Welcome back to our Meet the Postie series. Each month I sit down with a fellow member of the Postie team to ask them questions about work, life, and everything in between. These posts are loaded with relatable stories, tips on stress management and work/life balance, fun photos, and more. Last month we sat down with Sean Walker, a newly expecting father. This month you get to meet Brandon Mecham, a rockstar on our customer team and a new dad of twin boys! Brandon’s commitment to his job, his family, and his hobbies is inspiring. Let’s get started…
Name: Brandon Mecham
Location: Utah
Team: Customer Success
Time at Postie: 2 Years
Favorite Food: Anything from the Costco Food Court
If you could travel to space, who would you take with you: Han Solo just so I could fulfill a childhood dream and be his copilot in the Millennium Falcon.
Find Brandon on LinkedIn!
What inspired you to join Postie?
I wanted to be part of a company where everyone from top to bottom was essentially on the same team. Where we’re on the same boat, rowing towards the same goal of building a product that offers a great value. My first job right out of college was working for an agency, and I got a taste of that at that job. Then I worked at a handful of other places, and I always missed that camaraderie. I also had exposure to Postie at my previous job at Rhone; I saw it from the client side of things and that was interesting. Overall I just had a great feeling about what was going on with Postie, and the opportunity to get into a channel that some people in marketing don’t think about a lot, but has great value, was appealing to me.
Tell me something about your professional development journey.
Right out of college, I started working at a marketing agency. I learned how to do Facebook ads and learned what all the KPIs meant and why they’re important. It was a good time and I met a lot of great people who have become great professional contacts.
After that I changed gears a bit and actually joined a major bank in Utah. I started working for them because I had a contact there who worked in the cyber security department and they needed to build a cyber security awareness program from scratch. He knew I was in marketing and knew that was a good skill to have when building this program. It took a couple of years to build the program and it was a really unique experience, and a fun experience. But I missed traditional marketing, so I got back into marketing through a contact from my first job at that marketing agency.
I got hired at a Rhone, a big active lifestyle clothing brand company where I was hired to be the lifecycle marketing manager. I did a lot of email marketing and SMS marketing. That’s actually where I was exposed to Postie for the first time. My manager was handling the direct mail channel, and I sat next to him in the office, so I got to see the hard proofs for our campaigns. I actually still have a couple of the hard proofs from when I worked there. I was always excited about those campaigns when we were launching them. When I came to Postie it was fun transitioning from the client side of things to the customer success side of things, because I understand the challenges that marketing professionals have in that sphere. It’s been fun to come full circle.
What have been some of the most important lessons you’ve learned throughout your career?
Write down what you learn. Internalize what you learn, and then apply what you learn, especially with marketing. Things are changing a lot, and there’s always room for advancement and optimizations. If you’re just consistently going at a pace of what you know and not trying to build upon that, then you’ll be missing out on a lot of opportunities and you’ll be left behind in some aspects. That’s why I like Postie; there’s endless opportunities to learn on a weekly basis. I’m constantly writing things down. I have an excel spreadsheet where I list things I’ve learned for the day, with links to blogs, places of reference, all that stuff. Then I can internalize what I learned so I can then apply it.
Where do you think you can make the biggest impact in your role?
Because of my previous role at Rhone as a lifecycle marketing manager I can build upon understanding the challenges that people have on the client side of things pretty easily. Everything I did there was relatable to my job at Postie. I was dealing with a lot of customer success managers with the tools we were using. I was talking to them regularly, and there were some people I had a really good relationship with and others who you could tell they were just going through the motions. That’s helped me understand the importance of client relationship building, and I know I can make a big impact there. Now in my role I work so my clients feel like I’m a part of their team as opposed to someone just checking in on them to check it off my list for the week.
I also have a lot of attention to detail, almost to a fault, but nonetheless, I have found attention to detail has helped me out a lot. There’s a lot of detail required in building a successful direct mail marketing approach. Making sure everything is in order is really important. That’s something I really valued doing. That’s a skill I bring to the table.
What’s the most important lesson you’ve learned working with your team?
What’s really great about Postie is how we all work together. My team is not just the customer success team. There’s the marketing team, or the development team, or the data science team, or the sales team, where people are getting different levels of experience, but we all work as one team. So the most important lesson I’ve learned – and I learned this early at Postie – is that there’s something to learn from everyone on every team at every level here at Postie. I’m learning something from someone at Postie every day. I’ve learned it’s very helpful to be open to learning from everyone.
What’s your favorite memory from working at Postie?
It’s probably a standard answer a lot of people would give, but the offsites. Particularly my first offsite, which was last year in Colorado. In my previous roles I never got to meet everybody in person, mainly due to the pandemic or the size of the company. So that first offsite in Colorado, where I got to basically meet everybody in person. We spent 3 days together getting to know everyone. It was a really welcoming experience to be able to have that camaraderie. It really set the tone and reemphasized what I was looking for at Postie.
Do you have any strategies for dealing with stress at work?
The biggest strategy I have with dealing with stress is trying to just mitigate it as much as possible by making sure nothing is left behind. I have an obsession with to-do lists. I have a whiteboard, I have a document, I have my wife that hears “Hey, help me! Remind me to do this.” I’m like, always trying to make sure I’m on top of things, because the biggest thing that stresses me out is when I fall behind on tasks.
But the biggest thing that helps me is to spend time with my family. That’s a great perk from working from home because I can see my family all the time. I’ll have lunch with them, or take a quick break after a big client call. Those quick, small breaks to remind me what’s the most important thing and what motivates me.
Do you have any mentors, Postie, or otherwise, you’d like to shout out?
My former boss at my last company, Kyle Johnson. He and I worked together at the first marketing agency I worked at right after college and he hired me years later as his life cycle marketing manager. He’s a great example on how to learn and how to lead. He was an incredible mentor, even to this day. He and I left around the same time, so we follow each other’s career.
I would say also, my mom. She works at Intel and is a good influence on me and a great example of how to be professional. She’s been a manager for 20 years, so she’s helped me with so many things in the past, like building resumes and preparing for interviews.
What do you enjoy doing outside of work?
Going to the movies. I’m a big movie buff. My first job in high school was at a movie theater. I started working in the snack bar and cleaning up and sweeping up the theaters. Then I started working with the projectors, and I loved it, and I thought it was so cool. This was before all the projectors were digital. I’ve always been in love with the movie going experience. It’s harder to do now with kids, but my wife and I have a lot of family that live close by, so we’re able to get out and go to the movies. I drag her to all my action and sci-fi movies, and I will definitely compromise and go to a romcom with her when she wants.
What would your perfect weekend look like?
My wife and I love going to Disneyland, so I would say getting away to Disneyland with the family would be the perfect weekend. We both went a handful of times as kids, so we have that shared experience of that magical feeling of going to the parks with our family. We try to go once a year, and we usually find a three-day weekend so we can recreate those magical moments for our kids. They’re a little young, so right now we’re acting like they’re going to remember, but honestly, it’ll probably be another three years before they start remembering the visit. For now we’re just priming them and enjoying the time together.
What’s something surprising that not many people know about you?
I recently got into home renovation. Before last year I’d say the biggest thing I’d done was install a dishwasher, and it almost broke me. It was so frustrating, but I figured it out. But then last year I randomly found a passion for it. We bought a townhome last April and before we moved in I got really into fixing it up. It didn’t have a finished basement, so I finished the basement – the entire thing. I became obsessed with tools. I get a big sense of joy just walking into a Home Depot. Maybe it’s just a dad thing that’s happening to me, but I like the Home Depot theme song. It’s my personal life theme song right now.
Do you follow any sports teams?
I am a die-hard Sacramento Kings fan, they’re an NBA basketball team for those unaware. I grew up just outside of Sacramento, I moved there in the early 2000s and they had a legendary run back then. I was just getting into sports, so it was a match made in heaven. I found my favorite team, at just the right time, and I’ve been addicted ever since. I’ve been a dedicated, loyal fan ever since.
The Kings went on a 16 year playoff drought, which was one of the longest playoff droughts in all of major sports history, but they made the playoffs last year for the first time in 16 years. I traveled back to Sacramento last year and I went to their first playoff game; it was awesome. Now that they’re good, I’m not having as much fun because it’s really torturous when they lose. The last 16 years I was used to them losing, so it didn’t hurt as much, but it feels very vindicating for them to be good again.
What type of books or movies do you enjoy?
I love sci-fi, action, adventure books. Dune is a good example since that’s timely. I read the book a couple years ago. When I read it for the first time, I was like, “what is this book? I don’t understand anything that’s happening,” but I find it rewarding to read something that’s a little denser, and then reread it and better understand the different levels and complexities of the story.
What’s a cause that you’re passionate about?
Generally speaking, service. Whether it be to my neighbors, family, friends, or strangers, I like sacrificing my own time for others. I know a lot of people have done that for me in my lifetime, so I feel an extreme obligation to do that for others at times. It’s easy for me to do that for people I know, but doing something for people that I don’t know as well is very impactful because those acts of service are a lot harder to do.
What’s something you’ve always wanted to try or something you’ve always wanted to learn?
There’s been a couple of things I’ve tried to learn in the past and have not given up yet, but one I’m currently taking a hiatus on, is learning a musical instrument. If I were to pick one thing it would be learning the piano. In fact, when I was dating my wife I was taking piano lessons from my friend’s grandma because I was trying to find a new skill to learn. My now-wife was actually interested in learning as well, so we started going to piano lessons together, and it was a cool bonding experience. But as life has progressed, we’ve gotten busier, we have kids so it gets harder, but I’ve always been really interested in learning a musical instrument, and I’d love to find time to get back into that, maybe more specifically with a piano.
What’s the best thing that has happened to you this year?
This is the easy one. The birth of our twin boys about a month ago. That was an amazing experience. We’re really happy to have them. Now we have 3 kids, a 3 year old, his name’s Luka, and then our twins, Montgomery and Campbell. The birth of a child is the single most incredible experience I’ve ever had in my life. Seeing two of them at the same time was just incomprehensible. It’s been really amazing. It’s been fun, a real wild experience the last few weeks. We’re finding a new norm for our life, but very happy to find that new norm and have them join us. And really, just the best thing is that everyone is healthy.
I have put myself on notice to get in the best shape of my life though. I know it’s physically taxing now with just one toddler, but two toddlers and one slightly older is going to be a lot. It’s like I’m preparing for a major sporting event. I need to be in tiptop shape to be able to have all my faculties as they grow.
What’s something you’re proud of?
I’m proud of actively trying to be a little bit better every day. In my work environment, but also as a dad and a husband, and sometimes I have hard days, but I’m trying every day and not giving up. I make an effort every day. If I’m having a bad day, I can look back and be proud of how I’ve improved and how I’m always trying and doing my best.
If you could pick any super power, what would it be? And why?
Super speed. There are not enough hours in the day to do everything. I have to prioritize and if I had super speed I could do everything and get it all done, and that would be very helpful. At the moment, right now in my stage of life, I would say super speed is the most important power.
🚀 See you next time!
