These days it’s a lot easier to run with Dad than it is to work with him. If you ask anyone on the Feetures! team, he has more energy than all of us combined, but he can’t quite keep up with John and I on our runs anymore. He’ll be the first one to tell you; however, John and I haven’t been able to beat his PR in the 10k.
In all seriousness, the real fun is that the three of us get to run and work together all over the world because of our business today. It’s always a priority for the three of us to get out and run at least a few miles after a day of travel, trade shows, or sales calls. Some of our favorite places to run include the Lady Bird Lake Trail in Austin, TX, the Bald Mountain trail in Deer Valley, Utah, the English Garden in Munich, Germany, but you might be surprised that you can find a beautiful place to run just about anywhere if you look hard enough.
We are lucky that we get to share the simple pleasure of running every place we go. We find that this routine of running together gives us an opportunity to talk about the day’s business, discuss opportunities or challenges, and sometimes reflect on family matters.
This Father’s Day I’m reminded of how lucky we are that the three of us share such an immense passion for working together to build the Feetures! brand. People are amazed that we are even able to make this arrangement work, but I explain that the three of us are very different from one another, and that is a good thing. We often disagree, but we are able to keep in mind that we have one common goal. We respect one another’s opinions and have healthy disagreements. I commend our dad for always welcoming our opinions, even when I was straight out of college and my dad had 30+ years of industry experience. This doesn’t mean that we don’t have to deal with family dynamics. As the little brother, I constantly have to prove myself, at least I think I do. It just means that we are able to realize how lucky we are to spend as much time together as we do, and most importantly we enjoy it.