I'm a fake surfer
If you’ve seen the content I shoot from my office you’ve probably seen the two blue surfboards leaning against the wall behind me.
They look pretty cool on camera.
Fantastic backdrop. Very “Queensland Australia” vibe.
Very “I bet this guy is goin’ out for a surf straight after this”
But, nope… I can’t surf. I’ve had maybe one or two lessons years ago but likely couldn’t catch a wave if I tried.
I own the boards because I want to learn, and I want that to be the guy I am.
Living here. Board under the arm. In the water before I open the laptop.
My eldest, Issy, she’s 13 and loves the surf. Wants to go to the beach every other day with her mates. Does surf lessons at school. I’d love it to be something we just… do together. Dad & daughter.
But I don’t go out.
Because I don’t know the etiquette.
I don’t know how to read the waves.
I don’t know which app tells me when the conditions are actually any good.
I don’t know how to spot a rip, how to wax the board properly, where to paddle out, or what to do when someone’s dropping in on me.
I know the solution. It’s not complicated.
Go with a local. Someone who’s done it a thousand times. Someone who’ll say “don’t go out today, it’s rubbish” or “paddle here, not there, and watch that guy on the shoulder.”
Someone who shortcuts the years of getting it wrong on your own.
But I haven’t done that yet either. And the boards just sit there.
Why am I telling you this?
The same thing happens in your business.
You know you need your own branded products.
You know the dropship margins are too thin to build anything real on. You’ve probably even got a few banger ideas for your brand in your head.
But you don’t move. Because the risk of getting it wrong is too big.
You’ve built something that works… (sort of)
It pays you… (sort of)
And the idea of putting $20k into stock, picking the wrong product, landing freight wrong, ending up with a 3PL full of something that won’t sell…
That risk is bigger in your head than the quiet cost of staying where you are.
We’re humans. We’re wired like that from our caveman days.
We protect what we have harder than we chase what we could gain.
And that’s the gap that keeps good founders like you stuck for years in a business that pays them just enough to not quit… but never enough to actually be satisfied.
Escape Velocity is the locals who take you out surfing.
Not a course you watch at midnight in bed and never implement.
Not another framework on Notion.
A coach who looks at your actual store, your actual numbers, and says “that’s your best first SKU idea, here’s how to find the best manufacturer, this is how you know the order quantity, here’s what we’re doing first and here’s what we’re doing later.”
The risk doesn’t disappear. But it shrinks. Because you’re not guessing anymore.
If you’ve been circling this for a while, the boards in the corner of your life… waiting… this is the call to actually go in the water.
— Matthew