Failure is an opportunity, a former SDSU football player who runs a construction company in Alaska told a Brookings crowd last week.
“The best businesses that last are the ones that fail and fail and fail but keep going,” Tommy Hopp told budding entrepreneurs Oct. 2.
Hopp, a former SDSU student spoke in a keynote address in the Student Union for the Ness School of Management and Economics’ 2024 Emerging Entrepreneur in Residence program. Hopp is the first SDSU alum to present the keynote in the four years the event has taken place.
He graduated in 2018 from the Ness School. He then went on to start FWD Construction, which specializes in building decks, out of Anchorage, Alaska.
He shared his experiences with failure in his business. There were many times where his company struggled, and he didn’t know if it would last. He shared a story about his company’s biggest failure, where they were going to build a deck and the demolition crew accidentally destroyed the wrong deck.
FWD Construction had to not only redo the deck they destroyed, but also destroy and build the actual deck. They built the wrongly destroyed deck back for free, and the mistake cost them a lot of money and time.
But Hopp didn’t give up. He found a way to turn his biggest failure into a learning experience and even more opportunities.
“Our biggest failure led us to making more business than we ever have,” Hopp said.
The customer of the deck that was mistakenly destroyed ended up referring FWD Construction more than any other client had, according to Hopp. This led the company to the most business opportunities they had ever had.
“Failure is an opportunity,” Hopp said.
Hopp has spoken to other universities about his journey and he gave plenty of advice to attendees.
“You’ll have to start with what you have,” Hopp said. “One of my mottos of my business is outwit, outplay, and outlast your competition.”
Hopp then went in depth with each of the three points.
Hopp talked about “outwitting” the competition. He discussed how to make better partnerships and business deals, as well as the importance of sticking to one niche. He emphasized not following the ‘shiny object syndrome.’
He told a story about a competitor of his company who tried to branch out from just building decks. This decision lost them money. Hopp said he thought about trying this, but in the end did not.
“Being excellent at something is better than being unique,” Hopp said.
Hopp then talked about the best way to outplay the competition. He said to take inspiration from others who do the same.
“It blows open your eyes to what you’re not doing, what you could be doing, what you need to do,” Hopp said. “It opens your mind to what skills you need to pursue and then ultimately, put it to work.”
Hopp said one of the best ways to become great at something is to learn from industry experts. At the beginning of his career, he followed every big-name deck construction company, watched all their videos and took inspiration.
“Being excellent at something is better than being unique,” he said.
He then recounted the story of the deck his company mistakenly destroyed.
After Hopp was done speaking, he talked to some of the aspiring entrepreneurs.
“I was inspired by Hopp and how many times he said that he failed and kept on going,” Ben Helland, an SDSU student said.
