What started out as a small way to share their experiences traveling the world through photos on Instagram has exploded into monumental YouTube success for couple Bella and Dallin Lambert— two young entrepreneurs with respective stories of success and passion that’s inspiring millions.
Wise beyond their years, Bella and Dallin, better known as Della, have each decided to com mit themselves, not just to each other, but to their passions. Bella is most widely known for the jewelry company she founded in her teens, Origami Owl. Her business’ mission, to be a force for good, has seemingly translated into all areas of her life including the YouTube channel she co-stars in with husband Dallin. His passion for content creation and dedication to consistency has helped their digital presence grow exponentially.
In this episode, hear how Bella built a business at age 14. She dives into the sacrifice and leaps of faith required of her and her family at the start of Origami Owl and how it has grown into what it is today. Hear how she and Dallin are approaching platforms like YouTube, balancing networking, strategic thinking and fun — offering a lesson in new marketing methods that should have business owners taking notes.
“Perfect is the enemy of done.” -Mike Ayala
HIGHLIGHTS:
- [00:00] Intro
- [01:46] Meet Bella and Dallin Lambert
- [02:38] How they met
- [03:10] Who’s had the greatest impact on their lives
- [04:19] The one thing has had the greatest impact on their success
- [06:28] Greatest setbacks
- [09:31] What drives them and keeps them going
- [13:46] Sacrifice and the birth of Origami Owl
- [24:04] Managing Origami Owl from a school bathroom
- [27:53] Origami Owl’s mission statement and helping employees find their passions
- [32:04] Life through postcards and sharing on social media
- [34:46] Earning freedom of time and travel
- [37:34] Dallin shifting his mindset around his passion
- [40:06] What they’re up to today & starting Della Vlogs
- [47:30] Why they do it and how they’ll grow to a million subs
- [50:50] The core aspects of the business have changed
- [55:59] The message they’re trying to share with followers
- [58:10] What their workweek looks like
- [01:01:18] Advice for others looking to invest for their freedom
- [01:04:36] Outro
- [50:41] Contacting Mauricio Rauld and accessing his e-book
- [51:39] Outro
RESOURCES:
STAND OUT QUOTES:
“I hate talking about myself like to say that I’m successful. But I feel like we put in so many sacrifices in our journey to be able to get to where we are today… I feel like we did earn it and I’m really proud of that.” -Bella Lambert [22:20]
“Until the pain of your current situation becomes stronger than the pain it’s going to take to get there. You won’t do anything about it.” -Mike Ayala [22:41]
“One of my mentors always says perfect is the enemy of done.” Mike Ayala [01:02:22]
“Just just go after you don’t need the best website, you don’t need any of that to get started. That all just kind of falls in place later as you keep going, but just go after it.” – Dallin Lambert [01:02:16]
CONNECT WITH BELLA AND DALLIN LAMBERT:
Find | Bella and Dallin Lambert
At Origamiowl.com
On Instagram: @Bellagraceweems @Dallinlambert
On YouTube: @Dellavlogs
FULL TRANSCRIPTION
Mike Ayala 00:00
So today, I’m actually really excited to be able to bring to you a story that is just such an inspiring story. I first met Dallin and Bella, probably a couple of years ago. And when I found out what these two were up to, and just the age that they were and all the wisdom and experience they had, I was just blown away. And so I’m really happy to be able to bring this story to you guys. And I think it’s going to inspire you. So today we get into how Bella shares the background of her wildly successful company Origami Owl we get into how her mom sold their family’s special leather couches in the diamond from her own wedding ring to help support Bella’s company early on, you guys are gonna be blown away when you hear how old Bella was when she started this company. And then what this company has been built to today. It’s just amazing. Dallin and talks about their adventures and traveling and how they’ve made some impact and grown a sizable following on social media which is just such an amazing again story as to when people set their minds to what they really want. And we discuss this formula a lot in the investing for freedom formula, but what do you really want, why do you want it? What are you going to do to get it, measure results and then adjust it’s really Really cool just being able to see this in action, which is my goal on the show here to just bring you, people that have kind of, they obviously didn’t know the formula, the way that I look at it and talk about it, but they apply it and they make these moves. And so you know, when Dallin gets into these adventures and traveling and the things that they’ve done, it’s just pretty cool to see how after the fact they set their intention, and they’re just out there making this stuff happen. They’ve got a certain desire in life, they wanted to see the world and they’re turning this into a business and inspiring other people to do this. And so that’s, that’s pretty cool. I can’t wait for you guys to hear it down and also talks about their backgrounds and starting on YouTube and advice on people trying to grow a YouTube following. So you guys are going to be completely inspired by these two individuals and just their passion for life. And I mean, you can just hear in their voice. So without further ado, let’s just dive into it. There we go.
Mike Ayala 01:46
Alright, so I am so excited to have Dallin and Bella Lambert, on the podcast.
Dallin Lambert 01:51
Thank you we’re excited to be here.
We’re so excited.
Mike Ayala 01:53
Yeah. You know what’s so crazy about this? These guys are 26 and 23 years old Yeah, guys because they’re just like little kids. So what’s really cool about I think what we’re going to get into today is just, I mean, all the things that they’ve done where they’re going, you know, I talked to these guys a year ago about what they were wanting to do. And these guys are executors.
Dallin Lambert 02:16
It’s crazy. That was a year ago.
Mike Ayala 02:17
right?
Bella Lambert 02:18
It’s weird to think back to that night. I can’t believe where we are now.
Mike Ayala 02:21
Yeah, it’s crazy. And you know, I mean, seeing the excitement that they had at that point in time and the thing that really gets me excited to actually share with you guys again, it’s just back to that execution point. You know, there are a lot of people talk about doing things, but most people don’t go out and get it done. And you guys are doing it. So
Dallin Lambert 02:38
Oh, thank you.
Mike Ayala 02:38
I really appreciate you guys. So give me just the high level when did you guys meet?
Bella Lambert 02:45
So I had a party at my house and I invited a friend who invited a friend invited Dallin.
Dallin Lambert 02:51
So I was like the last invite man. Yeah, Lucky.
Bella Lambert 02:54
He showed up and we actually became friends for a year and then we started dating.
Mike Ayala 02:58
Wow, that’s cool.
Bella Lambert 02:59
We stayed as like friends for a while, and yeah, kind of crazy. Then we got married. And we just had our three year anniversary yesterday.
Dallin Lambert 03:05
Yesterday actually,
Mike Ayala 03:06
I saw that. Nothing secret in the social media.
Dallin Lambert 03:08
Oh, it’s not we put everything out there.
Mike Ayala 03:10
Yeah, I love it. Cool. So here are some questions that we dive into with every guest. So and if you guys want to both answer fine if just one of you does, whatever. So who’s had the greatest impact in your life?
Dallin Lambert 03:22
Hmm, I saw that question. It’s a good one.
Bella Lambert 03:27
I think Dallin has had the greatest impact on my life. I don’t want to be cheesy, but for real, ever since I’m very down. I feel like together we’re like a team and everything we do. I feel like we support each other and we’re we have very different strengths, but I don’t know. I feel like he’s definitely been the biggest impact of my life.
Mike Ayala 03:46
Okay, so you can’t answer Bella.
Mike Ayala 03:48
Yeah, you know, I’m stuck now. No, I mean, it also sounds cheesy too, but hang on. I gotta see my mom. Yeah. I love it. Yeah, like, I think like growing up, I’ve had a really good relationship with my mom. And when I wanted to kind of like, take different endeavors in life, especially within like, last couple of years, she was always like, my, my support, like, pushing me on so
Bella Lambert 04:14
Aw,
Dallin Lambert 04:14
Yeah,
Bella Lambert 04:14
I’m gonna cry watching this.
Dallin Lambert 04:15
Yeah, yeah.
Mike Ayala 04:17
Well, gotta make sure mom hears this.
Dallin Lambert 04:18
Yeah.
Mike Ayala 04:19
Cool. So if you could narrow it down to one thing that has had the greatest impact on your success, what would it be?
Bella Lambert 04:26
Perseverance.
Dallin Lambert 04:27
Yeah,
Bella Lambert 04:28
I would say perseverance. I think that when times get hard, it really shows like, how are you going to react to things and are you going to persevere through them? I think that’s had the greatest impact on me. There were definitely times where it was hard for me to get started in my business and even on YouTube. There’s a lot of negative comments or a lot of people who tell you that you can’t do something. And for me, persevering through that time has always helped me.
Mike Ayala 04:52
That’s awesome.
Dallin Lambert 04:53
I think 100% I think especially starting social media and YouTube, the first couple of months is always the hardest, you feel like you’re not growing, you feel like there’s no success. Then once you just kind of breakthrough that, and things just kind of start rolling and things are happening is when it all just starts coming together, but you got to just keep grinding and persevering for that. Through that beginning…
Mike Ayala 05:16
So are you guys saying that life isn’t all roses?
Bella Lambert 05:18
No!
Dallin Lambert 05:19
I wish
Bella Lambert 05:20
I wish
Dallin Lambert 05:21
Oh man, there’s a lot of behind the scenes that people don’t see. I mean, of course, I think especially with us with social media, we’re only going to post and put out there the highlights the best and no one really sees what really goes on and what we do, which I’m excited to talk about. Yeah, like those scenes. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Because it’s especially with Bella story. She’s put in so many hours so much work to be at where she’s at now. So
Mike Ayala 05:48
that’s cool. It’s inspiring.
Dallin Lambert 05:50
That’s crazy. Yeah it is
Mike Ayala 05:51
so you know one of the goals here at the investing for freedom podcast. I really want to remember the Wizard of Oz. Yeah, I love knowing that the wizards are behind the Yeah, I can ask like that I want to get behind the curtain purpose, you know, you got this big production happening but then people don’t understand the Blood Sweat tears. I mean literally tears sometimes that go into running businesses and you know, we talk a lot about jobs, people hate their jobs and everything else will it’s not any. It’s not any easier on the other side of that, in fact running a business or having your own brand or any of that could actually be more gut-wrenching. So I’m excited to get into that.
Mike Ayala 06:28
What was your greatest setback? And what did you learn from it?
Bella Lambert 06:32
Well, in the beginning of starting my business, we actually ran out of chains, which I have jewelry business. So if you run out of chains, like you’re not able to even like wear the lockets that we sell, and that was a big setback for us. And I always talk about that story, because it’s just so funny to think at the time. We thought that was like the biggest crisis and we weren’t gonna make it out of that. But then that was just like a little bump in the road and a lot of times say, Oh, you’re so lucky. This is just like this perfect little straight line to the top. And for me, I feel like it’s been like this like roller coaster of like the ups and the downs and like little bumps in the road like that. There have been so many others, like, that’s not the only thing but in my business, I would say that and then in our YouTube channel, I would say like all the negative comments, sometimes I thought they don’t affect Dallin as much as sometimes they affect me like, I…
Dallin Lambert 07:25
I just gotta say, man, some girls are mean to girls out there sometimes
Bella Lambert 07:28
I know
Dallin Lambert 07:29
I feel like it’s a little different, you know, guy to guy, but
Bella Lambert 07:32
There’s just so many negative comments, but Dallin luckily has helped me kind of move past the like, I don’t really care as much anymore, but there have been some that I’ve been like wow, that was really mean. Yeah. So
Dallin Lambert 07:46
yeah, I just think like, you gotta think of maybe what that person is going through why they would say that or how to maybe understand a little bit about them. And if it’s real bad, you just delete it and move on or just keep it up and Maybe use it to motivate you and yeah, keep grinding.
Bella Lambert 08:02
Yeah
Dallin Lambert 08:02
haters
Bella Lambert 08:03
now they kind of motivate me because it’s like, wow, how cool is it that we have people who actually take time out of their day? Like I have all these comments, we have some negative some positive, like, that’s cool that people are commenting on our stuff like I feel like bad exposure is still good exposure So,
Mike Ayala 08:17
What is the piece of advice you find yourself sharing the most?
Dallin Lambert 08:22
Hmm, I think uh I think for me, kind of goes along with that last question. But persevering, like, just don’t stop. I mean, once you have an idea and once you have a goal and you have something that that you want to accomplish, go after it and realize that there’s gonna be the setbacks realize there’s gonna be bumps in the road. But don’t stop because you already have this idea you already have most likely a plan put in place so it can be done. You can get there.
Mike Ayala 08:53
That’s awesome.
Bella Lambert 08:53
Yeah, the number one thing that I always say is no matter how young or how old you are, you can absolutely go after it.
Mike Ayala 08:59
I love that.
Bella Lambert 08:59
I think Like that’s the number one thing I just feel like people get so stuck on either their age or it’s either I’m too young to do something or I’m too old to even start something at this point, or just I’m not good enough. And I feel like it doesn’t matter how young or how old you are, you can go after it if you believe in yourself. That’s awesome. I love it.
Mike Ayala 09:18
I don’t want to camp on this but one of the things that we talked about over and over is the five keys to freedom What do you really want? Really want. Why do you want it? What are you going to do to get it? measure results and adjust along the way?
Dallin Lambert 09:31
Yeah, perfect.
Mike Ayala 09:31
So like when I hear the advice that you’re given, and you guys are obviously very clear on what you want out of life. So without going into the whole formula, what do you actually really want? what drives you guys every day?
Dallin Lambert 09:44
I think like what I just love when someone brings in that not good comment that hey, we brighten up their day, we help them out in some way more on them some entertainment, some happiness, whatever it can be. That’s just really like what keeps me going out there, but I love
Bella Lambert 10:03
Yeah, we just opened a p o box, actually. And we link it in every YouTube video. And it’s cool because people actually send us letters. And yesterday we’re opening these letters from all over the country. And it’s people who say that our YouTube channels impacted them in some way. And it’s just, it’s silly because our videos are so light-hearted and just fun and silly. But the fact that like, someone would say, I had a really rough day at school, I turned on your YouTube channel, and it brightened my day like that makes it so worth it to us. And also, just like in my business, it’s cool to see people also achieving financial freedom through my business. And that I just that makes me so happy. We always say at Origami Owl, we want to be a force for good. We want to make a difference in people’s lives. And I think that at the end of the day, if I know that I had a part in doing that for even one person that makes it so worth it to me. That’s so awesome.
Mike Ayala 10:54
So I always say that. I think if you want to live more, you have to give more. Yeah, and that’s what kind of drives me I mean, I have to I have two things that I really… So my personal freedom, my time freedom. That’s a huge thing for me. I heard Robert Kiyosaki one day say that wealth can be measured in the amount of days that you don’t have to go to work. Yeah, totally. And so for me, and by the way, that’s subjective, because it’s different for you. And it’s different for you. And it’s different for me, it’s not some monetary target of Oh, you got to be worth a million or 100 million dollars. Somebody could be completely personally free and be so when we say what do you really want? So one person could maybe just want to make $15 a day. Right? And that’s cool. Yeah. Like if that’s your thing, then yeah. So it’s not really ever about money. And so when I hear you know, what you guys are passionate about and reading those letters and Origami Owl and that, you know, helping people achieve financial freedom. That’s, that’s amazing. So I commend you guys.
Mike Ayala 11:46
Yeah, I also think it’s important to always think people over profit. I feel like when you’re helping people and you’re reaching out to people or you’re being kind to others, or you’re thinking of people first I feel like that’s when the profits come. And we’ve really seen that in my business, we really at Origami Owl, focus a lot on people and developing people and helping them grow and helping them find their passion. And so it’s cool to see how that does translate into profit in the long run. And we’re never really thinking about like, how are we going to inspire someone so we can make money? That’s not what we’re thinking. We’re thinking, how can we really help someone in their life and it’s cool to see how that can help not only them in their business and in their life, but also us as well.
Dallin Lambert 12:27
I’ve got real lucky because Origami Owl has been around a lot longer than since I’ve kicked off this YouTube thing. So luckily, her and her mom have already set these like this, like people over profit. I’ve just kind of grabbed these, these little things that I’ve learned from Origami, I’m like, alright, we’re gonna we’re gonna use this jumping into YouTube. And I think that’s why we’ve had success that we’ve had in such little time. Because Bell has kind of already established these values and these sayings, but
Mike Ayala 12:59
yeah, core beliefs
Dallin Lambert 13:00
Yeah, and beliefs, there you go. And we’ve used that. And now everything and that’s really helped us.
Mike Ayala 13:06
Yeah, that’s the I. So I think that that’s one of you just pointed out one of the keys that I think is a super big key to success when you live principle-based, whether it’s a good principle or a bad principle, that’s what everything is founded on it. So when you have, you know, we say sayings, but literally people over profit, if that’s the saying that’s up on a wall, it’s not going to do anything for you. But if it’s truly a core value, which I can tell it is with you guys, then that drives everything that happens in your entire world. And so the nice thing is you’ve built this foundation in this principle, and it doesn’t matter what you go on and do it, you get to take that list in that group of people in that community in that following that you’ve built with you. So that’s pretty amazing. I love the way you pointed that out.
Mike Ayala 13:46
So it would be unfair if we continued to talk about all the amazing things we could talk about without really digging into Origami Owl and where this all started because you were 15.
Bella Lambert 13:57
14
Dallin Lambert 13:57
14 man.
Bella Lambert 13:58
I was 14 years old. Yeah, it’s, it’s crazy to always reflect on my story. So I’m 23 years old now. But I started my business when I was 14 years old. The reason I started it is because I went to my parents and I said, you’re gonna buy me a car for my 16th birthday, right? And I remember
Dallin Lambert 14:14
She was thinking ahead,
Bella Lambert 14:15
Yeah I was thinking ahead, I was preparing. And they looked at me and they laughed, and they said, in this family, we work for the things that we have. And so if you want a car, you’re gonna have to work for it. And so I started babysitting, I earned $250. And I went to my parents, and I said, Okay, what do I do now? I’m never gonna get a car and I was getting frustrated. And they said, Well, why don’t you start a business or something? And I was like, Hello, I’m 14 years old, like, How am I supposed to start a business? But the cool thing about my parents is they’ve always believed and inspired me since I was a really young girl. So they totally believed in me. They’re like, you could do this. Like if you want to start something, you could do it. And so basically, that’s what I did. I decided to start a business at 14 years old I started selling. I named a Origami Owl where we sell customizable jewelry. I’ve always been passionate about jewelry since I was really little. And I loved making jewelry that was meaningful to me whether it had like my birthstone, or my favorite color or my initials on it, I loved that. And so we opened up Origami Owl started selling it around in the area. So like out of my house, and I would go to little boutiques on the weekends after school, I would work and we started selling the lockets that you fill with charms. And in the beginning, they started taking off and it was crazy because to me I would make like $200 one night and I would just I would like I couldn’t handle how crazy that was to me. I was like I worked for like three months babysitting, I earned $250 and in one night I just made $200 I remember I told my mom like we’re eating good tonight. And so it’s crazy to look back on that we ended up from there from doing like the boutiques and selling the jewelry out of my house. We opened up a mall kiosk at the Chandler mall. I don’t know if you’ve ever been in the chat room while we were right outside of Abercrombie and Fitch well, yeah. And I would go in almost every day after school and I would just work. And that for, for me like as a 14 year old girl, that’s a sacrifice because you want to hang out with your friends when you’re in high school and I had so many things I had to do like my homework, I’d be doing homework at the cash register. And so there was that side of it. And then I started seeing the success that I had. And I knew that if I could impact other people, it would just be so cool. And so we ended up opening up the company as social selling. And basically anybody could go online buy a kit of the product and sell it themselves. And so that’s what we did. We did not anticipate the amount of growth that we were about to have. We had no idea we were expecting maybe 1000 people to sign on within a year or two. And within a couple of months, we had reached that goal and it was so insane to just see the explosion of growth we always compared it to a bowling ball rolling down a hill because we felt like the company was just taking off so fast. And we just cannot believe it. And so where it’s at today we have 25,000 amazing designers, we call them our amazing designers who sell the jewelry. And when. So when we hit, we hit a crazy goal, we actually reached $250 million. And within a couple of years of opening Oragami Owl, which was explosive growth, we were one of the fastest social selling companies to ever start. And when I look back at that, it just it’s just really crazy and humbling to see how something that was seriously started at our kitchen table could have even reached that amount of money or success. But now my main priority and my main focus is to help other people and it’s cool that through Origami Owl we’re able to do that and I mean I could talk about Origami Owl all day we might need another 45 minutes. I love it because It’s just it’s so cool to reflect on and to think about all the things that have happened with it, but I just feel really blessed and really grateful.
Mike Ayala 18:07
Before, before we move on, so a lot of people hear stories like that. And they say, Okay, great. Bella can do that. Yeah. Did you have like this? I mean, I even heard you. I heard I heard Dallin say, you know, you were looking ahead for… you just wanted a car. Yeah. So, like, Can anybody do this? Or what? What was like What sets you apart? What made this thing blow up?
Bella Lambert 18:31
Yeah. So it’s funny because I do get people who say that all the time. Oh, that’s great for you. But I could never do that. And I seriously think to myself, I was a normal 14 year old girl. And the craziest thing is, if I wouldn’t have just like, had the courage to just try, I would have never known what could have happened. Imagine if I would have gotten $1,000 just bought a used car and then just stopped like, I would have never seen the success that we’ve had and luckily I had amazing people who supported me We actually have co-founder Sean, Sean Maxwell Tyson Basha, and my amazing mom. And it’s cool to see what you could do when you’re surrounded by amazing people who want to lift you up. And also, if you just believe in yourself, if I just, it’s, it’s just crazy to think about, like, I could have just been happy with the $250 babysitting just continued to babysit, or it’s cool to see that I decided to invest in myself and to just take a leap of faith and try something.
Mike Ayala 19:28
Yeah. Did you have a clear plan? Or were you just rolling with it?
Bella Lambert 19:31
Honestly, just rolling with it. We had no idea what we were doing. And a little backstory that I don’t really share often is, it’s cool because my mom and my dad always believed in me. And when we started the business, we didn’t have a lot of money as a family. And so we lived like a pretty average life, I would say and one day I came home from school. And this was like, right when we were transitioning into the mall kiosk time, so it was like pretty early on in the business and all of our couches, were gone out of our house. And I was like, Where did our couches go? Mom, because my mom is an interior designer. She always has loved like, these leather couches that she had were like her favorite thing. And they were gone. And I said, Where’d they go? And she said, Well, I believe in you. So I sold the couches, so we can make some extra money to be able to help you in your business. And I was like, 14 at the time. So I was like, Wow, that’s cool that she believed in me enough to do that. And then a couple of months later, she ended up selling the diamond on her wedding ring. Because we still needed more money for the business. And so it’s just like little things that people don’t see in the behind the scenes that really helped the success of the business and it’s cool to see how she believed in me and believed in my dreams and wanted us to be able to be successful. Oh, and I did get my car. I ended up getting a jeep. Her name is Owlice. O-w-l-i-c-e.
20:54
Nice.
Bella Lambert 20:55
Like Owl. Origami Owl.
Mike Ayala 20:56
Yeah, that’s great. I saw that.
Bella Lambert 20:58
Yeah. You get It. So it’s cool because every time I see that car, I think about where this all started. And it reminds me of the dream that I had. But now it’s cool because I feel like that dream has been passed on to other people who are able to go and reach their own dreams through Origami Owl. So
Mike Ayala 21:15
that is so awesome. I appreciate you sharing that, you know, just getting transparent. And we’re going to get into this a little bit more, as well. But talk more about the YouTube and yeah, and the haters. And, you know, people sometimes think that there’s two sides to this, right? People think oh, okay, you know, Dallin and Bella can do that. I can’t. But we’re all the same. Right? Exactly. The only thing that differentiates I think people you guys touched on this off off-mic, but it’s great. It’s hard work. It’s just taking one step at a time. When you really look at the five keys to freedom. That adjust, I think is super important. Because you had this dream and vision but you didn’t see a 250 million dollar company or whatever it is three years or five years later, whatever that number was. You didn’t see that necessarily, right. And so you’ve got this idea and it’s just putting one foot in front of the other and taking your, your mom sold your couches.
Bella Lambert 22:04
I know, like, and it’s so many experiences like that, like so many sacrifices and I think that is also a big another big word when it comes to success is sacrifice. Like what are you willing to sacrifice to be able to become successful? And for me it is kind of weird. I hate talking about myself like to say that I’m successful. But I feel like we put in so many sacrifices in our journey to be able to get to where we are today.
Mike Ayala 22:29
You earned it.
Bella Lambert 22:30
And I feel like yeah, I feel like we did earn it and I’m really proud of that. And it’s, it’s just crazy.
Mike Ayala 22:35
Yeah, it’s exciting. So, I found myself saying this a lot lately until the pain of your current situation becomes stronger than the pain it’s going to take to get there. You won’t do anything about it. Well, and so just even, you know, thinking through all that the blood sweat, tears, the grit, selling couches, selling your mom sold her diamond
Bella Lambert 22:56
I know and the crazy thing is she actually never got a new diamond she I bought a $5 cd off of Amazon and put that in her diamond. And she still wears that. And she it’s like a reminder of her to her that where we came from and where we started, it keeps her humble. And also, it’s cool because she probably she definitely could buy herself a diamond now if she wanted to. But it’s the principle to her of the sacrifices she made to get to where she is today.
Mike Ayala 23:21
That’s so good.
Mike Ayala 23:22
I feel like it’s so cool.
Mike Ayala 23:24
That’s awesome. That’s why again, and not to hit it too much. But what do you really want? Yeah, you know, it’s not necessarily fame and fortune and diamonds. And I mean, that’s all cool, whatever. But it’s all relative, right? What do you really want? You want to help people you guys are out there. I know. Freedom is a big thing for you guys. And I don’t want to go there yet. But I think when we get into the YouTube channel and the traveling and everything you guys do I mean, I can just see that from the outside. enjoying life. You guys are so passionate about everything you do. So what do you really want? Why do you want it? It’s amazing to talk about. I’m so inspired by your story. So thanks for coming on.
Mike Ayala 23:59
Yeah, of course. Thank you. I can listen to it all day. I’ve heard it. All right. 500 times, man but
Mike Ayala 24:04
So there’s a couple things before we move off of Origami Owl that I want to just so what I remember you telling me a story that. I think it was you?
Mike Ayala 24:12
You were at school and you’d be in the bathroom like writing. Tell me that.
Bella Lambert 24:16
Yeah. So it’s funny because when we had the mall kiosk, we actually would I made a business card because I was a businesswoman. And we How old were you? I was 14. Okay,
Mike Ayala 24:26
That was the mall kiosk, weren’t you? You’re probably 15 then
Bella Lambert 24:29
No, I was like 14. Yeah, so 14, it happened really fast. And so we ended up I had a flip phone at the time, I was so cool. And I put my business my phone number on every business card that we would give out and we gave out a couple hundred at that mall kiosk. And so after Christmas, which was when everybody was buying our Origami Owl lockets I started getting nonstop phone calls. When I was in school, I’d be sitting in class and my phone would just be constantly buzzing. And it was because we didn’t have a website yet and we didn’t have a phone number for Origami Owl, we had nothing and so people were just like grasping onto this business card trying to get ahold of us to buy more gifts or buy a locket for a friend. And so I would go to the bathroom, I would say, Hi, this is Bella from Origami Owl, how may I help you? And there’d be toilets flushing in the background? Like, this is a very professional business center. What are you talking about? And I would take down orders on my arm and on my leg, I would write them down and I would go home I would literally fill orders from my arm I would pick man I hope that was to writing it down on the order and it’s just that’s so funny to look back on because we were grinding even when I was in school, like I was trying to work my business.
Mike Ayala 25:38
Yeah, that’s so crazy. Okay, so one other thing that I just want to make sure before we move on, you said a lot there about Origami Owl and you know your amazing co founders and just your philosophy on people over profit. Tell me about the owls nest.
Bella Lambert 25:53
The Nest. Yes. So we call our headquarters the nest. Origami Owl nest Owl’s Nest, you know, we like to be witty and funny, I know you see it. But it’s so cool. It’s about 80,000 square feet. It’s in Chandler. And we have the most incredible team members on the planet, like, our team members are incredible. And we have an aqua blue slide at our nest from the top floor to the bottom floor.
Dallin Lambert 26:18
You can just think of like the most like, perfect office that’s just like, fun dreamy. Like, that’s the spot.
26:25
It’s so fun. And it’s just so cool. Because everybody that works there embodies our mission statement, which is something that we’ve we were so passionate about. And it’s been our mission since the very beginning. And it’s to be a force for good to make a difference in people’s lives. And that’s what we really preach at Origami Owl and everybody who walks in there always says, Wow, it just feels so different here. There’s an amazing energy here. And that’s really, it comes from our team members and the people that work there and people who are passionate about what they do. And so I feel so lucky to be surrounded by so many incredible people at our nest, it’s so fun.
Mike Ayala 27:01
I love it. And the reason why I really wanted to dig on that because you know, coming from the investment world, we’re always talking about leverage. So you can get more done. You can buy more properties with leverage, borrowing money from banks, etc, right? But what’s more important to me and I leverage works in all areas of life, you can in order to do something different or get to somewhere different than where you currently are. It’s Einstein’s definition of insanity, right? Doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. If you don’t leverage something different than what you’re currently using or utilizing in your life, then you’re not going to change anything. And what I hear you saying over and over and over, it’s people over profit, it’s the team. And I fully believe that if you want to do anything amazing in life, you’ve got to leverage other people’s talents and abilities and their real core giftings. Absolutely. And not only their gifts, but what do they really want. So
Mike Ayala 27:53
When we start talking about, you know, the five keys to freedom, what drives them? everybody that comes on this show, we want to talk about what’s what the why behind what you know, let’s get behind the curtain Why are you really doing what you’re doing? But when you look at your employees, or the people that are working with you, or even business partners, what are they really wanting? And when you have that true mission of people over profit, what… Tell me your mission again?
Bella Lambert 28:17
So our mission is to be a force for good to love, inspire and motivate people of all ages to reach their dreams and empower them to make a difference in the lives of others. That’s the full mission.
Mike Ayala 28:26
I don’t know if I’ve ever heard anything from a business mission statement that embodies what I really believe on the five keys to success, the freedom because you’re really empowering that like you’re empowering them to success, you’re motivating them, you’re really how to how do you figure out what they want? Is there like a process that Origami Owl that you get into that or is it just identifying? Do we all want the same thing? Is that what really what it is?
Bella Lambert 28:49
Yeah, I think like what our team members want. I feel like our team members are so passionate about what they do, and I feel like we try to work with them and we try to make sure that they’re happy and that The thing is, when it comes to team members, a lot of times people are working their nine to five job because you know, they need to make money. But at work on the aisle, we try to inspire them at their time when they’re there, to be able to go after Origami Owl and just leave the nest, spread their wings and do what they’re passionate about, like maybe what they’re doing at Origami Owl isn’t their complete passion. But we hope that when they’re origami out that they can learn what their passion is. And they can go and do that. And so it’s funny because when team members leave as sad as it is, we’re always so happy for them because they’re going in there, they’re reaching their passion, and they’re, they’re going after their dreams. A lot of people are there because they’re passionate about helping people and that’s what we do at Origami Owl. I think that’s the thing that we do the best and it’s cool to see our team members embody that as well and want to be a part of that and want to make a difference. And so I feel like the people who are with us right now are our team players there are they’re just incredible and they just want to make a difference.
Mike Ayala 29:59
Well That’s amazing. You guys have an annual convention. Yes, we do. How many people go to that?
Bella Lambert 30:04
Um, like four to 5000 people? Yeah. It’s pretty crazy. It’s so stressful.
Mike Ayala 30:11
About for you. Is it stressful for you, Dallin? Not so much for me. I just gotta. I’m there to support her. Yeah, I got to keep her grounded. Yeah, totally. Yeah, it’s a lot of pressure for her. She’s speaking a lot. She seeing around 4000 designers that love her and want to be with her. And yeah, it can be a lot. Yeah, pulls a ton of energy out of you. I bet.
Bella Lambert 30:33
Yeah. But it’s always I feel like it’s a big family reunion whenever all of us get together, because it’s just people I love who are doing what they’re passionate about and wanting to better themselves. And so, I love our convention. It’s so fun.
Mike Ayala 30:44
There’s a lot of you energy.
Bella Lambert 30:46
Oh, yeah, at the end of it. I’m like, motive. I feel so motivated. I’m like, I could just run a marathon right now when I do this. I just feel so excited to
Mike Ayala 30:52
Do you crash a couple days after, like right after?
Bella Lambert 30:54
Like, literally right after I crashed and then I get back up and I’m motivated again.
Dallin Lambert 31:00
Gotta take a couple days. But then after that, right back into the
Mike Ayala 31:03
I got to commend you Dallin. I mean, she said at the beginning that you’re like the most influential person in her life. So,
Dallin Lambert 31:09
thank you.
Mike Ayala 31:09
And that’s pretty cool to see how you guys like flow together. Okay, so Origami Owl’s awesome, you guys, and that’s just amazing what you’ve done. But I’ve loved watching your guys’s journey together. So you just celebrated three years yesterday. Yeah, three years. I don’t know when I actually met you guys. It’s probably been a year and a half, two years maybe? Yeah, probably. Yeah. I think the first time we officially met was at the lake on a boat ramp on your guys’s boat. Nice. That’s so fun. Yeah, that makes sense. Oh, yeah, I think so. Because then there was that issue. Yeah, we hit the prop something like that. Yeah, totally. And then yeah, but yeah, I think that was first time we Yeah. And then you guys went and got your boat and cams, right. Yep. Yeah, got it. Yeah, a little plug for my son. I met you guys through my son Dylan, right. He’s a professional wake surfer.
Dallin Lambert 31:55
We always saw Dylan at the lake and I was like, I want to be able to surf like that kid.
Bella Lambert 31:58
He’s taught me so much. He’s incredible. I want to be like Dylan.
Dallin Lambert 32:01
Yeah Dylan’s a good guy.
Bella Lambert 32:03
He’s awesome.
Mike Ayala 32:04
This is just another example of you guys being so giving in everything that you do. And you know, a lot of times we live in our own head. We live in our world every day. There’s a bunch of chaos and confusion in our own brains. But watching you guys from the outside and everything you do it, it comes back to people over profit. I truly believe that I see that as a principle in your life. You guys have been so influential in my son’s life. You guys have taught me a ton. Wow. Yeah, not really. I mean, just like sitting at dinner with you guys. One time, just you guys were we invited you over number one, because we like you. But number two, because our son was you know, he was kind of growing and I saw some gifts that you guys had and really wanted to just get together and I was inspired after that. So I really appreciate your guys’s energy and your horse.
Mike Ayala 32:44
Okay, so let’s dig into what you guys are like in this whole other phase of life. I think. Not the Origami Owl. It’s not still a big part of it. But tell me where you’re out. What do you guys working on?
Dallin Lambert 32:55
Yeah, so uh, well, throwing it back a couple years. I always love social media. I always thought that you could grow with it. There’s a lot of opportunities I love. I like photography. I like doing videos and as a way to like kind of showcase what, what we did and we love traveling. And so it’s funny, we kind of did like a, we started a little Instagram page started putting like our travel photos on there. What was that called? It’s called life through postcards. No, it’s cool. We actually like took Postcards from our travels and sent them out to people and until it kind of started getting a little bigger. And I’ll send I’m calling on what the stack of like 200 postcards trying to get out to people. Yeah,
Bella Lambert 33:34
I remember one time we ended up writing like 500 postcards and mailing them out to people. And it was cool to see how we created this little community on Instagram of people who just wanted who a lot of people said, Oh, I feel like I’ll never be able to go to this place. send me a postcard there. Or some people would say it’s my dream to go to this place. I want this postcard to put on my door so I can go there. And I just think that’s so cool. That we were able to create that little community.
Mike Ayala 33:58
So when you started Origami Owl it was all about a car? Right? That was the why at that point in time, which is just crazy, right? I know it. I know it changed and morphed. But were you guys a little bit more strategic about life through postcards? Was there a real reason behind it? Or did you guys just say we’re just gonna do life through postcards?
Dallin Lambert 34:13
I think our reason was that I just looked at like some of these other people that would, for some, some reason or another would never be able to travel to these places that we went to. And I wanted to bring them a little piece of like Bella said a little piece of that place through a postcard. Yeah. And that was cool. But then it kind of just, I don’t know, I don’t think it really,
Mike Ayala 34:35
I thought we were trying to document our travels as well and have it in one place so we could look back at it. I feel like it was like the most fun time in our life and we wanted to document those memories and share it with the world. So its kinda what we did.
Mike Ayala 34:46
So let me ask a different question then. You guys are obviously blessed and fortunate, but it’s not like it was all just given to you guys. You guys have grinded. We’ll talk more about that. You worked your tail off as a teenager and you guys are still I mean it looks great on the surface and everything’s Yeah, you know, the 15-minute video that goes up is that’s blood, sweat and tears for like hours and hours and hours of thoughts. And so, with life through postcards, I know you guys were already traveling. Was there… Is there a way that people can begin to earn their freedom through? Was there like any kind of monetary benefit? Or? Or was that just not even part of the conversation? Free hotels or something or,
Dallin Lambert 34:59
I mean, that was kind of maybe in the back of the mind. But it never was really the main focus, I knew I had a lot of friends that were in the social media business that we’re getting those free hotels that were doing different brand deals with airlines or cruise ships, whatever, whatever it was that had to do a travel, I was in the back of my mind, but I always thought that you had to have like, 2 million followers to be able to kind of get that so I never thought that I would kind of get there there was it was going to be a process to get there. And so at that point, it was just more of documenting what we did and kind of having fun with it.
Bella Lambert 36:00
Yeah,
Mike Ayala 36:00
so when we asked the question what do you really want is his time freedom and travel? Is that a big part of your guys’s what you really want?
Dallin Lambert 36:07
Yeah, and I think with YouTube and social media is it’s something that we can do on the road, I kind of want to, as I was thinking of, you know, how can we make money or create this freedom of time? That was something that always just was right there. And I felt like when we travel, we make videos on the road and we’re still being able to do what we love and work. Yeah, while we’re anywhere in the world.
Mike Ayala 36:34
Okay, I love that. Cuz, like we don’t want to talk about our passion and our purpose and bring money into the conversation. Yeah, it feels bad,
Dallin Lambert 36:44
right
Mike Ayala 36:45
But money’s not a bad thing.
Dallin Lambert 36:48
No, not at all.
Mike Ayala 36:50
So when we talk about investing for your freedom, you guys are passionate about travel. You guys are already traveling the world you want to share that message. And it’s okay to monetize it right? Of course. So I know that was And the reason why you started doing it with life through postcards, that wasn’t the reason why you started Origami Owl either, right? Yeah. But did you make some good money? Yeah. Or are you making some good money?
Dallin Lambert 37:07
Sure. No, for sure. And I think like, it also is motivating. When you get that check each month or every two weeks, whatever it is, it is motivating. It helps. Yeah. And then when, when maybe you have a bad month, or your videos don’t do as well. It’s, it also motivates you to… Alright, what do we got to do? What do we got to do next month to change that? I mean, money is necessary. You got to have money to your money to live. And yeah, it is important, but
Mike Ayala 37:34
And when you’re really good and passionate at what you do, you should get paid for it. Yeah. And it’s Oh, it’s interesting, because it’s always easier to talk about money from like, situations five years ago. Remember when you made your $200 Yeah. And you were so excited about that? $200. Right. And you told your family like, Where are you good tonight? Well, that’s easy to talk about because it was six years ago or eight years ago or whatever, but whatever we’re currently doing, sometimes it’s a little bit challenging to, to say, hey, yeah, we’re, you know, we’re making money off of this, but that’s not why you’re doing it. Right. So can you teach other people how to do that? Or is it something you can learn?
Dallin Lambert 38:08
For sure. I don’t think I was like that three years ago. Mm-hmm. I think that’s definitely been a complete mind shift. A mindset shifted completely. And I think Bella has been a huge part…. I know Bella’s been a huge part of that and hearing her Origami Owl story is inspired me to shift that I was on the road to kind of just I just want to say kind of the average you know, I was gonna go to college, which is, I don’t know being that average kind of life isn’t bad. A lot of people live it and they’re happy and that’s what’s awesome. And that’s kind of the road I was on but hearing Bella and kind of her story and other people in my life that have kind of guided me is drawn me kind of what I’m doing now. Yeah. When I first met you, you were a painting contractor. Yeah, I was working for a painting company. I was going out. I was getting sales for them. The game leads for them and yeah, it was cool is a good friend of mine on the company was awesome. Yeah. And I saw I was a plumber by trade. Yeah. Right. So I’m always really hesitant. Like our goal here isn’t to get people to quit their jobs, right? That’s not really. That’s why question number one is what do you really want? Yeah, it doesn’t. It’s different for everybody.
Bella Lambert 39:25
I think the goal is to find what you’re passionate about. I think that is what it is like Dallin watching him being the painting contractor. He wasn’t happy. Like he was always happy, but he wasn’t like he didn’t have the light in his eyes. Like he does now
Dallin Lambert 39:38
I couldn’t do it for another 20 years. No, it wasn’t for me.
Bella Lambert 39:42
Yeah. And it’s cool to see how his mindset is totally shifted since we started YouTube and see the passion that he has behind it and something that he loves to do. We love to make videos together. We love looking back on our memories. And we love creating those memories and so it’s so cool that something that we just loved to do. Has been able to become a full-time job for Dallin and something that we could do together.
Mike Ayala 40:06
Okay, so I feel like let’s move into the like, we talked about life through postcards. Obviously you guys love traveling you love a certain lifestyle. That’s great. What? What are you guys working on now? I think our I think, I mean, Bella still is obviously heavily involved with Origami Owl, her goal is to continue growing that and being a big, big impact in that community.
Bella Lambert 40:30
Yeah, that’s my number one passion. And that’s something that I feel like will always be there as Origami Owl and creating that community with Origami Owl and connecting with others. And so that’s always been my number one focus. But I just, I love what I do.
Mike Ayala 40:44
And I think for me, I wanna, I’m just looking in the future. I want to continue growing. Della vlogs. With her, the YouTube channel and I think I want to have a lot of motivation to continue helping people I want to be able to help people travel. I want to put out some travel guides on things that we’ve learned as we travel and maybe put out a guide of growing or how to grow YouTube channel. Just different way different things that I can put out there to help people find their passion or, you know, learn we have, we have some a lot of friends that are in the YouTube industry that I’ve really, really helped us. So I want to be able to pass that on to maybe that next couple that’s looking person, whoever it is looking to do what we do.
Mike Ayala 41:28
So, talk to me more about the YouTube channel. It’s called Della vlogs Yeah, Della. So it’s funny we kind of put… took Dallin and Bella and put it together. Yeah,
Bella Lambert 41:37
just Della.
Mike Ayala 41:39
So we just yeah, we’re, we’re grinding every day. We’re trying to put out a video every single day, which is hard because, I mean, that’s constant editing, constant filming I mean, like, that’s, that’s really the hardest part thinking like, Alright, what are we going to film next? What are people want to see? And then making it all come to life. So you guys do a video every day. We try. We try to Yeah, so far we’ve been on a good streak right now. We’ve been on good for the last couple weeks. I missed you guys up today.
Dallin Lambert 42:08
No, man, we’re still gonna go home and get something done.
Mike Ayala 42:11
Nice.
Dallin Lambert 42:12
Yeah.
Mike Ayala 42:12
So what, what, what started this? Like, what? What made you guys say we need to start Della vlogs or did it just happen? So
Bella Lambert 42:19
we actually started by putting up our travel videos and our travel videos like we put a video up randomly on our channel. And at first it was actually undermining the channel, and it would get like 200 views and we would be like, Oh, that’s so cool. Or it would get like 1000 views and we thought that was so cool. But we didn’t have like a community of people like we do now. And one day, we just decided to change it to Della vlogs you want to speak a little bit about that?
Mike Ayala 42:44
Yeah, I just thought I always just, you know, something that like I said we can do on the road. I was taking, when we travel, I was taking a lot of time off work and I was like I want to be able to do something while we’re on the road. So we just kind of just came together and called it Della and I dont know it just kind of happened.
Bella Lambert 43:01
Yeah, it kind of just happened randomly. It’s cool to see how like our videos have been transformed. And we’ve learned so much through this process. And it’s just been so fun.
Mike Ayala 43:11
So without giving away too much, there wasn’t some kind of process that you guys went through. You’re not strategic on the backside. Like, how do you guys have 100? And how many followers? Like how many subscribers?
Bella Lambert 43:24
We just hit 130,000 Yeah, yesterday.
Mike Ayala 43:27
I mean, that’s a lot of people.
Dallin Lambert 43:30
I’m trying to think like, so secret sauce. I mean, they’re just putting out good stuff, like you guys are.
Bella Lambert 43:36
I think a lot of people are like, how do you grow your YouTube channel, I put out a video and it doesn’t get that many views and all this. I feel like we’ve been there. Like we put out we’ve put out videos I’ve done terrible, but we don’t delete those videos. We keep them up and we stay motivated to just keep putting out better content every single time. And so I think for us, the most important thing is being consistent with YouTube. I think that’s the number one tip that I would give to any starting a YouTube channel is tell your followers when you’re going to post we say we’re going to post every day and we make that commitment and it’s hard. But if you want to put out like my little sister has a YouTube channel and she says, I’m going to put out a video once a week, and she’s only 13 years old. So she puts out a video once a week, and that’s when her followers know that she’s gonna post and so, for us, I think consistency is important. Um, and it’s fun.
Mike Ayala 44:23
I remember the first four months, we had absolutely zero growth. Yeah, I mean, I was an I like that was when I was trying to put out like, my best videos put out the most amazing travel videos on these places. And it was a hard man because I would put out a video and upload it. And I’ll just sit there and I’m like, Alright, I’m waiting for these views to start coming in. Nothing. I’m like, where’s the money at apparently make a lot of money on youtube, like what’s going on and there was nothing and then I’m like, um and Bella just kept me motivated, we got to keep going and all sudden, we got 10 subscribers and that turned to 20 and then those 20 started And then when we hit 100 and kind of started and then I feel like once you once you get to 10,020 just start rolling and then we just kind of things are rolling right now things have been really good the last couple of months and we’re just gonna keep that, keep it rolling. Yeah, I know when I sat at dinner with you guys were really strategic. I don’t know how many subscribers you had at that point in time.
Bella Lambert 45:23
Probably 1000
Mike Ayala 45:24
Yeah, probably. Yeah, you guys were very clear at that point in time on what you guys were gonna do.
Mike Ayala 45:29
I think, I feel like there was like, you know, we were talking about the I don’t know, what’s the word? You got it? There are certain certain types of words you got to put on your.
Bella Lambert 45:38
Oh, the tags
Mike Ayala 45:39
Yeah. So there is kind of like a methodology.
Dallin Lambert 45:42
Oh yeah, for sure. I mean, I think I think you got to find your niche and find like, what kind of audience you’re going to target and then there’s a lot of different ways. YouTube helps you out a lot. I want you to grow. There’s a lot of ways to put in tags to kind of target that community. Create a good thumbnail. Yeah, the thumbnail is important. I mean, just the title. I always just thought like, when I got on YouTube and grow through the random homepage, what videos brought me in? Yeah, I mean, I remember like, I saw a video. I don’t know, this one always stands out to me. There’s a guy that was in the ocean and he had like, a drop of blood. And there was a big ol shark that was photoshopped in the background. And it was the title was like, do sharks really smell blood? But that thumbnail of the I knew the shark was fake? Yeah. But I was just like, I was curious. I wanted to see. And so I mean, I mean, I mean, no, you don’t have to make a fake thumbnail, but I just thought I just like things like that, like you gotta have a good thumbnail a good title, something that’s gonna drive your audience want to watch your video. Hmm. And so things like that, that have helped us grow over the past.
Mike Ayala 46:48
So why do you guys I mean, you put a lot of time and energy into making these videos every single day. Yeah,
Bella Lambert 46:54
and we prank each other a lot. Yeah, that’s really hard to do.
Mike Ayala 46:56
Yeah, we Yeah. We’ve learned that our community likes when we prank each other. Yeah, I saw one. I saw your truck full of Like shipping…
Dallin Lambert 47:04
wow, that was a bad one
Mike Ayala 47:06
I ordered on Amazon packing peanuts and I got like 10 bags I saw on your porch. Yeah, they’re everywhere. Yeah, no, I totally, like red bags are out of town when they came, and I saw on our cameras. I’m like, What is that, that that showed up? But they were just in the boxes. And then I was like, Oh, I’m just working on a project. Yeah, no big deal. I got to bring him to work. They need me to bring him to work and then I filled this car with him. Yes. She got me good.
Mike Ayala 47:30
So you guys obviously put a lot of time and energy into this. What? I’m just trying to figure out why.
Dallin Lambert 47:39
Maybe we don’t even know why yet.
Mike Ayala 47:41
Do you just love it?
Bella Lambert 47:42
I think we do love it. I think it is something that’s fun for us. Like sometimes it is hard to get videos up every day, especially I work nine to five so or 10 to five. It just differs depending on the day. But I feel like for us it’s hard to get a video up every day but we do it because it’s Fun. We love it. We’re seeing growth right now, which is exciting. And I feel like it keeps us motivated. Our goal for the year is to hit a million subscribers. Okay? I truly feel like we’re gonna hit that by January 1 of 2021. I feel like we’re gonna do it. And for me, it’s, I’m putting it out there right now.
Dallin Lambert 48:17
Yeah, no, it’s definitely doable that can happen. I can’t wait to be 10 years in the future, and sit down with our kids maybe 20 years and be like, hey, look at this cool thing that we did or, look what we did. You don’t have it all documented. Like, it’s funny. I’ll go over to my parents house and my mom will pull out scrapbooks of like, my elementary schools are like things that we did as a family. And I think it’s just evolved now. We’re gonna pull up YouTube videos, and we’re gonna have hundreds of videos of what we’ve done and yeah, cool things and our adventures and things like that.
Mike Ayala 48:51
That’s cool. That’s a good reason. Yeah, it doesn’t always have to be about money. I wasn’t trying.
Bella Lambert 48:55
Yeah. No, no.
Bella Lambert 48:56
That’s always been one of our number one motivation motivators is um… We want our kids to see these moments in our life, and we think it’ll be cool to reflect on in the future. I love it. And it’s cool to me that people want to see it too, like that people are subscribing and becoming a part of our Della fam and wanting to be a part of it.
Mike Ayala 49:14
So you guys are gonna get to a million subs. They call it subs, right? Yeah, I’m like learning the lingo.
Bella Lambert 49:19
You’re doing good. Yeah.
Mike Ayala 49:22
How you gonna do that? Because you guys, you’re gonna basically, I mean, you’re gonna increase by if you’re at 131 30. Yeah. How are you gonna do that? I think what are give me three things that you’re really going to do to? Is it just like…
Bella Lambert 49:38
This Dallin’s thing.
Dallin Lambert 49:39
Yeah, yeah. So I think I think a big thing as well too is we have a lot of friends in the industry that have helped us some that have. We have good friends have 2 million subscribers right now and some that have 50,000 but I think surrounding yourself with those kinds of people and gaining information from them, and they’ve also helped us they’ve we’ve done videos with them where they’ve introduced us to their community and some of their communities come over to seen us and we’ve helped others grow. And so I think that’s a big thing that we’re gonna really focus on this year is spending a lot of time with people that are also in that same community as us and collaborate with them can be a part of that.
Bella Lambert 50:23
That’s also Yeah, one thing I also whenever I speak at a school or something, I say, surround yourself with people who know more than you. And you said that on this podcast, I love that. Because that is important to surround yourself. We surrounded ourselves with people who knew more about YouTube than we did, and we learn from them. And that has helped us grow.
Mike Ayala 50:39
So I have a mentor that always says, I always want to be the dumbest guy in the room. Or another way that he says it too is if you’re the smartest guy in the room, you need to find a bigger room.
Dallin Lambert 50:49
Exactly.
Bella Lambert 50:50
Yeah.
Mike Ayala 50:50
And what I’m really into like you I think the thing that a lot of people don’t understand is marketing has just changed all 100% and so There’s, you know, you’ve got all these businesses, like 65, 70% of all people are employed by small businesses. And what I think the small business owner in general doesn’t understand. And whether it’s a real estate investor, whether it’s somebody running a plumbing and heating company, whether it doesn’t, it doesn’t matter if it’s Origami Owl, what people don’t understand is like the, the core aspects of business have just changed a little bit. Yeah. And so what we used to have to do is we’d have to go to a chamber of commerce business after hours, and we’d have to rub elbows right. Or you’d have to pay to go to an event or whatever and not i’m not saying events are out. But really what you guys are actually you just collaborated, right? Right. And people don’t really fully understand that when somebody says collab, right? That’s the
Bella Lambert 51:44
yeah lingo that the lingo
Mike Ayala 51:46
Yeah, so what we used to business 10 or 15 years ago, it was like, Okay, I’m a plumbing and heating company. I’m going to collab with this general contractor. I’m going to collab with the yellow pages, right? So Mark, I’m going to collab with a website, designer. That was like marketing 10 years ago, 15 years ago. Yeah. What I think people don’t understand is businesses like exponentially shifting right now. And so when you guys, your key number one is your networking right old term was network. Yeah, now it’s collabing.
Dallin Lambert 52:14
Yeah, I guess this the same thing. That’s interesting. I’ve actually never thought of that. But yeah, that’s perfect. That’s exactly what it is.
Mike Ayala 52:18
The thing that I want my listeners and my audience to understand is that you guys are on the front edge of something, that if we don’t get ahold of as business owners, we’re going to get left behind. And it’s happening so fast. Yeah, this is why I want to start this podcast. Number one, I want to share information. And I want to bring people in that are smart and good at what they do. And I want to inspire people, but also everything is shifting so fast. If you don’t have a personal brand in the world today, if you’re not using social media, YouTube, all of this stuff to leverage whatever that audience is back in the day, we wanted an email list. And I’m not saying we don’t want an email list. Still we do. Right? But back in the day, it was just about an email list. And before that it was about a mailing list. Yeah. Now it’s about it’s a subscriber list right now totally the power of those eyeballs. And you guys have been you, you kids. I’m gonna call you guys kids. You guys have been talking about this for five years now and US, US older people are just beginning to understand it. When we had the Yellow Pages. Remember that? Did you guys ever use a phone book?
Dallin Lambert 53:17
I sat on it.
Bella Lambert 53:20
Yeah, I did too.
Mike Ayala 53:22
That was eyeballs back in the day. And so business owners This is why I’m hitting on this because nothing has actually changed. It’s just a different dynamic. Exactly. And this is where the world’s going so number one you said your your the right people, you’re collaborating with the right people? Yeah, give me another one. Um, top three things you’re going to do to go from 130 to a million.
Bella Lambert 53:43
Consistency. We keep using that word, but I feel like that is the number one thing
Dallin Lambert 53:47
It amazes me how there’s been weeks where we didn’t post either for two weeks straight and amazes me how we’ve seen such a hit on our channel that a negative hit where people want to… you think of it as a as I like it as like a TV show, you know, when when, you know, every Monday night, that show is going to come on, you’re going to wait for it all weekend, you’re gonna wait for it for that day. And if it doesn’t, you’re going to be disappointed that whatever happens, it doesn’t come here. And so I think I think people, whether it’s kids or whoever it is get home from school or from work and they’re waiting for that upload to be there. And if it’s not there, they’re gonna be disappointed. So consistency, we gotta we promise something. We got it, we got to deliver and put out, put out the content.
Dallin Lambert 54:35
So you guys talked about networking, getting in the right rooms, the collabs, if you will, yeah. And then we talked about consistency, which I think is huge. And that goes with anything, whether it was Origami Owl or whatever. So right one more thing you guys are like, I mean, you guys are gonna get some exponential growth here this year. I love that you threw that out there, by the way, cuz she’s not even. She’s just like, okay, we’re doing it like we just happening and that usually happens. But anyway, another conversation. So give me one more. what’s The third thing that you guys really feel like you need to focus on to get exponential growth.
Dallin Lambert 55:06
I think what I like about our channels, I think we do a little bit of both. I think we’re, we mix it up, we’ll do some travel videos and then we’ll add some entertainment in there with the funny pranks. And sometimes we’ll do like, challenge videos or reaction videos. And so I think we’re trying to kind of, we kind of have an overall niche, but then we’re kind of trying to hit the inside of different categories of what we do. Hmm. So I think I think what also we want to do at this in this year is kind of broaden that niche, kind of start hitting other categories other content that we put out. We also have we’re also going to start doing a little bit of a merch another lingo some merchandise, merge, yeah, put out some, some shirts, some stickers, things like that to help just kind of bug out our brand a little more
Dallin Lambert 55:59
Do you guys have something that you guys talk about? Like at the dinner table when you’re all inspired about what you’re going to be doing over there? Like, is it something just inspiring people to live a better life? Or is there any kind of like when you guys are, there’s, I think it’s just just like, enjoy life. I mean, I think that I look at it as you know, you never know when your time up is gonna be times up here. And so just enjoy life. We’ve had a lot of fun.
Bella Lambert 56:24
What’s your catchphrase? Every video down says one thing. I think that kind of like,
Dallin Lambert 56:29
Oh, yeah. We talk about how stoked we are. And our Stoke levels are very high
Bella Lambert 56:33
We say what our Stoke levels are at the beginning of every video. So we’re like, Guys, the stock levels are high today. And like, it’s funny to see all of our followers comment, like the stoke levels are amazing today or high or whatever,
Mike Ayala 56:43
like, be stoked out there. And yeah, and enjoy.
Bella Lambert 56:46
And that’s what we’re about. Yeah.
Mike Ayala 56:49
Okay, so I appreciate like all the transparency and just going it’s what an inspiring story. 26 and 23. Right, yeah. And so I heard kids mentioned
Bella Lambert 57:00
Yeah, yeah. Hopefully in the future. Yeah, I don’t know. We’re just kind of having fun right now. And we’ll see where that goes. That’s definitely going to be the next step though.
Mike Ayala 57:07
Yeah. Well, the one thing I mean, kids are fun to right. So anyway, I’m not trying to encourage you guys.
Dallin Lambert 57:14
What’s your what’s your one-sentence advice on that?
Mike Ayala 57:18
on having kids?
Dallin Lambert 57:19
Yeah.
Mike Ayala 57:21
You know, we’ve always just treated our kids as another person. So I don’t know if you’re talking specifically about you guys having kids.
Mike Ayala 57:29
Just like At what point did you feel like you? I mean, you’re were grinding in your business. It’s funny. I heard your wife did a Facebook post where you left for a couple months to do your thing. At what point did you feel like it was okay to kind of jump in the next step? I actually jumped to the next step because I was missing out on our kids. See, I was an employee until I missed the entire third pregnancy. Oh, I see because I was working out of town 90 hours a week and yeah, so Cara’s dream. Cara’s dream was to always be a stay at home mom. So we’d like
Dallin Lambert 58:05
that was the goal.
Mike Ayala 58:05
Yeah, like, I mean, let’s get to work. Right. That’s kind of how
Dallin Lambert 58:09
that’s awesome.
Mike Ayala 58:10
Yeah. So, um, so what does an average workday look like for each of you?
Bella Lambert 58:16
So I normally go to the office around nine or 10. And I have a bunch of different responsibilities there every day is different when I’m at the nest, like you never know what it’s going to be. We have so many fun like team meetings and all that different kind of stuff, but I’ll be at the nest usually for until like four or five o’clock, depending on the day some days I’m traveling for work or doing different things like that. And then I get home and we’ll film
Dallin Lambert 58:44
Yeah, so while she’s at work, I’ll usually what I’ll do is I’ll take the videos that from the previous days, make sure they all get uploaded correctly. The thumbnail is done. And either concept the video for that day or, you know, get our get our content ready for Instagram. We dont only just do YouTube. Obviously, we’re hitting Instagram, Facebook, different, all different platforms and make sure that’s all ready to go. And then we’ll film a video that evening and make sure that it’s all edited properly and yeah, get it going for the next day.
Bella Lambert 59:16
A lot of times I come home and I’m pranked right away. So like sometimes I’m like, I hope I don’t come home to something like yesterday, or the day before that I cant…
Mike Ayala 59:24
the advantage because while she’s at work, I got the time. Yeah,
Bella Lambert 59:28
I came home and he had destroyed like half of my makeup drawer with a hammer.
Bella Lambert 59:34
Oh my goodness.
Bella Lambert 59:35
You can watch that on YouTube.
Mike Ayala 59:37
Oh, wow. That was a good one. Um, I got a lot of messages for it was a trend going around where the husband or boyfriend takes her makeup, her old makeup and not old makeup. My makeup I got one new one. But um, yeah, and
Bella Lambert 59:52
mashes it with a hammer. So you just never know what you’re going to come home to. It’s really fun on Sundays. He doesn’t know what to expect either. And I appreciate it back right now.
Mike Ayala 60:01
That’s why we have a lot of fun with it. Yeah, we have a lot of cool. You guys had talked about the grind. So it’s not all just, man. It’s tough. It’s, I remember, we actually have a guy now that that does help us edit because with that goal of putting out a video every single day, it’s just it was tough and we filmed during the day, and then I would sit down and edit at night. Till like one in the morning. Yeah, to one in the morning, get some sleep. And the next day we’re filming and it’s just it was nonstop. And so I remember like that first. I want to say like six or seven months where we didn’t have an editor. I was just, I was constantly on stop all night editing, filming the next day. Yeah, and then when we would travel, I would just be a whole nother thing. Like, on top of it. So it was really hard. It was tough. There’s a lot that goes on behind it. But um,
Bella Lambert 60:54
Yeah, but I think for us, like the grind to us is like I’m always thinking, Okay, what am I going to do to either prank him next or what’s another great video that we could sit down and do together? Like one of our next videos we want to film is doing a reaction to our wedding video three years later. Yes, we’re probably gonna film that today. Yeah, so
Dallin Lambert 61:11
That’ll be a cool one.
Bella Lambert 61:12
So we’re always just contemplating different things like that and always try and keep up with the latest trends.
Mike Ayala 61:18
That’s cool. Well, I really appreciate your guys’ time so what some final last words. What advice would you give to people out there just looking to invest in their freedom?
Dallin Lambert 61:28
Yeah. I would you say that and just go after it. I want to touch on a point Bella said at the very beginning. Back when Origami Owl I was just starting. They didn’t have a website and have a company phone. They didn’t have an office space. I think people get so caught up with that. Like I want to start a YouTube channel but I don’t have the latest camera. I don’t have the latest microphones on my computer. I mean, I know I know a couple that they all do. YouTube videos are done on their iPhone. iPhone shoots an incredible video. Perfect. Yeah, you can buy a $5 tripod that holds up Your phone and make videos with that you don’t need that latest editing software. I mean, just I feel like so many. There’s so many. I want to call them excuses that come in when people want to start because they think that they can’t do it without that. Just go after you don’t need the best website, you don’t need any of that to get started. That all just kind of falls in place later as you keep going, but just go after it.
Bella Lambert 62:26
I totally agree with that. I feel like yeah, a lot of times people are like, I’m going to do this when I lose the weight. I’m going to do this when I have this. And it’s like, you’re never going to do it if you have that in your head. And so a lot of times like I’ll be like, Oh, this isn’t this wasn’t filmed with the perfect camera, but Dallin’s like, No, it’s okay. We it’s real and it’s raw, and we’re just gonna put it out there having content and don’t wait to do things and just go after it.
Dallin Lambert 62:52
I wish I would have started the YouTube channel. Four years ago. Yeah, you know what I mean? Totally.
Bella Lambert 62:57
A lot. We did. We actually have been there though, where we were We were those people that were like, we’re not going to start a YouTube video. We’re not going to start your YouTube channel until we have the perfect brand name for it and the perfect this and this. And we did wait for a couple of years but then one day kind of this flip switched in our head and we’re like, we’re gonna do it.
Dallin Lambert 63:15
No more waiting.
Bella Lambert 63:15
No more waiting.
Mike Ayala 63:16
Yeah. One of my mentors always says perfect is the enemy of done.
Bella Lambert 63:20
Yeah, whatever. That is amazing. I need to write that down.
Mike Ayala 63:22
Yeah, it’s a good one. That’s a good one. I have this other mentor. We’re actually going to hopefully go interview him because I think he’s pushing 85, 90 years old. This is like the 15-year-old version of that or 20-year-old version. He says “Get off your can do what you can and can the rest.”
Dallin Lambert 63:37
Yeah, like.
Bella Lambert 63:38
That’s awesome.
Mike Ayala 63:39
But I love that you guys brought that out perfect is the enemy of done, you know, especially in this day and age with video and audio and all that stuff. Like Yeah, everybody just wants perfection and consistency is what you said right? And you can’t be consistent. Without getting started. You got to just get started right.
Mike Ayala 63:54
And everything else just kind of falls in place as you start going. Yeah, they just start coming your way and it all works out. Well.
Mike Ayala 64:01
That’s why I put the adjuster at the end of the five keys to freedom. What do you really want? Why do you want it? What are you going to do to get it to measure results and adjust? Yeah, because if you don’t get started, you guys won’t remember this but before power steering and cars, like you, couldn’t turn the wheel unless I move out. Oh, yeah, you have to be moving in order to turn the wheel right. It’s really hard to turn the wheel and I’ve always thought about that in business and anything else until you get moving. You can’t really you can’t really turn
Dallin Lambert 64:29
You’re full of analogies man. That’s cool. I need to write these down.
Mike Ayala 64:33
Well, it’s gonna be recorded, so you just listen to it.
Dallin Lambert 64:34
There we go.
Mike Ayala 64:36
I appreciate your time. Anything else we need to talk about?
Bella Lambert 64:38
No, thank you so much for having us today. This has been so fun.
