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Transcript

[00:00:00] Travis Bader: I'm Travis Bader, and this is the Silvercore Podcast. Silvercore has been providing its members with the skills and knowledge necessary to be confident and proficient in the outdoors for over 20 years, and we make it easier for people to deepen their connection to the natural world. If you enjoy the positive and educational content we provide, please let others know by sharing, commenting, and following so that you can join in on everything that Silvercore stands for.

[00:00:40] If you'd like to learn more about becoming a member of the Silvercore Club and community, visit our website at Silvercore.ca.

[00:00:51] I'm sitting down with Trevor Public over the Vice President of Sales for Armament Technology Incorporated. They make, according to one very prominent optical physicist, the best rifle glass in the world, and they're located here in Halifax, Canada. Trevor, welcome to the Silvercore Podcast. Pleasure 

[00:01:10] Trevor Publicover: to be 

[00:01:11] Travis Bader: here.

[00:01:11] So of course, that prominent optical physicist, that'd be, uh, Ilia, Ilia Kashkin. Yes. And he is an individual who does not mince his words, will tell you what he thinks, whether you like it or not. And when I was exploring different optics with him and talking about different glass that they have out there, he says, you know what?

[00:01:34] It goes to you guys, you Canadians, best glass quantifiably in the world at. And that's gonna be your tangent theta line. That's correct. Yep. So that really peaked my curiosity and uh, I wanted to learn more about ATI and Tangent Theta about what you guys do. And it's actually a pretty fascinating story and, uh, you've got some interesting stories yourself.

[00:01:58] And I kind of broke a golden rule that I usually have, which is don't talk to the person really ahead of time. , don't talk to the person ahead of time. And because when you get into the podcast and you want to talk and you want to ask questions, you want it to be natural and something that you don't know the answers to.

[00:02:18] So there's a whole bunch of things that I've been kind of holding in the back of my head, although we have spent in the last couple days together and I got a good tour of the factory and, and what you guys. But, um, why don't I throw it over to you a little bit and, um, you can tell me a little bit about the history of ati.

[00:02:37] Sure. 

[00:02:37] Trevor Publicover: Um, I'll be happy to, honored to be here. Thank you. Um, really appreciate you jumping on a plane and flying all the way to. You know, little old Halifax Nova Scotia to, to see us and honestly, my pleasure. Yeah. Yeah. So we are a little strange for the Maritimes. Um, we're unique probably in Canada and most places of the world, and we do have a pretty unique story in it.

[00:02:59] I, I, I think it's a pretty good story. Mm-hmm. . Um, so Armament technology, uh, was founded in 1988 by Andrew Weber and Andrew Weber is still the single owner of the company, um, since retired from his day to day kind of positions and maintains our, uh, executive consultant position. So he gets to come in when he is not out enjoying life fishing, hunting, and kinda, you know, metal in our business when, uh, when he is a metal there.

[00:03:27] But it's a good meddling, so, yes. Um, it's nice to have him around. Um, so Andy back in 1988 was working out of his basement. Making sniper rifles, um, for the police and the military. So he was modifying a 700, um, platform. Sorry, Remington. Remington, yes, that's the word. And uh, that got complicated. We, he at the time, was selling to Australia.

[00:03:54] There was some contracts in the United States, um, Boston Police Department, several Canadian contracts, and it became very hard to convince a purchasing officer why his Remington 700, which was $5,000, was better than a $800 outta the box. Right? 700 even though his was far superior. Right. Uh, we, that just kind of changed one day on the range, um, in Knot.

[00:04:24] Um, cuz Andy was a competitive shooter, has been all of his life, and had a relationship with Raytheon Elkin Elkin at the time. Ernest Lights. Corporation. Yeah. And they made the elk can C 79. Right. So for all of us Canadians, it's a very iconic scope. It's on every single rifle that the Canadian military carries.

[00:04:45] Um, it's either the big black or the big green thing on the top of the, on the C7 or the c8. And um, back in that time it was about 90, 91, 92. There was a few issues with the C 79 and it wasn't retaining zero. Andy being the machinist and the, and the mind that he was, had figured out a fix for that on his own because he was having problems but was comp, uh, competing in service rifle stuff, and was at the range.

[00:05:18] And he was beating all of the military guys in the competition. And there was a group of course shooters that would travel from here and go up to Ontario and, and compete. One day, one of the commanders come up and said, why is it that your group of guys using the same equipment that my guys are using and you're beating us consistently?

[00:05:39] Right? And Andy's like, well, it's because yours is not the same as mine. And I found a, you know, a zero retention issue and I found a way to fix it. And at that time, the guy said, well, can you fix ours? And Andy's like, ah, yeah, absolutely 

[00:05:53] Travis Bader: fix it. . 

[00:05:55] Trevor Publicover: So that's really when our armament that you are in today kind of kicked off.

[00:06:02] It was the, the maintenance and repair and support for every single elk can scope that the Canadian military had. So that amassed to about 80,000 scopes, every single one of them, uh, over the course of their, now still current lifespan has come through this office in some cases, two or three times. So we've maintained that repair, support, refu, uh, refurbishment for the military for the last.

[00:06:29] 15 years and still today. That's awesome. We still do that today. So it's a, it's been a core part of our business. Um, we've obviously evolved from that into multiple other, uh, divisions and brands. Uh, the, the story kind of started first with us representing Acan outside of the C 70 high scopes to a commercial market, right?

[00:06:56] So the Specter Dr. Um, the one to four, the one and a half to six, we were, and we still are the master distributor for Alcan, Raytheon. And that meant we handled the commercial business in Canada at the beginning, and then we started to evolve that into the United States and now kind of globally. So we are active in about 52 different countries around the world.

[00:07:19] Um, not just for Alcan, but for all of the products that we do. Um, we. That really was the beginning of something different from the C 79 s that we did that that supported that contract was still running strong. then, uh, premier Radicals was a company out of Virginia, right? Yeah. And they did long range sniper telescopes.

[00:07:45] We were a distributor for Premier, so we would buy scopes. Bring them in, resell them to our distribution network. Took the risk on the inventory. Right. Which is a familiar theme moving forward. Uh, as many people may know, if you're familiar with the long range shooting community, premier had some troubles.

[00:08:05] They went out of business and they weren't solvent. And basically there was several years where nothing happened and Andy wanted to do something different because he was a competitive shooter. He's won medals all around the world. Um, he's very accomplished. He couldn't find what he was looking for in the market at that point in time.

[00:08:25] Hmm. So he said, you know what, I can do something myself. And we had a relationship with the people who had previously owned Premier and cracked a deal so that we bought the assets of Premier. That was it. It was like the machines spare parts. Um, we had some inventory here and Andy set out to design. And manufacture and distribute what we would've considered the best scope or what we would want it to be the best scope on the planet.

[00:08:57] That's a lofty goal. It was a lofty goal, and it still maintains to be a lofty goal, but we've come a long way in the last eight 

[00:09:06] Travis Bader: years. Well, a lofty goal from somebody who's building Remington's 700 s and izing them and selling them, and then getting into the optics world that, I mean, there's a entre, entrepreneurial sort of spirit that goes with all of this, which is, uh, something that really kind of, uh, uh, sat in the back of my head and was, uh, reinforced meeting everybody here and meeting Andy.

[00:09:32] You know, that's saying, show me your friends. I'll show you who you are. Right? Yeah. Well, when you go to a company and, uh, let's say you go to your local subway and the people who are uh, working there are happy and chipper you. Got an idea as to what management's like and, uh, what work environment is, you know, they're gonna spit 

[00:09:52] Trevor Publicover: in your sandwich or not

[00:09:53] Right, 

[00:09:53] Travis Bader: exactly. Exactly. You go there and everyone's upset and you're like, okay. Or, or they're rude or they're, they typically kind of will mirror what the management's like. And um, that was one of the interesting things here, speaking with you as a vice president in your role and. All, every, all your coworkers from, from all different walks of life.

[00:10:15] Yeah. Everyone's happy. Everyone's smiling. Everyone's having a great time. And I mean, it's not like, it's almost Friday. It's 

[00:10:21] Trevor Publicover: Friday. Come on. No, it's Thursday. Oh, it's Thursday. It's Thursday. Come on. All right. So no excuse there. Right? 

[00:10:27] Travis Bader: Um, and before you go on, cause I want to, I want to hear about how tangent theta and, and the goal there, uh, talking about the, the L can.

[00:10:36] So l can e, l can, so that'd be Ernst Litz Canada, right? Yep. Okay. You got it. So is Ernst Litz the second who kind of propelled the company forward, from my understanding anyways, and they have four subdivisions under Leica, I think it is. So high end camera optics, solars, I'm sure everyone's. Leica if they haven't heard of Elkin.

[00:11:00] Have you, do you know anything about the, um, the Leica Underground Railroad or under, have you heard of this thing? I 

[00:11:08] Trevor Publicover: have heard of it. I don't know if I know all the details, but, um, 

[00:11:13] Travis Bader: well, I don't know the details either. That's why I was gonna ask. But from my understanding, so there 

[00:11:17] Trevor Publicover: was a group of people that came from, if I'm reading this right, from Germany into Canada, 

[00:11:23] Travis Bader: from what I understand, uh, During, uh, the war, the Holocaust?

[00:11:30] Uh oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Uh, Ernst Litz would hire specifically people, Jewish people, and then, uh, station them in places outside of Germany. Right. And, and it became a thing where hundreds and hundreds of people were coming through and he would be hiring them and station 'em in other places and he would set them up with, uh, funds to get them going.

[00:11:54] And, uh, I think everyone got a camera as well, if I'm not mistaken. You know what, 

[00:11:58] Trevor Publicover: I'm gonna have to dig into this cuz I, I didn't know all that detail. I, I heard a little bit, but 

[00:12:03] Travis Bader: this is, this is something I've heard the past because what I, from what I understand, and his daughter as well was heavily involved with that and she was, um, um, I think something to do with, uh, Ukrainian slave labor mostly Wow.

[00:12:15] Women and helping to, uh, uh, empower them. Like just some really, really phenomenal things out of that. Out of the, out of that family. And apparently nobody wanted to talk about it. Uh, they didn't want it publicized. And so after the last one, I guess passed away, they've gone and made a book out of it. And I think they made some sort of a Netflix show or a movie out of it.

[00:12:34] But, uh, really? Yeah. But, so there's, how did I miss all that? There, there's an interesting kind of heritage thing that goes in line with trying to do good, um, taking risks. And those are some big risks right? 

[00:12:46] Trevor Publicover: At that, at that point in time. That's a big 

[00:12:47] Travis Bader: risk. . Oh yeah. You know, show me your friends. I'll show you who you are.

[00:12:51] Yeah. I mean, uh, there's, uh, uh, you guys working with the er, Litz Corporation and you're doing some interesting things as well, innovating in some risky ways within your company. I thought that was an interesting little tidbit of, uh, that's interesting of history there. Yeah. Yeah. So, so they're looking, they say, look, we want to make the best rifle optics in the world.

[00:13:13] What does that mean? Like, what, what are we looking at? 

[00:13:16] Trevor Publicover: Quality? Sure. Yes. Um, The support for it. The things that, if you're referring to what Andy set out in tangent data, it was without question everything that he could find that he thought was the best in class. Mm-hmm. , and we really set out to be the Rolls Royce of the optics world.

[00:13:44] That was our internal goal. We wanted to be the best in optical quality in clarity. We wanted to have the scope that was the most repeatable. So it went out to the extreme ranges. It came back to zero. We really wanted to have the scope that was, um, I mean, the quickies clicks on the planet, the trickiest clicks.

[00:14:11] We wanted the clique AST clicks. You don't want mushy clicks, we don't want mushy clicks, but we wanted it to be very precise. And a tangent, theta scope is an instrument. Um, and it's kind of a self-testing instrument almost. Um, it's, it, it has come into this world and proven itself to all of its users just by being good.

[00:14:32] And it's really easy for me, as you know, the sales guy to Sure talk about that stuff and say, yeah, yeah, we're the best or sure, whatever. Nobody really believes me. But when you get eyes on the scope, when you get to go to the range, right? When you get to run it to the extreme extremes, or if you get to come and tour through the plant and you see how we test it, how the design was tested, how every single production model gets tested.

[00:14:59] Then you can see maybe how we got to the best scope in the world, but being the best, you know, it, it also means a lot more than just having a good product. You have to stand behind your product. You have to support the product. We're not immune to issues, right? Like everybody else. Sure. It's a bespoke product.

[00:15:16] These are handcrafted scopes. Things go wrong. Mm, sorry. Things go wrong, . But we like to think that we stand behind everything that happens and uh, we take it extremely serious. If there's an issue and a customer has a problem. Things stop. We get the scope back. The same people that build the scope are the same people that repair the scope.

[00:15:38] So, um, we're a fairly lean, mean operation here, but we're, we take all that stuff to heart. So being the best means people will use our products, people, um, see the value in what we sell our products for sure, because we are at the very high end of the scale. Not absolutely highest, but we're, we're up there.

[00:15:59] There's 

[00:16:00] Travis Bader: prier scopes out there, but you're up there. We're up there. You know, I remember reading one place talking about, um, It's like Mercedes-Benz. Yeah. They said, we want to build the best vehicle, and once it's built, we'll take a look at all the costs involved in order to do this and price it accordingly, as opposed to saying, well, we've got a, we've got a cost bracket that we want to be working around.

[00:16:21] What do we have to start culling? What do we have to cut? And so we can meet that and still have a good vehicle. It sounds like you guys have taken the approach of let's just build the absolute best and then work our way 

[00:16:30] Trevor Publicover: backwards. We're, I mean, we've been saying this since the inception of Tangent Theater.

[00:16:35] We're fairly unapologetic about our price , and we wanted to make sure. , the people that spend the money, they're gonna get that value and they're going mm-hmm. get what? We hope that they see the value in that. Um, yeah. And we don't, we don't wanna sacrifice, um, you know, tolerances or parts or whatever that might be.

[00:16:54] And that would degrade the quality of the product. Mm-hmm. and, uh, as you saw today, there's a lot of little parts, a lot of little bits that go into a sniper rifle telescope. Right. I think, I'm gonna get this wrong, it's like 252 individual little parts. Some of them have tolerances of microns and mm-hmm.

[00:17:15] when you're putting that all together and put it on a shock tester and tested at a thousand GS for a thousand drops or whatever we are doing to qualify it, it's gotta hold up. Mm-hmm. , but it also has to hold up in the field. It has to hold up to recoil. You know, our scopes are qualified to 50 calibers and higher, but they also have to survive.

[00:17:37] Being, you know, jumped out of a plane into the water, outta the water, into an atmosphere, whatever this, whatever the situation might provide. So we're building scopes for professional users, and that might be military, police, um, professional shooters or guys who just see the value and, and. Spending the money on a good product.

[00:17:59] Travis Bader: Well, I, I know I've got some questions that, uh, we put out through, uh, social media just for people who are interested in learning a bit more about the, uh, the scopes. Yeah. Uh, one of the things that I thought was pretty neat was, was the shock testing. The pressure testing the temperature testings. Like you guys will get these things down.

[00:18:17] Like what, how far below negative 

[00:18:20] Trevor Publicover: we go to, we go to the mill spec, which I think is negative 85. Whoa. And plus the same, I believe as 85 or 90. Wow. Um, I, I think maybe it'd be good to step back a little bit because we do a lot of different things here. Mm-hmm. , um, and maybe we can just take a minute to explain like, we are the master dis distributor for Elkin.

[00:18:44] We have, um, our radical and some IP in the scopes that we sell. We are the OEM manufacturer of tangent data. Yeah, we have several brands, um, that we make, like sa i optics, zop Tech, and then we have Tenter Bricks, right? So we're a little confusing to some and, uh, lines kind of get a little skewed sometimes and, and people get a little confused.

[00:19:10] So the stuff that we test and we build in here, tangent theta are, is our design, our baby. And as you saw, we, we run the test and all that, but we also run all those same tests on all of the other scopes that we sell, even though we don't make 'em. Oh, that's awesome. So we wanna make sure that everything, I didn't realize that everything we do gets held up to the same standard.

[00:19:32] It may not be the same thing that we're building in house, but we're holding it to the same standard and. Sa I optics, which we can talk about later. We've aided in the design. We don't make it here, it's made for us in Japan. Mm. But we've got a lot of experience. We have a lot of smart people, we have optical engineers, and we have a network of people that, um, we've just developed over the last, you know, 34 years of being in business.

[00:20:01] So we've got a pretty deep bench to draw from, and that goes into our designs, whether we make it in house or not. Um, but we make sure that whatever we sell, we wanna be, you know, the best in class. 

[00:20:15] Travis Bader: Right. Well, do you wanna jump into a couple of the questions that people had? Yeah. I, I got some questions about, uh, a hunting trip that, uh, needed to before, but, but before we get into that, let's just see, see if I can pull it up here on my phone.

[00:20:31] Trevor Publicover: Questions are good. Yeah. 

[00:20:32] Travis Bader: Um, I. Ooh, here's an interesting one. Release date for a tangent. Seven to 35. Can't 

[00:20:41] Trevor Publicover: tell you. Okay. No, I didn't tell you. . So we are, we've been working on a seven to 35. We've been reluctant to give a lot of information out. Did a podcast a few months ago where we kind of leaked a little bit of it and, um, spread like wildfire.

[00:20:55] Mm-hmm. , we are hoping that we'll have something for a, a demo model for shot. It may not be an official release, but we might have something at chat show this year. Uh, we're kind of stuck on a couple components, so supply chain's been a bit of an issue. Um, why takes out happened? Happened idea. Yeah. Uh, We're planning and hoping that it will be in shot timeframe.

[00:21:21] If that doesn't happen, we will be shortly after that. But we're looking at Q1 for a potential release of seven to 35. Wow. That's 

[00:21:28] Travis Bader: pretty soon. We're pretty excited. Well, and that answers the next one. How long till they release a tan theto, the 35 to 37 top end. So they, that would be about the same. Yeah.

[00:21:36] Yeah. Will they ever make an a i six with a different radical? We 

[00:21:42] Trevor Publicover: will. Um, so I guess maybe we can talk a little bit about that. So we constantly try to be innovative and figure out new things, and we get a lot of feedback from our customer base and what they like and what they don't like, and we try to kind of fit it into our model.

[00:22:00] So what we're working on now is, uh, I look on mill based radical. So everything that we have in aai. Well, there's two options. Um, it's our rapid aiming, radical calibrated in 5 56 or 7 62. And it's the same calibrations that we use for the Elkin one to four. So it's very similar ballistics. We have had a lot of feedback that people just wanna have a mill just straight up mill tree radical, so we're working on that.

[00:22:27] Um, we're still multiple months away from that being a product, um, just with kind of the cycles and probably also looking at a MOA version, um, as well, so, 

[00:22:39] Travis Bader: okay. Very cool. Yep. Uh, this is my favorite question. Uh, so the last one was by, uh, a gear report key Who asked that one? Then we've got a ger dot. Who do small circle glass make far away?

[00:22:53] Bigger . Did you see that one? Yes, I did. I don't know what I think 

[00:22:57] Trevor Publicover: the answer was. Yes, the answer there is 

[00:22:59] Travis Bader: yes. . Um, what about spotting scopes? This is Okanagan precision shooters. 

[00:23:03] Trevor Publicover: Good question. Uh, we talk about that frequently in our r and d meetings, and the answer right now is no, there's no direct plan for that.

[00:23:13] Um, we have, you know, we have the ability to do that, but our focus right now is on our core business of our primary models and our new released models. Um, we have a, we have a, a very large back order. Um, we we're doing our best to make them as fast as we can. Sure. But we're really kind of at capacity in some regards and we're looking to expand.

[00:23:39] I don't know if we've got room right now for a spotting scope. I'm, it's not off the, not off the table, but there's no short term plan for it. 

[00:23:46] Travis Bader: Yeah. I guess, you know, building the company out, you gotta make sure you're taking those steps in manageable. Manageable steps and manageable steps. As growth comes, you can take bigger steps.

[00:23:54] Yeah. 

[00:23:55] Trevor Publicover: Yeah. I think we, um, everything is an option at this point. Um, we just wanna make sure we're doing the right thing and we're satisfying the customers that are, you know, buying from us now. And we just, we don't wanna let anybody down. So. 

[00:24:10] Travis Bader: Yeah. No, that makes sense. The, um, look, looking. You know, the people say, you know, we punch above earth weight class looking what you guys have built.

[00:24:22] Starting from, Hey, I work on Remington 700 actions and I ize them to now I'm a distributor working on, uh, optics for the Canadian military to, I want to have the best glass in the world. Like, those are some pretty big steps for, for a company to take. I would say, I guess when you 

[00:24:39] Trevor Publicover: put it like that, , 

[00:24:41] Travis Bader: and you talked, we've talked before about it, and you, and you briefly brought it up at the, uh, the beginning about risks, taking risks on ensuring that you, you just invest more into the company on inventory in order to have things on hand for whatever eventuality.

[00:24:57] Trevor Publicover: Yeah. We realized that early. Um, if we don't have the inventory or we're not planning, you know, years in advance, that's, that's been one of the keys to our success on pretty much all of our brands and, and developments and, uh, we don't. Uh, sometimes we miss the mark and, you know, we'll sell more and we get stuck with no inventory or we can't make it fast enough.

[00:25:17] Mm. We, we try to always have something in stock. Tangent data has kind of been the exception because it's, it's been, I mean, it's been great and it's been very popular. We just, we would, we'll get better at getting them out quicker, but right now we're just, we don't wanna miss out on the quality and we just don't want, we don't want rush.

[00:25:37] Right. How over quantity, take the time to get it right or 

[00:25:40] Travis Bader: Right. Yeah. Quality over quantity. Yeah. Have, have there been times, just from a personal interest, from a sort of like business development standpoint, have there been times when you've taken those risks of, uh, stocking extra inventory and it's really bit you in the butt?

[00:25:55] Of course. 

[00:25:56] Trevor Publicover: Yeah. Yeah, of course. But, you know, we, we manage it, um, in a way that it doesn't impact the business. Mm-hmm. , um, and we've been. We've been pretty lucky that we, you know, we, we drive it fairly hard and we've got a lot of good connections and there's a lot what we're stocking up on when we get caught in those situations, it's only usually for a few months that we have to, to carry it.

[00:26:23] Generally, it's not because of something that we've done or a customer's done. It's been a market condition or something changed politically that has, you know, has changed a motivation. But things usually come back around and 

[00:26:37] Travis Bader: so if, if a few months down the line it kind of figures itself out. It doesn't sound like it's been in the hardest bite in the butt.

[00:26:44] No, no. It's, it was kind of the answer I figured it'd come to, and I only figured that was a little sting. Little sting for a bit, but we'll figure away because. Uh, from the entrepreneur mindset and really everybody who works here seems to have a, uh, the freedom or ability to be able to make suggestions or effect change within the company in a way that, uh, an owner, an entrepreneur could, um, There's always an answer, there's always a solution.

[00:27:13] There's always a way when you get to the end and you look back, did the ends justify the means? Like, did I, like, should have I just cut bait sooner and, and just counted my losses? But um, maybe yes, maybe no. But it seems to me from talking to everybody here and yourself, that uh, big key to the success that ATI has seen is in its ability to be, and I'm using air brackets here, lucky.

[00:27:35] And of course, you know, the harder we work, the luckier, luckier we get by some weird coincidence. 

[00:27:40] Trevor Publicover: Yeah, yeah. Thanks. Yeah. So we are a very entrepreneurial company and our culture really breeds that in all of our employees. And I think there's that, um, that mentality that people will do whatever it takes to.

[00:27:57] Get things done when they need to get them done. We did a tour of Tenex earlier today and you know, you all the, the people in the back that are working through thousands and thousands of flip cover kits and ours, and it's not uncommon that, you know, we've got a production schedule that goes out to multiple months, sometimes straight out over a year.

[00:28:18] A customer will call. So listen, I know we're not scheduled to receive these parts until, you know, three months away, but we really need them next week cuz it's holding up a big military order. Mm-hmm. , there goes nights and weekends for everybody, but nobody complains, everyone drops and does whatever it needs to do to get that stuff out to do our best to help the customer.

[00:28:39] And it, and it's right across the company. It's not just in our tenex line, tangent data operations and support. Like we really have a good group of people here. Um, that get her done. That get her done. That get her done. 

[00:28:51] Travis Bader: Yeah. Lucky air, air quotes here, air quotes 

[00:28:53] Trevor Publicover: lucky. And we have a very low turnover rate.

[00:28:56] The people that come in. Like I said, it breeds that, just the culture and the mentality and once people come in, you know, we take care. We like to think we take care of our people and you know, we hope that 

[00:29:07] Travis Bader: they stick around. Well, I get kind of a family vibe here, honestly. I know you guys aren't all related, but you get kind of a family vibe that everybody is working.

[00:29:13] That's an Atlantic Canadian thing. 

[00:29:15] Trevor Publicover: There you go. Yeah, it's a maritime thing 

[00:29:18] Travis Bader: maybe. Maybe in some ways, but I'm sure not all maritime companies are gonna have that. Um, Kyle Mack asked, can you ask him what kind of glass they use in the E one to six? Is it the same they use in the Elkin offerings? 

[00:29:34] Trevor Publicover: So let's talk about glass for a minute.

[00:29:36] Okay. Let's step away and talk about glass for a second. Cause Sure. We get that question a lot. And it's not just for AAI, but optics in general. There is a few places in the world where the substrates come from and there are many different specs for glass. And inside of a scope there's lots of glass, right?

[00:29:59] Right. So it's not just the glass that's on the objective end. Yeah. There's multiple lenses and, and elements that are throughout it. And all of them have different specifications and could come from different places. So, . We spec and source all of our glass for tangent data from Germany. That can come from multiple sources.

[00:30:19] Um, some are in Asia and others are in Germany, and others are in Japan. And they could all be mixed in different areas. And it's kind of like the secret sauce that nobody talks about, but there is no real good answer. But we get all of our stuff from Germany for tangent data. Aai all comes from Japan, right?

[00:30:39] That's where the scopes are manufactured. Some of that glass may come from Germany. Some of that glass may come from Asia. Some of that glass is made in Japan, but it's all done by the speck of the actual element when it gets designed in the optical, um, in the optical design early on. So the answer to the question specifically is it's probably mostly Japanese glass.

[00:31:03] Okay. Um, in the sa i, it's not the same as the glass that's in tangent data. Very similar in the quality and the spec and the design, because we got to spec that. Right? So, um, there's a bunch of different glass elements inside and they're probably all a little bit different. It's hard to say where exactly each one's coming from.

[00:31:23] Depends on the 

[00:31:24] Travis Bader: spec. That's a good point. That's something I never thought about actually, that Where does a glass come from? Well, not all of it necessarily comes from the same place. 

[00:31:32] Trevor Publicover: No, it doesn't, huh. Um, generally speaking, I think there's, uh, this thing that floats around on the internet and people hear one word, like there's a manufacturer in Germany, and if, you know, it's that type of glass and that just satisfies everyone in there.

[00:31:48] Okay. Well that's good marketing. It's marketing. Yeah. Um, but I would say that most of the manufacturers in the optics field probably have the same. Dilemma and elements come from all over the place. It just depends on what the quality is and what the clarity is and how the resolution works. Makes sense.

[00:32:10] So hopefully that answers the 

[00:32:13] Travis Bader: question. Okay. Kack, and he also doubled up here, he says, uh, and also in another pen tax, if they plan on releasing one to eight or higher magnification scope or a new hybrid type site like the L can, one to four and one to six from sa i l can or TT data. 

[00:32:30] Trevor Publicover: So if I just said yes, would that, would that answer all?

[00:32:32] Okay. ? 

[00:32:33] Travis Bader: Yes. Next question, . 

[00:32:35] Trevor Publicover: So, uh, Aai, we are planning that to be a family of scopes. It was always designed to be a family of optics that was in a different space than tangent data. Tangent data is at the upper end of the, of the pyramid. There is a, a big market for quality scopes in the mid-range price. Um, and there are some holes in maybe different magnifications that work for different applications that we've identified.

[00:33:13] Not that it's a big surprise, but we are working on a family of optics to, um, build out our sa eye line farther than the one to six. So we had to start somewhere. One to six was where we started. Yeah. We understand it's a, you know, it's a pretty competitive market. There's lots of great scopes out there.

[00:33:34] We feel like we've got a good. Start with Sayi and we're gonna build on that. So the answer is yes, 

[00:33:39] Travis Bader: answer is yes. Hey, good answer. Um, 

[00:33:44] Trevor Publicover: that I will say we're not gonna build something that looks like an kin one four that's separate. Like kin is kins, kin kin's, Alcan, right? We're looking at more of the low power variable stuff, um, in different magnifications that will be higher.

[00:34:00] Travis Bader: So we've talked about this one before and that's about the radical on the one to six and how it can be a bit polarizing. Yeah. And this guy says, I want to get an A one to six, but the radical leaves a lot desired. It says, we'd love to see other offerings, also maybe a one to eight. So it looks like you've kind of touched on that a little bit.

[00:34:16] Next guy says, I agree radical's not for everyone. Glass clarity. Uh, build quality color correctness is spot on though. And that was by gear report, Caleb. So, uh, let's talk about a polarizing radical cuz we, we had some chats about this today about, uh, we did. And the, uh, similarity between my opinion anyways.

[00:34:36] Boots, boots and radicals. Yeah, 

[00:34:38] Trevor Publicover: it's a bit of a fad. Yeah, it's a bit of a thing. Um, it's hard for us to, well I think it's hard for the industry in general to keep everything together. There's not one radical that satisfies everyone. Mm-hmm. . There's some that come close, but there's a lot of design and the way people shoot maybe is evolving a little bit.

[00:34:58] And what they're looking for is evolving, specifically our rapid aiming radical, the. We've had it for a long time and it was designed originally in a scope that was to bracket a torso from shoulder to hip, right? And that X-Wing fighter look that some people call it that's at a hundred meters. It's for fast acquisition and really draws your eye to the center of the target, right?

[00:35:29] It's a lot for some people and we knew that it was gonna be polarizing when we put it out, but a lot of radicals are anyway. Sure. People just don't like some things about it. Other people love it. Most of the time people just have to get behind it and they have to look at it and they have to use it. And to see the application and to see it really draws the eye to the center of the aiming point if you're moving, um, and if you're shooting quick.

[00:35:55] And that was the whole intent. 

[00:35:58] Travis Bader: You know, I think a lot of people get stuck in analysis paralysis. Yeah. As well as social proofing. Yeah. So like Amazon and social media and arresting or different forums and blogs, uh, people, if they're gonna make a big purchase or even a little purchase, they want to see, they want to know, am I making the right decision?

[00:36:17] And so they'll go and they'll look at how many reviews are on and what other people are saying about it. And that can, that can influence people's decisions a fair bit. Yep. And I likened it to Boots. I remember I was heading, outing a hike with a, uh, buddy of mine. He just got back out the, uh, British Army fit and tough as nails and, and he's, oh, let's go for a hike.

[00:36:39] We'll just walk up a couple of the hills around here while they're, Not hills. They're, they're mountains, but, uh, not better. Go get a pair of boots. Someone's like, oh, those Dans, you should get these. Dans, they're the best boots ever. They're so comfortable. They work great. You never get a blister. Oh, Dans completely inappropriate as a hiking boot, number one.

[00:36:55] But, uh, at, at the time, or at least the ones that I picked up were, and I picked him up and, uh, I couldn't wear shoes for about three weeks hours. Oh, no. , I had blisters so bad. My, when I poured it, and it was pouring rain too, when I poured it out, it was just red, red water coming out of these things. Um, yeah, maybe they're great for that person, but until you get behind them and use 'em, everyone's feet are gonna be different.

[00:37:18] Everyone's eyes are gonna be different. And we talk about glass. I. Quantifiably IA can say this is the best glass ever, um, based on, on scientific analysis, but how your eye sees it and then your brain perceives it, is gonna be a certain level of subjectivity involved here. And just like with those radicals, there's gonna be some radicals that some people just swear by and they just say, this is the best and maybe it's really good for them, but you really have to go and try it for yourself.

[00:37:48] You do. And really, I've been shooting since I've been four years old. One thing that I have seen is a cycle of fads is they come through and they go over and it's all brand new again. But you can make anything work for you. You can, maybe some things you're tweaking a little bit, but I mean, even your duplex radicals you can range with if you have known, uh, measurements on them and you can Exactly right.

[00:38:11] And you can make, uh, calls with it. And, uh, just the old school Hunter, hunter, duplex, um, so. I think for people when they're looking at radicals, it's really important to not get tied up in what everybody else might be saying, but take a look at your specific application of what you're hoping to use it for the majority of the time.

[00:38:33] Yeah, and then work your way back from there. Does this one fit and will it do well and. I don't know. I, from my perspective, I think that's a, uh, it's not Gucci and sexy and in a marketing thing, like always putting a new radical out. 

[00:38:46] Trevor Publicover: But, uh, we're trying not to be Gucci and markety and all that stuff, but I mean, it, it happens.

[00:38:51] And right when we released the A one to six with the rapid aiming radical, we were really targeting like three gun shooters, fast moving, quick acquisition of the target, right? Uh, that was what, you know, it, it, it brackets an IPSec target at hundred meters perfectly. Yeah. Uh, that was the intent. And you know, like you said, you can make that work for pretty much anything if you, if that suits you and it doesn't annoy you every time you look through the scope.

[00:39:21] But 

[00:39:22] Travis Bader: I got, I got one more question I think I can ask in here. Then I wanna delve a little bit just about, uh, more about the company, cuz it Sure. It does intrigue me. Sure. Sure. Um, uh, here's a good one. How do I get a. 

[00:39:34] Trevor Publicover: Thanks for all these questions. 

[00:39:35] Travis Bader: This is great. Yeah, no problem. I mean, this isn't me. This people just written in and, um, Adam Bach says Adam, I've known him since he's been 12 years old.

[00:39:44] Fantastic fellow. Um, he's on the range any day that he can get away and get on the range and helping others do the same. Nice, uh, good instructor, good ambassador for, uh, for the, uh, the gun world in general. Um, he said, I'd like to know about the scope, price points and durability. Is there a diminishing return on expensive scope when it comes to the view that it can take and still function flawlessly with super high end scopes?

[00:40:14] Does the end user expect better, build quality to withstand harsher punishment, or is it just exact extracting perfect optical clarity. And then he has an also, so this is actually three questions also. Can he physically wear a scope turt from use? So that I'm sure you maybe got the last one. So why don't we just go through em systematically?

[00:40:34] Sure, 

[00:40:34] Trevor Publicover: yeah, yeah, sure. So I think going back to making the best scope on the planet and the quality and the support, there is an expectation that that scope is more ruggedized. We're building them for a military, uh, specification. We expect that soldiers would use them, um, in their day to day taskings and everything beneath that, we also understand, and we weren't the scopes against manufacturers, defects for the life of a tangent, the scope.

[00:41:09] We are designing these things to last and, you know, to take a lick and keep on ticking, right? If I'm allowed to say that right? It's like, yeah. So I think yes. If you are paying good money for a scope, you can expect it, it's gonna last. Um, but if you're a guy who falls and drops the scope on a rock or whatever, follow your tree stand or the things that life put in front of you that aren't necessarily manufacture defects, eh, you know what?

[00:41:41] That may not be the case, but it depends. Everything is situational. Yeah. And for the times that that has happened in the past, we'll bring a scope back in. We'll have a look at it. Most cases, if we can fix it, we'll fix it. If there's some minimal cost, like there's things that we can't fix. Sure. If you scratch the glass, if you bust an element, It has to be replaced.

[00:42:01] Right. I mean, but we can figure that out on a case by case basis. There is that care of the glass, how you clean the glass, the lick of the glove and the little, but that doesn't work. Yeah. What I mean, that's the most common thing that we have, like Yeah. What's that little swirly mark thing? So yeah, so there is an expectation of common sense, but generally we will stand behind our products.

[00:42:28] But I think going back to the question, , you should expect your scope to last a little bit longer, to take a little bit more of a, a lick within, you know, uh, um, a degree of understanding that it can only take so much. It is really aluminum and glass, right? So, uh, inside of that, uh, we test to a certain, our designs are tested, improved, and then our scopes are also tested, um, individually every single scope that leaves this faculty has a thousand rounds on our drop tester at a thousand Gs.

[00:43:06] And you were lucky enough to witness that today? Yeah. That drive being insane. Yeah, it's crazy. And it's just behind us here. So funk fun all day. We wanna make sure that the elements stay together, all the pieces work when you're using them in extreme ranges. So when the erector tube gets dialed up to its extreme.

[00:43:26] Ups and downs. Yeah. Um, and left and right. Yeah. That it comes back to its optical center where you've zeroed it and has a repeatable function. So that's very important and we test it through multiple phases. Um, we leak test each one to make sure that there's no design flaw in the scope. Um, if there is, it goes back to the drawing board.

[00:43:51] Mm-hmm. , we drop test it, all our scopes are filled with nitrogen, so they're not susceptible to the temperature, temperature changes and build up of, um, condensation inside on the glass if something changes. So all that's pretty serious stuff and intended for, you know, professional, serious users. And 

[00:44:10] Travis Bader: you know, we were talking before about a, um, a batch that I was at and it rained and like we're in British Columbia and it rained and rained and like it was a multi-day match.

[00:44:20] And day two, there was three people on the line and they all just so happened to be, maybe there were. A same batch run or something, but it was another scope company, not an inexpensive scope company, and they're having fogging issues in there. And it struck me that um, now this company's probably producing a lot more and maybe they're not able to, um, test each in every scope in the same way.

[00:44:47] But the level of confidence that comes with knowing that you're actually gonna be able to see your target. Yeah. Whether it's just a competition and it's a, um, uh, and it's sort of extreme conditions or you're out hunting and it's really, uh, cold out. I mean, they, they couldn't see the target. The thing's just fogged completely up on 'em.

[00:45:07] It's problem. Yeah. Something kept going through and that pressure testing that was just kind of neat cuz you'd, on the underneath side of the scope that you got this thing you can attach before it's solve fully, fully assembled. Yep. And it's gotta maintain and have zero pressure leak in or out. And, um, , there's ways, if there was a leak, they'd be able to, uh, determine and find it.

[00:45:27] I mean, that we've talked before on the podcast about like the Nike effect. Yep. You put Nikes on, you can run faster and jump higher. Right? Yeah. And, and that's just a psychological thing cuz people have a confidence in what it is. If I look better, I'll do better. Right. But shooting is such a psychological thing.

[00:45:43] Yeah. Right. They say it's 90. So 

[00:45:45] Trevor Publicover: with tangent, thes, you can shoot farther and faster. Right. . 

[00:45:47] Travis Bader: Right. Because you got that psychological sort of look, I, I have the confidence in knowing that it's been drop tests x amount of times and very annoyingly in an office where you keep hearing these ths where it's got the, um, Uh, where it's been pressure tested, I've, yeah, I thought that was the, uh, uh, personally, I, if I were you guys, I'd be putting that on the whole marketing brochure and, uh, and showing 

[00:46:09] Trevor Publicover: it out there.

[00:46:10] Yeah, absolutely. And that adds to, you know, the, the build time and that, yeah. Again, we don't sacrifice the quality and we wanna make sure that every one of them is tested and, um, that is super important to us. But, you know, to the other guys in the line that had the fogging issue Yeah. Like us, like them, we're not, you know, immune to all of these issues.

[00:46:31] Sometimes, you know, the Murphy shows up or there's a, there's a problem. But again, it's how you handle it and how do you deal with it? How do you deal with it? And that's a very serious issue around here. So, 

[00:46:42] Travis Bader: So we have a few more questions, but I'll get into 'em afterwards because you were talking a little bit about, uh, care and maintenance.

[00:46:47] So you're saying I can't spit on my objective landing anymore? Well, I mean, you can, but and, uh, and rub it off with steel wolf. 

[00:46:55] Trevor Publicover: No, that's, that's, that's probably not 

[00:46:57] Travis Bader: best practice. Okay. So, uh, what about, uh, giving a little, uh, breath and, uh, maybe using a microfiber cloth or, that's okay. 

[00:47:05] Trevor Publicover: Kleenex. That's a Kleenex.

[00:47:07] I, that's a little sketchy. Unless you really had to, so, okay. Every scope now ships with a lens pen. Um, tangent data. Um, well, it's actually Tenex lens pen and a microfiber cloth. Okay. We had story time. Okay. So we had a, an instruction sheet on our website probably five, six years ago where, There was this whole detailed set of instructions where you had like canned air and you blew the, all the dust off the, the glass with the canned.

[00:47:40] Oh. Can be careful with that. So yeah, I certainly do. 

[00:47:43] Travis Bader: How do you be blasts well pressed air and particles 

[00:47:46] Trevor Publicover: anyways? Well, this particular story was, um, a bench rush shooter in the desert. Was it? Upside down? Upside down. And the glass exploded. 

[00:47:56] Travis Bader: Okay. I'll let you talk it through for people who don't understand what's gonna happen here.

[00:47:59] Trevor Publicover: So he read the instructions and he was cleaning because it was dusty on the desert and, uh, wanted to clear the glass off before he used the lens pen. But, It was 110 degrees in the desert, took the canned air and instead of just blowing it off, turned the canned air upside down, which kind of turns into like this liquid nitrogen right.

[00:48:19] Type thing. Yeah. And sprayed the objective lens with the canned air upside down. It, it popped. So our bad, we shouldn't have said, don't do that on the desert. When it's 110, we help the guy out. Sure. Uh, so again, back to this whole common sense, don't put anything that's abrasive. Um, your service gloves with a little leather, you know, that that was a, that was a big thing with a lot of the C 79 s.

[00:48:47] We get back, you know, guys get sand in the lens. It's like, I gotta see. So the tongue and the thing, it works for a while, but Sure. What we say is, you know, if you have a lens pen with a brush or there, you can buy these little, um, like little blower tubes that will kind of blow some light air clear off the lens.

[00:49:07] You can, um, turn the lens pen around and there's a little pad, right, that has some solution on it. So it gets out all the spots. Uh, it's pretty slick. It's easy. Just don't use anything that's abrasive. So the stuff that you think is gonna work, the stuff you'd use on your eyeglasses would be the same thing.

[00:49:23] Okay? So you can spray, um, some like alcohol, uh, on the lens to clear it off, but would 

[00:49:29] Travis Bader: that, would that detract from the coatings that are on the lens? A little No alcohol? 

[00:49:33] Trevor Publicover: No. No. But. Particles and scratch as well. Okay. Yeah. So 

[00:49:40] Travis Bader: you know that compressed air cans, when I was younger, I used to get a fair few letters about the school to my, to my home.

[00:49:47] And, uh, they weren't always good letters, not really, but I was able to take that compressed air upside down and he can press down on the paper and spray it and it makes a whole thing go translucent. So you can read what's actually in the envelope and then it's shortly after it all kind of evaporates and dries up.

[00:50:02] Oh, I like that. Yeah. That was, that was my little spy 

[00:50:04] Trevor Publicover: trick. . I like that. Yeah. So no canned air? No canned 

[00:50:08] Travis Bader: air, no cann air. Okay. So that's basic cleaning. Um, 

[00:50:12] Trevor Publicover: straightforward. We do have instructions on our website that don't have canned air, that don't have canned air. At least I hope they don't know we took that out.

[00:50:19] Um, there's some detailed stuff and there's different options depending on the level of cleaning, but just general maintenance is, 

[00:50:26] Travis Bader: What if someone does get a scratch on there, can that be like polished out or is that the coding? That's, 

[00:50:31] Trevor Publicover: that's the coding. So you're, so if the, if the lens gets scratched, depending on whether you can live with it, um, it means that either has to be, well, it has to be replaced or it's just beyond economical repair.

[00:50:45] Travis Bader: Do you, you know, I've seen scratch lenses, I've looked through and they look just fine. Right. But you look at the lens, they can have some pretty good scratches. Yep. Just like with like photography, you can scratch a lens up and it takes great pictures. Uh, does it have to be pretty significant of a scratch for you to have some sort of an optical issue or, well, 

[00:51:04] Trevor Publicover: I think it's more what the user can manage.

[00:51:08] Um, so some people just. Stand to look through their scope and see any degradation in the image, whether it be a little spot of dirt, um, and sometimes dirt gets loose inside through the, like through the production process. It happens. Yeah. There'll be spots in the glass. Some people can live with it, some people can't.

[00:51:27] Yeah. Scratch doesn't really degrade what it is, except it's an obstruction in your line of sight. Okay. So it 

[00:51:35] Travis Bader: depends. So that clean room that you guys have upstairs? Yep. That was pretty cool. So you're a little. Uh, first thing I noticed when I went in there is a bit warmer, a bit more humid. Yep. 

[00:51:45] Trevor Publicover: Tri Lamin Flow benches.

[00:51:46] So there's a positive airflow that goes through the whole clean room, which is meant to keep all the dust particles and all the dirt. That's why they don't let sales guys in there. So we just keep all that stuff out of that. Uh, and sales guys, you know, we have our, we have our people that work in the pods inside and we do our best to keep the dust and the dirt down even throughout the whole office.

[00:52:07] We keep it at a very high humidity and we just wanna keep all that stuff at a, at a minimum 

[00:52:14] Travis Bader: human arrow bind to the particles. Keep it down. You got it. Smart. Um, okay, so got an idea on cleaning. How about, uh, what are things I can do to really, uh, mess up mounting the scope? 

[00:52:26] Trevor Publicover: Good question. We get it a lot and there are a lot of.

[00:52:31] Ring manufacturers. Um, we've pretty much run the gamut of most of the major ones. And we found, uh, kind of the sweet spot for our five to 20 fives where we publish a torque spec for the rings and it's 25 inch pounds regardless of what the ring manufacturer says is the limit for their rings. Mm. So we have a lot of experience in history through our past life with Premier mm-hmm.

[00:53:03] um, dealing with their scopes. There were some thin wall scopes where if you over toed the, the rings, it would pinch, um, the tube which crossed the erector, which caused issues with parallax. Some cases you could release the tension on, on the rings, and it would go back to what would be normal. Other cases it didn't and it had be erect apart, so, We understood that in the design for five to 25.

[00:53:30] So we beefed up the tube a little bit and we made it more rugged. And we published a spec to torque your rings too, which is 25 inch pounds. I just said it. Yeah, I Say it again. 25 inch pounds. . Yeah. And pretty much all of the major manufacturers now, you'll have no issues, but there are issues that come up if you, you know, just are mutant sometimes and forget and over torque stuff.

[00:53:54] It happens to the best of 

[00:53:55] Travis Bader: us. Well there's, you know, uh, when I started working on guns, nobody talked about torque specs. Yep. Uh, and then they became all their age. Everyone says it's gotta be at this, otherwise your gun will fall apart or it'll blow up. It just won't work. And I think it's, if you have a feel and know where to tighten it to, and it's not gonna, You're good and you're done.

[00:54:15] Um, some things that I've seen are people who don't, uh, store their, their torque wrenches properly. I mean, good point. Most have to be taken right back down to zero and released, and they'll have inaccurate readings. Or if they start using oil in there, or lock tight fluid's gonna change your, your settings again.

[00:54:34] And they're, oh no, it said 25 when I did there, or whatever it might be. Um, having that feel is something you can't really teach. Yeah. I guess over a booklet or, or YouTube, it might be a difficult thing to teach. Yeah. And maybe that's why they came up with the, everyone started getting hot and heavy for, uh, torque specs.

[00:54:52] Specs. 

[00:54:53] Trevor Publicover: Yeah. Uh, it happens and you know, there's new ring manufacturers that come up all the time. Uh, we try to work with everyone and we try to make sure that our stuff is, you know, quote unquote bulletproof. We're susceptible to all the same issues that everyone elses, right? And, uh, the, yeah, the, the specs right now are higher than what they were, um, lower than what most manufacturers recommend that their rings are capable of.

[00:55:21] Mm-hmm. , but you don't always necessarily need to have it maxed out and, you know, if you do run into an issue and you've mounted your scope up and you find like there's a problem on when, on a tangent, data parallax doesn't seem to be right, first of all, give us a call, maybe second of all crank it down a little bit or just check to make sure you're at the right spec.

[00:55:41] Maybe, you know, have a do over but um, you know, give us a call to shop and we can walk you through all that stuff cuz you know, that's pretty important. 

[00:55:49] Travis Bader: Sure. I'd say so. What about, um, Let's see. Uh, so when you're mounting this thing, I'm keeping it level. Do you have any tips and tricks for people aside from, uh, 

[00:56:00] Trevor Publicover: we have a, we have a whole big instruction sheet on very detailed, uh, procedures to level a scope.

[00:56:06] Okay. But I mean, how do you level your scope? Do you level your gun use a plum, bob? Yeah. I mean, it's you, if you don't have all the tools, you can kind of make it up. Yeah. Um, and in most cases 

[00:56:20] Travis Bader: it works. Yeah. That's what, that's sort of what I found. And you know, if you got an eye for it, you should be able to see if it's level or not.

[00:56:26] Trevor Publicover: Yeah. Yeah. I think if you have a, a stable base for your gun level, your gun derails as best you can. Yeah. Mount your scope. Use a plum bob hanging off the wall. Yeah. Level your radical. I mean, there's a lot of more detailed stuff that you can go through, but it depends on, on, 

[00:56:47] Travis Bader: well, you know, and some people say like they'll put a level on top of their scope and they'll say, well, this scope.

[00:56:52] Uh, caps might not necessarily be level Yeah. With theoreticals. Correct. 

[00:56:57] Trevor Publicover: In most cases I don't think they are. Okay. I don't think like the not a good procedure for you to set the level on top of our scopes or any scope, cuz it's not necessarily the same in line with your rail. Um, 

[00:57:13] Travis Bader: yeah, that's a good point.

[00:57:15] Um, I don't know, did we, did we answer the last question there on the, uh, can you wear out your, uh, no we didn't turrets. 

[00:57:21] Trevor Publicover: No, but let's go back to that. Yeah. Then we're back. Cause that's an important one. Okay. That's one that we pride ourselves on and we spent millions of dollars. To focus. Um, we wanted millions.

[00:57:31] Oh, like hyperbole Easy. Yes. Easy. No, not hyperbole. No, no. . We spent many years in development to get to the place where a, we had the cliques clicks and that they didn't degrade over time and use, so we set up multiple jigs and the way our tens work are a little bit different. They're not, you know, all tens.

[00:57:56] We have a little special, special, special thing inside. Yeah. Um, saw that it pretty cool. It is pretty cool. We mounted it on a jig and we hooked it up to, you know, it was pretty basic. It was a drill and we let. Run for weeks and hundreds of thousands of rotations, which far exceeded what the normal life expectancy would be, probably of the user of a scope.

[00:58:20] Sure. Um, and in most cases, nobody would ever be adjusting the turrets to that level. That's, and 

[00:58:26] Travis Bader: really ocd, but sure, it could 

[00:58:28] Trevor Publicover: happen . So what we wanted to make sure is that over time those clicks didn't get mushy and they stayed precise and crisp and tactile and you could hear every positive click. And that was very important in, in the original design and slowed things down.

[00:58:47] And we maintained that today. And you saw it yourself. Um, yeah. There's people that spend a big chunk of their day testing the clicks and making sure that everything is. Very cool. So I would say no unless you go completely crazy, which, uh, you'd have to spend a lot of time. Those clicks are not, our clicks are not gonna, um, get worse over time.

[00:59:12] Travis Bader: I've got another question here. It says, uh, I'd be interested in a long range scope recommendation for a 300 wind, ME 500 yard plus. And, uh, this is from a fellow, uh, Siri 300, and he's a, um, I know him to be a hunter, been a waterfowl hunting with him in the past. I'm wondering if he's looking at this from a precision rifle standpoint or a hunting standpoint, but maybe if that little background gives a, uh, uh, flavor to an answer.

[00:59:39] Trevor Publicover: Uh, yep. And, uh, I think we have something that's in between all of that. Mm-hmm. , where you could cross into precision rifle and hunting. Uh, we have something that. It kind of is dedicated to completely hunting. So we have about three to 15 in a hunter, long range hunter model. It has, um, special turrets, which are, they're kind of locking, but you have to click them up to dial your targets, which I don't think we actually get to see today.

[01:00:08] But no, we didn't look at that, didn't we? So the three to 15, it's a 30 millimeter tube more than capable of, of, of, uh, engaging anything, you know, 500 plus at that range. Yeah. And everything that we offer above that would be, would be suitable. It just depends on how much weight you would like to carry. Um, what zoom or what resolution you wanna see at distance.

[01:00:34] Obviously, a five to 25 is gonna get you a little bit closer to whatever it is you're aiming at, if that's what you want. Mm. Most people stick around 10 to 12 depending on how far their engagements are, and I would say you'd be comfortable at that level. Um, so the answer that depends is we probably have something that would suit either strictly hunting or in the middle of hunting and competition or just competition.

[01:01:01] What 

[01:01:01] Travis Bader: would the middle one be? What, what would you recommend for, uh, 

[01:01:04] Trevor Publicover: three to 15 p? So it has a 34 mil tube, has, uh, a little bit more range, so it gives you a little bit more, uh, distance that you could reach out. But still in a compact design, it's a little bit heavier than the 30 mil tube. Same beefy turrets as the five to 25.

[01:01:22] Um, not as long, not as heavy. Very good, capable scope. 

[01:01:27] Travis Bader: Okay. One thing that we haven't talked about that we, I got to see firsthand today was the toolless re zeroing. Yes. Yes. That was pretty slick. Yeah. And you know what, sorry, we forgot to talk about that. How the heck, hasn't anybody done that before? 

[01:01:42] Trevor Publicover: I don't know.

[01:01:43] Yeah. So we've patented, uh, toolless re zero and it, uh, it's really easy. We have, uh, a screw on the top. Um, very tactile, big fat fingers will fit in there. You, once you get your zero as we did today, yeah, you unwind it. Four, five revolutions. Pick up your turret, put it back to zero, tighten it back down.

[01:02:05] You're 

[01:02:05] Travis Bader: done. Yeah. And even holds your zero stop for you. It does, it 

[01:02:09] Trevor Publicover: reset. It resets it. So you then have, you know, five clicks past that. So 

[01:02:13] Travis Bader: that's pretty damn 

[01:02:14] Trevor Publicover: cool. It's pretty damn cool. Yeah. It 

[01:02:17] Travis Bader: works very well. So if people haven't seen that and they're interested, uh, I'm gonna have something on the, uh, yeah.

[01:02:23] Little 

[01:02:23] Trevor Publicover: video that, a little clip, so that'll be good. 

[01:02:25] Travis Bader: Yeah. Um, I'm looking at a few notes I took here. Um, president on Roster two. Clean toilet . Yeah. Quick notes taken down. Right. Nice work. Make sure not to mention . 

[01:02:43] Trevor Publicover: Whoops. We're gonna bring it up anyway. . I, yeah. I just passed my 10 year mark with the company.

[01:02:50] Um, feels like you, it was just yesterday, like, so. It's been great. My previous life, I came from a large defense contractor, um, was based outta the UK kind of more corporate environment and culture and kind of get tired of being on the road, want to spend time with my family and wasn't quite sure where to go.

[01:03:11] And just by strike of luck, I found this place and met with Ted and Andy and came out with the company. And within the first couple weeks I went to the bathroom and there was a duty roster on the back with a bunch of names and a cleaning schedule. And I'm like, what's this? And. Why's my name on that

[01:03:35] It's like, well, you're up on Friday for cleaning the bathroom, buddy. Um, so it speaks to the culture of our company. And I was like, ah, you gotta be kidding me. And looking back now, it's pretty cool. I mean, it's, it's super cool. The president, the owner, there's nobody that got excluded from cleaning the toilet duty or scrubbing the floors.

[01:03:55] We all took part in that. I was, I believe, employee number five or six when I, when I came on. So, uh, it was entrepreneurial. It still is. We don't have to clean the toilets now. We actually have somebody comes in to do that, thank God, . Uh, we have a lot more people too, so, yeah. Uh, well, it 

[01:04:14] Travis Bader: speaks to the, uh, to the business.

[01:04:17] Like I always hate it. Well, that's not my job. It's not my department. That's for someone else. I do, I've worked here for x amount of years now. Right. So I'm, I'm above that. I mean, the job's a job. We all do it. Some are dirty, some aren't. Yeah. But I, I think it speaks volumes to, uh, a place that I would enjoy working at is one that that ego is left outside.

[01:04:41] Yes. Yes. And that's one of the things cuz I've seen, you know, like David background and Yep. And, uh, British Army, British military, and, uh, uh, accomplished individual as a PRS shooter. I didn't get one whiff of ego from him. Nope. Or anybody else here. Nope. And their backgrounds, I mean, Andy, like, holy girl, look at what he is done.

[01:05:05] Yeah. Right. It's pretty amazing from nothing. 

[01:05:07] Trevor Publicover: Yeah. Pretty amazing. Just out of his 

[01:05:09] Travis Bader: basement. Yeah. Well I heard, uh, I didn't actually know the whole story with, uh, accuracy International. I thought that was kind of interesting. I think we can talk to the EI story maybe, but, uh, accuracy International, just. It just started out of their basement, so to speak as well.

[01:05:27] And they just two people working in the shed and they got this contract to, uh, uh, or possibility to have a contract and they just rented a big old warehouse and had their friends dress up and, uh, yeah, look busy. And they said, look it, this is, this is our warehouse. It was a part of the procurement process.

[01:05:44] They had to do a factory tour, but, uh, that sort of spirit of just getting it done and now look at 'em, where they're at. AI is a, uh, I mean they supply all the UK military with their precision rifles and other, other armies as well. 

[01:06:00] Trevor Publicover: Yeah. The difference between them and us at that point in time is we actually owned the building, so

[01:06:05] Oh, . 

[01:06:07] Travis Bader: Oh, it's funny. Yeah. Yeah, 

[01:06:09] Trevor Publicover: for sure. 

[01:06:10] Travis Bader: Um, you had a hunting story? Want to hear this one? You haven't brought it up yet. No, I haven't. Yeah, I don't know. Haven't, so, uh, in the entire couple days here, I, I heard something about, uh, having to be medivaced out. 

[01:06:22] Trevor Publicover: Uh, yeah. Yeah. So two years ago, I just passed the two year anniversary.

[01:06:28] Um, I grew up hunting, um, with my dad and my brother, and we hunt in the eastern shore. It's a very rugged, um, thick, dense area. Generally whitetail, you know, if you are lucky, if you see them at 20, you know, 50 yards. And that's, that's max. And uh, we had found this new spot and we kind of planned for it for six months, you know, looking at maps.

[01:06:54] We got in done Rey and just, we set up blinds and cameras and all that. And, you know, my dad and my brother, the plan was to go and sit in the blind. Um, it was two lakes. I was gonna go and kind of circle around and there was a big buck that we. Yeah. Kind of tailing. I got fresh on the tail of this monster, so I was a little bit, you know, jacked up.

[01:07:21] Yeah, a little excited, a little excited. And, uh, side to that and lessons learned, and actually some of the things I've even picked up on the podcast from watching some of your guests, I know a lot of the things that I did wrong that day, um, a lot of things that I could have done better that, um, led to me getting medevaced outta the woods.

[01:07:43] So I was in a real tough spot where, um, I was kind on my hands and knees crawl through some thick bush and there were some, um, quite steep hills with some quite steep little dropoffs. And, you know, my truck, I carry a first aid kit and a tourniquet and sure, you know, um, all kinds of bandages. And I have a little spot, uh, messenger.

[01:08:08] So smart. If I get caught. It's in my truck. All in your truck 

[01:08:12] Travis Bader: in my 

[01:08:13] Trevor Publicover: right, which is my, I had a, I had enough to probably survive a week in my pack, which I was only going out for the day, but no way to message. So I had my cell phone, okay. And I had a Garin gps and I, uh, probably halfway through the morning and messaged my brother, said, Hey, listen, I don't know if you can see where I'm at, but I'm kind of getting close.

[01:08:32] I'm gonna, this is my plan. I'm gonna circle around this area, give him my utm, and then kind of figured out on my phone that I could service. So we started sharing stuff, and then I took a step and I kind of cut my finger and I looked at my, I was like, ah, you know what? I'm really dumb. I don't have anything to bandage myself up.

[01:08:49] So I put my gloves on and there was a, a fairly steep ledge right in front of me, and I. Surveyed the area. I took one step with my pack on, I had my gun on my hand, and I just lost my footing at the edge of this ledge. And I just went face first over the ledge. I was falling face worth face first. My gun with my tangent data.

[01:09:15] Yeah. In this hand pack on it. And I kind of cupped up as I was falling. And it was a sharp rock at the bottom, my leg hit the rock, um, and snapped my tip and fib, uh, oh my. So, so that's a good break. And it was out to the skin. So compound. I, uh, I kind of fuzzed out for a few minutes and I picked up my phone and I could still get to my brother and I'm like, I'm really messed up.

[01:09:42] I broke my leg. You gotta get to me. And he's. You know, you're joking, right? Like he thought I was calling cause I shot to tear. Yeah. Which I didn't. Um, you know, I reached down, I grabbed my leg and I flipped over and it did the whole floppy, floppy and you feel the bone sticking out through. So I got my leg elevated, I still had my pack on.

[01:10:02] What 

[01:10:02] Travis Bader: were you feeling, like getting like signs of shock when that happened? 

[01:10:05] Trevor Publicover: At that point I was good. Okay. Um, and I had taken, you know, I take first cl first aid all the time. Sure. You're, I'm self aware. Um, my brother was the, uh, the head of the search and rescue for his area wasn't the area that we were in , but we were 500 meters apart.

[01:10:23] It took him 45 minutes to get to me. It was that thick. Wow. So I laid in the hole, broken leg. Um, he got to me and I'm like, listen, you gotta call 9 1 1. You and my dad are not getting me out of the spot. So, long story short, I laid there for about three hours, um, before a, the first. People that get to me were, uh, a fire department, um, that had kind of trudged their way in.

[01:10:47] God loved them. And, uh, they had a sled. And, uh, they got me in the sled. The paramedics kind of did first level kind of support. They got my leg in a, in a flat swap flap. They got the flap, they got the flappies down, but they. , they couldn't administer any mets, um, cuz they didn't have the qualifications. So there was like 15, um, people including police officers and the, and the, uh, ambulance guys that drug me out of the woods for three hours.

[01:11:17] Travis Bader: Unmetered. When did the pain kick in? 

[01:11:20] Trevor Publicover: Uh, soon as they bump 

[01:11:22] Travis Bader: me into the sled. Yeah. So while you're waiting for them, it was like, okay. When I was 

[01:11:26] Trevor Publicover: waiting for them, I was right and then it got dark and I started to get cold and I could feel like, all right, I know that I'm, I've got signs of shock and you know, I'm talking to my brother and he's taking pictures of me and he's doing what you would do as a brother would do.

[01:11:43] As a brother would do. Yeah, so it, it was, uh, it was a bit surreal. Um, it's like I come into the terms with the fact that I'm laying in the woods for what was a long time before my brother even got there with a broken leg. Scary knowing that all of my kit was in the truck and I didn't have it. And so, you know, I've internalized that a lot since.

[01:12:07] And, you know, you kinda live that over and over. And 

[01:12:09] Travis Bader: so 

[01:12:10] Trevor Publicover: lessons. Lessons learned, not so heavy pack. Right. Take what I need. Not more than I need. Um, take my time. Be a little bit more calculated. You're rushing a bit. Were you, um, I was, I was trying to cover some ground. Okay. Because 

[01:12:28] Travis Bader: that's tactically advancing 

[01:12:30] Trevor Publicover: daylight.

[01:12:30] Swiftly, daylight was, uh, was, was becoming scarce. It was in the afternoon, so it was about two 30. You know, I wanted to get my eyes on that big block. Yeah. Um, and, uh, I wouldn't have left home without my spot and I wouldn't have, uh, left my tourniquet and all my other first aid stuff, which for some reason was in my truck.

[01:12:53] And I decided to take water and some other food. And I had, I had a, a blanket and other things, which I did use, but. I had just some dumb mistakes that could have really cost me. And if I wouldn't have had cell coverage, that would've been tough. It'd have been worse. You'd be crawling. Yeah. That wasn't gonna happen.

[01:13:11] Travis Bader: So about how far of a fall was that, do you 

[01:13:14] think? 

[01:13:14] Trevor Publicover: Uh, I'd say at about six, seven feet. Um, so it wasn't crazy, but you know, I watched my leg hit that rock and this is like, I knew as soon as it happened that, uh, something was up. So the question 

[01:13:28] Travis Bader: I'm sure everyone's asking, how'd the scope Fair know what 

[01:13:32] Trevor Publicover: it was?

[01:13:33] Strangely, the, it was the thing that I can remember thinking about as I was falling, cuz you hear so many stories of guys fallen with their rifles and, you know, discharging. Mm-hmm. . So as I'm falling, I threw it to the side. Okay. Landed in some moss and there was some rocks, there was some scratches. It's since ran the battery test here.

[01:13:56] still shooting it. So it was, uh, it was our three to 15 hunter model. Uh, it was fine. Wow. It did way better than me. , way better than you. I needed a three to 15 of my leg. So, 

[01:14:08] Travis Bader: um, I'm, I'm looking through a couple more of my notes here. One of 'em I put down was Cuts through Mirage. 

[01:14:17] Trevor Publicover: Yep. So there's a couple things that we can talk about.

[01:14:21] Yeah. One of them is the resolution and the clarity of the glass that is in our tangent. Thes, um, I think has an advantage to, um, seeing through some of that distortion of mirage. Another product that we have is, uh, polarizing lens for the ocular end of the scope. Okay, so like your sunglasses. Yeah. A polarizer on an optic has the same impact.

[01:14:48] You have to tune it to get it to polarize. Yeah. But helps cut down some of the effective mirage. Um, shooting on a bright, sunny day over reflective surfaces like water, snow helps reduce the glare, um, from that to help you see your target better. If you happen to be in a position where you need to shoot or see through glass, um, same as your glasses, it takes away all the glare so you can see to the target to the other side.

[01:15:16] So, One is the coatings, one is the resolution. The other is, you know, pairing that with a polarizer helps as a system to kind of bring that mirage down a little bit. It doesn't take it away, but it helps you see your target a little bit better. 

[01:15:32] Travis Bader: Interesting. Uh, one thing, so tanex flip cap covers. Yep. Um, got a cool tour of the factory there.

[01:15:43] Yep. Looking at all the stuff you're doing and they've got an interesting story as well. But, uh, one thing that, uh, you guys have is the ad's, the anti-reflective devices. Yep. Uh, can you tell me a little bit about how these ad's work and, uh, why somebody would want them? 

[01:16:02] Trevor Publicover: Absolutely. I think more people need them than they know and.

[01:16:07] Don't understand why they would want them. So I, I'm happy to, to talk about it cuz it's something that we developed for the US military and goes back 25 years and we developed a proprietary coating called Exom. And that Exom is put on the honeycomb, uh, and it helps absorb light. There's two things that we wanna block, and that's the reflection coming back from the scope that if sunlight hits the glass right and then comes straight back out is one.

[01:16:41] So if you're in the military and you're buried in the side of a hill, you don't want to be discovered because of cause you're flashing back out the glint or the glare. Right? Yeah. Um, and also the reflection that's kind of come back off, it gets absorbed inside of that and it, uh, it actually acts as a, um, as a lens cover or, um, sun shade.

[01:17:02] Sun shade. Yeah. Sorry. Okay. A two and a half inch honeycomb works the same as a sun shade. What it doesn't do is doesn't block the barrel ma uh, mirage. Right. Because of the lens. So if you're, if you're stacking that, obviously we can't do the same thing, but it has the same effect as a sun shade helps if the angle comes in from the sun.

[01:17:24] So kind of blocks off that glare from your eye when you're, when you're looking at your scope. 

[01:17:28] Travis Bader: See I picked some of that up cuz I, I just couldn't find a, um, an a r d for a scope that I was looking for. Yeah. And uh, to just kind of screw in. But, uh, Tenex had one that, uh, worked with a scope and it works great and I use it for, on a hunting rifle.

[01:17:45] Excellent. At, um, uh, you only have to be looking right towards the sun. Yeah. Are they coming in one time and not be able to see anything through it to realize I could really use a solution so I can actually see my target. 

[01:17:58] Trevor Publicover: Absolutely. And you know, one of the other kind of just. Maybe forgotten about. Part is it actually protects the glass in the front, so ah, yes.

[01:18:06] If you're trudging through the bush and you know, you, something happens, the sticks hits your scope lens or, or whatever it, uh, it's a small price to pay to protect the coating on the 

[01:18:17] Travis Bader: lens. One thing I've heard people talk about is light transmission, and I know Elia's got thoughts on that as well about, uh, the ideas of it.

[01:18:24] But, um, uh, an a r d would change the amount of light just cuz it's got a, the honeycomb mash in front of it. It's gonna change the amount of light that come through. Yep. Um, when and where would that be a concern? Uh, or is it a psychological 

[01:18:40] Trevor Publicover: thing? It could be a little bit of both. Yeah. Um, it does, it does have an impact on light transmission.

[01:18:46] Okay. For sure. Okay. It's very minimal, uh, in maybe the very darkest edges of the evening. There may be a, a couple percentage, um, drops in transmission. Uh, Very hard to see with the eye and hard to measure in some cases. So, uh, we do, we do build different sizes and different thicknesses of the honeycomb all have slight different impacts.

[01:19:16] And the cool thing about the honeycomb in all of the magnified optics is you can't see it when you put it on the front of the skull. No, you can't. So the focal point is out past where the honeycomb is, and unless you're on a true one x, you can get the imprint, but it really doesn't impede, you know, any of your shooting points.

[01:19:33] So, uh, it it's pretty cool. 

[01:19:36] Travis Bader: Very cool. Well, from my perspective, I mean, just if I'm, if I wanna ring steel and it's a certain time of the day and I'm in one of my lo locations, I like to go to, unless I have a sunshade or an a r d, I'm just not seeing it. Yeah. Uh, hunting. Same thing out there. It came up and I couldn't take the shot, wasn't an ethical shot, couldn't see the animal, so just had to let it go by and I was like, I've gotta find a solution for this.

[01:20:02] And the a d worked 

[01:20:03] Trevor Publicover: well. So we all of our Tenex products. Before you go to the next question, just while we're on the topic, all of them screw in all of them. That's one of the things that we do very well. Right? If we're gonna brag about something, we'll brag about the fact that we've got probably 5,000 fits for almost every optical manufac optical manufacturer on the planet.

[01:20:27] Um, if we don't, we probably have something that's pretty close. Yes. Uh, it's a pretty tough business to have all the thread specs, the IDs, the ods, and have all those fits. We generally, we have a few models that have the boots that go over that kind of fit over the top on some different scope models that don't have the ability for a thread ring or right.

[01:20:50] That op, so we try to fix something to that, but I would say 98% of all of our products for Tenex screw into the front or have a cap that goes over the back. Right. They're really not a standard in the optical industry for sizing and thread specs. And, which is crazy if you think about it. Yeah. Yeah. So, so that's what we do well.

[01:21:11] Um, you may not think that when you go to our website and try to find your product , but we're trying to get better at that. So it, it's, uh, you know, it's a, it's a work in progress. Well, that's, 

[01:21:22] Travis Bader: um, yeah. I don't think most people think about the fact that within the same manufacturer in the same line, you can have differing thread pitches or, uh, IDs, ods, , diameter, outside diameter 

[01:21:35] Trevor Publicover: even.

[01:21:35] It's just by the same line, same model, different. 

[01:21:38] Travis Bader: Right. Yeah. And I don't think a lot of people would really take that into consideration. And the fact that you guys have been just scrapping, carving out a niche in an area, which probably really good in making sure that, uh, uh, keep competition out cuz who else wants to go through all of that effort and expenditure?

[01:21:56] Um, yeah, that's, uh, nothing worthwhile ever comes easy does it? True. I mean, 

[01:22:04] Trevor Publicover: and then, and we built the, we built the products to be tactically tough. Um, going back to the original days, and I think I might have told you a story that the original design for the US soldier was that flip cover that was positively attached to the scope was designed to be grabbed in the open position so they could stand up, pick up their gun in their optic by the flip cover and run and move.

[01:22:27] And, you know, we've never, we tried not to lose sight of that. 

[01:22:30] Travis Bader: Right. Um, You know, sometimes being in the right place at the right time or setting yourself up so you're ready when the right opportunity comes up. That plays a big part in business, saying yes to the right people and making sure you're surrounded by the, uh, same similar minded people who are positive, who work in the right direction.

[01:22:51] I remember listening to you speak before about saying no to the wrong people. 

[01:22:57] Trevor Publicover: Yeah, that's a tough one. Yeah. Um, it, uh, there's a lot of different companies that have different business practices and we wanna partner with companies, distributors, dealers who share our same beliefs, who, um, understand what it takes to sell high end optic.

[01:23:22] We never compete or we don't compete on price. Generally, I'd say we never compete, but we. Stand behind the product. We understand that we are then probably the most expensive. In some cases, all of our products are usually a little bit more expensive. So having a partner that understands the value and the quality is extremely important to us.

[01:23:46] We've learned a few hard lessons. We've had to break relationships because of that. Mm-hmm. Because they're not a good extension of our company here, or us as, as the way we want to portray ourselves to our customers. And that's always a tough place to be in because, you know, hey, we're Canadians, we wanna be friends with everyone.

[01:24:07] We don't, we don't want to be the, we don't wanna be that guy. But sometimes you gotta be that guy and 

[01:24:11] Travis Bader: you've built. Business, our reputation on saying, yes, can you do this? Yes we can. Yes. Right. Can you do cuz l can, yes, we can. Right? Yeah. And at a certain point you gotta turn around and look at, am I saying yes to the right people?

[01:24:23] Yeah. Am I being a little bit more selective? So something like that comes up. Is that a big boardroom discussion and everyone's waiting out the pros and cons? Or do you guys kind of have bumpers in line and just say, you know what, this person's offside or this company's offside outside of our bumpers or parameters that we've put in.

[01:24:41] Uh, we give them the opportunity to correct it or they're gone. Is that sort of as easily pragmatic as we, we kind of know where our variables are? 

[01:24:49] Trevor Publicover: I think in a lot of cases, yes. Comes with experience. It comes with hard lessons learned, gut instinct. There's a few things that. Tip you off. People go down a certain particular path at the beginning of a relationship.

[01:25:06] Not that you want to kind of paint everybody with the same brush, but you know, you kind of, if you've done it enough and things kind of tweak you in a different way, you kind of trust your gut, you trust your instincts. Yes. I would say everyone would, if they messed up, we'd give them multiple chances to Correct.

[01:25:27] Right, right. Um, we wanna avoid getting to the place where we have to correct 

[01:25:33] Travis Bader: somebody if you can just identify it right off the bat. Right. Yeah. That's interesting then the gut instinct portion of it. Cuz people don't really talk about that in business and you don't teach gut instinct. Yeah. I mean, the best predictor of future performance is past performance.

[01:25:47] Right. So you and I, were gonna get into a business relationship. First thing we're gonna do is look at each other's past performance. Yep. And we're gonna take a look at, um, Uh, social media presence. We're gonna take a look at like personally, if I'm getting into business, some, somebody over on British Columbia, I get onto court services online and if they have, I had one person phone me up and he had this idea he wanted to build a mall for guns and to getting all these gun things together and it'll have a range in there.

[01:26:13] And, and we'll be integral to this and we'll warning bells, bing, bing, bing as this person's talked. And, uh, they had run some very successful businesses and presented with a lot of flash and a lot of panache. But my gut, something was just ringing, so I got off the phone first thing I did. Okay. Google a name, use ent, open source intelligence tools, right?

[01:26:39] Absolutely. Um, court services online had three pages of civil suits of people suing this person or the person suing them back. And I'm like, thank you. No, thank you. Right? But. I mean, the proposal that this persons coming out with, it sounded great. And I think, um, I think that's a difficult thing for people in business to, um, to quell their ambition of for success.

[01:27:09] However, they deem success in their own business to stop and regroup and say, what's the macro of this look like? What's the big picture of this relationship? What, what would be some, like, without naming names, uh, sort of warning signs that you would see, like if, if you were to talk to old you, going back a little bit prior to learning 

[01:27:28] Trevor Publicover: something, I'd kick his butt.

[01:27:30] We, we have a, a pretty wide variety of, of customers and have had over the multitudes of years, and we're not looking for more, let's just talk about our distribution channels. We're not looking for more internet based. Customers that just have no, uh, angle except to sell it at a cheaper price. Right? A lot of our products, we maintain map and we protect them, which protects our distribution network.

[01:28:04] And we're looking for good partners who pay their bill know how to sell, um, optics in the way that we would want them sold and kind of extend our, um, culture in relation ethos exactly into our customer base or what potentially will be, you know, their customer base and ours. Things they say when they call us on the phone, um, tougher on the phone questions maybe that they're asking, or things that they're looking for without a relationship, without understanding what we're looking for and we don't know what they're looking for.

[01:28:42] So, Going back to some key questions maybe will tip us off. And then we do the same thing. We'll get online, we'll start doing our, our background checks. Maybe we'll give people a chance to do stuff where, you know, it's kind of cash in the barrel head, so to speak. And we will, we will slide depending on the personality of, of the person.

[01:29:07] It's almost tougher on the phone. And that's kind of what we've been lacking over the last three years where we're starving a little bit for more face to face stuff where you can pick up on keys. Right. And the non-verbals, the non-verbals, you meet somebody at a trade show, probably more apt to get, uh, involved with them if you have a face-to-face discussion like we are now.

[01:29:27] Mm-hmm. harder on the phone. We might be a little bit more strict, but I don't know. It just depends. And how do you describe the gut instinct but. A few things kind of add up over the years. Put it all together. You make a decision. Sometimes you say yes, sometimes you say no. 

[01:29:46] Travis Bader: Yeah, yeah. You know, when I'm talking to somebody and everything they're saying sounds awesome.

[01:29:52] It sounds like exactly what I think somebody would think I would want to hear. Yeah. Okay. Alarm bells are going off, right? What's up? I always just, for me, I just like back up, back up, back up next. Sure. You got one fellow I work with and he does that to me sometimes. He's like, I'm just doing it. Cause I know how much it, he's like, I don't wanna hear this.

[01:30:11] Um, the, um, and how a person will treat others who can't do anything for them is the one key indicator that I've found as well. If they're, uh, yeah. You know, just seeing how they, if you're going out for food and they treat somebody in a certain way that. that they're not treating you? Um, I, I, 

[01:30:33] Trevor Publicover: that's a warning sign.

[01:30:34] Big time. Yeah. That's a warning sign. Yeah. I'm with you on that one. 

[01:30:37] Travis Bader: Is there anything else we should be chatting about? You know, I, I've gone through a bunch of the questions. There are some basic, uh, q and A on upkeep of the, uh, the scopes and, uh, and, and, uh, you know, common questions that you'd probably get asked.

[01:30:51] Um, are there any things that maybe I've missed or that we should be 

[01:30:54] Trevor Publicover: touching on? That's a good question. We have talked a lot. Um, we have. . You know, I think, uh, uh, a desire and focus in our company to evolve and to grow our customers that are listening now, you know, stick with us. You know, if you're waiting on a scope, we'll get it to you,

[01:31:15] Yeah. Um, yeah, we want to, we wanna be innovative. We want to be thought leaders within, you know, without being too fatty. Right? 

[01:31:26] Travis Bader: Fatty, fatty 

[01:31:27] Trevor Publicover: faddish, fatty faddish, whatever. Uh, we're, we're professional company and it's based on, you know, um, professional shooters and we're very serious about our business. I like to have fun.

[01:31:41] We, I think we're a fun group of people, but you know, we're pretty serious about this business and we're pretty serious about, um, making sure that we maintain the standards that we set out to achieve. And we do have a lot of brands. We do have different variations of products. We have a lot of great relationships with our OEMs, which in one case, they're our customers and on other cases could be considered, you know, competition.

[01:32:10] But it's such a small world and we really value that. And we never wanna damage, we'll never sacrifice the business over the relationships that we've built over the last, you know, 10, 20 years in cases like brilliant, small, small company. And, and this industry as a whole is a fantastic place to work for me, for a lot of the people here.

[01:32:32] I grew up in the outdoors. I love to fish, I love to hunt. Um, I like this culture, but I also like everybody else in the industry who, I think I might have said this before, they get up every day and they just grind it out and Right. They want to, they want to, they want the same goals. They want to be in the same place.

[01:32:53] Helping people out, providing good products, increasing, you know, the, the capabilities, either down range or in com. Competition, just refining stuff. Um, making our processes better, uh, evolving our products, making those clicks a little bit, click here, bit more clicking, you know, a little bit more clicky. The clicks.

[01:33:14] Clicks, quickies, clicks. Improving. Our trade market might already be, I dunno, , you know, just stuff that makes us more efficient. Right. And it's for everything. It's like when a customer goes to our website, I'm really concerned that it's complicated and sometimes I question, man, I wouldn't buy from me.

[01:33:31] Right? Like, it seemed like it's, it's. It, there's a lot of information there, and we're trying to make it easy. So that's a constant battle we hope to approve 

[01:33:40] Travis Bader: on. That's a struggle that so many companies have, will have. I mean, if you talk to a, uh, software developer, an engineer designer, Hey, I'm a full stack developer, right?

[01:33:49] Yeah. They're gonna talk a very different language and what the end user is gonna want to see. That's the way they have their UX experts, right? Yeah. The people that, in, like from an engineer's perspective, they can produce a best quality product and, but is that being presented in the best way for the, for the end user?

[01:34:06] And some places do the other side and they will present in the absolute best way, but maybe, maybe what they got behind them isn't gonna be quite, uh, quite at the same level, right? Yeah. And 

[01:34:17] Trevor Publicover: I think the way that, you know, from an operational perspective inside, we could make it, um, Different, that's easy for us, but it would be like almost incomprehensible for our customers.

[01:34:32] And so now it's, it's a, it's a process. Like we build everything almost. It's not just in time cuz we carry all the inventory, but it's gotta go into a build cycle. And I'm talking specifically tenne bricks, right? So the tenne brick customer orders, a flip cover ANR reflection device, whatever. Yeah. That gets through the system into the build cycle.

[01:34:53] Well, there might be 7,000 parts in front of that one customer's order and takes two to three weeks. So what we need to do is get better at that. So there's a lot of things we want people to have, our cust have our products in a timely fashion. Companies like Amazon, other just in Time, which, you know, the FBA fulfillment where I, by Amazon Yeah.

[01:35:18] Have a product that order like almost the next day. Yeah. There's an expectation of online, um, procurement that that's what it's gonna be. And unfortunately, you know, for us, we're not there, but we have a goal to be closer to that. 

[01:35:29] Travis Bader: Well, that's, as one developer actually I was talking with, with said, everybody judges their user experience or customer experience based on the best possible thing out there.

[01:35:41] Yeah. When people look at a, an online store, they're comparing you to Amazon, which has millions and billions of dollars to be able to, uh, perfect. And see what everyone's like, demographic and psychographic and all of their user habits and all the rest. So it, it's tough for these small and medium size businesses.

[01:36:03] It can be tough for the big ones too. Uh, 

[01:36:05] Trevor Publicover: yeah, for sure. And, uh, another challenge, not only just for us, Getting the customers to find the part, like when you went to find the part and the fit for your scope. Hopefully that was a good experience. Yeah. We also have a challenge with our dealers, uh, who want to carry our products.

[01:36:20] So imagine a store that would have to have a shelf that had 5,000 parts on it, right? It's not gonna happen, right. So we've struggled a lot with that in the past, and it's very, it's very difficult for customers to get the stuff that they need. Having on the shelf, some of our competitors, um, it's a little bit easier to fit and model stuff.

[01:36:40] Ours, it's impossible. So our best path forward now has been to get our dealers if they want to. Offer Tenex products to their customers. We can get them set up on our website as kind of a dealer account. Mm. They have access to all of the fit guides, all of the models they can buy at our dealer pricing directly on our website.

[01:36:59] It's easy for them. Yeah. Easier for them. Cuz then we don't have to manage a whole bunch of infrastructure to get, keep them up to date. And then it's easy for us to, cuz we can kind of get that into the cycle quicker. So. 

[01:37:10] Travis Bader: Yeah. Very cool. And I, and the other part that really kind of struck out, stuck out to me was the, uh, uh, the relationships.

[01:37:18] How you're saying you don't want to, why would we burn this relationship? Those are super important. Honestly, anybody listening to this, I know we've covered ga I know we're talking about, uh, objects, but we're also talking about a company. We're talking about being an entrepreneur. We're talking to Bill lessons learned on a hunting trip.

[01:37:34] Right. I mean there, there's a kind of a wide gamt what we're talking about here, but I can't say it enough. Business, it's not personal, it's just business. People say that, right. I, I don't know, maybe, maybe somebody out there who's much better at business than I am can, uh, can have a compelling argument to the contrary.

[01:37:54] But in my opinion, all business is personal. Yeah. It's all based on relationships. Those relationships take time to establish, which are based on trust. You betray that trust, you betray the relationship. It affects the business, and that's from my experience. The core of 

[01:38:13] Trevor Publicover: business. In every situation that we've been in a downturn or we've run into a rough patch in this company, it's the relationships with our distribution and our customers and our OEMs that have seen us through that.

[01:38:28] Right. 

[01:38:29] Travis Bader: Every single time. Yeah. And it's always, it's, it's not personal, it's just business. When things are going good on one side, right. You just wait till the other side of the coin comes and it will come. And we hope 

[01:38:40] that 

[01:38:40] Trevor Publicover: we never forget that when the people that you know help you when you need it and you know when you don't and they're always there.

[01:38:45] It's those, yeah. For me that's super important. Awesome. 

[01:38:49] Travis Bader: Trevor, thank you very much for being on the Silvercore Podcast. I thoroughly enjoyed my time with you, with the company and, and recording this. Thank you. It's been an honor.