Western wear is having a moment – and so is the upstart Western brand Tecovas. Founder Paul Hedrick is a Texan who realized that cowboy boots were either too expensive or too cheap, so he decided to create a premium brand with an attainable price. He traveled repeatedly to the cowboy boot capital of the world – León, Mexico – to obsess over every detail, and later he expanded his DTC business to make a surprising bet on brick-and-mortar stores. Today, beyond boots, Tecovas sells jeans, shirts, dresses, hats, and bags, and this year, the company expects to do more than $300 million in sales.

This episode was produced by Alex Cheng with music composed by Ramtin Arablouei. It was edited by Neva Grant with research help from Iman Maani. Our engineers were Patrick Murray and Robert Rodriguez.

You can follow HIBT on X & Instagram, and email us at hibt@id.wondery.com. Sign up for Guy’s free newsletter at guyraz.com or on Substack.

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Rivian founder and CEO RJ Scaringe joins Guy on the Advice Line to answer questions from three early-stage founders. He also gets into how trade policies and shifting tariffs are impacting the automotive supply chain.

First, we meet Ashley from Southern California, who’s deciding whether to take outside capital to take her altruistic ice cream brand worldwide. Next, Kwadwo in North Carolina is debating leaving his full-time job to go all in on his handcrafted furniture brand. Then Robert in British Columbia is looking to grow his backcountry skiing invention beyond the early adopters.

Thank you to the founders of Vedder’s Organic Ice Cream, Crafted Glory and Zoa Engineering for being part of the show.

If you’d like to be featured on a future Advice Line episode, leave us a one-minute message that tells us about your business and a specific question you’d like answered. Send a voice memo to hibt@id.wondery.com or call 1-800-433-1298.

And be sure to listen to Rivian's founding story as told by RJ on How I Built This in 2022.

This episode was produced by Iman Maani. It was edited by John Isabella. Our audio engineer was Neal Rauch.

You can follow HIBT on X & Instagram and sign up for Guy's free newsletter at guyraz.com and on Substack.

See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Substack was founded to create an escape vehicle for writers: Chris Best and Hamish McKenzie imagined a world where writers didn’t have to rely on legacy publications or corporate advertisers, but could instead create a more direct and meaningful relationship with their audience. Despite early skepticism, Chris and Hamish were confident that many people would pay a few dollars a month to subscribe to their favorite newsletters, on subjects ranging from politics to sports to tech. Today, Substack has over 35 million active users, and while many of its offerings are free, a number of its content-creators make upwards of $500,000 a year.

This episode was produced by J.C. Howard, with music by Ramtin Arablouei.

Edited by Neva Grant, with research help from Iman Maani.

You can follow HIBT on Twitter & Instagram, and email us at hibt@id.wondery.com. Sign up for Guy's free newsletter at guyraz.com and on Substack.

See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.