The LoCo Experience
The LoCo Experience is a long-form conversational podcast that dives deep into the journeys of business leaders, entrepreneurs, and changemakers in Northern Colorado. Hosted by Curt Bear, Founder of LoCo Think Tank, the show brings real, raw, and unfiltered conversations—where guests share their successes, struggles, and lessons learned along the way.
LoCo Think Tank is Colorado’s premier business peer advisory organization, founded in Fort Collins to help business owners gain perspective, accountability, and encouragement to grow both personally and professionally. LoCo chapters bring together business owners at all stages of the journey into professionally facilitated peer advisory chapters, led by experienced business veterans. These groups provide a trusted space to share challenges, seek advice, learn togethter, and support each other’s success.
The LoCo Experience Podcast extends this mission beyond the chapter meetings— bringing the wisdom, insights, and stories of local business leaders to a wider audience.
Our triad mission with this podcast is simple:
Inspire through real stories of resilience and success.
Educate by sharing valuable business insights.
Entertain with engaging, unfiltered conversations.
If you love “How I Built This” and the free-flowing style of Joe Rogan - but with a Northern Colorado focus - you’ll enjoy The LoCo Experience! Our closing segment, "The LoCo Experience," asks guests to share their craziest stories — and we get some doozies!
It’s a passion project with purpose, and we invite you to listen, follow, and share, and maybe consider sponsoring. Know someone with a great story? Nominate your favorite business leader for an episode!
- Update frequency
- every 7 days
- Average duration
- 99 minutes
- Episodes
- 269
- Years Active
- 2020 - 2025
EXPERIENCE 118 | Chas Greener - Content & Video Creator at Chas’s Crazy Creations - Cultivating a Creatives Community
Chas Greener, formerly a Dance Director at Mountain Kids in Fort Collins, transitioned into content creation after an injury in 2019. She now runs Chas's Crazy Creations with over 10,000 YouTube subs…
EXPERIENCE 117 | Samson Jagoras and Darius Bell - Clearly Acquired & Pain to Profits Podcast - Funding & Equipping the Next Generation of Business Leaders
Samson Jagoras was a Division I football player at CU, and soon became an early-stage and key leader and eventually minority partner in Madwire/Marketing 360. Darius Bell came to know Samson while h…
EXPERIENCE 116 | Chris Cox - Plenty Wellness & Buzz Screens - Why’s and Waypoints of an Entrepreneurial Journey
Chris Cox found relief from long-term back pain through use of CBD in 2016, and soon turned his growing knowledge of and passion for holistic medicine into a retail enterprise - Plenty Wellness in Lo…
EXPERIENCE 115 | Valeria Ortiz - Vortiz Insurance - Serving the Underserved & Building Community
Valeria Ortiz, founder of Vortiz Insurance, offers education and insurance packages for the Medicare market, with its headquarters in Greeley, Colorado. I met Valeria at a local event and struck up a…
EXPERIENCE 114 | Phil Pelto, Firestorm - The Power of Network Effect & How to Build Authentic Connections
Phil Pelto is the Co-Founder of Firestorm B2B Networking and Certus B2C Networking - The Power of Network Effect & How to Build Authentic Connections, both with an increasing number of chapters and …
EXPERIENCE 113 | Sean Godbey - Founder and Owner of Old Town Spice Shop - Adapting Your Business Model for Changing Times
Sean Godbey founded Old Town Spice Shop in Fort Collins, Colorado with his brother and parents in 2010, with an original plan to expand to five retail locations within just a few years. They found s…
EXPERIENCE 112 | Seth Coonrod - Timberline Audio Video - The Highs and Lows of an Entrepreneurial Journey
Seth Coonrod is the Founder and Owner/Operator of Timberline Audio Video in Loveland, Colorado, and also a LoCo Think Tank member. He worked as a key employee of a similar company in North Carolina …
EXPERIENCE 111 | Shelley Polansky - President/CEO of the Better Business Bureau Serving Northern Colorado and Wyoming - In Pursuit and Support of Ethical Business Practices and Stories
Shelley Polansky has been on the team at BBB of NoCo and Wyoming since 2008, serving in Dispute Resolution, Education, Communications, and Outreach before ascending to the leadership role in 2019. L…
EXPERIENCE 110 | Nathan Wilbanks & Alex Swanson - On Artificial Intelligence, Marketing, Writing, and Thinking - and the Romance of an Entrepreneurial Journey Together
Nathan Wilbanks and Alex Swanson are the Founders of BizOp Media, a content and strategy-driven marketing agency headquartered in Fort Collins. In 2021, Nathan departed Bizop to develop new ideas, an…
EXPERIENCE 109 | Franklin Taggart - Musician, Podcaster, and Coach for Creatives
My guest this week was Franklin Taggart - a fellow consultant with the Larimer County Small Business Development Center and founder of Franklin Taggart Coaching. Franklin was the first podcaster to …
EXPERIENCE 108 | John Kefalas - Larimer County Commissioner, Behind the Scenes of a Life of Service
John Kefalas is currently a Larimer County Commissioner, elected to his second term in 2022, and previously served many years as a Colorado State Representative and later, State Senator. He previous…
EXPERIENCE 107 | Drew Yancey - On Peer Advisory, Leading Performance (because it can’t be managed), and Building Next Level Enterprises.
Drew Yancey is the President and COO of Incite Performance Group in Fort Collins, and the LoCo Facilitator for a pair of Next Level chapters. He’s also the author of a new book, his third, with co-au…
EXPERIENCE 106 | Aaron Everitt - InMotion, Real Estate Update, & Stop the Alphabet Soup
Aaron Everitt, broker with The Group, joins us to give his quarterly update on the Northern Colorado real estate market, sharing market and interest rate updates, and examples of opportunity in any m…
EXPERIENCE 105 | A Brothers Fountain II - Fall Tour, Muscle Shoals, Business of Music, and Love of Community!
My guests on today’s episode were AJ and JJ Fountain, bandmates with locally-famous campfire folk music band A Brothers Fountain, and co-founders and partners of Stoked Ember Productions. This was t…
EXPERIENCE 104 | The Trainor Brothers Circus! - Brian, Adam, & Joe Trainor Share Stories of Brotherhood and Entrepreneurship
This week we somehow fit three of the Northern-Colorado famous Trainor Brothers into the podcast studio, with Brian, Adam, and Joe Trainor all sharing their stories and philosophies with me and with …
EXPERIENCE 103 | Becky Allsup, Designing a Team & Building an Integrated Enterprise
Becky Allsup is the owner of Becky’s Custom Interiors, which in turn holds Niche Design House and Rebecca Windsor & Associates. Niche is primarily an upscale commercial and residential design cen…
EXPERIENCE 102 | Working In Your Strengths with Serial Entrepreneur, Inventor & Author, Matt Shoup
Matt Shoup is a serial entrepreneur, author, inventor, real estate broker and investor. He’s the President of M & E Painting and Roofing, Inventor of The Pirate Patch, and a realtor with C3 Real Est…
EXPERIENCE 101 | Nick Armstrong, WTF is up with Nick, Founded in FoCo, Comic Con, and FTW Hot Sauce?
Nick Armstrong is among Fort Collins’ most interesting people! He’s the Geek-in-Chief of WTF Marketing, the Pepper Pioneer of FTW Hot Sauce, and the Lead Organizer of both Founded in FoCo and Fort C…
EXPERIENCE 100 | Dudley Brown and Ben Gates, More Guns for a Safer America!
Dudley Brown is the Founder and President of Rocky Mountain Gun Owners (RMGO), and the President of the National Association for Gun Rights (NAGR), both based in Loveland, Colorado. Ben Gates is a p…
EXPERIENCE 99 | Dr. Heidi Golding, Traditional Medicine, Modern Technology, Family Trauma, Ayahuasca & Magic Mushrooms
Dr. Heidi Golding is the Founder and Practitioner at Living Well Chinese Medicine in Loveland, Colorado. She’s an acupuncturist, an herbalist, and one of the most interesting health professionals I’…