We had the good fortune of connecting with Ferdinand Retanubun and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Ferdinand, what’s the most important lesson your business/career has taught you?
I think the most important lesson that my business has taught me so far, is that being your-authentic self, will go along way. For example when I meet a client or just a random person interested with my product, I like to start with a smile before introducing myself. I believe that being my authentic self, a person who is fun, easygoing and have lot of positive vibes or good energy, people can feel that. Good positive energy will attract a similar vibes. I have gotten a lot of feedbacks from clients and I believe the most important feedback that I have gotten so far is that people genuinely appreciate me for being me.

What should our readers know about your business?
My business started about one year ago. I have always wanted to start my own business and we were blessed with the news that my wife was pregnant with our first child. I told myself that this is the right time to start a business. I want to have the flexibility of not working 9-5 job and that’s how the business started.

What set my business apart from others is that I am genuinely care about good quality products, reasonable pricing and great customer service. My business started in the middle of a pandemic. Even before the pandemic, I have always seen that there is a lot of issues within the industry. A few of those issues are products availability, exuberantly high prices and severely lack of good customer Service. I believe that with my public servant background, I can at least fix the customer service issues or the lack of it.

There are a few things that I am most proud of about my business. Good quality products, availability of the products and great customer service. First, I have handpicked the products that I want to sell in the US market, still do my own Quality Control, we provide a generous return policies and great warranty to back up our products. Second, with supply chain issues and not having products available, many clients are left hanging with long lead times or 6-8 months of of just wasted time and waiting for products. My business we strive on providing products with no lead times. No lead times mean, there is no waiting on production times with my products to the end user customer. We will always have our products in stock and ready to ship out to our clients. There is not a single company in our industry that can match that. Thirdly, providing great customer service have to start with me. I treat my clients just like when I was working as a first responder. I treat them with respect and treat them how I want to be treated. Respect their time, being honest and always thanking them for allowing me to provide a service to them.

I have learned many lessons along this journey. One important lesson that I get so far is that do all things with CARE. A lot of people just do not care. People come to work just to collect paycheck and not thinking about how their actions can have impacts not just to my products but to the clients that they are serving. For examples, one of our product is Lightweight Rooftop Tent (RTT). Since this is an oversized products, we use 3rd party LTL services. Basically we use trucking company to deliver the RTT because it is big item. There are some instances that I was able to convince the client to purchase the products, everything went smoothly and then during the delivery day, the item was severely damage (mind you that we pay a hefty amount of money to ship out his RTT and they’re sitting on a pallet). There should be no excuse of why the RTT is damage. It is all about carelessness, not caring one bit about the impact that it can especially toward a new small businesses. As a small business, every margin is calculated and for someone to deliver my product damage because of carelessness is just blasphemy.

What I want the world to know about my company and I, is that I genuinely care about the products I am selling and customer serve to me is as important as the products itself.

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?
I am a foodie and will travel for amazing food. I actually have the list of all of the restaurant that I had tried and considered them to be worthy of my list. If I have to show my best friend the best time ever, I would take them all around the bay area. The itinerary will go like this:

Early morning drive to Half moon bay to see the sunrise. I will take them either the pier or a secret hidden spots with direct access to the beach. We would then enjoy the smell and breeze of the ocean. Next, by the pier there’s a small coffee shops that make a nice latte then I will take him/her to one of my favorite breakfast place, The granola house. I would order their freshly made Belgium waffles with granola and chocolate drizzles. We then will go up toward San Francisco to visit the city and have a lunch by the fishermanwarf. Before lunch, we can visit some cool spots like the COIT tower, the golden gate bridge and etc. If its during the baseball season, I would take him or her to see the San Francisco Giants. Take them to some good o’ baseball. Have some crabsandwhich and beer at the park. We end the night with some nice ramen spot. There is only one Michelin star ramen shop in the San Francisco (Mensho Tokyo Ramen) if we have room for dessert, I would take him or her to a nice stroll by the forth mason to get some Ghiradelli ice cream to end the night.

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?
My first shoutout will be to my rock, the mother of my children and my wife: Ray Y. She makes me a better person everyday, she put our needs first before hers, and I can not thank her enough for all of that she has done for us. I love her for being who she is, an independent, strong will and smart women.

My second shoutout will be to my father: Hubert. We immigrated to the US some 22 years ago. I was about 11 years old at that time. My father came to the US so that we can have a better life, better opportunity and better future. If it weren’t for his guts, determinations and perseverance, I would not know where I would be today. I have also gotten my work ethics from my father. I used to see him get up at 3 AM to go to work everyday sometimes even on the weekends.

Website: inspired overland.com

Instagram: inspired_overland

Facebook: inspired overland

Other: email: inspiredoverland@gmail.com contact: 925-315-5655

Image Credits
KD.SIX ATEMOFFROAD BEERONIMO MICHAELTAINGG