Work-at-Home Grit: Dr. Rob Yonover on Turning a Simple Plastic Idea into Life-Saving Military Gear

Tim Melanson: [00:00:00] Hello and welcome to today’s episode of the Work at Home Rockstar podcast. Excited for today’s episode. I got someone who’s been working from home for over 30 years. That’s so cool. He got me beaten big time. He’s the founder and CEO of Sea Rescue Corporation, and what he does is he invents and produces survival gear for the military and civilians.

Super excited to be rocking out today with Dr. Rob Yonover. Hey, Rob, you ready to rock?

Dr Rob Yonover: Absolutely, Tim. Thanks a lot. Thanks for having me

Tim Melanson: Awesome. Well, we always start off here on a good note. So tell me a story of success that we can be inspired by

Dr Rob Yonover: All right, well, I was screwing around with a piece of plastic on my patio. It’s now approved by the military, used worldwide, saved lives. It’s o- under the ass of every astronaut on SpaceX. So that’s like rags to riches in the work-at-home story.

Tim Melanson: Wow

Dr Rob Yonover: yeah, that’s the home run story. I have a lot of singles and strikeouts too.

Tim Melanson: Well, I mean, hey, a home run is a big one, right?

Dr Rob Yonover: Absolutely. It, it absolutely is, and then the best part about it is it saved someone’s lives, and they thanked me. So I [00:01:00] guess the, the analogy for bands, it’s like a triple encore and people all saying they love you, and they’re gonna live by you the rest of their lives, like you’re Bob Dylan or something

Tim Melanson: Yeah, when you make something that’s super valuable like that too, I mean, a- and, uh, you know, all of us in our business, we’re trying to solve problems and help people, right? Uh, but saving lives is a big one, isn’t it?

Dr Rob Yonover: Absolutely. I mean, I, I’m a PhD scientist. I worked on volcanoes, but I s- always felt that need to do something that mattered really, ’cause it’s easier to bust your ass for something that matters. And make no mistake, working at home is not easy. Everyone thinks it’s easy ’cause you wear your favorite T-shirt and your underwear, but shit, you gotta k- kick ass and outwork everyone, and you’re, you’re looking at the king of outworking everyone

Tim Melanson: Yeah, well, I mean, that’s just it. Uh, you’ve gotta be self-motivated too. I mean, it’s… No one’s looking over your shoulder to make sure you’re getting work done, right? You gotta, you gotta get it done

Dr Rob Yonover: especially, especially in, in Hawaii, the discipline is, is key, and I- living here in Hawaii, you want- it’s so easy to wanna [00:02:00] screw off. The weather’s beautiful, the waves are great. So that self-discipline is a character. That’s the first question. If you don’t have that, you can’t work at home.

If you need someone to crack the whip on you, you can’t do this. So just be honest with yourself. If you’re not disciplined and motivated and, and really almost rigid in your, in your work ethic, then this is not for you. But for everyone else, it’s the only way. This is, this is the only way to work and have a real life

Tim Melanson: Well, yeah. Well, I, I know for me, I remember when I was working in an office, like, I was just frustrated all the time that everybody else seemed to be slacking off, right?

Dr Rob Yonover: Ex- exactly

Tim Melanson: I think that’s probably a good sign that you should be working from home. If you’re, if you’re the type of person that just wants to be producing all the time, and you’re just like, "I, I, I feel weird just sitting around and, like, hanging out at the water cooler," ’cause that’s what everybody’s doing, well, you know, working from home might be the right thing for you then, right?

Dr Rob Yonover: Well, it’s motivation. You’re creating your own things, just like a band creating their own song. You, you wanna cover [00:03:00] stuff or you wanna create your own? If you can create, you wanna be a creator, and if you’re working for someone else working on their stuff, it’s very frustrating ’cause you know you have all these great things in you and you don’t wanna lose them, and you don’t, you don’t wanna go to your death bed without trying.

I mean, I’m all about trying. Failing is fine, but trying. If you don’t try, that’s really a sad thing and, and, and on many level, and that’s why when I talk to people about starting their own business and working from home, I, I do a simple math equation. 128 hours a week, 40 hours a week to work, ’cause you need da- you need, you need to qu- keep your day job for, from the beginning so you can quit your day job.

So if you have 40 away from 128, that still leaves 88 hours. 48 to sleep, 40 to sleep, still leaves 48. So you can work nights and weekends on your passion, on your thing that, that inspires you to enable you to make it through the 9:00 to 5:00 in the early days till, till you [00:04:00] can’t, till you, can you succeed on your passion, then you can quit your day job.

So that’s really critical, I think

Tim Melanson: Yeah, and, and I think that you make a good point because I think some people, like, worry about maybe burning themselves out, you know, the burning the candle at both ends. But in, in my experience, I find that it’s, it, it fills you more when you’ve got that little passion going on at nighttime, right?

Okay, fine, you might be losing sleep, but you’re getting excited, right?

Dr Rob Yonover: Exactly. And, and I, I, for, for the inventing world, I like to keep switching gears from project to project, ’cause then you come back with fresh eyes, and each gear you switch, maybe it’s sleeping, maybe it’s enjoying nature, maybe it’s working your day job, maybe it’s working, working on invention A or invention B or invention C.

But I find that when I come back to things, it’s like I’m rested. That sector of my brain is rested and I’m ready to attack the new sector. So I think it’s really healthy. I’m not saying working a day job is healthy, but paying the bills and not having to worry, I mean, you have to take [00:05:00] worry out of the equation.

If you can’t cover your ass and your bills, you’re, you’re not gonna be creative enough and, and successful enough to do it. You, you can’t… You don’t have the right attitude. So you, you have to get rid of that pressure

Tim Melanson: Yep. Yeah, the, the pressure. A- and people can smell that

desperation on you too when you’re not paying your bills.

Dr Rob Yonover: Exactly. You gotta be able to walk away from deals and offers. If they know you’re desperate, they’re gonna take advantage of you, and, and that’s not where you wanna be

Tim Melanson: Yeah. Yeah, and, and, uh, yeah, I, I totally agree with that. That’s, that’s amazing. So now let’s talk a little bit about the, that failure, that, that bad note, right? Because I mean, hey, you’ve been doing this for a long time, and people will, like, be scared to fail. And I mean, the bottom line is that we’re all gonna make some mistakes here and there.

So I’m wondering, can you share with me something that, uh, we can learn from? Like, something that people will just go, "Wow, I can’t believe he’s still doing this now."

Dr Rob Yonover: Well, I mean, you go back 30, 40 years ago when I thought about this, this rescue streamer idea that my wife was like, "You know, get a real [00:06:00] job. Stop playing with that piece of plastic." You know, I had to, I had to confront her and her family first about, you know, "You’re a smart guy with a PhD. You should be making millions of dollars.

You should be providing. We have little babies," and all, all this stuff, and I’m failing because no one’s em- embracing it. So I, I couldn’t… Especially something new. When you start a new category, in the signaling world they had smoke flares and sea dye, all of a sudden this guy from Hawaii comes with a piece of plastic because once you unfurl that, they can see you forever.

It’s clearly the right idea, and it’s been adopted now. But to, to get something new takes a long time and a lot of nos and a lot of get out of here. And something simple like this, this is on half a billion dollar aircraft, like SpaceX or F-16s. I mean, they don’t want a piece of simple plastic. It’s not that simple, but the premise and the material is.

So I, I think that you can’t… You have to internally have your own meter that [00:07:00] says, "I’m proud of this. I believe in this. I don’t give a shit what you say. I believe in this, and you, you’re gonna be in that category of I told you so. Okay. Okay, asshole, you don’t think this is worth a shit? You’re going in the back of the line.

Thank you." But I’m a polite pain in the ass. I will bug you forever if you have something I want. So, and I’m very polite. You, you blow me off and say, "This is worthless," I’m not gonna get mad at you. I’m gonna say, "Thank you. I don’t think you really understand, but thank you for your time. Bye." And then come back again on them.

You know, don’t, don’t burn any bridge, ’cause these guys that say no first may come back and you may need a yes from them later. So I’ve had so many nos that I don’t even care, and the, the truth is the more nos you field, the easier they are to deal with. You let them brush them off, brush off your back.

"Okay, you don’t want it? I don’t care." You know, and I even got it on Shark Tank, and they all, they, they all loved it, but I got five nos from them. I’m like, "Okay, well, whatever. You guys don’t like it, you’re gonna, [00:08:00] you’re the ones who are gonna be sorry about this." And it, it’s an attitude I’ve had my whole life, and it’s a tough attitude to have, ’cause it’s like overconfidence.

But you gotta pick, pick the winners. Go, go for the ones you really believe in

Tim Melanson: Yeah. Well, a- and, and that is something that a l- I think a lot of people … Look, I mean, the programming is just, "Oh, go get a big job. Go get a good job, you know, work the nine to five," all kind of that, all that stuff. So when you start to, you know, play around with this little you know, piece of plastic like you say, that, that’s real for a lot of people, going like, "I got an idea," you know?

Dr Rob Yonover: It’s best not to even tell people, truthfully. You, you work on your idea until it’s at a point when you’re ready to tell people, and, and in, in the invention world, i- i- ideally have your patents in a row, your trademarks in a row, what you need, your barriers to entry so you can go to battle publicly and release it to the media, and release it to your customers so no one will steal it from you.

So you have to build that up, and sometimes it’s best to do that privately. [00:09:00] And I, I kind of get a rush out of that, going, "Okay, I’m not showing anyone this for a while, till it’s really ready." And, and I think that… You can tell people that are close to you that you trust, but the public and regular general people, don’t tell them

Tim Melanson: Yeah. Yeah, ’cause there, there are certain people in your life that are just gonna drag down whatever, right? But, but there are other people that are inspirational too, and they, they will kind of… Like, was there somebody in your path that, like, did actually think it was a good idea and helped you?

Dr Rob Yonover: the, uh, yes. First of all, the, the idea… First, my family is supportive ’cause I come from three generations of work-at-home rock stars. My grandmother was an early doctor in this country, and she ran a practice out of her home in Chicago, believe it or not. My father started a mail order business in the ’60s, and we all worked for him.

So when I tell my parents, who were creative, artistic, and business entrepreneurial, that I’m starting something, they are supportive. I tell my in-laws, they’re like, "You’re an [00:10:00] idiot. You should be some, you know, you should be making a lot of money and work for someone on Wall Street." That’s what they think.

So it’s like you, there’s this difference there. You have to, you have to combat that. And then I had people all along say no, and then there was one Coast Guard guy, I used to send max faxes out. I don’t know if your a- audience knows what a fax machine is, but that’s how I… I used to go fishing with a fax machine for media and to the just contacts in general.

Just keep sending out hundreds of notes and trying to get media play or someone in the military or a company to look at this. And one Coast Guard guy said, and he worked for, um, I think, uh, a- An admiral or someone, he goes, "Yeah, this, this could work. This is good." He gave me the chance to look at it, and said, "Here, send me a sample."

And then they tested it, and that’s how it started to get… Ultimately went to Navy approval, and then all the m- branches of the military. So you need one yes. You need one person that’s a third-party endorsement to stand up for you. And my brother, who’s an [00:11:00] advertising guy, taught me that all these editors are sitting on their butts thinking about what to write, back in the old days when there were magazines, and it’s your job to contact them and, and that’s what I’ve been doing forever.

I am the ultimate media whore, and I, I keep working the media because when you get an article written about your technology, that is an, an de facto a third-party endorsement. I didn’t pay them for the ad, yet they’re talking about it. That’s way better than me paying for an ad, ’cause when you read an advertisement, you’re like, "Oh, this idiot says this ’cause they’re paying for it."

So it’s the same reason why in newspapers they say it’s a paid advertisement, ’cause they have to tell their readers someone’s p- someone’s writing this on their own behalf. So I’ve had the, all those noes stand out, but the, the ones that… The, the noes I forget. You gotta have a short memory, just, you know, I gu- I guess like in, in the music world, you have a bad show.

You, you can’t live on that your next show, right? You had a bad night. You gotta move on. You gotta keep, [00:12:00] keep moving forward, and keep writing your, your music. And, and it’s i- ironic, in this rockstar world, we were pool boys in Miami Beach growing up, and I’ve sold shoes, I made lounge chairs, I fixed pools. I had all these weird jobs, but the one we loved was pool boy, and one of my buddies from high school became a rockstar, Jane’s Addiction.

I don’t know if you know who Jane’s Addiction… Yeah. Yeah, Perry, Perri, Perry Farrell’s like my little brother. I taught him how to surf and go crazy in high school, so we’re still, we’re still tight. And so he started Lollapalooza, and he’s very, he was very entrepreneurial. And then my other buddy’s the mayor of Golden Beach, and he’s, like, worth hundreds of millions of dollars, and we used to sell shoes together at the shoe store in the mall.

So w- we, you know, we were never, you know, too proud to get our hands dirty. And the other irony is our little neighborhood, there was rich neighborhood, middle class, and lower, lower middle class, and we were more in the middle class. And we kinda [00:13:00] had a chip on our shoulder because the rich kids were all, they, they had cars, they had girlfriends, they had mustaches.

You know, they’d smoke cigarettes. All the shit we didn’t have, and it just kinda gave, gives you drive, man. We, we had the drive and, and it’s, it’s insatiable. I mean, you talk, those two guys I just cited, the rockstar and the mayor, they’re driving hard as d- as I am. We’re both, we’re all in our mid to late 60s, and we’re just not even, not letting up on the gas, and all three of us don’t need…

They, they especially don’t need the money, but, uh, we all have made our mark. We don’t need to be- Pushing and charging so hard, but we, we, we’re addicted to it. It’s part of our mindset

Tim Melanson: Right on. So w- when you were getting out there and, and, you know, trying to gather the fans, right? Uh, sending out all these fax machi-

Dr Rob Yonover: Yeah

Tim Melanson: there, was there like a, like an evolving strategy that you were using or was it just plain old numbers for you?

Dr Rob Yonover: Well, the, the thing was there was this thing before the [00:14:00] internet called Bacon’s Publicity Checker. It was a big fat book, and it had the editor, name of editors of every magazine and TV station in the, in the world, and it had fax numbers. So the, the strategy was to make a one-page press release and just at, at 11:01 at night in Hawaii, it was cheaper to make a long-distance phone call or fax.

So at 11:01 I would be, you know, hand typing one fax at a time, hand calling with the number. And it was like… And I’m a fisherman too. I fish and I surf, and the thing about fishing is if you have zero lines in the water, you have zero chance of catching a fish. If you have five lines in the water, which is how I troll for fish, you have five chances.

I had 100 chances. Maybe not 100. I, I would send 30 to 50 out a night. So there… A- and then what I did was it was all about getting street cred. So the Miami Herald was the first magazine or newspaper to write about the Streamer. I took that [00:15:00] article and I sent, started sending that out saying, "Look what everyone’s saying."

I kept doing that. I got Outside Magazine, Men’s Journal. I even got it in Playboy. I’ve got it everywhere. And my, my, my collection of articles about the Streamer is now thicker than the Bacon’s Publicity Checker, which I started. And, and, and it includes it, it, it’s still working. I mean, I’m on this show to get the word out organically ’cause you’re not…

I didn’t pay you. You don’t even know me. I’m just, you know, and if it’s you’re 50, 100,000 people, it doesn’t matter. I just want to get the word out, and maybe someone in your audience tells someone that tells someone that tells someone, and you just keep doing that. And I’ve been doing it forever, and I enjoy it too because I’m basically a frustrated college professor.

You know, I’m, I’m preaching my gospel, which is entrepreneurship and invention, and I think that’s, that’s the way I do it. Just keep, keep working it.

Tim Melanson: [00:16:00] Wow. Well, uh, and you know what? The mediums have changed so drastically, like, uh, from the fax machines now to the internet. Like, what do you think? Do you think it’s easier nowadays, or do you think it was harder be-

Dr Rob Yonover: I, I think it’s, it’s easier to make something that you think is good and, but the, but there’s so much noise out there, it’s harder. It’s harder to get something of quality. And, and I mean, I’m a… Like I said, I, I’m a, I’m a polite pain in the ass, but the other P in those Ps is patience. And for, for instance, Outside Magazine, I, I sent them…

I called them for three years before they wrote about it. So you can’t give up on the first no. So nowadays, I think you can create your own brand on your own social media site, but how do you get the eyeballs to get to look at it? And that’s the real challenge, and I think everyone’s trying to do that, so I actually think it’s harder.

But you gotta keep in mind, you go for ni- niche marketing. You don’t want… You know, of course [00:17:00] you want massive national, international, um, recognition, but it might be better if you have a kayak device to go to the kayak people, you know what I’m saying? Go to a smaller audience as your target, and even locally, more locally.

So wherever you live, try to get, uh, a group there, and get to a small email group of those people first. That, that’s what I would do. That’s what I do this, these days

Tim Melanson: Yeah. I think it’s probably, I think you’re right. I think it is, it is harder now. However, I think that the difference is back then you probably could throw some money at it. If, if you had a bunch of money, you probably could, you know, cut some

Dr Rob Yonover: that’s true

Tim Melanson: And now I don’t know if you can really do that. I mean, throw as much money as you wa- as you want, there’s still a bunch of noise, right?

Like, so it really is a lot of just hard work,

Dr Rob Yonover: No, it really is, and I… And that’s really the most frustrating thing, and, um, to en- encourage people to be entrepreneurs, the key is to have a product that you can make inexpensively and [00:18:00] have a margin when you sell it, and have a, have an audience that wants it. And I mean, those are not simple questions.

So the, uh, Guy Kawasaki, the guy from Apple, he’s a Hawaii guy, and he talks about if you can make something for a dollar and sell it for five, you’ve got something. You know? A- and, and to have someone want that five dollar item. So those are bo- all big ifs, but that’s the excitement of it, and, and you’re rewarded.

I mean, the beauty of it is if you are a stay-at-home rockstar, a work-at-home rockstar, you ha- you own the ultimate royalty, which is your own time, and that’s what I was taught by my ancestors, and it’s so true. I mean, I, I really… And especially just for whatever you’re doing. If you’re raising a family and you have your own time, you can be with them more.

If you’re a surfer and you have your own time, you can surf when the waves are good. If, if… It just goes on and on and on, and just the whole feeling that you’re not under someone’s thumb like you felt at the water cooler, like everyone does. It, it’s… But [00:19:00] don’t be too proud to not do that. Take that paycheck so you can, so it can fund your adventure, because the truth is it takes twice as long and twice as much money, it might even be 10X, to get something launched.

You know? And, uh, it’s really, really hard and, and it’s sad, ’cause we have all these tools to make work at home so much easier. I mean, I was fax and a phone, that’s it, and a, and a let- and the US mail. Now we have social media, Zoom call, you know, the whole thing. It’s just so much easier to get out there, but everyone’s out there, so…

And everyone thinks they’re a rockstar, and everyone thinks they’re, you know, the center of the universe. So how do, how do you burst that?

Tim Melanson: Yeah. Well, but, but then on the other hand, not everybody has really solid work ethic and you know, that drive and, you know, keep going. I mean, I, I think I heard even just with podcasts, most podcasts don’t get past three episodes. Like, you know, it just is what it is. So if you’ve got [00:20:00] the drive to keep going and keep going, keep going…

Well, I mean, ’cause I, I remember, you know, even just with musicians with making it big or, or athletes, you know, they start talking about statistics and, "Well, the chances of you succeeding are, like, really, really low." I always thought that’s kind of a, not really the right way to think about it. Okay, fine, there’s not very many people that are gonna succeed, but I’m gonna guess that the ones that do are the ones that work the hardest,

Dr Rob Yonover: I’d like to s- I, exactly, I’d like to see that, uh, statistic recast with the real hard work discipline guys that put in the hours, years, that how many of those succeed? I’m sure the number goes way up,

Tim Melanson: Oh yeah, absolutely. ‘Cause you’re comparing them to people who are just, you know, moonlighting or were just doing whatever, you know?

Dr Rob Yonover: Well, that’s, that was the frustration. When I started doing outreach to inventors, and I get this all the time, "I got this great invention. Here, look at this. Let’s split, let’s split it and you do it. You, you bring it to market." I’m like, "No, idiot. The hardest part is bringing it to market, and I have no passion for your invention."[00:21:00]

I think the key is you have to have a passion and ownership, and I don’t mean just owning it outright. I mean, ownership in that you created it. You’re, you have to feel that to put in the long hours, or you have to feel the goal of being a work-at-home person. You, you know, you have to know how great the benefits are, ’cause that helps you with the discipline.

You know, it’s a chicken and egg thing, so

Tim Melanson: yeah. It’s funny that you say that too, ’cause in my world I b- I build websites. It’s one of my main parts of my business, and I, I… You don’t, you wouldn’t even, um, believe how many people contact me saying, "You know, I build websites. Can I just white label for you?" And I’m like, "What? Why would I do that?"

Dr Rob Yonover: Exactly

Tim Melanson: you know, the hard part is actually going out there and getting the clients, so you want, you want me to do the hard part and you’re gonna do the part that I like? Like,

Dr Rob Yonover: Exactly. Now, I, it’s, it is, it’s comical, but, you know, you gotta give, uh, credit for asking,

Tim Melanson: Yep,

Dr Rob Yonover: that, they, they had the balls to try, so that’s fine.

Tim Melanson: They did. talk a little bit about the tools. So now, hey, we’ve already talked a little bit about it ’cause they’ve, [00:22:00] they’ve improved over time, but what is it the, what is your main tool now that you use, and what, how does that differ from when you first got started?

Dr Rob Yonover: Well, ironically, the main tool is still face-to-face. And the beauty of the world now is you have- Not, not just a telephone, but you have this ability to talk. Like, I’m meeting you, I can look in your eyes. As I talk, I can tell whether you’re bored, or I have to move quickly, or re-explain something. But the biggest, uh, but the bigger tool is when are we gonna meet?

At a, a trade shows are the… Still, I used to hate them, but I love them, and it’s still the same. I hate and love trade shows, because that is the place where all the industry of whatever you’re in is there, and you can shave, I can put on a suit and tie, and I’m on an even keel with powers in my industry, and I can make a physical impression.

I can shake their hand, look them in the eye, and give them my [00:23:00] elevator pitch, and I have 30 seconds or a minute, not even, to get them impressed, to get another 30 seconds or a minute, or to get their phone number. So I still use that as the main tool and, and it’s not like I enjoy it. I do enjoy when I’m there at the trade show or at the event when I can look people in the eye and talk to them and show them hands-on this is what a streamer looks like.

It’s so powerful. So I, I still think that’s the best thing. But beside that, I, I, you know, you go with the, the marketing you can. And, and, and nowadays you do social media or, I, you know, I have an Amazon site for my streamer and, and I have this whole site there, and of course the website, the regular traditional website, but I have a website within Amazon, a store.

And my social media isn’t the greatest, and I’ve made a strategy, instead of spending money on advertisements, which can hit or miss, and in this world that I’m in, survival, people don’t give a shit about survival, [00:24:00] the consumers, ’cause they wanna buy a… You ask the typical guy when they’re going out fishing in a boat, they want more beer.

They want… They don’t care about a survival gear. The mil- the military wants it. That’s why I stuck with them. They have to be safe. And in fact, the Canadian Air Force is one of my big customers, by the way, which is really cool, ’cause they’re, they have safety down. The Europeans are big on safety, the whole US military.

So you have to find your niche, which is which one is effectively looking and receptive to things. But aside from that, I just put out stuff and just don’t go away. I mean, that, that’s the key is longevity, and that’s why the day job, as much as we hate it, is really critical. ‘Cause the whole thing for me is longevity, and I’ve been doing this 40 years, and really at the beginning everyone’s like, "Oh, that’s an interesting idea.

You’ll be gone in two years." You know, you’re not gonna compete against the Smoke, Flare, Sea Dye, the ePyrb, the big companies. But if you stay and have that staying power, people respect you just for that. And you [00:25:00] have to… It’s almost like you’re a, I hate to use this phrase, but you’re kind of like a sleeper cell.

You’re just staying back there, and I’m all about low overhead, right? I, I know I talk about the, the, the day job. The day job is to fund to keep the lights on. But you don’t want any wild spending, and too many startups spend too much money on everything. Just spend money on the basics and survive, make some money.

When you keep the… You reinvest the money, you don’t just blow it and buy a Ferrari the first time you get a, a big sale, and I think that, that’s a lot of, a lot of people make that mistake, and they don’t plan. You know, the Japanese were smart. They plan, like, 20 years out. The Americans are business guys are planning a year out, and it’s like, "No, we’re planning, we’re playing the long game."

And that’s… I’m all about the long game, and that’s, that’s been a suc- secret to my limited success

Tim Melanson: Yeah, that’s amazing. Yeah, well, a few things to unpack there. Like, I do agree that face-to-face, either on Zoom or e- like even in person, I mean, that is really [00:26:00] it. I mean, and, and I think that, uh, even more as time goes on because, you know, it’s so easy to just send out a bunch of emails or just post a bunch of things on social media.

Anybody can do that. You can get I- AI to do that now, right? So you’re gonna get an edge if you can get somebody and actually talk to them about what you’re, what you’re doing, right? So people get to know you, right?

Dr Rob Yonover: Exactly, and that’s why, that’s why the trade shows and, and associations or clubs or groups in your neighborhood even are so much better. You build relationships. You can’t build relationships with social media and emailing. And, and, but, you know, the Zoom is so effective. You really can do it… You could do it virtually now, which is fantastic, and that’s been…

And, hey, for me living in Hawaii, every, every flight is so long, I’m burnt out. I’ve been here 42 years taking these flights all over the world. I’m sick of it. Now to talk, you know, talk t- across the world real time, I, I feel like I know you now a little, you know me a little, and it just starts the basis [00:27:00] of a friendship, workshop, a collaboration.

And that’s what business is about. It is about relating to each other and seeing what their needs are. I mean, I, you know, uh, for me, I’m pretty rigid in that I have products. I’m not really a service, but I wanna learn a little about what will trigger you. Let’s say you’re a buyer potentially, what do you need and what, how can we customize the unit or, you know, whatever it might be to help you come to the point that you wanna acquire our technology to protect yourself and your people?

I mean, it, it just, it just, uh, you have to read the people, read the person, and the only way to read the person… And I did it by phone forever, and I, I can tell by the voice if someone’s getting bored, right? Or if they’re excited, you could tell. But it’s easier to have the voice and the facial expression.

So that’s… I’m all about that

Tim Melanson: Now, when it comes to, like, the cash flow and all that stuff, like, I, I mean, when- if you have a service and it’s your time, well then, okay, you could [00:28:00] probably work for free for a little while, right, to build that. But when you’ve got a product and when you’ve got a physical product and there’s some, like, real costs associated to that, how do you, like, how do you make sure that you’re gonna be making more than

Dr Rob Yonover: I know. Well, I mean, I, I am being a little misleading in this whole thing because my overall strategy was licensing, and I had licensing deal for 15 years, and I negotiated it with, with guaranteed royalties. So for 15 years, whether we sold a million dollars or a dollar worth of s- product, I got the same monthly stipend, the ma- same base level.

And if it went above, I got more. But if it went below, I still got the same. And that enabled me to invent other things, and it also enabled me to take care of my wife, who became, uh… she got in a wheelchair from multiple sclerosis. So we had little kids. I have a wife in a wheelchair. So luckily, I had this cashflow that was guaranteed, and I, I worked for the company, and I helped build [00:29:00] it.

But the, the… And also, when I wrote the licensee with my attorney, the key thing I wanted was when it’s over, the license, I want it back ’cause I’m not… This is my baby. I’m not letting it… You, you… And I even gave it in perpetuity to the licensee. But after 15 years, they, they didn’t wanna keep paying me royalties, guaranteed royalties, ’cause they were– they made a lot of money, but they just, uh, you know, it’s risky for anyone.

You have to pay based on unknown sales. So when I took it back, that… So the last 10, 12 years, I’ve been running it myself. But for 15 before that, I had a license. So, and I believe in license, but I also believe that what I did was very rare because when I licensed it, I had Navy approvals. I already had some sales.

It’s hard to get a license deal with guaranteed royalties. So to answer your question, it’s, that’s why it, it’s impossible. If you’re inventing a product, you have to have a day job. You have to [00:30:00] have a flow of cash, period, end of story. And if you have one invention or one job that you make money on, you have to keep hitting that and build the other stuff in your spare time.

So there’s no, there’s no magic thing, and I, I totally agree with you. You have to look at your overhead, and you have to say, "I have to cover my nut, and if I have to take the job and go to the water cooler and fall asleep after lunch drooling on my desk, I’ll do that." But it’s just, there’s no way around it

Tim Melanson: Yeah, it’s gotta be so tough too, ’cause y- I mean, you, you, you go through so many of those nos that it would be so difficult to keep those spirits up while you get to the point where you’re getting those yeses, right?

Dr Rob Yonover: No, exactly. And, and it’s, it’s just, uh, you really have to have tough skin or, you know, thick skin, and I, I don’t… You build it up, but it, it, it hurts. I- it still hurts when someone blows me off and says, "I, I don’t believe that. I think that thing’s worthless," or, you know… Which is totally false, and I try to counter that with testing and a- adoption and life-saving, all these things that it’s done.[00:31:00]

But you still encounter people, and even in social media, there are people, the trolls out there, people wanna shoot you down just ’cause that’s their nature. They get off on shooting you down, and that’s why, you know, I wrote some books and, and, and I thought I was gonna be more of a speaker, and I, I love doing it, but there’s always the trolls that are giving you shit, and I’m like, "You know, you don’t deserve to do it."

And I, and I kinda don’t read my reviews. You know, it’s fun to look at ’em sometimes, and I… But you know, it’s just, you can’t… That affects your thick skin ability. And, uh, and I’m, I’m a, I’m an emotional, personal guy. I, I, I do get offended easily, so I try not to even look at that. And, and I, and it’s tough. I, I mean, it’s very dangerous.

Like, the kids with social media and suicide, there’s a lot of… I, I don’t know how people do it when you’re a… I, I, we grew up with no phones. My kids grew up with flip phones only. So the new… And I have grandkids now. They’re growing up with, you know, y- you, you [00:32:00] get embarrassed or bullied by someone, and there’s pictures of you, and everyone, you think everyone hates you, and it’s embarrassing.

Gosh, that’s so, that has to be so hard on your mental psyche. And I, I really… One of my, one of my goals in life is to get people off phones, and the record will show that in 2007 when the Apple phone came out and everyone was raving about it, I was the only person I knew who said, "This is bullshit. These phones are bad, and they’re…"

And now 19 years later, they’re just as bad, if not worse. And AI, all that stuff’s worse. It’s just making people fatter and lazier and stupider. So it’s like, what, that is not what I want, and the creativity aspect is horrible too. You’re less creative. And when we were kids, if you had a, if you watched color TV all day, you, you were an idiot.

And now you have a color TV in your pocket in the form of a iPhone. That’s worthless. I, I, you know… Yeah, they’re great devices, but I, I [00:33:00] just think you shouldn’t… My personal o- o- uh, opinion is you should only have Wi-Fi at your home or office. You shouldn’t be allowed to be on the internet when you’re out in public, so you can look at people and talk to people and look at nature and experience life.

The phone should only be phone calling and texting out in the wilderness.

Tim Melanson: Yeah. It’s, it’s, it is kind of scary that there’s no guardrails, right, around any of it. ‘Cause I mean, yeah, sure, they’re great tools and they can help you to be… Technically, they can help you be more creative. They can help you be more productive. But they also can steal your time and they can, right, do all these negative things to you too, right?

Dr Rob Yonover: Exactly. It’s almost… I used to think about it when my kids were little and I was trying to teach them about saving electricity, and that nothing is free. They just think, "Oh, just write a check," or, "Just turn the light on." I’m think- I wanna invent a, a, I don’t… It’s a 25 cent quarter slot in your house to turn a light on, so kids have, "Oh, you [00:34:00] can’t use your lights or your, your computer.

You can’t use that. You gotta pay to play." Like, it’s a timer. So i- ’cause then you can start looking at your time going, "Oh, man, it’s not free to be on a phone." In fact, if anything, parents should make their kids pay for their phone plans. You know, you shouldn’t even give your kid a phone. You should give them a dumb phone and say, "This is what I’m giv- " I did that with my kids.

Right in college, they were, you know, iPhones were coming out and I’m like, "Nah, I’m not buying you one of those. Those are horrible. I’ll buy you a phone so in an emergency you can call me." And then sure enough, they, they bought them later in life, but I got lucky in terms of timing with how old my kids were.

Now, my grandkids sh- they, they see everyone has these phones, and they expect it, so it’s gonna be tough.

Tim Melanson: It is gonna be tough. Yeah, well, and by the way, that, that, uh, y- your idea about the, the coin slot thing, that actually is possible with, you know, these smart devices nowadays. You could actually have that linked to, uh, some sort of like

Dr Rob Yonover: that’s how we were. We, we, we [00:35:00] had little jobs. I had jobs my whole life, and when we had money, then we could buy candy. To me, the smartphone was candy. You can’t eat candy unless you pay for it. So you save your money, you get an hour of smartphone.

Tim Melanson: Yeah. That, that’d be so smart.

Dr Rob Yonover: Right?

Tim Melanson: Let’s move into your guest solo. So what’s exciting your business right now?

Dr Rob Yonover: Well, what, what’s exciting

Tim Melanson: Yeah

Dr Rob Yonover: Wow, the whole thing with the military is really cool. The, the, the fact that the streamer went up to space is really cool through SpaceX, and I, I still… It’s really expanding to where militaries all over the world, I’m part of a group, the SAFE Association, a life support survival group from all over the world.

I get to go to this one trade show a year. That’s my thing. I’d like to go to too many, and there are people from all over the world, and I love it. I’ve always been an international person, and I get to work with and equip their people and make them safer, and that really is cool to me. And I’m also working on my other…

My [00:36:00] home run invention is a pocket desalinator. Converts saltwater to freshwater passively just with a solar still. Two, two, uh, two bags, inner bag and an outer bag. The inner bag is black with a Gore-Tex window. You put saltwater in it. The saltwater evaporates, but the vapor goes through the Gore-Tex and gets stuck on the inside of the outer bag.

You can drink it. Salt crystals are too fat to go through the Gore-Tex. Very simple, but I can only make a quarter cup of water a day. Isn’t enough. They need a pint a day for the military, and I just got approached by a group I know that’s r- using AI, which I’m not an AI fan, but in this case, that’s what it’s for, and we’re supposedly gonna figure out AI, I call it Hal, just as an old reference.

You probably don’t know what Hal m- Okay. Well, I’m waiting for Hal. I told them, "Ask Hal to figure out how to manufacture ’em." I know how to… I know in my mind how to build this thing, [00:37:00] and I’ve built them, but I don’t have the expertise in plastics and heat sealing to do it, and I need someone like Hal to tell us what materials, how to do it, and where to do it, and that would be…

If that thing works, that’s gonna be way bigger than a streamer, which is just saving lives. This is providing fresh water to the whole world, which is gonna be the next big wars are gonna be fought over water, not over oil. So that’s exciting, and I wrote a bunch of books, and I wrote… I put a, like a free book out on my, on, on Facebook and Instagram just for fun.

I, like 20 years ago, I wrote all these stories. I had this crazy upbringing with my friends at being a pool boy in Miami and just becoming a scientist working on volcanoes, the whole thing. The whole journey’s been crazy. So I wrote all this stuff, and instead… And I got four books published, Hardcore Inventing, Caregivers Survival Guide, Hardcore Health, and Brainstorm Islands is a children’s book, but this I just put out there.

I’m still hoping [00:38:00] someone reads and goes, "This should be a movie or a TV show." So I put it out on Facebook, and I realized that the beauty of social media is you can have pictures with the text. And I know, I know no one reads anymore, but I put the, I put 15 stories out and, and once a week for 15 weeks and- People that read them just loved it, and I, I’m thinking of, I’m actually thinking of repackaging it, renaming it Pool Boy Underdogs, which is the original name, and doing an audio book, if you will, audio stories where I read it to people.

Because people don’t read, so I have to get over that hump, and it’s gotta be on social media, so I’m gonna put it on YouTube, and this is the irony. You can’t do audio only on YouTube

Tim Melanson: Yeah

Dr Rob Yonover: only, they only want video, so I’m gonna put a picture and read with one picture. Like you read a- you know how you read a book, you keep looking at the [00:39:00] cover?

I’m, I’m gonna do that. A- a- anyway, I’m thinking of doing that, and, and it’ll be f- I, I think it’ll be… I just wanna share these stories, and I still, I think, you know, you watch enough, I watch a lot of movies and TVs, and the stories I’ve had are, are viable, I believe, for someone to take them and do something with.

Or not. Again, e- everything, to me it’s all about what do I wanna do, whether people like it or not. And the beauty of social media, you can do, you can be a rock star on social media in your mind, right? A- wh- whether one person or a million people follow you, who cares? And you know, I’ve, I’ve had millions of people look at my stuff.

The Shark Tank had 16 million that night. Someone just lifted my Shark Tank pitch, put it on YouTube, it has 58 million hits. So I’ve had millions of people looking at this stuff, but in the survival world it’s still hard to sell safety. I don’t know, I don’t care how many millions look at it, they’re still gonna buy that six-pack of beer for their boat.

Tim Melanson: Yeah.

Dr Rob Yonover: that’s always a challenge. [00:40:00] So I’m, I’m doing all sorts of stuff, and I got grandkids so I’m trying to kind of steal them away from the social media video world. So my new nickname, I used to be Uncle Punishment, ’cause I’m kind of mean to kids, and they love me for that, believe it or not. Kids love rigidity.

They, they like rules. So I’m now, now I’m No Electricity Grandpa. I take the kids and we don’t do anything with electricity. It’s always outdoors. The only thing I do is I take them to, like, the Taco Bell to eat some bean burritos, so that, that’s, I am teaching them how to eat at restaurants, if you call that a restaurant.

But it’s all about being outdoors, in nature, being creative, being, you know, resourceful, responsible, respectful. All those things happen without devices. So I, I’ve got another startup in terms of getting my kids, now they’re grandkids, I can form them a little, as much as my son and daughter-in-law will let me have them.

Tim Melanson: Mm-hmm. Right on. So how do we find out more about your [00:41:00] inventions and your book and everything about you?

Dr Rob Yonover: the best thing is just Google my name, Rob Yonover, and it’s on Amazon. I know A- Canada has Amazon all over the world, but you can go to Sea Rescue Streamer, searescuestreamer.com, or Rob

audioDr: Yonover.

Dr Rob Yonover: I’m on all the social media platforms. Like I said, I’m not the greatest social media guy, I’m not on there all day, but I put out stuff like this.

This will be on my social media one day when, when you release it, and just go to my name. My name’s unique so you can’t really misspell it. I mean, you can misspell it, you’ll still show up, ’cause I’ve got 40 years of media play. So, and I, I love talking to people, you know, drop me a line. I, and I, I love trying to inspire people, ’cause I was inspired by my parents, friends, colleagues, mentors, professors, all that.

So it’s all about, it’s all the human touch, man.

Tim Melanson: Awesome. Well, let’s get into the music a little bit. So tell me, who’s your favorite rock star or band?

Dr Rob Yonover: Well, it’s not even close, so. I mean, it, a- and I’m, I’m not alone. [00:42:00] Bob Dylan is orders of magnitude above everyone. That’s why he’s the most covered musician of all time. And I don’t just mean once in, I don’t mean just once in a while Dylan. I, I do what most people don’t do, which is I listen to CDs from start to finish, ’cause that is an artist’s work.

I like to work, look at their piece of art. And today’s music, no offense, I don’t know, and no one does it. You know, I was… My son, when he was playing with Napster back in the day, I’m like, "This sucks. You guy- you’re ripping these guys off and you’re just cherry-picking song, song, song, song." That’s not how it’s supposed to be.

I understand it is that way because artists aren’t that great now. No one can put a CD, which I don’t know if the kids know what a CD is, an album. You put 45 minutes together and, and you got someone willing to listen to it, and the difference between Dylan and everyone else for me is I can listen and then start it again, or, or listen to whole CDs.[00:43:00]

I’ve been listening to s- I wear CDs out. So, and so, and, and I always ask people, "If you’re on a desert island and you have a CD player and you take three CDs, which CDs do you take?" Now, so be careful now, and, and the rule is no greatest hits. That’s not fair, and no double albums. So mine are, again, it’s for sure.

It’s, it’s… I, I wavered a little ’cause I found a Dylan, uh- album that’s a bootleg that’s incredible. It has releases that he never put out, but I’m not gonna even talk about that, ’cause that’s too remote. I’d go Highway 61 Revisited, Dylan, that’s the classic, when Mike Bloomfield was his guitar player, the genius guitar player from little white boy that all the, the Black guy blues like Muddy Waters and then took under his wing.

That’s, that guy was the king. He OD’d at 27, unfortunately. But if you wanna hear his work, go to Highway 61 Revisited. Then I go [00:44:00] to my buddy, Jane’s Addiction. Um, actually they’re third, but Jane’s Addiction, Nothing’s Shocking, one of the few albums I can listen to over and over. And then Sublime, 40 Oz. to Freedom.

So I think those are my three, and I, and then I love classical, I love all sorts of music, but those are the three that I can listen to over and over and over. And you know, I grew up with Zeppelin and Led Zeppelin and all that stuff, but I, it’s dated and I love it, but I like a one-off song of theirs. I can’t listen to their albums over and over.

Those three bands I just spoke of, Sublime mixes all the genres in one song sometimes, blues, reggae, punk, ska, within a song. So th- those guys were otherworldly. Another unfortunate death from overdose in their 20s. And then Jane’s, you know, Perry, they’re, they’re incredible. Jane’s Addiction is, is just, for me, and, and I tell people this all the time.

It’s not, even if I didn’t know the guy, I would totally be into that [00:45:00] music. And I just think it’s the sound, the energy, the whole thing. And I, I think that I love music and I love creativity, and I wish I could create music, and I can’t. So I’m, I’m a big fan of it.

Tim Melanson: Well, you’re making up for it with lots of creativity

Dr Rob Yonover: Uh, that’s exactly, I’m in my lane.

They’re in the music lane, I’m in the invention lane.

Tim Melanson: Awesome. Well, thank you so much, Dr. Robby Eonver. This has been awesome.

Dr Rob Yonover: Thanks, Tim. My pleasure, man. That was great

Tim Melanson: Great. And to the listeners, make sure you go to workathomerockstar.com for more information, and we’ll see you next time on the Work at Home Rockstar