The Important Things in Life

Last night, Friday night, we had a great opportunity to go and listen to the founder of OGIO. He was just released from being a bishop in the same stake that Heather's dad is a bishop of a singles ward and the singles ward had a small dinner and invited him to come and talk. Any event which includes food is usually worth it to me so we decided to go. We had enchiladas, which I love, and then Mike Pratt, the founder of OGIO, spent an hour and a half sharing how the company of OGIO and his life. He talked about how it got started and how it has been a part of his life and how the gospel has made everything worth it. It was really neat to hear a millionaire talk about how he felt all he has is really nothing and he loves the gospel. He shared how he has always been an inventor and designer and how he knew early on that was his niche, and his strength. Out of high school he had a really good insurance job but he new it wasn't for him and he would make it in that kind of career. As a 19 year old he designed a pop open cup holder for cars, since they didn'thave them in cars in the 80's, and how he flew to Hong Kong by himself and found sources to build it and everything, then how Coke and Mcdonalds both talked to him about using his new pop out cup holder. Then after a mission and getting married he was at the gym one day and wondered why duffle bags didn't fit in the gym lockers, you always had to stuff them in and stand them up funny, so he designed a rectangle taller bag to fit in a locker, got a loan from someone in his ward to start manufacturing them and within 2 years they were selling 8 million dollars worth of locker bags, and that was the start of OGIO. Since then as we all know, OGIO has grown to a huge company with lots of different bags and packs and golf bags all with different little features like the magnitized duffle bag handles and things like that that have been creating by Mike and have patents. After talking about his business and his start he talked about how as a young man he wasn't a member of the church and how he found it, went on a mission and it has made life worth it. He talked about people he knows who are owners of huge million dollar companies and they have lost everything, but for him the church has been a solid platform and all the inventions and patents he has really arent what life is all about.

I am now a big OGIO fan!