A Family Chasing Their Dream from Colorado to Norway, and Back Again!

I think it's deeper than the two people deciding to open a store.

Because I feel like it's an awesome example of what can happen when you step outside of your comfort zone.

When you take a risk, you take a channel.

And you never realize what's going to happen out of that.

And I think both of them are the awesome example of what can come out of taking your channel, moving abroad, deciding to open your own store.

And well, I hope you enjoy their story.

And I say let's go ahead and kick things off by having Nate introduce you to active.

SPEAKER_01: Sure.

Well, on a very general note, it is clothing from Scandinavia.

So Sweden, Norway, and Denmark produce an inordinate amount of high-quality clothing that tends to be focused on the outdoors and movement and performance and technical ability and stuff like that.

And we are based in Colorado, which is sort of the epicenter for those kinds of activities.

My wife and I have lived in Colorado for 22 years.

I grew up in North Dakota.

She grew up in Maryland, and we met out here, and we were lawyers forever.

And it felt like forever.

So we were looking for a transition, and we she found a program in Oslo, Norway, where we had been as tourists before and really liked.

And so we decided to move over to Oslo for a year.

And so that was 2016 into 2017.

We moved with our two children.

SPEAKER_00: Wow.

Awesome.

So I'm going to imagine that the move to Norway is then what suddenly sparked this interest in Scandinavian clothing, which then sparked the creation of Active.

SPEAKER_01: That is correct.

In kind of those sort of steps, too.

So we were looking to segue in our careers.

So the program that we found was, in essence, the law of the internet.

It was communication and technology law through the University of Oslo.

So Leslie, that's my wife, and I took our steps towards getting our LLM, which is the next level of legal education.

And it covered the big points uh data privacy, intellectual property, and e-commerce was a part of that.

So we were sort of brushing up on the laws surrounding commerce in the uh internet realm as we were living in Oslo.

And Oslo has a very much a cafe culture.

So you tend to pick up a coffee on your way into class, after class.

It's just very much a strong part of the social dynamic there.

And so we would be in these coffee shops like we were in Colorado, and the Norwegians that would come in would be decked out head to toe in the latest and greatest technical clothing, which is very much a thing in Colorado, too.

So you when you're in a coffee shop, you'll see people that appear to be on their way to a hike or onto a yoga class or just anything like that.

They're not necessarily going to do that, but that's just the clothes that they select for the day.

So instead of the the big businesses that supply those clothing options here in Colorado or in the US generally, in Scandinavia, they have all of these little niche brands.

They're just focused on like Odlo is one.

They're focused on, and that's O D L O.

They're focused on kind of outdoor cardio.

That's their thing.

So if you are like a winter runner or cross-country skier, you might kind of gravitate towards them.

They have those for each little piece of your life.

And so what started as sort of a joke, you know, these clothing lines would go over really well in Colorado, kind of escalated, and we started looking into whether that was a possibility.

So that we moved back in 2017, we had to finish our academics, and then I turned to this in 2018, reached out to a bunch of producers, and received pretty good feedback.

So in October of 2018, we started our website, ActiveStyle.

Wow.

And yeah, it's one of those things that it obviously took a lot of work and it's every day it's work, but it also feels like it kind of happened quickly, too.

SPEAKER_00: Of course.

So now how long were you guys in Norway?

SPEAKER_01: Like 13 months we were there.

So my kids went to school in the Norwegian school system.

My son was a fifth grader, and so his was more English-based, okay.

An international school, but my daughter was a first grader, so she went to Vindernskola in West Oslo, where they were teaching in uh Norwegian.

SPEAKER_00: Wow.

Okay.

So now I have to ask, so so was it for for you and your wife to go to the university there?

Is that what prompted the move in the first place?

SPEAKER_01: That was the justification, yes.

Okay.

We really wanted to live outside of the US to give that kind of texture to our kids' lives, to our own lives.

From a heritage standpoint, I am like seven-eighths Norwegian, one-eighth Swedish.

So uh I have Scandinavian roots that genealogy is a big thing in Scandinavian countries.

So before we got there, in our trip and we were tourists there in 2012, we met three sets of cousins.

And so we had there was like a safety net there.

We actually knew people in the country before we got there.

And then while we lived there, we were able to kind of meet up with additional cousins, so which was really nice.

It's it's it's it feels very comforting to kind of to kind of tie in those uh long-term heritage connections.

SPEAKER_00: So yeah, yeah.

That's so that's so fascinating.

That's really pretty awesome.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, thank you.

SPEAKER_00: Wow, wow.

So now tell me a little bit more because I I personally am not familiar with like that region of the world and stuff.

So tell me what was what was life, you know, like during that time, as far as I mean, that did you guys really get to get out and like you know, enjoy the nature and everything, you know, there.

SPEAKER_01: Yes.

So there is a Norwegian concept called Frelutzliv, which is loosely translated as like free air life.

But what it really means is kind of capturing the natural world in your daily activities.

So in Oslo, Oslo was basically built into a forest.

I mean, it's it's it's got a city center that is very much like any city center in the world, but on the uh as you move out from there, you kind of get into uh wooded areas and parks.

So I would drop my daughter off at her school and I would continue on and kind of hike through a little park, like right there.

So that was that was something that we really embraced is that part of walking and being in nature like every day.

So that was that was uh certainly an important kind of part of the Norwegian experience and ours in Norway.

At the same time, we we we did not pick up much of the language.

The the cultural rules within Norway are such that you just don't you don't really talk to strangers.

If you don't know them, like the the metro during rush hour will be pretty quiet.

Like people just don't talk back and forth.

So there was not a lot of opportunity to practice the language, and our program at the University of Oslo was in English.

So my daughter picked up some Norwegian, but she doesn't have a person really to talk to practice it with, so yeah.

SPEAKER_00: That's that's what I I just started to ask if the kids picked it up more being in school, but uh, but yeah, I guess if you don't you guys are like, okay, that's great.

I don't know what you're saying.

SPEAKER_01: And I mean English is a language 1A in Scandinavia, I mean in Europe in general, but it's sort of the the common language through through any of those countries.

So it's it's not as if you couldn't communicate.

And Norwegian, I can uh from a reading standpoint, it's a Germanic language, so there are a lot of things that sort of cross over between Norwegian and English.

So you can kind of figure out what's going on, but to speak it is a little more difficult.

SPEAKER_00: Yeah.

Yeah, understandable.

Now, as far as anything stand out in your mind, like while you guys were living there, any things that you guys got to experience that kind of stands out above the rest?

SPEAKER_01: Well, so it's we are recording this on the 17th of May, which is the Norwegian Constitution Day.

It is the biggest celebration of the year in Norway.

Oh, wow.

So, yeah, and so if I mentioned my heritage, Setnamai, which is what it's called, is was a big it was a big part in our family.

I mean, it was big enough.

We certainly recognized it every year.

So for that day, my mom and her sister flew over, and we, and what it is, it's it's everything is closed.

There's a now it's not taking place today due to COVID restrictions, but in a normal year, they would have a parade through in every town, but in Oslo, through the main thoroughfare, the Carl Johanskata, from basically downtown to the palace.

So and every kid in the Oslo schools will will kind of march through.

Many are in uh red, white, and blue, which are their national colors, or you're in a what's called a bunad, which is the traditional dress for celebrations from centuries ago.

So that was an incredible day.

It was everybody goes down to the center, and then it's you have a parade, and it is it's just a very much a celebration that is I mean, it's like our Fourth of July, but they don't have a ton of other celebrations, so it is kind of all of their big days kind of pushed together.

So that was remarkable, and I look forward to going back again to attend the celebrations whenever the world fully reopens, so maybe next year or so.

So that was that was a high watermark for sure.

Now, one thing that we another trait that we really adopted when we were in Norway, Norwegians are intrepid travelers.

They are they are on the go all the time.

And Oslo is nicely situated in, and Europe is just so much smaller than the US, that you can get to places uh cheaply, which is remarkable, and quickly.

In Scandinavia, you can use it, use the train, you can use boats, but flight is just so fast.

Like Oslo to Paris is a shorter amount of space than it is from Denver to Chicago.

So you just can you get on a plane and you're in a completely different place very quickly.

SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and that's just you're you're you're so right.

It's it's I guess it would almost be like comparable to like us, you know, think of like you know, crossing between just states, you know, where there you're going to different countries.

It's just something here in the US, we're just definitely not accustomed to at all.

I think that's so fascinating.

SPEAKER_01: Yes.

I mean on the East Coast it's it's closer because you can but it's we're sort of a monolith.

Like we are it's one country, but you can we would one of our trips we went to Central Europe.

So we landed in in Budapest, Hungary, which is a an amazing place.

That's the language Hungarian is unlike any other language, well, except for Finnish, which is also very kind of just non-romantic.

So it's it's just an interesting experience.

And then we went from there to Slovakia, which was an excellent place, and then to Vienna, which was our favorite city in all of Europe.

We loved Vienna.

SPEAKER_00: Really?

So what what was it about Vienna that made it so special?

SPEAKER_01: So I think it's the it's the combination of the old world and the new.

So uh the Austrian, from a historical perspective, the music, the Vienna Opera House is sort of center in the city.

So you have all of these, you know, Mozart was there, there's the cafe culture there as well with the Sasha Tort, and so you have all of these things that have been around forever nestled with a state-of-the-art transportation system.

They're from a sustainability standpoint, they're very green, so you feel as if efficiency is everywhere.

So it's just those two traits sort of balanced out.

And they're certainly you hear German, but it was uh easy to communicate in English on a personal level.

I love Wiener Schnitzel, which is you know a very thin fried, usually veal, but couldn't be pork cutlet.

I had those all the time when we were there.

So that part is fantastic as well.

And it's just Paris is amazing, and Rome is amazing, London is fantastic as well.

But they start to sort of feel with the EU, there was you would see kind of the same shops and the same places in all those three cities.

So that it it kind of felt a little the same.

Vienna did not for us.

We it just felt completely different.

So we were we went there twice, actually.

SPEAKER_00: Oh wow.

Well, I'm sitting here thinking to myself, how in the world did you guys have any time to do schoolwork?

SPEAKER_01: Well, that's a fair point.

We would our classes were kind of obviously during the week, and it was very much a not self-study, but things that you would sort of develop on your own.

So it was not like I went to law school obviously before that.

It was not from a a strenuous standpoint, it was not anything like that.

It was much more relaxed.

So we we got our stuff done, but at least once a month we would find our way.

There's one train that takes you from Oslo to the airport.

Uh, we'd find our way on that train and we'd be heading whether somewhere whether it was Finland or Paris or Vienna, London.

We went several times.

So we also made that a priority.

You only get that opportunity, you know, when you're over there to explore all these places.

So we tried to take advantage.

SPEAKER_00: Absolutely, absolutely.

Now, one thing that I'm sitting here thinking myself is is I think a lot of people may be surprised, I think that that you guys did this trip while having kids.

So I think a lot of us think of of that as when you're young, you don't have children and stuff.

Is that an experience?

Would you would you recommend it to people who have kids or or not?

Is is what I was kind of wondering.

SPEAKER_01: I'm not sure if it's as black and white as that.

You know, you kids are they're resilient, and our children, the ages was it was a good fit.

Six and ten are they're old enough so they remember it.

Like this is the that's a big part of their life, was and they're now 10 and 14.

So they recall their time in Norway and our travels and all of that stuff.

But they were young enough where they still liked us.

So, I mean, we were, you know, we were a family unit, the four of us.

We spent the entire year together, of course.

And when they're that young, they you know, they still listen to you and yeah, of course, respect.

SPEAKER_00: Well, that's yeah, yeah, of course.

Well, that's what that's what I just was sitting there thinking myself, like what in a in a sense, a uh a trip to truly bond a family together and to get to you know be in this place that that gets everybody out of their comfort zone and then everybody experiencing all these new things together.

I I don't know.

It just seems like to me something that is not only beneficial for each one of you individually, but also as a family as a whole.

So I think that's pretty awesome.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I I would agree.

It it pushed us.

So in the Oslo in Oslo, it's incredibly safe.

So the kids at a young age will ride the subway and buses by themselves.

So my son was a fifth grader, and he would hop on the subway and take himself to school every day.

Wow, that's wild.

Yeah.

It is, it was like the first time he did it, you know, we were and he he had a phone over there because that's pretty universal.

But like we were tracking his where, you know, did he get off at the right spot?

He did.

Okay.

So you know, it he it gave him an opportunity to kind of show his independence.

SPEAKER_00: So absolutely.

That's awesome.

Well, so now so so we go from from the time spent there, now kind of full circle, you guys moved back to Colorado.

So what was was it much of a transition for you getting back used to just life back in America?

Not really.

Not really, okay.

SPEAKER_01: It was that was what was sort of weird about it, is so we we rented our house out for a year, and it we rented it out furnished.

So we arrived back like August 1st, 2017, and it kind of felt like we'd just been on a trip for two weeks.

It that was it was that was what was weird was like it didn't feel weird.

You just kind of dropped back in to your routines and you're in your house.

And so it was strange for not being strange, I guess.

SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's perfect.

That's perfect.

So now you you move you move back to Colorado, and at that point, if if I'm not mistaken, that's kind of when you guys really started thinking about this whole thing of uh of opening a clothing store, correct?

SPEAKER_01: That's right.

I mean, we we were thinking about it.

We had one like semester left to do an independent study, like in essence, you write a dissertation.

So that took us through the end of the that year, 2017.

And then as we started January 2018, I just sent out random emails to the companies that we really liked when we were there.

We are good consumers, so we did a lot of shopping when we were in Oslo.

Wonderful.

So, yeah, we had like a list of you know 10 brands that that we thought were phenomenal and were not readily available in the US.

So it started with just my coming from a Gmail account.

My email, hi, you know, here's a paragraph of our story.

We were in Oslo.

We are going to attempt to open an online store.

We would love your clothing to be a part of that.

And what was interesting is if they had a foothold in the US at all, it would be in Colorado because there is that outdoor connection.

So one of our favorite brands that was one of the reasons that we did this is called Amundsen Sports.

And it's named after Roald Amundsen, who is a national hero in Norway.

He was the first man to go to both poles.

So the North Pole and the South Pole.

And so he's kind of Neil Armstrong, but he was an athlete too, because he, you know, they you had to get there.

So a little bit like Michael Jordan, too.

So he's just all of these things.

And this company was Amundsen Sport was started by his, I think it's his great nephew, who has the last name Amundsen.

And they are their clothing is is meant for movement and all of those good things, but it also harkens back a little bit to the heritage.

So we loved it anyway.

So I reached out to them and their rep was in Boulder, just 20 miles away.

So I was able to like meet him.

And so that helped out a lot.

SPEAKER_00: Wow.

That's so wild.

That's so awesome.

Now, now I'm curious if is there a way?

I mean, obviously, with all of these individual brands and stuff, I don't know if if it's a uh as easy as just blanketing it under under one umbrella, but I'm wondering, is there is there something that makes the Scandinavian clothing unique or different than anything you can find here in the United States?

SPEAKER_01: Yes.

Uh in a way.

I mentioned that they design everything for movement and for the indoor-outdoor life.

A component of the clothing that is not as readily accepted in the U.S.

is wool.

So wool is the major ingredient in most of the clothing that that we sell.

And in the U.S., it has a varying reputation.

I think.

I know that when I was a young kid living in North Dakota, I would get a wool sweater that was not great and it would itch and I would hate it.

SPEAKER_00: And that's exactly what I'm picturing when I'm thinking of wool.

SPEAKER_01: Yes.

But if you it all depends on what kind of wool it is.

And merino wool is the tends to be the choice of our manufacturers.

And merino wool is not that.

It is soft and it's lovely and it looks great.

And so when we're heading into the spring-summer season right now, and the last thing you would think you would wear during a hot time would be wool, but it's actually very pleasant because it wicks.

And you if you it's if it's kind of a sweaty humid day, it will take the moisture off your skin, and it is cool, which is I know, which is crazy to think about.

SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you just I was gonna say totally blow just blew my mind.

That's wild.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so we'll have people in the shop and they'll be they'll I'll give them my spiel about wool, and then I'll have them try on a wool t-shirt, and they will be really surprised, and usually buy one because they are it's sort of every part of a technical item that you would want.

It it will wick the moisture away, it can keep you cool or warm because its breathability is is kind of built into the material, and you don't have to wash it very often because it's antimicrobial and antifungal.

So it kind of self-cleans, which sounds like it's like the miracle ingredient, which is kind of true.

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00: So yeah.

Wow, that's so interesting.

So because you're you're right.

We just here in America, I mean, that's just not something that we generally think of like, you know, that we're looking for in clothing.

And so I think that's just so unique.

It is.

Wow.

SPEAKER_01: So cotton is is kind of king here still, and because it's just so it's so readily available.

But I will, as we talk to people in our in our store, I'll come across, it's a good five to ten percent of the buying public will only buy wool.

Like they've they've discovered it for themselves, and they're actually seeking it out because it is a little harder to find.

So there is, you know, America's a big enough country where you can have you can have a small trend that is still 15 million people, which is a lot of people.

Yeah.

So yeah, so that that's been my experience.

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00: That that's pretty cool.

The only thing I I could compare it to is like thinking about, you know, of a material that you wouldn't ordinarily think of as being so amazing is like, I know, like I've recently, you know, discovered bamboo and like how amazing bamboo is, and that's what like my sheets and stuff, and I'm like, I swear I'll never buy cotton sheets again, you know?

And yeah, so that's just that's so awesome.

Now, so now when you guys came back and you saw this need and and was like, you know what, let's give it a go.

You guys started out as just an online-based store, correct?

That is correct, yes.

Okay, awesome.

Now, how long after starting it did you guys decide to go ahead and go go all the way and open up actually like a storefront location?

SPEAKER_01: That was a process that we've turned on the website in October 2018.

And then that year we did a couple pop-ups because again, as we talk about wool, you can't there's only so many ways that you can express what it feels like or how it performs on a web page.

At the end of the day, the customer needs to feel it with their own hands, it's gotta be tactile.

So we did some pop-ups, and it they were the reception was very good.

So that that was like, okay, well, there's in person has a lot of attributes.

Obviously, leasing a storefront is something that is a challenge for a new business.

So it took us a year and a half to sort of get our our sea legs on on the actual business, and then we started to consider a move into a storefront.

At the same time, the pandemic was ramping up.

So, which from a clothing business standpoint, last March, April, May, there weren't a lot of people going into shops.

So most of the clothing purchases, if they were being done, were online.

So there was like a there was a spike in traffic and sales and all of that stuff.

At the same time, we were approached by the uh this space that is just south of where we live, called the Stanley Marketplace, which is this, it's an older building, but it's it's less than or it's about five years old in its current incarnation, which is restaurants, there's a brewery there, there are shops that kind of cover all of your little needs.

There's a barbecue joint that's fantastic, and it's a place that when we were just customers, we were at three times a week because they had coffee and they had everything that you could need.

And we knew the demographic because it we were in there all the time.

So we knew what what customers frequented it.

Anyway, a spot opened up last summer in in the marketplace, and it was something that we contemplated and we ran the numbers and and we felt like yes, this is a good fit.

So we we moved in September of last year, so September 2020, right in the middle of the pandemic, we opened our doors.

SPEAKER_00: Wow.

So most people I would think would be like, you guys were absolutely nuts to do such a thing.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, we got that.

SPEAKER_00: We got that quite a bit.

How was it though?

They're you know, launching the opening of this store, you know, in the pandemic and stuff, did it take a while, obviously, to kind of gain traction there?

Or it did.

SPEAKER_01: It was, I mean, the past year has been such a roller coaster for everybody that it's and we just kind of wrote it with everybody else.

So in Colorado, we were our state government was trying to be proactive when it came to when there were spikes.

So, for example, there was a spike that happened after Thanksgiving, because apparently a lot of people got together, and that we that escalated our alert system.

So at Stanley Marketplace and throughout Denver, there were there was no in-person dining for like the two weeks before Christmas-ish, right around there.

And that's a big driver of traffic to the marketplace.

So that was difficult because you just didn't have the steady traffic of people coming in to you know have breakfast, lunch, or dinner into the place.

But we also see the flip side.

We're starting, things are starting to open up again, and foot traffic has returned.

So we're seeing, I I get this on a daily basis.

People are surprised that we are in this space and they volunteer that they have not actually been shopping in about a year, you know, 15 months or so.

So it's it's an interesting thing in that the introduction of our brand to the space is just is taking place over a longer time.

It's just a longer introduction because people just aren't in the marketplace like they were before the pandemic.

SPEAKER_00: Absolutely understandable.

Well, how what has been kind of the feedback that you guys have gotten?

I mean, both when you launched even just the online store and now where you you have a location, are people is it still a just this like kind of a continued shock of you know selling you know clothing like this?

You know, I'm just kind of curious, being that it is so different.

Well, like, you know, what your reaction of your customers has has been.

SPEAKER_01: It's varied.

If someone has traveled to Scandinavia, they might recognize, and we have some brands that are recognizable.

Hestra is our glove company, and they make phenomenal gloves.

They're based out of Ora in Sweden, but they're really well known in the US.

So people will see that.

They'll see the Hester gloves and be like, oh, okay, well, that's that's sort of the benchmark for quality.

Then I want to see what else you have because they are amazing.

So, but if if a visitor to our store has been to Scandinavia, they may have bought a brand.

We get that a lot.

Like we have a brand called Ivanhoe, which is based in western Sweden.

They make phenomenal things, but they are not easily found in the US.

In fact, we're really the only people who carry it.

So if people have been to Sweden and picked up a sweater from there, they will be amazed.

Oh, Ivanhoe, I love this brand.

And so it it's one of it's kind of those connections, and then it is the introduction to all these little niche brands to the regular customer that we spend our day with.

That's that's how we greet and educate any potential customer.

SPEAKER_00: That's so awesome.

I love it.

I love it.

And I guess, I don't know, I guess in in essence, is I I was sitting here thinking about it as you're as you're talking, and I thought, you know, like what a remarkable story that you guys have got to have really in in in very recent years, and in, you know, from the time of deciding to to move abroad and you know, to get to live out some of these things that I think a lot of people only maybe dream about, of getting, you know, moving outside of the country and then moving back and becoming, you

know, entrepreneurs with launching, you know, something that not only is just another clothing store, but it's something truly unique that is not only offering something that's extremely useful, but something totally different.

And I just think that's really awesome about you guys and I think kind of sums up your story as a whole.

SPEAKER_01: I would agree with that.

And it, yeah, we've been lucky and it's been an amazing experience.

SPEAKER_00: Well, awesome.

Well, well, Nate, I want to thank you again so much for coming on the podcast.

And uh I definitely going to be sure that in the show notes today that we leave the information for your guys' store, both for those who maybe are in Colorado or maybe will be visiting at some point, as well as uh people far away from Colorado, like myself down here in Florida.

I don't really know well, you you've you've totally changed my mind.

It's hard to say.

We don't really need uh wool product, but you totally changed my mind on that.

So maybe down here in the Sunshine State, we're gonna make wool the uh the new things.

SPEAKER_01: So it could happen.

SPEAKER_00: That's right.

Well, awesome, one nate.

Thank you again.

And um, I uh wish you guys all the luck.

SPEAKER_01: Well, thank you so much, Kevin.

Have a great day.

SPEAKER_00: Thank you.

And that's the lowdown with Kevin Lowell.

I hope today's episode inspired you, motivated you, and excited you to get out and enjoy life.

No matter what obstacles that may be standing in the way.