Entrepreneurship is a war zone, and isolation is the fastest way to become a casualty. As digital channels blur together and third-party knockoffs flood the market, relying entirely on borrowed audiences is a massive vulnerability for modern brands. Garrett Peters, co-founder of Duncan & Stone Paper Co., joins the show to unpack the mechanics of scaling an online physical goods brand while retaining complete ownership of the customer relationship.

We sit down to examine the shifting landscape of digital commerce and the reality of platform erosion. Garrett outlines the tension between Amazon acquisition and DTC margin, the complexities of managing retention marketing flows, and how his team is accelerating physical product design to capture fleeting market trends. The core philosophy here is simple but demanding: success isn't about finding one tactical silver bullet, but rather turning on the entire e-commerce flywheel and refusing to over-complicate your distribution before you're ready.

The actual execution of these systems takes a heavy toll on founders, demanding a constant evolution of self-awareness. We dig into the operational fatigue of managing multiple storefronts and the creeping realization that the person who started the company might not be the right executive to scale it. You will walk away from this conversation with a clear framework for auditing your own bandwidth, evaluating when to say no to new marketplaces, and managing the psychological friction that comes with business growth.

If you care about direct-to-consumer strategies, omnichannel brand building, and the psychological realities of leadership, you’ll get a lot from this. Please make sure to subscribe to the channel and share this episode with another founder who is in the trenches. What is the hardest part of stepping out of the daily operations to actually act as the CEO of your business?

Subscribe and tune in for new episodes of Big Talk About Small Business with Mark Zweig and Eric Howerton. Each week we focus on practical insights and real-world strategies to grow your business!

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