Chris Grainger: 0:53

Welcome to The Line Within Us, a podcast serving Christian men who are hungry to be the leaders God intends you to be. I'm your host, Chris Granger. Let's jump in. All right, fellas, it's meet episode time. Let's get right into it, okay? So the scripture of the week this week is in the book of Jeremiah, the ninth chapter, and we're looking at two verses, verses 23 and 24. It says, Thus says the Lord, let no wise man boast of his wisdom, and let no mighty man boast of his might, let no rich man boast of his riches. But let the one who boasts boast of this, that he understands and knows me, that I am the Lord who exercises mercy, justice, and righteousness on the earth. For I delight in these things, declares the Lord. So guys, I took some time when I unpacked those two verses at length for you in our spiritual kickoff episodes. So go back to one of your podcast feed if you didn't get a chance to listen to it. Hopefully, you'll be encouraged by it. And if you enjoy the spiritual kickoff episodes each and every week, we do these live Monday through Friday in our Lion Within Us community. We do it for free. We offer this up as just a something of value to you. So head over to the LionWithin.us to get started with that today. Okay. Now for this episode, it's a little bit different. We brought in Mr. Kurt Avery. Okay, so he's the founder of Saw Your Products. And you've probably, if you're a camper, if you're a hiker, if you're an outdoorsman, you've probably used their products before. Okay. So he's the president, he's the owner, he's the founder of it, everything. And he really has a heart for marketing and branding. But man, what an incredible testimony. He is so passionate about creating disease-free water and story after story after story of how his brand and their products have just made a huge impact. Absolutely huge impact in the world. He talks about how he gets started, uh how it's going now, and also future goals. Okay, so he is uh he and his wife Barbara, they live in Florida and they have four grand, they have uh their parents, they have four kids and they have five grandkids. So wonderful things happening for him in his life. So hopefully you enjoy this conversation. If you're if you're in the business, if you're an entrepreneur, you're gonna learn a lot. So enjoy this one with Mr. Kurt Avery. All right, Mr. Avery, how are you doing today? Welcome to the Lion Within Us. Yeah, well, I appreciate the opportunity to be here. This is great. Well, excited to chat with you for sure. And we always like to start off with just a uh light way for the line within us. So maybe tell us something fun about you, sir, that not many people know about. Oh my gosh.

Kurt Avery: 3:25

I'm not that much fun of a person, but it this is this will relate to fun. I I there was a time where I worked at General Electric Strategic Planning in the Motor Division, and I put down on my annual review that I'm really good at causal relationships, understanding how things fall, looking for you know, uh-huh, unexpected kinds of well, the the secretary at that time didn't understand that word, so she wrote casual. So I go to my review and the guy says, So you're really good at casual relationships. You must be a lot of fun at parties. I said, No, you got the wrong person because I am not a lot of fun at parties. I'm way too serious. So possible and casual.

Chris Grainger: 4:10

Yeah, just a little slip of the language there, right?

Kurt Avery: 4:13

Yeah, just a little you. Yes, forgot that you minute. That's right.

Chris Grainger: 4:17

Well, that's great. Well, I mean, I'm definitely excited to to to chat and to hear more about your testimony, and maybe just get us started for the listeners out there. Uh, I'll share a little bit about your testimony and your your background. I'd love to just kind of hear a little bit of your story.

Kurt Avery: 4:32

Yeah, well, God got a hold of me pretty early. I I usually do the story. I remember when I was five years old and it was Christmas Eve, and I just crying, very upset. I said, Why are we giving presents to each other? I mean, this isn't what this is about. This is about baby Jesus. It's not about us giving presents. So I that's when I guess I knew I had to. But but I didn't take it lightly. When I got into the teens, um, you know, I remember one time we were heading off for a thing, and I I just got in a quiet place and I said, Lord, if I can only have one thing, give me wisdom. That's all I want. Just the rest of it'll fall in line, just let's focus on wisdom. Some say I did, I got it, some say I didn't. But um I I didn't take it lightly because I think you know, you have to, you know, apologetics or whatever, you have to say, why do you believe what you believe? Because it's not just because your parents were there. Well, I had one parent was, one wasn't, but um, you know, why do kids that grow up in Islam end up being Islam? You know, so you gotta you know, but I I I when you look at nature and you understand that we actually have a series out there uh called Science Dilemma, which we explore all the DNA and intelligent design and fossil records and all that kind of stuff. It it didn't happen by accident. There had to be an intelligent creature behind it. So um when you look at all the other basic religions, I looked at a lot of them and and they just don't have it. You know, creation belongs to our God, not uh anybody else. I mean, they can't deal with it. So that brings you back to you know strengthen your faith. I didn't I never lost the faith, but I I wanted to make sure I really had it for a reason and not just because it was given to me.

Chris Grainger: 6:20

Right.

Kurt Avery: 6:21

So you gotta search and make sure you understand what you believe. And you know, now if anybody wants to check out Science Dilemma on YouTube or whatever, you'll you'll get some real facts behind creation and the literal creation. So that's where we're at. Um spent with me the whole time. Uh Sawyer is a big old walking testimony.

Chris Grainger: 6:42

Sounds like it. So when you were at five, you said you had one parent that was w that was really walking with the Lord, one parent that wasn't. What was that dynamic?

Kurt Avery: 6:51

Yeah, and it ended up that way too, yeah.

Chris Grainger: 6:53

Really?

Kurt Avery: 6:54

Which is tough, but Yeah.

Chris Grainger: 6:57

I got you. So I mean how was that how did that dynamic impact you and your walk?

Kurt Avery: 7:03

Um well, I had a my oldest brother, my old only brother, the old oldest child, had difficulties. He was never all there, okay. I mean, he had he was brilliant, but the emotions of like a four-year-old. And that was really tough on my parents, you know, and and I think for many reasons, my father just said, you know, why? Why, why me? Why did I get this? And they had a miserable life. I mean, that that child made life really miserable. And my mother just held on to his faith and her faith, and he just hadn't wouldn't have none of it because he had a rough time.

Chris Grainger: 7:42

Mm-hmm.

Kurt Avery: 7:44

You you just gotta look at it and like I said, God had a hold of me, so that wasn't gonna shake it out of me. And uh it wasn't my son either, so yeah. I I didn't have any you know, mad at God because he gave me a child like that. But we have four wonderful kids, but uh even still I don't think I would blame it on God. But he his faith he didn't have the faith, so he did.

Chris Grainger: 8:09

So gotcha.

Kurt Avery: 8:10

It was tough, you know. You you uh life is a binary choice. You go up or down at the end, so it's a tough one. See the loved ones not go up.

Chris Grainger: 8:21

Well, I'm curious because you said you prayed for wisdom as a teenager, and you know, I think about discipleship and mentorship, and so who were the the men at that point in the life in your life who were who were trying to to shape you and teach you and and so far as growing your faith?

Kurt Avery: 8:38

I I don't think there were any. I really I didn't have any men in my life, really. Not until you get to college, you know, and then you got stuff but uh yeah, professors and things, but no. No. I just I just God was there, that was it.

Chris Grainger: 8:54

Mm-hmm. Wow, that's an amazing it's it sounds like you were just lot walking with him. Obviously, it sounds like your m your mother had a big impact on your faith journey as well.

Kurt Avery: 9:04

Yeah, yeah. Just her character. She I mean, sh she wasn't deep into the Bible or anything, but she held on, and my grandma too, you know. Just didn't know any different, you know.

Chris Grainger: 9:18

Wow. Well, how did you take that faith and and apply it to your career? Obviously, you've done had a very successful career and and you and so much of that is part of what your your business is grounded in. So love to our sure listeners would love to hear how that parlayed there.

Kurt Avery: 9:36

Well, went to a Christian college, uh, Hope College in Holland, Michigan. So we had a you know, had a lot of faith there and a lot are surrounded by believers and professors that were believers, and uh got myself an incredible wife. Um huge difference there, you know, when you have a faith partner and every every which way it's 48 years now we've been married, and um she's a rock. And uh in fact, right now she's getting ready to go teach a Bible study, so a lot of faith there, yeah. Uh you know, I I just study a lot, you know, or a lot of Bible studies and got great churches with good preaching and you know, small groups and all that kind of stuff, just firm it all up. But but again, it was because it's logical. I'm I'm I'm math oriented, okay, very logical. And logically, I don't know how you could pick any other faith than this. So once once you've crossed my Rubicon on logic, that it makes sense, then then it's rock solid, you know.

Chris Grainger: 10:42

Fair enough.

Kurt Avery: 10:43

But but God's been with me all through business. I mean, you you know, you got all those little things you look back and you say, that was a God moment, wasn't it? Yeah, that was and certainly in Sawyer there's a lot of God moments, just phenomenal stuff that uh which are in the book, um things that you say, only God could have done this.

Chris Grainger: 11:02

Well, for for those that are not familiar with Sawyer, what what is the what is the company? Give us a break uh a rundown of what Sawyer does.

Kurt Avery: 11:09

Um it's it we're outdoor protection. So the main things we do are every every product we make is very, very advanced. Uh we're we kind of small following in sunscreens, but we're very big in insect repellents. We're we're number one on Amazon at this time of the year for our categories. We do the clothing treatments for the military and for the the hunters and the hikers and all that. We have the topical repellents. We've moved into the replacement for DEEK, which is for keratin, and we do water filtration. So we've come up with the only filter on the market that can take out everything that would make you sick. Not viruses, they're not in the water, they're airborne, body fluids, they're not really in the water, but they don't survive in the water. Excuse me. So our filters never wear out. So you're you're talking something the size of a Coke can that will last for 15, 20 years, and you cannot get sick using that filter. Nothing that can go through that thing that'll make you sick. And we're the only ones. We've been there for 20-some years with this, and so we're real big. We're we're we're we own the outdoor market. All the everybody on the Appalachian Trail or PCT, they're all using our stuff. But overseas, we we do that well too. We go into a village and within two weeks all the sickness is just gone. The waterborne sickness is over with. Um, we're in slums and they're closing medical clinics because they don't have customers anymore. So and we're down now to like 20 or 30 cents. We can give somebody clean water for the next 10, 15 years. So it's it that's that's really what we're about right now.

Chris Grainger: 12:52

Wow. Heavy emphasis on the water. I mean, it sounds like the the water filtration has been a probably a major opportunity to sh to share the gospel for people as well.

Kurt Avery: 13:02

Oh, it it's huge. Um obviously clean water. The the demonstration they normally give is they give you a they they show a glass of really filthy water and then they run it through the filter and it's crystal clear, and they say this is your life before Jesus, this is your life after Jesus. Took away all the dirt in your life in the sense. So yeah, we we we share a lot of gospel. Well, we have 140 charities working in 80 countries. We're we're everywhere where you name it, we're in the toughest places you can imagine. Um, but that's that's the demo, you know, water is life, clean water. So gospel is shared with almost all the charities. Wow. And uh a lot of a lot of baptisms and conversions and what's been some of the career.

Chris Grainger: 13:47

I mean, so you've been there from the beginning with Sawyer?

Kurt Avery: 13:50

We founded it in 1984.

Chris Grainger: 13:52

1984.

Kurt Avery: 13:53

So we started in a little back room with uh with a pad of paper and a little tiny computer and uh calculator. Only had 29 functions on it, and here we are.

Chris Grainger: 14:06

Here you are everywhere.

Kurt Avery: 14:08

We're state of the art and everything now.

Chris Grainger: 14:10

That's incredible. So you've had to have some incredible God moments. I mean, when you look back over that that period of time in Sawyer, what stands out the most from those God moments that you've probably witnessed and experienced?

Kurt Avery: 14:20

Yeah, there's a there's one in the book that's staggering. Um I think big. Okay, my God's big. I don't put him in a box. He's big, real big. So uh Gulf War I comes along, and uh I see they invaded uh Kuwait, and I said, uh oh, we're going to war. I had just gotten into the sunscreen business and and uh uh connection to the military called and said they got a big contract out there for sunscreens for uh for uh the Gulf War I need 230,000 a week starting in a couple of weeks. Said, okay, let's bid on that. At the time, we were hand-filling 2,000 bottles a day, and they got to go to 200,000. Well, I had a mentor who had the money, dropped $800,000 in 15 minutes, got all the equipment, got all that stuff, and we began to make it. So we we did, we did the contract. We're about uh three weeks into the contract, having just shipped truckload after truckload to um uh McAllen, Texas, and we get the notification by the way, you have to be a commercial brand. Well, I at that point we had just gotten into business less than 30 days earlier, and I had sold two cases, 24 pieces. One case to California and another one to Broadway Hardware in McAllen, Texas. So the inspector is down there, gets in his car, drives down a mile down the road, goes in there, and one of only two cases in the market is right where he is. And so we win the contract and made six million bottles of sunscreen. Tell me how that isn't God setting that up. I just met the the Broadway hardware store buyer a month ago and he picks up a case, and that's what we needed to get the contract.

Chris Grainger: 16:15

Oh my gracious.

Kurt Avery: 16:17

Yeah. So that was just one of many. There's many times he's bailed me out.

Chris Grainger: 16:24

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Kurt Avery: 17:29

Wow.

Chris Grainger: 17:30

That's incredible. That is absolutely incredible. So I mean, it sounds like you also had were surrounding yourself by people who believe in you and your mission that were able to support you when those opportunities came.

Kurt Avery: 17:41

Yeah, yeah. I had a good godly man um back me up then. Yeah, we had met him later. I only met him like two years before, maybe only a year before that. Yeah.

Chris Grainger: 17:52

Uh-huh.

Kurt Avery: 17:53

Good Christian guy. He's passed on since then, but he had the money and the means, and we just did it.

Chris Grainger: 18:01

Wow. That is incredible. What what a what a crazy story. So I mean when maybe there's there's guys listening now who are entrepreneurial-minded, and maybe they're they're right where you were in 1984 with the you know a pen and a pad and an idea. What what encouragement would you give them to keep pursuing?

Kurt Avery: 18:20

Well, f well, I'll go back to the book. First, you read the book, because in the book there's 25 tips on making sure you have a solid business plan. How to grow it, how you you can't run off with some crazy plan and expect God to bail you out. I mean, you gotta do your homework, you gotta, you know, go through the four P's, the five C's, all that kind of stuff, creative destruction, all that. So you gotta have a good idea, don't just chase anything. But then once you're pretty sure you have the idea and it's right and people have verified it for you, do it. I mean, we're God is big. Don't he if it if you're right and it's in his plan, it's gonna happen. So don't think small, think big, but do your homework. You know, don't run off crazy, but do your homework. And, you know, we we lost money 23 of the first 25 years before we became an overnight success, you know. So uh it took a long time to get here, but we knew it was right, and we knew God was behind us, but and and and we made it. So don't be afraid. We're in America, they're not gonna throw you in debt or prison, you know. I mean, but but do your homework. I mean, that's where the book comes in. There is 25 lessons that'll help you make sure your plan is solid and it's correct. And then if it's correct, don't be afraid. Just go.

Chris Grainger: 19:37

Gotta take that step of faith, right?

Kurt Avery: 19:40

Step of faith, but with your homework done. I mean, you gotta you you don't just go out blindly saying, I feel like this. I I talk to entrepreneurs that they so think they've got it right, but they're they're they're running with passion. Well, passion is great. You gotta have the passion, but you also gotta have the business plan. You gotta have it solidly figured out and not just run out there crazy.

Chris Grainger: 20:04

Fair enough. Fair enough. What about the Sawyer Foundation? I know you guys got that going. What led you to creating that?

Kurt Avery: 20:13

Well, here's here's the deal. I I have bought back all my investors, so I know and own 100% of the company. Um and we have structured it to where my goal in life is to not make profits. We try not to make profits. So we do give away a lot of a lot of money, a lot of filters every year. And the whole idea is make just enough profit to keep the bank happy. But then even when we make the profits, we give it to the foundation to give away. So when here's a marketing term, when I exit the market either physically or mentally, all the stock goes to the foundation. So then the foundation owns Sawyer, kind of like Hershey Foundation owns Hershey Chocolate, you know. Because we you can't take it with you, right? No U-Halls in heaven. So it's all gotta go. We we give away, we we say to the public 90% of our profits, but we actually give away a lot more than that because we don't let us make profits. I don't try to make profits. I try to give it away before. I'd rather give the money or filters or whatever away rather than paying taxes and letting the government decide where the profits should go. So we have a very unique thing because we have the very product that the world needs. I mean, if we made cupcakes, you'd have to make the cupcakes, make the profits, pay your taxes, then give away what's left. But I don't have to. Nobody tells me I have to make a profit so I can give away the filters. Then I can do research and promotion and all that kind of stuff. We spent a lot of money on research to know what we have so we can now, we're at a jumping point right now. We're ready to just absolutely go to the next level. Um, we hopefully, you know, within five or ten years, our we're like a cell phone, everybody has one. And we just take we, you know, this is you talk about a big God. Uh God is not stopping us, but we have the ability to take bad water off the table in the next five, ten years, just gone. Which kind of changes God's whole relationship with man, because we've had bad water from the get-go, and yet now we're very close to taking it out of play. So that changes how man relates to God and God relates to man. I mean, that's a biggie. That's the biggest medical breakthrough out there. So we're ready now. We have QR codes, we can talk to you in any language, we can interface with every individual owner, we can track all this stuff, but we know that if you have a filter, you're not gonna get sick for 15 years from water if you take care of it. Huge. And we're doing it for 20, 30 cents a person. 30, 20 cents a person gives a person 10 years of clean water.

Chris Grainger: 22:57

Wow.

Kurt Avery: 22:58

Yeah, so it's and we're right now to the point where we're ready. We got all the research in play, we got all the technology in place. We're on we have WhatsApp to interface with anybody who owns a filter. We have instructions in 18 languages, so we're we're ready to go.

Chris Grainger: 23:15

So what do you um what what does the next step look like? You said you had a jumping point, a launching point for the for the next step. What do you think those steps are?

Kurt Avery: 23:25

We have a we have a plan. What we're doing is we're gonna start with the schools, and the school we teach the teacher how to teach the kids how to use the filters, and then they bring the parent in from the home and they go through it again. So then that home gets a filter, but we've already proven the teachers are there as a resource. So that's step one, and then at parallel to that, we go into the churches and create water stations. So we have a filter, one one filter, you put it on your tap, and you get anywhere from two to four hundred gallons of water a day per $20 filter, and every day for the next 20 years. So we we then go create water stations at the churches, and then people can come to that church every day and get clean water or come every couple of days, fill up a jerry can, whatever they want to do. So those are the first two stages, and we're starting those, literally starting those within a month. And then after that, we do mass distributions because now anybody with a smartphone can link into it, but we got to kind of create the here's what it is. So we're starting out with um uh El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras. We want to prove a country, and we can do that on Sawyer's nickel. Sawyer has enough money to do those countries with a little bit of help. And we're gonna we're gonna do Bolivia too. We're using we're using our charities and we're using what's called Organization American States, OAS. If they used to teach us that, they probably don't teach it anymore. So we have connections to all the governments and whatever. And so, like in Honduras, we're going in through the Department of Education. They're they're actually promoting it through the schools. So that's step one. You know, we if once we start knocking off countries, we've done five countries now, border to border. Everybody in this country is is not sick now. We're just done. Did the whole thing with one big country, Liberia, but also a lot of small countries, so we're on the ring of fire, you know, Vanatu and Christmas Island and Fiji and you know, some of them over there. But we go in, we literally, it's it, every everybody has clean water. There's nobody without clean water in those countries. Now we move to mid-sized countries, so we'll do those. But then I think once we prove a few of those and we show you it, and we got the statistics to verify all this stuff, we measure not just the sickness, we measure we save them money because they're not buying water. They can drink anything they have. There's no infrastructure inquired. You don't need to build water treatment plants. Whatever they're drinking, we make it safe. It doesn't matter if they're drinking it from a little pool where the cows poop, it doesn't matter. We make it safe to drink. Uh and and then we save them, they don't have to buy medicine. They have we do 10 to 20 percent more personal income because they're not spending money on those things. Uh we've proven that the adults get to work an extra 30 days a year, which is huge. Kids go to school, they're not missing school now because they're not sick. So it's really a transformation. It it we give the women an extra two, three hours a day because that's what they spend now trying to do water, boiling, and all that stuff. I mean, we're not we're not chopping down trees and burning unnecessary propane. I mean, it's just absolutely transformational what that little filter can do. We we in one of our slums, the violence stopped. The gangs are so they're not beating each other up. We you know, Kabira, which is a suburb of Nairobi, if you were there six years ago, you wouldn't walk down that street. You better bring a SEAL team six with you because you're not going to make it. Now you can just walk down there. You can you could walk down there by yourself, nobody bother you. All the gang violence has stopped because of the water. And obviously a lot of uh conversions too. I mean, they sure 20, I mean one time they had 27,000 believers out of 400,000, but that's more. They're doing baptisms every week. So it's it's um it's pretty transformational. But we're now where I can do those small Sawyer can has the resources to do mo get kick started, but then now it's time to go out and get the big hitters that all we need is money. We can give you the filters, we got the technology in play. So there are people ready to to join us to change the world. And and you know, the government, you know, you know, USAID is still active, it's now within the State Department. You know, j just think if we took all the Central American countries and gave every one of those countries 10 to 15 percent more GDP.

Chris Grainger: 27:56

Yeah.

Kurt Avery: 27:57

And and and nobody's sick. Just think how much you could transfer those nations. It it's staggering what this thing's gonna do.

Chris Grainger: 28:07

So go back to to that uh garage in 1984. Can you does it feel real to you to have these types of goals and conversations?

Kurt Avery: 28:17

No, it's just it it only because we went through the process. My uh my wife Barbara and I, we we pinch ourselves. We every once in a while we'd make fun of ourselves that you know, just from an upstairs bedroom with a pad and paper and a calculator, and here we are now. I mean, this is this is big stuff. This is a huge change in in in human health. I it's you know, I don't know what else is up there, penicillin maybe or something. I mean, we're right up there with anything change. So no, it it's surreal, but it's what I expect. You know, God and and you know, why the the the toughest part is why us? For all the people in the world, why did God pick us? Well, there's reasons he didn't pick the Gates Foundation or some of those things, because he's not gonna get credit. So he's gonna get all the credit for this.

Chris Grainger: 29:08

Amen. How about the the people that that are part of your organization? I mean, how how have you incorporated your faith, obviously it's a big part, into it, and how has that infiltrated to the people who work directly for Sawyer?

Kurt Avery: 29:21

Yeah, well, what it's mostly all believers. Um first of all, I have the best of the best. I mean, why would you not want to work for Sawyer? I have enough margins, we pay very well, but how how often do you get to hit your wagon to a company that's going to change the world like this? So I have very, very happy employees. Um in the factory, it's it's it's I got from all over the world. And you know, we share stories with them from their home country and just see the tears come down. We have videos that'll make you cry all day long. Uh but as far as the office people, they're scattered all over the country. They're everybody's all in. And and you know, I I hire from Christian colleges and whatever, so you know, a lot of believers here. Not 100%. It's not mandatory, but you you you come in with a passion. So it's everybody knows what we're doing and why we're doing it. Where's the factory at? Um, it's a tiny well, first of all, here's my philosophy in the book. Uh, we're a marketing company, that's what drives it, not the manufacturing. So I I don't have a very big manufacturing facility, very, very little. Uh we we make our insect repellents there, but that's about it. And anytime anything gets significant, it's out of here. There are people that are happy to manufacture for you all day long. Manufacturing our products is not what adds the value to the to the product. It's the marketing that does, you know, making everybody understand why we are the best. So I try to minimize manufacturing, but it's in uh our our home plant is in Safety Harbor, Florida, kind of bike. Clearwater St. Pete. We have a plant in Panama down in uh d to do some labor. I I farm everything out. We don't want to do it. We we're a marketing company. That's where what drives it. There are plenty of people that want to spend their time manufacturing. God bless them, they can have it. So we we probably only manufacture labor is not even 20% of what our total impact is in terms of labor around the world.

Chris Grainger: 31:18

Wow. Well that that mindset that you're a marketing company, that that's that's a new, you know, many people think that way. How how did you get there?

Kurt Avery: 31:27

Well, I that was my that god gift to me in marketing. But here's the sad part marketers make all the money because they know how to connect the thoughts from an engineer to the consumer, and the consumer to the engineer. We're the translators. Consumers, you know, like like Henry Ford had that great quote: if I asked the people what they wanted, they would they would want a faster horse. So what you gotta do is you gotta go out to the marketplace and what do you really need? What can we do? How what problems can we solve for you? And it may not be the way they think, but we can solve that problem, whatever that was. You know, it was you know, water. When we got into the water business, the the camping hiking community used 70,000 heavy filters a year, you know, ceramic or whatever, big lug things. They were they were at two, three pounds a piece. We're down to three ounces a piece. And so the market went from 70,000 units to millions now. We do millions of filters, us and the other brands. Um, and when we first started, the the retailers said, Well, you know, we we sell these things for ninety dollars and we're making half of that a piece. And said, and you want us to sell these for nineteen dollars? I said, Yeah, but you're gonna sell so many more, you're gonna collect a lot of ten dollar bills. And so, I mean, it they didn't have a choice because we were coming anyways. You can't you can't stop technology if it's I mean, try to sell a rotary phone now, you can't. Okay, so you couldn't sell these things. And so we blew it up, just totally changed the whole way. But again, it was solving what the customer wanted with a technology they didn't even know existed. So you find that out and then you bring back to the engineers, they create the product, or vice versa, the engineers have an idea, but you gotta fine-tune it because engineers know how to work. I I'm I won't tell you what company I was with, but I remember they they came up with a trimmer, which is incredible. You know, how do you you know what are you gonna do with a fast-moving piece of string? Nobody's gonna go back to hand clipping. But then they wanted to come up with this thing there, and it was burning you. And I said, you can't sell, but but you just learn how not to have the exhaust pipe on your arm. I said, you can't tell the consumer to do that. How many lawsuits you want? So the engineers had the idea, but they had to modify it to fit what the consumers could actually use. So we're the translators, we're the translators between the good ideas and what you have to do so consumers can understand them and use them, or solve problems that the consumers don't know how to articulate and bring it back to the engineers to sell them. So that's why the marketers make the money, because they're they're the translators between them.

Chris Grainger: 34:16

Mm-hmm. And I guess your story, the translation story of the dirty water to the clear water, that that that seemed like that just came pretty natural. Was that something God did he give you that as well?

Kurt Avery: 34:28

Well, and the people in the field. Remember, we have 140 charities. Actually, it's counterintuitive because if you really understand bacteria and stuff, all the things you can see don't make you sick. But all the things that make you sick you can't see. So the fact that we take the dirt out of it is not what makes the water safe. But it makes a good testimony. But but you know, you could take somebody else's filter and do that, and it might look clean, but it's not safe yet because the little things that you can't see are still in there. But so it's it it's a good it's it's a good little story to tell, but it's actually not scientifically accurate.

Chris Grainger: 35:06

Right. Wow. Well, I mean, it sounds like you just got some incredible things going there, and God's been leading you the whole way. Maybe what's been some of the the biggest challenge that you've faced at Sawyer when you look back through your through your career, and how did you overcome that?

Kurt Avery: 35:25

Like I said, we we lost money 23 of the first 25 years, and yet we're still we were still in business.

Chris Grainger: 35:32

So speak to that. You you mentioned that just in kind of casually, but then that that's hit me. Like, but speak to that. What that's a lot of uh that's a lot of setbacks. A lot of guys would give up.

Kurt Avery: 35:43

Well, and a lot of we had good products. Um and we were learning. I had a switch from mass market. I I was uh in the marketing department with some pretty big brands, and but I had to switch to guerrilla marketing, and that was sitting in the stores all day long explaining the products, whatever you couldn't advertise. So I blew through a little bit of money in the beginning, but then we figured out what we had to do, found our way in the marketplace. But I I knew that if I kept inventory, the banks could never foreclose because they don't want inventory, they want cash. Now I've never missed a bill, okay? I've always paid, you know, and sometimes they're a little late and then I'd make it up. But we made ourselves where nobody the bank would never want to close the loan. No, they didn't have big loans, they were they weren't too big. Now we do because it's cheaper to borrow money and give stuff away, pay the interest, than it is to, you know, we we could we could be cat we could be debt-free if we wanted to be, but I don't want to be, because it's cheaper to borrow the money. That's a kind of interesting concept. I'd rather borrow, let's let's pick a number. Uh if you borrow five million dollars, you're gonna pay you know three hundred thousand in interest, which is tax deductible. So you now you're only paying two hundred thousand dollars, but I can give away five million dollars. Because I instead of I don't need it, so I but I got it, so I would rather pay two hundred thousand dollars in cash to give away five million dollars in filters and goods. So I uh but we could pay it off, we're we're profitable enough, but I don't want to. Um but then back then I did it so that they would never foreclose because I knew we were gonna make it. We we had good products, we were gonna make it. We just had to get to enough momentum. Uh so I never stiffed anybody. Banks all came out whole, they all made their money, you know, and and our bank now I got a bank that loves what we're doing. They're just all into it. And so they, you know, we make the covenants, we make the interest payments, they're making their money, but um they know that I'm not making as much money as we could. We we could make a lot more, but we'd rather give it away. You know, I I don't want the IRS to use it for social media programs in the US. I'd rather go over to Africa and South America and change lives. So um, but it was tough, you know. I had a great, great wife, you know, and and I took consulting jobs to keep the pay, and my wife knows how to buy expired meat and put the barbecue sauce on it or whatever, so she's very frugal. You know, we shop at Salvation Army, you know, stuff like that. We got through it. We still do just because that's our nature. We live quite frugally. I mean, I I don't need I'm an old country boy, I don't need a lot of stuff. Um and she she she's very humble, so um, but it it does change it because you know, on the factory, you people come down to the factory and go, that's not very impressive. I mean, we still got holes in the wall where the forklift hit it. I said, But you know, here's the problem for you know, every dollar I spend we spend on the factory, fixing it up, making it look pretty. That's four or five people that could have clean water for the next ten years. I I said, I I'll I'll leave the hole in the wall there. So what? Well, someday we'll patch it up, but I'm not gonna spend money there when we can change so many lives for that same dollar bill.

Chris Grainger: 39:12

You're so locked in on the mission, that's incredible.

Kurt Avery: 39:15

Yeah, so we're locked in. We we have plenty of stories. If they go to Sawyer.com, there's plenty of stories there, they'll put tears in your eyes. I mean, we save hundreds of thousands of babies' lives every year. Um there was one, if you want a couple little stories. One while you in Afghan uh uh in uh Uganda, the guy goes in, he's a missionary, he goes in there for a week and he says, I notice you don't name your kids till they're three years old. He goes, Yeah, because if they make it to three, we're sure they're gonna live. But if before three, we don't know if they're gonna live or not, so we don't bother giving them a name. So he goes back, installs the filters for the village, a couple hundred villa filters, goes back again. They name all that birth now because they haven't lost the kids. You know, it was the bad water that was killing the babies. You know, and they lose up to a third of their kids. Wow. And now nobody. The the kids all live. I mean, can you imagine that?

Chris Grainger: 40:14

That's unreal.

Kurt Avery: 40:16

Yeah, and and there's so many stories like that. It's it's just choke you up.

Chris Grainger: 40:22

Well, we'll make sure the links are there for the guys to check out some of these stories. This has been just incredible. Uh Mr. Avery. Trying to find genuine resources to help grow spiritually can feel overwhelming. At least it was for me. For the longest time, the support that I was looking for didn't exist. I knew I wasn't alone, and at the same time, God was leading me to take action. That's why we built the Lion Within Us Community, which is simply a place for Christian men to grow together in an honest, practical way that's always rumoring God's word. We've made it simple. We have our daily spiritual kickoff for that little boost to get you going. We have Bible studies focusing on discerning truth and applying it. And we have a private forum where you can speak freely amongst other gods who listen. And then we have things like Friday Forge Couples Night, where we tackle the hard items that gods are craving to talk about, but most space settings just refuse to explore these areas. So our community is about a growth mindset, intentionality, and transparency. Simply put, leave the mask at the door, and come back you are. No perfect resume, just a willing heart and a desire to lead. I believe in what we built, simply because I've seen God use it to strengthen so many men. And I'd be honored to walk alongside you. So if you're ready, visit thelionwithin.us to explore the community. Start your free trial. Look around and see how this could help you lead with clarity and courage. So your journey begins here at thelionwithin.us. I look forward to seeing you inside the den. Before we wrap up, let's have a fun little lightning round. Just to uh we always like to do this at the end, uh, just to get the guys to know a little bit more about you and just have uh some some fun stuff to wrap up with if you're good with that.

Kurt Avery: 42:30

Well, we'll try.

Chris Grainger: 42:32

I'm not very fun, but that's so hey, you've been a lot of fun with me. I've thoroughly enjoyed hearing your testimony. So we'll start off easy. You got any hobbies? Anything you enjoy doing for fun?

Kurt Avery: 42:44

Um, well, I did a lot of sports, which has taken away my I I played a lot of sports. I played cot two in college, but I played and played, so now I got some messed up knees and whatnot. So about the only other than work, which is a whole lot of fun. I mean, you you gotta understand how much fun this is to g to save all these lives. But um, I just do yard work. I go out and work up a good sweat every day. There you go. Chopping down this and that, whatever. And I even get to the point where I'll go clean up the city's property because I ran out of my own property to clean up. But so it's a it's a good workout because I can't I can't play any ball anymore.

Chris Grainger: 43:19

So I go what sports did you play in college?

Kurt Avery: 43:22

I played soccer and baseball.

Chris Grainger: 43:24

Oh wow, okay. What position in baseball?

Kurt Avery: 43:28

First base. Nice. All right. And if some in right field, because I had a rocket arm. I I I uh could throw the 300 feet in the air. So they put me out in right field, so that's you know, everybody gets their triples and whatnot. So I had the long arm, but uh mostly for almost always first base. Awesome.

Chris Grainger: 43:49

That's awesome. What about favorite food? Where what's your go-to, Mr. Avery?

Kurt Avery: 43:54

Well, I would love to have spaghetti. Well, right now I'm I'm I was a stress eater a little bit, so I a little bit too much weight. So I'm working my way back down again, you know, for health reasons. So my wife just came up with this new one. It's called zucchini uh, we call it Zucchetti. So instead of pasta noodles, she grinds down the zucchini and then you put the the spaghetti sauce on top of that. Because I love spaghetti, always did. And uh so now I can have it without the carbs. There you go. So that's moving up to my favorite now. There you go.

Chris Grainger: 44:27

All thing about that is it's not as good as the second day is not as good. But the what when you make it initially, it's you can it is good stuff.

Kurt Avery: 44:36

Oh yeah, well, hers is good.

Chris Grainger: 44:38

That's awesome. That's awesome. What uh what's all-time favorite movie when you and your wife are sitting down and you got a you got a uh a night on the couch, what what movie are you pulling up?

Kurt Avery: 44:49

We we don't watch movies. Um we watch the British baking show.

Chris Grainger: 44:54

Okay, let's go favorite show then, yeah.

Kurt Avery: 44:56

Okay. Yeah. No, we'll we we love we love a lot of cooking shows. So all the, you know, we're we're uh we're being on the you know the food channel all the time, food network and all that stuff. We love that. We love Jeopardy. Usually try and catch one of those a day just to unwind.

Chris Grainger: 45:13

Oh yeah.

Kurt Avery: 45:15

Uh a lot of sports. Uh well, I watch sports and a lot of news. I I think it's from a again, this is my marketer. I watch all the news. I watch the Fox, I watch the CNN, the MSNBC, I watch it all. Um because a marketing is really nothing more than learning how people think and what they do. And so I need to know how everybody thinks, because I'm doing the whole bell curve, not just one particular ideology. So um like Chick-fil-A, we'll sell them all, even if they know where we're coming from, we'll sell everybody. So uh it's it's important for me from as a marketing point of view to watch the whole breadth of the way people think. So watch them all, consume a lot of news.

Chris Grainger: 46:01

Love it, love it.

Kurt Avery: 46:03

Usually might be playing in solitaire on my computer while I'm listening to the news, because I have to multitask. I just can't sit there and listen to you know, I I have a phrase that I would love to be God if it weren't for the people. Yeah. How how he can listen to people whine, eight billion people whining all day long. I I that's a skill set I do not have.

Chris Grainger: 46:23

Amen. Well, speaking about God, let's pull there. What's your favorite thing about God?

Kurt Avery: 46:29

Oh, just creation, just the whole unbelievable uh complexity of it. Everything from the micro to the macro, I mean, and and it's just mind-boggling. That just that that's how I don't know how I don't know how people can not believe in God. I mean, if you just honestly look at nature and the complexity of it, I don't care if it's an ant or a microorganism to the stars, how how can you not believe in God? You know, and then obviously Jesus, because it he gets to tell the whole story.

Chris Grainger: 47:05

Amen. Now let's flip it 180. What's your least favorite thing about the evil one about Satan?

Kurt Avery: 47:12

Oh, he's smart, crafty, very, very crafty. Um I I think the greatest word he ever invented is tolerance. Think about it. For the sake of tolerance, he's taken the edge off of all the Christians. He's compromised the churches, he's compromised the culture. God is not tolerant, God is patient. You know, he he doesn't say, okay, we all get to go to heaven. No, he's got I you know, and I I go back to my favorite verse, Jeremiah uh 923, where you know, and it ends with I'm the God, you know, if you if you um understand anything, understand I'm the God of wisdom and justice. See, we like uh I'm the God of loving kindness and justice. So we love the loving kindness part of it, but we forget the justice. We just like to lop that off the verse. But he is both. And so saying diffuse that by using the word tolerance. We like to defuse the justice part of God.

Chris Grainger: 48:19

Amen. Amen. I love that. I wrote that the tolerance piece down. I will definitely want to share that with some others. So, last question for you, Mr. Avery. What do you hope the listeners remember the most from our conversation today?

Kurt Avery: 48:32

Um I I would really encourage them. I mean, the book is like six dollars on Amazon or something like that. The purpose of the book is to help you have a better business. And if you have a more profitable business, then you can use it for the kingdom. See, people have got, you know, let's take a restaurant. Well, you know, you got leftover food, but more than that, you have buying power. You're buying at wholesale. You can set up food banks or whatever cheaper than anybody else could because they can't go to the stores and get it. You're buying at wholesale. So pick a business, I don't know, whatever, you know, in accounting services. You you have services. So everybody can take their business and jump into the changing the world part. So I want to make your business help you make it more profitable and look, you know, and there's so much in there, uh, creative destruction, all that kind of stuff. And if your business is more profitable, you'll relax a little bit, and then you can find creative ways to jump into changing the world and sharing the gospel. So um you'd be surprised how little you can do. You don't you don't have to be big. You can start small. You know, we started small and then to get bigger and bigger and bigger. So if you're doing God's will and his work, he'll he'll bless you and it'll just get bigger beyond your dreams.

Chris Grainger: 49:51

That. Amen. Well, it's been an absolute honor, sir. Where do you want to point people to connect with you or with Sawyer Products?

Kurt Avery: 49:58

I just go to Sawyer.com. You can always reach me there.

Chris Grainger: 50:01

All right. All right. Well, it's been again a true honor and a blessing. Thank you for sharing your testimony and definitely an encouragement to a lot of guys out there who are listening. And uh anything else you'd like to end with?

Kurt Avery: 50:12

No, just thank you for giving me the chance. You had a great, great uh podcast. And it's just I appreciate you giving me a chance to spout off a little bit.

Chris Grainger: 50:20

Oh, it's an honor, sir. You have a wonderful day.

Kurt Avery: 50:23

Okay, thank you.

Chris Grainger: 50:26

If you're looking for a simple way to get your week started right, the weekly roar is for you. So every week I'll share a short reflection on scripture and a couple practical steps to help you walk it out. It's all about being clear, honest, and staying rooted in God's Word. And here's the deal: there's gonna be no inbox games, there's no hype, it's just an encouraging and quite often a challenging word to help you steady your week and strengthen in leadership. So if that sounds interesting, sign up for free at thelionwithin.us slash roar. And here's the cool part. You can read this in a few minutes and carry it with you the rest of the day. So again, thelionwithin.us slash roar. That's R-O-A-R, to get your personal weekly roar every Monday morning. All right, guys, I told you that was gonna be a great one. Thank you again to Mr. Avery for coming on. Question of the week this week is what do you most often boast about in your life? Again, going back to the things that that we talk about the most, that's the most important. Obviously, it needs to be the things centered on God and what he's doing in our life. Okay, so again, thank you to Mr. Avery. Head over to Sawyer.com to check out all their wonderful products. If you're an outdoorsman, you probably got some of this stuff already at home. Okay, but again, what a great mission, what a great goal, and just uh man, powerful testimony right there. So thank you guys for listening. Give us a rating and review, head over to the lionwithin.us. That's the way you can connect with us and all the wonderful resources that we have for you from our daily spiritual kickoff to our community to uh leadership mastermind, all the ways we try to serve guys, as well as open up the Bible app and check out the Lion Within Us on the Bible app there as well. We love to connect with you there. We've got tons and tons and tons of plans. So hopefully you'll find some encouragement along your way. Okay. We'll come back on Friday. We'll have a good, fun Friday episode for you. Guys, have a wonderful day and just keep unleashing the lion within.