Plant-Sourcing Platform GoMaterials Has an Eye to the Future

From episode: EP41 - Revolutionizing Plant Sourcing: Unveiling Go Material with Marc Elliott

Willie: How much time do you spend on innovating the next moves for Go material? Because I feel like you are a guy that spends time doing that. How much time do you spend on the future of Go materials? And do you see a need for Go materials to continue to evolve?

So if, uh, I don't know if you heard like recently I, my partner, Mike Shireen and myself, I am very much an operator. I love being in the weeds. That's what I was telling you. I, I've been, I speak to our customers every day. I love that. There's nothing more like I'm, I'm in love with landscape contractors, even though they can be a pain sometimes. That's what I service. And I love the green industry. There's nothing more that makes me happier when I walk down the street and I see it's just street trees, mature ones lined up, canopying the road. Recently I switched positions with my partner, Mike, who's now CEO and I've taken on the position of COO. So I focus less time on actually planning the actual technology. Kind of makes up an hour or a couple hours of my week where I do sit down with my two co -founders, kind of give my two cents because at the end of the day in this company, I'm still one of the best experts at the whole industry. I have extreme knowledge of the industry more than anyone else. And there's a running joke at the company that I'm the best plant sourcer in the world. Just cause I source all over North America. There's no one that does sources and knows nurseries all over North America. You give me a tree, I'll tell you 15 suppliers that have it at a good size. It's just like a Bible in my head. So I do contribute to it, but then I let them run with it. At the end of the day. And then kind of give my two cents every now and then.

Willie: My question should have been redirected. Go materials instead of you, let's say go materials, go materials, time on innovating and to see where the company can be in the next year or two years, three years, five years, you guys spend time doing all that. We have a full tech team of eight to 10 people doing that full time with our co -founder Shereen, who's heading up the product. And that's pretty much her full -time job.

Willie: So I say that because listen to our podcast, one of the things that people wonder is how to scale and then people think that scaling is just buying more real estate or buying this or buying that. And it's not a hundred percent, just that a lot of it is what your moves are for the future. And are you thinking about what your moves are and innovating and pushing towards that? So the fact that you guys have eight people on staff, it's like your train is at a hundred miles an hour. So have fun catching up guys..