Sara Sheehan’s guest in this episode is R.T. Custer, co-founder and CEO of Vortic Watch Company and Colorado Watch Company. R.T. transforms antique American pocket watches into one-of-a-kind wrist watches through Vortic Watch Company, and with Colorado Watch Company, will be building the most American-made watches at scale available today. Sara talks with R.T. about how he identified his calling in converting pocket watches, surviving a crippling lawsuit early in his entrepreneurship, loyal customers, and where he’s headed next. 

R.T. discusses launching on Kickstarter and shipping watches to customers a year and a half later. Vortic scaled from shipping 100 watches to 200, and R.T. realized due to how the restoration of antique pocket watches works, he would face a maximum capacity of roughly 400 watches a year. This led to the formation of his Colorado Watch Company brand to address the ability to create quality American-made watches at scale. He and Sara talk about sourcing the antique watches, the market for wrist watches, and the triumph of surviving the 2017 lawsuit that he calls the hardest thing he’s ever done.

The lessons R.T. has learned from his entrepreneurial ventures are many and varied. He shares how he learned that people want to invest in momentum and how he realized that momentum and being the visionary for his company can only come from him. Sara learns about R.T.’s Angel investing, plans for the Colorado Watch Company scaling, why R.T. feels such a connection to military service, and the intricacies of antique pocket watches. This episode is a fascinating glimpse into a very niche entrepreneurial venture that is being scaled through an additional brand without sacrificing the original vision. Sara takes listeners deep into R.T.’s inspirational journey. 

About R.T. Custer:

R.T. Custer is a multi-passionate entrepreneur, speaker, and guide supporting founders through community, connection, and mentorship. As the CEO of Vortic Watch Company, the Chief Revenue Officer of Carter & Custer Agency, and the co-host of Fast Foundations Mastermind, he knows what it takes to build a successful business and drive impact. He wholeheartedly believes that you can live a life of wealth and freedom when you’re not afraid to take risks, and he uses his platform to empower founders to step into their worth.

R.T. is also deeply passionate about his work as an Angel Investor and Advisor in consumer product companies through his video podcast, “Products Worth Talking About”. He is a sought-after speaker and podcast guest, especially after launching a 2nd YouTube show called “Custer & Wolfe, Building a Watch Company” with his business partner, Tyler Wolfe, to document everything that goes into building an American manufacturing company. R.T. has proven that it is possible to enjoy life to the fullest while building wealth, and he wants to share everything he’s learned so that you can enjoy the same freedom.

Most importantly, R.T. is a partner to Lindsay Roselle and the father of two boys, Sawyer and Wesley. They live in Fort Collins, Colorado, where they run their collective 5 businesses, chase their kids and two dogs around, and spend their (minimal) free time golfing, working out, drinking whiskey, and hanging out with friends and family. 

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Contact Sara Sheehan | Sara Sheehan Consulting:

SaraWSheehan.comSara Sheehan on LinkedInMeet with SaraContact R.T. Custer | Vortic Watch Company / Colorado Watch Company:

Vortic Website: VorticWatches.comColorado Website: ColoradoWatchCompany.comR.T. Custer: Website: RTCuster.comLinkedIn: RTCusterInstagram: @rtcuster___

 

Transcript: 

Sara  0:02  

Hi there. I'm Sara Sheehan, and welcome to my podcast, Transformational Thinkers with Sara Sheehan. Today, I'm talking with R. T. Custer. He is the co-founder and CEO of Vortic Watch Company and Colorado Watch Company, a passionate advocate for American manufacturing. R.T. leads two ventures dedicated to preserving history and proving that Made in the USA is not only possible, it's powerful. At Vortic, he transforms antique American pocket watches into one-of-a-kind wrist watches. Every Vortic watch is a one-of-a-kind creation that honors US craftsmanship and industrial heritage. Alongside its sister brand, Colorado Watch Company, Vortic is redefining what it means to build American from scratch with integrity at scale. With Colorado Watch Company launching at scale in August, he's building the most American-made watches at scale today. R.T. also hosts the American Dreamers podcast and YouTube show, sharing stories of entrepreneurship, craftsmanship and legacy. RT, I'm so glad to be talking with you. Welcome to the show.

R.T.  1:22  

Thanks for having me. I'm excited to be here.

Sara  1:24  

Excellent and so R.T. Let's start with how you and your business partner, Tyler, knew that you wanted to create a watch company that converted pocket watches into wristwatches while you were in school, how did you know that was your calling?

R.T.  1:47  

The whole story starts fairly simple, and it was on a golf course after school one day when we were both studying at Penn State, and we took this journey through his passion initially for wristwatches. And I just thought it was fascinating that he was so interested in watches, especially as, you know, we were in our early 20s. We didn't have a whole lot of money, you know, we were not really able to collect many things, period. And he had this little collection of watches, and we were talking about it just as we were playing golf, because he was wearing a watch while playing golf, and I thought that was interesting. I had never really worn a watch before, and at the end of the conversation, we had these questions, and even Google didn't have the answers, and it was, why don't we make watches in America? Why are all watches made in China or Switzerland? And we just started going down that rabbit hole. And about a year later, after doing a ton of research and having all these other ideas surrounding that, we stumbled on the history of the American pocket watch and how millions of old pocket watches were made in USA back between about 1850 and 1950 and the light bulb went off and we realized, well, if we upcycle these old pocket watches, you know, we take the inside out and we make all the outsides here in America, then we'd have 100% American made watch, and that would check the box, and we'd be one of the only, if maybe, the only company making watches in the USA. And so we put that idea on Kickstarter back in 2014 and we just said, Hey, we want to make a watch in America. We use old pocket watches, and we turn them into wrist watches, upcycling at its finest. And a bunch of random people from the internet pledged money to bring it to life. You know good old crowdfunding and the rest is history. That was 10 years ago.

Sara  3:44  

That's very impressive. Since you've been doing this for quite a while, can you talk a little bit about your business's growth trajectory from where you started to where you are today? And in doing so, if you could share a little bit about what was interesting in your journey, what it's been like, what your challenges or big victories have been, it would be great to learn.

R.T.  4:14  

When we started, I mean, it took us probably a year and a half from launching on Kickstarter to actually ship watches to customers, which was very unexpected. You know, we thought, I mean, we were kids when we started the company, we had never made anything before. We never started business before. So, I mean, it took us at least six to nine months just to figure out how to run a business and source components and stuff like that. But once we really got started, we started actually shipping watches in 2015, 2016, we started with maybe 100 watches the first year, scaling to a little more than 200 watches the next year. And then sometime in the first few years, we realized how hard it was going to be to scale that, that idea of Vortic and taking an antique American pocket watch and restoring it, and turning it into a wristwatch. First of all, restoring it. You need a watchmaker, which there's not very many watchmakers in the world. And you need a very specific type of watchmaker that's not just fixing a, you know, a modern watch, like a Rolex. There's a lot of people that can do that. Sure you're restoring something that's 100 years old. You need to find parts for it, or make parts for it. And nobody really does what we do. And so we're doing everything for the first time, trying to source all this stuff, trying to figure it out. And at a certain point, we realized, you know, somewhere in that three to 400 watches per year is, is the max capacity of the business.

Sara  5:42  

Interesting.

R.T.  5:44  

Which was at that time, okay, it's like, 2017 2018 I was just like, okay, well, let's just start, let's start increasing the price, right, high demand and low capacity, you know, we can, we can increase the price. And so the price started going up. We started doing custom orders. You know, people sent us grandpa's pocket watch. That was, that was kind of a cool thing that we learned is, Oh, that's interesting. We never thought about that. But now we, you know, we're really the only company that we can take your, your family heirloom, and restore it and turn it into a wristwatch, which is just a super, super fun part of the business. We call it, convert your watch. And when the pandemic hit in 2020 we were doing all custom orders. We had this really cool watch builder on the website where you could visualize where you're going to order. You upload a picture of the pocket watch, and then we show you what it could look like as a wrist watch. But in the pandemic, nobody wanted to wait six months between when they purchased something and when they got it. And I figured out, like, okay, we're making about one watch every day, you know, 350

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Erscheinungs­datum: 8.7.2025, 08:00:00