Well, gang, it’s been way too long since my last post! Anyway – lots and lots of stuff to update you on – including new events, awesome IceMule reviews and potential Retail opportunities – so here goes:

Last weekend I was in Tampa for the IceMule’s first Kayak Fishing Tournament, the Whiskey Joe’s Mammouth Slam Classic, part of the Tropic Bay Kayak Fishing Classics Series. First, nothing held at a place called “Whiskey Joe’s” can be bad – it’s against the laws of the universe. Second, Captain Pat and the crew put together a first class event and it was awesome to be present when three IceMules were presented as prizes. I took the opportunity to shoot some video on my Flipcam and the results are in the YouTube video below.

If you’ve read the “About Us” section of the IceMule Cooler site, you know the basics of this story…

A few years back, my then girlfriend (now wife) and I were planning a day hike. Since we had planned to be out most of the day, I wanted to pack some sandwiches and water for a picnic lunch, but I didn’t want to carry a cooler around all day. But no portable, waterproof, leak-proof, backpack coolers were to be found. Plenty of cheap sewn coolers that I knew would leak, but nothing good.

So I decided to make my own. In fact, I got obsessed with it. What follows is my take on what you should do once your new business obsession sets in like a virus you can’t shake…including a few tips on how to conduct concept testing, getting a prototype made and finding the right manufacturer.

I received an email yesterday from an old friend from my consulting days. My old buddy Greg was uncharacteristically polite and solicitous (“how are you? the IceMule site looks great…I’m so impressed” etc etc etc.).

Now this is a guy who is much more likely to ask me how I can even get around at my age without a walker …
So, as you can imagine, when Greg sent me such a, well, nice note, I know I was being set up. And then he hit me with the punchline: he’s been working on an idea, an idea he thinks could be a business, and he wanted to pick my brain about how I got the IceMule off the ground.

I’m taking a short break from writing about the business of the IceMule Cooler to spend a few minutes on the fun part of owning a cooler company.

If you’ve been keeping up, you know that we’re making some serious traction in the Kayak Fishing market. Here’s the issue though. I am a fisherman (mainly trout on a fly line the last few years, plus a bit of deep sea). And, when I get a chance, I kayak in and around the St John’s in St Augustine.

But I have never been kayak fishing. And I’m dying to dive right in. But I need some gear & I need some gear recommendations!

Whew. What a week. This whole Blog/Sponsorshippin/running a cooler company by myself thing is tiring!

It has been a heck of a ride this week, though, kids – and all of it good. Punchline: I am TOTALLY into the whole sponsorship scene. Plus, tons of extras that have come my way as a result of reaching out through CoolerNotes and offering to sponsor some of the good people in the Kayak Fishing community. In fact, the extras are what are so surprising and they really speak to the power of social media / online-based marketing.

Let’s recap:

As promised in my last post, I’m going transparent in 2010 – I’m going to post about the various marketing tactics I’m using to promote the IceMule. I’ll describe the tactic, show our tracking methodology (you can’t manage what you can’t measure), tell you the cost (most of the time – I’ll still reserve the right to run behind the curtain every once in a while) and periodically post results from each tactic. I know, I’m crazy, but what the hey… I’m all about sharin’.

One of the things I want to do with CoolerNotes is to post about marketing plans and then report on success or failure. In my day job as a corporate marketer I would never consider this – why would I clue the competition in on my plans?

Crazy as it may sound, though, this is what I plan to do – in detail. There are a couple of reasons I want to do this…

Early this week I got an email from Kayak Fishing Magazine, somewhat out of the blue, asking if they could do a product review of the IceMule.

Well, um, let’s see….I target kayakers, and specifically kayak fishermen through adwords, I have spent hours and hours trolling (that’s a fishing term kids) kayak blogs and message boards to better understand the needs of this audience, and I’ve been tinkering around with the idea of spending real money on a print ad (old school) in a competitor magazine. So, yeah, you bet you can review the product. How many do you need and where do I send them??

Right now I’m on a flight back home from Las Vegas, where I spent the last few days hanging out with good friends, trying to mentally justify that perpetual last hand of the night, and indulging in a few light Buds and heavy meals.

However, I also got a chance to attend a few sessions of a great conference centered around entrepreneurship. Two of the speakers had huge cred on this topic since each has built multi-million dollar businesses on their own.

One was Gary Vaynerchuk, who was there to speak on…