ADR 024: Margaret Blankenbaker Interview (Sew Strong)

Margaret Blankenbaker is the founder of Sew Strong, a GRT run sewing company which produces some very unique products. In this podcast we interview her and learn how she found GORUCK, what her first event was like, and where Sew Strong came from. Margaret is one of the nicest people we’ve ever met and we were so excited to get this scheduled. We can’t think of a better company to round out the month of November than Sew Strong. Resources * GORUCK & Rucking Glossary * Sew Strong * GORUCK Light Events * GORUCK Tough Events * Rogue Dynamics What’s Next Thanks so much for listening! If you missed any of our earlier episodes you can give them a listen right now. Hopefully you enjoyed the podcast and are excited about the next one. This is very new to us so we would appreciate it if you would cut us some slack as we work on perfecting our methodologies. Did you enjoy the podcast? We’d love a review on iTunes or even our Facebook Page! Didn’t enjoy it? Leave a comment here in the show notes and let us know what we can do better! Thanks so much for the support and make sure to check out the links in the Show Notes. Subscribe through iTunes, Android, Google Music, Stitcher, or TuneIn and never miss another episode! Podcast Transcript Brian: Today I’m chatting with Margaret, who is the founder of Sew Strong. Margaret is a fellow GRT and makes the incredibly popular patch tags and stash tags they’ve probably seen in the Tough group. How are you doing today, Margaret? Margaret: I’m doing great, fine. Thank you so much for having me on. I love listening to your podcast, and so it’s a great honor to get beyond here and talk to you in person. Brian: I’m so excited to have you on here. As you know as well, we have a lot of friends in common and everyone just has amazing things to say about you, so I’m incredibly excited that we’re able to talk and finally connect. Thank you for being on. Margaret: Thank you for having me. Brian: Before we get into Sew Strong, I want to talk a little bit about your involvement in GORUCK and the GORUCK Community. How did you stumble upon GORUCK? Margaret: It’s kind of a funny story. In 2015, I had done my first 5k. My mother-in-law actually gave me a challenge, she was going to do the 5k and she said, “Do you want to go with me?” I said, “Sure.” I did. I trained for it and I did the 5k and I loved it and it was such an incredible experience to train for something and then do something physically hard. Right around that time, I’ve always had a love for backpack. I love sewing them, I love buying them, and I was Googling slick black backpacks, and of course the GR1 came up because it’s very slick and very black and I thought,