About Podcast

Scott Jensen liquidated his 401k, maxed out a HELOC, and spent six years burning through 

his corporate savings to build a backpacking company. He's in Costco, Scheels, Walmart, 

Macy's, and Amazon. And he's still almost out of money.

Scott Jensen is the founder of Near Zero — a company on a mission to demystify backpacking 

with a complete, bundled, patented kit that gets you trail-ready in 30 minutes. He spent 15 years 

in corporate supply chain at Honeywell, Tyco Electronics, and Carlisle, learned Mandarin Chinese, 

lived in China as an expat with five kids, and used every bit of it to build something no one else 

could easily copy.

What he covers:

→ Starting a snow cone business at age 8, making $20/hour with a hand-cranked machine — then saving $500 to upgrade to electric

→ Becoming a balloon artist at 15 after a classmate said he was making $30/hour on weekends

→ Working for free for an import-export mentor who told him: "Go work for corporate first, then come back to me"

→ Honeywell sponsoring him through Thunderbird — the #1 international business school in the world

→ Living in China with five kids as an expat from 2018 to 2020, then evacuating when Covid hit

→ Quitting his director-level job in 2021 with zero retail experience and all-in on Near Zero

→ The Dean backpack: named after his dad, 11 prototypes, an 80-page tech pack, three years of development before the first sale

→ Getting into Scheels, Walmart, Macy's, Amazon, Boy Scouts of America, and Costco — all while burning personal savings

→ Raising $100K through a SAFE on WeFunder, with a $100 minimum investment for future equity

→ Why his Chinese supply chain background creates barriers to entry nobody can easily copy

→ The cash crunch every founder hits — and what Josh James (Omniture, sold to Adobe) says about how to get through it

→ Learning Mandarin on a mission to Taiwan after expecting to go Spanish-speaking — and how that single surprise assignment changed his entire career

🔗 CONNECT WITH STU

Instagram: @stu

Website: https://startupswithstu.com

📌 CHAPTERS

00:00 – What "Near Zero" means and Scott's moon landing

03:00 – 15 years in corporate: Honeywell, Tyco Electronics, Carlisle, and living in China

07:00 – Snow cones at 8, balloon art at 15, palm trees, vending machines, wedding videos

11:00 – The decision to quit: depleting the 401k and maxing the HELOC

14:00 – What Near Zero is: 100+ SKUs, the Dean backpack, and the all-in-one bundle

18:30 – How he built the Dean: 11 prototypes, 80-page tech pack, three years of development

23:00 – Getting into Scheels, Costco, Walmart, and Amazon — and the cash flow problem that followed

27:00 – Raising on WeFunder: $100 minimum, SAFE structure, investor perks including a backpacking trip

31:00 – The barriers to entry: patents, supply chain complexity, and why big brands won't copy this easily

35:00 – Stu's advice: focus on sales, build the right team, treat investor money as sacred

39:00 – Taiwan mission, Mandarin Chinese, and how a devastating assignment became a career launchpad

43:00 – What's next for Near Zero

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