GOVCON GIANTS PODCAST ERIC COFFIE

Eric Coffie (00:00):

Episode 61,

Wesley Ross (00:01):

You know, even though they've gone through a rough time with everything that's happening, you know, and they'll stuff that they've worked for for so many years, it's kind of been shot down to take this moment and learn from, you know, you've been locked away from your friends, your family, people for such a long time, but you know, you've had this opportunity to kind of find yourself and learn what you want to do with your life. And I mean, I have so many people who've kind of told me, like, what's inspired them over the whole Corona time, but, and people will say like, Oh, well now I have this dream or I have this goal or I want to do this and I want to do that. And then people will say it, but I mean, I can't really do it. And I think people should, if I could say one thing to anyone in general is like, follow your dream and let nothing stand in your way of that.

Wesley Ross (00:47):

There's the only person who will hold you back from what you want to do in this role. And what you want to do with your life is you only have one chance at living. And there's so much out there so much you can do because as regions of this world, that so few people are into. And if you want to go there, go there. If you want to go to space, go to space. I mean, if you want to be the next billionaire, if you want to on some big company or drive the fast cars or do this, or do that or pay off your mom tells her, pay off her student debt, don't let this and this and X, Y AKI from that, you know, go do it. And like, I feel like a lot of people just take it. So Elle bag by the small things, the little tiny things in life, kind of hold them back from what they want to do. And just never let that happen to you. If you're going to do it, you're going to do it. If you want to do what you do and you let nothing hold you from that.

Speaker 2 (01:37):

Welcome to that Govcon Giants podcast, federal contracting for people on the outside looking in. If you are here to learn how to win a piece of the pie without getting your face smashed in. Then you've tuned into the right place. Now the giant that not only walks the walk but talks the talk, your host Eric Coffie.

Eric Coffie (01:56):

Occasionally you run across a story that catches her attention. And that was the case. One of my friends, Ford, me the story of Wesley Ross, a 16 year old military contractor read the title and the purpose of him forwarding that to me. Well, it was to provide some positive news during the midst of the mayhem that ensued following the murder of George Floyd, with all the news coverage focused on riots, looting removal of Confederate statues every day seemed like doom and gloom. And when we first opened up the group chat and reading the story, I immediately thought to myself, we've got to get this kid on the show. So we reached out to him via Instagram and he confirmed immediately over the next 60 minutes, you were hearing a story of someone much wiser than their age suggest you'll learn about overcoming adversity, the power of having a vision and the ingenuity of working as a business owner who was under

GOVCON GIANTS PODCAST ERIC COFFIE

the age for most things. This has been the most shared story of my channel all year. I know that you will enjoy this interview with the bright young man who gives us much hope for future and all that they Can accomplish. I like to welcome our next giant Wesley Ross.

Wesley Ross (03:04):

Thank you for having me on.

Speaker 4 (03:06):

No, listen. I it's interesting because someone in my network sent me your story. They're like, Hey, look, there's some good things happening out of Minneapolis. We want to share this story. And it was your story.

Wesley Ross (03:19):

Yeah.

Speaker 4 (03:21):

You know, tell me you know, we're not going to harp on it, but how has the city changed since

Wesley Ross (03:28):

The incident? Well, ever since things kind of started here, there's been a lot of kind of crackdown in the, this has kind of been on edge a lot more. And I mean, whenever you go to the cities, pretty much every store is snowboarded up, even though the riots have kind of calmed down it's to like a lot of fear left. So people have kind of been staying away from Minneapolis and st. Paul.

Speaker 4 (03:50):

Wow. Wow. That's interesting. So now to your story, tell us I've read about your story here. I've got the article that was written about you, first of all, how did they even hear about you to write it?

Wesley Ross (04:03):

So once it was like back in around February or March once the whole covert stuff kind of kicked in, I had emailed a few news networks, kind of talking about the stock of PPE that I had because I wanted to kind of get it out there. So businesses will have a place to go to. And I kinda just thought I was going to be ignored and that none of them would answer me, but then a pioneer press had came in back on like early June to do a little article. I was like, Oh, wow. Like, I mean, it's a few months late.

Speaker 4 (04:36):

Huh. huh. And so how old are you today? I'm 16. Okay. 16. Now tell us about your journey and how you got started.

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Wesley Ross (04:44):

Yeah, so kind of ever since I was in the seventh grade, I R w I always knew that I wanted to live my dreams and goals at early age. And so they kind of took with me doing a lot of different things from, I started off with selling bracelets and handmade soap to then moving to a all e-commerce clothing store and to shoes then back to clothing and then electronic parts. And then I went back to, I went to auto parts and that's kinda where things that dumped out for, I started bringing in more money and things like that, but it wasn't, it wasn't enough to kind of get to where I wanted it to be. So I had moved on to the contracting after I saw that movie war dogs, because it's one of my favorite favorites. And I decided, I mean, Hey, like, okay. I mean, these two 20 year olds did it, they made it 300 million. I know, went to jail, but I can do all of that except go to jail. And so I, I kinda just followed the steps of the movie. It was about two ish months to get for me to get everything registered inside. But after that, I mean, I, I did my first contract. It was for canned vegetables for federal prison. And then from there I kind of just rolled them. That sounds too easy.

Speaker 4 (05:58):

I mean, if it sounds too simple, you're telling me that you follow the steps from the movie. What part of the movie that you follow? Like did you use

Wesley Ross (06:09):

So I know in the movie they had talked about how they use BizOps to find the context.

Speaker 4 (06:14):

They did say that a movie you're right. Yeah.

Wesley Ross (06:16):

Yeah. So I went to fed SOPs and I found a contract. It was for like lockers and benches. And so I didn't really know, like at the start that the, it was kind of delivery orders and that you would get paid after it. So I figured, Hey, you know, if I just find some lockers in Memphis somewhere, they'll pay me. Then I find them and ship them. And I found out that a, you don't pay first a, B, C I have to be registered. And it's not just like some random kid. And like, I'm on it. Just start selling stuff without the registration. And that, you know, it wasn't really like a place kind of like to mess around because I just figured I was just sending like emails, like, Hey, look, I can provide like this and this and this and this for you. And I just figured that I need to move on and kind of build up that professionalism first, before I start actually doing things.

Speaker 4 (07:04):

So what did you do? How did you build up a professionalism?

Wesley Ross (07:07):

GOVCON GIANTS PODCAST ERIC COFFIE

So there was, it was so the, the contract that I went in on, or that I tried to go in on for the lockers of benches, it was this contracting officer for an H in Minnesota. She kind of explained to me what I had to do in terms of getting like a cage code, registering in sam.gov and things like that. Oh, and then also the Oh my gosh, I'm forgetting the number. It's the other one. You need the other one you need Dan's number, DUNS number DUNS. And so after I got all of that in, I registered our registered with the state and the IRS first, and then I did all of the, a DUNS number, cage code, all of that. And then from there, it kind of just, I went back in, took things slowly. And

Speaker 4 (07:47):

So a contracting officer explained this to you. Yeah. Does she know your age? No. But you were, how old were you then? 15 years old. No one ever asked her age. Nope. You know that, you know, and I, and I like that point because people add, you know, people ask me this question, Eric. Well, is there a certain age requirement? Like, no one's ever asked me my age. But that's interesting. And it's also the same thing when you set up your corporation, right?

Wesley Ross (08:14):

Yeah. For what I registered with the IRS, I did have to register with my social security and date of birth and things like that. But there was no issue on registering or anything like that.

Speaker 4 (08:24):

Who helped you set up your corporation with the IRS?

Wesley Ross (08:26):

I actually, I had did it all by myself. I spent like I, so I, I kind of knew like what I needed to do to, to have a business. And I mean, IRS website and kind of explained it well enough for me. And I kinda just followed all the steps of it. I mean, I was staying up to like four or five in the morning, kind of type everything out and get everything in as fast as I could. What was your incentive?

Speaker 4 (08:48):

Why would you stay before five more and trying to get rid of through an IRS website, right. I'm sure you're afraid. Like why you, Leslie, what are you doing?

Wesley Ross (08:56):

Yeah. my incentive was kind of that contract with the, it just because it had, it was ending in a week and I thought that if I had registered fast enough, I could get in a week, which was impossible because I still have to like go through everything else. But kind of the thing that like drives me is just the, the money gain. I mean, if, if you want to like walk the walk and talk the talk, and then you have to be able to like show that. And so, I mean, I, I know exactly what I want to do, like with my life and like everything I do. So I knew that, I mean, Hey, hard work and dedication is what's going to actually bring money in on the

GOVCON GIANTS PODCAST ERIC COFFIE

table. So staying up the four or five in the morning was no issue for me. If I knowing what the potential could be too, you know,

Speaker 4 (09:37):

Interesting. Someone just wrote a comment, says you have people in their forties that are scared to email people, you know, I, which is very true. And they're actually scared to even get registered with the IRS because it's people pay, you know, and maybe you don't know this, but people pay thousands of dollars to set their businesses up.

Wesley Ross (09:58):

Yeah. And you said I could do it myself. I had no fear. I mean, I knew there was going to be like a lot of work to it, but for kind of like throughout my life, the things that I like do to kind of run businesses and things like that, I, I know that I can do it myself if I just put my mind to it. So kind of my mentality. So your mom didn't help, you know, she's kind of been my, my little inspiration for someone else that I want to work for. Cause I mean, I want to prevent things from my mother as well, just because, I mean, who wouldn't want to but I've kinda just been handling things on my own. I've been approached multiple times by like different groups and companies are like, Hey, you give us like, so, and so amount of money, we'll help you set this up and help you this. But I didn't really want to trust it towards other people. And because I mean, who like who better can you trust other than yourself? Okay,

Speaker 4 (10:46):

Fair. That's fair. Now I did read someone, an article said you had a partner on a deal.

Wesley Ross (10:51):

So it was a buddy of mine. He lives over in Georgia. Okay. And so it was this contract, it was for gravel and the total cost was like $115,000. And it was, it was something I needed to be paid for because of the company, a, they knew it was a government contractor. They didn't trust it enough in order to send it first. And they get paid later. Right. I mean, I'd have 115,000 laying around. So he had supplied pretty much all of the money. But since he didn't really know what contracts were, we ended up dividing them. I just districts. He was like, Hey, you know, you brought in some money from me. So, you know, dividing it perfectly fine.

Speaker 4 (11:28):

You hold on, hold on. Let me go back. Now. You, how old was this guy?

Wesley Ross (11:33):

He's 35. 36.

Speaker 4 (11:36):

It's a 36 year old to lend you a hundred grand.

GOVCON GIANTS PODCAST ERIC COFFIE

Wesley Ross (11:39):

Yeah, because we we've been friends for awhile now. A lot of my friends are older. Go ahead.

Speaker 4 (11:51):

But I'm saying what, what gave him the confidence to say, all right, I'm going to lend you this a hundred thousand dollars.

Wesley Ross (11:56):

Yeah, I think, I think for me kind of just like, he knew what I could do. Like if I was given that opportunity to give him that money I think the reason that he trusted it so much, just because it was a government contract and that kind of showed him like where the money would be going. Yeah. Cause I don't know if I was I'm 35 year old, I'm thinking have a hundred thousand to some random 15 year old. I showed him as a contract. I think he trusted me a lot more,

Speaker 4 (12:20):

You know, it's interesting. I actually picked up some PPE contracts, right. Myself and you know, people tell me, is that contract real? And this is me. Right. It's like, you know, I I'm like they actually went behind my back and email the state to make sure that my contract was real before even a great and work with me. So essentially, you know, so it's an interesting dynamic that someone else trusted you enough, but that's good. I'm glad because obviously in order to go to the next level you need capital and you're starting to realize that.

Wesley Ross (12:53):

Yeah. Now

Speaker 4 (12:54):

You said some of your first contracts how did you find it?

Wesley Ross (12:58):

So it was with the $5,000 I'd saved up from my auto accessories store. So I sold things like steering wheels shift dogs.

Speaker 4 (13:07):

Is that why you want it? Like with the land bowls and the cars?

Wesley Ross (13:10):

Yeah. Yeah. I'm a really big car enthusiast. I should run one of the largest shows in the state. And then I go to like meats and races and things like that. Oh, you organize the show? Yeah. It's called the great Minnesota auto show. I get outta here. So you organize the auto show? Yeah. There's actually another

GOVCON GIANTS PODCAST ERIC COFFIE

article on that. It's done by the Rivertown news. It was back in October, I think, of 2019 when they wrote it.

Speaker 4 (13:36):

So how did you get into that?

Wesley Ross (13:40):

So I, and by the way, when did you start that? Yeah, so my, I started way back in may of 2019. It was kind of right when I was getting into the automotive scene. Cause I mean, I wasn't really like that much with the current thesis, but kind of kind of grow. Like it kind of grew into me. And I formed a club in my school, the a it's called the Woodbury auto enthusiast club. And then I knew, so we have like an auto body shop of our school and it's kind of, it's kind of not in the best condition. And I knew I wanted to raise money for it. I mean, you can't really just go to the school district saying, Hey, give us money for our auto club. Right. so I knew I had to find my own way to bring in money for the club. So this was the shows was kind of the opportunity to kind of bring in money, you know, find people who wants to donate and things like that, where we can get new parts, new cars and things like that for the shop, but,

Speaker 4 (14:32):

Okay, so you raised our rates and money, but how did you turn into an actual event?

Wesley Ross (14:37):

Yeah. so I, I took the Facebook and I just started posting everywhere. I was like, Hey, like I'm this guy, I'm trying to run a show to my school and raise money for the auto shop. And I was approached by like so many people who wanted to one of the one really big group was called car Queens. They're like this Midwest group of ladies who are all car enthusiasts and they were really helping me helping me get things set up. But I got permission from the school to use the lot, ran tickets through event bright and kind of just spread it around on Facebook. And I mean, I think the first show get around 237 cars and an assortment of motorcycles and trucks and things like that.

Speaker 4 (15:16):

Wow. So now you're the popular guy.

Wesley Ross (15:18):

Yeah. Well, I wish I wish I kind of like stay laid back at school.

Speaker 4 (15:23):

Yeah. But she organized an auto show that brings all these cars. So I guess you just come out for that. Yeah. Okay. So now, so you organized the auto show. Okay. So you took the money from that and then you use it to invest in your first contract.

GOVCON GIANTS PODCAST ERIC COFFIE

Wesley Ross (15:39):

I took the money, so I talked to most of the PR some of the profits from the speed labs, which is the name of the auto parts business went towards the old school thing. But a good bit of it was what I had saved up over the summer and spent, because I mean, I was 15 years old. I didn't really save money, but I took 5,500 from the store and put that into my first contract.

Speaker 4 (16:01):

Okay. Okay. And then you just kept taking the money that you made from that and putting it to the next contract. Sweet. All right. And then when, what, why did you believe you could do that? The bigger contract for a hundred thousand dollars? Was it in that gravel or something? Yeah.

Wesley Ross (16:19):

So it was just, I knew, so, okay. Kind of what I do now is I, I tended to stick with like small, like food contracts to supplying prisons, things like that. And it sometimes like I pads it's like, like small contracts, like $8,000. Sure. But I was, those only happened like every like few months, like every three or four months for the food. So I was kind of in a little money pit where I wanted, cause I've been trying to save cause I'm busy. So I wanted to get a car whenever I decided to buy one. I want it to be something nice to have in principle, a lot of money. And so this opportunity presented itself where it wasn't something that I really, it wasn't like gravel that I needed to have on me. And it was kind of along the same lines of things that I do now.

Wesley Ross (17:03):

So I figured, I mean, Hey, it's a really large contract, but I could do it. Let's give it a shot. And I spent hours on our searching through Google, trying to find companies that could supply it. And I mean, I'd call people and they'd be like, where's he going? And like, they'd freak out because they're like, Oh, government contract. Oh, what's that? And the lady was hanging up, but I found, I found a company. I can't remember their name. This was a few months ago, but they were really nice. They supplied it, everything was good. And then from there kind of just been moving along, but I haven't really done any large ones since, just because it's the whole problem with finding the capital for it.

Speaker 4 (17:38):

Did anyone know your age? No. They want to ask? No. Did they ever meet you?

Wesley Ross (17:44):

I just do it all from my house.

Speaker 4 (17:46):

I love it. I love it. Have you ever thought, well, what if they find out I'm under age?

Wesley Ross (17:55):

GOVCON GIANTS PODCAST ERIC COFFIE

We have, it's kinda been a thing for me is like, would they still trust me to like, do like, things like that. But I mean, once they know that like it's still registered and everything's legal, I would hope that they would trust me. I mean, I kind of, I try to develop in a nice professional way. I, in my heart I'm like, yeah, they trust me, but in my mind I'm like, ah, they really trust a 16 year old.

Speaker 4 (18:19):

Well, I you know, from the looks of it, from talking to you for this short time, you don't care, obviously you don't carry yourself in that manner. Right. So all they're doing is listening to someone on the other end of a phone call. Yeah. That's interesting. What are you working on now?

Wesley Ross (18:35):

So there's actually a bunch of food, prison orders that came in. I think it was around 30 or 40 that I was looking at earlier today. So I've kind of just been, trying to get in as many of those as I can. I can't always get, so I mean, the supplier that I work with a provide the food for such a cheap price compared to a lot of manufacturers. And that's one of the reasons why I like to include contract history. Cause I'm always just searching through Google, but they provided for a really cheap price. The only issues that I can't also there'll be like 40 or so contracts that I can maybe get in maybe five or six, just because I can't supply the capital to do all of them. So that's kind of been the issue where like, I want to do all this. I know I can win them all, but it becomes an issue of, I don't have the capital to do the mall. So I kind of have to like go through and pick and choose which ones can I really bring in the most profit from, you know,

Speaker 4 (19:28):

Somehow Wesley, I believe after this interview, you're going to have capitalism.

Wesley Ross (19:34):

I hope so. I hope so. I really want to do big things with this company. I know I was looking at a few offices around town. I was looking to hire a couple of people to kind of work with the contracts, things like that. I really want to expand this. I want this to be something big. That's why I want the name Northstar dynamics just because I was kind of copying general dynamics just because, I mean, it sounded like strong and power on the guard uncle company. So I kind of want to like do that with everything I want to expand. I want to be built bigger. And I just want to be, I want to be great with what I do. I love it.

Speaker 4 (20:04):

That's a great answer. I love it. Wow. That's a lot to take in, you know, so I, and again, I didn't even know about the auto show. It's interesting. How did you watch war dogs? Like what made you watch for ducks? What did it, was it a preview? Did it come up on your next book feed? Like how did you know about like even watch

Wesley Ross (20:27):

GOVCON GIANTS PODCAST ERIC COFFIE

It was, I had first saw him in the movie theater and then completely forgot about it. So I'm a really big like warrant. These are not warring thesis, but I, I love like kind of like the technology that goes in, like playing, saying things like that's the ones who saw this movie didn't really notice about. I knew it was a war Avenue called war talks. I was like, Oh, I'll go see it. The ones, my first time seeing it, I kind of forgot all about it, but it ran into my feet again. And I remember I had really enjoyed the movie, so I watched it again and I kind of like paid a lot more attention to everything that went on. And I was like, wow. Like there was actually a lot to learn that I didn't pay since he was in the theater. And so I re I actually, that night I re watched it three times because under the little, little Google subscription where you only get like 48 hours to watch it, I watched it three times to kind of get all my information. Did you take notes? Yeah. I took a lot of notes. I like that. I like that.

Speaker 4 (21:21):

I actually have a free course and war dogs is one of the required homeworks of my free course because a lot of people say, well, how does this thing work? And I'm like, here, here's a moving format that explains it all. Yeah. But you're the first person that I've ever met that actually used the movie to go out and actually do the work. Yeah. That's freaking awesome. So, okay. You said you don't have enough money to do the contracts that all the 40 or so opportunities, how much money you need.

Wesley Ross (21:51):

If you had, if you could do them all, what would it take if I could do every single different,

Speaker 4 (21:57):

Not every single, but the 40 that you look at, the food ones, you know, you could win.

Wesley Ross (22:00):

Yeah. If I could do the 40 that I know I can run, I'd be looking at around like maybe 250,000, like puddle. I mean, you'll have really small ones that are like two, 3000 and then you'll have really big ones that are like 60,000 hospitals. So good. Because these $60,000 contracts will bring you anywhere between like 80,000, 85,000, but I can pro I can sales. Right, right. Yeah. That's good. How

Speaker 4 (22:26):

How fast do they pay you on these contracts?

Wesley Ross (22:29):

So for the small ones are usually paid by the purchasing card. So it's usually by the end of the week, I already had the money back in my account. For the order one, that's like two, three weeks because I, I stayed away from the site. I use unison marketplace for the orders that I do. I stayed away from fed BizOps and now beta dot Sam, because the wide area work flow, just because it's a 30 day payment terms. I could not, I'm so impatient when it comes to the money. And I was like, I can't wait 30 days. You're like, forget it.

GOVCON GIANTS PODCAST ERIC COFFIE

Speaker 4 (23:00):

Wow. Okay. So your, so your, most of your bids are coming from unison? Yeah. Sweet. No. And they, and they pay you with instead of payment card?

Wesley Ross (23:10):

Yeah. The government payment card.

Speaker 4 (23:12):

How do you accept payment? Like how do you accept payment cards? I do it through PayPal. Okay. So you set up a PayPal account? Yeah. They didn't ask your age.

Wesley Ross (23:20):

I actually have the PayPal account of the PayPal account set up through my grandfather. So it kind of runs through him, but it's like unscrew his name and then it just goes through me.

Speaker 4 (23:29):

Okay. All right. So that one, they require like an age thing. Okay. All right. But now you accept credit cards. Yeah. And genius. I like it. I like it. I like it. I see a lot of people, a clap. And let me just look real quick and see what people questions. I mean, they're just ranting and raving. Hold on. Let me see if there's any questions. You're awesome. Wesley got blessed. Let's see. Trailblazer loved sharing some positive news during his times. He's got it way to go. Wesley said, so did he have a business prior to getting a contract? Someone asked, did you have a business prior to getting your first contract beat labs?

Wesley Ross (24:15):

Yeah. Speed labs. And then a few other companies that weren't really successful. Speed labs was a successful EAD labs to be labs was successful. I still have it now, but I don't really sell as many products as I used.

Speaker 4 (24:29):

Hmm. Okay. yeah, I was looking to see if any questions. Alright. You said you were in speed labs for selling car accessories. Was that like a drop shipping or Amazon fulfillment?

Wesley Ross (24:41):

Yeah, I was pretty much doing drop shipping for it.

Speaker 4 (24:45):

Now, one of the things that they mentioned is you, you actually did supply some PPE. Yeah. Okay. Was that through unit unit send as well?

GOVCON GIANTS PODCAST ERIC COFFIE

Wesley Ross (24:54):

No. So for the people or for the PPE, I did supply it, but I, I like made a moral promise that I wasn't going to do it through the federal contractors because I know I knew personally I knew I was getting for a really cheap price, but I knew it wasn't the best price available to the government. And I didn't want to overcharge on something that was really needed at the time. So I stuck with the P for the PP. I kind just took the selling that towards businesses and citizens. And I sold it in small quantities of 5,100, 200, 500, 1,050 contracts to the government for like 300,000. I mean, to me, I was like, Oh my gosh, like I want it, but I knew, I knew there would be companies you could apply for a lot cheaper than me. I wanted the government to get cheap price as cheap as it could be. So you want the benefit for the taxpayers? Yeah,

Speaker 4 (25:44):

That's, that's really nice. So you just,

Wesley Ross (25:46):

I really didn't want to overcharge,

Speaker 4 (25:49):

But, but how are you able to get the PP?

Wesley Ross (25:52):

So I have a manufacturer in China that I had worked with on a previous contract. And so for that, I mean, I, he had contacted me and was like, Hey, like we have all these mess that we even sold because like kind of things kind of slowed down in China. And I mean, I think it's total stock was like, I mean, it was, it was, it was in the millions. And so I figured, Hey, like, I mean, you know, send a few my way and then I'll I'll have them. Cause you have, I wanted to make sure that there was still quality in the product, so I would go through them and then once they were ready to go, then I will ship them out. But up to date, I've supplied around 50, 50, 5,000. And I mean, I still get orders every now and then for more, can you really? Yeah.

Speaker 4 (26:36):

Wow. That's that's so, so he gave it to you, you tested it, you sold some and people keep coming back to you. Yeah. Did those people meet you? Ah,

Wesley Ross (26:44):

No, no, no ones, not me on my website though. I do have a little like about me part where you can kind of see that I'm a younger person, but I mean, people still trust me to do it. Cause I mean, I like when I'm on the phone with people is to professional, super professional, super nice customer service. Do you have any help yet? Now our, I do have two employees. The two girls from my school, they kind of handle the marketing out towards businesses and businesses and citizens. They, they enjoy it. I pay them well. But they're fun to work with.

GOVCON GIANTS PODCAST ERIC COFFIE

Speaker 4 (27:19):

How did you convince them to work with you?

Wesley Ross (27:21):

I kind of will. So at the start well this wasn't like just STEM, but like a lot of kids at school and they kind of thought that like, Oh, he's lying. Like, Oh, this is a scam. But like once I actually started showing people like what I do and kind of like the steps along with it. And I mean, this isn't the only thing I do. I also trade stocks and I, I do a few other things, but once I kind of showed people like, Hey, like what I do is real, a lot more people started to trust and believe me. And then I had approached them about the job and I kind of explained it a little bit more, show them the process and things like that. And they just, they were so ready for it.

Speaker 4 (27:54):

But how does he know, like, okay, what made you, what did, what did, what did you use to determine that you had to hire someone? What was the basis of it?

Wesley Ross (28:01):

Yeah. So for me, I'm really skilled in a lot of things. So like the whole e-commerce marketing, things like that super skilled, and I've been doing it for about five years now, but I knew that I had a lot of time that I needed, or I had times that I needed to put towards other things. And I really want to have people to kind of take off that workload for me. And also I wanted to give more people my age, that kind of the opportunity to work in the business world, even if they weren't running a business, kind of to be here by my side to kind of learn off of me. And so we just, we went along with that and I mean, I've been doing it for a while now with them, but yeah.

Speaker 4 (28:40):

What did you call it? What do you call, what did you cut? Tell them their position would be their title.

Wesley Ross (28:44):

Yeah. So one is the marketing director and then the other one is the marketing associate for Mt. Marketing strategist. And so the marketing director kind of, she like runs the whole marketing department and then the strategy kind of falls under her. And so she reports to her and then she reports to me. And every week we kind of make a plan for what our target is kind of what we're trying to do for sales. And then they just go about executing it.

Speaker 4 (29:13):

And how do you pay them? Is it, do you have a payroll company? How do you pay them?

Wesley Ross (29:16):

GOVCON GIANTS PODCAST ERIC COFFIE

Yeah, so for the marketing director, I just pay her through most Fargo's Zelle. So I just send it from my account to hers. And then with the strategists it's cash.

Speaker 4 (29:27):

Right. I mean, so you qualify for PPP funds, huh?

Wesley Ross (29:31):

Yeah, I wish I wish,

Speaker 4 (29:34):

You know, I mean, you're a small business. You can get the idol program.

Wesley Ross (29:38):

Yeah. Well, for the, for me, it was kind of whole thing with me not being 18 or 21 and I couldn't qualify for things like I wish I wish I could. I wish I could, but yeah,

Speaker 4 (29:50):

I, I, you know, it's funny, I never thought about that right there. So there's an age restriction on them qualifying for the loans. That's interesting.

Wesley Ross (29:57):

That's been my issue with the food contracts is I wish like the whole, you know, you can get like credit for like, Oh my gosh, I'm forgetting what it's called. But like, when you can get credit towards putting the vendor business vendor versus credit suppliers. Yeah. I couldn't do that because I'm 16 years old has been, my issue is I, I, if I could just get the money, I could do so much in crows and do Oh, so far, but since I was 16, I can't get the loans and things.

Speaker 4 (30:23):

I see. Do you ever think about the people that were bidding against you in any way?

Wesley Ross (30:29):

Yeah. sometimes I kind of, I feel bad when I like it'd beat out like small businesses just because, I mean, they're a small business too. But I feel really good when I beat up the big boys and contract and things like that, but I mean, there's so many people who've submitted bids and so it feels really good to win. Sometimes it just sucks though, because I mean, I know I am taking away money from them, but it's, it's, I hate to say this, but it's kind of a dog eat dog world. And I mean, I just, I want the biggest bite of it. So I,

Speaker 4 (31:00):

This is capitalism that's right. Wow. I love it. What does your mom think?

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Wesley Ross (31:06):

He, she absolutely loves it. I mean she tells me she's proud of me every single day. I just, because I, I mean, I worked for, for the money and all of that and kind of to reach my goals, but also worked for her. I mean, I want to provide things to my mother because she's done so much for me.

Speaker 4 (31:21):

It doesn't help that they had closed down the schools because of the Corona. Like you have to go to class and go to actual physical school. Yeah. So you can work on your business. Yeah. Well, that's good. That's exciting, you know. Okay. So you're still bidding food contracts where what's next.

Wesley Ross (31:44):

I know I wanted to expand into kind of like the manufacturing area kind of just like, so there'll be contracts with the like different types of like three D printed items or items that could be three printed. That was something I was really interested in looking in. I have a friend he runs Ciro 3d, which is a motorcycle accessories company over in Wisconsin. And they kind of do things three D printing wise. And it was kinda something I was looking to expand to and kind of like three D print items with the government. And then along with that, I want to take Spanish into kind of the technology area and kind of working on different technology, technological contracts for them.

Speaker 4 (32:21):

Nice. So much has said PayPal is doing grants for black owned businesses up to 10 K might want to check that out. Okay. let me just jump over here real quick West, come a second and see if people have any questions for him. Let's see where I find smaller contracts. I want to share this with my brother, keep doing what you're doing. You're off to a great start with Lee. Impress him, brother, keep up the great work. Someone asks what's the profit margin on the food contracts.

Wesley Ross (32:53):

Yeah. So further. So for the low end contracts, I mean, you'll be putting around average. I put into the low, the low ones are about 2,500. It'll be between like 1,220 500 for the small ones. And I mean, I'll bring back profit in between like 800 to 2000,

Speaker 4 (33:13):

You know, it's funny. They said that like majority of Americans don't even have $1,200 in their account and you're investing 12 to $2,500 in contracts. Yeah. Does anyone in your family ask you to borrow money?

Wesley Ross (33:28):

No. Well, I mean, sometimes I kind of like give out loans when, like, I know my family needs to do things like with the whole Corona stuff I've been helping my mother, they offer bills. Okay. I mean, cause she

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wants, she's a teacher, so she wasn't really paying off. It's still gets yeah. I mean, she's my mom. I have to her mom.

Speaker 4 (33:45):

Right. Not your mom, but anybody else in the family hit you up? No. No. Do they know what you're doing?

Wesley Ross (33:51):

Yeah. Yeah. They've seen the articles. I tell them about it all the time and they're really proud of me. I think they know like if they were in something serious, I mean, of course I'd help them at any time, but I think they just know that like he's doing what he's doing, you know, he's kind of just making it on his own. So just let him do what he does. Okay.

Speaker 4 (34:09):

Normally you know, entrepreneurship comes from somewhere like a family. You have no one in your family background, history, that's entrepreneur or business person. Hmm.

Wesley Ross (34:19):

I kind of, I just inspired myself because I mean, I just knew, I knew exactly what I wanted to do with my life. I, I guess the only really big inspiration I've had in my life is the, the guy from Ciro 3d. Just because he's kind of been like, not per se my mentor, but kind of like my, like he's kind of in the guy pushing me along. Even though he doesn't do government contracts, I mean, he kinda sees like the, the little, the inspiration or like the light in me and he kind of wants to help that like grow. So I love him to death. He's absolutely my favorite person in the world and I couldn't thank them enough for everything.

Speaker 4 (34:53):

Wow. How old is he? He's 28 years old. Okay. Alright. Alright. So you've been, you've been kicking butt, man. I'm very proud of you. People are saying how do you pick your next codes?

Wesley Ross (35:08):

Oh yeah. So the Nazi COEs I have Oh my gosh. I'm forgetting. Cause I put in so many when I registered it was, it was everything under durable goods and non-durable goods. I did automotive access or automotive parts. Pretty much like any type of like supplies and materials. Next codes I put in. So I mean, I have, I have so many under the registration. But I, I, Oh my gosh. I wish I could say, I wish I could tell you the numbers, how many, but it was all of the verbal and nonverbal and pretty much like just anything that's materialistic. I put in, I feel like

Speaker 4 (35:46):

That you could give a 20, 20 commencement speech.

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Wesley Ross (35:50):

I wish I really wish I could. What would you say? What would you tell the people? I, I would tell them that, you know, even though they've gone through a rough time with everything that's happening, you know, and feel stuff that they've worked for for so many years, it's kind of been shot down to take this moment and learn from, you know, you've been locked away from your friends, your family, people for such a long time, but you know, you've had this opportunity to kind of find yourself, learn what you want to do with your life. And I mean, I have so many people who've kind of told me like, well, it's inspired them over the whole grown a time, but, and people will say like, Oh, well now I have this dream or I have this goal or I want to do this. I want to do that.

Wesley Ross (36:31):

And then people will say it, but I mean, I can't really do it. And I think people should, if I could say one thing to anyone in general is like, follow your dream and let nothing stand in the way of that. There's the only person who will hold you back from what you want to do in this role. And what you want to do with your life is you. And I mean, you only have one chance at living and there's so much out there so much you can do because as regions of this world that so few people are into. And if you want to go there, go there. If you want to go to space, go to space. I mean, if you want to be the next billionaire, if you want to be on some big company or drive the fast cars or do this, or do that or pay off your mom tells her, pay off her student debt, don't let this and this and X, Y occupant that, you know, go do it. And like, I feel like a lot of people just take it. So Elle bag by the small things, the little tiny things in life, kind of hold them back from what they want to do. And just never let that happen to you. If you're going to do it, you're going to do it. If you want to do it, you do it. And you let nothing hold you from that

Speaker 4 (37:33):

Very well said. I think you've got a standing ovation. I think you've got a standing ovation. I think, I think that this particular conversation is going to inspire a lot of not just teenagers, but 20 something year olds, 30 something, you know, 40 something year olds, 50 something year olds as well.

Wesley Ross (37:56):

Yeah. Cause I mean, I, I wouldn't mind having from the competition with people, I actually know I was kind of looking to move on to something else. I guess I can tell you about it if you wouldn't mind hearing on it.

Speaker 4 (38:08):

No, I'm open bothered. You got, you got the mic.

Wesley Ross (38:11):

So it's, it's a new thing. I'm starting, it's called Phantom electric motorcycles. And it's this project I've been working on since around December. But with the world moving to kind of electric vehicles, I wanted to, I wanted to build electric motorcycle. And I wanted it to be one of the fastest out there. I

GOVCON GIANTS PODCAST ERIC COFFIE

have the designs, you know, I know exactly what I want to do and I have the capability of doing it. It's just, I've been in the issue of money again. And that's kind of what I've been saving up my money for was the whole car, because I'm a car enthusiast, but also I want to, I want to build this motorcycle. And I mean, I have the company registered, I will have that set and it's, it's something that I wanted to work on over the summer, but it's pretty much I wanted to just build this motorcycle, show the world exactly what capable, capable of told the world, what I'm capable of.

Wesley Ross (39:03):

And then I wanted to turn it into something like real and legit. Cause there's so many modes of motorcycle, motorcycle companies out there who have tried at the whole electric side. So they've been doing building like really crappy motorcycles and it runs into this issue where so many people would be willing to like go to the electric side, but it's just, they get these really awful bikes that no one really wants to work with. And so I know, I know exactly how I want to build it. I know exactly I want to do it. And I mean, with the numbers that I've gone to, the number of so many times the numbers that I've run, I mean, I could, I could build you or if I had the money to do it, I could go one of the, probably the greatest spikes you've ever seen, but it's the issue of the money side of it. Cause I mean, I'm a, I'm an auto person. I know exactly like how to do it and what I want to do. I actually took a class with with MIT on electric vehicles to kind of give you a little bit of Akron knowledge. Okay. Yeah.

Speaker 4 (40:02):

Why not? Do like a Kickstarter campaign.

Wesley Ross (40:05):

Yeah. So I try to kick start a campaign. I try to go from the campaign and actually tried going through a different investment groups. And the issue with a lot of them was I didn't have a prototype that was ready. Because I, I did like, I ran the numbers and build a prototype and it was going to be around 30, 35,000. And I didn't know if it was exactly something that I wanted to put all my money towards. So I never built one. I mean, that would be a good bit of the money that I have. Right. and I mean, I knew that if I could just get that money for it, I mean, people who go in and guess for like $200,000, I was like, well, Hey, I'm just asking for 30. Because I knew exactly how to build it.

Wesley Ross (40:45):

So you have the companies who will spend so much money on research development, but build their own body. And I mean, I don't want to really tell people my secrets, but I, the body that I wanted to go with it's, I mean, it's, it's not expensive. All the things that I wanted to do with it. They're kind of cheaper on the cheap and too, but I knew exactly what I wanted to do. And I thought this was the thing that a lot of these motorcycle companies don't know, like if you just kind of a wishy washy, Oh, let's do this. I was trying to illustrate that. I knew exactly what I want to do. But if the issue of you don't have a prototype, so we don't want to fund it,

Speaker 4 (41:19):

GOVCON GIANTS PODCAST ERIC COFFIE

I can tell you this. One of the stories I do share, and people are referencing Elon Musk. I share the story. You know, everyone right now is so talking about space X and the flights of the rockets and things like that. But what they don't know, the side of that is that he had to fight and claw his way to even make that a possibility. It wasn't given to him. Even he even had to Sue the U S government in order to be eligible, to bid on contracts, to fly rockets and send satellites up to space. He had to Sue our government. So it wasn't an easy pathway for him. Right. They didn't just open a door and say, come on, we welcome new. No, because the big companies, like you talked about general dynamics, North room group, Boeing, all these companies want to keep out the innovators of this world.

Speaker 4 (42:05):

Right? So those people don't want to see you succeed, but I think I've got some people on here that do want to see you succeed. And and I think that maybe it's a possibility that you could easily raise a $30,000. What I would say is this is, you know, put together your drawings put together a sketch, all the stuff that you have in your brains, put it on paper. Okay. And then, you know I'm sure, you know, that's not a whole lot of money. Trust me, $30,000, not a whole lot of money to put towards an idea that there's a lot of people that here that's waste $30,000 on entertainment and a weekend. I know some of them, you know, so I'm sure there's a lot of people here that would take a chance on you. Let me just jump over real quick and see if there's any questions and then we'll wrap up and hold on. All right. Comments. He just inspired this 40 year old. Someone says when looking at government content ops, how did he know how to read it? When they look, when I look at it, it looks confusing. Yeah.

Wesley Ross (43:04):

I remember at the start, I was really confused. Cause you would see all these different numbers codes for SS and I mean all of these things and I mean, I used to sit there and be like, Oh my gosh. But I mean, I would spend, I would spend like on a contract that an older person would read for like 15 minutes and say, Oh, I don't, I don't want to look at that. I mean, I would spend like an hour or so reading up on every single code, every single, you know, piece of information that it has all different wage determinations, things like that. Just to kind of like learn more so that when further down the road, when I see these contracts, I know exactly what it's asking for and things like that. But I mean, I feel like it's kind of, it's kind of easy to like find what you're looking for, as long as you kind of just, if you sit down and actually like read it and to take the time, then you'll know exactly what you're reading. Do you think maybe they're afraid more than anything else? Yeah. I feel like a lot of people it's, I mean, you can get these documents where it's like 30, 40 pages of information, information, information, and they're like, Oh my gosh, like it's seems like too much to do. And so they kind of, it kind of like crushes, those dreams are ever doing contracts, but I mean, I would say I would just sit down and read the pages and once I was done, I knew exactly what I had to do.

Speaker 4 (44:15):

What's the, I have a couple of people on here suggested some things. One I know the guy, he says, Hey, you need to ask for 300,000, not 30, by the way. So let's, we're going to change your number, going to say 300,000 just in case your first prototypes don't work out. Right? Yeah. Okay. So he says, asked for

GOVCON GIANTS PODCAST ERIC COFFIE

300,000, not 30. The other thing suggestion was there. There's a bunch of retired motorcycle racers that don't need to be educated about what you're trying to do. They will be a great place to look at targeting. Some of them may be on LinkedIn. Okay. So there's and then I've got another comment on here. Someone says get in contact with Raymond Cooper, CEO of Rema motors, Raymond's on LinkedIn and he has done an incubator program. So that may be something else to look at.

Speaker 4 (45:05):

And then Jason says, ask for 60. So again, you know, we're gonna have 30,000 now I'm going to throw it out the window. You need to get 60,000. And then, you know, someone else's go for 300,000. So and then, and then one of the things that I that's been benched before to me is I can work with, it's easier when you're trying to pitch an idea to someone who's an educated buyer that already understands the marketplace. And that's why he suggested retired motorcycle racers, because they already understand the industry and you don't have to convince them about like the parts and the components and, you know, they'll, they'll be able to get it your idea really quickly, someone else that just had money be like, well, why is it electronic? Why would you want to do that? Why don't you wanna do electric motorcycle? Right.

Wesley Ross (45:56):

They're like, why go electric? Yeah.

Speaker 4 (45:58):

No, that's that's I agree with you. Someone else has sent me another name, Marcus, hold on. L a M O N I S. Okay. Alright. Do you still have your Kickstarter campaign up or is it gone?

Wesley Ross (46:15):

It's gone. Yeah, I had to get back.

Speaker 4 (46:17):

Okay. All right. Well maybe we'll something we'll work on. I like working on good causes. You know, it seems like fun or maybe what we do, right. Is we you could get the money to do the contracts. Right. And then I pay you. I get you to mind. You need to do your prototype.

Wesley Ross (46:33):

Yeah. Because I mean, personally, like I hate, I hate asking people for money. It's always something that I've always had to work for. And I mean, you know, that's why I kind of do the contracts because I want it to work for, instead of asking things. But my, my fear with the whole motorcycles is that some other person might pass me up. And then if they had the money at the time. And so it's kind of something like the whole fear for me is that what if I don't have the money by the time that like some other company comes along and everyone's like, Ooh, look at this guy. You know, when that could have been me, who's like doing exactly what they're doing.

GOVCON GIANTS PODCAST ERIC COFFIE

Speaker 4 (47:08):

Blake has a question and this would be the last question I take. Cause we've already pushed an hour. It says, once you win a contract to you, receive the supplies and ship them off to the agency.

Wesley Ross (47:19):

So the way how I worked with things or how I fulfill them is I'll get the contract, all contacts, contact supplier. And it's pretty, I'm just Amazon again, pretty much. I mean, it's not through Amazon, but they send it right to the base. The base pays me and then I pay the supplier and I mean, I'm happy, they're happy. And you know, everyone wins. You never had any rejected products. Yeah. I, because I know it's going to the government and I specifically tell them every time they're like, this has to be top quality. Like no mistakes they'll know, go through it for me and make sure everything's okay. Have you ever met the supplier? No.

Speaker 4 (47:55):

So they just, they just know you as a North star. Yeah. Okay. By the way, I think some people ask the questions. His company's name is North star dynamics. Matter of fact, why is you, why don't you tell people how to reach you? Give them a little plug about yourself and then we'll sign off.

Wesley Ross (48:10):

Yeah. So if you want to find my website it is in S D U S a dot U S the email to the email that's on the website is sales@nsdusa.us. But, and we checked that one as often. The best, if you want it to reach me. Cause I mean, I loved speaking to anyone and everyone. My email is Wesley rocks.work at gmail.com.

Speaker 4 (48:35):

Wow. Great job, Wesley. No, I love it. I love it. Thank you. First of all, for coming on, this has been a lot of fun. I I enjoy and, and listen, I'm actually happy. You mentioned the motorcycle thing. So you, do you think you're going to get out of government contracting to go into making an electric motorcycle?

Wesley Ross (48:52):

I, cause I mean, think about it this way. Isla must did both. Yeah.

Speaker 4 (48:58):

Okay. He does government contracting and he makes electric cars. Yeah.

Wesley Ross (49:02):

Yeah. Because I mean, personally I like racks, but you know, it gets, it's not boring. Cause I mean, I'm only doing it for like three, four hours a day, but I like the adventure. I like the thrill. And I mean the motorcycles, I mean, I'm sitting here because what I wanted to do is I wanted to build it in my garage because I don't have like a for facility. And he's like, that's why the cost of like build it would be so cheap

GOVCON GIANTS PODCAST ERIC COFFIE

is because I'm not paying people. It'd be me building it. But I mean, I mean just with the whole motorcycles, it's like a thrill. There's that fun. I mean, I'm building motorcycles, I'm selling it to people, you know, I'm working on innovating, growing, expanding. I mean, that's kind of what I want to do with North star, but until, you know, I kind of expand into those further areas. It's, it's something that I kind of have to like hold down on.

Speaker 4 (49:47):

And, and then again, if you left the government space, what would you do with your two employees?

Wesley Ross (49:51):

Yeah. Hey, they could Mark it for fence and motorcycles and kind of spread the word about the motorcycle. I love them. They do really well with their job.

Speaker 4 (49:58):

Yeah. That's good. That's good. Yeah. Listen I'm looking forward to helping you. There's some people that are asking me how they can help you. So it sounds like to me, we're going to have to kind of figure that thing out afterwards, but listen, thank you so much for coming on. I appreciate you sharing your story with us. Let's stay connected. Maria knows how to reach you so we will definitely be in touch. But it sounds like I've got, I've got a pretty big following hold.

Speaker 3 (50:28):

It says a last comment says on a motorcycle thing, just keep reaching out to motorcycle nuts. They're everywhere. So Hey, thank you so much. I appreciate you. Alright. Take care. Hey gov. Conjoins family. Thanks for sticking around. If you have not joined our email list, please make sure to do so. Today more than 5,000 people have already signed up and receive exclusive content. That's not shared anywhere on any of our platforms. We notify you of upcoming opportunities, new Facebook groups, webinars, events, and much more. You have to be intentional about growing your business. And that means seeking out the information and learning from every resource possible. Make sure to send them on our website at [inaudible] dot com. And in fact, this month I gave away 40 free one on one sessions with me throughout my email list. Also we are now doing mastermind Mondays on YouTube live each and every Monday at 6:00 PM. And on Instagram live every Wednesday at 8:00 PM for all of our book recommendations, show notes and much more visit our website [inaudible] dot com slash podcast. Thanks for tuning in hope that we've added value to you today in some way

Speaker 5 (51:50):

[Inaudible].