Interview– Jordan Cornille

Jordan Cornille, the calm, composed, creative co-founder of Curtiss Motorcycles, opens us to the dreamscape of motoring. We talk about the ways dreams come true, how motoring has become the dreamscape of his own career as a designer and motoring strategist, and the importance of reframing the role motoring plays in our lives. We also discuss how all this might move us towards a more sustainable global future.

Listen to full episode :

Transcript:

Jordan Cornille Forever

Andrea Hiott: [00:00:00] Hello everyone. I'm so glad you're here. Today we have the designer and motoring strategist Jordan Corn on the show. He's a graduate from the Elite C C SS Transportation Design Program in Detroit, the College for Creative Studies. His first motorcycle design was a spectacular looking ewin Zeus. He's also a co-founder of Curtis Motorcycles and it's calm, composed, creative center of operations.

Have you ever heard of Glen Curtis? For those who haven't, we've got some shows coming up on him. He was an early bicycle and motorcycle maker in the United States, and he's really the man who started the aviation business in America and deserves as much credit as the Wright brothers when it comes to that.

But still, most people have never heard of him. Even Jordan admits he'd never heard of him, as you'll hear on this podcast. Um, and Jordan's [00:01:00] a person very studied in the art of transportation, but he just hadn't come across Glenn Curtis until about eight years ago when he and Matt Chambers started dreaming up ways to create ecological motoring or sustainable motoring that could have the spirit and style of some of the best of America's transportation creations.

And though Pierre Tere Blanche had turned Matt towards a similar road, it was not an easy or obvious turn back then. And so it was only later when Jordan Cornell came into view that the path was illuminated. And Matt and Jordan started a new company together called Curtis towards building luxury electric motorcycles.

And now this whole new world has opened up for everyone. And as Jordan tells it, that world is really one that revolves around family and all the different ways that humans become family to one another. For Jordan, of course, his wife and his baby daughter move him more than anything. But he also sees Matt and JT Nesbitt and the others that he [00:02:00] works with at Curtis as a sort of family, which is something pretty astonishing because as you'll hear, Matt and JT were his early heroes in the field before he'd even met them.

Uh, and now he works with them and even maybe thinks of them as family. Perhaps there's ways that everyone in the motoring world shares something like kinship because we all have to figure out these familiar motoring ties if we want to survive and thrive ecologically, especially when it comes to motoring.

And Jordan seems to think that the best way to do that is to rethink our relationship to objects and to the things we buy. Maybe not considering it just stuff we're going to eventually discard objects like the little red wagon that he mentions that his grandfather used to pull him around in when he was a kid or.

Maybe it's your daughter or son's first handcrafted little wooden bike. These are objects to be kept and passed down over generations. Jordan says, and an electric motorcycle is a [00:03:00] work of art like that too. Um, maybe all the ways we move through the world could be those kinds of objects, things that last forever.

At least that's how Jordan sees it. Uh, it's something for dreaming and desire and meaning. Jordan's dad used to tell him stories when they were riding in the car, when Jordan was just a little boy, or maybe even when they were taking his mom's minivan somewhere. You know, his dad would just turn these vehicles into spaceships or horses or I don't know, vehicles that could move into the past or the future or even up to the stars.

And those became some of Jordan's fondest and most imaginative memories, those rides in the car with his dad. And now with his own daughter, he does something similar in hopes to pass on that same kind of dreaming. So this word dreaming is something that Jordan raises quite a few times here in our conversation.

And by the end of it, he's connected that word dreaming to another word, which is desire and meaning as well. [00:04:00] And so these words, dreaming, desire and meaning sort of set out this path for how Jordan sees forever motoring. I hope you enjoy this conversation and let's go.

Hey Jordan, thanks for being here today. Oh, how

Jordan Cornille: are you?

Andrea Hiott: I'm good. So this is a podcast about motoring, specifically forever motoring, and we're exploring that word in many different ways. So just to start today, I wonder if you could think back and tell us about an early experience of motoring or something that moved you.

I've

Jordan Cornille: got a lot of early memories of motoring. It might not be exactly what people would expect, but I've got early, early memories, whether it's riding on my grandpa's lap, on his lawn mower while he is mowing the lawn on a Sunday afternoon, you know, riding in the back of a a little red wagon, like a radio flyer.

We would [00:05:00] tie it up to a bicycle and my grandpa would ride the bike and kind of pull us along. Mm-hmm. Sometimes we'd fall out and get hurt, but those were fun memories, me with my siblings. And then some of my favorite early motoring memories are just kind of spin in the back of my car with my dad driving when I was a little boy.

And my dad would pretend that the car is some alternate mode of transportation, whether it was a motorcycle or a race car, or he'd pretend to be the pilot of an airplane or a space shuttle. And, and so I think some of my earliest motoring memories are really tied to sort of nurturing imagination, if you will.

Which is, which is kind of interesting.

Andrea Hiott: Yeah, it is. It sounds like you were being transported in more ways than one. It's wonderful that your dad did that. It's very imaginative.

Jordan Cornille: Yeah. It's something now as a, now as a new dad, I, I, I imitate it [00:06:00] sometimes with my little daughter because that's, because it is one of my, it's one of my fondest memories when I'm

Andrea Hiott: wonderful being little.

That's wonderful. Yeah. I guess, I guess that means you want her to feel the way you felt in those moments.

Jordan Cornille: I think so. I think because it's such a, it's such a happy memory, something that I've held onto for so long. Mm-hmm. That it's an sort of an easy thing to share with her, I guess.

Andrea Hiott: Yeah. I think that says something about motoring in, in a kind of larger context too, about how it connects us through times and generations, and also how it's of a sensory experience.

Right. It's not just cool cars and motorbikes, which we can also get fascinated by at times. Have you thought much about that? About the larger ideas of

Jordan Cornille: motoring? Yeah. And a lot of it ties back to that memory of, of my dad and that I, I sort of relate motoring to, to kind of, uh, a dream, if you will, or mm-hmm.

This, this possibility of anything. You know, my mom's [00:07:00] minivan could have been the space shuttle, so what is motoring? Motoring can, can open up this dreamlike world that's so, uh, freeing and happy and peaceful. That's something that really entices me. Commod.

Andrea Hiott: Yeah, that's true. It's about going places, but it can also be places in your mind, imaginary places.

It's also about this going to new places Right. And stressing what's possible.

Jordan Cornille: Yeah, absolutely. I. Another, another memory I have for a few years during my childhood. I lived in Southeast Asia, I lived in Indonesia and, and motoring took on a whole, a whole other form over there because, uh, in, in Jakarta specifically, there would just be hundreds of thousands of scooters and mopeds.

And that is motoring no matter what you need motoring to be, whether it's transporting your goods, whether it's transporting your family of size. Um, when were you there? Uh, I lived there when I [00:08:00] was in middle school. So early teens.

Andrea Hiott: Yep. Yeah. So that made a big impression and that's a really different concept of movement.

Just being in that movement feels different, doesn't it? For sure.

Jordan Cornille: It's kind of this, this organized chaos. It feels like what, what you see shouldn't be working, but it does somehow, you know, like an ant colony or something. And there's something beautiful about that. It just seems like it should be impossible, but it's not.

That speaks to

Andrea Hiott: another thing that can happen with transportation and movement and motoring is that we can get overwhelmed a bit. It can be so much, and especially when it's a really new sensory experience. So on that note, trying something new and also the familiar of motoring, it sounds like it was always a special experience for you, but did you grow up thinking as a little boy, like, okay, I wanna work with cars or motorcycles?

Jordan Cornille: Not, not specifically. I wouldn't classify myself as a traditional gearhead or anything like that. I did always dream of, of, [00:09:00] of something vehicle related. You know, my, my first dream was probably to be a, a firefighter, you know, driving the fire truck and then for some time I wanted to be a pilot. I loved the idea of taking to the air and then I sort of fell in love with cars in high school, I guess.

So there was always a connective tissue there. So how did.

Andrea Hiott: What, how did you end up going to college for what you went for, which is your first, tell us where you ended

Jordan Cornille: up. I went to, to college for creative studies in Detroit and studied traditional automotive design. I wound up there because of Matt and JT actually.

Oh, it was in early high school when I came across a picture of the race that they had worked on together and, and designed, um, just on an internet article or something. And the race just totally took me away. It was the first time I had ever really looked at a motorcycle specifically even, [00:10:00] and I remember it being the first moment in time in my life when I've had this conscious recognition that products are designed and created.

I had never really thought about that up to this point, but the. Me 'cause it was so avant garde and unique and, and cool and beautiful that it made me ask myself, who, who came up with this? How do you create this? How do you decide something can look so radical and and different from everything else? And so the Wraith actually brought me to the world of, of design.

And that's what, that's what kind of led me to automotive design in Detroit.

Andrea Hiott: Yeah. So Matt Chambers and JT Nesbitt, and that was Confederate at the time. And that was what their third bike?

Jordan Cornille: Yeah. That, that was, that was the company's third bike. It was the second that JT and Matt have worked on together.

Andrea Hiott: You saw that and you thought you wanna be able to create [00:11:00] something that has that effect on other people that this bike had had on you.

Was that kind of the, or was it total

Jordan Cornille: curiosity? I think, I think up to that point. I had never seen a motorcycle that didn't look like a motorcycle, and the Wraith didn't really look like a motorcycle to me, the way that people, man, imagine a motorcycle. So it was just so fun to discover and realize that maybe getting involved in that you could hopefully have that impact wherever the path took me.

I didn't even specifically say I'm gonna design motorcycles or even I'm gonna design cars, just products. But can I, if I go down this path, can I create a TV that you wouldn't think of as a TV or, or a, or a drinking glass or a car or a boat? Okay. So, so, so, so it really just kind of opened up this, this stream like state for

Andrea Hiott: me, I think.

Mm-hmm. So it's almost like this kind of uncanny experience where the world isn't quite what you thought it was, or it sort of [00:12:00] jolt that you liked about this Yeah. Idea of design, but where were you living at the time? Why did you go all the way to Detroit? Or were you living near Detroit? I

Jordan Cornille: lived in New Hampshire and New England.

Okay. That's where I spent most of my childhood. Um, and when I started researching and diving into the world of automotive design, you learned that it's a fairly specialized skill and it's not taught at, you know, every state school. So there were, there's a handful in the country that are considered the top, and, and Detroit c c s was definitely one of the best.

So, yeah,

Andrea Hiott: I guess so. You're right there with the big three. Right? Did they play a big part in the

Jordan Cornille: They definitely, they definitely did college. The, the building where most of my classes were at C C Ss, uh, was the original GM headquarters and design centers. So my studio classes where we designed cars for the semester were kind of right up there were Harley Earl and Bill Mitchell, and those gangs were designing cars and [00:13:00] GMs heyday.

Andrea Hiott: Oh my. That's pretty exciting. Did you realize at the time how special it was? Or was it all a process of sort of discovering all those people once you were there?

Jordan Cornille: You definitely, you definitely realize how special it is, whether you know a lot about that history or not. The building is almost like a museum itself.

Mm-hmm. You walk in and you just, there's something almost spiritual about it when you, when you go up to those top floors of that building and overlook downtown Detroit and

Andrea Hiott: you can feel it. For sure. Yeah. I've been some of those buildings and the, some of the early factories definitely has a spatial resonance still.

It

Jordan Cornille: does for sure. Yeah.

Andrea Hiott: So it almost seems too perfect that the reason you went to school was this photo that you saw of Matt Chambers and JT Nesbit, and now you ended up working with him. Did it, how did that happen? Did it happen soon after your schooling?

Jordan Cornille: Yeah. Tell us that. It did. It happened, uh, had it before school ended even.

It was. Just good timing. During my senior year, I started applying [00:14:00] to, to companies preparing for what's next and I was applying to the car companies, the big three in downtown, et cetera. And, uh, I decided to send my portfolio and resume to map or whatever reason. I never expected to hear anything back.

You know, kids in school would say, oh, I should send him my portfolio to Ferrari, but you don't, you don't expect, you don't expect to call back, that's for sure. Um, but one afternoon I wrote a cover letter to Matt probably telling him the story about how he inspired me to be here in the first place. Um, and he called me back really quick.

He called me back like half an hour later and offered me the job. That

Andrea Hiott: must have been one of those moments too, almost like looking at the rate kind of out of your body experience.

Jordan Cornille: It was definitely kind of a pinch, a pinch me moment. Also, like, is this real? Um, I guess I'll find out when I drive down there after I graduate.

Uh, so it, it did sort of [00:15:00] feel good to be true too. Good to be true. 'cause it was, it was, yeah. It was just very exciting. Yeah,

Andrea Hiott: definitely. But looking at it now, it sort of fits, doesn't it? I mean, it's definitely the spirit of that bike that you first saw and the very act of just being so bold to send Matt, the, the, uh, email is probably exactly the kind of thing that would get his attention.

It just fits very well, doesn't it, with that spirit of the company in a way.

Jordan Cornille: I think so. Yeah. I think it does. I think everything felt very aligned and just Right.

Andrea Hiott: So tell me what happened then. So you jump in your car and you drive to where, where, where was it at the time? New Orleans or Birmingham, or where was Matt?

In the company?

Jordan Cornille: Birmingham. Yep. Okay. Me and my dad loaded up the car and drove down to Birmingham. I was gonna start on a Monday, but we got down on a, on a Friday. So we, we stopped by. The office to, to meet Matt in person and just see where I'd be working, make sure it actually was real. Mm-hmm. Before [00:16:00] my dad left.

Andrea Hiott: But was he concerned? It was good. I'd like to try to imagine that car ride down where your dad's kind of the same man who had, uh, made the car into a vehicle that could take you anywhere was, you

Jordan Cornille: know, I think my dad was as excited as me 'cause he knew this was, he, he, he knew that this was the company that had led me down this path.

And so, so he knew I was excited and that's all that mattered to him. So, yeah, it was great. We, we met Matt and Matt took us up to lunch and Matt told us more about the company. It was the first time I saw motorcycles in person.

Andrea Hiott: And was it as striking as seeing it in

magazine?

Jordan Cornille: More, more so. It's, it's, it's something that you do have to see those motorcycles in person and, and see the material and touch the material to, to truly understand.

Really how special they are. They photograph great and their, and their designs are so radical and novel and, and [00:17:00] exotic that they'll capture your attention of course in, in photos. But when you see them in person, it really takes 'em to a whole nother level. And you see this attention to detail and part fitment and the materials that, that when you see 'em in a person, you know, really stump them special beyond just, um, a unique point of view in terms of design.

Andrea Hiott: Mm-hmm. That's a similar feeling to the one we, we were talking about of this transcendent kind of, it's almost like look like a wild animal kind of is in your presence when you kind of see it in person. It is this, it almost feels like living, you guys talk about that a lot, that, that the bikes are alive or organic.

Um, I think it, they do tend to kind of exude that in some strange

Jordan Cornille: way. They do, they do. They have, they have this sort of presence, you know, they feel when you stand around 'em, you, you feel compelled to walk around them and get a 360 degree view. You wanna touch them in [00:18:00] that sense. They, they are sort of an artwork or sometimes they, it almost feels like you're in the presence of some sort of relic.

They just feel powerful. Not in terms of horsepower, but in terms of presence. It's, it is really special. Yeah.

Andrea Hiott: And what do you think that has to do with the materials? The materials that are used are always natural and raw in a way, but it also probably has to do with the people who are creating it. And what is going into the bike

Jordan Cornille: or what do you think?

I think it does have a lot to do with the people and what goes into it. I think there's so much passion and infuse in terms of the early stages of the design and the craftsmanship of each individual bike itself. You, you, you really feel like everyone that had a hand in this put everything they had into it and that they're proud of it and that they enjoy what they do.

I think that really comes across is that the people that are working on the are are enjoying their work.

Andrea Hiott: Yeah. [00:19:00] Or at least giving it sort of everything, their attention, waking up and going to sleep with it in their mind, but Absolutely. Yeah. So you come here with your dad and everything's kind of okay and it's, it's fine and it is legitimate and the dream is real.

And so you start working with Matt, but what did that, what was going on? They had just finished a bike, I think at the time, or uh, was it with Pier? They were, or

Jordan Cornille: it was right after Pierre. Um, and they were just wrapping up the design of the P 51 Fighter with the Pierre Blanc. Yeah. And that, that product was getting ready for production.

They were wrapping up a few things and. I helped wrap up a few minor components on, on that product, but really the, the first day I walked in and, and Matt and I didn't have much of a chat. He just told me to go to my office and start sketching, uh, what could come next. Mm-hmm. I did, and I did hundreds of [00:20:00] sketches the first week, and Matt kind of left me alone, more or less the first few days, just did hundreds of sketches and we went out into the main area, main entrance of the building and hung them up ball on the wall, and we would ponder them and just start exploring, exploring the possibilities of what would be next.

Andrea Hiott: Had you thought that that was how it was gonna go? Were you prepared? Did you have some ideas in mind or were you

Jordan Cornille: I didn't, I, I didn't have any expectations. Okay. I had, I had expectations when I sent him my resume, and that was either, I wouldn't hear from him. Or an assistant would reach out and set up an interview and then there'd be another interview and, and, and when, when Matt just called me half an hour later and offered me a job mm-hmm.

I, I kind of threw all my expectations out the window before I arrived on my first day. Well, that

Andrea Hiott: was probably the one thing that you needed to do, actually, to work well with him, or he's definitely not typical in any way. But how [00:21:00] did it feel to first meet him? Did you think, okay, this is gonna work? Or was it just all a bit unclear?

No, I,

Jordan Cornille: I, I felt, I felt excited. Matt had a big smile on his face when I first saw him, and I could tell he was excited to have, have someone fresh and, and probably young do, and almost, almost naive. And I think that gives you this whole world of possibilities. And I think he saw that from the beginning. I think he was excited to, to be able to work with someone that's not coming from another brand that doesn't have.

These, these preconceived ideas or biases, you know, I was just kind of a blank slate for the company. And I think Matt saw a lot of advantages in that. So he was excited. I could see that. That made me really excited. I definitely, I felt like it was gonna be a long-term relationship from the start.

Andrea Hiott: There is a lot of power right.

In that youth and coming fresh and being so excited. And it's kind of wonderful that instead of [00:22:00] trying to direct you or fit you into something, he was just like, let's, like, you know, explore. That's, um, it's a little unusual, isn't it? But do you think that had a, do you think that had a positive influence?

Jordan Cornille: I think for sure. I think there's, there's pros and cons to experience, you know? Mm-hmm. You could hire someone that's been in the industry for, for 20 years and they have this wealth of knowledge and experience and they know how things are done and they know how things work. And that of course has its advantages.

But it could have some cons too, I think. When Matt saw this young kid walk into the office who's never designed a production vehicle at all, whether it's a car or a motorcycle, I think he saw this sort of dreamer. And so he sent me into an office with a pen and a blank pad of paper and just told me to, to draw and where most of the things I sketched up feasible.

Uh, not, not from the start, but they certainly could have led to, to new fresh [00:23:00] ideas. So you were sketching

Andrea Hiott: all this in two D then just like putting them on the walls. That's how I'm imagining it. Or just

Jordan Cornille: literally pen on, pen on paper and then a put a piece of scotch tape on the paper and stick it to the wall and step back and look at it.

I love that. And, and usually, and usually point out what's wrong with it.

Andrea Hiott: So it was almost like, uh, a good way for you both to get to know each other and what you liked and what you didn't. But it sounds like at first it didn't go so well, or, I mean it went well as far as the exploration, but you didn't really get anything that you both liked at first or.

Jordan Cornille: What was happening. We spent, we spent a lot of time doing that. And there were a lot of cool things in there. There were a lot of cool sketches. Uh, we started out sketching around the powertrain of the fighter that they were bringing into production. You know, how can we take this platform and modularly apply it to a new style or a new form?

Um, and there's a lot of cool stuff, but there is nothing that really took it to the next [00:24:00] level beyond simply a re styling. There is, there is nothing super fresh and innovative in there, but there's, there are definitely cool sketches and there were some designs that we could have brought to production that probably would've sold great, but they weren't, weren't pushing motorcycling or the motorcycle industry by any means, you know, into the future.

Andrea Hiott: So they weren't at that edge. They weren't quite. Popping with that, whatever that is. That transformative, strange animal, like, I don't know, whatever you were trying to describe earlier, that's kind of what you were both looking for.

Jordan Cornille: Yeah. It hadn't quite come, you know, there you would point to some and say, Ooh, that that's really cool, you know?

Mm-hmm. That would look slick. That would look great out on the road, but there was nothing where you saw it and it just, you know, dropped your jaw and made you say, we have to make that. Mm-hmm. That, that hadn't, that hadn't hit for a little while, and I think that's what we were looking for. We were fresh in the phase.

You don't wanna rush it. Mm-hmm. Your bike still [00:25:00] hasn't even started, uh, customer deliveries yet, so you have some time. And, and you, you do wanna find that thing that you just, you know, it keeps you up at night 'cause you just have to make it. And you

Andrea Hiott: did find it eventually, but not probably in the way either of you really expected.

Because up till then the company was only making I ces. Right? Internal combustion engine motorcycles. So I guess all the sketches were for those, right?

Jordan Cornille: They were, and they were originally around the X 1 32 V twin engine that was in the fighter. And when we kind of had exhausted ideas around that, we started branching out, we started exploring, bringing in different types of motors, 90 degree VT twins, boxer twins.

We started branching out within ic. Uh, but we've had the same dilemma. Nothing that we had to make, nothing that was really moving, moving the ball down the field. Um, and I remember sitting in the office one evening, six, 6:30 [00:26:00] PM and I asked Matt if he had ever dabbled in ev. I expected him to say no, but he told me yes.

He, he told me when he was working with Gear Tur Blanche, they had explored, uh, EV power drains and designs, and he showed me some of the sketches they had done and there was some really interesting stuff. And I think we both thought maybe this is what we're looking for. Let's start playing around with this.

So the next day I basically started that sketch program from the start as if it was my first day. But with, with the possibilities of EP technology,

Andrea Hiott: it's quite a turn. Did it just come to you too? Or had you been thinking about electric vehicles?

Jordan Cornille: I hadn't been thinking about 'em all that much, but when I asked Matt, he said they had explored with it.

I thought maybe this is, maybe this opens up some new possibilities with the Sketch program. Maybe there are different packaging opportunities, [00:27:00] different performance. Capabilities. Um, and so it was something fresh that we were looking for, and I think it, it got us excited to kind of say, okay, let's, let's just pretend we're starting from the beginning again, but with this technology, what could we do there into that get us excited?

Andrea Hiott: Yeah. So you started to fill the spark. What was kind of the state of electronic electronic vehicles then? That was around 2015 or so, or when was that?

Jordan Cornille: Two? That was, yeah, that was, it was probably fall 2015. Okay.

Andrea Hiott: Um, there wasn't the craze of Tesla, for example then, right? Was

Jordan Cornille: it just started? No, there, there, there wasn't the craze, maybe the, the craze was gonna be starting within the year or so.

Mm-hmm. Okay. Tesla had been around for a little bit. They were still really pricey, um, in the world of motorcycles. Zero motorcycles had been around for a few years. But hadn't, hadn't caught on in terms of [00:28:00] going viral by any means. So the state of D V U world was, was still pretty quiet if you'll,

Andrea Hiott: so it was a bit of a, a risk in even more of a way than it might, it might seem today.

But you mentioned the v uh, twin, and this is important for Curtis, Glen Curtis, the name of the company that you now work with Matt, for, which we're about to get to how that happened, but how, how does, that's been so important with, with the I Cs and you both knew that, and you'd been drawing a lot of sketches like that.

So did you think, okay, how are we gonna get this with the ev seems a little dissonant.

Jordan Cornille: Yeah, there are definitely discussions had about what do you, what do you carry over? You know, the iconic American V twin that Glen Curtis first built in 1902, a year before Harley was even founded. It just went on to become arguably the most popular.

All known thought, iconic actor, powertrain in the world. Iconic. [00:29:00] That was the word I was looking for. Thank you. Mm-hmm. Um, the American B twin man, it's just an absolute icon for sure. What does the, uh, how does that translate to ev if it does it all? Uh, the, the sound, the, the aesthetic of it? Um, yeah,

Andrea Hiott: just the look of those bikes that

Jordan Cornille: double.

It's very, it is very special. You know, the, the, the v twins that Matt had used in his confederates always had just this very powerful but elegant look. When I was in school, we had a, had a studio sponsored by Harley Davidson and Chief of Design came in and he described their v twin as the diamond within the, the ring setting.

You know, we think of it as, oh, wow. As the diamond, as the jewel. And, and that's a great way to think of it, especially for the American v Twin. Such an iconic, uh, platform. So we've had discussions about what. What does it mean to go ev, especially as an American manufacturer, and, and how [00:30:00] do you fill those shoes?

If it's, it's you're walking away from that, what are you walking into? And that was a problem from the very beginning that needed some sort of solution. Yeah.

Andrea Hiott: The solution you found is pretty exciting. I guess it was the Zeus right prototype that we, we should get around to talking about that. Was the first, the first kind of coming together of all these ideas, or was it

Jordan Cornille: It was, it was when we decided to build the Zeus, we had a handful of forms and styles that we had settled on.

That was kind of when we were finding Curtis 2.0, figuring out what it was gonna be, how were we gonna launch the brand, introduce the brand to the world. Um, and we had settled on the Zeus and we were still trying to figure out what Curtis is going to be and what we want Curtis to stand for. At the time, we were enamored by the capabilities of the EV technology, the [00:31:00] power and the torque.

And this was just coming off of Confederate and these big powerful strong B twins. And so we were still a little bit on that sort of high, if you will. And so we took two, um, electric motors and put them together on one shaft and one casing. We, we branded it the Ewin. Um, I love

Andrea Hiott: that. Had that, anything like that been done before seems almost as simple thing to try,

Jordan Cornille: but it, it was, it was surprisingly simple to do.

We hadn't discovered it before, but it was surprisingly simple to do it. It created some packaging issues that we later decided weren't gonna work outside of the motor. But in terms of doing the motor as an ewin, it, it was a relatively elegant solution. And, and. It sounded cool. It looked cool. It had a ton of power.

It had a ton of torque. Yeah, it definitely looked really cool. It's really cool. We decided to,

Andrea Hiott: yeah. Yeah. Just the where you can just see the two [00:32:00] engines. It's beautiful.

Jordan Cornille: It is. It is. It has sort of an equally powerful look as the V twins did, though. It had some successes, for

Andrea Hiott: sure. So this is also the time period that Confederate was changing to Curtis.

Was that also kind of a discussion that you and Matt had and decided, and was that tied to this total, like, all in, we're gonna go electric, we're restarting this rebirth. It feels like, in a way, it

Jordan Cornille: wasn't obvious to us at the start what to do. When we first started sketching electric motorcycles, I was leaving them unbranded for a little while, and then we started sketching them with Confederate branding and Curtis branding.

At one point, Matt had mentioned to me that he had just recently gotten the Curtis trademark, which I thought was amazing. And of course he's told the story about how was the easiest trademark he's ever gotten, which flows

Andrea Hiott: my mind. He's hard to believe. People just don't know Glen Curtis. Somehow he's like such a hero in aviation and sode [00:33:00] comes

Jordan Cornille: and cars.

I was, I was just ashamed that I had never learned about him. You know, my, my daughter is certainly gonna learn about him 'cause he is, he is the man that changed our country and the, our world for sure. He is an amazing guy. Uh, he should be taught right alongside Edison and the Wright brothers,

Andrea Hiott: but he's not, maybe he can drive the plane that your daughter is in, which is actually your car when you're telling her the stories.

That's

Jordan Cornille: a good pilot. Pilot. That's a good idea. The pilot maybe. He'll yeah. So yeah, it wasn't obvious at first. It, it took us a while. We were sketching Electric Confederates. Electric Curtises, and at one point in June, 2016, our third co-founder, who's our, our first and biggest investor in the brand, kind of pushed us over the edge.

It was that night, we decided, let's go all in on Curtis. If we're gonna do this, let's do it. Right. Let's go all in. Let's be able to be laser focused. 100% on one thing. Let's not divide our attention. We said we're starting fresh, we're going electric, [00:34:00] we're gonna be Curtis.

Andrea Hiott: And that happened at night. Were you together or were you separate?

What was that night like? I don't know what was going on that, that

Jordan Cornille: happened. That happened, uh, towards the end of the day, we got the email in from our investor that pushed us over the edge and Matt said, let's do it. And I was fully on board, said, let's do it. So we, we went home. We got some sleep. We came in the next morning and we were Curtis.

Wow. We had to, we, we had to make it formal and, and legal and do all that stuff. But in our minds, the next morning we were Curtis here, on and out. It, it was exciting. Walking in the doors that morning was exciting as, as my first day of work because it felt like it, it was the first day of work

Andrea Hiott: at Curtis, another rebirth.

And your role was different too, right? And instead of coming into a company, you're now sort of starting a company in a way.

Jordan Cornille: It definitely felt different. I felt so much more involved in the company as a [00:35:00] whole, and the brand wasn't just kind of a new, fresh, young kid, lowest on the totem pole sketcher. I was, I was right in there making these decisions with Matt, which felt crazy to be so young and making those decisions.

But it shows you within that year, 'cause I had started with Matt June 15th, 2015. Mm-hmm. Um, so within a year, we just had created this, this wonderful relationship. I knew he trusted me and really took consideration and what I would say and, and listened to my ideas and respected my ideas. As I did his. Um, so it said a lot about, about the relationship we had created within a year.

It definitely does.

Andrea Hiott: There's something he gives you if when it works with Matt, um, there's something really special that happens there, that there's some kind of interaction or freedom to explore, but also be supported. That happens. That doesn't often happen in the motoring world when it comes to designing and [00:36:00] building for someone who owns

Jordan Cornille: the company.

He puts a lot of trust into the people he works with, and, and with that trust comes, comes all the support you'll ever need. And it comes with the right amount of, of critique and criticism, which is all supportive. It really is special to work with him. So

Andrea Hiott: now we're up to Curtis, which formed officially in 2016.

Um, how do you think of your role in, in this, in the company and the creative. The creation of, of the bikes that were to come.

Jordan Cornille: My role today, I, I see, I, I feel like it has sort of evolved to almost, almost Matt's chief of staff, if you will. I don't touch everything, but I touch almost everything in the company with Matt, almost like an operations guy.

I still work a lot in design and styling, and we work on future, future facing product portfolio. What's going to come over the next several years [00:37:00] beyond what we're doing right now. And then Matt and I spend a lot of time on brand, how we want to present our brand, the story we want to tell with our brand, uh, strategy moving forward, whether it's product or financial, anything creative.

I touch a lot. Are your

both

Andrea Hiott: really full into every part of it, more or

Jordan Cornille: less? We, we really are. And we listen to each other a lot. We share our thoughts and we're honest with each other. Um, It's a lot of fun. It's one of the things I love about working with such a small team is that you do get to touch so many areas of the company that it doesn't become so

Andrea Hiott: monotonous.

Mm-hmm. Well, I wanna know how, how you first heard of JT Nesbit and how you met him and because he's another one of those team members that we, we should discuss a bit. But first, let's go back to the Zeus just for a minute. I know it was a big deal. Uh, it got a lot of press. It was beautiful, but it, it never quite went into production.

Right. Can you just gimme a little recap of the Zeus? [00:38:00]

Jordan Cornille: Yeah. It never did, it never did get into production. We introduced it in May, 2018 at the Quail motorcycle gathering, and that was, that was when we introduced the brand publicly to the world. Oh, wow. Um, so we had, we had the press at, at our tent, and we showed the bike and we introduced the brand and we talked about Glen and talked about what we were doing, and it was very well received.

Alan Kakar. Wrote it and he loved it. Um, but there was always, we, we always had this feeling, and the realization we came to with the Zeus was that what we had actually done was designed an electric confederate. It was still about, uh, uh, kind of this raw, primitive power and, and torque and sort of badass three.

Andrea Hiott: Mm-hmm. Yeah. The Ewin is a sketch of that. I mean, it's, it's strong and beautiful in its own right,

Jordan Cornille: but yes, it, it is, and [00:39:00] it ticked all those boxes. Mm-hmm. Beautifully. But, but all the boxes that it, it was ticking. It was still confederate, so it, it didn't feel truly like a Curtis to us. Hmm. Uh, just a, just a few months after that event, Matt had told me that he had started talking to jt, who I was very fond of.

He had worked on the race, so of course I knew who he was. He was. Kind of the designer that led me to design. He's definitely one of those designers. People know, he, he is, especially in the motorcycle world, but mm-hmm. Even outside of it, and if I, if I had a design hero, it was JT and Sbit. And so the idea that Matt was considering bringing him onto the team, I was super excited.

She's willing to join off and, and bring his wealth of knowledge to our team.

Andrea Hiott: Let's do it. Do you remember when you first met him, did you go down to New Orleans or how did that, do you, do you remember that first meeting?

Jordan Cornille: I do. I, I had actually met [00:40:00] JT a couple years earlier. He had come up and visited us in Birmingham and he had showed us some of the stuff he was working on and he gave me a couple little design seminars because I was still the rookie and he was the seasoned veteran, a motorcycle design pro, if you will.

He's always excited to share his knowledge and, and he, he is good at explaining things and teaching. But I wasn't sure if I'd ever see him again after that. It was a, it was a fun visit, but when I found out he'd be joining the team, I was super excited how many people get to meet their hero, let alone work with 'em.

So it was very exciting that he was very unusual.

Andrea Hiott: Were you intimidated at all or were you just ready

Jordan Cornille: to go? I wasn't intimidated despite his six foot sticks stature. He's very kind and, and gentle and, uh, he is, he's always wanting his teammates to learn more. Uh, he is, he's a joy to work with. So

Andrea Hiott: did you and Matt and him, and was Pam around in, in, in all this too?

[00:41:00] Or did you allall just kind of get together and discuss like, what are we gonna do and it's gonna be electric? How are we gonna find the style that, that is Curtis, what is Curtis, did you have these discussions?

Jordan Cornille: A little bit as a team, but as Matt does, Matt let JT do his thing and we kind of left JT alone for a little while, and while JT was working on.

What he wanted to be working on. Matt and I spent more time on, on brand because we still weren't 100% satisfied with where we landed in terms of brand presentation and narrative. Matt and I really spent some time digging deep into Curtis as a brand and, and the meaning behind Curtis while, while JT was diving deep into the bike itself.

And after some time JT presented his work to us and we gave him the usual support and criticism. He took that and rolled with that, and that eventually turned into, into the one that we see today, uh, over [00:42:00] the course of several years. It was a long process, but Sha t's extremely thorough with his work. Uh, he definitely

Andrea Hiott: lives and breathes

Jordan Cornille: it too, for sure.

He absolutely does. There's no doubt about

Andrea Hiott: that. But he changed your ewin. So how did that, what, what happened? Something else incredible. Came out of it. Really an amazing innovation.

Jordan Cornille: Yeah. I think you're referencing our axis centered design. Mm-hmm. Which is our patented kind of primary innovation of the one.

Okay. Conceptually, Matt and I knew that it kind of made sense to put the swing arm pivot on the axle of the motor, kind of the center line of the electric motor. Okay. And that would keep things super simple and, and as slim as possible. But our faux version of it, it wasn't direct to drive like the Axle Center is.

We kind of just had caps and the swing arm mounted around the center aligned. So you didn't have that shaft, or it was, it was, [00:43:00] no, it was located in the right real estate. Mm-hmm. But it didn't, it didn't have, uh, the function that our access center design has that JT came up with. So I think JT saw. We had done on the ze, and he said, that's a really inelegant solution.

So the problem you're trying to solve, which it was. And so he solved it very elegantly by mounting the swing arm directly onto the shaft of the motorcycle. So the motor is driving the rear wheel directly. Um, it keeps the bikes super narrow at that point, at a point where the motorcycle usually kind of keeps getting wider and wider here.

Mm-hmm. Um, and it keeps everything just perfectly centered on the motorcycle. It's a really, mm-hmm. Beautiful. It's very minimalist solution. It's very minimalist. Minimalist in terms of engineering and design. It's a, it's a great solution. It is.

Andrea Hiott: I love it. So that's, that's even more interesting that it, it did kind of evolve a bit.

Jordan Cornille: It evolves and it needed a lot [00:44:00] of, of solution. Conceptually, Matt and I kind of knew what made sense, but we were not intelligent enough to, to figure out how to execute it at all. Or

Andrea Hiott: just maybe, yeah, there's different ways of being intelligent. It's

Jordan Cornille: a different form of intelligence, but it's a form of intelligence that JT has.

He does naturally have that came, he came, he, he came in and I think relatively simply created what is, without a doubt, the best way to make an electric motorcycle. For sure. It's super cool.

Andrea Hiott: Yeah. And, um, we should talk about Viner a bit too, because there's other innovations and very cool things with the battery, and I'm not even sure what all he's done, but when did he come into the picture?

Jordan Cornille: Vinne came into the picture, I wanna say 2019 ish. Okay. So you had the design, we had the, the design conceptually was there, but there's still a lot of work to do to, to make it a production vehicle. Mm-hmm. Go through many evolutions and there was a lot of engineering work to find out. And, and [00:45:00] Vinne joined up and Vinne was fresh out of college and he didn't have a bunch of experience.

He was a, a sponge in terms of absorbing knowledge. He worked every day with J Tge. The two of them worked on every millimeter of the motorcycle. They both knew what liked the back of their hand. Different form of intelligence, different form of intelligence. Yeah. So he was, so, he was, Venet was absolutely instrumental in helping JT get the Curtis one over the finish line and make it a real product.

So

Andrea Hiott: what's, tell me now, you've been on, you've been on this bike, Curtis one, and how does it compare to an I C E? Because of course people are very loyal to their iic and what's an l e experience really like? I think riding an electric vehicle,

Jordan Cornille: I think it's amazing. It's so simple and smooth. Uh, Adjust and peaceful.

I, [00:46:00] I'll preface it by saying I don't ride motorcycles a lot. I'm kind of a weird motorcycle designer that doesn't ride motorcycles. I have rid a motorcycles and I have my license. Uh, but I didn't have a ton of experience. I think for a few reasons. I think in, in recent years there aren't a lot of motorcycle designs that have compelled me to say I have to go buy that.

Uh, growing up as a kid, I was not allowed to own a motorcycle. It was my mother's rule. And yeah, my parents said, once you're out of college and, and off our dime, you can go buy a motorcycle 'cause we can't tell you what to do at that point. Uh, so for my whole life I wanted a motorcycle. I think I wanted a motorcycle 'cause I wasn't allowed to have one.

Yeah. And so I was told myself the day I graduate college mom, I'm going out and buying, buying a motorcycle. The day I graduated, college was also the day I was allowed to buy a motorcycle and. I think I felt a little compelled to do so when I was allowed to do it right. But, but at the same time, nothing [00:47:00] compelled me.

There was nothing I had to have, there was nothing I really wanted to, to be seen on a ride. Nothing. Got me super excited. I I figured the time would come. I had, I don't have a ton of writing experience

Andrea Hiott: somm. Yeah, it's good you bring that up because of the Curtis, it's opening up a whole new group of people who are interested in it.

But there's this kind of strange thing with the Curtis where we touched on it a little bit before. It's an art object. It's the technology. Um, you like to just be around it. I don't know. What do you think the Curtis one seems to be even more, um, inclusive or opening the space to people who might not completely feel comfortable riding a

Jordan Cornille: motorcycle.

It's so, it's so simple and approachable. Um, You know, the, the confederates, they're so, they're so cool and exotic and bad. I asked at the same time. They're very intimidating. Oh yeah. They're, they're, and, and I was nervous. [00:48:00] You know, Matt would say, all right, go take one for a ride. 'cause I was scared of them.

I didn't, I didn't want to ride one, to be completely honest. I, no, but I also didn't want to say, no boss. I can't ride that. So I was nervous and they were intimidating. Um,

Andrea Hiott: they're just hard to control too. I mean, they are intimidating, but they're really powerful. Some of them depends which one, I guess. But

Jordan Cornille: they're, uh, the Curtis won the first time.

I, I walked up to the one that I rode, not intimidated at all. And I probably should have been a a hundred thousand dollars mm-hmm. Beta prototype. One of, one of a kind. You don't wanna be the person that re wrecks that. Mm-hmm. Uh, so, so I, I should have been intimidated, but I wasn't because I knew, I knew the technology in it.

I knew that perfect balance that the access center design gives it, that JT came up with. That I knew it was gonna be easy. I, I hopped on it. JT snapped a photo of me and I went off and it was as easy as could be. It was super fun. [00:49:00] It was magical. It was, it was peaceful. It's just kind of you and a little bit of road noise and, but you still hear nature.

There's nothing to do or think about in terms of controlling it. Mm-hmm. It's, it's really as easy as could be though. Even though I probably should have felt intimidated, I, I felt no intimidation. So approachable, very comfortable. Sounds meditative, almost. Experience. It does, it puts you at ease and they're really, you don't need to be thinking about anything.

You don't need to be thinking about shifting a clutch. You don't need to be thinking about heat or, or where I can touch, where I have my legs. Mm-hmm. None, none of that. There's nothing to think about except. The ride and your environment. And so it's just an absolute joy.

Andrea Hiott: What color was the first one you rode?

I'm trying to just imagine it.

Jordan Cornille: It was black. It was black with a red battery. Very pretty.

Andrea Hiott: Oh, that's pretty. And [00:50:00] where did you ride it to? Just around the neighborhood or?

Jordan Cornille: We were outside of the Barber Motorsports Museum in Birmingham. Oh, that's beautiful. Up there on that road. It's got some really beautiful, long winding roads.

Mm-hmm. There was, it had just started to drizzle. There was no one out on the road. It was a, it was a really wonderful ride. Great first

Andrea Hiott: ride. Absolutely. So what's the sensory spirit like? How is it different from the IC and the L A V? You already said it a little bit, but do you think it loses anything?

Let's be honest. A lot of people like this crazy explosion and noise and to where it really takes all of your attention and almost numbs you. It's almost like escaping to ride some of these I ces, although it takes so much discipline too. Is the L e v, can it compare to that? Really? I think

Jordan Cornille: they just, I don't think it uses anything.

I think they just don't really compare. I think they're just two different experiences. Even though it's two wheels, it's a motorcycle, it's, it's two different [00:51:00] activities in my mind, you know, on the ic you're very conscious of, of the machine and the mechanics, and that can be really cool, especially if you're on something like a Confederate fighter mm-hmm.

That's got this loud thumping roaring V twin that's just badass. Mm-hmm. Like a, a fighter jet that's super cool. There's just something visceral about it.

Andrea Hiott: Yeah. You can feel the power of it in the sound.

Jordan Cornille: Yeah. And then on the other end, on, on the ev uh, you hear the birds chirping and if it's nice weather, you just see the, you're more conscious of your environment, I think.

I think on the i c you're more conscious of the machine. And on the ev you're more conscious of the environment, but I think it's like the difference between rock music or classical music. I think people can enjoy both, but they're just two different things.

Andrea Hiott: I like that. Or there would be some [00:52:00] people who might really enjoy the meditative surfing, martial art, kind of l e v and some people who would want the noise and that's fine.

Right. So, um, I'm wondering, it's a little off the subject, but I'm wondering if when we'd have these kind of conversations, it seems like all you do is sort of live and breathe Curtis and the motorcycles, and maybe it is that way, but I wonder what else inspires you in life that you sort of bring to Curtis?

What other interests do you have? Jordan? Inspiration.

Jordan Cornille: The first thing for me would be family outside of Curtis. And I think Matt probably feels like he is. My stepdad, 'cause he's probably watched me growing up. Since I've started working at Curtis. I got engaged, I got married, I had my first kid, I bought my first house.

Oh wow. I've gone through all these things. Family life is, is very important to me. It's spending time around my wife and daughter. It's what kind of builds my cup after a long day of putting in work for Curtis and kind of reenergizes me for the next day. You know, watching my [00:53:00] daughter grow up. That's definitely my primary source of inspiration these days.

How old is she? Um, but she's almost two now. Oh. So she's just going through this phase where she's just learning new things every day and getting faster and saying more words. So that's very inspiring. That's magical hobby. Magical. And aside from that, I just love, I love observing and admiring any form of craft and design, whether it's fashion or local arts, tour.

Architecture. I always have this appreciation for people that do design well and have a sense of craftsmanship. I find those sorts of things very inspiring.

Andrea Hiott: I can see after this conversation how it relates to your work with Curtis because it is a kind of a family. There's something, all those themes actually are continuous, they sort of connect, right?

That people who really care about what they're doing, the [00:54:00] connection to art and design and objects that really mean something that does become like a family and, um, with your people that you trust and love like your wife and your child, but also your work work colleagues, you do kind of, you know, explore the world together.

That's what makes it meaningful.

Jordan Cornille: Yeah. Abso absolutely. Matt and I talk about sort of our dreams for the company and I often tell Matt that I just have this vision in my head from the day we started, and that's that I'm. I'm 80 years old and I have my grandkid on my lap. And I, and Curtis is this powerful, sustaining, great American brand and I'm able to tell 'em that I was there at the beginning of all this.

And I think that's something I'd like to instill in the culture and all of the people that come through Curtis over the next few decades is that sort of passion and pride for what we're doing. And it's [00:55:00] something that you wanna share with the people you care about most. 'cause it's something you're proud of and

Andrea Hiott: you love and it's something you want to last, you want to pass on.

And I think that speaks a bit to the way this bike is made too. Right. I'd like, you know, before we go to talk a little bit about this idea of the environment and ecology and what sustainability really means. Um, I mean, I hear what you're saying, uh, is kind of resonating with that, but maybe you could clarify it a little bit more for me.

Jordan Cornille: For sure. When I talk about sustainability in, in the context of Curtis, I always use the term true sustainability. And that's sort of this creation of something that's gonna last forever. It's sort of the, uh, uh, anti planned obsolescence or anti-fat fashion. So, uh, you know, buy, buy a pair of jeans that's gonna last you 10, 15 years.

Don't buy a new pair of jeans every six months. I think that's real sustainability. I think [00:56:00] that's sustainability that's far more meaningful in the long term than just the clean technology that's in the bike itself. And so I think that's really the important discussion that needs to be had when we talk about sustainability in our industry.

And that's just something that if you instill that in the product, not only is it more sustainable, but I think it's more, it's more meaningful and it's something to be proud of.

Andrea Hiott: When you're 80, you can look back and, and feel good about what you're telling your grandkids about.

Jordan Cornille: Absolutely. And when I'm 80, I can, I can hand off, uh, my Curtis one to, to my child or my grandchild, and it's in as good of condition as, as the day.

I took delivery of it decades ago and we've upgraded the battery cells and put fresh tires on. It's actually a better motorcycle than the day I took delivery of it. And, and I could leave this with you, with this incredible machine that was crafted decades [00:57:00] and decades ago, but is getting better over time and is never gonna go away.

It could be in the family forever. It could become this really special family heirloom. Absolutely. Wet send

Andrea Hiott: it's a vehicle with all

Jordan Cornille: that. Didn't, didn't exactly. And we didn't send 15 other motorcycles to the landfill. Over the course of those decades, we've always had this one in our garage and taking care of it.

It's taking care of us.

Andrea Hiott: Well, I love that idea so much. And in the end, that's what we want. We want the two have done something meaningful with their lives and to have something that sort of represents that, that we can pass on to others, whatever it may be, that's the best use of any object. But at the same time, I have to say, you're a company and you wanna be profitable.

And I think that that is actually a good definition of profit. But it's, is it the kind of definition of profit that works in a capitalist world that you're in? Or is it just you're gonna do this no matter what and set a new trajectory others can [00:58:00] follow? I mean, how do you see that?

Jordan Cornille: Oh, I think it, I think it can definitely be profitable.

I think you have to have some meaning to what you do. And I think that's a valid thing for us to pursue. And it's a philosophy won't, we want to apply to all sorts of different categories. You know, we're starting so, so far up with the one. Six figure motorcycle, but we're gonna work our work our way down.

And I've imagined us working us all the way down to, to, you know, a toy that my daughter would ride around the house right now, but, but having that be something that, that she can save for her daughter in the future. This was the bike I learned to ride on and it still works great. You're gonna learn to ride on that bike.

And, and so, so we're, I think we're able to apply this technology to such a vast array, um, within the spectrum of our portfolio that there's always gonna be business to be heard. [00:59:00] For sure.

Andrea Hiott: So just to kind of finish up, you've already touched on it a little bit, but I guess I wonder about what you think about this idea of desire.

Uh, it's, um, it's something that is talked about a lot, desire and luxury and so on. And I wonder, you know, you sort of made things happen in your life and you sort of. I don't know if it was consciously or unconsciously, but I wonder how you see this idea of desire and that you're actually putting this object into the world that other people want.

How do you see all these things as, are they connected for you? This the feeling you're giving someone of freedom and desire for the object and the experience of, of riding it and also your own life and experience with motoring? I think so,

Jordan Cornille: yeah. I, I, I kind of link the word desire with the word dream, which I used before and, and sort of my motoring memories.

Uh, you know, whatever you're riding on or in, there's just this, you can have these dreams and there's this possibility of being [01:00:00] whatever you wanna be and, and making that happen. So, so for me, the desire and the dream are linked together and I think, you know, the Curtis one is the perfect device for that.

I like that

Andrea Hiott: you, that you link those. And it is interesting that you talked about this kind of dream space your dad opened up for, for you in terms of movement and there is a kind of pure desire in that too, right? It's not wanting something, it's just, uh, motivation maybe is even better word, like being present to the world and being part of it overall.

This time it's been, um, not quite 10 years, but it's been a while that you've been working with Madden for Curtis, and I guess your life has changed a lot in that time. So before we go, if you could just say something like, in your own life, personal, professional, whatever that, that you think of as a real, uh, moving moment.

Something that's moved you over this time that you've been working with Curtis, this time really of, of growing and becoming an adult and, and a man in, in a [01:01:00] different way.

Jordan Cornille: Uh, I think it would go back to, to. Sending my resume to Matt and kind of starting the whole journey was, was the support I got from my family was, was always very moving.

'cause it was kind of a, a bold, crazy move, but my family and my loved ones and my buddies at school, there was never any doubt in anyone's mind. Uh, you know, so there's a lot of support for me doing what I wanted to do and not following the flock, following the herd. Um, that was, uh, moving moments right at the very start of my journey with Curtis.

And that's

Andrea Hiott: when the, the more you live, the more moving it becomes because you realize how unique it is actually to have, have people support you in that way and, and, and how hard it would've been without it, you know? Absolutely.

Jordan Cornille: Absolutely. It's always

Andrea Hiott: a bit of a group effort, I guess. Moving. All right.

Well thanks Jordan. It's been really great to talk to you as, [01:02:00] and, um, I'm looking forward to seeing more. Of what is to come over these next decades.

Jordan Cornille: Absolutely. There's a lot to come for sure. It's gonna be fun. It is, I'm

Andrea Hiott: sure. All right, well, best of luck to you and everything.

Jordan Cornille: Thank you. Thank you for having me.

Yep. Take care. You too. Bye Bye.