This discussion explores how innovative approaches, particularly 3D printing technology, can address critical societal issues like housing affordability and community development, driven by a philosophy of creating impact and fostering connection.
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Welcome to a new lens with common good
capital where we talk with investors,
raas, fund managers and philanthropists
about their experiences within different
impact investing themes as well as
explore the power of stewardship in
capital. I'm your host Jeff Schaefer,
CEO of Comic Good Capital, and I'm here
today with And do you want me to call
you Zachary or Zack?
>> Zack is fine.
>> Okay. Zack and then Mannheim. Yes.
>> And normally I don't introduce people
this way, but Mannheimr, where is that from?
from?
>> Technically Mannheim, Germany, but
accumulation of a lot of Eastern
European places.
>> Okay. I I would have guessed that and
actually Schaefer is German and it means
shepherd. So that I guess we're uh we
have some commonality. But uh Zach is
the founder and chairman of Alquist and
3D which is a company that uses 3D
printing technology to create
exceptional design while lowering the
cost of housing and infrastructure in
economically distressed and underserved
communities. He is also co-founder of
Altis Community Studios, a social uh
enterprise that empowers local artists,
entrepreneurs, and activists to
transform their communities through
creative and collaborative projects. So,
I love hearing your background here. You
You must be a creative by nature.
>> Most likely. Yes.
>> Yeah, that's what that's what I would
figured. Well, thanks for joining us.
And what's fun about this, we actually
just did a webinar and you were on
there. Did a great job. And so, now
it'll be fascinating to hear a little
bit more of your story. So, start off
and just tell us uh where where you grew
up, kind of where you went to school,
and then just a brief summary of your
career, and then we'll we'll dive in
from there.
>> Sure. So I I grew up in southeastern
Pennsylvania, just outside Philadelphia,
home of the world champion Philadelphia
Eagles. And I went to college at
Muenberg in Allentown, Pennsylvania. I
was a theater and philosophy major.
Prepared me for zero careers in my life.
And after I graduated, I moved to London
for a bit and did theater over there
until my visa expired. I came back to
America and did what every other kid
that went to theater school did does. We
went to New York and tried to make it on
Broadway. Although my goal was off off
Broadway of doing pretty experimental
theater. I ran theater companies there
for about 10 years and then worked in
restaurants cuz theater barely paid you
anything. In New York, I realized very
quickly that the last thing New York
needed was another theater or the
theater company. I wanted to be in a
place where we would have more of an
impact with the work that we were doing.
So I didn't know where I wanted to go.
And then you paired that with rising
cost of living and everything else. New
York even back then was becoming very
challenging. So, I left Brooklyn. I did
a road trip to 22 cities around the
country and I chose De Moines, Iowa to
move to. Very, very different than my
surroundings in in Brooklyn. But, uh, De
Moines hit all my my demographic boxes
for what I wanted to do. And that's
where I started a nonprofit that was
based in cultural and educational
offerings in downtown De Moines. We
opened up a space that catered to every
walk of life. We had every type of
artistic median uh medium uh
represented. We had sound recording
studios, live music venues, a full
blackbox theater, restaurant, culinary
academy, circus academy, dance academy,
comic book store, you name it, it was in
there. And this really helped change the
cultural landscape of downtown De Mo. We
did this in an old 1937 art deco
firehouse that we purchased from the
city. What I didn't know at the time was
we were doing something called economic
development. I'd never heard that term.
It never came up in any of my theater or
philosophy classes. Um, suddenly I
started getting calls from other
communities, mostly rural, around the
Midwest, saying, "Hey, we have empty
buildings on our main street. Could you
come here and help us do something
similar?" And so I started a business
that helped these communities grow. And
at first it was helping them grow with
cultural concepts of creating business
models for new theaters, cultural
centers, restaurants, breweries, coffee
shops, all the stuff to help attract and
retain that next generation of
workforce. And that grew into these
communities saying, "Hey, this is great,
but we have child care issues. Our
hospital closed. Our schools are
underfunded. Our streets are falling
apart." And so we began to work with
engineering groups and turn this into a
master planning group that would help
these communities grow. And these are
really rural towns. Average size
population for us was like 5,000. And it
grew out of the Midwest. And soon we
were doing this in 25 different states
around the country, mostly in the
Midwest and the Mississippi Delta.
Meanwhile, the number one issue
everywhere we went was housing. And they
kept saying things like, "Hey, this is
great. This new theater concept that you
want to do, but if we don't have
anywhere to live, why does that even
matter?" Which is a fair point. So, we
began to look at ways to drop the
housing cost. And in 2016, during my
research, I went to a seminar from a
futurist and he talked about all sorts
of things and one of those things was 3D
concrete printed homes. This is 2016.
And somebody in the audience raised
their hand and asked the question, hey,
how long until you think that this type
of construction method becomes prevalent
in America and he said, well, given the
cost and availability of land, uh,
zoning issues, regulations, unions,
etc., I'm going to bet 10 to 15 years.
And he was a good futurist because I
think he was right on. Afterwards, I
went over to him. I bought his book so
he would talk to me. And I said, "Hey,
your point about doing this in urban
areas and taking 10 to 15 years, I think
you're right. but I work primarily in
smaller communities. Don't you think
that this could take root there sooner
because we can move faster in these
places? And he said, "Well, you know, I
never really considered that. You might
be right." And that set me off on four
years of R&D. I traveled around the
world, met with all the major
manufacturers of 3D equipment at the
time, of which there weren't many. We
ended up getting a grant in the state of
Virginia to uh 3D print our first homes
there and I started the company in late
2020 specifically to address the housing crisis.
crisis.
>> So I got to stop you there for a second.
What's fascinating to me is obviously
you and I have met before but I didn't
know all that background. So my question
was or comment is you must be creative.
Yes, you answered that question very
quickly. But what's intriguing to me as
somebody who's been in the financial
world for the last 28 years to see to
hear your story to hear your training
and to see how your creativity and
innovation is being used to make a
difference in the world is it's
inspiring. On the other hand, it kind of
breaks some of the stereotypes in the
sense that I've sat in financial world
where it's all about money and it's all
about getting your greatest return. And
so to see you build what you are
building to solve a problem and
obviously I'm assuming you need to make
money in the process but it doesn't
sound like making money was your number
one goal. Not not that there's anything
wrong with that.
>> There isn't.
>> Yeah. But it's just fascinating how you
come to this and so here you are I'm
assuming in the space just based on what
I've heard and read about you. You're
probably one of the experts in the space
and you were doing what you were doing
the previous 10 years or whatever it is
and building wasn't in your training.
But look at you today. The method of of
how you implement your concept is
irrelevant as long as you can find the
most efficient way to do it. If you had
asked me 20 years ago if I would be 3D
concrete printing homes anywhere, I
would have said, "What is a 3D concrete
printed home?" But I would said, "You're
crazy. There's no way that I would be
doing anything like that." And so for
me, this is a very linear path. To
anyone else, I it probably seems crazy.
That's the pathway you go. My goal is
and always will be to help create
community. I try to do that everywhere I
go. And at the moment, I'm kind of at
the base level in my mind that you can't
really have community unless you have
places to live.
>> I mean, we uh at Common Good and myself,
we've done a lot in affordable housing
here in the US. I've also made some
investments in Africa, housing over
there. And sadly, the last 3 to 5 years,
the general public is waking up to this
idea that there's an affordability
crisis. But I think it took a crisis to
get everybody to see it.
>> That's the only good thing about CO. It
woke everybody up to how bad the
situation is. And primarily how bad it
is everywhere. For years, it was
terrible in big cities and we've always
known that, but now it literally every
single community has this problem.
There's a shortage of homes everywhere.
They all cost too much. I mean, it
couldn't have been better illustrated to
me than this must have been 2017
somewhere around there. I was touring a
a small town in Iowa and came across a
home that had 14 people living in it.
English was not their first language and
it had a tarp as a roof and they were
paying $1,400 a month. And I just said,
I don't even know how this is allowed.
So to me, owning a home, the way this
country has been set up, and this I
think goes to your question of capital,
this is the American dream. Home
ownership is the American dream. That's
how it was set up. That's what our
entire financial system is based upon.
It is what, right or wrong, this is what
we've got. And frankly, that American
dream has not been real for the majority
of American families for decades. And so
if we're going to solve our larger
political problems, to me, this is the
route. If you want people to succeed and
thrive with whatever they're doing,
wherever they live, whatever their
family's like, they need to have that
bedrock of financial security, and that
starts with owning a home.
>> All right. Well, so then let's jump into
that my my typical capital question and
see. And if you've already answered,
that's fine. But so when did you realize
the power of capital? And then what does
that mean to you? And if it's first of
all, is it different than what you just
said? I guess what I'd say
>> when I realized the power of capital
probably when I didn't have any. But uh
I could tell you my real first
realization of this was I owned a
restaurant many years ago and we under
capitalized to start the business
because we wanted to borrow as little as
possible. um and it killed us and that
became a problem very quickly right away
and that's when I first realized oh okay
so borrowing more was not necessarily a
bad thing because it would help us ramp
up and so but I still didn't have a real
understanding of that until I got deep
into the work I'm doing today in terms
of what you need for home ownership not
only are home prices unaffordable but
coming up with a down payment is
unaffordable like the only reason why I
was able to buy my first house was
because uh the Obama administration gave
gave us $8,000. That must have been 2009
somewhere around there. That's There was
no way my family and I with what we were
currently making could have afforded to
buy just a very very modest I think it
was a $160,000 home back then, which was
a ton of money. Capital when we live in
a capitalistic society. Whether that's
good or bad depends on your perspective,
but it is true. The power of capital is
necessary for any human in this system
to thrive. Okay, let me go back and this
is a a weird question. Not a weird
question, it's worded weirdly, but so
let's see if you can digest this one.
How would you describe
who you are in the context of where
you're at in your life journey?
>> Who I am in the context of where I am?
>> Yeah. If you were to look at your
totality of what you think your life
will be, where are you at now? And what
are you doing in the context of this totality?
totality?
>> You know, I I incomplete. What
percentage? I'm not sure but you know I
sometimes consciously and sometimes not
find myself in situations where I know
very little where I am not an expert in
any sense of this and I I go into things
in order to solve problems and also
because they interest me highly
construction I knew nothing about going
into this technology I knew nothing
about certainly didn't know anything
about robots or the the housing market
or I knew none of this all I knew was
that there was a problem and and
something that I found useful during
this path is often it's the people that
come in objectively or blindly into a
system can achieve more quicker because
they don't know what they don't know.
And so there are many things that I
probably wouldn't have done for this
company or in this industry when we
first started if I knew now if I knew
then what I know now because I would
have said either that that's a mistake
it's not going to work or I would have
said well that's not how things are
normally done so we should probably I
think that's that thinking is abhorrent.
I think you should go into this with the
intent to change the way a system is set
up not maliciously but in order to
improve it. So then take 3D printing in
the context of building home. Describe
to us how it fundamentally is changing
or will change the historic conventional
h house building construction.
>> Most people would answer this question
by saying the way it's going to change
it is because we're going to have lower
costs and stronger and more sustainable
homes and all of that is true and that's
going to happen over time. The way I'll
answer the question is the number one
way this is going to change the
landscape is the amount of jobs this
technology is going to create in markets
where they don't currently exist. This
is construction is one of the largest
industries in the world and so it it's
necessary everywhere. But you have you
take that and the rate of young people
that want to go into the trades. You've
got the need for homes going this way
and the rate for people going into it
going this way. And that's been true for
probably 40 years, maybe more. And it's
because the trades are often not safe.
They may not pay as well as you want
them to until you get to an experienced
point. There's tons of regulation. It's
frowned upon sometimes by people who
don't think that that's a either a real
job or a good job or whatever that not a
job that requires a four-year college
degree. So you take add all this up and
the amount of people wanting to go into
the trades have gone down. It's not
sexy. It's not cool. It's not something
people want to do. However, most people
do want to build. They do want to work
with their hands. They do want to create
something whether that's physically or
mentally. This technology allows you to
do all those things in a safer way.
Typically in a higher paid position and
normally without having to go anywhere
close to a four-year degree and go
severely into debt. This is going to
interest a lot of people. It already is
interesting a lot of people, but there
aren't enough options out there for
training, nor are there enough companies
to hire the people to be trained. So,
we're creating all of this at once. This
entire industry, we're creating the
demand. We're creating the talent pool.
We're creating how to physically do it.
We're creating the software. We're
creating the robotics. We're building
this entire thing from scratch. It's
different than when say radio went to
television. The communications industry
already existed. And you could say that
the construction industry already
exists, which is true. But the industry
for 3D concrete printing, it is being
created right now completely from
scratch. And that means we're going to
have a ton of successes. We're going to
have a ton of failures. We're going to
have a ton of challenges. We're going to
have a ton of interesting opportunities
and things that we never would have
thought. So here's a good example. Five
years ago when I started this company,
would I have ever thought that I would
be printing for Walmart? No. Not because
that was crazy. Just because that was
not the goal. And in my mind, a company
the size of Walmart is not going to
adopt this type of brand new technology
early on in the industry. And I was
completely wrong. Not only have they
adopted it, but they're going to grow
this. But it's not just Walmart. It's
other large companies that want to get
into this work. Everybody understands
that this is going to solve a problem.
Some of those problems are being solved
today with this technology. The rest
we're still learning as we go.
>> So if you can divulge this
hypothetically Walmart or somebody else,
what would be their main drivers from
saying, "Yeah, let's do it this way
versus traditional."
>> The easiest answer is uh save money.
>> And has that been proven out?
>> It has now. So the first one we did last
year in Tennessee was that did not get
proven out. That first project was not a
a money saver for them. However, we
demonstrated enough promise for them to
say, "Okay, let's do one more of these
and let's see what happens." Because the
first one, we had every single thing
against us. It was in August in
Tennessee. It was 110 degrees on the
pad. So, we had to literally go
nocturnal. We printed from 9:00 p.m. to
6 a.m. That was problem number one.
Problem number two, it was a size four
seismic zone. We and most other
companies had never printed it. Problem
number three, this was 8,000 square feet
and 22 feet tall. Nothing has ever been
commercially printed by us or any other
company on the planet like that. Problem
number four, the design was conservative
and not efficient for 3D printing
because we had nothing to do with
design. It was already done and they
handed it to us and they said, "Print
this." So, and then of course problem
number five, we had new people we were
training. problem number six never for
this company. You can keep going but
those were the main issue given all of
those odds and I will say in the first
week of printing it was setting itself
up to be a failure very very challenging
but we finally had that breakthrough and
from then on it was fairly smooth
sailing. Now when we finished that work
that took us 48 print days to do and we
had eight humans on the job site and two
robots. Now the next one they said, "How
do we get more efficient?" And and we
said, "Number one, we need to design it
with you." So we went to Bentonville. We
sat side by side with their architects
and their engineers and we designed the
next one together. That was the biggest
best thing we could do. Secondly, we got
the material company involved and they
began talking to us about the best
possible way to do this. We reconfigured
our robots to better be able to print a
structure like this. We trained our
teams. We rehearsed. We did so many
other things that we had not done for
the first one. And so on the second one,
we were able to finish the second in
seven print days, 75 print hours with
five humans and two robots. And we set a
record and we showed Walmart that there
was real savings upfront, not just the
savings that you're going to get on the
ancillary, on the energy usage and
things like that, but real true savings.
And that's when they said, "Whoa, okay,
we get it. We want to do so many more."
Congratulations to you and your team for
winning that getting it done. You'll be
a better company for going through all
those through all those challenges. So
another question I'd love to ask and
again you may have already answered is
and this can be you can think of this in
a big way or small way but h how would
you say you're trying to change the world?
world?
>> So I'll answer the the small way first
by trying to teach my kids that anything
is possible and would I work with them
every day on that. I I would say
building community is what I'm always
trying to do. Whether that's literally
building it by building a structure or
building community by getting two people
that would never otherwise associate
with each other to communicate in a
friendly way in the same place. And
that's always been my goal. I I left I
left Brooklyn a long time ago because
everybody around me agreed with my point
of view at the time. And I felt that it
was obviously a place like New York is
very diverse culturally, but it's not
very diverse ideologically. And I wanted
to understand why people thought the way
they thought who thought differently
than I did because I didn't understand
it because of the way where I had grown
up was very one-sided. We all think this
way. And I naturally agreed with that
and still agree with a lot of those
thoughts. But I needed to meet other
people and understand why they would
think this way because I couldn't
possibly fathom. Now almost 18 years
later and being around so many different
types of people with different types of
points of view and coming from different
places, I have a much more seasoned look
on how the world works. My own thoughts
have changed, which is natural, of
course. But if I'm trying to change the
world, it has to do with who am I
talking to right now, right in this se
in this scenario? How do we differ? And
how can we find common ground? And then
how do you transfer that to other people?
people?
>> And and do you know why you had the
intrigue or the interest, the curiosity
to learn about other people? Because I
mean there's many people who grow up
probably in your environment and they
don't walk away with that the way you're
walking away with it. Was there
something that happened? Why is
community such a big thing to you? Which
by the way, I don't disagree, but I'm
not so sure that's not everybody thinks
that way. Well, I think everybody thinks
that community is important immed
especially in their own immediate
sometimes their community could just
mean their So that's fine. There were a
lot of different things that I'll give
you. There's a lot of ways to to to say
this, but my favorite story is when I
had first moved to De Moine and we had
just started the social club and we were
trying to figure out how to get this
moving and we had this makeshift
building that was held together by dirt.
We had first we had a theater in the
back, a piece of crap theater, and we
had a little bar in the front with a
cabaret stage, and we started doing
shows. And the first groups that came in
to rent our theater was a group called
3X Wrestling, and they do WWE style
wrestling. Now, I never thought we'd
have wrestlers in our theater, but they
had money, so we said yes. So, they
started renting our theater once a month
to do their wrestling shows. And at the
same time, totally coincidentally, in
the bar, we booked a jazz and poetry
night at the same time. Now, these are
two worlds that would typically not be
caught dead socialized together. And so,
the first night, everybody came down.
They got drinks from the bar and they
ran off in opposite directions. Second
month, same thing. But the third month,
something really interesting happened.
The wrestlers were on their intermission
and they were coming into the bar to get
drinks and run back to the theater to
avoid the poets because they're so
scary. But there were these two guys
about six5 bull leotards standing a
little bit away from me drinking a beer
and watching the poetry. And they
suddenly turned to me and they said,
"Hey, are you the guy who runs this
place?" I said, "Yeah." And they asked
if they could talk to me in private. So
we sat down in my office. I asked what I
could do. And they said, "Listen, we'd
love to get more involved." I said,
"Great. We're a nonprofit. Here's 10
different volunteer opportunities." And
they said, "Yeah, we had something else
in mind." And they looked around to make
sure that nobody was listening. And they
whispered, "We both write poetry." and
they asked if they could read their
poems at the club. I said, "Sure, it's
an open mic. Anybody can." And that
began our wrestling and poetry evenings.
And so the following month, these two
guys, they came out, they went and
wrestled. They came out, they got on
stage, they read their poems, which were
pretty good, and then went back and
wrestled some more. The following month,
people who were their friends came out
to watch the poetry at first to support
them, and then they kind of got into it.
Two months later, the poets, encouraged
by all this new behavior, said, "We
should probably go check out what they
do." They went in to watch the wrestling
and they walked out saying that was awesome.
awesome.
10 months in, we had to change the times
of the program so people could go to
both. Now, this was in 2008 during the
Iowa caucuses back when they had
meetings. And the political
conversations happening in this room
until 2 in the morning were some of the
most natural organic convers people that
disagreed with each other almost
entirely on every issue were standing
there drinking a beer with each other
and having a civil conversation. Now, we
don't think minds were being changed,
but relationships were being formed. And
we stood back and watched this and we
said, "Okay, how do we replicate this
every night?" And so what we tried to do
was to book at least two different
events every single night that tried to
draw as opposite crowds as possible. And
so that was when that was a big light
bulb moment for me, but uh it was also a
lot of fun.
>> That is a I love that story because we
all can relate to how our own perception
of wrestlers and poetry and to see them
come together. I mean, they're both in.
Yeah, I would have loved to uh to have
seen that. Is that still happening?
>> They don't I I don't know if they still
do it today. The the social club,
unfortunately, closed, I think, in 2020.
I know those folks are still around. I
don't know if it's happening the same night.
night.
>> Well, I one of the things I should tell
the audience here is that Zach and I met
I don't let's just say a month ago,
something like that. I wear another hat
with a group called Promising People,
and we essentially are training men and
women behind bars with virtual reality.
And so we got in contact through some
relationships. Part of the idea is to
put his courses on how to do this into
the headsets to take into prison so that
as they get trained and get released uh
there could be a natural workforce uh
for you and for this industry. And I and
I bring that up because you know I've
been doing stuff in prisons for 34
years. uh started when I was a freshman
in college and it's the same type of
thing as most people look at people in
prison and go I got nothing in common
with these people these guys are thugs
or whatever whatever whatever then you
get in and have a dialogue and and and
sure some of them fit the stereotype but
not the majority of them to see inmates
crying because they're they couldn't be
at their sister's child's
you birth or or whatever like you don't
that's not a paradigm of how you picture
these these these men and so u I'm
anxious to see how how this works out
with promising people because as you've
already said outside the walls I mean
community is important and so is is
housing well the same thing is true with
men men who are behind bars and frankly
when they get out the community that
they struggle to find is just is just
massive so it's so hard and then and
then obviously the need for a a job it's
so critical so I think and you probably
already know this but you will find in
the prison system. There are some
amazing people with amazing skill sets
that I think would just, you know, would
be awesome at what you're doing. You've
got some pretty big plans that you're
working on and things that you're
dreaming about. I don't know if the word
stewardship comes up in your vernacular
at all, but h how do you view
stewardship and and how are you trying
to live that out?
>> I mean, we're stewards of our clients.
We're stewards of our staff. We're
steward stewards of just the community
as a whole. You could look at our
business like you could any business and
say on the one hand we have this
business because we want to make money
which of course is true and there's
nothing wrong with that and that's what
everybody has to do as long as we live
in a capitalistic society. So that's
where we are. However, the mission of
the organization we do have a mission
and that is to help pe put people back
into the American dream, help make
buildings more sustainable and and
greener and better for our planet. Help
create community wherever we're going.
We are stewards of of our mission and we
have to remember that it'd be very easy
to go down a pathway of well we're just
going to print retaining walls and
gutter systems forever and make our
money and be fine and we could and we
will do those things but not only those
things we have to remember the original
mission of the organization and we are
stewards to that.
>> You know I love the way you answered
that because on the other hand you want
a sustainable business so you can go do
that. So I'm projecting that you took
those opportunities with with Walmart.
Not that it is your number one priority
to build for Walmart, but on the other
hand, it probably gave you gives you the
capital, gives you you can learn and all
kind of stuff so you can hone your craft
to go do what you ultimately want to do.
And so I I think it's a good lesson for
all of us because on the when you get in
this impact investing world or or and I
don't want to confuse the two you get in
the philanthropic world it's like ah
well if you're doing this over here and
it's not completely your mission somehow
you failed and it's like well no
sometimes you need to pivot a little bit
you got to stay afloat.
>> That's that's right. I mean this is this
is startup life.
>> Startup life is exciting and horrible at
the same time
>> and I don't recommend it. But I would
say that that yes, you do have to pivot.
And yes, having a a client like Walmart
is not something we ever of course want
to say no to. It's it's less about the
impact of of what that does for our
bottom line and it's more about how much
can we learn in this process. That's the
true thing that Walmart has afforded us
is the ability like going from project
one to project two was it really in my
opinion we'll be able to tell 20 years
from now that's what built this company.
That's that's when we learned it. That
was our breakthrough. We had periods of
success prior to that, but nothing close
that moment. There's other benefits to
this and frankly, if you want to talk
about stewardship, it's being a steward
to any and all. Everybody needs help and
we should be working with everybody.
There shouldn't be anything that we
disclaude. So, it's interesting you say
that when I got my MBA, so I guess that
would have been 2004 to 2006, a lot of
the case studies were Walmart and a lot
of them were on the negative side. And
so, you know, even hearing this, it's a
great reminder and and translate this to
companies, translates this to people,
they're typically not either good or
bad. There's generally there's probably
some play between both of them. And so
here you look at Walmart and if you go
off of the perception that I had based
on, you know, going through my MBA
school, whatever, however many years
ago, and yet you see that Walmart is
probably venturing out in a space where
a lot of other smaller companies can't
do it. And they're going to allow you to
hone your skills. You're going to make a
difference for them and they're going to
make a difference for you. And so it go
it even goes back to your concept of
community and not shunning somebody just
because they do things a little bit
differently. you still can work together
and and accomplish things. And I'm
assuming in the same light, there's
nothing wrong to have Discord. I mean,
you told Walmart, look, to do another
one. I need to actually come down and do
this together. And so, you probably have
a much better relationship with them
today than you did when you started. So,
>> yeah, we it's they got excited about
that. And we today we have a great
relationship. And they are most a lot of
folks probably wouldn't think of Walmart
as an innovative company and they are by
far one of the most innovative companies
and they've changed their their
perception greatly over the last 10 to
20 years and they're continuing to do
that. And when you've you've got
companies of this size they're going to
be scrutinized. They're also going to be
celebrated and so we I I am I didn't
know much about the inner workings of
Walmart obviously before we started
doing this work. I know a decent amount
today and it has been a a wonderful ride
with them of being able to learn side by
side. They are as much if not more
excited about this technology as we are.
>> Well, what's interesting is is if you
take that same concept, you know, in the
impact investing space, and I'm not
saying I I fall into this personally,
but the larger companies can be shunned
easier. And yet I've always sat on the
side that says, "Well, yeah, but a lot
of these big companies if they make
minor tweaks, the impact they can have
is massive to any startup that they're
going to have." And so usually it's just
a matter of having a dialogue and and
finding alignment in different areas.
And I'm assuming the alignment there is,
hey, we want this stuff cheaper, we want
it faster, and you can do that and
deliver, you know, the other
environmental benefits. It's a home run
for everybody.
>> Exactly. And that last part is is one of
the big things that gets glossed over
and forgotten is that they do want it
better and cheaper and faster, of
course, but they also want this to have
more positive impact on the environment.
And frankly, I don't think enough
companies are thinking that direction.
Walmart definitely is, and we're a small
piece of it.
>> Okay, last question. If you could have
one dream come true, and it could be
more than one if you if you want, and I
can take your family out of it if that
helps you, but if you could have a dream
come true, what would that be? I
immediately go to I want my kids to be
happy and healthy. But taking my family
out of it, one dream to come come true
would be for for everybody to venture
outside of their comfort zone and their
little bubble where they live and work
on a on a regular basis to not they
don't have to agree with but to
understand the perspective of the other
of the person opposite them is to
respect it. Not agree. They don't have
to agree, but to understand why a
certain per person thinks the way that
they do. I think if everybody could do
that, the world would be a much better place.
place.
>> All right. I I am going to add one more
question. So, we're talking 3D printing.
I think of houses. I'm assuming you've
thought about this. If not, that's fine.
If you had from scratch had, you pick
it. whatever it's 30 acres, whether it's
500 acres, if they somebody gave you the
money and gave you the freedom to say
now go build a community that you want,
have you thought about like would it
look different? I mean, I'm assuming
it's been built by 3D printing, but how
else would it look different from what
we're used to seeing?
>> If I had a blank check to build a
community, yes, it would be done with
3D. probably other technologies being
involved as well, but every component of
every home, of every structure would be
3D printed out of all types of
materials, not just concrete. It would
be designed entirely by the homeowners
themselves. Every every little bit of
it, every door knob, every drawer pole,
every bathtub, every fence, every door,
everything would be designed by the
individual who's going to end up owning
it. And in some cases, they would print
it themselves. the products that they're
using, any waste inside their home would
be recycled for them to be able to print
other things for their homes in the
future. There would be shared community
space where you have larger 3D printers
that everybody can utilize in their
area. Culturally, they would be able to
utilize all of the art forms would be in
that walkable community. Every store,
everything that you need to purchase
would be available there, provided
locally and provided by the community
itself. And yeah, I think that that does it.
it.
>> Had you thought about that before?
>> Of course.
>> I just say because you answered it like
like you had.
>> Yeah. Very cool. Well, Zach, thanks for
for taking the time. It's just fun to
One of the opportunities and and the
things I love doing here is talking with
people who are not just talking about
doing stuff, but are risking and doing.
And that's exactly what you're doing.
And so, I'm anxious to see where this
goes. I hope that one day you will have
your blank check and you can or at least
help design one of these communities and
then we'll go from there. So anyways,
thanks so much. Anything you want to say
in closing?
>> Thank you. Great questions, great great
interview, great discussion. Thank you.
>> So just as so everybody knows if they
want to find out more about you, put it
put it in the description, whatnot,
where can they find you?
>> Allquest 3d.com. My contact info is on
there. Feel free to reach out to me
directly. I'm also pretty active on LinkedIn.
LinkedIn.
>> Wonderful. Well, uh, don't forget to
subscribe to New Lens with Common Good
Capital on your podcast app of choice.
This will help new listeners find the
show and hopefully put them on a path to
more fulfilling portfolio from the
impact investing space. Zach, thanks so
This podcast is a production of Common
Good Capital. Does not constitute an
offer or a solicitation of an offer.
Such offer would only be made through a
private placement memorandum.
Prospective investors in private
placement securities should be aware
that making an investment is speculative
and involves a high degree of risk,
including the risk of losing all or a
portion of an investment. Investments of
this nature are illquid and subject to
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