Episode 381 - Greg Putnam

Summary

Cleared Hot: Episode 381 - Greg Putnam

Released on April 7, 2025

Hosts: Andy Stumpf & Greg Putnam

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1. Introduction

In Episode 381 of Cleared Hot, host Andy Stumpf welcomes Greg Putnam, a former Navy SEAL and the current owner of Little Belt Cattle Company in Montana. The episode delves deep into Greg's transformative journey from military service to entrepreneurship, exploring the challenges he faced both in the battlefield and the business world. Their candid conversation offers listeners an insightful look into leadership, resilience, and the interplay between politics and personal ventures.

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2. Greg Putnam’s Military Background

Greg Putnam served as a Navy SEAL, primarily in the SDVs (Seal Delivery Vehicles), where he undertook rigorous training and operations. Reflecting on his SEAL experience, Greg shares:

“I'm shocked that I'm still alive on some of the absolutely dumbest I have ever done in my life under the guise of being a special operations.”
— Greg Putnam [32:05]

He discusses the physical and psychological demands of SEAL training, emphasizing the importance of camaraderie and the harsh realities that differ significantly from Hollywood portrayals.

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3. Challenges in Political Campaigns

Transitioning from military life, Greg became involved in political campaigns alongside his business partner, Tim Sheehy. They faced relentless negative campaigning aimed at undermining their reputation. Greg recounts:

“They launched a systematic attack with tons of funding, like a million dollars a week in negative campaign ads directed at making us look like terrible people.”
— Greg Putnam [08:25]

Andy probes Greg about the emotional toll, to which Greg responds candidly:

“The negative campaigns didn't just attack policies; they went after our families, businesses, nothing was off-limits. It was a scare tactic to deter good people from entering politics.”
— Greg Putnam [10:37]

This relentless negativity not only threatened their business but also served as a deterrent for potential candidates aspiring to bring positive change.

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4. Transition to Cattle Ranching

Post-military and amidst political turbulence, Greg shifted focus to agriculture, founding Little Belt Cattle Company. He emphasizes the significance of vertical integration in the cattle industry:

“By keeping all phases of cattle production within our system, we ensure quality from start to finish, similar to how we operated in the military by maintaining control over every aspect.”
— Greg Putnam [85:10]

This approach allowed Greg and Tim to maintain high standards, streamline operations, and build a reliable supply chain that caters directly to consumers and local businesses.

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5. Running a Vertically Integrated Cattle Company

Greg details the intricacies of managing a vertically integrated cattle business:

• Genetic Selection & Nutrition: Ensuring cattle possess the genetic traits and nutrition necessary for optimal growth.
• Pasture Management: Implementing rotational grazing to prevent overgrazing and maintain pasture health.
• Market Integration: Partnering with businesses like Black Rifle Coffee to create synergistic marketing strategies.

He shares insights into the operational challenges, such as maintaining consistent supply and managing customer relationships:

“Consistency is key. You can't have a slip in quality because restaurants and consumers rely on us for reliable, high-quality beef.”
— Greg Putnam [117:47]

Greg also highlights the importance of local beef production for food security, asserting that:

“Food security is national security. By producing locally, we bolster America's competitive advantage and ensure a stable food supply.”
— Greg Putnam [124:34]

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6. Coping with Negative Campaigns and Business Impact

The negative political campaigns against Greg and Tim had tangible impacts on their business. Customers began distancing themselves to avoid political affiliations, leading to a temporary decline in sales. Greg elaborates:

“We experienced an $8,000 to $10,000 sales decline from businesses that wanted to avoid any association with our political stance. It was frustrating, but we focused on maintaining quality and building new customer relationships.”
— Greg Putnam [138:31]

Despite the setbacks, their commitment to quality and strategic partnerships enabled them to recover and even expand their market presence.

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7. The Importance of Local Beef Production

Greg passionately advocates for locally produced beef, emphasizing transparency and traceability:

“Consumers today want to know exactly where their food comes from. By controlling our supply chain, we provide transparency and build trust with our customers.”
— Greg Putnam [117:47]

He contrasts this with the segmented nature of the traditional cattle industry, where cattle are often sold and processed far from their origin, diminishing traceability and consumer connection.

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8. Insights on Politics and System Corruption

Greg offers a critical perspective on the political system, suggesting that systemic corruption and negative campaigning stifle genuine candidates:

“The system is so toxic that even good, service-driven individuals find themselves corrupted or overwhelmed by the relentless negativity.”
— Greg Putnam [86:06]

He reflects on the difficulties of maintaining integrity within a system that rewards negativity over positive change, underscoring the need for reform to encourage more authentic leadership.

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9. Lessons Learned from Military in Business

Drawing parallels between military service and business operations, Greg underscores the value of discipline, strategic planning, and adaptability:

“Just as in the military, in business, you have to plan meticulously, adapt to changing circumstances, and lead with integrity to build a successful operation.”
— Greg Putnam [125:34]

He emphasizes that the resilience and leadership skills honed during his SEAL tenure have been instrumental in navigating the challenges of the cattle industry.

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10. Closing Thoughts

In wrapping up the episode, Greg and Andy reflect on the intertwined nature of Greg's military background and his entrepreneurial spirit. Greg expresses pride in contributing to local food systems and supporting his community through high-quality beef production.

“By focusing on quality and building strong relationships, we’re not just running a business; we’re fostering a sustainable and transparent food system that benefits our community.”
— Greg Putnam [85:10]

Andy commends Greg's dedication and resilience, highlighting the valuable lessons listeners can glean from Greg's journey.

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Notable Quotes

• “Don’t go into the military for financial independence.”
  — Andy Stumpf [22:54]

• “Food security is national security.”
  — Greg Putnam [124:34]

• “Consistency is key. You can’t have a slip in quality because restaurants and consumers rely on us for reliable, high-quality beef.”
  — Greg Putnam [117:47]

• “The system is so toxic that even good, service-driven individuals find themselves corrupted or overwhelmed by the relentless negativity.”
  — Greg Putnam [86:06]

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Conclusion

Episode 381 of Cleared Hot offers a compelling narrative of Greg Putnam's evolution from a Navy SEAL to a successful cattle rancher. Through his experiences, Greg sheds light on the challenges of combating political negativity, the importance of local agriculture, and the lessons learned from military service that transcend into effective business leadership. Listeners are left with a profound appreciation for the resilience required to navigate both the battlegrounds of politics and the rugged terrains of Montana's cattle industry.

Transcript

[Greg Putnam]

Beautiful Anonymous changes each week. It defies genres and expectations. For example, our most recent episode, I.

[Andy Stumpf]

Talked to a woman who survived a murder attempt by her own son.

[Greg Putnam]

But just the week before that, we just talked the whole time about Star Trek.

[Andy Stumpf]

We've had other recent episodes about sexting in languages that are not your first language or what it's like to get weight loss surgery. It's unpredictable.

[Greg Putnam]

It's real, it's honest, it's raw. Get Beautiful Anonymous wherever you listen to podcasts.

[Andy Stumpf]

Good morning, everybody. I hope you all had a great weekend. My guest today is Greg Putnam. He's a former Navy SEAL and current owner of Little Belt Cattle Company. Cattle company north of Bozeman, Montana. Now, you might ask yourself, did they call it Little Belt because he's so tiny? No, they didn't. Although he is very we, if you know what I mean. They called it that because that's the mountain range that's right there. Greg has been on before. God damn. So he. His career mostly was in the SDVs, seal delivery vehicles. And I'm going to be honest with you, they terrified me because I didn't really know what they did other than spend an ungodly amount of time in the water, far longer than I would ever want to spend. So anytime that I've ever seen one, and there's only been one time that I've seen it for real, I went in the other direction because I just didn't want to get put inside of it. He opens with a story about perhaps exactly why that is the case. So episode 381 with former Navy Seal, current businessman Greg Putnam. Now, before we dive in, let me pay the bills. Today's episode is brought to you by Black Rifle Coffee. That's right. You know, they've been a part of this podcast for years now. They helped me bring this podcast to everyone for free. I've been a fan of the brand, a part of the brand for quite some time now. I own one of their coffee shops up here in Montana, currently the only one in Montana, and it's been a hell of a ride. But today, let's talk about their website. So let's head over there right now. First thing I'm looking at. Elixir. I don't know how to say this. Vitae. Vitae. I don't know. Its origin is from Mexico. The region is. I'm not even gonna try to say that. I feel like I know how to say that. But I'm not gonna embarrass myself further. This is an example of one of the bags of coffee that you can get if you join the ecs. The exclusive coffee subscription. It's gonna be one bag a month. Now if that's not enough for you, don't worry. I just scroll down here. All these other bags, you can get those on the regular coffee subscription as well. You don't have to limit yourself to just the ECs. You could do the normal coffee subscription as well. They have a full selection of everything that you could need. If you're a coffee lover or just a fan of the brand, you could fly the flag metaphorically. Hats, T shirts. I think I've seen them do some shorts before as well. Not currently though. Mugs. Things to make coffee in, things to take coffee on the go, all of those things. They also have energy drinks, which I'll be the first to admit I'm not a fan of energy drinks. But we sell these in the coffee shop and they are flying. So for people who like energy drinks, I highly recommend you check them out. Four flavors Black Rifle Energy that comes in Freedom Punch, Wild Frost, Ranger Berry and Project Mango. Really a smattering there, covering a lot of it. They have a loyalty program. You can join their email campaign. All of those things. I also recommend you check out their apparel section. Spend a good amount of time on there. They make some amazing designs. Everybody knows why I like this brand. 1. I like the people. I like what they stand for and it's just a part of my life at this point. Let's get into the show. After you go over to www.blackrifflecoffee.com. let's go.

[Greg Putnam]

Okay, got the red smoke. North or south? West of the smoke. West of the smoke. Okay, copy.

[Andy Stumpf]

West of the smoke. I'm looking at danger close now.

[Greg Putnam]

Come on with it, baby. Give it to me. I need it. You're cleared hot. Copy cleared hot.

[Andy Stumpf]

I like that you brought a single breath mint.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah, yeah, just in case. Did you want one? I actually have more. I just didn't want to be digging in my pocket.

[Andy Stumpf]

No, I'm just curious why. Oh, you have three.

[Greg Putnam]

Perfect.

[Andy Stumpf]

I thought it was better when it was just there by itself.

[Greg Putnam]

Oh, you'd like the one.

[Andy Stumpf]

Dude, I know where we have to start. How does it feel to be partnered with an out of state billionaire who bought his way into Montana to try to influence national level elections? Not that any of what I just said is true, but you guys had to deal with that. I was fascinated to hear because I know during the election cycle and some people have said to Me, you should run for office. To which I can't say fast enough. No, thank you. That's not actually how I respond. I use much more colorful language. One of the main reasons why is I can't fathom why anybody would want to put their family through that. The shit that they say, the stuff that it seems like they make up. It seems like everything is fair game. There's no rules. And you, I mean, what I opened with was obviously a joke, but you're partnered with Tim, she who the narrative was out of Stater, no ties to Montana. It literally was trying to buy an election in a state that he thought he could swing. And I think you and I had texted one time in between. You're like, God damn it.

[Greg Putnam]

I think I actually saw you in Vegas and I was just like, you know, you always, you have like, you always have, like, good, sound advice. And I was just like. And we were just kind of talking about. But number one, how's it feel? It feels great. Right? It feels great now. Now that it's over that.

[Andy Stumpf]

Fuck that part. Let's talk about the part where it didn't feel great.

[Greg Putnam]

Yes, yes. And so a couple things there. Number one, people, I don't think realize how long these cycles actually are.

[Andy Stumpf]

So you mean the election cycles?

[Greg Putnam]

The election cycles. So keep in mind, this is just all my personal. I don't work for the campaign. Didn't work for the campaign. And if not a paid spokesman for them, I'm just going to talk about, like, what. What was my experience as a friend, as a business partner, and that's about all I can do. So Tim started that campaign about 18 months prior to the actual election. So you have. Why? Because he had no name?

[Andy Stumpf]

No, no. I mean, why did he want to do.

[Greg Putnam]

Oh, got it, got it, got it. That's a great question if you actually think about it. And for all the attacks that they sent, you know, his way, at the end of the day, he didn't have to do it. He could have just taken his successes and not done really anything at that.

[Andy Stumpf]

Being successful in growing businesses.

[Greg Putnam]

Correct. And he didn't. There was no. He did not have to go back into service. Right. And. And I'll say, like, honestly, like, Tim is like a very, like, service driven person. You know, I think from obviously, like a young age. He went into the military at 18. It's something that's been important to him. He actually is something that's extremely, you know, community driven. And I would say that's, you know, from a country, from the state, from military, from all the people he's hired, et cetera. You know, honestly, I think the, I think the bench in Montana at the time was fairly weak. They'd already ran people against Tester. They did not do very well. And honestly, they needed somebody, you know, that had, you know, what Tim brought to the table. And I think they, they came to him with, you know, kind of with, with this ask. I will say this, I highly doubt they gave him the full read in.

[Andy Stumpf]

Like I was going to ask what the difference was between what he likely thought it was going to be and then what it was, which is you speaking for him a little bit. But I know you guys are friends, so you probably got at least a little bit of window dressing.

[Greg Putnam]

Well, I got to watch it too. Right, and so what you ultimately watched happen was a, you know, a systematic attack at very high levels with tons of funding. This number may not be 100% accurate, but like what I was told at one point, it was a million dollars a week in negative campaign ads directed at making look like a terrible person.

[Andy Stumpf]

I feel like two thirds of those landed directly on my cell phone.

[Greg Putnam]

Yes, or in your mail or on your YouTube or on the TV. Like you couldn't go anywhere.

[Andy Stumpf]

The mailing was legitimately unbelievable. We live in a neighborhood, you know, one of the standalone boxes. So people are out there walking and there's almost always. I think this is the case. There's a garbage can right by one of those. There wasn't even enough room because it was already full of the mailers being stuffed in.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah, just overflowing every day, two or three.

[Andy Stumpf]

What do they. What was his. What was the one. Was it shady?

[Greg Putnam]

Shady she? Yeah, yeah. There was little kids running around the playground at my kids school and they were like, you're a shady she. No, you're a shady she. Now what's really funny, and Tim brought this point up the other day, was if they had spent a million dollars a week talking about what a great guy John Tester was versus what a piece of shit Tim she supposedly is, they probably would have won.

[Andy Stumpf]

But can you think since you and I have been alive, can you think of a single example of a positive campaign? No, I don't. I can't either.

[Greg Putnam]

No.

[Andy Stumpf]

And it's always the attack of the other person's character.

[Greg Putnam]

Correct. And you know, it goes both ways. Right. And what I will say is, and I think that this is also part of why it happens the way that it does. It is to deter good people from going down that road in the future. And it allows, you know, the. It allows, quote, unquote, them to continue to maintain power in certain ways, because then they dictate the people they're putting forward. And if you're putting those people forward, then you ultimately have some sort of level of control over that situation, that person. And it's a scare tactic. It's not just that, like, we'll go after your policies, we'll go after your stances, we will go after your family, we will go after. After your businesses, we will go after your kids. We. There is no area of. That is off limits. And, you know, if you're somebody that is at a point in. In your life, like your. Your businesses and your finances, et cetera, are like, totally sound. Okay, maybe they can't affect it that bad.

[Andy Stumpf]

No, they just make shit up then.

[Greg Putnam]

But they do. But if you're in a point where you're building businesses, you're growing businesses, you're. You're growing a family, you're growing a life, right? And you have. You have that level of attack coming at you. It's. It's really. I mean, I think, honestly, it is a. It's a. It's a warning, and it's a scare tactic to other good potential candidates, to you come into the space. This is what's going to happen to you as well.

[Andy Stumpf]

And when, Win or lose.

[Greg Putnam]

Win or lose. And then when you think about it, I mean, as. I was actually surprised how some of those, you know, the campaigns, the commercials, the flyers, I had people say to me at different places in Montana, you know, well, I saw that on tv, so it has to be true. And I'm like, you realize that those are paid advertisements. And they were like, well, it's on tv and these are adults.

[Andy Stumpf]

I saw Airwolf on tv.

[Greg Putnam]

Exactly.

[Andy Stumpf]

That doesn't mean it's true.

[Greg Putnam]

It doesn't mean it's true.

[Andy Stumpf]

You don't get that reference at all, do you?

[Greg Putnam]

Not at all.

[Andy Stumpf]

We are.

[Greg Putnam]

Google that.

[Andy Stumpf]

We're a dying breed.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah.

[Andy Stumpf]

I was actually on YouTube the other day trying to find the seasons of Airwolf because it's time. It's time to watch it again, go.

[Greg Putnam]

Through the whole thing.

[Andy Stumpf]

The last time I watched it, I think I was 10. It's time.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah, you might. Did you find it?

[Andy Stumpf]

You can find little snippets. I can't find anywhere where you can actually watch the episodes.

[Greg Putnam]

Interesting, because there's a lot of that now, too, where, like, you go. You're like, I should be able to find this.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

And you can't.

[Andy Stumpf]

Well, instead I went down the rabbit hole of what happened to that helicopter, which it ended being sold to a charter company in Germany.

[Greg Putnam]

It actually crashed.

[Andy Stumpf]

The original Airwolf helicopter crashed.

[Greg Putnam]

Got it. Interesting.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah. I was bummed. I was going to buy it, but, you know, maybe I was going to go visit.

[Greg Putnam]

That's funny. These are my favorite shows as a kid. That is a good show. But the funny, like, you know, and we can talk about it more. But, like, the interesting thing was in the last, you know, point, just kind of thinking back on this. But there was two things that really stood out. There was a guy I know, and all these guys, you know, they like to refer to themselves as political operatives, I think is the word. And really, they're just, you know, the word operator operative doesn't come to mind.

[Andy Stumpf]

When you actually influence peddlers, essentially. Pretty much connectors or people.

[Greg Putnam]

Correct.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

And so one of these guys who I. I knew called me before Tim got started. And so I'm on the. He. I pick up the phone, and he's like, hey, just so you know, like, this is all business, not personal. You know, you just. You just. You know, we got nothing against Tim as a person, but this is just how it is. And I was like, yeah, that's fine, man. You know, hold on.

[Andy Stumpf]

Michael, what are you doing?

[Greg Putnam]

I don't know why it did that.

[Andy Stumpf]

Are you over there doing other work instead of paying attention to a stock? If you want to do some work, pull up a fucking clip of Airwolf.

[Greg Putnam]

There you go.

[Andy Stumpf]

And make your life better. Fucking pull it up, dude. Let's watch this shit.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah. Not a clip.

[Andy Stumpf]

I found.

[Greg Putnam]

I like that. You already found it. Oh, look, there it is.

[Andy Stumpf]

Like an Ernest Borgnut.

[Greg Putnam]

Oh, that is amazing. Oh, that is.

[Andy Stumpf]

Who doesn't want to wear a motorcycle helmet while flying a helicopter?

[Greg Putnam]

You don't wear that with your.

[Andy Stumpf]

I do wear a helmet, but not a motorcycle helmet, because they make ones for it. Oh, Jan. Michael Vincent. I heard the cocaine kind of derailed his career.

[Greg Putnam]

Oh, is that right?

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah. I heard he had constant meetings with the Colombian marching powder and it just marched his ass right out of that hole.

[Greg Putnam]

That will happen in that time frame of.

[Andy Stumpf]

Scroll down. Actually, Michael, I'm curious here. Yeah, 84. So I was a whopping seven.

[Greg Putnam]

Nice.

[Andy Stumpf]

79 episodes.

[Greg Putnam]

See, I didn't catch that until I was a little. I was so I would have been three.

[Andy Stumpf]

Michael. Click on that. A little arrow. Can I stream Airwolf? Yeah. Find that to the Right to the right. Please say yes. Please say yes.

[Greg Putnam]

Oh.

[Andy Stumpf]

Oh, Roku channel. Son of a bitch.

[Greg Putnam]

You don't have that one.

[Andy Stumpf]

Is that. Can you get that on Apple tv?

[Greg Putnam]

No, I think you have to have the actual Roku.

[Andy Stumpf]

Oh, fuck off into the sunset.

[Greg Putnam]

That's all these services are now. You think you have them all, and then the one thing you want to watch is on some random one that.

[Andy Stumpf]

Dude, I'm not going to be my dad yet. I just went through a horrible, horrible adventure with him. He spent six hours on customer support with Hulu because he was embarrassed to ask me to help him log in because he shares my fucking account.

[Greg Putnam]

Nice.

[Andy Stumpf]

So I go to his house. The TV's damn near ripped off the wall. He's got an 8 and a half by 11 legal pad with a perfect mind shit. Written down. And I tried to ask him to brief me on what he had learned. He could not. He was confusing things that had no association. He had pulled the Apple TV puck out. He was getting the serial number off of it. His wife was like, give us your email and password. Like, fuck you. I just. I just logged in and just. And I left.

[Greg Putnam]

How long did it take you to fix it?

[Andy Stumpf]

4.2 minutes.

[Greg Putnam]

Nice. So his six hours of.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah, he just didn't want to get made fun of.

[Greg Putnam]

Sure. Sure you would. You were. You weren't going to make fun of him, though. Of course.

[Andy Stumpf]

So 18 months before the. What does that mean? Does that mean they start thinking about the strategy, or does he just start going out and meeting people and talking to people?

[Greg Putnam]

Yep. What they did was, you know, they. They. They start. Once they committed to do it, they start doing all these different tests on, you know, they call these people, oh, you know, do you know this guy? No. Well, what if we told you he was this, this and this, and then they go, okay. And then they come up with these assessments. I can't remember. His name recognition was extremely low, so the biggest thing he had to do was actually start getting out there and meet people. And ultimately, that's where he was successful within the campaign. But you've got these guys. So this guy, like, I'm talking to him on the phone, and he goes, you know, nothing personal, blah, blah, blah. I'm like, all right, cool. Yeah, just like, keep it above the belt. Like, I get it, it's a dirty business, whatever. And I was like, but I really would appreciate if you left our business and my name out of it, because I have nothing to do with it.

[Andy Stumpf]

Absolutely not, sir.

[Greg Putnam]

Oh, no. He Goes like this. Oh, of course. Of course. We would never. Andy. As I go, all right. I go, well, you know, whatever. Like. And I go to hang up. He goes, however, there is an article coming out on Bloomberg tomorrow that you might see your name in click. And I'm like, what? And then the next day, obviously, I read the article, and I'm like, oh, so this is just like, if he had called me up and said, look, man, like, blades are coming right to the face, like, I'd be like, okay, cool. Don't stab me in the back, though. And then call me up and be like, oh, I would never, like, at least have the balls to call me and be like, yo, this is coming. You're getting pulled into it. And I'm just like, it's. You just learn so quickly. And I think it shows, honestly, why there has been such a drift in poor candidates, and we've ended up with what we have.

[Andy Stumpf]

Who would the. Yeah, do it.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah, it's a. And that's what. You know. And honestly, this was when Tim and I first talked about it. This is what I told him. I'm like, as your buddy, I don't think you should do it. And as an American, I hope you do. And I still feel that way.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

Because, I mean, I watched. I mean, his kids, you know, are the exact same age as my kids, and we spend a ton of time and just watching, you know? Cause you can't isolate that away. And, you know, as your kids get older. And I think a lot of, you know, folks that go that direction into politics, you know, they're usually a lot further kind of down the road. Like, their kids are. Most of the people I know that have done it, their kids are either, like, out of college, they're at a little bit different point in life when your kids are in grade school and they're being subject to, like, those. And it's. It's almost like, inadvertent to a certain extent. You couldn't turn anything on without seeing that. And. And they handled it really well. And, you know, but it was a. So to get his name recognition there, I mean, he had to travel all over Montana and shake hands and meet people and talk about what he was going to do and why he wanted to do it. And, you know, ultimately, that's what. You know, that's what got him over the line.

[Andy Stumpf]

What was the. The narrative I remember hearing was he essentially bought into your business so he could say he was a Montana. Right. That's the angle they took.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah, they Took a couple angles there.

[Andy Stumpf]

But that one directly wrapped in little belt, which is because I remember. Do you remember the conversation? You're like, how do I attack these motherfuckers?

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah. Because every part of you wants to be like, how do you come back? And then you have to be, no. And how do you combat $1 million a week? And then here's what happens is with 2 million. Yeah. Well, if you don't have any money.

[Andy Stumpf]

I also don't have to do that.

[Greg Putnam]

Right.

[Andy Stumpf]

Just giving you advice. Should you have.

[Greg Putnam]

So what, you know, and then what you. What you start to learn as you show a little, like, tactical patience, is that they only keep pressing into the areas where they're starting to get traction points. Exactly. And so the. The less life you breathe back into it, the quicker you know it, it goes away. So the angle they took was exactly what you said. And then they hadn't really attacked the business directly. And then they came out with an ad. And again, you're not like, talking about them finding real, like. Like varsity level people in any of these industries, right?

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

So they found some dipshit guy and he came out. You probably remember. Anybody in Montana remembers that. And they basically were like. Like, at my ranch, like, I have cattle and I grow alfalfa. Tim Sheehy's ranch and company sells pink hoodies and little coffee cups. And we were like, yeah, we do.

[Andy Stumpf]

And in addition to the other things.

[Greg Putnam]

Correct. And they didn't hit on any of that. They didn't hit on the fact that, like, the business of the company that we had built at the ranch that we've built and was like, it wasn't even close comparison to. To this guy. Like, I can't even think of a good example of this guy that they drug up. Yeah. You know, to. To push their message. Ultimately, that message felt pretty flat because a lot of people in Montana were like, oh, so that means if I, you know, if I bought a business or start new in a business, I mean, the ranching and agriculture industry is like, one of the only industries I've seen where there's this huge amount of emphasis put on how many generations before you did it. And if you don't have that, there's kind of a feeling of like, then your skill or your, you know, legitimacy in the industry isn't as good as somebody else's.

[Andy Stumpf]

They just think you watched Yellowstone and thought you're gonna be the correct Jim Dutton or whatever.

[Greg Putnam]

That's right. That's right.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

But, like, think about, like, if you're if you're a first generation doctor, most people go like, oh, great job. You're like the first person in your family.

[Andy Stumpf]

Nobody really asks what the doctor. Have you ever gone to a doctor? Be like, sir, how many generations?

[Greg Putnam]

How many generations?

[Andy Stumpf]

How many generations of your kind have been a brain surgeon? You're like, oh, sweet, you're a doctor. So you're. Please fix my elbow.

[Greg Putnam]

Well, think about like the SEAL teams. Like, how many times did you, like, were you like, well, this guy, like 99% of the people that go into that.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

Don't come from generations of people who did it before, right? No.

[Andy Stumpf]

Because there's very few idiots in each family that would think of that as a viable occupation.

[Greg Putnam]

Correct. Yeah. Yeah. And so they.

[Andy Stumpf]

I got an idea for a cool job. Let's suffer for as long as possible.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah.

[Andy Stumpf]

Most likely in peacetime, have a really shitty neck, shoulder, back, knees and elbows for the rest of your life and maybe get to do something, maybe not. And even if you get to do something, it's not going to be as awesome as people think it is.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah, yeah. And, you know, and we'll pay you, like, okay for the effort.

[Andy Stumpf]

You can maybe flirt with six digits.

[Greg Putnam]

If you're tax free. I remember I told somebody one time, I was like, yeah, but I had this bonus coming up and I could get it tax free. And I told them how much it was and they're like, so you were willing to get shot for that low? And I was like, no. Oh, I would have done it for free.

[Andy Stumpf]

No, the bonus is just an add on. I was already doing that job.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah. I was doing that no matter what. Yeah.

[Andy Stumpf]

Don't go into the military for financial independence.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah.

[Andy Stumpf]

Not that it can't be achieved. I tell you what, there's some people now in the modern era. Fuck, man. They're side hustles. They're hustling on the side and they're killing it. And as long as it doesn't impact your military duties, I'm all about that.

[Greg Putnam]

And people that were smart with how they, you know, invested in what they do with their money. There's people that came out and did. I mean, I, we absolutely, you know, were able to come out in a far better financial position than we were and when we got him in.

[Andy Stumpf]

But it's a stable job. You do make good money.

[Greg Putnam]

You do. You absolutely do.

[Andy Stumpf]

And I think you would agree with this. People focus far too much on the money coming in. The number you really need to control is the money going out.

[Greg Putnam]

Yes, yes. Correct. Yeah. It's plenty coming in that you can actually, you know, in. Yeah. And, you know, the fact that you got to go do, like, those things with your buddies and they paid you as well as they did, even if it was peacetime.

[Andy Stumpf]

Right. If I had served from 80 to 2000, I still would have be scratching my head right now, wondering how I was able to find a job where they paid me to go do those things as opposed to me paying for.

[Greg Putnam]

Those experiences a hundred percent. Look how many people. Now there's people out there that pay to go just get, like, a look at that.

[Andy Stumpf]

I'm like, man, what are your thoughts on the SEAL boot camps? Don't. I see the wheel spinning. Don't you dare fucking soften it. Tell me what you think.

[Greg Putnam]

I mean, I, I. I mean, I, I don't know why anybody. I don't know why anybody would go to one of those.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yes, you do.

[Greg Putnam]

I mean, I know why they would. Look, I can't.

[Andy Stumpf]

You can't because you went through the real thing.

[Greg Putnam]

Yes.

[Andy Stumpf]

It has taken me a while to come to the realization. So our job was very physical, like, visceral physical experiences. I started seeing this when I was working for CrossFit, because there are some people. And again, my, you know, CrossFit, there's the definition for the company. It's. It's exercise that, when I was exposed to it was at a maximum 60 minutes per day to get you better. At the 23 hours that occurred outside of the gym, people went into the sport aspect of that. The ones that got the most, I would say, addicted to it, whether psychologically or physiologically. When you talk to them, they didn't have a lot of physical experiences, like a visceral physical experience. And so that was their first one, and it latched. They loved it. I see it in jiu jitsu, too. And I don't think it's negative. I just think that it speaks to. Either people are not necessarily seeking that out, or we have crafted a world, whether people believe it or not, that is so soft that a lot of the hardship has kind of been rounded out.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah.

[Andy Stumpf]

And so people, I think inherently, they want. They want to touch the dragon a little bit.

[Greg Putnam]

Sure.

[Andy Stumpf]

You know, I saw one of these ads, and I don't know anything about this, but they were knighting people at the end of one of these boot camps. It's not nice, Greg.

[Greg Putnam]

Well, it's, you know, if you actually said to me, though, if you said, all right, I don't know what these, what they Cost, Right.

[Andy Stumpf]

But if you're like, all right, thousands of.

[Greg Putnam]

Okay, so let's just say it's. It's $5,000, $18,000.

[Andy Stumpf]

No, you go fudge yourself.

[Greg Putnam]

I am not.

[Andy Stumpf]

Well, actually. No, don't pull it up because I don't know where this conversation is going to go. I'm not trying to talk shit on another veterans business. I'm just talking in general about my thoughts.

[Greg Putnam]

I'm afraid if I see anybody that comes up on it too, and I don't pull it up, I don't want to look because then it might. You my.

[Andy Stumpf]

I am going to say this. That is shockingly more money than I thought.

[Greg Putnam]

Okay, so it's shocking, right? So what? So you take that $18,000 if you.

[Andy Stumpf]

I don't remember getting that at the end of buds, do you?

[Greg Putnam]

Actually, I was later than you and I got a bonus at the end of buds.

[Andy Stumpf]

What?

[Greg Putnam]

Yes. Oh, yeah, they had the. It was. Well, it was taxed, but pre tax. 40 grand. Biggest check I had ever cashed in my life at that point.

[Andy Stumpf]

You got a forty thousand dollar bonus for making it through buds?

[Greg Putnam]

Yes. Yes.

[Andy Stumpf]

You're a piece.

[Greg Putnam]

And so did everybody else from like. I think they started that in like maybe like 04.

[Andy Stumpf]

I'm gonna go ahead and need your trident.

[Greg Putnam]

Look up Michael, if you don't mind. Look up the SEAL Challenge contract in what year it started. I'm just curious.

[Andy Stumpf]

I am gonna need you to mail me your tr.

[Greg Putnam]

Did you not know that that was happening?

[Andy Stumpf]

No.

[Greg Putnam]

Oh, yeah, yeah, they had. Because if you came off the streets.

[Andy Stumpf]

You'Re not a real seal.

[Greg Putnam]

Well, you know, you're not a real seal. If I hadn't done.

[Andy Stumpf]

First off, it's clearly jealousy because, I mean, I got my paycheck every two weeks, which at that point might have been $600 in a. In a stiff high five and handshake on the way out the door. Oh, yeah, 40 grand.

[Greg Putnam]

Well, think about this too. This is actually, I think the funniest part about it is nobody that made it through Buds made it through because of the 40 grand.

[Andy Stumpf]

You don't know that.

[Greg Putnam]

I'm pretty sure.

[Andy Stumpf]

I would say it's most likely why you made it through.

[Greg Putnam]

Well, you could argue in Hell Week.

[Andy Stumpf]

You were like, I am gonna quit.

[Greg Putnam]

I'm gonna get that 40 grand.

[Andy Stumpf]

Somebody whispered to you, what about the 40 grand?

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah, yeah. You're like, you're like, don't quit. You're like, fine.

[Andy Stumpf]

I will suffer for 72 more hours for that.

[Greg Putnam]

40 for that. Yes.

[Andy Stumpf]

What'd you just call it now?

[Greg Putnam]

You didn't get it till the end of. Oh, this document is dated at.06.

[Andy Stumpf]

Okay.

[Greg Putnam]

But I don't. Can't find anything that specifically says when it started. Gotcha. Well, anyway, when they were trying to get more people through.

[Andy Stumpf]

You got it on graduation, you got it.

[Greg Putnam]

I don't know. I can't remember if you got it. I think you got at the end of.

[Andy Stumpf]

Really?

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah.

[Andy Stumpf]

Were they giving birds out or not giving birds out? Did you get your trident at the end of.

[Greg Putnam]

You did.

[Andy Stumpf]

Okay.

[Greg Putnam]

And then when I showed it to my team, they quickly took it away from us. And then for how long? That is a good question. It was different for everybody based on how you did as a new guy?

[Andy Stumpf]

A few months.

[Greg Putnam]

It was a couple months. However, we did have people at that command that were. I was laughing about this the other day. There was one person in particular that let every new guy know that you weren't a SEAL until you'd been there for six years. And he didn't want to see anybody wearing a trident talking to.

[Andy Stumpf]

Six years.

[Greg Putnam]

Six years having a trident. And he was. He was dead serious. And he said, if I. I wanted to do his voice, but if I see you in town telling people that you're a SEAL or wearing a trident around, I will murder you. And he. I'm not joking, Andy.

[Andy Stumpf]

I mean, first off, your average enlisted tour is 48 months.

[Greg Putnam]

Yes.

[Andy Stumpf]

So what he's saying is you're going to have to do your entire first tour at a command without wearing bird. And 12 months into your second tour.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah, he was. He had some of the greatest quotes of possibly all time.

[Andy Stumpf]

And that is a benchmark, though. That is.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah. He thought, everybody.

[Andy Stumpf]

That's really unachievable.

[Greg Putnam]

He set us down on these bleachers because there were some new guys kind of helping some other new guys. And he proceeded to tell us just exactly what he thought of our level, how long it would take before he considered us worthy of even wearing. And then he proceeded. It's one of the greatest quotes of all time. And he said, and I've actually reused this in other, like, contexts, but this was it in the context he told it. He said at the end of. After yelling at everybody, he said, you know what new guys instructing new guys is? That's like brothers fucking sisters. It feels real good when you're doing it, but all it does is make more retards.

[Andy Stumpf]

God, that's not a doctrine anywhere. But that's good.

[Greg Putnam]

That is as good when you see somebody in the way. I mean, it made you as a new guy. If one of your buddies was like, hey, like, how do, hey, how do I do this? You're like, I don't know. I'm not telling you.

[Andy Stumpf]

How many people, how big of a recruiting crisis do you think NSW would have if people really knew what it was? Like that your first speech is going to be that and that we're basically idiots with machine guns running around doing the absolute best that we can, but oftentimes not as good as we could.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was funny because I mean, the.

[Andy Stumpf]

Hollywood movies and the books are great.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah.

[Andy Stumpf]

That wasn't necessarily my experience. I look back, first off, it's been. I've been out for a good amount of time now and.

[Greg Putnam]

Have you been out? Well, you probably.

[Andy Stumpf]

I got out in 13.

[Greg Putnam]

Okay. And you were in for 17. Okay. So you're.

[Andy Stumpf]

I'm five years away from, from being out as long as I was in. Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah.

[Andy Stumpf]

But I look back with pure wonderment on how I'm alive on some of the absolutely dumbest I have ever done in my life under the guise of being a special operations.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah. Well, the real guys have just like really not wanted to look like a. In front of your friends.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

Like that is the driving factor of see. And so, and we talked about this last time, but like when I got out of buzz in sqt, I went right to SDV. And SDV is like, with your 40.

[Andy Stumpf]

Grand you left that I did.

[Greg Putnam]

I did.

[Andy Stumpf]

Bastard.

[Greg Putnam]

And what I learned after spending as much time in STVs as I did was that you didn't have to actually implement a lot of hazing. If somebody needed a little course correction, you just keep putting them on dives.

[Andy Stumpf]

Well, the sdv, I don't know if you know, this is actually hazing.

[Greg Putnam]

It is hazing. And that was the way that, you know, so other than a couple things here and there, but they only actually, you know, other than one person's hit, that was his personal, you know, bar, but you know, they took him for a bit. And then as you were a new guy, if you were good and you were doing all the stuff you're supposed to, you got it back. Just do not let that particular individual see you walking around town for six years. And there was guys like that had been there, you know, because the platoons, they were long, they were about, around two years per platoon. So you already felt that's what it.

[Andy Stumpf]

Is at regular team too, is it? 18 month workup, 6 month deployment.

[Greg Putnam]

Okay. So it. Maybe it was. It felt long because we would do these. You would have your workup and then you would go into this. Not exactly the same, but almost like a deployable status. That was a year, so maybe it was closer to three years. Because I remember all my buddies were back from their first deployments and we hadn't even like started on ours yet. And you know, they're quickly reminding everybody that like they're a one platoon or now you're a new guy.

[Andy Stumpf]

And potentially the most dangerous combination is a one platoon or in a new guy.

[Greg Putnam]

Correct.

[Andy Stumpf]

Because those are actually the same thing.

[Greg Putnam]

Other than a new guy helping a new guy.

[Andy Stumpf]

I'm shocked. I. I think if they were to make an actual. If it would be possible to capture the shenanigans of that job again. I look back now and I am amazed and shocked that I'm still alive. Cannot believe that I got paid to do the things that I was able to do. And I'm really glad it's in the rear view mirror.

[Greg Putnam]

Sure. I'm guessing, I mean, with all your jumping stuff, were you jumping those bundles? See that to me, and I never did that, but I watched people do it. That to me was one of those things where you're just like.

[Andy Stumpf]

I'm sure that the technology has improved. I know they've changed the tethering system from beneath the tandem master down to the bundle. Those opening shocks were some of the most horrendous, like G force inducing openings. The tether. If you didn't have your legs in the right position, I would go back and I would augment some of the courses. If you, you know, as it pulled you from your body from horizontal to vertical, if you didn't keep your legs away from that tether. I watched. I don't want to overstate it. I know for a fact I watched at least one video, probably two, of a tether whip. Because as you go through that trapdoor and you accelerate, oftentimes with the bundle underneath you, you'll put a little bit of slack into the tether and it whips out and just complete blown all the cls in a knee. If it hits the leg sideways, Jeez.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah.

[Andy Stumpf]

So you got to keep your feet away from it.

[Greg Putnam]

Huh. So you just keeping your feet like super. Just mindful of, like.

[Andy Stumpf]

I would cross mine and kick mine behind me as hard as I could so they wouldn't flail around. Some of those openings were dynamic.

[Greg Putnam]

I don't doubt it.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah. I mean, you're. You're like hugging and Just I would cross my legs, pushing behind me as far as I could. Just wanted to stay away from that tether because you'd see it as you deploy your parachute. You go through that trapdoor and it accelerates and there's a little bit of slack on it. And then as it starts, you feel the, the tension starting to build. Holy shit, dude. We're talking stars.

[Greg Putnam]

After opening, like, have you had a lot of like, neck, back issues after that?

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah, we all have.

[Greg Putnam]

I know, but I mean, it's called.

[Andy Stumpf]

The team guy trifecta.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah, but that back, neck, shoulders, that.

[Andy Stumpf]

In particular, they brought out G testing. I was not there for this, so I'm repeating a story that I heard. They brought out G testing sensors because they wanted to get an understanding of the opening shock load after sequentially breaking the sensors on multiple jumps in a row. They just left without any more interest in knowing how many G forces the tandem master was taking on opening. They measure ejection seat ride. G forces with those things they were breaking.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah, I don't doubt it.

[Andy Stumpf]

We would do four of those in a day.

[Greg Putnam]

Oh, yeah, yeah.

[Andy Stumpf]

And then, I mean, just pushing the fridge out.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah. The first time I actually saw one of those, I was like, you're tying that to somebody. Oh, yeah.

[Andy Stumpf]

It's pretty cool.

[Greg Putnam]

It is cool. I mean, it's in, It's a. It's. I'm blown away by like, honestly, like the skill of being able to actually do that.

[Andy Stumpf]

It's less skill than you think.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah. But it's still like you got to be a really. You got to be confident in your ability. Under canopy, in the air, you can chop it away. That would. I didn't know that.

[Andy Stumpf]

Oh, yeah. Oh, you can just cut that thing away. And it should. It even has its parachute with its own cypress.

[Greg Putnam]

Oh, interesting.

[Andy Stumpf]

What you're wearing on the tandem master in your chest is actually the bundle parachute. So you should be able to cut it away. It's a four point connection.

[Greg Putnam]

Okay.

[Andy Stumpf]

It has its cypress. It should open. They don't always open because sometimes it will get a little bit out of control and you have to. One of the jumps you do, you have to self set your drogue. And the reason I'm saying you have to be. You have to be confident. Yes. And you have to be competent, but on a normal operation, somebody is standing there setting your drogue for you. So you basically are shuttling the thing out. You want to hold onto it until you get into the air, let go of it at the right time. You'll pitch over the top. Like you'll come over the top and then you'll feel the drogue and you start to fall. One of the jumps you have to do is a self set. So you go out without somebody holding onto your drogue so it can rocket you over to the other side and people will get underneath the bundle and throw their drogue.

[Greg Putnam]

Have you explained what these are to your listeners before?

[Andy Stumpf]

It's just a scam.

[Greg Putnam]

It's about this size.

[Andy Stumpf]

About relatively the size. It just. It's a refrigerator. I mean, it's about average size of a house refrigerator. Hundreds of pounds. It's a way to. You could reduce the burden on other jumpers by putting a bunch of equipment in there. You could jump in mortars or rockets.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah. So all the gear would go in there and one guy would jump out and fly. Yeah, Yeah. A good amount of. Of team gear for sure, would get flown in by one person.

[Andy Stumpf]

And additional skill set, you learn to jump passengers and the bundles. And it was fun. But I do remember specifically the ramp came down on the paths. I was the first guy out on the first bundle pass. And you have a video guy and he's holding the front of the bundle as he is. He's walking you back towards the aircraft and he's holding and he's checking the spot and he'll tell you to stop. And you just have these two fabric handles. And I remember sitting there thinking in my head, this is arguably one of the dumbest things I've ever fucking done.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah.

[Andy Stumpf]

And then the green light came on.

[Greg Putnam]

And you just look.

[Andy Stumpf]

You just look over your. The jokes are like, ready, set, go. And you just fucking send the thing.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah. And you know that everybody's behind you, watching you.

[Andy Stumpf]

Oh, they're judging you. Well. And of course.

[Greg Putnam]

Oh, and if you're on camera.

[Andy Stumpf]

Oh, yeah. Every jump at that course, there's a video debrief.

[Greg Putnam]

Oh.

[Andy Stumpf]

Because you learn on passengers first and then you go do the bundles.

[Greg Putnam]

Dude, that reminds me, we were doing this thing and it, like, it's one of those things that kind of sounds cool until you start doing it, but they had this guy come out to Hawaii and he was going to teach this. This free dive, breath hold course.

[Andy Stumpf]

That's how you. And that's how you fucking die.

[Greg Putnam]

Well, this guy was. And this guy taught, you know, all the people. So he comes in, he's got this whole class, blah, blah, blah. And you know, anybody that was into spearfishing, that kind of stuff was like, oh, this Is amazing. Everybody else was like, are you kidding me? This is what we're doing for. It was either a week or two weeks. But they would drop this plate down on this rope, and then you would go down the rope, and they would put it at different feet. And so I remember I'm doing this one, and we went down, like, I can't remember if we. We went over 100ft, which is very, very deep. Very deep on a breath hold.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yes.

[Greg Putnam]

And. And, you know, you're supposed to, like, basically, you drop down. Once you get below, I think it's like, 33ft, you actually start descending. Exactly. And so you're just like. You're kind of holding this rope, and you're just trying to chill out, and. But as you're going down, I mean, you can feel your lungs, like, just getting smaller and smaller. And I remember I'm just sitting there. I'm chilling out, and much best you can. And I'm like, I should be there by now. Like, I'm gonna take a little peek, you know, and they told you, like, don't look. Just wait till your hand hit it. And then I'm like, I'm gonna take a little peek.

[Andy Stumpf]

It's been enough time.

[Greg Putnam]

I take a peek, and, like, the only thing I see is the camera on this plate, probably 15, 20ft still below me. And I'm at this point, like, I'm ready to go, but I'm like, oh, that camera's looking right at me. Like, I mean, I looked at it. Like, it wasn't like, who is that? Like, it was 100%. So I kicked down to this thing. By the time I get there, I've used every little bit of oxygen I have left. And I look up, and I remember thinking to myself, the props on the dive safety boat looked very small. And I was like, oh. And I started kicking towards the top. And you're not supposed to. You know, you don't want to burn a lot of oxygen, so you're supposed to, you know, just nice and steady. Well, I was not nice and steady. So not only did the camera catch me, look at it, swim down to it. Then it caught this, like, panicked swim to the surface. And the only reason that I swam down the rest of that way was because that camera was looking right at me. And I knew that everybody was going to debrief at the end, and. And that, once again, I was like, you know what? I'm getting down there.

[Andy Stumpf]

The debriefs were amazing. So you have to hold the bundle until you get into the air. You don't have to. The. The ride is wilder if you don't. And people. So what I would do is I would tell myself, hold onto this bundle until it's vertical. Cause you're coming out of the airplane horizontal. It hits it pitches. Just let go. And in videos, you know, you'd have the student talk to me about your jump. Oh, I had an excellent exit. I held onto the bundle until it was vertical and then let go. And it was a great skydive. And then we'd hit play. And they're six feet back in a C130. Just.

[Greg Putnam]

Just launching that thing. See, I was actually. I didn't realize that you actually went out and held it. Yeah. Until you got. I thought that thing, like, went out. Grant, you were just.

[Andy Stumpf]

Initial. People strapped themselves to the top of it that. Like Conex boxes and stuff like that. And for. For people don't know what a Conex box. It's a. How do you think? Two feet tall? Three and a half. It's a rectangle. Yeah. Edges that are designed to just absolutely slice and dice you into fucking pieces. Break every bone that is metal rectangle that we'd store gear in. Or you would used to before.

[Greg Putnam]

It's like a. It's like. Like one of those. I don't know what they're, but they're like those steel containers you can buy.

[Andy Stumpf]

But it's box of death.

[Greg Putnam]

It's probably a quarter. Right. If you just quartered that thing up.

[Andy Stumpf]

In a little chest. Go. Initial tandem master.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah.

[Andy Stumpf]

Strapping themselves to the bundles.

[Greg Putnam]

Ride it out.

[Andy Stumpf]

Go.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah. See that? Yeah, that's. That's where you look back and you're like, that is some dumb.

[Andy Stumpf]

Or awesome.

[Greg Putnam]

Or awesome, depending on your level of. But, like, that's the funniest part is, you know, whether it's somebody taping you or just your buddies there, I mean, I'd say. What percent do you think it is of people that actually will do whatever the task is just because Everybody's there watching.

[Andy Stumpf]

84.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah. I was gonna say it's at least 80. Yeah. Yeah.

[Andy Stumpf]

Cause I mean, nobody wants to do the stuff they asked us to, but we were all there, and we knew that if we didn't, we would never live it down.

[Greg Putnam]

You would never live it down. And that was the main reason why you were like, oh, yeah, I'll. Yeah, that sounds great.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah, totally. Oh, you don't want to go pussy.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah, maybe. You know what? She had a kilometer to this patrol in. Just because you don't want to go. Meanwhile, nobody wants to.

[Greg Putnam]

Nobody wants to go.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah.

[Andy Stumpf]

Michael, are you ready to enlist?

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah, definitely.

[Andy Stumpf]

Michael asked me the day if he thought or if I thought he could make it through buds. I don't know.

[Greg Putnam]

I didn't. You asked me if I thought I could make it through buds.

[Andy Stumpf]

Oh, yeah. What'd you say?

[Greg Putnam]

I said the water would probably get me.

[Andy Stumpf]

He's never seen the ocean. So assuming that's not part of the equation, what do you think? Let's take a snapshot of Michael. What do you think? He's taller than you, but almost every human is.

[Greg Putnam]

That is true.

[Andy Stumpf]

Do you know the shorter SEAL than you?

[Greg Putnam]

Oh, yeah. Yeah, definitely. I couldn't think of them by name, but, like, there was guys in my boker that were shorter than me, but I was in the SMURF crew the.

[Andy Stumpf]

Whole time, of course, which I. You know, there's no chance they let them call them that anymore.

[Greg Putnam]

Oh, you don't think so? You think they change that?

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah, I bet you they did.

[Greg Putnam]

Oh, because that's. Again, that's like a point of pride because that is. That and the. Whatever. What were they? What do they call the tall one? There's a name for that, too. I can't remember what it was, though. Maybe there wasn't, because they had their own.

[Andy Stumpf]

Never in either. I was never threatening to be in either. Well, yeah, because purely in the middle.

[Greg Putnam]

What people don't realize, you know, that it's all height based as you go through buds and then you line up. So if you're, you know, 5, 10 to 6 foot, and you weigh, let's say, average, like 190. There's a lot of you.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

If you're on the short end of the tall end, as people in your boat crew quit, they recycle you with somebody else. So if you're in a boat crew with all the same height people, it's. It's. You don't really notice the difference if you're the tallest guy in the SMURF crew or the tall guys. Hell, it's very uncomfortable and. But yeah, there's. There was. I mean, there was definitely people that I've either met. I mean, there was a couple people that were definitely shorter than me. For sure.

[Andy Stumpf]

You were almost purpose built for the sdv, I think.

[Greg Putnam]

You know, what's funny is you would think they just sent, like, a bunch of, like, small guys there, but there was.

[Andy Stumpf]

It'd be better if they did.

[Greg Putnam]

You would think that there was more room, but it didn't matter if there was four small guys in the back or three, you know, huge guys and one small guy or a mix. There was never more room. It always got. I mean, I've ridden back there with every size human and it just. There's no room back there. Depending on. Depends what you're doing. Like, if you're in warmer places, it's not terrible. When you're in cold places, it is.

[Andy Stumpf]

I mean, no, I don't, I do not support in any way the length of dives you guys used to do.

[Greg Putnam]

I don't think I've. I don't think I've told this story ever. Like public. I mean, people know the story. But like, I saw a SEAL officer refuse to train and not get in the stv.

[Andy Stumpf]

Already had his bird.

[Greg Putnam]

Already had his bird, had done deployments, was a troop commander and 03. Yeah. Or 04.

[Andy Stumpf]

Okay, so a lieutenant or lieutenant commander.

[Greg Putnam]

Yes.

[Andy Stumpf]

Refused to train.

[Greg Putnam]

Refused to train.

[Andy Stumpf]

Tell the story. Be as broad as you want to. So start with what was his name?

[Greg Putnam]

I will not say his name, but this is. Just gives you a level of like what the SUV is like.

[Andy Stumpf]

So you, Michael, if you did make it through buds, in the unlikely event which I would give you, I'd actually give him a coin toss. 50. 50.

[Greg Putnam]

It's so hard.

[Andy Stumpf]

I mean, which is better odds than I'd give most people.

[Greg Putnam]

Cool.

[Andy Stumpf]

But an SDV would break you.

[Greg Putnam]

Isn't that the little tiny thing you go into?

[Andy Stumpf]

Greg would be able to answer this. I've only seen one in person one time. And then I ran away from it because I was terrified they're going to put me in it.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah, and you should have been. But yeah. So we would do these dives, and by the time you get into your dry suit and your buddies are there and people are helping you get ready, you know, and then the, the deal is like, as soon as that the, the SUV goes in the water, there's no screwing around. Like, you are getting in, like everybody's, Everybody's waiting on you, basically. Right.

[Andy Stumpf]

Well, you mean as soon as the boat touches the water.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah, yeah. The, like, standard is, is like boat touch the water. Everybody's standing by, like dive soup, checks are done. And you're getting in that thing and you're going like, everybody wants to try to get this thing over with this.

[Andy Stumpf]

It's going to be long enough as it is.

[Greg Putnam]

Completely. And so this particular time, it was like a late afternoon, so it was not dark yet. And the, the boat got launched. And then if you wait too long, it starts drifting out. Then you have to swim out to it. So you're swimming out to it, you've got this dry suit on, you got all your gear under it. You're sweating, basically. And by the time you get to the stv, then you're completely out of breath. And the expectation is like, you're immediately going to put a hook in your mouth and go into the SDV and then do some, you know, mental gymnastics to Michael.

[Andy Stumpf]

Pull up a picture of an suv. So we have some background flavor for this story.

[Greg Putnam]

So this particular person.

[Andy Stumpf]

Oh, yeah, go to images.

[Greg Putnam]

There it is.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah, yeah, just go to images. There'll be some bangers. Yeah, perfect.

[Greg Putnam]

So, you know, if you look at the images. So the. There was, you know, there would be two. There'd be people in the boat kind of getting it set up. And then the. The rest of the people would. The. The mission specialists would be making their way out there. So this particular day, we're getting ready and this guy comes up to me and he's like, yeah, I want to go. And I'm like, you want to go on this? He's like, yeah, yeah, yeah. Like, I'm like, all right.

[Andy Stumpf]

And this was an STV qualified.

[Greg Putnam]

He's been through SCV school.

[Andy Stumpf]

Okay.

[Greg Putnam]

And was he jocked up yet? No.

[Andy Stumpf]

Okay.

[Greg Putnam]

We were. No, no. We're still at the, like the High bay. This is kind of midday and. And people knew the closer it got to launch time, the grumpier everybody got. And I.

[Andy Stumpf]

We should explain why. Give me a broad range of dive time that you might.

[Greg Putnam]

Oh, you could like a. I would say like a. Like a. No worries. Not even think about it. It would be somewhere around like four to six hours. Six hours and above you'd be like, oh. But a four hour dive could quickly become a six, seven hour dive. And these were just, you know, this was an. Once in a while, this was pretty regular. And so for people who have no.

[Andy Stumpf]

Understanding of that, we'll call it six hours. Go sit in a warm pool underwater on an open circuit rig for six hours and let me know how much you enjoyed that.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah. And then make the pool super cold and cram yourself into like a bathtub with a couple of your friends. Turn off all the lights and sit there and don't talk, don't move and verse six. Yeah, like, if you think about that, like, that's like driving, you know, from.

[Andy Stumpf]

That's. This is gonna be. That's more time than it will take you to get home in Bozeman.

[Greg Putnam]

Absolutely. In underwater. I was trying because my. My wife has the kids, like, they went on spring break today. And my one daughter yesterday was like, we're gonna be in the car for seven. And I was like, seven hours. Imagine that car flooded with icy cold water and you and your sisters crammed in the back in the dark. And like, don't tell me about seven hours, you know, and. But everybody at STV is STV qualified. So they go through the course. They've all dove, but there's different levels in this particular training area. And I remember the first time I did it. I mean, every alarm bell in your brain is like, this is bad. Get out of here. This is bad. And they're like, they shut the door, and however you're in, you're in. And again, you're not gonna be the one that's like, I'm. I'm bailing out of this thing. Right.

[Andy Stumpf]

And does that ever happen?

[Greg Putnam]

Well, I've never seen, other than this one incident, I've never seen somebody else, like, bail out of it. Everybody gets to the point there where you just, like, fight that. That demon down and. But when you come out. So everybody had dove in this thing. This was not like the first time ever. First time in this particular scenario. Different gear. Much more claustrophobic, much. When you're in dry suits, they're very floaty, so you have tons of weight. Like, I mean, I used to have. I can't remember exactly how much, but, like, I mean, I would need, you know, 40, 50 pounds.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah. Because you just cannot get all the air. Right.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah. To keep your butt, like, just on the seat so you're not floating in the back like a washing machine the whole time. And so as we would get closer to these dives, you know, nobody's. Nobody's coking and joking. People are. Whoever's diving. And I. I was known to get, like. I would get a little grumpy. So this guy comes up to me, like, maybe 30 minutes before we're about to leave. We've done all the briefs. We've done all the things. And he also made a comment. He was like. He's like, well, who are you putting me in the boat with? And I'm like, oh, I'm just gonna put you with these guys. He's like, I don't want to watch a bunch of new guys. Like, I want to go with. With, like, you and some other people. I'm like, all right, whatever. So I shift the thing around. And so about an hour, maybe Half hour before we leave, he comes up to me. He's like, what are you wearing under your dry suit? I'm like, what? He's like, what are you, what are you wearing under your dry suit? I'm like, warmies. He's like, well, what do you think I should wear? I don't know, man. Like, like, I don't know.

[Andy Stumpf]

Clearly the answer is a Speedo and nothing else.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah. And then I'm like, I'm like, I don't know. Like, just whatever you think is appropriate for you.

[Andy Stumpf]

That's a weird question for a guy who's already dove and probably should have had a wetsuit on and understands the immersion and cold.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah. So, like, he hadn't done this dry suit stuff yet, so he'd only done wetsuit stuff. Wetsuits.

[Andy Stumpf]

Oh, God, that's even worse.

[Greg Putnam]

Well, the wetsuits, like, you just throw it on, right?

[Andy Stumpf]

And I mean, at least you can just. Immediately, you're done.

[Greg Putnam]

There's no thought process. Right. Like, you just put a wetsuit on and suffer. Yeah. And then like, whatever. It's up to you. Like, you're like, am I going naked or am I wearing, like, you know, like ranger panty? Like, like, what am I wearing? There's no thought with this. It's more of like if were going to go into a cold weather environment. You're like, I want my puff. I want a mid layer. I want a base layer. Like you need like the John Barklo nine layers of.

[Andy Stumpf]

Which is wild because you're going to sweat your ass off when you start. But you need that shit for the trenches of that dive.

[Greg Putnam]

Once you start getting cold, there's no.

[Andy Stumpf]

There'S no coming back.

[Greg Putnam]

Whatever you have is what you have. So we. But when you, the further you have to swim that you just, you're sweating and you're breathing. So. And I'll tell you, there's another really funny part of this whole story. But. So we. So he's asking me all these questions and I'm. I'm just like, hey, man, I don't know, you just got to figure out like, whatever it is that you need. But like. And he was like, oh, okay. So then we, we get there, we get jocked up, we do our dive soups. They launch the boat. This guy's not ready. The boat starts drifting out. Everybody has to swim further.

[Andy Stumpf]

But he is getting jacked up.

[Greg Putnam]

He got jacked up. Fully jacked up.

[Andy Stumpf]

And a dive soup is a diving supervisor. Check two people check your stuff to make sure that you basically. It's put on properly and functioning properly.

[Greg Putnam]

Correct. So we do all that and we make. Start making our swim out. Really good buddy of mine was our platoon chief, and he's in there in the. With. With the other, like, pilot or whatever, and they're waiting for us. And we get out there, and he's already, you know, kind of giving me the like. And he's got a full face mask on, so he can't yell at me, but I can see his eyes. And I know him well enough of, like, what he's saying, but, like, more.

[Andy Stumpf]

Importantly, what he's feeling.

[Greg Putnam]

Yes. And so me and the other. The other guys that were in my platoon are out there, and this guy who is in charge of our platoon gets out there. And so he gets out there and he's like.

[Andy Stumpf]

So he's in the water out at the boat now.

[Greg Putnam]

We're floating out.

[Andy Stumpf]

I mean, he's basically. He's committed.

[Greg Putnam]

We're committed. We're probably at this point, 150 yards from the launch point, and we're drifting.

[Andy Stumpf]

The evolution has begun.

[Greg Putnam]

It has begun. And so everybody's kind of waiting, and you're briefed just like, on, you know, like in a bird or whatever, like, where you're seated. Right. And there's more advantageous positions, potentially depending on. You're basically sitting on each other's laps. And so, like, if you and I were sitting in the back of this thing, if. If I was sitting on your lap, I'd be closer to the door, which doesn't really matter, but it does feel a little better.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

Or you'd be sitting on my LA lap, and you'd be next to the door. Right. And then there'd be people next to you as well. And so I'm like, all right. Like, he was. Because I was like, you're gonna be in. And then I'm basically in front of you. And you earn your position the longer you're there, right? So you get to be like, hey, I'm gonna be the number one man in. And I'm sitting here and I'm getting cozy. Then the next guy, and the next guy, the next guy. And everybody has a little spot that they like to be. And then there's a. There's a really. The last guy in is the least advantageous position because basically somebody pushes you in, shuts the door, and however you are is how you are. So if your fin is stuck back like this, you can't move it. If your neck is cranked like that. That's how you are. And if you wiggle around back there, you piss everybody else off, and you will get corrected at the end of this thing.

[Andy Stumpf]

Perfect.

[Greg Putnam]

So you're just as, like a new guy. You're just sitting there now. You're breathing heavily. You're crammed into this thing. You're underwater. And you know that's gonna be your next few hours, right? And so we get out there, and I'm like. I'm like, all right, man. It was like, get in. We got to get going. And he's like. I could tell he's a little nervous. He's breathing hard. He's like, are you gonna go? There's. There's a couple different rigs that you can breathe on.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

And he asked me which one I'm gonna go on. And I'm like, this is what I'm doing. He's like, what do you think I should do? Like, I don't know, man. It's a personal choice. He's like, well, I'm gonna do this. And he starts kind of explaining himself. And I'm like, all right, whatever, you. And now my boss is like, really? Like, let's go. And so he. He goes, I'm gonna. I'm gonna do this. I'm like, all right. So he goes in and he barely ducks in to the back. And as I'm like, kind of getting my stuff together to get in to my position, he comes out of that thing and he is not feeling great. And he's like, oh, keep in mind, he's the only one in there at this point. There's no room back there. I was having a heart. I can't breathe. And I'm like, what do you mean you can't breathe? He's like, there's no room. And there's. And I'm like, look, man, you're one.

[Andy Stumpf]

Of four fuckers getting like, you gotta get back there.

[Greg Putnam]

We gotta get going. He's like, I'm gonna switch breathing apparatus. Like, okay. And he's like. So he kind of, like, is fishing around to. To find the. The one he's going to use. And he's like, I can't. I can't get it. I'm like, what do you mean you can't get it? He's like, I can't get it. I can't. It won't come off. So I reach in. These things are rubber banded. And I. Not joking. I pull this thing with about.

[Andy Stumpf]

It could have been double wrapped.

[Greg Putnam]

It was. It was properly put up. You know, the New guys put it up. Well, I pulled with about three pounds of force and I popped this thing off. And I'm like. He's like, oh, okay. So I'm like, all right, let's go. Now my boss is. And this is the other part. So Tim, she and I were in the same platoon at this point. Tim and this particular individual did not get along super well.

[Andy Stumpf]

And Tim was an O, right?

[Greg Putnam]

Tim was an O. He was our aoic of this platoon. And he's on the beach. And I can still see, like, we're probably 200 yards out now. And these dry suits are like really tight around your neck. And if you've never seen Tim before, like, he's like a blonde haired, like. And so he's. He had this. I could see his blonde hair and his face. Everybody's face is super red because you're basically just being choked. And I see him pacing up and down the beach and I can just tell, like, what he's saying to our platoon. He's like, look at Greg out there screwing around. He's probably not getting in the boat, you know, And I know he's probably talking shit about me. And so I, I watching this and I'm looking at this guy and I'm like, all right, man. Like, we have got to get going. And even our new guys are like, what is going on? I'm like, so the next time I like. And I'd been there at this point for.

[Andy Stumpf]

Is the boat on the surface? Kind of.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah, we're floating. It's full water, but it's floating.

[Andy Stumpf]

So he hasn't even entered the.

[Greg Putnam]

We have not even gone.

[Andy Stumpf]

He hasn't even entered the true torture chamber.

[Greg Putnam]

No, no, no, no. We haven't even dove away. So I had been there for a couple years at this point, so I kind of like a new little tricks, you know what I mean? And so, so the second time now I'm like, ready, like, I am standing by. I am ready. And he. I'm like, come on, man. Like, you gotta go. So he gets in and they get. They don't love when you get like super detailed about how the thing's set up. But let's just say so. No, he's in. But let's just say there's a. There's a, like a, A, A bar, like a centerpiece that if you know where it is, you could use for leverage. So I get in right behind him and I put my foot on this bar and I'm pushing back against to.

[Andy Stumpf]

Make sure he's Seated.

[Greg Putnam]

Well, to make sure he's seated in his position and.

[Andy Stumpf]

And not getting out of his position at this point.

[Greg Putnam]

And I told the other guys, I was like, hey, like, as soon as I'm in number three, four, five, whatever, however many, get it done, right. So they're ready, and they know, like. And so I can feel him behind me, and I. And again, I've been doing this for a while, and so I can feel him back, like. And he's not a small guy, and I can. And I start hearing this, and I'm feeling this person behind me, and the door is not very large.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

So I'm pushing against him at this point and, you know, as a good teammate, helping him out so that we can get going. Like I said, you don't move around back there. Like, you sit in your misery, and.

[Andy Stumpf]

You don't like everybody else.

[Greg Putnam]

You don't make it somebody else's misery, that is. You learn that. So he's back there, and he's writhing around, and all of a sudden, like, I'm in my own lap, and this guy is climbing over the top of me through a triangle about this big, and it, like. So I'm like. Like, I can't get.

[Andy Stumpf]

You're folded over.

[Greg Putnam]

I'm folded over. And he is. He's coming out. And he comes out.

[Andy Stumpf]

Still not underway.

[Greg Putnam]

We have not even launched yet. The other guys hadn't even been in. We maybe had the. The next guy, but not all of us were in there. Yeah.

[Andy Stumpf]

We haven't even finished the loading stage.

[Greg Putnam]

We haven't loaded yet.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

And so I come out, and I'm not real happy, and I'm like, perhaps.

[Andy Stumpf]

Not the best military bearing.

[Greg Putnam]

Not the best. No merit. So at. And. And you've seen it before. Like, when you watch somebody that's, like, truly panicked.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah. You can see in your eyes.

[Greg Putnam]

Oh, his. So he's like, you know, doing one of these, breathing super hard, and I'm like. I'm like, what the are you doing? And he's like, I couldn't breathe down there. And he's, like, doing one of these numbers. Then finally, he just kind of, like, locks on. And I'm like, look, man. And this guy's like. Like, he's not a new guy.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

Like, look, this is the absolute worst thing you will ever do in your. Oh, I'm sorry. Let me back with track one second. I look back to the shore, and there she. He standing with, like, this power stance, and. And I see that red face and his blonde hair. And. And he'd done some stuff, you know, to Tim that wasn't super cool. And Tim was my boy. So I'm like, I have two options right now. I can extend the like, hey, bro, it's gonna be all right. Or I could like push this guy off the cliff. Right?

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah, obviously you go with the ladder immediately.

[Greg Putnam]

So I'm like, look man, this is the worst thing you are ever gonna do in your entire career. And I'm like, you either need to get in the boat or swim your ass back to the beach. And he's kind of looking at me, he's like, yeah, I might need a day iteration. And I'm like, yeah, yeah, you do. You need a day. No, keep in mind it is not dark out. And. And I'm like, yeah, you do. You need a day iteration. And he goes, yeah. Now my boss has ripped his mask off. He's like, what is going on? And I'm like, he needs a day iteration. I'm like, he's like, a what? And I'm like, he's got to go back to the beach. And my boss was like, whatever, we just got to get going. So we all get geared back up. We jump in, we take off. This guy has like now like probably a 250 yard swim back.

[Andy Stumpf]

No swim, buddy.

[Greg Putnam]

No swim, buddy. To the beach.

[Andy Stumpf]

Well, he has his shape now.

[Greg Putnam]

Everybody is standing there, not sure what is going on. And as he comes back, there's a particularly like obnoxious. He was like, probably like, he was either like, I think he was an 8, but he was like a trade at guy. He's like, what's going on, guys? Like, oh, you know what, you got like an equipment problems? Like, no, no. He's like, what's the problem then? What are you doing? And he's like, I need a day iteration. He's like, a what? He's like a day iteration. He's like, what? Then all of a sudden this guy's like, senior Chief, stand down. And like, the guy's like, what is going on right now? This guy gets out of the water, takes all his stuff off, jumps in his car and just leaves. By the time I complete this dive, get on shore hours later, hours and hours later, and pull my cell phone out like, this shit has gone viral. I have. I. I Bet I had 50 plus texts from Hawaii, from where we were, from every single person, like, what was. And I mean, people were pissed. Like, super.

[Andy Stumpf]

I mean, yeah, the CEO, let's be honest, he quit.

[Greg Putnam]

He quit. The CEO of the Team had text.

[Andy Stumpf]

Me and was like, which is traditionally not awesome.

[Greg Putnam]

No. And he was like, you need to call me. And I was like. And then all my buddies who like didn't like this guy were like, you know, just like, oh, you know, and guys were like, you know, by the time I get out. And then I was like the only one who really like witnessed it or whatever.

[Andy Stumpf]

Well, let's be, let's be honest too. You had a little extra space back there too.

[Greg Putnam]

I did. Which is a lot nicer. When we sent him to the beach.

[Andy Stumpf]

It was kind of a bonus ride.

[Greg Putnam]

It was a very pleasant ride, to be honest. And it was as spacious as it gets. But that was like a fair reminder of just how bad that command, how challenging it was.

[Andy Stumpf]

And what happened to that guy?

[Greg Putnam]

Well, let's just say this. He was not our troop commander any longer. He. It wasn't great. Let's just say that he. There may have. He. He had to, he did have to talk to the group, which wasn't great.

[Andy Stumpf]

And then meaning like the group of you guys, everybody.

[Greg Putnam]

He, he got some feedback from, from everybody and then he, he left the command not too long after that, from what I recall. And I'm not sure what he did after that.

[Andy Stumpf]

Probably a four star admiral.

[Greg Putnam]

Probably, probably. But that was like one of those times I'd seen new guys, like everybody else wanted to do exactly what he did.

[Andy Stumpf]

That speaks though to the reality of the job.

[Greg Putnam]

Correct.

[Andy Stumpf]

Where's that? In the movies?

[Greg Putnam]

No, no. When you are putting a dry suit on and a diaper. You don't see that in the SEAL movies.

[Andy Stumpf]

No. And the selection program, course, Crucible, whatever you want to call it, is supposed to weed out anybody that is going to crack and quit physically or physiologically.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah, it was, it was. I mean, it was honestly like looking back now, like it was a crazy. I haven't told that story in a long time and I was not a great person to. Because everybody, you know, it just kind of like became funny then, you know, so everybody's like, yo, tell me what happened, you know, and like my ball. Awesome stuff. Like, you know, in the front, he was like, yeah, I just thought Greg was in there like screwing around. And then, you know, it was just one of those things where. But it was a, it was a stark reminder of just how miserable that was. And when you'd been doing it for a while. Yeah, it lost a little bit of the, you know, just like that, that like you just were just like, whatever, this is what I'm doing. You're in there, you're breathing. You're just going through your little, you know, yoga breathe and just trying to calm down and then just go into your pain cave. Yeah, but it was. Yeah.

[Andy Stumpf]

Did it ever warm your heart watching people suffer more than you?

[Greg Putnam]

100%. There's another guy, and this is not nearly as long of a story. Not as funny. But, you know, there's just certain people in your platoon that like, it's more funny when they.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yes.

[Greg Putnam]

So this was that guy and he was talking all this shit about how he. It was supposed to be like a two hour dive home. He's like, I'm not wearing any warmies. Like, I'm just throwing this shit on. Like, I can't wait to get home and play video games or whatever. And he was sitting behind me and we were all like, giving him shit. We're like, yo, like, he was one of those guys like you couldn't talk any sentence to. And we had the worst one of the. Like, he is a good dude, but, like, he's just not as talented as an SDV pilot as some of the other guys. Lot slower, typically. And he managed somehow to get lost. And that dive took way longer than anticipated. And this guy behind me, it went from him like, like, like he kind of writhing around to like these audible episodes that would last like 10 to 15 seconds of him going, and I'm laughing so hard and in which he can probably feel. He can feel me. I am laughing. I'm like worried I'm gonna get an ag because I'm laughing so hard, which.

[Andy Stumpf]

Is an air gas embolism usually caused from holding your breath.

[Greg Putnam]

And so I'm laughing and I'm waiting now. It entertained me the whole ride home. And you, like, reach around and squeeze people to make sure, like, everybody's okay. And so I was like, jokingly, I would squeeze him and he would squeeze me back and then I would just wait. And then he would go into these. By the time we got back, he couldn't physically get out of the box.

[Andy Stumpf]

I was gonna say, was he just jackhammering away?

[Greg Putnam]

He went from jackhammering to like, no jackhammering to these, which is actually dangerous.

[Andy Stumpf]

It's when they stopped jackhammering.

[Greg Putnam]

Then he would go to these, like, episodes of just full body convulsions with audible release. And I'm laughing. Cause I know the guy and it was one of those people that his suffering brought a lot more joy, but he couldn't. He had to get physically carried out of the vessel and put in the van at the end of it.

[Andy Stumpf]

I mean, I'm sure there's no long term health consequences from any of the stuff you guys did.

[Greg Putnam]

No. And they've never done any that I'm aware of. You know, nobody's ever done. They have, you know.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah, that might be intentional, Greg.

[Greg Putnam]

Probably.

[Andy Stumpf]

You know, they look like when they brought out the G force meters for the parachute. Correct. You know, maybe we don't need to know.

[Greg Putnam]

Maybe we don't. We just. Yeah, yeah. But yeah, it was just like one of the. And they never. Right. With diving stuff, they're just like, wow. Yeah. We don't know what happens.

[Andy Stumpf]

You're like, do you know if it's true? I had heard that the Navy dive tables were essentially created by just throwing people in the water and bending them. They'd bring them up at a certain time. Seemed to be good five minutes longer. Oh, you're bent. Perhaps the line on this table is at two and a half minutes past the last guy.

[Greg Putnam]

I didn't. I have not heard that. But I will say this. One of the other joys of that command is you would get to go to ndnu, I believe it's called the Naval Experimental Dive Unit.

[Andy Stumpf]

I've heard of this.

[Greg Putnam]

And you would go and test some different theories that they had and or equipment.

[Andy Stumpf]

And so you would like full test dummy type shit.

[Greg Putnam]

They had a pool there that they would, they could change. Like they basically could make the. They could like simulate different depths and temperatures and then they would put you in there to try different things for certain durations. And so not only did you get to do this for real, you got to go to the training center at times. Yeah. And figure out like, oh, you know, these steps at these temperatures with this gear, you can, you can be there this long before, like you can't function anymore.

[Andy Stumpf]

Have you seen the documentary of these deep sea divers that were working on the oil rigs?

[Greg Putnam]

No.

[Andy Stumpf]

This guy, they just made a movie about it with Woody Harrelson. But I remember watching the documentary. This dude's umbilical gets snapped and he is left on the bottom as the support vessel drifts away. And they had like a. I don't know, I want to call it a Rover or whatever, but they're like, this guy is fully like seizing out. He spoiler alert lives. But they're making a movie about him. I don't even know how deep they are. I think they spend over a week getting pressed. When they come back up, I don't know if there's A paycheck large enough for people who are willing to do that.

[Greg Putnam]

It's funny, I just saw a, you know like a ad or something for that and I saw the little guy in the boat. I was like, oh, I wonder what that is.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

But I didn't know what the.

[Andy Stumpf]

They were down there doing. And I didn't even know that they did that with humans. And I don't know why I didn't guess that. But the depths were ungodly.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah.

[Andy Stumpf]

It gets. He gets snagged and somehow. And they have a five minute bottle autumn. I guess.

[Greg Putnam]

So I can't get into too much detail. I'm gonna figure out a way to talk about it. So just tell us the secrets.

[Andy Stumpf]

So tell us the secrets of the depths, Greg.

[Greg Putnam]

The. So yes, there, there's people that go down for long duration and then part of it is when they come back up.

[Andy Stumpf]

We'll call it when they get repatriated.

[Greg Putnam]

Correct. And then, you know, some of them go. They come up to the surface and then they'll go almost into like a recompression chamber for long time to like run the table or. They're basically brought up in a way that. That does that. But it can be. I'm talking like this isn't like a couple hours. No. These guys, I think these are weeks.

[Andy Stumpf]

These guys were getting pressed. I know what you're talking about. There's a way that they're bringing them up from the pressure they were at at the bottom and they're getting them onto the vessel and then they're living inside of that chamber.

[Greg Putnam]

Into the chamber. Exactly.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah, exactly. So there's no like they were down saturated enough that they. Because I've seen that's where they can make the walk. Some hard hat divers do that. But I think that's like a. On like a single dive. They're ripping their off diving into the chamber. Almost literally this. And I don't know how they do it. They might bring them up from the bell and the bell might itself connect to it.

[Greg Putnam]

That's what it is.

[Andy Stumpf]

But they are going from pressure into pressure and then over weeks being brought back up to the surface.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah. Or from what I understand about it, the, the bell can be brought up in a particular way that that's happening.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

So. But that saturation thing is for real and.

[Andy Stumpf]

Fuck that.

[Greg Putnam]

You want to know another thing about it?

[Andy Stumpf]

Yes.

[Greg Putnam]

Which would be not good for me. I know I talked to some people that had. Had done that and most of them were like an inch or two Shorter after because of the pressure on them.

[Andy Stumpf]

You simply can't tolerate that.

[Greg Putnam]

I can't handle that. No, no, no. I can't go any. Come on now. I don't have any inches to spare. You know what I mean?

[Andy Stumpf]

That job is simply not. Not for you.

[Greg Putnam]

No, no. And they would have liked it to have been. You know what I mean? But like. So just think about what that's doing to you physically.

[Andy Stumpf]

Do a lot of STV guys or do you know of any that go the commercial diving route afterwards just because of the. Or are they just completely cooked?

[Greg Putnam]

Most of them are pretty cooked on it, yeah. Yep. Yep. And you know, they. They probably very. Now there's a lot of divers that come out of. You know, we had different, like support units and, and there's some different diving groups out there that, that we worked with. And those guys are probably a lot better suited for it just from there. I mean, that's what they like to do.

[Andy Stumpf]

And well, they also have the technical knowledge. You guys weren't doing welding and maintenance.

[Greg Putnam]

No, no. And they could do that stuff. And even. I mean, you know how it is. Like, we had these guys come out one time and we were getting our. These particular rigs we were using ready. And guys, we were just throwing them in the back of a pickup truck. They come in these cases and we.

[Andy Stumpf]

Were not say that. Throwing in the back pickup truck. You don't mean in the case. You mean just throwing.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah, we were incre.

[Andy Stumpf]

Incredibly sensitive.

[Greg Putnam]

We were not using the cases. We hadn't seen the cases for a bit. And we were like. One guy was throwing them to a guy in a truck and the truck guy was stacking him in the back like wood. And this guy, this diver comes up to us and he's like, are those going to like be dermoed. Like thrown out?

[Andy Stumpf]

Which means drmo, Defense Reutilization Management Office. Basically being demilled and canned.

[Greg Putnam]

Getting thrown in the trash.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

And we're like, no, those are going for the dive today.

[Andy Stumpf]

He's like, straight to the pier.

[Greg Putnam]

But he's like, I'll stop. All stop. He's like. He's like, oh, what? And he's like, where are the cases for these? We're like, cases? What are you talking about? He's like, the cases. The cases that they came in.

[Andy Stumpf]

No, those are just the shipping cases.

[Greg Putnam]

We're like, oh, we don't. And he's like, I'll stop. I'll stop.

[Andy Stumpf]

Exploded his brain.

[Greg Putnam]

He. It. We. I don't think we dove for a Couple days while he went through like proper maintenance, storage, loading, handling and these things were they. There was basically a battery in this thing that controlled the amount of oxygen that was in the system. And there was a couple of these batteries. But if you had a malfunction, it could just be the battery. And then it. You were. Your whole life support system was all basically ran on that battery. It'd be like if you had a, like a Cypress that you weren't allowed to pull. And you're like that Cypress is the only thing controlling the parachute going off. So when guys were throwing those things.

[Andy Stumpf]

Around, probably not good for the battery.

[Greg Putnam]

Not good for the battery, not good for the overall.

[Andy Stumpf]

Not good for the circuit board associated with the battery that was running your license, all of it.

[Greg Putnam]

But like those guys who, who taught us then, you know, the proper care of that equipment. Like, those guys could go do that stuff all day long. Most of the, you know, the SEAL team guys just wanted to ride into where they were going, get out and then go do seal stuff and then come back out, suffer on the way back home. Yeah. Nobody. I don't know one single person that went into any sort of, you know, dive based, really anything.

[Andy Stumpf]

Wow. This episode is brought to you by Fabric by Gerber Life. This one is such an easy topic to talk about for me because I am the father of three children and every day I think about at some point in time, am I doing enough for my kids. Part of those thoughts, not always, but sometimes I'll start going down the rabbit hole of, you know, what if something were to happen to me? How do I take care of the people that I love? Not only do I have three kids, I have the most amazing partner and wife in Leah, and I want to take care of all of them. How can I do that? Life insurance. Now, here's the deal. I have watched the end of life for more than enough people from an administrative side of the house here. And there is such a difference between those that take the time to frontload. And honestly, it's some hard conversations. You have to talk to the people that are around you, talk about your wishes, talk about your desires, talk about what you want to have done, and then you need to lay that out and have it concrete. When I have seen end of life and that has happened by the individual or from the individual before they passed, the end of life is going to be complicated and emotionally distressing enough as it is. There's no easy way to slice that cookie. But layering on top of that unknown wants, desires, needs how things want to be laid out. It is a different universe entirely. The people that have the hard conversations up front, I have seen their families do as good as possible in those moments and for situations where I have seen people not have those conversations, I've seen it absolutely completely unwind families, infighting arguments, cutting people out, horrendous. There's a couple specific points I want to read here about Fabric. Fabric by Gerber Life is a term life insurance that you can get done today. Made for busy parents like you all online and on your schedule. You can be covered in under 10 minutes with no health exam required. If you have kids and especially if you're young and healthy, the time to lock in your low rates is now. This is again goes in line with having the hard conversations and doing the work up front. Fabric has flexible high quality policies that fit your family and your budget like a million dollars in coverage for less than a dollar a day. Fabric has partnered with Gerber Life trusted by millions of families like yours for over 50 years. There's no risk. There's a 30 day money back guar and you can cancel at any time. And they have over 19005 star reviews on Trustpilot with a rating of excellent. For anybody listening to this, you can join the thousands of parents who trust Fabric to help protect their family. You can apply today in just [e-mail] Cleared hot that is meatfabric.com Cleared hot mike echo echo tango fabric.com Clearedhot policies are going to be issued by Western Southern Life Assurance Company. Not available in certain states. Prices are subject to underwriting and health questions. Back to the show. So you've known Sheehy for a while?

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah, him and I, I think we started working together in 2013.

[Andy Stumpf]

I was going to ask you what was the aviation business that he started here in Montana? Was it firefighter based?

[Greg Putnam]

It is.

[Andy Stumpf]

Was it? Does he still have it?

[Greg Putnam]

He does.

[Andy Stumpf]

Well, because I'm sure there's a separation for what he's given his job but.

[Greg Putnam]

Bridge Aerospace it does. So he started Bridger Aerospace when he got out of the Navy.

[Andy Stumpf]

What was it called?

[Greg Putnam]

It's called Bridger Aerospace.

[Andy Stumpf]

So how cute. Up in Bozeman.

[Greg Putnam]

That's right. That's right. So Tim had been a pilot as a kid and then he's a super accomplished pilot. He flies all those planes and, and so he started that company.

[Andy Stumpf]

And what was it for though?

[Greg Putnam]

Basically isr. Think of ISR for firefighting is as.

[Andy Stumpf]

Far as looking for fires or are you talking about scene control and management, looking for personnel or probably a little bit of all I was going to say. Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

And then they. They basically, as they grew the company, they. They started getting these planes. And I'm not a pilot, so my plane term knowledge is not perfect, but they're. It's a scooper. So essentially it's like a seaplane and it comes in and lands on the water and it fills these massive tanks and then they take off. Exactly. And they fly them basically with a. With a buddy. So you're running two dropping, two reloading. So instead of your traditional, like, aerial firefighting, where you have to land, refill with, like, flyer retardant and that kind of stuff, it takes a tremendous amount of time where these things can just, you know, continuously put water on those fires and they do it all over the place.

[Andy Stumpf]

But, I mean, they're up here often.

[Greg Putnam]

They are. They were staged up here last summer. So he started that company, ran that company, was a pilot, was the CEO, and then when he, you know, officially committed to running for office, then he basically had to step down and out of the company. Obviously, there's.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

You know, contracts and things like that. So he is not involved in that company, but he started that company, ran that company, and was, you know, an active pilot and flew all those planes.

[Andy Stumpf]

I mean, I know it's only. What's it been, two months?

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah. November.

[Andy Stumpf]

What are his thoughts so far? And again, you're kind of.

[Greg Putnam]

That's a good question. Yeah.

[Andy Stumpf]

I never met the guy.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah, you should have him on. He's super interesting.

[Andy Stumpf]

I invited him on, like, six times when he was running, and he would go like, all right. It was actually never him. I never communicated directly with him.

[Greg Putnam]

I'll get you.

[Andy Stumpf]

We can't.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah.

[Andy Stumpf]

But I was like, I got an idea. Go fuck yourself. Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah, I can see that. But no, he. You know, I don't know. That's a. You'd have to ask him that. Honestly, I mean, I think he.

[Andy Stumpf]

I worry about politics.

[Greg Putnam]

What part about it?

[Andy Stumpf]

I can't decide if the people who want to go into politics have a natural or susceptibility towards being corrupted or if the system is so fucked that it's like toxic exposure, that at some point you do become corrupted.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah.

[Andy Stumpf]

And I'm not saying that in a measurement or reflection of him. It just seems really dirty.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah. And I mean, again, right. Like, you look at the system, you look at how it is right now, and you look at where we have kind of ended up. Yeah. And because.

[Andy Stumpf]

Let's say you are, you're somebody. You're like, this system is super fucked up. I'm going to go in and I'm going to try to change it. And you get in and maybe there's a couple people that are, that are like that with you. But then you realize you can't do a goddamn thing. Because even to do something which from the outside appears like movement being made, but probably in reality is a fraction of what is. You know, what people would think it is is you have to tow the party line a little bit here or there for sure. Right. So then it. You like, you go in, you're like, I'm gonna fucking right the ship on this one. But then you realize you can't.

[Greg Putnam]

It's kind of, you can either leave.

[Andy Stumpf]

Or play along a little bit.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah, I mean, I would say. And again, not being somebody that's in it myself, but it's no different when you, you show up to your platoon, you're a brand new guy, right. You're like, I'm gonna do this and this. Well, it takes some time before you actually get. So you have to be committed to. You've gotta be obviously committed to what it takes to get into a position where you actually are able to influence some of those decision making.

[Andy Stumpf]

What does it take to get into those positions?

[Greg Putnam]

I don't. Yeah, it's, you know, and I think, and I think that's one of those things that, that I'm with you. I mean, you watch it happen and you wonder is that just kind of the, the natural course that happens when you get in or you more are people that are more predisposed to that or both.

[Andy Stumpf]

I don't know.

[Greg Putnam]

I think we're seeing more people now that are getting backed because at the end of the day it is supposed to be a service position. Right.

[Andy Stumpf]

Not supposed to be an occupation.

[Greg Putnam]

No. And not supposed to be a way that you come out with this extreme amount of personal wealth at the end. It's supposed to be service back is the design of the system. And at some point, you know, I believe that that has been lost.

[Andy Stumpf]

And does he talk at all about how long he would want to be there?

[Greg Putnam]

No. I mean, he has definitely talked about his like term limits and things and kind of getting away from this career politician. But I don't know exactly what, you know, I think it's one of those things where you do it for the, you know, kind of the period that you're in and then, you know, obviously you got to get reelected and Then.

[Andy Stumpf]

You got to, you know, that's 60% of the time was the stat that I've heard is once you are elected, 60% of the time that you have is allocated towards getting reelected immediately.

[Greg Putnam]

That wouldn't surprise me.

[Andy Stumpf]

Which is crazy.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah. Yeah. You, I mean you see it and you're kind of. Obviously there has to be some changes and I think you're seeing now, you know, people are kind of waking up to the fact that, that the system is not functioning as it was intended to. And unfortunately you need good people to come in there.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

And make those changes. And you want to be encouraging good people to potentially do that. Right. And.

[Andy Stumpf]

And the best way to do that is to totally trash them and their.

[Greg Putnam]

Family election process and ruin their, their, their businesses, their reputation.

[Andy Stumpf]

That's the best way to get good people in there, I think.

[Greg Putnam]

Correct. Correct.

[Andy Stumpf]

That's that hyper negative campaign.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah. Yeah. Other people are like, yeah, yeah, I want to do that.

[Andy Stumpf]

You know, and yeah, that like that looked awesome. Where do I sign up for that?

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah. And you watch good people that. And you're like, wow, like that's. Yeah, it's a, it's a. I think it's gonna be a really interesting. You know. And I will say this. I've had some time now like where I've met, you know, some other people from different places that are. And I did a thing with. Where with Tim a couple weeks ago and like I actually left there. Like really. I, I left there actually feeling far more positive.

[Andy Stumpf]

There is in D.C. yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

Than I was expecting. Just because you realize though, when you actually get, you know, kind of some one on one stuff and it's not campaign based, that there are some really good people that are really trying to make a positive difference that are, that are. And, and you know, and you see kind of what that looks like and almost normalizes it to a. But you watch, they're just trying to get some deals done. They're trying to get things across the table and you're looking at a group of people that do care about the direction of this country. And I think we did get to a critical point where if we. We continued to go in the direction we were where it's almost unrecoverable and you know, again I go back to the advice I, you know, or not advice, but just my comment to him was like, you know, as an American, I'm really glad that, that you're doing this and somebody of like kind of the, the moral, you know, fortitude and it's it's definitely one of those things where. Yeah, you. I think people get into it, like you said, like, where they're. They're looking at this positive impact and other stuff. And then it's probably like a lot of things where you get in there for a while and it starts to just kind of wear you down. But it'll be interesting. I mean, it's hard. You should have a mind because it's hard to. And to be honest, like, you know, like when we hang out and stuff, we. We typically aren't spending a ton of time. Like, I'll be like the last thing.

[Andy Stumpf]

On earth he wants to talk about.

[Greg Putnam]

Exactly. And, you know, and I may be like, oh, how was your week? Or whatever. And, you know, but rarely am I like, what's the long term? You know what I mean? It's more just kind of just, you know.

[Andy Stumpf]

Does he have any overarching plans for Montana?

[Greg Putnam]

I don't know.

[Andy Stumpf]

We need him to get the Grizz back on the hunting list.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah, yeah. Like I said, you should have him on and hit him with all of these.

[Andy Stumpf]

He might not be ready for it.

[Greg Putnam]

Well, you never know.

[Andy Stumpf]

I don't even know the questions I have.

[Greg Putnam]

You have to write them out.

[Andy Stumpf]

I would actually honestly spend more time talking with him probably about aviation.

[Greg Putnam]

Sure.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

He's a really. That is, like, there.

[Andy Stumpf]

That he is, like, so that was pre military. He was already into.

[Greg Putnam]

He was. Okay. Yep. And probably the area that he was is in still, you know, most passionate about. And. And again, it's. It's one of those things where you. You can't really attack somebody's accomplishments in that space where you go, you know, do you fly the planes or not?

[Andy Stumpf]

Right. And no, the way they chose to attack him on that one was again, it was. It was more of an ad hominem attack on the person than the fact that the technology or the. The platforms used to fight fires. Oh, you got a government contract to build your business. This, that, or the other. That's the angle that they took on it. And it's like, yeah, I did get a government contract to fucking fight fires to fight.

[Greg Putnam]

Like, that is how those get funded. Right. And he could go through the whole thing on. And I never worked for that company. I was around and have, like, a good idea, you know.

[Andy Stumpf]

So that's in Bozeman Base.

[Greg Putnam]

It is probably at the airport. It is, right at the airport. Yep. Yep. And those planes, I mean, they fight fire. It's a. It's not just a Montana thing. They fight Fire Montana, but they fight fire all over the country.

[Andy Stumpf]

They get about six months until they're very busy.

[Greg Putnam]

Correct. But like they just flew down to Oklahoma. There's fires there. They were in California.

[Andy Stumpf]

That's right.

[Greg Putnam]

They were, yeah, yeah. And people are seeing now, I mean these firefighters or these forest fires are, they're getting to the point where you look at what happened in Hawaii, look at what happened in California, something has to change with that system full. I mean it's crazy.

[Andy Stumpf]

And I don't know what you change.

[Greg Putnam]

Though, that you could change how. And again, I'm talking about this from a, like, I'm not an expert in any of this at all. I think you can change how you attack those fires like right off the bat where you get these things going. You have the fence kind of in place and even these scoopers are like a completely different style of fighting.

[Andy Stumpf]

Dude, I tell you what though, man, the Santa Ana's out there. Speaking specifically on the LA fire. I don't know how you fight a fire with 90 knot winds, trip digit winds. I mean you looked at some of those. It literally looked like a blowtorch.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah. And that was crazy. I mean, I think it is just kind of people are just realizing the level that those things can get to of destruction.

[Andy Stumpf]

Mother Nature just doesn't really give two shit.

[Greg Putnam]

No, no, I don't know what that solution is, but they've tried to implement new techniques and you know, like you were saying, it's, it's a mix of, you know, ISR planes that can provide real time information to people on the ground. It's, it's active dropping and you know, if you think about it, it's very similar to the military aerial, you know.

[Andy Stumpf]

Construct and it's a natural way that stuff goes anyway.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah, yeah. And these planes are, I mean they're really interesting. And you know, these guys that fight those fires are, I mean they're, they're, they're brave guys and they're, it's. I flew one, I've never flown a plane before, but I was, we were at one of their like simulators one time and all those guys were like, yeah, this will be funny. Like, Greg, you should get up here and fly this thing. So I'm like, all right, I'm just in the sim. And it was, it was, I mean.

[Andy Stumpf]

You'Ve heard the stats on people when they're surveyed in an emergency. Do you think you could land a commercial airliner? An ungodly percentage of people will look directly at the person asking them out and be like, for sure I'm here.

[Greg Putnam]

To tell you you don't want me flying that thing. Because, I mean, then you. You know, so. You'll love this. So I was coming in to try to do one of these, like, water things, and they're, like, sitting there, kind of, like, coach me through it. Right.

[Andy Stumpf]

Slash laughing at you.

[Greg Putnam]

Well, they're laughing at me. The thing's bouncing all around. They're, like, turning at. It's all in. And I, like. I don't get seasick. I can't remember a time that I've gotten motion sick. I was ready to puke on this thing.

[Andy Stumpf]

Really?

[Greg Putnam]

Oh. Cause, like, the way you're sitting and, like, the. You're seeing the horizon, and then, like, in a lot of that, obviously, is how you're flying it. But I'm coming in to do my little landing, and. And I just. I didn't feel like I. I was. I didn't like where I was at, so I just reached out and I pull that throat. Because I'd watch guys, you know, do, like, touch and goes. And I was like, oh, this is what must be. So I just pull up and pull the throttle, and. And they're like, whoa. Like, what are you doing? And I'm like, oh, I wasn't ready. I like, what was that maneuver? I'm like, touch and go. I don't know. Like, what?

[Andy Stumpf]

Not seeing top.

[Greg Putnam]

What do you do?

[Andy Stumpf]

You let him fly, right?

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah. You just pull up and. And you give it the gas and. But it gave me a whole new appreciation.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

Because when you're flying over those flyers. And again, I've never done it for real, but, like, there's tons of turbulence.

[Andy Stumpf]

Well, it creates its own weather.

[Greg Putnam]

It does.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah. Flying can be complicated enough. I mean, on a bluebird day with some white, puffy clouds and some terrain, like. Like where you live in Bozeman. Glorious. Reduce visibility by 90%. Suspended smoke particles in the air, and you have to go drive at the fire, where it's so hot it's creating its own weather.

[Greg Putnam]

Yep.

[Andy Stumpf]

It's not the same thing.

[Greg Putnam]

Yep. No, it's. I mean, and the amount of hours it takes, you know, and the different ratings and things that those guys have.

[Andy Stumpf]

To get, it's pretty unbelievable.

[Greg Putnam]

It is unbelievable. And then again, like, that was something. I mean, Tim was. Was a pilot on that thing. He was a nav on that. And, you know, the. He's not a guy that's, like, standing by and going, hey, you guys should go do this. I mean, he's doing all that stuff. And it's. It's a really interesting. I mean, it's an interesting space. It's definitely like an emerging area.

[Andy Stumpf]

It's needed up here too.

[Greg Putnam]

It is.

[Andy Stumpf]

There was. I mean, I wasn't joking when I said they have about six months until they're busy. It's either Canadian fires blowing smoke down here or our own ones that start, whether be from people accidentally or arson or most of the time, honestly, it's lightning.

[Greg Putnam]

Yep.

[Andy Stumpf]

There was a fire started a few years ago over a property dispute. You could literally see where it. The person lit it and it just went right downwind, uphill. The V. Like a perfect V. Yep. And holy cow, man. I was on just the app where you can watch the. What the air traffic. They had spotter planes up there. They had the scoopers, they had the sea planes. They had the big ones going down to Missoula to get filled up with the red stuff. Fire retardant.

[Greg Putnam]

Yep.

[Andy Stumpf]

Crazy. And as soon as they were done there, they're off doing it somewhere else.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah.

[Andy Stumpf]

Nonstop for that whole season.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah. It's not. Once those planes leave, they, you know, again, they might not come back if they're in Oklahoma and then they go somewhere else. And it's just kind of following now. And you're. I mean, there was a fire in Long island the other day. Did you see that on the news? It was like a wildfire in Long island. And it was like a. Not. Not like crazy crazy. But yeah, it's a. It's a cool company. And. And again, that was like one of those things that they tried to. To just.

[Andy Stumpf]

They came at him hard on that.

[Greg Putnam]

Oh, big time. Big time. And that again was like, you know, if you have a company that. That is in the government space, you're reliant on government contracts. That's the business. Right. And. But yeah, it is what it is. Yeah.

[Andy Stumpf]

So obviously the move once you get out of the military specializing in very, very long dives, is to start a cattle company in Montana. One naturally leads to the other.

[Greg Putnam]

Yes.

[Andy Stumpf]

Most guys getting out of STVs I've heard do this, bring them up to speed on little belt. How many. How many years have you been out at this point? Because the first time you've been on before two years ago, I think.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah, it was two or three years ago.

[Andy Stumpf]

You had been added a bit.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah, we had just kind of gotten started. We've. Yeah, we've come quite a bit further down the road at this point, but yeah, we started. Really started it full on. Full on in 2020. There was some prep going into that. And through that process. You know, honestly, the COVID thing was the first time we really thought about doing this full, vertically integrated local supply chain. And looking at. And to be honest, like, looking back now, like, if we had known all the different things that it takes to get there, I can't say that we would 100% made that decision again. However, I'm glad that we did. And we've worked, like, really hard to build this vertically integrated system. And in the cattle industry, it's a very phase line business where, you know, I would be one portion of it. You would buy, you know, those cattle for me. You would grow them to another phase. Michael would buy them, and he'd take them to another phase. He would sell them to somebody else. And you don't actually see a lot of feedback on how those cattle perform after your phase. So I would explain it as like, you know, it'd be like if you made wine or beer or something, and you just had one portion of that, but you never saw the end result or tried that product. How do you know how your operational decisions and things are?

[Andy Stumpf]

I didn't realize it was that segmented.

[Greg Putnam]

It is in. In Montana is you see a lot of cows in Montana, and traditionally, those cows produce calves that then get bought and go into the Midwest, and they continue to grow and get finished in the Midwest, and then they'll go into kind of large national programs. But I think it's 2% of the cattle that are, you know, that. That start in Montana get consumed in Montana. That may not be perfect, but that's the stat that I've heard. The rest of the Montana basically is the factory for producing calves that then go into beef production as a system, and they traditionally go into the Midwest, get grown, get finished, processed, distributed.

[Andy Stumpf]

You do see a lot of calves here. You do for a short period of time.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah. Like, you'll see them basically from, you know, you'll start seeing them, you know, called February 1st through, you know, early summer. And what that is, is you have cows that are the factory, and that would be the cow calf component or kind of the first step in that process. And then those cows every year produce that calf. The females basically come kind of like back around into replacing numbers, getting sold as bread cows for. For operations that are. That are growing. And the. The males typically go into kind of the beef production pipeline. With that being said, what we ended up doing then was, was keeping all of those phases, keeping those cattle in our own system and taking them through that whole thing. So that gives you basically quality assurance from start to finish. We literally start with the genetic selection that is going to basically do two things. It gives those cattle the, you know, they got to have the genetic capacity and the nutrition to get to a point of performance that we're like shooting for in our beef program. But that's a, you know, that's a 20 on average. It's about a 24 month process from Flash to bang. Yes, correct. So if you think about it, even just from a, you know, from a business capital perspective, you know, you basically put, let's just say a dollar in when that calf hits the ground and you don't see it come back to you for. And usually it's not even just hunting for months because then you got to sell that beef. So it's probably another like 30 to 45 days. So the capital that it takes to take those cattle all the way through that system Is why it's segmented traditionally like it is.

[Andy Stumpf]

That makes sense.

[Greg Putnam]

And it's not a bad system by any means. The system works very well. The thing that you don't get then with that system, though, Is the ability to trace those animals all the way through that entire process. And so what we ultimately wanted to do and what we saw, you know, kind of with the beginning of COVID Especially when people couldn't get beef at the grocery store, was our actual first plan was how do you put montana beef back into montana communities? And that, that started us down that road. And we basically have gone from filling, you know, two or three in a. In like a horse stock trailer to fill in a stock trailer to a stock tiller trough to. Now we're killing full semi loads on a very regular basis. So we're. We're, you know, we basically have a ratable supply chain of 12 months, where every single month you have the right number of cattle being finished at the right time.

[Andy Stumpf]

Makes sense.

[Greg Putnam]

And so for us, we do a grass fed grain finish program. And so we were partnered in a feed yard in billings. And so those cattle go into there, get finished on grain, and then we're processing those and then we're doing all the distribution. So we work with a bunch of restaurants locally, and then we also have an online presence now that people can just go on and order. We actually just finished up doing a deal with black rifle with. They've got a bunch of like, partner folks at their subscription.

[Andy Stumpf]

Oh, the God damn it. Coffee club.

[Greg Putnam]

The coffee club. So we're working with them now. So if you're a Black Rifle Coffee Club subscriber, you can find Little Bell Cattle Company on there. There's a discount code specifically for those guys that are subscribers, and they can go on an order and catch discount and get 100 Montana beef.

[Andy Stumpf]

Where's your guys? Rants in relationship to Bozeman. My son now goes to MSU.

[Greg Putnam]

Okay. We're 90 miles northeast of Bozeman.

[Andy Stumpf]

Is that up by, like, White Sulfur?

[Greg Putnam]

It is. We're east of White Sulfur in west of Harlowton.

[Andy Stumpf]

Okay. I don't know that second.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah, it's cool. It's a. The little belts. That's where our name came from.

[Andy Stumpf]

Do you have elk that harass your cows?

[Greg Putnam]

They don't really harass our cows, but we do have elk. Do you need to be shot? You know, we actually have some. We're getting some, like, some better bulls, but yeah, they. They do. One. One of the kids that works for us, us shot a really nice bowl this year.

[Andy Stumpf]

You have a bunch of antelope, right?

[Greg Putnam]

We do. We have good antelope, too.

[Andy Stumpf]

Dude. I haven't drawn an antelope tag in three years.

[Greg Putnam]

Interesting.

[Andy Stumpf]

I also.

[Greg Putnam]

That used to be, like, 99%.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yes.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah.

[Andy Stumpf]

I only know of one or two people that have. They made the. The change to the 920 tag, which is what I used to put.

[Greg Putnam]

That's the one you get the statewide one.

[Andy Stumpf]

Well, it doesn't exist anymore.

[Greg Putnam]

Oh, I didn't know that.

[Andy Stumpf]

They segmented into districts.

[Greg Putnam]

Interesting.

[Andy Stumpf]

Which I know nothing about.

[Greg Putnam]

I thought the 920. Was that you. It's archery only, but you got any district. And then the rifle one, you had to.

[Andy Stumpf]

In my understanding, that's what it was as well. It was a very. It was a tag that had a pretty large swath of public land use.

[Greg Putnam]

Yep.

[Andy Stumpf]

My understanding, though, is that they carved that into 13 or 16 different districts, so now you have to apply for that particular district.

[Greg Putnam]

Got it. And to be honest, with the amount of beef carcasses that I deal with at this point, I have not been hunting nearly as much as I used to. We always get veg, and that was a funny one. We can talk about that too. You know, we. You know, they. They were hitting us on all this, like, public access stuff, which was just completely false. Like, couldn't be more false. We.

[Andy Stumpf]

Oh, were they saying that, you guys.

[Greg Putnam]

We were blocking public access.

[Andy Stumpf]

For people who don't understand that issue, this is a contentious one in Montana, the Big Sky State, they call it that because of how amazing it can look, how big the sky can look. Huge sectors of national forests, state lands, public land. But what you'll find in some of the most epic elk hunting areas are ranches. And let's say that this everyday field craft water, which is probably filled by Mike Glover's garden host in his backyard. Let's say this is like right here is the western edge of a great hunting area. You'll see these ranches that wrap all the way around. And you can't just walk on private property. So it becomes privately locked in public land.

[Greg Putnam]

And that's one of the best parts people get. They do. One of the best things about being a resident of Montana is the access to guaranteed public ground.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

That you can. That. That is like it is yours to. To recreate on. Right. And. And there is. And there's. There's. Now I will say this. The way that is set up. There is access points to a lot of that ground, but there is stuff that is blocked.

[Andy Stumpf]

Not accidentally.

[Greg Putnam]

No, no. And it. It obviously, like, there's some things there where it. It definitely adds to the value of that ground. That. And. But the. This. I don't know the spirit of it, But a lot of that ground does have access points. Some of it doesn't. But the intent was that there was public access points that people could go to access that public ground.

[Andy Stumpf]

We have a bmas. Right. Block management.

[Greg Putnam]

They block management. There's state sections and there's federal.

[Andy Stumpf]

Okay.

[Greg Putnam]

We have a county road that basically divides the ranch on the east and the west that ends at one of those access points. We use that access point because we have cattle leases that allow us to graze up there in for certain periods of time. So we use that just as much as anybody else.

[Andy Stumpf]

Your cows are just up there about.

[Greg Putnam]

Yes. For.

[Andy Stumpf]

Do you ever lose them?

[Greg Putnam]

No. We're actually pretty good about. It takes some time sometimes to find them. But the problem.

[Andy Stumpf]

Cows.

[Greg Putnam]

Yes. And it's a lot of ground to cover. And. And it's.

[Andy Stumpf]

It's sounds like a lot of time on horseback.

[Greg Putnam]

It is a lot of time on horseback. And typically we do. I mean, you. You. We always get them all back. It's just a matter of if they all come. Once you actually get them kind of going, they typically will start coming in together. And you don't have. But you might have a group that doesn't see the rest of them. And you know, and then you got to count them in. Just like inventories in the military. You kind of know, like, hey, we're down this many, and then you got to go find them. And what can be really funny is when somebody's like, yeah, we're down 5. And then in actuality, you're not. And you're out there actually looking for stuff that doesn't exist. But that's a different story.

[Andy Stumpf]

That also sounds like the military.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah, but this road, like, goes right across the ranch. And, and what they were saying was, and what they were trying to portray was that we blocking access would mean we barricaded that road off and not disallowed people to go to that public area which would be their portal.

[Andy Stumpf]

So think of a road like this seam is a road. This is your access point. Everything past this is public. So people can use that to gain the gateway to the public.

[Greg Putnam]

Correct. We have never once, in any capacity, blocked any amount of. We've not there. You could make an argument. We use that just as much as anybody else. What we don't allow is for people to openly cross private property to access public ground outside of that access point. So we had a guy, he calls, he. I want to say he was from msnbc, but I, I, I don't know if I'd put. I can't be for sure.

[Andy Stumpf]

I'm from media.

[Greg Putnam]

Okay, Media. Yeah. Michael, you can edit that part out.

[Andy Stumpf]

No, we're in. Maybe it was msnb.

[Greg Putnam]

I could look it up in my phone. I just, I don't feel like you're.

[Andy Stumpf]

A traditional media source.

[Greg Putnam]

Okay. Traditional, big media source. Guy calls me up, he's like, hey, I was hired to write an article about how you and Tim. She basically run a fake ranch and that you block public access to the public. And I'm like, first question out of my mouth, I'm like, you're paid to write this or you're a journalist writing a story? Well, I'm a journalist writing a story. Well, then how are you paid to write this? That just sounds like your.

[Andy Stumpf]

He should get paid for the story when he submits it.

[Greg Putnam]

But he had somebody say, this is the story we want you to write.

[Andy Stumpf]

Oh, for sure.

[Greg Putnam]

So we go through the whole thing. I explained to him what I just explained, and I said, listen, you could look at stuff that we've been putting out since 2020 on the ranch. You're actually more than welcome to come out at any time. However, you got to stay for three days. You gotta run my schedule, and you gotta be out with our crew for 72 hours. If you can't make it 72 hours, the title of the article has to be. I couldn't make it on a fake ranch for 72 hours.

[Andy Stumpf]

I would read that article.

[Greg Putnam]

He was like, I don't think that's necessary. I'm like, it's an open invite. You can see. And his chances of doing that were quite slim would be my guess. So we go through the whole thing. I'm like, well, look, we've never black. So we have this, like, pretty good constructive conversation that ultimately ended with. I'm like, look, if you had a house, there was a lake behind your house with a beach, and a mile down the road, there was a parking area that people could park at, access the lake, sit on the beach, and have a great time. Would you let them walk through your house to get to the beach? And he's like, well, no. Like, okay, then you can't have a problem with. There's public access that allows you to get to that. If there has been cases in Montana where people block that for sure, and I'm a hundred percent with everybody against that. I'm telling you right now, there has not been a single incident ever that we've ever blocked public access. Do we allow everybody to come walking across the ranch? Keep in mind, we also.

[Andy Stumpf]

Those are two different things. Blocking public access on that road and then allowing people onto private property to take a shortcut or two different fucking.

[Greg Putnam]

That's exactly. And keep in mind, like, part of my job also, like, we've got a lot of livestock. We have a team of people. And in their safety and security is something that I have to take into consideration. Where, you know, we have people that come across, they leave, you know, whether they leave gates open. They don't know where we are. They don't know where our animals are. It just becomes a safety issue. And there's different programs out there that private property can participate in. And, you know, I know some places that are in. In those programs and some places that aren't it for us. It did not, because we're running a full working ranch. It didn't make sense for what we were doing, and they were trying to beat us up on that. And that was like a big one that they were really trying to. I mean, again, in those ads, complete false information about, you know, the. The. The number of acres that. That. That, you know, is owned, the access points. I mean, you could look this stuff up.

[Andy Stumpf]

You could go on to Onyx and.

[Greg Putnam]

Click and find it.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah, you could.

[Greg Putnam]

It would take you 30 seconds to find the actual information. And instead they're just putting out false Information to paint a narrative that isn't true. And they really did. They tried very hard to, you know, to very, very much negatively affect our business. And, you know, to be honest, we just stayed the course and did what we've been doing and just stuck to trying to produce the best cattle and the best beef we can. Here we are, though. We hire a lot of veterans. We hire rural people in Montana. We're putting beef back into our communities and not just into, you know, restaurants and our online thing, like we do a bunch of school districts. And the way we're able to do that is because we also sell into high end restauran restaurants. And that helps offset the cost of putting 100% Montana beef back into. And that's something we're super proud of. And we were doing that. Not so I could sit here and tell you about it. It never came up on. Tim never mentioned it. You know, I'm just saying that in that when we think about putting it back into the community, that's on a much broader scale than just, you know, hitting different, you know, kind of business points. It's something I'm super proud of, that we're putting the same quality that's going to some top restaurants, top places, and that's what, you know, the places that we're supplying beef to, that's what those kids are getting as well. And it's been super interesting. We've learned a ton, just about, you know, kind of what does that take? And it's one of those things where if you haven't thought about a lot, but when you need, like a specific number of cattle that, you know, almost weigh the exact same at the specific amount of time, month over month. Because what you can't have and what a lot of people run into when they try to go down this road is they'll have, you know, a certain amount of supply in the freezer. Customers start buying, they run out, and then they can't restock for, you know, and then all of a sudden those customers go somewhere else.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah, that's not an overnight solution.

[Greg Putnam]

No, no. And it's never been easier now to access, like, local beef, you know, and I call it local, but like, wherever you live and what we ultimately built and still, you know, are, you know, doing and growing is we want people to be able to know exactly who and where that food is coming from. And I think that's a big shift you're now seeing in America as a whole. And it's similar to the hunting thing. Like, once you start Doing that. People want to know, number one, what they're eating. They want to know how it was raised. They want to know where it came from, who it came from, all those things. And as we've kind of built that out, that's what we've been wanting to give people. Because a lot of people have no idea. They've lost the connection of, you know, you go to the grocery store, you grab a steak. It's not like pulling out a steak that. From an elk that you shot, where there's a, you know, in.

[Andy Stumpf]

Where there's suffering, associated suffering.

[Greg Putnam]

And like you. There's a. There's like you remember who you were with. And again, you're not going to be able to give people that exact feeling. And that's not what we're trying to do, but we are trying to rebuild a connection to where people go, I want to buy a little belt beef because I feel good about the people making it. I feel good about how that's happening. I feel about, you know, the way that those. Those cattle are managed. And I feel good that. That I know that entire system of how that beef was, was produced and processed. And that's basically what we have been doing. And you don't see hardly anybody, you know, startup. But when I tell people like, we're a startup ranch, that they laugh. But it's actually been a great. There's so many parallels to military stuff where you have this great plan, then you go out to do it, and all of a sudden it doesn't work. And you're like, don't tell people our secrets.

[Andy Stumpf]

Works exactly as planned.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah. But your ability to actually kind of feel when the momentum has shifted a little bit and you're like, oh, we gotta make a course correction. I actually feel like we are extremely good at that. And, you know, we've kind of taken stuff, even the way we kind of go like, hey, this is the plan for the day. You know, this is, you know, the primary target, you know, or let's just say gate or whatever. Like, hey, we want to go through this gate. There's a secondary gate over here. The goal is to get them here however we get there. But it allows people to make decisions on the fly, recognize that they might not want to go that way, and it's going to be a lot easier to go that way. Right. And there's. It's one of those things. There's a lot of skill to it. It's one of those things just, you know, similar to military. When you go, oh, I'VE got this, like I am, I'm good to go. Like you will be humbled.

[Andy Stumpf]

What does a 72 hour schedule look like for you? What was that? What was that? Journalist. If he had rogered up to it, what was he signing up for?

[Greg Putnam]

That's a great question. It's a little bit dependent on the time of year.

[Andy Stumpf]

Well, I assume that you would have rogered him up for a very arduous. Yes, 72 hours.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah, so we would have, I mean I remember it was probably like either late spring, early summer and so it would have looked something, you know, we would have been, you know, probably, you know, getting out of bed somewhere, you know, by four, you know, you're getting up, you're eating, you're getting your lunch and whatever you need for the day, kind of packed. You're going out and catching a horse. You're loading a horse typically.

[Andy Stumpf]

By what do you mean you're catching a horse?

[Greg Putnam]

Well, your horses typically are in some sort of corral or like pasture and then you go out in, in, I mean it's nothing fancy. You just basically, you know, how do.

[Andy Stumpf]

You pick which one you want?

[Greg Putnam]

You've typically are on some sort of rotation so you want to, you'll have a certain string of horses that you ride and then you kind of manage, you know, what you're doing, which one you're taking. And also there's sometimes it's what are you doing for the day and what horse is better suited for that. And so you'll, you'll catch your horse, get your horse ready and then basically load up and, and kind of meet at a central location and then people will go out from there. And I mean the task could be, it could be gathering cattle from a big pasture into a group and moving them to another pasture. It could be, I mean it could be preparing a pasture where you're going around all the fence, you make sure the water, everything's ready for them to go to that next one. I mean it could be, it could be branding calves. I mean it could be, it's very seasonal and kind of age class size dependent. But a lot of it is, it also is healthcare. So you're going through, you're looking at all those cattle, you're select if there's ones that are sick, you're, you're, you know, giving them care. You're just, you know, you're, you're, you're managing the like the overall well being. But you're on large pastures. Like it's not like they're all together. Yeah. And so. Yeah. So. And then you're, you know, in the summer, I mean, that you're. You're pretty much gone all day, and then coming back that evening, you got to put all your horses up, you got to get things fed, you got to get prepped for the next day. And, you know, by the time you're eating and back in bed, it feels like you're doing it pretty quick again, you know, and it. Like, in the winter, it. The operational tempo is very much there, but it's not as intensive as, like the spring, summer, and fall.

[Andy Stumpf]

Shorter days, too.

[Greg Putnam]

Shorter days. And we're feeding cattle at that point, so you're, you know, we put hay up in the. In the summertime, and then, you know, basically we're plowing snow and feeding those cows between. You know, for us, it's basically about January through, like, let's just call it like, April 1st. That every day those cattle get fed.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah. And do you use those big. It's not a ball. It's like a roll of hit.

[Greg Putnam]

Is. Yep.

[Andy Stumpf]

Is it true that those things can start themselves on fire?

[Greg Putnam]

They can. They can get spontaneously.

[Andy Stumpf]

That is wild.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah. So when you stack them from, like.

[Andy Stumpf]

It'S from the moisture, right?

[Greg Putnam]

It is. Correct.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

Yep. So if the moisture content, believe it or not, is too high, you can.

[Andy Stumpf]

Have a spontaneously combustion payroll.

[Greg Putnam]

Correct. And then, you know, that hay is, like, valuable. There's a, you know, price per tons and whatnot. I don't know what the average is right now. I bet it's somewhere like, around like 160 bucks a ton, something like that. So for insurance purposes, you can only stack so much hay in a stack or it has to be spaced out, because if it caused fire, you know, it's a. It's a. It's a lot of money burning up.

[Andy Stumpf]

I mean, that'd be a great way to stay warm in the winter, I.

[Greg Putnam]

Guess, next to the.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yourself into one of those things.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah. So you have to be very careful when you put hay up. There's very specific moisture content, like parameters that you have to stay within.

[Andy Stumpf]

Did you know this, Michael?

[Greg Putnam]

No. We talked about it, like, a couple podcasts ago for some reason.

[Andy Stumpf]

You know what I'm talking about, right? Those big spiral. Like, they're not spirals at all, but those big rolls.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah. So what happens is you. You, you know, you grow that grass, you cut it basically with a. With a swather, but it's just like basically a giant lawnmower. Right. And then you use this thing called a Rake and it puts the. Basically it'll take two lines of cut hay and put it into one, but it also kind of turns it over and then you let that dry for a certain amount of time and then you come and roll it into the.

[Andy Stumpf]

The.

[Greg Putnam]

Into the bales.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

And that, that time that it sits on the ground, all of that has, you know, a certain amount of time that it can do that to get to the right moisture content to. To go into that. It's kind of one of those things where, you know, you see those bales and like, you don't think about.

[Andy Stumpf]

No. What, you know, like that fire instantaneously starting inside of it. Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

You don't think about, you know, like, for us, like we think about like what's like the protein content of that. There's different types of hay. There's different, you know, and you're paying for, you know, higher quality. And there's different kind of mixes of different grasses and things. And all of those are going to have nutritional impact on those cattle. And you know, when those cows basically come in from the fall to the winter, you basically want them at kind of a certain condition. And what you don't want to be doing is trying to put condition on those cows because it'll cost you a ton of money. Yeah. You want to be able to maintain where they're at so that through the winter, you know, you cut. You got to bring them in looking pretty good. And then you don't want them to backside, but you don't want to have. You don't want them coming in skinny where you have to put on. On weight.

[Andy Stumpf]

Do they just eat all day if they're out?

[Greg Putnam]

No, I mean, they've got a specific amount of hay that each one gets. You know, we would call like per.

[Andy Stumpf]

It's like when they're out grazing.

[Greg Putnam]

Oh, when they're grazing? Yeah. Yeah. They. They eat and then they lay down. Yeah, you'll see them like they eat and then they, they lay down. They kind of ruminate where they just kind of sit there and, and, and then they get up and they're. Actually, it's interesting, like when you watch cattle a lot, they almost follow a similar routine as, as, you know, elk or wild animal or whatever where, you know, they'll. At night, in. In the morning and in the evenings, they really start to spread out. And then kind of during the day, as it gets hot, they kind of suck back into like water sources, shade. They lay out, then they kind of get up and same thing. They kind of Work their way back out. And it's pretty fascinating. And, you know, there's. There's a number of different ways that you can kind of manage cattle for performance. And so a big thing for us is we do a lot of different pasture rotations, and so we'll gather those cattle. There's a big thing where you, you basically, you're putting the right number of cattle on the right size acreage for the right amount of time.

[Andy Stumpf]

That makes sense.

[Greg Putnam]

You've probably heard of overgrazing.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

Okay, so, like, do you think overgrazing is a function of number of animals or time?

[Andy Stumpf]

I guess it could be both. Right?

[Greg Putnam]

It could be. But if you had to pick one or the other, what do you think it is?

[Andy Stumpf]

Probably numbers.

[Greg Putnam]

So that's what everybody thinks. But if you think about it, it's actually a function of time. So if you had a thousand animals on one acre for one minute, and I'm making this up, yeah, that could be perfectly grazed, but if they were there for two minutes, it would be over. So you really have to figure out like, like what is the. Basically the volume of forage per acre and then the number of cattle that are on there, and how many days can that number of cattle be there to get, like, the desired amount of grazing you want? And then you're moving them. And what's interesting is every time you're moving them, you're basically moving them onto fresh feed. Versus the other style would be, is you turn those cattle out and they just stay out there for a certain amount of time. And, and then you, you pull them off, which would be more of like an open grazing versus a rotational grazing, where with that rotational grazing, you're, you're. You're really able to mirror the nutritional needs of those cattle at that time for whatever the goal is to the type of ground that you're putting them on. And a lot of that has to do with what type of, you know, grass is growing at what time. So if you're, for instance, if you're going up into the mountains, that grass is going to come in later than stuff down at lower elevation.

[Andy Stumpf]

That makes sense. How many head do you guys have now?

[Greg Putnam]

We are running. Oh, that's. So we have about. There's about 800 cows that'll have calves. There's about 500 yearlings for the beef program that'll come back in May, and about another 250 females that'll come back into a breeding program. So that's like 1500 ish there on the ranch. And Then we have about another like 500 or so on feed that are in that finishing process.

[Andy Stumpf]

What was it in 2020 when you came on?

[Greg Putnam]

Oh man, it was a lot less. We probably had. Oh man, that's a good question. Because we had some cattle with. We weren't doing the yearling thing yet. We were like very much just getting into the beef stuff. But we only had a couple at a time. Where now we have like I was saying, like a pretty systematic approach.

[Andy Stumpf]

I feel like it was in the tens or low hundreds at most.

[Greg Putnam]

No, we had a couple because we.

[Andy Stumpf]

Started, I mean in the beef program.

[Greg Putnam]

In the beef program. Yeah. We only. Yeah. No, I don't even think we had kill. I don't think we killed like a hundred total.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

That year I have to look back on when I came back in. But we really stairstepped our, you know, our numbers. But it's one of those things you, You. You know, we were killing like two or three at a time. And we were selling through that and then another couple and then we. As we got more and more business, we were killing more and more. Where now we almost have it to where it's almost pre allocated to where. Where you know, as that semi load gets processed, it's like, okay, a certain amount of this goes here. A certain amount this because you have to move all of it. And something that's cool is. I mean we literally move like from beef cheeks to oxtail in everything in between.

[Andy Stumpf]

And I have no fucking clue what you just said.

[Greg Putnam]

So I mean literally head to toe.

[Andy Stumpf]

Okay.

[Greg Putnam]

On those cattle carcasses, every pound, right. That you put on the rail.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

Is worth some sort of. Oh, I bet amount. Right. And you're trying to get the yield of the amount you know, of usable, you know, whether it's beef or product, right into some sort of market. So you know, we have from. We've got a dog food company that buys our. Basically the. They call it ofal, but it's a entrails. It's your heart, your lungs, your livers. And they freeze dry that and they use it for dog food. You know, for every one tenderloin customer you have, you have to have a certain amount of people that are selling grind. So we call. We have a gal that works for us who's awesome. She was a C17 pilot in the Air Force and didn't have any experience in this. Allison Snows her name. And she has this. She made this amazing Excel spreadsheet that like she can jam in like how many cattle and then it like we call it the calculator and it kicks out like, okay, this is how many. This.

[Andy Stumpf]

Please tell me you mean calculator.

[Greg Putnam]

Calculator. That's. And so she'll have to sit there and figure out this is where everything is going. And we've gotten really good then at all the different outlets that we need. And that's one of the things that I think is cool about what we're doing. We have a direct to consumer component. We also have kind of a wholesale restaurant component. And we've got a market that we work with as well. And by having those different outlets, it gives us the ability to move all those cattle. It also gives us the ability to not have to force customers. Customers. A lot of programs, it's like, oh, if you want a ribeye, you get 20 pounds of grind. Right. Because you got to move all of that.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah, for sure.

[Greg Putnam]

And what we've kind of been able to build out now is the ability for people to pick and choose what they want. And we'll do like curated boxes.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah, we're super industry standard anyway.

[Greg Putnam]

Completely. And we're doing one. Like we're doing one for Memorial Day. The funds, you know, a certain proceed of those funds are going to wars in quiet waters. And, and you know, that's something again, we kind of timed with the black rifle thing and we'll put some like boxes together like that where you get a couple things. Somebody, it's like a one click or you can just go on and pick what you want and you know, build your own box. They ship it to you and you get in your door. And that's what I'm saying. Like the ability to buy locally now has never been easier. And the access to like healthy, high quality food has never been easier, but it's also never been harder because you can also go down to, you know, grocery stores in different places and you don't realize the amount of imported beef that you're getting from other places that you have no idea where it came from, no idea what, you know, program that those followed, which is wild if.

[Andy Stumpf]

You think about it. The, the beef production in the U.S. and if you do look at a lot of the steaks at the grocery store, yeah, they're from Oconus, they're from outside of the United States.

[Greg Putnam]

Absolutely.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah. And there's. And I think you're seeing a shift now to, to this, you know, back to this like made in America and knowing your rancher and you know, farm to table, whatever you want to call it. And people have, you know, whether it's local farmers markets, whether it's online and you know, I talk about this all the time. I'm like a prerequisite for liking Little Belt Cattle company. Doesn't mean that you don't have to like everybody else. Right. And there's different people that are making great beef. That's going to be very different depending on like how that beef is raised and finished and you know, depending on the experience you're looking for, you're able to find that now. And you know, I'm a huge proponent of, like, if you're buying locally, you're buying from us producers, you're buying in a way that's supporting, you know, smaller producers that are doing that, you know, here in America, then you're helping rebuild, regrow that system. Because as you think about it, the more acres that come out of that system, whether those are recreation, because you see a lot of ranches now that, that, you know, are at a point where they are either selling, they don't have that next generation that's coming in to take over. And typically, I mean, you're seeing those, those acres leave production agriculture. And at some point, how does that system sustain itself when you're not replacing those acres someplace else? Right. And like, I truly believe that, you know, food security is national security. If you have one of the things that makes America amazing. And when you travel a lot and you leave the country, you see, this is our access to high quality, nutrient dense food is a major competitive advantage. When you compare that to a lot of other places.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah, for sure. What's harder, being a seal or first generation rancher? Strip the SDV out of it?

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah, yeah, no, that's a good question.

[Andy Stumpf]

I feel like the SDV would be hard.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah, they're both, they're similar in their challenges of that. For me, it's something that I really, number one, wanted to do very much wanted to be good at very much. Spent a lot of time doing the reps to get to the point where, you know, no different than being a new guy. And you see somebody that's been doing it a long time, you're like, I'm going to be like that guy. Right. And. But it takes that commitment and it takes doing those reps to get good at it. And similar to where, you know, you feel like you're, you know, you're a small part in there's, there's a similar purpose there where you feel like you're, you know, you're feeding people you're providing high quality product for people and you're doing a service. And you know, it's. They're different, but they're very similar. You know, you're dealing with. With great people, but also like a lot of kind of type A personalities that are like, oh, I want to do like this, I want to do like that.

[Andy Stumpf]

And would you rather ranch or get in the back of the SDV ranch all day long?

[Greg Putnam]

All day long. No question. No Reg. But. But then also you got to be out there when, you know, there's times where it's, you know, negative 30, negative 40. Those. When you have livestock, you are making a commitment that like you are providing the highest level of care that you can for those animals. And we really go overboard on the, put it this way in the prioritization of our business and how like cash gets allocated. We will always prioritize the health and well being of the cattle over anything else. And you know, it's a. But it's a really. It's one of those things where you. We've had the same crew now for a couple years. We've been a fantastic crew and no different. When you get used to working with the same people for a long time, you know, you're just like kind of that flow state happens and you don't talk a lot. You're just out there doing it. Everybody kind of knows their role. You're just filling in. And it's really enjoyable. When you get into that and it's cool, like you're producing something that. That wasn't there. And in seeing those cattle going like all the way through that, we've been. I'm really proud of the performance of the program we've put together not only on the live cattle side, but on the beef side as well. And the beef side, you can market and you can, you know, you can do all the things you can, you know, you can get that product out there. On the live cattle side, it's very, it's more, I would say, like reputation driven. You could spend all day marketing. And people on the live cattle side, they either think that you add value to their program or they don't. And if you're. And they show it in the way that they bid on those cattle. And we've had, you know, times where we've been, you know, the top selling group of certain age classes of cattle that is a big reflection of like the performance we've built into that program. And so when people were knocking us and stuff during that and I'M like, like, okay, then, then if we're not a real wrench, like, what is? Right?

[Andy Stumpf]

And how much impact did the negativity, the campaign actually have? Did you guys feel it?

[Greg Putnam]

We did. We felt it on. And I completely get this. You know, the restaurant business, especially in, you know, kind of the markets that we sell into, is extremely competitive. A lot of those people, you know, don't want any reason why somebody wouldn't stay or go to their restaurant.

[Andy Stumpf]

I mean, they're fighting for dollars too.

[Greg Putnam]

They are. We lost. We did, though. We lost. Probably leading up the last couple months, we were losing. Not losing, but we. We were. We had to. We had about 8 to $10,000 of sales decline from businesses that were like, look, nothing against you guys. We like the product. We like you guys. Like, we can't have. We don't want any political affiliation.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

And I was like, hey, that's fair, you know, and there was a number of those folks that were very honest with me and just said, look. And then there were some that just ghosted us. And. And then all of a sudden you're like, okay, so when you're pre allocating that product, you're like, okay, so should we go? And they're just not getting back to you. And then you hear from somebody else or eventually, you know, you see posts or comments that they make and you're like, oh, okay, I get this now. I will say this. We were able to find new customers and. And we found like, more customers, you know, as we went. But it definitely was, you know, it's just we are a beef company that we're like, look, like we're trying to sell beef to everybody, right? Like, if you're looking for good, high quality, 100% Montana beef, like, we will sell it to you. And so as you start seeing those sales decline, you.

[Andy Stumpf]

It sucks.

[Greg Putnam]

It does suck. And especially as, like, you're building and growing your business or trying. And you guys probably see this at times, right? Where, like, if somebody doesn't like Black.

[Andy Stumpf]

Rifle for whatever reason, every election cycle, it's the Act Blue thing where Black Rifle is somehow the Manchurian candidate for the Democratic Party. Because I think there's a total of $1500 associated with Black Rifle on Act Blue. And I actually got curious enough about it that I went on there and did a donation under Gray Rifle Coffee under my own name just to prove that you can put down whatever the fuck you want to. Yeah, it'd be a great psychological operation to Don just paper something like that. Because you could paint a picture that whoever you are targeting now has to fight uphill to defend. And people forget that there's like $55,000 on Win Red from BRCC that, like, that's left out of the conversation. Evan donated 500 bucks to Tulsi one time, who, by the way, is now a Republican. And.

[Greg Putnam]

And Fantastic.

[Andy Stumpf]

And the dni.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah. And so you guys know. I mean, you guys know in it, it's not necessarily even a reflection of you going like, oh, we. You're like, hey, you're probably feel the same way, right? You're like, hey, if you want a great cup of coffee, the doors. It doesn't say on the door. You can't come in, depending on how you vote. Right. Like, we don't ask. I'm sure you don't either. Like, we've never said to an employee.

[Andy Stumpf]

Ask at the terminal.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah, yeah. And then if they say take their card. Yes.

[Andy Stumpf]

Before we make this. Who'd you vote for? Yeah, no, we don't do that.

[Greg Putnam]

Exactly. And you'd be a lunatic if.

[Andy Stumpf]

Be fun to do for like a Friday.

[Greg Putnam]

It'd be funny. And. But from a business perspective, you would go under. Exactly. And so it was just like one of the. And obviously that was their intention. And I think again, for us, we just said, you know, hey, this who we are. This is what we do.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

This is what our focus is. It hasn't changed. You can look back at. You can go back and listen to our first podcast. And what I'm saying is the same, right? Like, we haven't changed our goal. We haven't changed our. What we do. We've gotten a lot better at it. We've gotten a lot more efficient at it. We've done a lot in a short period of time in an industry that traditionally, you know, it's. It's. I say all the time, it's like building pyramids because it just. You have to have your. You're building reputation in quality and consistency that just. It takes time to. To do that. And we've done that now. And I will say this for every person we. Customer that. That we lost during that time, we had customers that strengthened their numbers and relationships with us. And now, like, we're not going back to those other places and going like, hey, you. Like. Like, we're like, hey, we pre. Al.

[Andy Stumpf]

It sorts itself.

[Greg Putnam]

It does. And you just have to be patient enough and just. Just know that, you know, your. Your quality and what you're doing is there and stay true to, like, who you are. And what you do and, and it does sort itself out, but it's frustrating when you have people. I mean, I can't even. I could. We could.

[Andy Stumpf]

You can't engage in it. You just gotta let it go.

[Greg Putnam]

We could do two more podcasts about dumb stuff that people said to me, my wife, Tim's wife, I'm sure to him as well, where, you know, you're just like, what are you talking about? Like, what are you. Are you serious right now? And they're like, well, we would never buy this from you. And you're like, okay.

[Andy Stumpf]

Like, have you considered we don't want you as a customer?

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah. And eventually you get to that point where you're just kind of like, okay, cool. Then, like, just go someplace else and that's perfectly fine. And once. You know what's really funny, though, like, literally that the day after the election, it was like it never happened. And, and it was just completely back to. We haven't heard one thing about it since. Not one person has been like, you.

[Andy Stumpf]

Know, real soon, what's he elected for? Four years?

[Greg Putnam]

Six.

[Andy Stumpf]

Well, four years from now you'll start.

[Greg Putnam]

We'll hear it again. But that's all right. We'll be like, for the six years. Six years Senate. Yep, yep. Yeah, that's a big one. Like, to come into for your first go round, the weight of that campaign, you know, the, I mean, they, I mean, they were, they knew it too. And I mean, he came in to the. I mean, for real for his first elected position in any capacity, you know, and I think at the end of the day, right, like, you just. And you guys know those with the, you know, you, you stand by the people you support. And it's not necessarily based on, you know, what, you know, what, how do they used to vote or what? It's like, are they a good person? Are they in line with the values of what we're doing? Are they trying to do a good job? And you support those people, you support your friends and you just, you, you gotta, you just gotta. You know, but it's, it is not easy to do that. Like, on that, it got easier to do it the longer you did it, because there was nothing you could do about it either. Like, I finally got to the point where I'm like, like, it doesn't matter what we. It matters what we do. It doesn't really matter what we say. And we don't have any control over what's coming next anyway. But then you look at the people, they're pulling out of the woodwork. And you're like, okay, so these are like, you're not talking varsity level people coming out and going. And we had just as many people that stood up for us, especially in the ranching and agriculture space. Like, we had just as many. Like, really? I mean, the people that. That you want on your team were coming out and, you know, speaking on Tim's behalf. Speaking on our behalf.

[Andy Stumpf]

Well, the fake rancher narrative I don't think would work again because it didn't work the first time.

[Greg Putnam]

It didn't.

[Andy Stumpf]

So they'd have to take a different angle.

[Greg Putnam]

Correct. And when it fell flat, it was funny because then they stopped going in that direction pretty clearly. And then they started hitting other things.

[Andy Stumpf]

And I wonder what they'll go with next.

[Greg Putnam]

I don't know. Well, at least he'll have, like. And not that they all. They. They really care, but he'll have a track record now of policy in votes and things. And. And they were just so desperate in trying to keep their guy in that they'd have done and said anything to make that happen. And, you know, the. That was the funniest part. I'm like, you can easily find out out, like, especially in that space. Like. Like, we've been out. It's not like we. We don't do anything like, where we're like, oh, we've never. Like, we're pretty public about, you know, what we do, how we do it, and. And. And also the fact that, like, you know, we're not perfect. Like, we're figuring it out. We're changing things, we're learning. But, you know, we. We want to. To. We've always been very transparent and honest about who we are and what we do. And so it was just funny because it's like, you. Anybody could go on with five minutes.

[Andy Stumpf]

That's where you're fucked up.

[Greg Putnam]

Exactly. It is. And that's what I learned. I was like, you can't expect. And then you just got to go, like, all right, cool. Yeah, that's just.

[Andy Stumpf]

What city do you guys ship from if people order?

[Greg Putnam]

So we actually work. We've got kind of. We tried doing distribution ourself. That was not the right. Right way to go.

[Andy Stumpf]

You don't like packing boxes with dry ice?

[Greg Putnam]

No. And at the volume we were doing it, we quickly were like, this is unsustainable.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah, let's go ahead and source this.

[Greg Putnam]

So, yeah, so we have. We've got two programs we work with. There's a company called crowd cow that you basically can just go to our website and then click by Beef and it kicks you over to their page. But you can build boxes independently there. They've actually got four now. They've got. They've got shipping facilities out of Oregon, California, Dallas and Pennsylvania.

[Andy Stumpf]

Okay.

[Greg Putnam]

And so you order usually within like 36, 48 hours.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

On your door. Yep. And they're a really cool company. Like they're like very tech based, very efficient in how they do that.

[Andy Stumpf]

That's what you need for that section of the business.

[Greg Putnam]

A hundred percent. I mean it's you. You got to be good at. You got to know like what you're good at and. Or what you want to be good at and what you don't. Right. They've been a fantastic partner. We've been working with them for a year. They're great on like marketing stuff. They're great at. We go like, hey, we want to do this, we want to do that. They're super good in the way that that works. Just kind of like the timing and stuff for our business. It works really well. And then we're also working with a guy that is doing kind of a veteran coalition, Ballard Provisions. He's calling that. And he's doing more of a like shares where if you wanted to buy like an eighth or a quarter or half, he's doing more of like a volume based thing. And people can check that out as well if that's what they're. You know, it really just depends on kind of how your buying style is because you could do a subscription model and. And then, you know, like I was saying, we. We're in some. We're in a. We have a partnership with a market in Bozeman that people can go to.

[Andy Stumpf]

I've seen your guys stuff on the menus there.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah. And then we're in a lot of restaurants now and. And we've had some, you know, in our kind of next step is. Is. Is you know, probably even expanding that portion of it a little bit. And what's cool is people come to Montana and you know, they have a good experience. They get 100% Montana beef experience and then they can go to wherever they're at.

[Andy Stumpf]

Same thing on the doorstep.

[Greg Putnam]

Yep, exactly.

[Andy Stumpf]

Michael wanted me to ask this. He was too afraid to. He wanted to know what you guys do with the assholes. He likes onion rings.

[Greg Putnam]

Sure. I will actually ask.

[Andy Stumpf]

He was wondering could he package of that.

[Greg Putnam]

So believe it or not, like all that stuff.

[Andy Stumpf]

Welcome, Michael.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah, thank you so much. They have a. Believe it or not, they've got A home for everything. And you go to these processing plants.

[Andy Stumpf]

And leave nothing to waste.

[Greg Putnam]

Nothing. No, it's amazing. You go to these like, these, like larger, you know, mid sized processing plants. And I mean, it is. It's cr. Like when these cattle start coming through, it is.

[Andy Stumpf]

I'm telling you. I think that they're. It's an O ring. It's an onion ring of some kind. Somewhere not called an onion ring.

[Greg Putnam]

Sure. It's got to be something.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

So there's got to be a need for.

[Andy Stumpf]

What I need is a 1 pound bag delivered to Michael's house.

[Greg Putnam]

Okay, well, we can just get his. Get his address and get his. Nobody's getting my address. No, no, I know your address.

[Andy Stumpf]

It's fine.

[Greg Putnam]

No, you don't.

[Andy Stumpf]

I know where you work Monday through Thursday.

[Greg Putnam]

He moved. Yeah. Yeah. No, man, it's been super fun and like doing this, you know, like, kind of seeing the vertical integration. We've learned so much about the business as a whole just by having to go through that process. Oh, I bet it makes you realize how important each one of those levels is.

[Andy Stumpf]

That fulfillment is two businesses in and of itself.

[Greg Putnam]

A hundred percent. And to do it in a way where, you know, it just. You get to a certain volume where you can't. Can't.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

And once we. We tried do. So our whole thing was, you know, it obviously takes, you know, a fair amount of time to. To get kind of ready to where you're processing them. My biggest thing was how do you have a customer base standing by prior to that so that you're moving through that product?

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

You know, the, the kind of. The saying in beef is you either sell it or you smell it. So once it's in the freezer. Yeah.

[Andy Stumpf]

It's not going anywhere.

[Greg Putnam]

It's not going anywhere. And so, so we had done a good job of building a customer base so that when we had product, we had people ready to buy. However, we were not prepared for the fulfillment side of what that took. Trying to do that on our own. And we did it for a bit and then quickly realized we needed to find a professional.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah, find a specialist.

[Greg Putnam]

Specialist. And then also shipping from Montana, super expensive.

[Andy Stumpf]

We are kind of in the middle of fucking nowhere.

[Greg Putnam]

Middle of nowhere.

[Andy Stumpf]

You specifically, your ranch is in the middle of fucking nowhere.

[Greg Putnam]

And so now we have people on like those different coasts. It's centralized. We can get stuff to people super easy. And in then working with those partners, it's been great because. Let them handle that. We, you know, we focus now on Putting like the best quality beef we can in the package on developing, you know, the females that come back into our program that we sell on other people's programs and really just focusing on building out that consistency. And that's the biggest thing. I mean, there's a lot of people, you know, online that, like this, you know, you know how it is. They, they like to go, oh yeah, we do the same thing and yeah, we do this, but, you know, and, and they're not being entirely accurate about how that looks. And when you actually do a true start to finish program, you, you quickly realize that each one of those phase lines is like, it's, it's. I, I talk about this bunch like it's, you know, the links in the chain. It, it goes both ways, right? So like, if you don't have, you could put the best cattle ever in stakes in the freezer. If you don't have customers to buy it, it doesn't matter. Or you could have too many customers and not enough cattle. And then there's a disparity there. Right. And you're, you quickly realize that in this, you have to, especially for us, part of that local, you know, process is the fact that like, you have to have committed partners that, that are going to, you know, buy and use your product. And ultimately we learned on that end is like, you have to have quality and consistency. You can't. Restaurants, you can't, you can't have it one month and then not the next month. Right. Even people online, like, they'll go someplace else. And when you're competing against these really.

[Andy Stumpf]

Large ciscos, US Foods, click away from your competition now.

[Greg Putnam]

100%.

[Andy Stumpf]

It's not a drive to a different store.

[Greg Putnam]

No. You're just, oh, I'll go somewhere else.

[Andy Stumpf]

Forgotten, never to return.

[Greg Putnam]

Yep. And so your customer acquisition costs. Right. Like, like you just. And that's why you start. And it's funny, like, it's kind of one of those things where sometimes it's annoying, but other times you're like, you see people out there, like literally just word for word copying what you're saying and doing.

[Andy Stumpf]

It's okay.

[Greg Putnam]

No, it's actually great because you're going like, hey, you're doing something right. And as long as you can keep those and you realize that you're, your consistency is going to be a lot different than somebody else's because you've put that much like time, effort and thought into it. And that's something. And similar to, you know, making like special ops, right? Where you go, you know, oh, we need more guys, we need more seals. We need more of this. Right. If you don't have the bonus, then you're never going to get them. But no different than, as you start to increase in quantity, you can't have a slip in quality. A lot of companies make a big mistake in the beef side, where they've got a really good product, and then basically that product gets diluted because they try to fill something that they can't. And we've been really strategic about how we've built that out to the point where we're like, hey, we're not taking more customers, you know, until this point. Right. And that's all. You know, again, like, all it takes is one bad cup of coffee. Right. Like, one bad experience.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah. And onto the next. Onto the next, never to come back.

[Greg Putnam]

Yep.

[Andy Stumpf]

What do you want to close it out with? I get you back on the road back to Bozeman. Been out for two and a half hours.

[Greg Putnam]

One thing I do, other than your opening today, your cold bore, your Cold boy with Jimmy Watson, was what we opened with. I don't remember his dick getting stuck in the belt sander.

[Andy Stumpf]

He. I mean, I'm not going to say who gave me the beta on that. You know what I mean?

[Greg Putnam]

So I know that. And I did confess to him after that.

[Andy Stumpf]

He was like, how in the. Did you know that? Like, small world, dude.

[Greg Putnam]

Small world.

[Andy Stumpf]

Small world. And also, how many stories of people getting their dick stuck in a belt sander are there?

[Greg Putnam]

Zero. And you said to me, you were like, I am opening with that. What I thought was so great was, like, you know, like, you guys had met, you know, with a little bit of friction.

[Andy Stumpf]

Contentiously. Ever.

[Greg Putnam]

Sure. Yeah. And that started it off for such a great, great conversation. Yeah.

[Andy Stumpf]

He never Totally.

[Greg Putnam]

No. Amazing. No. But it was such a great. Like, he. It was almost like this, like. Like. But like, it just started with such a great. And then you guys had. That was an amazing podcast. And that was the funniest because you were like. You told me that. I was, like, thinking afterwards, I'm like. I'm like, there's no way he's coming out hot with that.

[Andy Stumpf]

No, straight out with it.

[Greg Putnam]

Straight out with it. And it was actually funny. I found the picture of him with the T shirt that we had gotten, and I sent it to him, and he was like, this is fantastic.

[Andy Stumpf]

But anyway, I had to tell nearly an unbelievable story.

[Greg Putnam]

Insane.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah.

[Greg Putnam]

Insane story. Yeah, it was. Yeah. Crazy. Just crazy.

[Andy Stumpf]

For people who are interested, go back to the episode with Jimmy Watson. We open with it.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah, you're welcome. And Jimmy and I were at STVs together for a number of years and worked together, and I'm super happy to see, like, how well he's doing.

[Andy Stumpf]

And he probably didn't fit well into an stv.

[Greg Putnam]

No, he's a big boy.

[Andy Stumpf]

He's a big boy.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah, he's a real big boy. And. And like I said, they don't have any. They don't give you any.

[Andy Stumpf]

It's like a compression sack. You get it in there, you'll get it in there.

[Greg Putnam]

Don't worry. Don't worry. And that's for the. The seating of the amount of time, you know. But no, that was great. I did have to mention that to you because that was.

[Andy Stumpf]

I love the fact I forgot you were the one who gave me that bait.

[Greg Putnam]

I love the fact that you just fired right out like that. And then he was like, what? And that was like, I do. That story. I'll never forget when he. When that doctor's like, hell, you know, was it Whatever, like 3 16th or a half? And he's like, doesn't matter. And I remember him telling me the story right after, and I'm like, that is really funny that the guy asked you that.

[Andy Stumpf]

But also, was it a 316 or.

[Greg Putnam]

I don't. You know, he never actually answered that, to be honest. To be that. But yeah, that shit was great. But no, other than that. Thank you. I appreciate it.

[Andy Stumpf]

Well, where can people buy your stuff?

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah, so you can get our stuff. Go to www.littlebeltcattleco.com. you can find us on Instagram.

[Andy Stumpf]

Do you sell pink cups and sweatshirts?

[Greg Putnam]

We do.

[Andy Stumpf]

Perfect.

[Greg Putnam]

We do. The notorious Pink hoodie is on there. We sell coffee cups still. We actually, you know, a lot of people came out in support, and we're buying those like crazy. So what's really funny was their ploy actually helped us out. Yeah, yeah, it was great. We made a lot of jokes out of it, and that was pretty entertaining. I wanted to keep that ball rolling, but my wife was like, this is Rinnet's course.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah, it might be better for him if you let it go a little bit, too.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And we.

[Andy Stumpf]

After he won, it's kind of like, that's the best. Fuck you.

[Greg Putnam]

Anyway, that was the greatest, like, for all of it, right? But, yeah, no, we got great merch. We got T shirts, we. We got sweatshirts. We got. You know, it's funny, last time I was on, it kind of happened again. But, like, I came home, my wife does, like, works for the company and does a lot of her marketing and whatever, and she's like, you didn't talk about little belt until like the last five minutes. You and Andy just talked about like SEAL team shit.

[Andy Stumpf]

Yeah, we just did that again. Sorry.

[Greg Putnam]

Yeah, yeah. And I was like. And she's like, you didn't even wear. I was like. So this time I was like, all right, I got a hat on, I got a sweatshirt on. Yeah. And then we can talk about stuff and. But no, check us out. And we, we super appreciate it, everybody that, that supported us through the whole deal. We're, we're really looking forward to doing this deal with Black Rifle and, you know, just getting more access out there and just getting our word out there. And again, if you're, you know, if you're supporting us producers, you're helping, you know, keep that, that system going. And it's really important right now. And I think it's even being highlighted more. You know, these different tariffs and different things and the ability for America to continue to feed its, you know, its citizens. Right is super important. And we just feel super proud to be playing a very small role in that and just doing the best job we can to do it right. Cool.

[Andy Stumpf]

Right on, man.

[Greg Putnam]

Hell yeah.

[Andy Stumpf]

Later.

[Greg Putnam]

Thanks. Marketing is hard, but I'll tell you a little secret. It doesn't have to be. Let me point something out. You're listening to a podcast right now, and it's great. You love the host. You seek it out and download it. You listen to it while driving, working out, cooking, even going to the bathroom. Podcasts are a pretty close companion. And this is a podcast ad. Did I get your attention? You can reach great listeners like yourself with podcast advertising from Libsyn Ads. Choose from hundreds of top podcasts offering host endorsements or run a pre produced ad like this one across thousands of shows. To reach your target audience in their favorite podcasts with Libsyn Ads, go to libsynads. Com. That's Libsyn Ads. Com Today.