COVID KILLED MY BUSINESS.
I NEEDED A REASON TO START AGAIN.
Odd Lots did not begin as a retail idea. It began after COVID shut down the business I had spent years building. I was devastated, starting over financially and looking for a purpose I could believe in again. Then I saw something I already understood from years inside logistics and supply chains: a problem I knew how to solve.
I STARTED BY TRYING TO FIX FREIGHT.
In 2018 I started Ten8 Logistics, a supply-chain and logistics technology company building an intelligent freight platform. The work forced us to become students of business process: how goods move, where systems fail, what delays cost and how much waste hides inside ordinary operations.
The deeper we looked, the more surprising the inefficiency became. Overstock. Dead inventory. Products decommissioned because they no longer fit a plan. Food rejected because a truck missed a delivery window. Perfectly useful value becoming somebody’s disposal problem.
I kept thinking: there has to be a better destination for this.
COVID KILLED THE BUSINESS.
NOT THE VISION.
Like thousands of small businesses, Ten8 was hit by circumstances none of us had built our plans around. I held on as long as I could, hoping the shutdowns would end before the runway did. Eventually the resources were exhausted. I had to stop the active build and start over financially.
I was devastated. Ten8 represented years of work and a future I believed in. I still believe in it, and I intend to finish what we started when the time and resources are right. But in that moment I needed more than another business idea. I needed a purpose I could believe in again.
Then the lessons from Ten8 started connecting to what I was seeing around me. I saw a problem I understood — and a problem I knew how to solve.
THE SYSTEM WAS THROWING VALUE AWAY WHILE PEOPLE WERE STRUGGLING TO AFFORD BASICS.
Once you understand supply-chain leakage, you start seeing it everywhere. Useful products lose their normal route to market for reasons that have very little to do with whether somebody could still use them.
At the same time, the cost of housing, food and utilities was putting more families into survival mode. Some qualify for assistance. Many do not. Utah SNAP eligibility, like SNAP generally, uses income tests and allowable deductions; that means real housing pressure and program eligibility are not the same thing.
And nationally, USDA estimates that roughly 30–40% of the U.S. food supply goes uneaten through food loss and waste.
That was the connection. On one side, useful value was falling out of the supply chain. On the other, people were struggling to afford the basics. I found a problem I knew how to solve — and, slowly, a purpose I could believe in again.
START SMALL.
RESCUE SOMETHING USEFUL.
PUT IT BACK TO WORK.
Odd Lots started with about $300 and the belief that economically stranded inventory could become community value. But there was no overnight success story. It was slow, hands-on work: find good products, earn trust, learn what the neighborhood actually needs, keep costs low, make mistakes, improve and keep showing up.
Over four years the project has kept growing — sometimes one pallet, one customer, one volunteer and one relationship at a time. Nearly two years after opening our first community store in my grandparents’ old neighborhood, that experiment has become a Community Value Market with the spirit of a co-op, a growing network of 700+ registered volunteers, and a community that increasingly helps shape what we build next.
THE BUSINESS SHOULD SERVE PEOPLE.
NOT THE OTHER WAY AROUND.
Odd Lots is a social enterprise built around a simple conviction: people should not exist to serve the business. The business should exist to create value for people.
That does not mean profit is unimportant. A healthy business has to keep the lights on, pay people, buy inventory, build infrastructure and grow. But profit is the fuel — not the destination.
In a time when families are being squeezed while enormous companies become larger and more distant from the communities they depend on, we are choosing a different direction. We buy the vast majority of our inventory, protect quality, drive costs down and try to return as much value as we reasonably can to the people around us.
David did not beat Goliath by becoming a smaller Goliath. We do not need to become what we are pushing against. We need to prove that a business can be commercially strong precisely because it creates real value for its community.
NOT CHARITY AS A DESTINATION.
COMMUNITY AS INFRASTRUCTURE.
Build better exits for excess inventory before useful value is destroyed or discarded.
Move food, basics and essentials into neighborhoods at prices designed to make household budgets stretch further.
Create reseller pathways, local enterprise and more ways for people to build income and independence.
Connect people to resources, jobs, events, volunteering and each other — because affordability alone is not community.
“Give a man a fish” and “teach a man to fish” were never competing ideas to me.
WE CAN DO BOTH.
Help somebody get through today. Then build the opportunity, relationships and infrastructure that make tomorrow better.
A THREE-YEAR WINDOW TO BUILD SOMETHING THAT LASTS.
AI, robotics and automation are changing work while the cost of living is already squeezing households. Communities need more than commentary about what might happen next. They need resilient local systems now.
Our next chapter is warehousing, distribution, expanded Commercial Recovery and additional Community Value Markets across the city. More capacity means more inventory rescued, more families served, more small businesses supported and more value retained locally.
This does not fix every problem in the world. It can make an enormous difference in the place we call home.
THE STORE WAS ONLY THE FRONT DOOR.
People came for affordable groceries, unexpected finds and ridiculous prices. What grew around the market was something bigger: people sharing time, skills, information, opportunities and a genuine desire to help their neighbors.
A growing group of neighbors who have raised their hands to help, participate and build alongside us.
We are a social enterprise, not a traditional co-op, but the market increasingly works with the same spirit: listen to the community, share value and build around what people actually need.
Affordable basics matter. So does being able to choose what works for your household without being reduced to a label or treated like a case number.
Resources, jobs, reselling, small-business pathways, events, volunteering and practical ways for people to help one another.
The community is not an audience for Odd Lots. It is becoming one of the most important parts of what Odd Lots is.
ENTER THE COMMUNITY →HELP US BUILD THE NEXT MILE.
You do not have to need Odd Lots to need Odd Lots to exist.
If you have time, volunteer. If you have inventory, send it our way. If you have capital, warehouse space, equipment, expertise or connections, help us build the infrastructure. If you simply believe your neighbors deserve a fair shot, join the community and bring somebody with you.
— TJ
Founder, Odd Lots Market