Ben’s Cycles, with Ben Burgert

In this episode, host Joshua Ross engages in a fascinating discussion with Ben Burgert, the entrepreneurial founder of Ben’s Cycles and a University of Denver alum. Burgert shares his profound passion for bicycles and the inspiration behind establishing his business, which specializes in restoring and selling classic bikes, allowing cycling enthusiasts to experience the charm and nostalgia of vintage bicycles. 

 Transcript:

Joshua Ross:

My name is Joshua Ross, and welcome to the entrepreneurship at DU podcast. 

Ben Burgert:

I’ve always kind of had a knack for writing and a knack for tinkering, and when those worlds collided, I realized I could kind of turn that into a business. And four years down the line, here we are with Ben Cycles and it’s rolling. 

Joshua Ross:

After graduation in 2022, Ben Burgert DU alum and founder of Ben Cycles took the entrepreneurial plunge and started a restoration bike company. And guess what? In his parents’ garage, Ben connected his passion for bikes with his love for fixing things to fill an unmet need, storing classic bikes in a growing market. 

Ben Burgert:

My dad, another good piece of advice that he’s given me is you make your money in the buy and you don’t make your money in the cell. 

Joshua Ross:

The products and services are different, the customer is different, the value proposition is different, but Ben’s entrepreneurial journey is similar to other entrepreneurs we’ve had on this podcast. Starting a business is a grind. There are mistakes made along the way. There is constant learning. There is definitely never enough money, but most important for success, it helps to have a support system of family, friends, and colleagues. Here’s the interview with Ben Burgert:. Ben Burgert:, founder of Ben Cycles. Welcome to the podcast. Glad to have you here. 

Ben Burgert:

Thanks for having me on. 

Joshua Ross:

So full disclosure, Ben is a former student and all around awesome person, and he’s involved in a business that I think you all can kind of gather what is, when I said cycles that one of my passions as well. So it’s been a lot of fun to watch Ben and his progress. So we’re just going to jump right into it. And my first question to you is why bikes do you ride bikes? What inspired you to start this business? Restoring and selling out classic bikes? Give us the 4 1 1 on it. 

Ben Burgert:

Yeah, so it honestly all kind of happened just on accident. I’ve always had a knack for riding and a knack for tinkering. And when those worlds collided, I realized I could kind of turn that into a business. And four years down the line, here we are with Ben Cycles and it’s rolling. Like I said, I’ve always had just that knack for tinkering and I realized that I can take these bikes apart, have a lot of fun doing it, and then sell ’em and make a buck. So why not? 

Joshua Ross:

So where did you get that knack for tinkering? 

Ben Burgert:

I get that from my dad. So I grew up, he’s got an automotive shop and we did a couple car restorations together. So I learned a lot of the restoration process from him and just the love for working with my hands from him, and it turned into me working on bikes, so why not? It’s pretty fun. 

Joshua Ross:

Awesome. Well, you graduated in 2022, correct? Yeah, from the Daniels College of Business at the University of Denver. So why take the risk right out of college, running your own business, and especially focusing on this really niche market? 

Ben Burgert:

So during school I noticed that I was even getting traction, and that was also with handling school as well. So I wasn’t able to really work on it full time. And then I gave it, I told myself after I graduate, I’m going to give this thing a year, and if it works, great, I’ll keep doing it. If it doesn’t, I’ll find something else to do and it’s working, so I’m just going to keep the pedal to the metal and keep it rolling. 

Joshua Ross:

That is awesome. And so you focus on this niche business of restoring classic bikes, and we’re going to dive into that. But as you started to think about this, did this idea of prolonging the life of a bike and sustainability come into play? What was your initial thoughts about bikes 

Ben Burgert:

Initially? Honestly, sustainability wasn’t my first go-to, I just get a whole lot of satisfaction restoring a bike from that point A to point B. It’s just incredible. But along the way, it also is sustainable, and I feel like a lot of people like to ride these old bikes. They’re a lot cheaper. They’re not as proprietary compared to a lot of the newer bikes nowadays. One of the things with the newer bikes, now, if you ride a Cannondale and you want to change your stem out, you usually have to go and get a Cannondale stem. And that isn’t great for everybody because it’s expensive, it’s wasteful and it’s not very fun. But with older bikes, they’re not as proprietary and you can swap a lot of parts around. It doesn’t really matter what you’re running with what, and you can really get away with building a unique bike that really represents yourself. 

Joshua Ross:

I love that. I happen to ride as well as, and actually one of the bikes that I ride is this Yeti cross bike, and it was actually the last bike that Yeti was still making in the United States, and it still has the cantilever breaks. Yeah, cool. It’s becoming actually, I think a 

Ben Burgert:

Classic. Oh yeah, Yetis have a cult folding. Those are cool bikes. Yeah, 

Joshua Ross:

I absolutely love it. And every once in a while I’ll be riding, somebody will come up next to me, that means they’re passing me and they’ll be like, I love the bike, and it’s a nice flex, but as I said, I love bikes, but I don’t see a lot of people on restored PEOs or Nishiki bikes out and around. So who are the people that are buying your bikes and what are they doing with them? 

Ben Burgert:

So it’s a mixed bag of clients. A lot of people, some of the lower end vintage bikes, diver store college students buy just people looking to buy a commuter have something a little bit more beater I guess, to ride around that they’re not too attached to. But then I also go as far as selling to collectors overseas who are willing to spend a decent amount of money on these bikes that they’ll enjoy however they want to, whether it’s putting it on a wall and putting it on display and just enjoying it that way, or actually getting out and writing it. 

Joshua Ross:

So have you built relationships with your customers? 

Ben Burgert:

Oh yeah. Yeah. I’ve a couple repeat customers come by. And then the other cool thing about the bike community is I’ll sell a bike to somebody, kind of tell ’em what I’m doing, tell ’em what I’m interested in, and bike people are all kind of connected. It’s kind of like the collector car community. So if someone wants to get rid of something, a friend of a friend wants to get rid of a pinella, they’ll usually tell me before listening on Facebook or anything like that. So I’ll get first dibs on a lot of these old bikes. So that’s one of the main ways I’ve been able to keep in touch with a lot of these people. And then social media has also been just a huge inspiration for me because people from all over the world ask me how would I do my restorations and what tools am I going to need? And so I can kind of guide them to do their own restorations. And that’s another cool part of the sustainability thing is now there’s other people out there who I’ve inspired to take these old bikes apart, restore, and then get ’em back on the road themselves. 

Joshua Ross:

So you brought up an interesting point about building this business and people are coming to you with bikes, which is wonderful, right? That’s obviously you’re doing a good job, you’re creating awareness, but is there competition in the market? 

Ben Burgert:

There is some competition for sure. Most of that competition is actually overseas, believe it or not. There’s a huge cafe in Belgium, steel vintage, they have about 200,000 followers on Instagram, huge bike cafe basically. So it’s a coffee shop and a place where you can also check out old vintage bikes and buy old vintage parks and stuff. So there is some competition, but not as much here in the United States. 

Joshua Ross:

Would that be an interesting model for you to follow something where with bike attached to insert brewery, insert coffee shop, right. 

Ben Burgert:

I feel like the coffee shop and coffee shop thing is kind of played amongst the bike world, so I want to do something a little bit more unique than that. I think it would be fun to do some kind of collab though, to have, oh, this is a bike shop and this, I think you can do both of these things here at this place. So I think that would be cool, but I’m not sure exactly what that would look like right now. 

Joshua Ross:

So audience, dm, Ben Cycles, if you have an idea, chime in and let ’em know. So you talked a little bit about how you source some of these bikes, but for the most part, when you started, how did you source bikes and now how do you source bikes? How have things changed and what is the criteria when you select bikes, restore? Because I’m guessing a lot of times you don’t get to physically touch them as well. 

Ben Burgert:

Right. So first started out with solely Facebook marketplace and Craigslist. I’d check that a couple times a day and just see what I could buy. And now it’s gotten a little bit different. It’s still Facebook marketplace and Craigslist, but I also run some ads on Facebook as a vintage bikes wanted kind of thing. I’ve gotten a lot of replies to that, but one out of 10 I’m usually buying. And then I also have shout out to my girlfriend. Every time she goes to the thrift store and she sees a bike, she always sends a picture. So that’s huge. That’s nice. And then whenever dad, like I said, he does the whole car thing, so he’ll go over to some people’s garages or whatever and if he sees a bike, he’ll ask, he’ll say, is this for sale or whatever and send me stuff. And then in terms of the criteria I look for, it’s got to be old. 

 

I prefer steel frame. I first thing is condition, is the paint falling off of it, is it dented, is it cracked? Paint’s usually not a huge thing for me, but if it’s dented or if the F frame has it cracked, I walk away instantly. And then the second thing would be components. So I look at the brand of the components and how nice they are, just the overall condition of everything. But if something’s covered in dust and hasn’t been ridden in a while, flat tires, that really doesn’t turn me away. If anything, that’s a good thing. So I can usually get it a little bit cheaper. But those are the main criteria would be components brand and then overall condition. 

Joshua Ross:

Explain why paint’s not an issue. I would think it would be difficult to go find a paint to match the bite. 

Ben Burgert:

Yeah, so I actually did funny story. I did recently do a touchup on a ti. It’s a beautiful bike, it’s a metallic red, and I actually found a Honda color that matched it. So I was able to do some touch up there. But in terms of the old bike community, now there’s just kind of this wave right now going on. It’s called positive patina. So if the frame has a couple paint chips here and there, maybe a couple of rust spots, it really doesn’t deter people away too much. It almost adds some character to the bike. Whereas a new old stock frame never been ridden, paint’s flawless. You kind of just want to put it on the wall and maybe not really ride it. So it’s a good excuse to buy a pretty nice expensive old vintage bike and then still be able to enjoy it and ride and not worry about scratching the paint up again or whatever. 

Joshua Ross:

So how do you value these bikes? Your dad sends you a picture, your girlfriend’s at the thrift store or somebody sends you something on Facebook. Walk us through this valuing criteria. 

Ben Burgert:

A lot of it’s just from years of researching different brands. It’s just like really any resale business vintage clothing, if you look at the different brands, some are way more valuable than others and it’s the same exact thing with bikes. So that would be the main thing. If I see Campagnolo Green flag, any kind of Shimano 600 dur race, that’s all green flags for me. And then it also depends on the tubing and what the frame was made out of. So if I see a bike that’s made with Columbus tubing or Reynolds 5 31 Ishi, anything like that, it’s definitely makes me more interested in the bike for sure. Even if I haven’t heard of that brand necessarily before. If it’s made with good components and good steel, it’s usually valuable in some aspect. 

Joshua Ross:

So then you figure out and you make an offer on the bike and you buy the bike or you buy multiple bikes, gets into your shop. What’s this process for restoring it? 

Ben Burgert:

In my opinion, every good restoration starts and ends with a test ride. So I’ll ride the bike beforehand, see what it needs, see if there’s any weird wobble in the turns or if there’s any wobble under breaking, really anything like that. I’ll take a couple notes and then I’ll strip it completely down all the parts off of it. I’ll test the bottom bracket. If the bottom bracket and the headset, those are the two bearings, if those feel like they have dirt in them or if they’re dry, I’ll repack ’em. If they feel fine, I’ll just let it be. But then I have a huge ultrasonic tank that all these parts will go into for about 10 minutes and they’ll come out just brand new and spotless. And then I’ll polish the frame up, make sure everything’s nice, true, the wheels, all these bikes get new cables, new cable housing, and that’s kind of the restoration process. And then I’ll test write it again and see if it feels any better if there’s still any little corks I need to work out. And then from there it’s photos and online. 

Joshua Ross:

So from start to finish, right before you take the pictures generally, and each bike is different, but how long does it take to restore these bikes? 

Ben Burgert:

Generally it’s about a day. It’s about a full day’s work. Sometimes I can get it done a little bit faster than that. Sometimes it takes me a little bit longer if I have to source specific parts, sometimes that can take a while. But I’ve built up a decent amount of stock just at the shop that if for basic stuff like barrel adjusters and if some certain things are broken, I can make easy replacements and stuff. 

Joshua Ross:

Alright, so you’re done with a bike, you’re taking the photos and then you have to price it. How do you think about pricing? Obviously there’s different components. There’s your time that it took to restore, there’s the parts that you have to get new parts, and then there’s also the value on the market on the bike. But this is kind of a smaller market and probably there’s not as much information for buyers out on the market as there would probably for restore cars. So how do you price it? 

Ben Burgert:

I try to do all of that, all of the pricing before I even buy it because my dad, another good piece of advice that he’s given me is you make your money in the buy, you don’t make your money in the sale. So 

 

It really kind of comes back to the condition of everything too. So if I have a spotless bike with the S gochi I’m working on is a perfect example, it’s all Campagnolo super record, it’s all graphed collectors would be willing to spend a pretty good lick for that thing. But yeah, it just comes down to the brands of everything and the condition mostly for value. And then I’ll look online, see what stuff is selling for, try to get a better understanding as to the actual dollar price for it. I’ll look at what things you’re going for overseas. I’ll look at Instagram, see what people are selling the same, even if it’s not the same model, if it’s the same brand, you can kind of also get an idea. But that’s kind how I do my value. 

Joshua Ross:

And you make a great point. This is also with real estate and a lot of other assets, you do make your money in the buy, right? Yeah. Obviously you make you liquidate in the cell, but in terms of what you’re talking about as the margin, what you make on 

Ben Burgert:

That bike, yeah, I kind of have a number that I’m shooting for and then usually just try to keep it to that so then I know how much I can spend on the bike before I even start taking it apart. 

Joshua Ross:

So what makes your restored bikes Ben Cycle stand out in the market compared to somebody if they’re buying a new or another used option? 

Ben Burgert:

Most used options nowadays that I’ve seen at local shops aren’t nearly as gone through as the ones that I’m sending. They’ll usually just lube the chain, leave the old bar tape on, usually not even change cables out and then just put it online, make sure it’s safe to ride, maybe swap the tires out. But every single bike that I sell, I completely go through, make sure it’s top notch and I want to make it so that people want to ride it. I want it to be a plug and play thing. So when you buy an old bike, you can from me, you can hop on the road and start riding right away and not have to worry about maintenance right away and having to replace stuff right away. You can just hop on and ride. And I think that’s where I differentiate myself from other used shops. 

Joshua Ross:

How do you communicate that to the market as you’re creating awareness, but how do you differentiate yourself from the competition, but also let them know that this is made to ride and when it shows up your door you’ll be ready to go? 

Ben Burgert:

So a lot of that comes back to the social media aspect of it all. I make videos for all of the restorations that I do, whether it’s little parts or complete bikes, so people can see firsthand, oh, he was working on this old Lotus and here it is for sale online. I saw him polish that frame two weeks ago in a video or whatever. I think on my social media you can see firsthand exactly what I’m doing to the bikes and then you know exactly what you’re getting as a consumer. 

Joshua Ross:

Walk us through social media. What different platforms do you use? How often do you use them? Do you use paid? 

Ben Burgert:

Yeah, so I don’t do any paid advertising. I wish I could, but back in the day, Facebook for whatever reason, banned me from running ads. So it is what it is. But luckily reels have been incredible for me. I’ve had a couple of reels get some good views and everything, but that’s probably been one of the more fun sides of this whole business is the social media aspect of it all. And I’ve seen great growth, so I’m just going to keep doing it. I’ve kind of found a little recipe that I like with social media, so I’ll just keep on doing that. 

Joshua Ross:

Listeners, if you check out Ben Cycles on Instagram, you’ll also see Ben in a lot of the reels and 

Ben Burgert:

Ben and his, a lot of my hands. Hands. 

Joshua Ross:

But I’ve also seen you having some fun on some bikes, right? Yeah. I’ve seen you on, I believe at one point on the Colorado Trail. 

Ben Burgert:

Yeah, absolutely. A couple bike packing adventures have been recorded. Last summer I rode to Wyoming with my friend Alex, and we recorded that and posted it and it got a lot of hits. So yeah, I don’t only focus on the restoration side of my social media and the business side. I also try to have some fun with it too. 

Joshua Ross:

Wait, so you rode from Denver, Colorado up to the border of Wyoming or deep into Wyoming? 

Ben Burgert:

So my friend and I, Alex, we decided it would be fun to go from basically to du campus to Cheyenne, Wyoming. We didn’t quite make it to Cheyenne due to some construction on the road. We didn’t want to ride on the highway and we wanted to take the back roads and we just couldn’t find a route through. But we did make it to the border. We have a picture of us next to the Wyoming sign holding our bikes up. That was a fun ride though. That was 125 miles. Wow. It was quite the ride. 

Joshua Ross:

Did you ride back? No, 

Ben Burgert:

No. My girlfriend came and picked us up, but we debated it for a second. We were like, you think we can make it back? And it was like, no, there’s no way. 

Joshua Ross:

I think that was a smart move. Yeah. So when you’re selling these bikes, how can people find you? Do you sell locally only online or both people in other countries? I think you were talking about buy your bikes. How does that work? 

Ben Burgert:

So one of my main sources and a great way that I’ve been able to sell is through eBay. eBay has a huge collector bike market, huge. So that’s where I get most of my state buys. I guess the majority of really, because I also sell parts too. So a lot of it’s from eBay, but now that my social media has gotten a little bit bigger, I’ve seen more purchases coming from directly from my website, which is nice because the fees on eBay, it’s like 13 point a half percent and that adds up with these more expensive bikes, whereas Shopify is only like 3.5% or something. So I try to sell everything on my website and then also on eBay and the description for all my listings, I’ll say save $30 instantly on shipping if you order from my website. So I try to drive most of my traffic through the website, but most of my sales are coming from eBay. 

Joshua Ross:

Okay. And do you mind sharing, what’s the average sale for a bike? 

Ben Burgert:

Average sale of a bike? Probably between 800 and a thousand. 

Joshua Ross:

Wow. So that can be significant.

Ben Burgert:

Yeah. Yeah. It really, the fees add up. Last year alone, it was almost 10,000 in fees just from eBay. So I can think of a lot of stuff to do with 10,000 bucks. We have a lot of bikes to buy. 

Joshua Ross:

Well, it’s interesting when we talk to our entrepreneurs at DU and we walk them through these different platforms to start selling and the pluses and minuses and we say, all right, you could go sell on Amazon and it’ll make your barrier to entry a lot lower because they have the platform, they have the marketing, they have the shipping, they have the storage, but you actually pay them for each point of that transaction. So it lowers your margins. Totally. And so after time you start to see the opportunity. If your business starts to do well, you start to say, all right, how do I actually improve my margin? And that’s what you’re doing. You’re saying, all right, eBay was great at one point in time, but now let’s direct traffic to my website. 

Ben Burgert:

Exactly, exactly. Yeah, eBay’s been great in terms of, like you said, it’s a huge search engine basically for collectibles, so I get a lot of traffic that way. But yeah, the fees are just through the roof. 

Joshua Ross:

We live in a world of Amazon Prime and nobody believes in paying for shipping anymore. And also people all believe that it’s going to show up in two days. True. Who pays for shipping? You are the customer. 

Ben Burgert:

The customer pays for shipping. Customer pays for shipping. I have $130 flat rate for anywhere in the us. If I’m shipping outside the us, I usually have to work one-on-one with the buyer and get a shipping quote and iron all that out. But it’s usually just that one single flat rate fee for shipping. Usually it’s a little bit more than that, but I also have to think it takes me time to pack and it takes me, I have to buy foam tubes to wrap the bike in and it takes a decent amount of materials just to get a bike shipped. And then like you said, the two day prime shipping, I can’t really compete with that with bike flights, but maybe one day. But I also understand that, I mean, people have told me multiple times that, oh, I totally buy this if the shipping wasn’t a hundred bucks. So I might try to pivot and do some other and just work the shipping cost directly into it and then just say it’s free shipping just to give the illusion of free shipping. 

Joshua Ross:

There’s that illusion quite a bit in a lot of different things we buy. Exactly. There’s certain things we don’t want to pay for, but we’re actually paying for it some way. So we talked about selling the bikes, that’s a revenue stream. Do you have any other revenue streams right now in terms of, I was thinking about consignment or restoration services, or are these things that you’re potentially thinking about in the future? 

Ben Burgert:

Yeah, so I’ve done a couple consignment deals. Those aren’t bad. I’d kind of try to steer away from ’em, just it can kind of be a little bit more on the stressful side if I have to handle the shipping for the bike. And it’s just a little bit more stressful to do a consignment. Another form of revenue that I actually just opened up is part restoration. So I’ve had people send me rear and front rails brakes or whatever, and I’ll restore just singular parts for people. And then full bike restorations. People will come by and ask for their frame to be realigned or stuff like that, but I don’t do any tuneups or anything like that, or your typical bike shop would be doing. I kind of steer away from that kind of thing. But focusing more on the restoration side. 

Joshua Ross:

So what are your plans for scaling this business and explain your current setup and what’s next for Ben’s cycles. 

Ben Burgert:

So it took me a while to accumulate all my tools. I’m doing all this currently out of my parents’ garage, kind of took over in a way, so I feel kind of bad. So I’d like to move things to a showroom and have a showroom floor where people can come and actually see these bikes firsthand and in person, not only to potentially buy them, but just to see ’em. Sometimes it’s fun to just go look at old cool stuff like walking into an old car dealership that specifies an only old stuff. It’s just fun to look around. I feel like that would be a great way to engage with more of a local community and then also get my name out there more. So that’s one way that I think I’d like to scale and then potentially get an employee, get someone to help out with just basic stuff, just packing and shipping, that takes me forever. 

If I could have someone help with just packing up a bike, that’d save me a lot of time. Or even when I have to drive down to Colorado Springs to go buy a bike that’s two hours in the car that I’m not at the shop working on stuff to where if I could have someone either go pick the bike up for me or just help out with the time there. There’s not enough time in the day for an entrepreneur. But I think those are kind of the two ways I’ve kind of been thinking about scaling this thing and then just selling more bikes, just finding more stuff. 

Joshua Ross:

So how do you move forward with that, right? As an entrepreneur, you’ve taken a risk, right? We’ve established outside after college you dove into this and you’ve had success, but now you’re looking at the next step which will require risk and an infusion capital. How do you do it? 

Ben Burgert:

How do you do it? I think it all comes down to just when I first started this thing, I just was like, I’m just going to try this out and let’s just see if it works. And I can always backpedal. I’m never completely obligated to this one thing. And that’s the beauty of running your own business is I have total free reign to change all this up and my processes I can change whenever and stuff like that. But in terms of how I’m actually going to execute it, that’s a great question. That’s a great question. I’ll have to give it a little bit more thought I think. 

Joshua Ross:

So lessons, what have you learned so far in starting running this type of business? What have been some surprises and what have been some things you’re like, wow, I thought that was would work. And you know what, I was 100% wrong. Yeah, 

Ben Burgert:

Some great advice I actually got from Professor Hagg, I hope you’re enjoying retirement. He said Entrepreneurs clean their own toilets. And that is something that I took to heart and it is a hundred percent the truth. You are going to have to figure out stuff that is pretty intimidating. It can feel like quite the hoop to jump through, but you just got to kind of go for it and just trust your instincts, trust yourself. And even on days, you really don’t, there are a lot of days where I just don’t really want to do it, but you just get up and do it and then while you’re in the motion and while the hardest part’s getting started, but while you’re rolling through it, I feel like it’s a lot easier. But just stay focused. Even if you have a bad day, just keep it rolling. It’s pretty easy to have a bad day owning a business. So just try to brush it off and just move on to the next thing. 

Joshua Ross:

Do you ever connect with other entrepreneurs to talk, share stories, get advice, 

Ben Burgert:

Not necessarily other entrepreneurs, but just other people who have high stress jobs or just jobs in general where we’re all just working toward the one end goal, but not as much as entrepreneurs. I should probably get in touch with other entrepreneurs. I think that’d be cool. Haven’t had as many opportunities for that just because I don’t know as many, which is kind of my problem. 

Joshua Ross:

Yeah, I would encourage you to seek entrepreneurs out. I mean, being an entrepreneur is actually really lonely. And when you connect with other entrepreneurs, you start to realize that you have a lot in common. You could be in completely different industries and spaces, but you’re dealing with a lot of the same things. 

Ben Burgert:

Totally. And I feel like I could connect more amongst the entrepreneurship world while I was in school. It was a lot easier with the grinds. Everyone kind of has that entrepreneurship mind. So I thought it was a lot easier while I was in school. But now it’s a lot harder to connect. I feel like, 

Joshua Ross:

Hey, we’re building a community here and we have 

Ben Burgert:

Students 

Joshua Ross:

And alums, so you are welcome to plug in at any time. 

Ben Burgert:

Yeah, you’ve done a lot with the entrepreneurship here with the garage and everything. It’s awesome. It’s really 

Joshua Ross:

Cool. Thank you. I appreciate it. It’s a lot of fun. It’s the people that make it amazing. Yeah. So throw out some advice for people thinking about jumping into something on their own, starting their own business, looking at this space, what would you tell them? 

Ben Burgert:

Just go for it. Get started. It’s, I think it’s easier to get started than to look back 10 years from now and be like, oh man, I wish I started. I feel like it’s also good to start young, start sooner as opposed to later, where it’s a little bit more forgiving in ways to take a risk where you’re not like you don’t have a house you’re worried about, you don’t have kids, you got to feed. You don’t have all those other things on your plate that you have to worry about. So get started earlier as opposed to later. 

Joshua Ross:

That’s great advice. I mean, your risk profile is so much lower in terms of what you lose, right? Exactly. You have yourself to feed, you don’t have potentially a mortgage and maybe not a car payment, but there’s things that you do have expenses, but at the end of the day, if you fail, you might have to move back in with your parents. And students tell me all the time, I don’t want to go do that. I’m like, well, lemme tell you something. I don’t think your parents want that either. Exactly, exactly. But take a 

Ben Burgert:

Risk. Right? No. Why not? Just go for it. It’s worth it. It’s so worth it. It is so much fun to run your own thing and it’s inspiring. It’s awesome. 

Joshua Ross:

So do you have a bike story that you’d like to share? Either something that you’ve done on a bike or a bike you restored that you almost didn’t want to sell. You almost didn’t want to give up because it meant something to you? Oh 

Ben Burgert:

Man. I’ve had a couple bikes come by that have been hard to sell. I guess I already shared my bike story with Wyoming, but one of the bikes that I restored was a 1965 Logano Roma Olympiad. It was handmade in Italy, the whole thing, all campagnolo chrome lugs. It was gorgeous. And the thing with a lot of those older, especially 1960s and seventies bikes is they didn’t import a whole lot of ’em to the US because cycling in the US is not like what it is overseas. It’s a lot like football to us is cycling to people in Europe. So to have that lagano in the condition that it was in and then also in my size of course. So I remember just finishing that restoration and riding it around and just being like, yeah, this is what I want to do. That was the bike that it was like, this is sealing the deal for me. I want to do this forever. 

Joshua Ross:

That is a cool story. Did you keep it? You did sell it. I did 

Ben Burgert:

Sell it. It’s gone. Yeah, that was very early on, so I needed to sell it. It was worth more to me to sell it, but I do think about that bike quite often. 

Joshua Ross:

That is cool. So a couple final questions. What advice do you give 18 year olds entering du? Think back to your 18-year-old Ben self. Think about 

Ben Burgert:

Interesting. 

Joshua Ross:

What advice would that be?

Ben Burgert:

What advice would I give to someone coming to du? Talk to people. Just talk to everyone. Just say hi. Don’t be too worried about everyone liking you. Just like talk and you’ll eventually find your people that way. Just talk to professors. Professors are willing to help. So if you are stuck with something or if you have an idea, especially in the entrepreneurship world at du, you will get help for sure. So never be scared to ask a professor for help and talk to people. 

Joshua Ross:

I love it. Our job here and our goal is just to make students successful. I mean, it’s pretty simple. 

Ben Burgert:

I mean, even after I graduated reaching out to you with accounting, stuff like that, you responded within the hour and I was just really touched by that. In a way. It’s just cool that you have a community even after you graduate, which is really cool. 

Joshua Ross:

Well, Ben, thank you for joining us today. This was a pleasure. Thank 

Ben Burgert:

You. This was a lot of fun. Appreciate it. 

Joshua Ross:

The entrepreneurship at DU podcast was recorded in Margery Reed Hall on the University of Denver campus. You can find us on Instagram at du Entrepreneur on Twitter, X DU entrepreneur, and on Facebook at entrepreneurship at du. This episode was engineered, edited, and produced by Sophia Holt. Entrepreneurship at DU is part of the Daniels College of Business, which has its own podcast. Check out Voices of Experience where we get your podcast.