How I went from Division 1 hockey player to successful entrepreneur before 26 ⬇️.
Up until my first year at Dartmouth, I’d never been exposed to entrepreneurship before. I’d spent 85% of my life training to be the best hockey player I could be.
2018
Then one afternoon in February 2018, I received an email that would change my life forever. “Gratefull Bed Investment Opportunity” read the subject line. Gratefull Bed is a student-run company that rents students full-size mattresses to students.
So I scraped all the money out of my piggy bank and used seller financing to purchase 10% of the company. I’ll never forget the feeling of receiving my first $1,200 dividend check. It was the best feeling in the world. At that moment, I was hooked.
2020
18 months later, I sold my 10% to the next generation of Dartmouth students. Equipped with my knowledge from Gratefull Bed, I was itching to start my own company. I thought back to my first-year floormate, Thomas, who had to drive 45 minutes to the nearest storage unit to store his things over summer break. There HAD to be a better way.
Greenbox Storage was born. I threw together a website and starting marketing my pickup / delivery summer storage service on campus. In 2020, Greenbox did ~$70,000 in revenue.
2021
The next year, I had a friend from back home who wanted to launch a branch at his school, Liberty University. We launched at Liberty as our first expansion school. We also launched a branch at Union College. Our 2021 revenue was ~$130,000.
2022
After graduating from Dartmouth, I went to Bentley University to get a master’s degree, play another year of hockey, and launch another branch of Greenbox. We also launched at a few other schools to get our branch count to 6 in 2022, with revenue of ~$270,000.
2023
Graduated from school and focusing solely on Greenbox, we went into overdrive. I hired five full-time employees, raised a $100,000 investment, acquired a rival storage company, and tripled Greenbox’s geographic presence to 18 branches. Revenue: $510,000.
Outside of Greenbox, I started posting my knowledge on X and LinkedIn, and have built a loyal following. I also launched a newsletter called Business Blitz, that teaches about entrepreneurship. In addition, I created the Startup Toolkit, a course that provides a step-by-step plan for launching a remote service business.
If you’re interested in hearing more from me:
Follow me on X: collin_ruth89
Subscribe to my newsletter: businessblitz.org
Check out my personal website: www.collinrutherford.com
