Tell us about Dog & Gun.
Dog & Gun Coffee sells specialty-grade coffee to those in the outdoors lifestyle.
Obviously coffee is our product but what we spend most of our time promoting is actually just getting outdoors fishing, camping, hunting and 4wding.
We do all of our roasting and packing in-house at our Brisbane roastery to ensure only the best product possible goes out to customers. Our signature products are our Pre-Loaded Drip Filters that make having a quality coffee in the bush really easy – you just need hot water and a mug!
What inspired you to start Dog & Gun?
I didn’t grow up particularly outdoorsy and it wasn’t until I took up hunting in my late 20’s to source my own meat that I realised what I’d been missing out on.
We’d regularly do backpacking trips in the mountains where everything you need to survive for a week was on your back. To save weight, we’d cut straps off our packs or even cut our toothbrush in half. Every so often though, I’d share camp with someone who, after a big hike in, would pull out a bag of coffee beans, a hand grinder and an Aeropress or a moka pot to brew with. That’s a lot of extra weight and when I asked them about why they’d bother, the reply was pretty universal: I need good coffee no matter where I am!
A chance encounter in Japan got me onto the single serve drip filters which were a great solution for getting quality coffee into the field.
Tell us about your career and background.
I started my career as an electrical draftsman for an engineering consultancy. I wasn’t good at school and didn’t go to uni but I always had a knack for technical things and picked up the job really well. It was a good career but I soon learned that office life and being an employee wasn’t for me, simply because I prefer to be purely results-focused and not just paid for showing up.
I’d been running a small web development business on the side and even started selling candy and soft drinks from my desk in the engineering firm but eventually got presented with an opportunity to invest into the start-up of a skin care clinic and leave the engineering job.
That was my first experience with running a team, driving growth and turning nothing into something pretty significant – it was awesome, even if the field itself wasn’t something I was particularly interested in, there was so much to learn about business so I soaked up the experience for what it was worth. I’m still invested in that company but don’t have much to do with the operations these days.
Dog & Gun came about from my interest in hunting and fishing. I was actively looking for a way to give back to that community because the people who showed me the ropes there really changed my life in the best way possible.
We launched Dog & Gun at the end of 2019, just prior to the pandemic and all the chaos it brought with it. The product-market fit was perfect and the timing actually worked out well as people were spending a lot of time on social media (where we were doing all of our promotions) which I think helped give us traction.
Describe a typical work day for you.
We’re constantly on adventures in remote places so a typical workday doesn’t really exist.
Generally, I’m focused on three core things: getting attention for the business, managing finances and making sure the team have the resources they need to do their jobs well.
Most days start early with a coffee (of course) and then getting stuck into any creative work – writing articles, editing photos or videos, creating social posts etc before everybody else starts flooding my inbox.
I’ll then check key indicators. I run a couple of dashboard-style spreadsheets to track trends like number of orders, Average Order Value, Return On Ad Spend etc. I’ll also take a couple of hours to approve payments, respond to emails, review operating procedures and do any other admin needed to keep the wheels on.
Mid morning we usually do a quick check in with the team (via WhatsApp or Google Meet if we’re on the road) to make sure everybody is working on the right tasks.
Outside of that, the days vary quite a bit depending on where in the world we are. We’re often on the road to some remote destination which presents an awesome opportunity to capture content and meet like-minded people who are also chasing adventure.
We get to network and share the coffee with a heap of people when we’re on the road and I think this has had the biggest impact on building loyal, long-term customers. People like buying from people they relate to.
Rache and I spend a lot of time working out growth plans, how to reduce our expenses, new product opportunities, how to build up team and community culture etc. There’s always a number of projects on the go and honestly, we’re pretty disorganized so we just chip away at what we can, when we can.
For the most part the business runs relatively smoothly, even with us being remote from the team most of the time. Occasionally we’ll be in crisis mode trying to resolve a big issue like key equipment breaking down suddenly, coffee beans not being available or stock being lost in transit. The warehouse team handle the day-to-day roasting and processing of coffee and we’re currently using a 3pl service to ship to customers which takes a huge load off of us.
What advice do you have for those wanting to start a business?
Don’t over-analyse.
You’ll never have all the information you need to make a decision, so you have to learn to prioritise action, accept the consequences, learn from your experiences and keep moving forward.
What gets measured gets improved.
It’s so important to be across your numbers and be constantly working to improve key metrics.
Build a good life, not just a good business.
Building a business is bloody hard work and can easily consume your whole life. The todo list never ends and there’s always some kind of fire to put out so you need to be deliberate about making time to do other things like eat well, exercise, get outside and spend time with people you enjoy being around.
What’s next for you, and Dog & Gun?
We’ve just formed a joint-venture with another company in Brisbane, effectively merging our two businesses together so we can share resources like equipment, team members and intellectual property. It’s an exciting step forward that will propel both organisations to the next level without the huge capital outlay we’d have to commit independently.
Dog & Gun is really about our community, so we’re going to continue to focus on building that up with the use of quality long-form media, doing in-person events and also sponsoring clubs that get people into the outdoors.
For me personally, I’m planning on spending even more time chasing epic adventures, learning new skills and teaching what I’ve picked up to people who are just getting started. I love filming and photography so will invest a bit of time into capturing some of the fun things we do and the people we meet along the way.
