From Semper Fi to Sizzling Steaks
This week, we sit down with the inspiring Bill Domenz, a USMC veteran who turned his passion for flavor into a thriving spice business, Corspice.
Bill takes us through his unique journey from his time serving in the United States Marine Corps to transitioning back to civilian life. Hear first-hand about the trials he faced, including dealing with medical record issues and navigating the complexities of securing buddy letters. His story is a testament to resilience and the power of perseverance. We also dive deep into the vital role that his spouse played during this challenging time. Their strong bond and mutual support were pivotal, highlighting the importance of having a strong support system during transitions of such magnitude.
Bill's entrepreneurial spirit as he turned a hobby into a flourishing enterprise. Explore how he transformed his love for spices and meat into Corspice, a go-to name for flavor enthusiasts. He serves up advice for fellow veterans on turning passions into profitable ventures and shares the joy that his business brings him daily.
Join us for this flavorful journey, seasoned with the courage and determination of a true veteran. Like, share, and subscribe to our channel for more inspiring stories. Don't forget to hit the notification bell to stay updated on our latest episodes!
In This Episode We Cover:
Bill's transition struggles
Advice on transition
Medical record issues
Loving support of his wife
Power of buddy letters
Starting a business from a passion or hobby
Battle Buddy Podcast Guest Links:
Transcript from Episode 104 with Bill Domenz:
Keith McKeever 0:01
Hey, welcome back to another episode of the battle buddy podcast today, we're going to talk about, well, we're gonna talk about some spicy stuff, no pun intended, I have a guy who started a Spice Company. And we're going to talk a little bit about business, we're going to talk a little bit about a transition out of the military. So if you're interested in business, and how to start a business and talk about, you know, taking this idea and turn it into something, maybe it's a hobby, maybe it's an idea, it's in the back of your head, pay attention. If you're looking to transition out of the military or you're going through the transition process. You definitely want to listen for that. So without further ado, let's jump into it. Welcome to the battle buddy podcast with Keith McKeever. So welcome to the show, Bill. Glad to have you here. Thanks, Keith.
So Bill, you are you know, like I said, You're You're the Spice guy. You're the founder of core spice. But before we get into that, I got that scrolling across there to be on the show notes for people to but tell us a little bit about your your military background and your story
Bill Domenz 1:08
kind of needed a change of all kinds of scenery was also kind of told I needed to change his scenery. So the doorbell rang. And one of the neighbors who had been gone for a while I didn't even know he was in the Marine Corps just happened to be there. And I asked him where he's been. And he said he joined the Corps and he was back on recruiters assistance. And he just gave me like a five minute spiel about the Marine Corps and it wasn't even intended to be him recruiting me. But the first thing out of my mouth after that little spiel was how do I sign up? And can we leave tomorrow? I'm gonna he was kind of taken aback here, right. Oh, no. He was like, What do you he was just like, No, what do you mean? And I'm like, no, no, I gotta get out of here. I gotta get out of here now. So long story short was within maybe 60 days. Me and friend of mine were supposed to do the Buddy Program. I was down at MEB signing. And sorry, yeah, maps SEPs is the last place you go to. Yeah, so while I was down there, he was at the recruiters office and they called me and had some Master Sergeant come track me down and put me on the horn because he backed out. So I said well, I'm still going. So I went in open contract because I wanted to be a grunt, carry a pack and shoot stuff. And they said that's the easiest way crunch full but right now you get in no problem. Going open contracts pretty much guaranteed crap. So that's what I did. And sure enough, when two and a half months into boot camp, they start rattling off which everybody's MOS czar and everything else they're like, who's the smart MF because he got aviation he's going to fix helicopters and of course they said my name and I'm still not paying attention because I'm like, does not compute those two do not go together Sure enough
Keith McKeever 3:06
he's a smart guy right?
Bill Domenz 3:08
Yeah, well that's not being the smart guy just like I was flat out told by everybody I'd be guaranteed drone if I went open contract. So go open contract and wind up in aviation. My buddy that wants to do the buddy program. He he wanted aviation. So when I get out of boat come back I'm recruited assistance because the guy across the street hooked me up on that straight out. So I got straight out of boot get 30 days recruiters assistance which worked out great because I was home without having to take leave for Thanksgiving and Christmas. So and then reported to duty station like I think the 31st or first year or something like that. So that part kind of but whatever. Yeah, still was pretty good. Nothing fit after that. 30 days though, because you know, you're home taken out on Turkey Day and Thanksgiving and drinking a lot beer and but they you know, get back to Memphis and they would be back in shape right away. So
Keith McKeever 4:11
it's understandable after all that all that physical activity and slimming down and being put into a lean mean, machine and, and go home to mom's cooking and beer, right?
Bill Domenz 4:20
Oh, it was the opposite for me. Because I got put on double rats. I went in it like I went in at like 165 and within two weeks, I was down to 145
Keith McKeever 4:33
Gotcha. laughs If they're trying to fatten you up.
Bill Domenz 4:36
Oh, yeah. So I graduated boot 187 Hey, yes, I did. So I was always hungry.
Keith McKeever 4:45
I was the guy had to watch going through. You know, I had to look over my shoulder and I was like, yeah, definitely can't can't grab that cookie. You know, because I am going to
Bill Domenz 4:57
the eyeballs. You guys had turkeys Pretty nice.
Keith McKeever 5:01
Oh, yeah. Like not like nobody could grab the cookies like but you know, they kind of laid them out there like to entice somebody to grab Oh, drill instructors was just like they're just they're waiting for somebody to just leave a look at the cookies. Yeah, they were probably like, they're probably like three week old cookies. I mean, they're probably stale as hell, but
Bill Domenz 5:18
yeah, but they would have been delicious during boot.
Keith McKeever 5:21
Oh, yeah. I mean, shoot. Yeah. If he would have let us break in there in the middle of the night. I mean, we would have just gobbled them all up. Oh, yeah. wouldn't have cared if there was a layer of mold on it or not.
Bill Domenz 5:32
There was two times in boot were the chow hall had chocolate milk. And that was just like, I think everybody drank so much of it. Most of us puked in our afternoon.
Keith McKeever 5:45
I definitely don't remember. I don't remember drinking any milk or chocolate milk. I do. Remember it was like endless amounts of water. And, of course, that Gatorade, Powerade, something like that. I mean, you get a little bit of that. But of course I was I was the kind of guy that I was. I had to cut some weight before I joined. So I was kind of very cautious of it going in. So yeah, I did make sure I tried to get the vegetables on the plate. Try not to get the cheeseburger. Of course, I was Air Force. I don't know how I was in the Corps. But once you get your, your training determined, you got snake pit right there. So you're gonna have to walk past all the drill instructors. So you better not be the chubby guy who's trying to cut weight and have a cheeseburger on your plate.
You better have the lean meats and vegetables, you know, cuz you are gonna get shit. It's, it's not gonna be pretty. So yeah, needless to say, I dropped a little bit of weight. I think I dropped like 1520 pounds or so what I was in.
But But I did go in when I when I went in, I kind of went in kind of very similar thing. I went in pretty quick. I talked to a recruiter, I think right around Valentine's Day, and I was in, in boot camp in early April. So I was kind of quick turnaround like you were. I was kind of like, Sure, why not? Yeah, let's do it. I got nothing. I was
Bill Domenz 7:05
doing my 19th birthday. So of course, you know, they sent cookies and crap. And so then, you know, while everybody else is eating them, you got to sit there and make a puddle of sweat.
Keith McKeever 7:18
So I luckily I missed my I turned 21 Right before I joined.
Bill Domenz 7:24
Which kind of sucked. You were you were the old guy. And
Keith McKeever 7:28
I was Yeah, I was kind of the old guy. So luckily, I have my 21st birthday. And I had about a week and a half to sober up before boot camp. So but I'll tell you what, going into tech school after that at Lackland. I don't know why they put the security forces tech school right next to the bowling alley. And, you know, they they had a they had like a dance hall like they had a place for tech schoolers to go right to give you a wristband. You could go in there on the weekends, you could have three drinks maximum, right? You know, the ID, that's all you could get was three drinks, trying to control the drinking. But they had no such controls at the bowling alley next door where you could just go get a pitcher of beer. Obviously, you know where I started my weekends off? Of course. Yep, you know, it was I'll finish off that pitcher of beer then go next door and get my wristband. So right made us made those the the dance club nights a little bit more fun and entertaining, because the three drinks wasn't enough when you're 21 years old. So at this point in time in my life, it would be enough it'd be perfectly fine. But back then, not enough. So anyway, so aviation mechanic Ah,
Bill Domenz 8:45
yeah, I want a 53 helicopter mechanic on it being a crew chief plane captain. door gunner stuff, you know, all the cool stuff, you know, the cool kids got to do. So in the end, it was really great. But, you know, initially, I was just like, I don't want to do this. So,
Keith McKeever 9:07
yeah, no different when you're looking at holds an F 16. And you end up holding a ranch, right?
Bill Domenz 9:12
Well, not just that it was we were always short handed. So it was not uncommon for 65 to 7580 hour weeks, and go five, six weeks without a day off. And they'd say you'd get a 72 which would turn into a 48 which would turn into a 24 which I will just show up tomorrow. So that was pretty regular. For all of us. We always had, you know, you'd have hair like this, because you're in the you know, you're an aviation, but all the grunts that see you without a helmet on are like man, I want my hair long and you're like the only reason why my hair is long is because I leave at 4am and I don't get back till 6pm
Keith McKeever 9:57
Yeah, let's let's the barber wants to come out here the flightline and cut Got it? Yeah, while I'm turning orange.
Bill Domenz 10:02
Exactly. Yeah. So that was, you know, every now and again, you'd come back from a flight midday or something. And he'd be standing here going. Get your ass to the barber now. But it's childtime too bad. You get a haircut today? Yeah, choose, right? I even had my one Gunny, buy me a comb. Because when I would take off my helmet, I didn't give a shit what my hair looked like, and it would just be crazy, all sweaty and crazy. And he's like, no, no, you need to comb that. And of course, I said this was my comb. And he said, No, no, no. So he went got me a little pocket comb for my flight suit. And I had to have it with me all the time. So
Keith McKeever 10:41
yeah, I never I never had it never had that problem. I, my heart started going when I was 25. So yeah, it was not that hard for me to keep mine kind of short. But yeah, it's that kind of tempo. That must a must have a difficult keep to well get now saying.
Bill Domenz 11:02
Yeah, once I got out was when I started having massive anxiety attacks didn't have when I was in. Adam, when I got out for about a year and a half for I learned how to control them, and didn't have any health insurance. And I didn't know I could go to the VA blah, blah, blah, I sat in a certain little corner, in the bookstore in the mall, scared to death reading up on it once I found out what the work is, if you assume you're having a heart attack, but the nurse tells you, you're not having a heart attack, because you're talking to him, and he's having an anxiety attack, go lay down and listen to some classical music and try and relax is easier said than done when you're when you're writing that anxiety attack for 810 1214 hours straight. So long story short, was just found out that it was from having a high stress environment to having zero stress. Because I didn't I didn't have to worry about bills, I didn't have to worry about food I didn't worry about shout out. I didn't worry about crashing I think if you're either yelled at didn't have to wake up in the morning. And you can't function because you're missing all of that high stress. So wound up finding jobs that you know, you can just work 60 7080 hour weeks at and it took probably 15 years before I could work a 4050 hour we can feel normal. So
Keith McKeever 12:25
Wow. So that's so at what point did you
with the anxiety attacks, like how long after? Or how long was that going on? And then before you went to the doctor, you don't realize that what was what it was like? How did you deal with that? Until that point?
Bill Domenz 12:49
Well, I tried drinking, I tried getting high. I mean, you name it, just trying to figure out something's wrong. But you know, you have no idea because two months ago, you didn't feel like this. And nothing's really changed that in your head. Nothing's changed. Right? But right, all of that, all of that stuff. All that camaraderie, you know, just having to work all the time live with the guy sleep there, you know, I mean, you'd be stuck on a plane for 510 days, and you were supposed to be on a three hour flight. So you know, our flight. Our helmet bags always had tuna fish cans, peanut butter crackers, smokes. couple pairs of skivvies and maybe a t shirt and some socks. And then you carried your helmet in your other hand. And sometimes pilots would think that's funny, and you're like, Yeah, you're gonna you're gonna I'm gonna be your best friend when we're stuck in a field for five weeks. So, and an
Keith McKeever 13:43
extra pay you get as an officer, you're going to be a coffin add up for for some snacks, right?
Bill Domenz 13:49
Oh, yeah. Yeah. And then, you know, like, like art. Our flight suits were stamped by you guys. unserviceable. So we were wearing your old shit. And we thought it was great because they didn't have holes in them. So to us they were brand new.
Keith McKeever 14:09
That sounds about like the most Air Force, Marine Corps kind of thing right there. Yeah, not not Air Force standards and like, hey, you know, hey, you got clothes.
Bill Domenz 14:19
Yeah, these things have been washed 10 times silver 10% faded, they have to go.
Keith McKeever 14:26
And you're like, hey, at least we're not flying naked.
Bill Domenz 14:29
Man, that was pretty much it. You know, we were happy when we had enough safety wire to put our boots back together.
Keith McKeever 14:36
And there we go. Yeah. So you know what, what other issues if any, did you have throughout the transit transition process other than, you know, anxiety issues and kind of dealing with that?
Bill Domenz 14:49
Oh, just trying to sort out like the, I don't know for Air Force guys or whatever, but I know 90% of the Corps when they get out in law. The guy specifically, you have this weird, you don't belong, you're not doing enough. Nobody cares. Where the fuck did everybody go? Pardon me? You know, like you're just floundering around just trying to figure shit out. And like, until I just recently, few years ago, I started going to the VFW and, you know, VA centers and things like that. And that's, like, why you don't know about that when we got out back in the 90s, or the late 80s, early 90s, you know, they flat out will tell you, you, if you sign this piece of paper, you get no benefits, you can't come back to us for nothing, blah, blah, blah. They don't tell you about the VFW don't tell you about the VA, they tell you nothing. And they just send you out to the world. So you're out there alone. I don't even know now if they're telling guys that. But I've talked to the VFW reps, at every place I've been and said, Are you guys hitting SEPs? And letting the guys know, because once a week, there's a group head now or even daily? Why aren't we there telling them to come find us, even if it's not our local guys, but the VFW as a whole should be doing that for every branch at every step center. Because at least right away, you know, you got some place to go and talk.
Keith McKeever 16:26
Ya know, every branch causes a little something different. What I believe it's pretty much a uniform amount of training, Transition Assistance Program taps, something like that. But it's all ran by the Department of Labor. And a lot of it is focused on get on LinkedIn and create a profile, create a resume and go get a job. This is great because everybody needs a job. But it doesn't cover at least in very much detail about the American Legion, the VFW, Iraq, Afghanistan, Veterans of America, the DAV, and that's like all these service organizations, the VA how to enroll in the VA, the resources at the VA, you know, nonprofits they get there's there's a ton of great nonprofits out there that can provide support, family support, what resources are out there for them. I mean, there's there's a ton of different things. They're just not covered. That should be and unfortunately, most of the transition process is sit down, pay attention. Create a profile on a resume, and good luck. Oh, yes. Yep, pretty much.
Bill Domenz 17:45
Don't even realize we didn't even realize until shit three years ago that my DVD 14 is wrong. And now they pretty much told me that you got a snowball's chance in hell of getting it fixed. So, I mean, if I didn't have my flight records, I wouldn't ever I wouldn't be allowed to say I was aircrew.
Yeah, all of that off of my DD 214.
Keith McKeever 18:18
Yeah, did you get back far enough? I know there was like record was a records fire in St. Louis, a big record center. I know a lot of vets I've talked to who've lost records there. Because that's what place they had two records. Back in the day, two things weren't digitalized.
My stepdad had told me when I got out, he was a Vietnam veteran. He said, first things first, take your DD 214 Take it to the county and have it recorded. That was on record recorded and scanned at the county. That county courthouse will will do that for you for free. Then it's stamped and recorded with the government. I was like okay, your second thing, go to the local VA clinic and talk to the VSO and start to start the process with with the VA. Yeah, if it wasn't for him, I could have fallen in that same boat of like, now, what do I do? I mean, might not have gone down that path. Who knows? That's why all right. A lot of a lot of guys don't. I was just talking to somebody earlier today that came up with a stat. I don't know where he got this. But something like, you know, when you look at suicide rates within our veteran community, something like 70% of those suicides are veterans who are not connected in any way shape or form to the VA. That's or any other org or any other organization. And that's a very, very sobering statistic to say, Okay, wow, you know, it's even if the numbers anywhere near that higher or lower, whatever it is, it's like, okay, that's, that's a place to start. You know, that's, that's, that's where we start making it change. So yeah, there's there's a lot of things that just aren't aren't taught in that process that need to be that need to be covered.
Bill Domenz 20:10
I got lucky enough to have a couple of guys I served with this year, show up. Geez, haven't seen him for 30 years, but few guys have wandered through the house now in the last couple of months, been able to do some dinner, have a couple of cocktails and whatever. And one of them was talking about his uncle said his uncle or his stepfather, I forget. But they didn't know about the DAV either. And I'm like, How is that possible? We're all on Facebook, and this and that, and everything else, and nobody knows anything. So it's just crazy. Like, it's good point.
Keith McKeever 20:54
It's all right there in front of us, but we don't know anything. Right. And
Bill Domenz 20:57
like, for me, my records were trashed. DD 214 is wrong, this that you name it. And I find out that, you know, my hearing my headaches, my this my that tinnitus, blah, blah, blah, should be covered in some way, shape, or form. Matt, and no, I could go after it. 30 years ago, much less four years ago. And now that I'm trying, it's all put if your records are trashed, it's all put on you to prove it. So without battle buddy statements, there is pretty much no way to prove it. And that was another thing they didn't know about was the battle buddy statements. And I was explaining to him in a course they're like, Well, you know, nobody's left. He's the last guy in his unit. I'm like, well, the other version of a battle buddy statement is is anybody who knew you when you got out prior to you going in, and over the last 20 3040 years, what changes have they seen. And all of that can be documented and used as well, which is something most guys aren't thinking about. Because your family and friends are also your battle buddies. They're the ones that dealt with you even more after you got out versus when you were in.
Keith McKeever 22:10
Your spouse can be a huge, huge person to get a letter from you, especially if you are married to them when you were in service or right around that time period. Because they have I mean firsthand, every day experience with you. There are growers and to get a letter from
Bill Domenz 22:27
or at the very least you bring them to every single meeting every single doc visit every VA visit. You got to bring them to everything because you're not going to tell your doctor what he wants to hear. You're going to tell them what you want them to know. And then you're gonna get smacked in the back of the head by the spouse and none of you wake up at least three times a week screaming and yelling and telling people to fuck off and whatever. You know,
Keith McKeever 22:54
or you're snoring a little bit worse than that, you know? Right, right,
Bill Domenz 22:58
exactly. Whatever it is, but you're not going to say what it is, you know,
Keith McKeever 23:03
it's not like a little saw. It's a freakin chainsaw or Yeah.
Bill Domenz 23:10
With with a two stroke motor attached that should be at the Moto GP.
Keith McKeever 23:15
Yeah, with a straight pipe on it. I mean, it's yeah, it's Yeah, exactly. Yes, this, this spouse can definitely offer perspective that you just can't, can't do. So. I mean, I know I've gone through that my wife has written letters for me on my last couple of claims. You know, just because, I mean,
13 years together to me, she's she sees things from a different perspective. Especially when it comes to
like, you know, like, well, kind of joking about snoring, but like sleeping habits and stuff like that, like, I mean, obviously, your sleep you can't, you don't know how much you snore. You don't know how your sleep sleep patterns are, how long you sleep, you know, those kinds of things. So it is important, or how you react to things or things. I mean, so you're maybe adult kids, if your kids are old enough to write that statement? I don't think they're going to take statements from 10 year olds or 15 year olds, but
you know, those people that are close to you. So what you know, is there anything in specific on on your records that that has been wrong? Or what kind of hurdles have you had with the VA trying to correct that or have you had any success trying to fight with them?
Bill Domenz 24:30
It's my fourth go around, and I've had zero success with even tinnitus. So, and part of it is is because I was you know, my DD 14 Doesn't say I was a crew chief doesn't say I have flight hours, it doesn't have anything. So even though I'm submitting my flight syllabus, trying to upload it, they don't want to read it. I've been to a doc I forgot what the exam is called. But basically they hook you up to like an oscilloscope and they test how fast your nerve responses are. And based off of that response, they flat out said it's from exposure to either jet fuel, hydraulic fluid, grease this that whatever, you know, it's just completely 100% stamped, you know, it's right there. Where the back quack I was going to, after a while he said, you know, you're really gonna want to go get this test done because I'm starting to think it's not your spine, you got other issues going on. So when had that test done submitted that and they said, Nope. You the there's there's no reason that that could have been from the core. So like, I mean, waiting and jet fuel inside of a sponson while you're trying to change the poppet valves and other things out, you know, that was that was standard for us. You know, just get your ass in there and get it done. Because you can reach the bottom of the tank without getting your face in it, you can breathe, just get in that thing and make it happen. And that's what we always did. So and then you'd be wearing your boots. That works fuel soaked for the next six months, you know, so your, your room smelled like fuel, you smelled like fuel. That was just normal. Every time we ate if we got a cheeseburger or something, you had fingerprints on it from grease and oil and whatever. That was just how we did things back when you know nobody had gloves. They didn't have that special sauce for your hands. protective layer stuff. You know, I didn't see that until, like, the year 2000. I was like, What is this shit? That would have been cool to have.
Keith McKeever 26:33
He has a special orange soap with all the grit in it to clean it off. Yeah,
Bill Domenz 26:37
I mean, it was just, I'm not I wouldn't change any of it. You know, it made me who I am today which way better off than I would have been had I not gone and so I can't compare them. They're
Keith McKeever 26:52
definitely frustrating, though to to have those challenges. But
Bill Domenz 26:58
yeah, because my record book is looks like it was whitewashed. So you can see a couple of words on a few pages here and there. They can find the key words like hearing loss. Headaches, you know this that, you know, they find all these key words back problems, whatever. But because the context is missing, they just denied. So So piece by piece, I'm just trying to get buddy statements together this that and I'm trying to make it even easier on other guys, which I'm like, doing the generic format for all right tonight is here's a CH 53. Crew chief mechanic. And you know, why? Because I mean, our barracks were sometimes in California. If they were taxiing on the threat, which side of the base that would be on the north side. Your barracks door could be 20 feet from the frickin flightline.
Keith McKeever 27:55
Slow close. Yeah.
Bill Domenz 27:58
So I mean, you know, if you were on the flightline, you had to work IRS. But if you're in your barracks, you didn't.
Keith McKeever 28:04
But what was that that law just makes a huge difference for your hearing? Oh, yeah.
Bill Domenz 28:10
Yeah, you know.
Keith McKeever 28:13
So yeah, just just just like the medical tests, you know, I mean, you know, I'm assuming your DD 214, kind of pretty much, I mean, assuming the shows, if it doesn't have the the aircrew stuff on there, assuming it kind of shows grunts, type activities or something like I mean, so if there's a medical records to show like, you only get these kinds of illnesses are issues from exposure to
fuel and oil, like, you don't get that being a grunt, or other other career fields, like you only get that if you're a fuel technician, or a mechanic or I only get that you only get only get that certain ways. You know, you don't get that sitting in an office desk, or, or an MP or firefighter or, you know, there's probably only like, you know, five jobs that you could get exposure to that. So,
Bill Domenz 29:08
unfortunately, we're also the, you know, I've got my patch for being a ship burner, you know, you know, there's the 55 gallon buckets, there's all the other buckets, go fill them up, pour some diesel on there, get it started, you got your stir stick, and you know, back then you were just out there as you were while smoking a cigarette stirring somebody's shit while you're burning it. And that was normal. And when it was time to bail from that base, a lot of times you'd wind up burning a lot of records to because they didn't want to bring it back. Because it wasn't digitized and nobody wanted to transcribe this shit. So but back then it didn't mean anything to us because we didn't know any better. So now that you look back on what you were doing, then you're like, we were just fucking ourselves over.
Keith McKeever 29:56
Now it's very much like the burn pits over the last 20 years of like Why did we just put everything into a giant pit? Like, the jet fuel on it and light it on fire? Like who's brought? It was was I mean, yeah, it was easy and and the contractors could get away with it. But he knows and they're still operating. So still allowed to operate in certain places. But yeah,
it is what it is, you know, that's why it's important to I think it's great over the last, probably 1015 years is we have more platforms like podcasts and YouTube and social media where people can talk about these things. And we can tell other people that are especially those that are still serving, look around your environment, see what you're exposed to go to the doctor, document everything. And then make sure that you check those records over and get get everything you can in there. Because you don't know it could be a year after you get out, it could be 20 or 30 years later down the road. You want to make sure that you have every record that you got, so that you're not having to run into issues with the fight.
Bill Domenz 31:03
Oh, yeah, cuz they're just gonna make it worse and worse and worse. Because that's, I mean, the VA is there to help you only if they deem it necessary. So until they deem it necessary to help you, you have to help yourself.
Keith McKeever 31:20
Yeah, it's, you know, it's the government. There's bureaucracy, there's red tape, you it's a process, and you have to figure out how to navigate that process. But they're not, they're definitely not going to put an express lane in for you to navigate. Right, right. They're not giving you a GPS, you know, they're gonna give you Mapquest
Bill Domenz 31:40
and you really don't want to get a lawyer if you don't have to. Because then whatever you have coming to you, they're gonna eat most of it.
Keith McKeever 31:50
You know, I think, in my personal opinion, that's like the new killer option.
Bill Domenz 31:56
The Oh, yeah. That's your last ditch. Yeah,
Keith McKeever 31:59
that's, that's, you know, definitely try the service organizations, your county, VSO, whatever, try those options first. But, you know, everybody gets to a certain point where it's like, Hey, I've had enough fineness. Give it up, you know,
Bill Domenz 32:16
if you want to call a lot of the county's VSOs, or our Dav approved as well, so they can help you out even more than you think.
Keith McKeever 32:24
Yeah, there's a lot, there's a lot of great ones out there, just, you know, give it a shot. See what happens, you know, sit down, interview,
Bill Domenz 32:34
if your current county doesn't have one, just go to the next county over because if your county don't have one, they'll help you.
Keith McKeever 32:42
Yep, there's definitely somebody out there for it. So any other issues that you that you've experienced to go into transition, or any other advice that you have for anybody who's who's going through either transition now, or anybody else might be in your shoes, they got out, you know, 2020 30 years ago might be looking at, hey, I'm gonna dust off these records and put in a claim.
Bill Domenz 33:06
Do it as soon as do it today. I mean, if you got to take PTO to get it done, get it done. Make sure your spouse is involved, and anybody you possibly can get a hold of hit all the groups on Facebook. So you've got battle buddies lined up. Because Facebook is a great tool for connecting. And generally, that's, you know, what a lot of us just use it for. There's no other platform out there that there's as many guys so we found a bunch of guys through other guys through other guys through other guys, you know, back channeling Facebook, and we call it hate book, but you know, it's the same thing. So, but yeah, I would find every resource you can and just start today because it's an uphill battle. And it's it's probably harder than the time you served. Then more frustrating because you know what happened? And you have to prove it to some jackass who has never met you never seen you and doesn't give a shit about you.
Keith McKeever 34:09
Right and, you know, you're trying to articulate that through, you know, a medical doctors opinions, written statements of yours, your spouse, battle buddies, whatever, it's, they're just taking it off of paper. You know, you're not getting to plead your case to the actual reviewer, you get to get to to the to the medical doctor, but if somebody sent in a cold, dark government building somewhere in a corner, probably with no window in their office, sitting near just eventually, six months from now, opening up your file and reading through it and saying, Well, I either agree or I don't agree. And here's Oh, yeah.
Bill Domenz 34:50
Yeah, it's, it's, I mean, 10 years after I got out was when I found out they pulled the wrong teeth. So my my impacted wisdom teeth were left in my head, my good ones were yanked, because that was the easy thing to do. But they marked that they pulled the impacted ones. So, after a few extra days later out in the civilian world, I've got a dentist sitting there, you know, in the old school X ray, sticking them up on the board, turning it one way, turning it back the other way. And he looked at me, he goes, Did you get your wisdom teeth pulled? And I says, Yeah, my, my right side, and he goes, No, your left side is missing. But your right side are still there. But your records say this. So, and then they were so bad after 10 years, maybe eight years ago, I finally had to have one pulled. Because they were so bad. Nobody would touch him until they had to get pulled. But I wound up on a PICC line and all kinds of other shit because of this thing, like 40 grand in the hole. All because they pulled the wrong frickin teeth. Oh, my goodness. So I mean it. But again, like you said, you don't know. Until you know, and it's so many years later, you're just screwed.
Keith McKeever 36:12
Yeah, you know, and you're at the whim of somebody's record keeping back 30 years ago, and, you know, as somebody want to do their job, right? Do they, maybe they do their job, right? But they keep the records wrong, or they don't do the job, right? fudged the records or, or maybe somebody just doesn't care, like when I was in, you know, getting the anthrax vaccine was was a huge thing. You know, you had to have it to go overseas. It was like a series of seven shots. You know, typically, you know, you obviously get them in a series of one through seven.
I think I got like eight shots total. And they definitely did not go in series of one through seven. It was like one and then two and three. And then I got overseas, and they're like, what's, what was your last shot? And I said, I don't know, there's my medical records. And they were looking at it. And I don't know, if somebody goofed it up. And they're like, well, we don't have that next series number. So we'll just gonna give you this one instead. And so like, the numbers are all over the place, it was like 123637. For like, they're like, it doesn't matter. It's all good. And I'm like, Okay, sure. Yeah, of course, you got them all. Or extra, or a total of whatever, if my arm falls off at some point in time, that might explain why, you know, or go, you won't be able to claim it. Probably not. Nope, nope. So, you know, weird weird things happen. I'm sure there's a million other stories out there like that. So but you know, hey, it's all part of all part of the journey, you know, we all transition out, we all have those those problems, but life goes on, you know, you, you go on to do other things in your life, and you had a passion for cooking, and making your own spices. And eventually, you've had some ideas to turn it into a business. So your business, obviously core spice, I've had to scroll across the bottom there, and it's in the show notes for people to go go to it, but tell us the backstory on on the business. And the idea behind it.
Bill Domenz 38:12
So I mean, I always had like two or three blends, always in the cupboard, always ready to go. And almost every time anybody come over for a barbecue, at the end of the night, they they'd want to take some home be it was leftovers, or some of the seasonings. And that went on for 1020 years, whatever it was, and my son's godfather, and all one of my oldest friends was here spending some time with us as well. And we were cleaning up the kitchen and he was on the other side of the bar having a couple and he slammed his hands on the table. He's like, That's it, you're not giving the shit away anymore because I had already sent people home with a few bottles and baggies and whatever and I'm like what are you talking about? He goes we're gonna start this as a business and I was like, sure you know, we're we've had a few cocktails let's talk about this you know and I kind of just yeah, whatever but in the morning he was still serious. So that entire day with the wife and him and you know everybody in the house we just kind of mold the ideas over came up with the name core spice and we wanted to pin up girl as a logo so to speak. You know, we already had a few blends that we knew were rock solid and then we started off with three and now we're up to seven we alternate with an eighth one with our fish because it's it's not a heavy hitter but the ones that love it, love it, but it's our most expensive blend also so we can't do it all the time. But
Keith McKeever 39:42
so when you come out with something new I know I've asked you this before when we when we talk but the I'm assuming the research and development side of this must get very interesting creating News New blends is
Bill Domenz 39:55
well. So it's really hard I think the hardest thing is, is that the wife has certain tastes, I have certain tastes, the kids have certain tastes, you know, everybody that stops in has certain tastes. And when you taste something dry, not cooked, it can be totally different. So like, if you try and cook with, if you just a big example, cook something with wasabi powder, if you cook with it, it disappears, it's gone. Absolutely gone. But if you use it, after you've cooked, you got you got some nice space. That's why it's only in that little clump in the corner of your sushi tray. Because if they actually cooked with it, it's it's gone. So it's just learning all those weird, all those weird nuances of what stays what what hides what comes out in the front of other things, even though there's barely any there? How do you How can you make, the objective was to do a dry rub seasoning blend, whatever you want to call it, it's all the same stuff. I want you to be able to cook a steak at home. And as long as you don't burn it, it should be as good or better than if you went out for a steak. So those are always the kind of, you know, what we're thinking like, how do you get somebody that is not a good chef. To be able to chef at home, make it easy, make it simple, have a great flavor, no added sugar, no MSG, none of the crap in it. And you want him to come back for more. Yeah, so and all of our blends are made to be used individually or we layer them all the time. So there's, you know, eventually I'm going to put out a chart on which which layer goes with which one and how you can line them all up differently. And I had to call them seven. I haven't sorted that one out in my head yet, because it's in my head, I just have to figure out how to pull it out.
Keith McKeever 42:02
I'm sure at some point in time, though, you know, over time, I'm sure you've had some I guess I call it failures where you've probably made a blend and you've tried it and you know, like, Dad, I don't think this is gonna, this isn't gonna work, probably nobody's gonna buy.
Bill Domenz 42:20
There's probably over 100 initial test runs that nobody else has even sampled because they just go straight in the trash. I'm not willing to try and cook with them if they're if they're that far off. Because there's some other ones where we, you're hesitant, but you're like, it's got something there and you'll cook with it and go. Alright, so it went this way, you were expecting it to go another way? How do you bring it in line where you want it to go? Or it'll send you off on a whole different tangent, which is also fun. Because we got like 15 More in queue that we want to roll out. I mean, one of them's just the plain Jane chili blend, so that you could just put two tablespoons in your pot and you know, add a little more if you want a little more flavor or not. But we've we've validated that one probably over 100 times now and it's insanely consistent. And whether we do it with ground beef, ground turkey, ground chicken steak combinations there venison, whatever, it's still pretty damn consistent. And now you know, you don't have to be a layer chili expert to make something that everybody at home wants to have a bowl of. So the same scenario, you know, we're just it's just one of those ones that we haven't got there yet.
Keith McKeever 43:43
Sounds like you're pretty close. Ally at least closer than trying something and being like, Yeah, this is just definitely not gonna work. I can only imagine just, you know, trying something and cooking putting, you know, putting something on a piece of chicken and taking one bite and just being like, Nope, no.
Bill Domenz 44:00
Oh, well, we usually don't even make it to that to the cooking phase. And you're like absolutely not. We're not even to try that. That's that's bad.
Keith McKeever 44:08
And how I'm very very curious. How do you even know at that point, like you just you just putting all the dry spices together and you're just kind of like, smelling it and just like this just doesn't work?
Bill Domenz 44:20
Well, you know, are
Keith McKeever 44:21
you wasting it or the latest?
Bill Domenz 44:24
The latest one we rolled out little heat little sweet but that it'll even show up but we were what we wanted something specifically for wings. We were targeting wings. And as it turns out, it's great on steak. It's great on salmon and a lot of other stuff. It's great on pork as well. But when we do wings on a smoker and we're using a pellet smoker, my son came up with it. You just throw the wings on for like 40 minutes at 250 Pull them off and you put them on frozen, pull them off, crank that thing up to 500. Or as hot as you can get it. Put all the wings in a bowl, just lightly dust them with your favorite wing sauce, doesn't have to be an actual wing sauce could be barbecue sauce, whatever, but just to give them a coating. And if you don't want that you could use and you know, just use a little bit of olive oil just to give him something to let the seasoning stick to. And then we'll hit him with little heat, little sweet, which is honey based for the sweet side. And then it's got a bunch of other stuff in it for the heat side. But we'll metal that all together, let it sit while the girl comes up the tap and and throw him back on just to get them a little crispy. Pull them off and then dip them however you want. And any sauce you want and or eat him straight. And we did that one. I had three variants of it. And we had a I don't know, I don't remember what the party was. But I had enough wings to do with like 3030 of each blend. And let everybody sample them out and hands down. Everybody pick little heat little sweet whether or not they had sauce on it as well. So and then one of the other blends turned out to be what we haven't released it yet. But it's it's just very citrus based. We call it garlic citrus burst right now. We're not sure that if we're going to keep that name, but it's it's
Keith McKeever 46:29
sounds like links.
Bill Domenz 46:32
So well, not just that we did a pork roast on Christmas, along with a couple of rib rose, ribeye roasts. And strangely enough, the pork roast went first. Which interesting. No, I mean, I was not expecting that at all. I didn't even get but the first little sliver. When I was carving it. To taste it. It was just by the time the plate came back around in the kitchen, it was empty. So I said, Well, now we know that one's got to get sold.
Keith McKeever 47:06
There you go. Now that sounds that sounds really good. So, man, yeah, you've got some I've looked at what you've got out there right now. And using the fifth gift like 15 other ones that you're you're thinking about bringing to market?
Bill Domenz 47:20
Yeah, we need to come up with names, we got to get pricing on it handle each one is it's not cheap to roll out the first time. So and then, you know, you got to store it, you got to sell it, you know? Of course, yeah, it's just shipping is a killer. Now, trying to get bottles right now is a little difficult. So like our our lids and our bottles aren't always the same anymore, just because they're the same size and generic shape. But they're not always the same anymore. Because you just get what you get. Because you're still having that trouble with getting things around here.
Keith McKeever 47:57
That makes sense. I mean, that's been, I think, that way for a lot of people for the last couple of years. So how to what kind of advice do you have for somebody who's looking to start up any kind of business, you know, with hurdles like that, to just deal with things, knowing that they're going to have problems with supply chain and things like that, you know, as they scale up and grow?
Bill Domenz 48:22
Well, being as I was in manufacturing for the last 2030 years, it makes it a little easier for me to think about things like that, where the wife never really had to. She knows how to run a business, that's for sure. If I was actually running the business, we'd be out of business. Because I would have spent all our money on stupid shit because it's cool. No, everybody, everybody will like this. And she's like, No, that's not how you work your business. So after the first year, we finally took the gloves off and shook hands and said, Okay, I'm the spice Master. You're the business master. So all advertising, all strategies, everything goes through her. And that's the biggest thing I could say is is know your place in your business. And don't be upset that you're not. You're not good at everything. Except what you're good at and find a partner that can excel at the places you don't. And be good with that and let them shine as well. Because if you don't, you just keep crushing yourself and the other, whoever it is, be it a spouse or partner, whatever. So it's just like that. Like I said, the business side just doesn't make sense to me. But I can grab 50 different blends of stuff and come up with all kinds of crazy stuff because it's creative. I don't have a business brain. I don't have it at work either. At my day job, you know, I mean it. I write code I play with databases. automation on machines, you know, that kind of stuff. It's all creative work. But when we go and sit down at the manager's meeting, and I have to listen to all of that jargon about the whole month's worth of bills and Bs, and whatever, you know, it's a snooze fest, and I know what an ROI is. But I don't care about it, because I just got I got work to do. Can I go back to work? I don't want to sit here. And
Keith McKeever 50:24
let me just go back to my lines of code, right? Yeah, no,
Bill Domenz 50:29
they don't argue.
Keith McKeever 50:31
It's good point. I mean, everybody does need to know, you know, everybody needs to reflect on what their skills are. Like, I've seen like, I, my wife and I are kind of the same way. Like, we both know, we have our own businesses, but like, we, we both know, like, what our our individual skills are, you know, you just have to know what they are. Which what your strengths are, what your weaknesses are, I know, you know, I'm good at certain things, and I'm terrible at other things. So, sure, that's, that's some great advice, you know, and I think the faster you learn that the better. But it takes a lot of self reflection, and awareness to Yeah, that's a bit honesty, honesty to be like, Okay, I'm really just not good at this. Like, I'm, I'm not good at the business side, or I'm not good at the creative side, I need to find somebody to do that side of it. And take this over. Yeah,
Bill Domenz 51:26
I, I would say if I, we tried this 20 years ago, we would have failed, and maybe the marriage would have failed to just because of the problems that it induces. And they're not problems they can all be worked through. But when you when you've got that passion, and you don't have self reflection, it is very, very difficult to step back and say, Okay, I'm wrong, or I don't agree, but do it anyway. So absolutely. It's very, I mean, that, to me, that was the biggest, biggest thing we did. And then now that when we go to work shows, and, you know, farmers markets, whatever, we actually have a blast when we get to work together. So a lot of our best times lately are now we're actually out working. But we're having a blast while we're doing it. We're actually looking at trying to get our food license so that we can do sampling and some other stuff. Because we're even toying with the idea of doing a course by food truck. There you go, which we think would, which would, you know, everybody we throw the idea it's on board with it too, because the big thing is, we we had lacrosse players, volleyball players, whatever, you know, all the kids doing things. And everywhere you go for tournaments, every show you go to where there's food trucks, it's always the same thing. It's the guy with the burgers. It's the smokehouse guy, it's the pierogi guy. And then that's, maybe there's two or three of those each. But there's no place to get a good salad, there's no place to get a good chicken sandwich. I mean, there's just there's no freshness at any events. So and that's what we would like to do and do it with core spice, obviously. And we think it'd be a winner. But, you know, something we haven't done before. So we got a lot of we got some kinks to work out, that's for sure. That's quite
Keith McKeever 53:27
well, you know, that's part of the journey. That's part of the joy of it, figuring it out. So the beauty of it is, I mean, obviously, you said you're the creative side of it, your wife's the business side of it. So yeah, Scott, put your two heads together, figure it out. And then, you know, figure it, figure out where it goes. But one other thing I wanted to point out and ask you about is you know, you're also through your business, you're supporting some veteran organization like canines for vets. Is that correct? You've heard some things there. So tell us a little bit about more with what you've done there.
Bill Domenz 54:01
So we we usually pick a currently it's canine for vets, we came up with a hot sauce just for them. And then we do I think it's like 40% of that goes directly to them for the bottle. So it's the bottle we drag around and sell. But we don't really make anything on it. It's one we're just doing to get them a big donation. And then you know, a percentage of all of our sales goes back to him last year around. I want to say right before Thanksgiving, we did a brewery. We did a show specifically for them to raise money for them. And we managed to get enough to sponsor a dog for a veteran for a year. So that was pretty cool. So now we're probably a dog and a half, two and a half dogs in with them being able to sponsor and being able to go to the facility and see how they do things and how the veterans react and everything's pretty cool as well. Amber's got a couple other veteran organizations in the works now coming down the pipe, we're looking at some different hot sauces. And it's, it's gonna be pretty cool this year, I think when things start rolling summertime,
Keith McKeever 55:11
that's awesome. You know, that's, that's, that's huge to be able to sponsor a couple of dogs for some guys, because you just you just don't know how much of an impact that can be on their lives, their spouse, their kids, you know, for the next 1015 years? Oh, yeah. It's huge, huge switch of what you've done, you and all your followers and customers to be able to support that. So that's awesome.
Bill Domenz 55:40
Yeah, they're fantastic. They, they mean, they come fine. As it shows now, which is kind of cool. We have kind of a following. And we'll hear from others. We have two buildings at work. And I was in the one building our secondary building. And I happen to have my core spiced coffee mug with me. And the one purchasing lady goes, Oh, wow, those guys are really cool. I like their stuff. And I'm like, thank you. And she's kind of gave me a weird look like, what do you mean? Thank you. I'm like, well, that's my company. She's like, really? So she had bought some stuff and and bought more of it the son to some people in Canada. We've got we've sold stuff as far as Guam. So that's our farthest delivery so far.
Keith McKeever 56:23
Nice. So well, who knows? Who knows? Who will listen to that? Maybe we can. Maybe we can change that? Right? We can say that a challenge? Always, always farther than Guam. All right. Anybody in England, Europe, you know, okay, let's, let's, let's challenge that. So if you know somebody listening, tag your friends overseas. So Oh, yeah. But no, that's, that's awesome. I look forward to see what you guys roll out not only products, but you know, any other organizations you guys are supporting. So I love that when when another veteran owned business, finds a way to benefit, you know, another, you know, a veteran nonprofit in some way and help veterans, I mean, that's what we got to do, we got to, we got to find ways to take care of her. And that's just one nice, clever way that we're taking care of ourselves and business, and ourselves in our families financially, but also using that as a way to take care of our veteran families too. So that's always great.
Bill Domenz 57:24
Veteran really pay attention, because like grunt style, cool stuff, but they're no longer veteran owned, and everybody still thinks they are. So if you don't pay attention to who you're supporting, you're not positive anymore. And they'll play with the words you know, because now they now they support veterans instead of being veteran owned. So we're the, we're the tagline used to be, you know, Yeti is made overseas, but it's engineered in Texas. Still good shit. But you're not really supporting a worker in Texas anymore. You know, and I've gotten plenty Yeti stuff, because it's good shit. But, you know, really look at what you're doing, including when you're doing a donation, you know, who's really going to and how does it actually support somebody at the bottom, which is who you're trying to support. So sometimes it might even be easier to just go to your local VFW and help out there.
Keith McKeever 58:25
Yeah, it definitely helps to research the companies and, you know, shop local, especially, you know, yeah, if it's local, and you know, share their content, follow them on social share that and get those local sales where people know, it's local, that we buy, say, not buy from big name, big name, you know, national brands, because, you know, hey, there's a bunch of great companies there too. But, you know, when it's local, you know, the people there's local impact, you know, it's beneficial there too. So, but Bill, I appreciate you coming on here. Share with us about your company in transition. I think there's a lot of great nuggets that we've yeah, great point on food reference there nuggets. But share with us about your company and your transition issues and whatnot. I think there's a lot of valuable stuff there for anybody going through that are looking to start a business and if anybody's interested in spices I got got that scrolling across the bottom I'll have the link in the show notes. If anybody's interested in go go shop there. Definitely go check it out. Whatever whatever spice whenever you happen to be listening to this or watching it go check it out and go go think about purchasing whatever spice or hot sauce whatever you got this was supporting a veteran nonprofit. So anything else to add bill?
Bill Domenz 59:44
No hit us up of course place.com And we got everything from hot to not so check it out.
Keith McKeever 59:50
Yeah, you got some you got some I'm not much of a spice purse. Your hot flavor stuff. So some of your some of your stuff on there looks really good to me like taco stuff. I'm kind of at Taco kind of sewer. So that's, that's what looks good to me. I can eat tacos all all day every day. But yeah, you definitely have some some delicious looking stuff on the site. So everybody should go check it out. Thanks for Thanks for stopping by and sharing with us. Thanks for having me, Keith. All right, take it easy bill. You too.
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