tech stack, what, kind of tools are working for you.

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Will Trowbridge (20:13)

Well, Asana went down this morning. So everyone's talking about that. Damn it. Another day without Asana. No, I literally just saw that. was just like, Hey, can we build a new Asana? Like, can we control our destiny a little bit here? No, I mean, when Amazon web services went down, holy crap, like frame IOs plummeting, like everything that we use is like, we're just done for the day. Google's hanging on with a, you know, by a thread. So anyway, yeah, on the tech side of things, Sailor actually launched a

sister production company, ⁓ a creative studio called El Lovato earlier this year in May. And we did that really with the intention of building a modern creative studio from the ground up with AI integrated from the ground up at its core. You know, it doesn't mean that we're only making AI things, but it means that we're building a creative studio knowing that AI is an incredible tool for us as creative thinkers and creative executors and producers and directors, cetera.

that can't be and shouldn't be ignored today. So we've built it in, like I said, to our operations and of course our creative making and creative ideating really throughout El Avado and are using that kind of studio as a sort of lab of sorts to churn out learnings for Sailor to take on. So Sailor is like, okay, tell us how you did all that. You know, let's now bring that to market.

and showcase an idea that's now, we now know is possible given El Avado's success in it. And so we can pitch differently. It affects everything from of course the ideation, but all the way back to the strategy. Knowing what's possible is changing from an execution perspective has really evolved our abilities more grandly on the agency side.

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Justin Levinson (21:56)

Fascinating. ⁓

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Will Trowbridge (21:57)

Yeah. I mean, it's definitely an interesting, an interesting conversation. mean, what we're trying to do is offer, I mean, one, we're like being, I don't know if you're feeling this or have talked to other people, but the level of pressure that our clients are putting on their internal staff to just embrace AI and to use it in their everyday work. There's no, they're not telling us to do that, but there is an underlying expectation that you're doing the same. So.

not only is it, we're finding a lot of creative success there, but it's also kind of needs state to stay competitive.

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Justin Levinson (22:28)

Totally. Yeah. I'm here. I hear from agency owners all the time. Be like, Hey Justin, what's like the hot thing going on right now? Who can I talk to? Who, how do I build? I'm looking to start an agency. How do I build it from the ground up using AI? That's something I get from people all the time. And who can help me build an agency from the ground up with AI? I get that as quickly.

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Will Trowbridge (22:45)

So,

so what? Like there's like a person who wants to start an agency and they want to build it from the ground up using AI, meaning like they want to, of course not have to build a giant team and then tear that thing down once some tool pops up.

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Justin Levinson (23:00)

Yeah. I there are, I feel like there are creative agencies now that are like, like, especially like in graphics are really employing a lot of AI and even some are like cutting down their graphics teams to more like freelance kind of, and because the AI is kind of, you know, dominating. they're looking for, they're trying to find out who's doing what and what kind of tools are being used and trying to see if they can sort of do replicate that from the beginning, opposed to like, you know, unpacking it later.

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Will Trowbridge (23:28)

Yeah, you definitely don't want to be building using a decades old playbook right now. It's like, there's so many interesting ways of doing things that weren't even possible six months, you know, a year ago. So that's probably smart. You know, I think that if I was to do it all again in 2025, I inevitably would have thought about, you know, some of the early foundational decisions differently, knowing that agentic AI is a thing now, right? It's like, the...

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Justin Levinson (23:55)

It's crazy. It's like, it's radically changed the recruiting business, which, know, we do a lot in. It's just, it's wild how much of it now is automated and how much with multi-channel campaigns and, know, scraping like data through clay and being able to reach like so many people with such personalized on point messaging. It's really getting insane. I'm always interested in it on the hiring side of the coin too.

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Will Trowbridge (23:59)

Mmm, I- Yeah.

Yeah. mean, that must be great though. Like, especially for a small shop or, you know, consultant or recruiter, single recruiter, like to be able to deploy at that scale has got to be just such a relief and such a time. You get time back, you know, I don't think the value changes. The value is you're being paid to source the best person for the job. It doesn't matter how you get there, you know.

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Justin Levinson (24:46)

Yep. think the, that sort of like sea of sameness kind of happens a lot with improvement too though, because it's like, when you deploy all that stuff in masses, people are all using the same like keywords and variables. And so it becomes noise in a lot of ways for us.

For me, it's like being creative with like the copy. how can I reach somebody that sounds authentically like me? That's not going to be the like, Hey, well, your experience at this variable seems pretty good. I mean, like we've all seen that. We've all seen that message. So it's like, how can, you know, on our end for, and I think hiring it's, it's still, it's not like, it is an element of creativity because you have to now, now people, you know,

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Will Trowbridge (25:19)

Yeah, yeah. Like, in the blank.

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Justin Levinson (25:34)

top level people on LinkedIn are getting hit up, you know, like dozens of times in a week. so if you don't have a message that's going to pop, just like if you don't have a social piece that doesn't pop, it's the same kind of thing. And I'm, you know, it's, I'm sure with that, there's probably an element of outbound for you as well too, reaching out to agencies. Is there, I hear from people on the studio side that they get hit up like dozens of times a week. Like, is there a way that you sort of strategic?

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Will Trowbridge (26:01)

mean,

from agencies, yeah.

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Justin Levinson (26:02)

Yeah,

like when you're reaching out to potential clients, is there any strategy there?

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Will Trowbridge (26:08)

to not cold call people. That is like my core strategy. my God, what a nightmare. I don't know, man. I think that it's an interesting time for our industry. Maybe I'll start cold calling some folks, you know, just to like really diversify ourselves. If everyone else is employing that strategy, maybe we should too. We've been rolling from, you know, on the referral side of things since the beginning of Sailor. We've been winning through trusted connections and even, I don't even know how they find our website, but like incredible brands.

Hit us up through our hello at sailoragency.com email. I'm like, holy crap, how did you find us? It's like the brands that any agency would want to work with. I'm just like, my God, something's working here. So I think shout out to our comms team and shout out to our, you know, internal social team who's pumping out sailor content every day, because that seems to be clicking. But I do think that like, you know, we're, like I said, we're diversifying. We're, we're not just entertainment. We're trying to kind of use each win.

in the kind of non-entertainment space as a springboard to the next. And that takes a lot of packaging. It takes a lot of communication to kind of make a spirit company understand the value of a hospitality campaign. It's like there's so many niches out there and there's so many agencies that fill them that if you're trying to be bigger than anyone in industry ⁓ or cross industry from an expertise perspective, you got to tell that story.

And so I think we have a lot of work ahead of us in doing that. I'm excited to do it. And I think that the value proposition for, for Sailor is clear. It's just now about getting into those doors, you know, and in those rooms and getting the chance to show everyone our wares, know, open up your watch, the watch jacket and show everyone all the, all the watches.

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Justin Levinson (27:55)

Well, I think the beauty of what you're doing is that you're creating excellent work, is leading to excellent work. so you don't have to deploy some of those desperate strategies of cold calling. I was just featured on a podcast as I was a top biller featured as a seven figure biller who has never made a cold call. So I am on your team. I've actually never made, I've never made a cold call in my life. I have actually, I have a couple of friends that have told me that the one thing that is interesting about the cold call is.

99.9 % of the time, you're not going to get a person on the other end. They're not going to answer because they're going to see whatever, who is this, they're going to hang out. But from what I've heard, the opportunity really is in the message where it's like, Hey, well, you know, I've just spoken to this really great, you know, creative director who's got a couple of million dollars in business. know, he, you know, he, we were talking, he's really excited about Sailor.

I'm going to leave you an email to explain you more, to explain more about this. So it's like, you're using the cold call as sort of a touch point for the warmup to get to the pitch. So you guys don't need to do that, but I've heard, I've heard this could be.

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Will Trowbridge (29:06)

I'm not I'm not above it. You give me your list man. Give me your list I'm gonna stop at a copy paste some crazy shit and send it to me ⁓

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Justin Levinson (29:13)

I will go on

clay and I will rip all the data I possibly can and we'll do a cold calling session together.

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Will Trowbridge (29:19)

Good. That'll be the next, that'll be the follow up episode of this. It's the most boring episode of podcasts. Just watching it. Possibly. Just crank on cold cars.

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Justin Levinson (29:28)

that totally destroyed by agency owners who are who are you? Why did you get my phone? How'd you get my phone number? But yeah, that's always interesting how people win business and that is great that the good work is kind of bringing in the business for you.

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Will Trowbridge (29:40)

Yeah, it's crucial.

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Justin Levinson (29:42)

Yeah. mean, in terms of like, you know, outside of, outside of work, which obviously we talked about life and it's sort of, it's all in one. ⁓ What, what kind of things do you like to do just on a personal note?

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Will Trowbridge (29:57)

I have two daughters who, one of which is very fresh, a couple months old, and they are my entire life out of work. My wife obviously is included in that, it's, it's, it's an, I don't know if you have, or you mentioned you have two girls. Yeah, two girls. Amazing. Look at us. It's just, it's insane. I used to have hobbies. I used to do things that.

for myself and now I pulled a muscle in my back sleeping the other night. I think because my, my body needs to go to a gym so bad that it is like, it's like kind of contracting in the middle of the night. I just, I don't have any other time to focus on anything other than raising these beautiful girls and this business, my three babies. And so I, that's where my time goes right now. Just, you know, anecdotally, like I got really into running.

at the beginning of this year, ran the LA Marathon, felt like I was a forever marathoner, and then immediately got tendonitis in my knee and I've been depressed ever since. And so I need to get back on the horse. I need to go find, figure out a hobby again and get back out there because it brings me a lot of joy. I need to diversify my life just like my business. gotta keep ⁓ it.

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Justin Levinson (31:18)

We're of similar vintage, imagine. I have two little girls. I have a three-year-old and a six-year-old. So they're upstairs making a ton of noise right now while my parents are watching so we can have this conversation.

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Will Trowbridge (31:28)

I can hear him, think. think I the thumping. That's the Shelburne flooring right there. You know the is at least 100 years old, if you can hear that.

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Justin Levinson (31:32)

Yeah, you're here.

Exactly, yes, mid-century-

But I, I recently, ⁓ got a personal trainer. know it's hard to believe, but I just hired a personal trainer. I've been going two days a week. My wife has noticed that my face is thinning out, which is, which is a good thing. yeah, that's been a big thing for me. And for, know, the other thing I'm planning on doing is playing in a baseball league here in next summer. So I'm trying to get in shape to play like a men's league 40 plus, men's league.

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Will Trowbridge (31:49)

Nice. Okay.

Cool.

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Justin Levinson (32:06)

I'm going to try to do that, but I'm the same as you. I'm very invested in children and in the business. You do lose hobbies, but yeah, there's so much other joy to be had.

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Will Trowbridge (32:18)

Yeah. I was literally thinking about the personal training thing the other day. was like, man, it be time just to throw money at the problem and see what happens. It's great.

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Justin Levinson (32:26)

Great though,

because it is, there is like an element of accountability, like, cause I have paid for this six months and there's these days I'm going to show up. ⁓ and the guy who's training me is like younger and he's more fit and he's like, show me. I'm like, okay. You know, the other thing it being this vintage is I fear that I'm going to hurt my myself. having this coach to sort of guide me has been, you know, there's an element of safety where I.

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Will Trowbridge (32:51)

I so right after having our first daughter I joined a CrossFit gym because I knew I had to get like aggressively back into shape and I literally, Justin, pulled my arm out of its socket and fully pulled my back in like the first two weeks. I literally was like so, completely pendulum swaying back way too fast and I completely destroyed myself and then I was like maybe I'm not a CrossFit guy and then I decided to go run forever, run away from my feelings. But yeah.

Man, mean, let me tell you, if you get into running, you might not go back. There's something about literally just that solo. You're so alone out there. That is so different than having children that I think lures a lot of people.

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Justin Levinson (33:37)

Totally. Yeah. It's been a wild ride being a parent. guess I never realized, like, I think when I was a younger man, I thought children were more of like, not to simplify it, but more of an accessory than it was like the dominating your entire being, know? ⁓ And now it's just like, wow, this dude's just like, and then the days, you know, they go by, you know, and you're just like, wow, I'm in bed again. I'm waking up again. I'm in bed again. ⁓

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Will Trowbridge (34:04)

Do you have friends who can't relate? I have a few friends still who just absolutely cannot relate and they're like, why is your daughter still awake? And I'm like, it's not time for them to go to sleep. can't just put away my accessory. They have a life. That's a human being who's here and taking a lot of the energy out of this room, but we're here for it.

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Justin Levinson (34:27)

Yeah, it's yeah, I got, have some friends that don't have kids that are living very different lives, but I like, I like my life. It's, it's been, it's been pretty good. ⁓

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Will Trowbridge (34:36)

Yeah,

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Justin Levinson (34:39)

⁓ but cool, man. I'm really thankful that you came and spoke to us on our podcast here. I've been really interested in having this conversation for a minute. you know, I'd love to, keep the conversation going. And maybe at some point we, we do a part two, ⁓ we can hear how things are going in, ⁓ 2026. Right. That's what's coming up next. Yeah, we can, ⁓ we can, we can talk.

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Will Trowbridge (35:01)

⁓ I would love that. And thanks so much for the kind words and support. I mean, it means the world. It's a, as you know, it's a, it's an interesting business, the founder of business, know, you you gotta stay close to one another. Yeah. You can, you can share in the joys and the perils of it all. ⁓ so kudos to you building, ⁓ all you've, all you've built. And of course this podcast, it's, it's fun to be on here. Thanks so much.

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Justin Levinson (35:26)

Well, have a good one, man. Take care.