Is Your RV Water Actually Safe? Blu Technology Has Answers

SPEAKER_03 0:04

Welcome to Learn to R V Beyond the Brand. I'm Tasha, and today I am so excited to have the opportunity to introduce you all to a company that I think can really make a difference for every R Ver, no matter if you are a full timer or a some timer. Today we get to sit down and learn about Blue Technology. We get to know a little bit about how they got started, their heart in serving the RV community and the world at large, and what makes their products different from everyone else on the market. So with me today is Rodrigo Ferrera, Vice President of Sales at Blue Technology. So, Rodrigo, thank you so much for talking with me today.

SPEAKER_01 0:52

Thanks so much for having me.

SPEAKER_03 0:53

Yeah, absolutely. So I guess just take a second and tell me a little bit about yourself and give me like a 30-second version of what Blue Technology is for people who don't know.

SPEAKER_01 1:06

Of course. So I joined the company about almost uh about a year ago, almost exactly. I knew uh the owners from previous business endeavors that that they we had worked together on a few years ago. And um, it was just a good fit. Things were a little closer to to where I was living at the time, or am living at the time, and so it became a kind of a no-brainer. So I came from the automotive sales background world, so it was definitely a change of pace and different little different nuances and and things to learn, but uh I we've I'm still here, so things are going all right. Mostly what I handle is the B2B side of things, so anything that has to do with retailers or e-commerce to partners or and then as well as the OEM side, because we are partnered with some RV manufacturers and uh continue are continuing to add more partners in that sense as well. I don't really get too involved on the direct-to-consumer side with our our website and stuff. We have a team that really does a great job with that because it's mostly a marketing team effort there. So more more of mine is dealing with B2B stuff with OEMs and and retailers. So that's that's kind of our my background in particular. As far as blue technology goes, it was it kind of happened a little bit by accident. We were uh our team, our our owners back in the COVID days, they had some service-based businesses that were completely unrelated, and uh they got into UV sterilization with in the hospital scene during COVID when hospital masks and PPE was a little bit um hard to come by. So instead of throwing it all out, and they were able to find ways to sterilize and and and reuse some of that equipment. So um, so we came came across some UV technology that eventually got into some we got into water with it too. So that started the whole water conversation. And uh, we took some water products that had UV in in them to a trade show and it did really well. It sold out the first day and realized, hey, there might be something here. Um, and again, this was before my time. So these are the the stories of of back in the day that I got. And through some philanthropic up efforts, we did prove the concept too in terms of filtration and stuff through providing some water filtration solutions to some developing countries and just to test out the the overall concept and and also obviously get back to to other communities. So yeah. That's kind of our our our our background. Um and things have just evolved from there and the rest is history, and we continue to grow at a very high, you know, good pace, great pace. Yeah, we're excited. And uh it's been it's been a whirlwind. Uh it's hard to catch up. We we don't it's hard to catch our breath sometimes.

SPEAKER_03 3:48

Yeah, that that is a whirlwind. I mean, to think that that all kind of started just at COVID. I mean, you know, and it's only 2026, that is such a fast turnaround. And I know that I'm getting way off of our outline that I sent you and everything, but that just amazes me because I know that you guys have taken so many steps to get your product certified and and to do things that other products in the market haven't done because of how long that takes. And to know that, and then to know that you guys have not been on the market as long as some of these other products have been, that's amazing. That's really awesome. This is my genuine.

SPEAKER_01 4:28

And that's just a testament to our leadership team. I mean, yeah, yeah. Our leader, our leaders and innovators here, um, you know, our mostly our ownership team that's innovating at a very rapid pace. So not only do we have to keep up with, you know, the everyday business affairs, but we also have to continue to be better and improve our products while also taking care of the customer and making sure that quality stays to our to our standards, right? So it's a team effort for sure, but it's it is incredible as far as the timeline goes that that we've been able to achieve as much as we have. And and a lot of that comes from the very strategic leadership team that we have that makes the dis makes decisions in terms of how we how we approach things. And a lot of it comes from previous business expertise. But we're we're no experts in in the R V field. Uh or you know, we've kind of been learning along the way. People, you know, we do, we do have some expertise in the water side of things, but it's been a little bit more um kind of learn as you go, too. So there's been there's been some challenges and some growing pains. And sometimes where you grow too fast, it's like, holy smokes, I gotta, I gotta learn this new thing, right?

SPEAKER_03 5:40

Yeah, absolutely. Well, I know that you guys are a veteran-owned company, and we learn to RV is um my co-host Jennifer, her husband is a veteran. And um, you know, so we love being able to support veteran-owned companies. You guys have your home base in Kalamazoo, you guys, you know, you've got your your facilities, and um, also you've got some in Grand Rapids and in Holland, and then one in Ohio, and a town that I'm afraid to mispronounce. So I'm gonna let you tell us what the name of that town is. Is it Finley?

SPEAKER_01 6:16

I don't even know that. It's Finley, yep, yep. Um and those those facilities have kind of been been shared between our, like I mentioned before, we had other service businesses that have given us infrastructure and some opportunities through blue technology as well. So um it's been it's been helpful to have those facilities available to us.

SPEAKER_03 6:37

Well, knowing that you guys didn't come from the RV industry to start, what kind of made you guys say, This is what we're gonna tackle the RV water problem? Like this is we're gonna take on this niche. What's what started that whole interest?

SPEAKER_01 6:55

Uh like I previously said, I think we we took that water, the the water, the UV sterilization, and and that kind of morphed into the water side of things with RV uh and UV sterilization. And then we we kind of brought it down a notch to start and just used filtration. Uh that was that's kind of our bread and butter as as uh I think you've you've also uh experienced some of our products as well. But so that that's that's that's where we we started out with the filtration and then we brought UV back in and have have essentially gone first full circle back into the UV side of things. So when when I say we we started on the hospital side of things, where like I said, cleaning and sterilizing things during the COVID periods, and then it it morphed into water, sterilizing water or I guess purifying water for communities that were less served, and uh that kind of morphed into hey, how do we take those portable systems? What's our other what's our other audiences? And RV was kind of an obvious choice, and our ownership team does have some RV experience as well and have been RVers for for a long time, and it's just it was just a natural fit where we knew there was uh there was things missing in for the R V community too, where we saw that there was a lot of not a lot of emphasis on water, and get into a little bit later maybe, but water in the RV community is very unpredictable and it's very unregulated. So it becomes a everybody's carrying our own bottled water. So that just it didn't sit well with us, and also the quality and everything that was out there was just a another plastic or you know, component that was clunky and just we just didn't like it. There was nothing good out there that provided um a quality, dependable product that we we felt comfortable with. So we that's that's how we uh went off to the races and said we can make something better, you know. That's awesome.

SPEAKER_03 8:48

Yeah, I you know, a lot of us start with kind of that basic inline filter from the store and call it a day. And that's that's what we had when we first got started because we just we just didn't know. We knew that we needed something, but we also knew that that wasn't enough. But can you tell us a little bit about why that isn't enough? Could you kind of help educate people on why that inline filter maybe isn't good enough for the well water or the campground water that they're getting when they're camping in their RV?

SPEAKER_01 9:22

Yeah. So to start that conversation, we'll we'll get a little bit into how you know campground water is is considered a transient community. So the as far as the regulations, basically whoever the people that test the water are the campground owners. There's not a whole lot of regulation that goes into that. So, and they're testing for very, very few contaminants versus, you know, if you go to municipal water, it's the municipality testing the water, and there's a whole plethora of contaminants that get tested, and that does just doesn't happen in the RV community. It's not uh a requirement. So there's a lot of unpredictability. There's there's different things that can we can run into, right? So there's things that can make you pretty sick pretty quickly: viruses, bacteria, cysts, mold, things like that in water and coming from unknown sources and groundwater, um, especially nowadays with so much stuff leaky leaching into the water. And then and then you run into the more inconvenient side of things, whether it's very hard water or things that can make you sick more long term, such as like for dealing with things like heavy metals or any sort of really heavy metals is what we we talk we talk about mostly. But there is some opportunity to reduce some of those um pharmaceuticals in in the water as well, um, that have made their way into our water systems. That's really what we're we're trying to reduce. Back to your question. Uh we see a lot of those people out there that are RB is that they're using those inline filters. Most of those inline filters are five, 10, 20 microns, and and just for layman's terms, that's just taking out sediment, you know, some iron, maybe dirt, anything that's pretty large and it's not doing anything in terms of bacteria or, you know, like you said, those, you know, maybe some heavy metal reduction, assist, anything like that that's going to make you sick. So that's really where our product shines because you know, we use we use one of those filters as a as a first line of defense that protects the next filters down line, but that's all people are running around with, you know, a lot of people. And it's like you're just running around with a 20-micron filter or even a 10 micron filter that's not protecting you in any case. And just because your water comes out maybe a little more clear out of that thing, it's not that does not mean you're protected.

SPEAKER_03 11:45

You just took out the loose dirt.

SPEAKER_01 11:46

Basically, yeah. Yeah, you removed a few rocks. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 11:50

So, you know, you don't really think about protecting your water until you realize that there's something wrong. So do you you guys get I know that you work with the B2B side, but have you heard any stories from customers where they realized that their water wasn't being protected while they were traveling on the road until it was too late?

SPEAKER_01 12:09

Yeah, unfortunately, that usually happens when it's too late and they're at a campground, especially like you know, we hear about a lot of times we hear about the hard water. Um, because that's usually pretty fine, people find out pretty quick if they're if it's very, very hard water um and they've never been to that site or that geography. So usually that's when they find out and they don't have a water softener, and that can, I mean, that can ruin a whole camping weekend or week. So it's um it's one of those things that can start wreaking havoc in your in your plumbing and appliances and and things like that relatively quickly. But you know, we do hear of customers the biggest thing we hear about is people carrying around bottled water, and that's that's one of those things we that we we aim to reduce from the beginning. So it's not really it's not so much stories of people getting sick, because but those do happen because we do hear those, but it's so much, hey, now I don't have to carry on bottled water and I feel good about potentially drinking this water. So there's we hear those stories a lot, and I I tend to ask our customers at trade shows and rallies and things, hey, are you drinking the water coming out of this thing? And and I would say 95% of them are saying yes, you know. So um there's it it gives people peace of mind, especially when you got so many people now that are it's not just you know retired folks or or what's say, you know, out there, it's it's the whole family going out. It's the dog, it's the two kids, it's and then you know, usually those kids and dogs and things, they're a little more susceptible to to certain things. So just peace of mind overall.

SPEAKER_03 13:38

Yeah, my husband wanted me to let you know that our water tastes much better.

SPEAKER_00 13:45

That's good. That's one of the that's one of the steps there. We want to make it taste better too.

SPEAKER_03 13:50

Yes, the tasty filter is working.

SPEAKER_00 13:53

Yes.

SPEAKER_03 13:54

Well, to to that point, we got our hands on the AR3 and we've had a chance to test it in our new rig, and it's made a huge difference in our water. We like I mentioned, we had the inline filter, and then once we realized that that was just like not doing the job, we also got a one of those big tabletop, I'm not gonna say the brand, but one of those big tabletop filters that sets up always. And so we have uh our two kids traveling with us. So our son just turned 18 in November, and our our oldest just turned 21. Um, they're great kids who don't think about, oh, I just took the rest of the water out of this thing. So a lot of times you'd go to get water and it was empty. Like all the time it was empty. So then you gotta fill it up and then you gotta wait for it to go through the I love being able to just turn on the faucet and go, look at the clean water coming out of my sink right now. It's the most amazing thing. I have gotten off on a tangent about how wonderful I feel about drinking out of my tap. And so now I've got to find my question. So the AR3, it's a three-stage system. And that may sound a little overwhelming to some people, but it might also be confusing for some people because there are some other quote unquote three-stage systems out there in the market. So could you walk us through what your guys' three-stage system is, kind of what it does at each stage, and then the the importance. You've touched on it a little bit, like that first stage is your, you know, filtering out the debris. But can you kind of touch on what each stage does and why it's important to go through the order that it does?

SPEAKER_01 15:46

Yeah, of course. Well, well, a little bit about like your filter that you were previously using is uh, you know, usually we're we're dealing with a one-stage system there that's um in many cases. There's there's variations of it that are just making the water taste better. They're not they're not going through a a very low micron filtration, which is gonna really get into that bacteria virus level of things. Um and obviously, like you said, there's there's very major inconveniences, right? We're waiting for those things to to um to filter your water and and have the water all go through.

SPEAKER_03 16:17

So come back in 20 minutes for a glass of water.

SPEAKER_01 16:21

Yeah. Exactly. So those things have a place. I mean, we have some of our customers that use those as a as a final step, just as an extra layer of protection. So there is a a space for those, and but I don't think you should be there's benefits to also running your water from a filter from the beginning, whether you're filling your tanks or just running your city water in the RB, right? So, um, because then you your appliances and your plumbing also benefits from that, and you just have the peace of mind that everything that went into your RB was filtered, and you know, you can drink it at or drink it if you decide to at one faucet or the other faucet, you just you can do it however you want. There's there's some convenience factor to that too, right? Including your showering too. So your showering, you know, your water's getting uh you know softened and and also filtered, and so there's there's a lot of benefits to filtering at the source rather than just your drinking water. Um as far as our system goes, you have, like you said, a three-stage filtration system. Our first filter is a five-micron filter that, like we talked about, has just gonna take the big chunks out to kind of save the other filters, right? It extends the longevity of the other filters. And so that the second filter is really where the magic happens. That's your our 0.2 micron filter, and that's uh that's bacteria and virus level. Yeah, so we have two variations, but when we get down to 0.2 micron filters, that's just so people can visualize that a little bit. It's like it's three fifth 350 times smaller than a human hair. I got a little note here. Let's see, up to 25 times smaller than a bacteria and about the size of what a virus is. So that's just the level that we're getting down to while also preserving water pressure and flow rate into the RV. So that's the second filtration step, and that's really where like I would feel comfortable drinking the water coming out of it. But yeah, we had a final polishing step onto our our systems, which is a tasty granulated activated charcoal filter. So that's gonna just take out a lot of those nasty smells and tastes that come in that water while also reducing some some other some final steps um as far as reduction goes. But that that's that's really the three-stage system that we've we've uh implemented and our customers grave about. So it's just it's kind of covering most of our basis. And then if you know, you can add softening onto that depending on where you're going. It's one of those things that I just recommend having a softener on board. Um, because when you need it, you don't need it till you need it, right? So it's right. A lot of folks skip that at first. And if they're especially if they're going to different places they don't know about how you know the water quality and things, um, a lot of times they can't get, you know, uh caught in a bad moment with with the soft as far as the hardness of the water.

SPEAKER_03 19:19

Yeah. So how with those filters, how does an RVer know, okay, it is time for me to change these filters out?

SPEAKER_01 19:28

Yeah. So there's there's a couple ways that we tell people recommend to our customers. The first way, like you can know, is if you're if you really start to lose your water pressure, right? So if water pressure is really starting to go downhill, we it probably means your filters need changing. And there's no hard set rule in terms of gallons or time or anything like that, because we can't control how dirty that water is. So they're you know, we give maximums in terms of hey, don't leave your filters in there for a whole year because that's probably not gonna work. But so the water pressure, yeah. So that's the first step that you know people notice. However, if people have not noticed a drop in water pressure in three to four months, especially if they're full-time RVing, um, we do recommend those be swapped out in three to four months. So that because because these filters are sitting in a hot, wet, you know, diff temperature changes, but a lot of times it's warm and and and wet, warm and wet water, there's a chance for bacteria or mold to start growing on them, even though they are sealed up. There is a chance of that, and we want to um that's just industry recommendation in general, it's not just our filters, right? So we do recommend that as a as a uh precaution more than anything to swap those out every three to four months. But it could be sooner if that water is just really bad, you could be swapping them out sooner. So that's just one thing we can't control. We can't control how dirty it is, and um, a lot of times those filters do have to come out sooner.

SPEAKER_03 21:00

We've definitely been in some areas that have had some rough water comparative to other places where it's like, oh, this water is almost like municipal water. So that makes sense to me that it, you know, you can't determine exactly how long, but those are some good things to look for. So I I love that. The AR3, one thing that I noticed for you.

SPEAKER_01 21:23

Uh-huh. Sorry, I'll I'll give you one more recommendation too, since you're using our system, is if you are not full timing and you're putting your or anybody, any of our customers, if they're not full timing and they're, you know, they're gonna leave the filters in, you know, for more than a week. We do recommend taking them out, letting them air dry for probably probably close to a week, letting them air dry. And then um, some of our customers will put them in like a Ziploc bag and throw them in the fridge just to avoid things potentially growing on them.

SPEAKER_02 21:50

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 21:51

We just don't want to leave them sitting for an extended period of time in in a wet, hot, you know, moist environment, I guess.

SPEAKER_03 21:57

Okay. That's a really good tip. That's a I would Never think to do that. So, one of the things I noticed whenever we were like doing our unboxing, this is the first thing I've ever unboxed before. And I felt very we watched a lot of unboxing things with my kids when they were little, and I was like, Why are we so excited about unboxing? But I was genuinely excited about unboxing this. But it was so light. So your guys' AR3 comes in under eight pounds and it's small, like it's it's it's small. And most of the three-step systems that I've seen out there are really bulky, they're really heavy. Was that like a this is we're like we're getting the engineers that can get us there? How did you guys, how did the team decide this is what we're going for? Or was that even what they were going for when they launched out the gate trying to get the system created?

SPEAKER_01 22:51

Yeah, so so from the beginning, obviously, like I talked about, we wanted to make something different that wasn't like everybody else's systems. Two things went into that is um a little back, well, a little background on the most systems out there are 10-inch systems um that are kind of industry standard, right? And the way those came about is because those were available for either under sync applications for the household for an actual like home, or you know, just in general, they were they were off-the-shelf systems that were available to RV cus companies and also filtration technology wasn't as good back then. So those two things kind of contributed to hey, we need a 10-inch system, and here's the 10-inch systems that are available to us. It wasn't necessarily the the right use case for RVs, but it was just what was available to them. So I don't blame them for using it. Right. But we we realized, hey, these things, these systems are huge, and does an RV need such a big system, a 10-inch system? Um, and the answer was no. Um after doing some testing, is uh first of all, RVs don't use nearly as much water as a as a normal house. Uh our our our water usage is is much much reduced. Um so we can we can get away with a a five-inch system, which is really what we pioneered. Uh since then, a lot of competitors have come out with five-inch systems, but we realized that five-inch systems are good enough. I mean, we have families in full-size class A's that are running, you know, five-inch three-stage systems and and do just fine with them. Um, so you know, we we we we found that five-inch technology and really started to push that. Um so that reduced our footprint and obviously our weight too. So that's one one portion of it. The other portion of that is we we decide to use materials that not anybody else was using. So that a big one of that is being the aluminum components. So if you take the AR3 that you have and you see all the exoskeleton, the silver and the blue top plate and all that, the frame, as we call it, that's all aluminum components, and that's what gives you that surprisingly light lightness, right? When you pick it up for the first time. Yeah. And then our canisters are stainless steel, you know. So those those uh those they're a little heavier than your plastic canisters, but using that aluminum components is makes up for that. So most systems out there at the time were all steel and plastic, and they were just heavy, very heavy, right? Because they're not only almost double the size, but they were also using much heavier metals or components. So and and we kept the stainless steel on purpose. We could have obviously gone with plastic canisters and made it even lighter, but we just didn't feel that that was a service to our customers in terms of the quality that they expected, right? So everything we do is pretty much stainless steel. We we we we we're trying to stay away from plastic as much as we can, as well as things like brass and metals like that that have a a little bit higher tendency to corrode in the long term. It can be a little more unpredictable in terms of their their makeup. So um that was our our big thing is is we always use stainless steel fittings and connectors anywhere we can. It's gonna be stainless steel, and all our accessories are stainless steel. So that's been that's been a big thing for us.

SPEAKER_03 26:06

It's so easy to I don't even think assemble is the word. Like that was not assembly. That was I feel like it was as easy as breathing to connect it to my RV. It was so simple. And it was it wasn't simple in a way. A lot of times you get a something for your RV and it's like it's so simple to attach, or it's so simple to apply to your RV. And then you get it and you're like, yeah, it's so simple because it's so cheaply made, or it's so, you know, this is gonna break in like three days. But it was so well made. The parts were so reliably um just craftfully made. And it still was just incredibly easy. Like my husband, after I assembled it all, he then took it apart and then he redid it and he was like, watch me do it with one hand. We were nerds, so we were, you know, how fast can we put this together? So yeah, it's a very light unit, which for an R V or we weigh our unit to make sure that we're not going over the G VWR or the G V RW. I get the letters mixed up because we don't want to do any damage to like our suspension or our frame or anything. And so knowing that we are able to protect our family with the water that we're using and do that without having to sacrifice a lot of our carrying weight in our rig is just a huge bonus for us. So, you know, applaud, you know, snaps, all of the different ways that I can applaud you guys. That I love how light that is.

SPEAKER_01 27:45

Yeah. Yeah. And that was part of the goal is to have not only lightness, but also make it healthier too. Like we said, less plastic, more stainless steel, so that we don't, you know, the plastic and microplastics are, you know, a big conversation these days. And anytime we can, you know, use a stainless steel component like the canisters, we we'd rather use that versus a plastic component, not only for health concerns, but also potentially for long-term durability um for our customers. That was one of the big things when we started, is there was two on the customer side of things, there were two things that we really wanted. We wanted to be, you know, have our quality always be at top of mind. And then also our our customer service side of things is we also wanted to take care of the customer after the sale, or even if they had questions before the sale or um anything like that. So we do house our customer service team here in-house and um and have people ready to talk to you at any point in time.

SPEAKER_03 28:44

I love that. So someone might look at a TDS tester after running water through their AR3 and see a number higher than they were expecting. Can you talk a little bit about the benefit of that higher rating, especially because those are all words that are foreign to me?

SPEAKER_01 29:01

Yeah, so TDS stands for total dissolved solids, right? So uh the way a TDS tester works is it's it's estimating total dissolved ions based on electrical conductivity of the waters. Um a little bit of a mouthful there, but that's how that's working. And and we do want the only, I mean, if you're if you're getting distilled water or or things that go through an RO filter, that's when you're gonna lose all those ions that we actually want most of them. You know, a lot of them like sodium and and chlorine and things that you're you want those on your water. Those are the minerals that like keep your body moving and and things. So we don't want to take out everything out of the water. So dissolved ions go right through our filters versus when you start talking RO and things like that, that's when you start to lose them. Although there are most RO systems now are remineralizing the water, but um, so TDS is not a full picture of how filters are doing at filtering the water. There's a lot of you know, um small organic molecules that can get through there, salts, metals, fluoride, things like that that can go right through those filters, and it's just not a full picture of what's actually in your water. Some of those things might be good, and some of those things, there's only one way to take them out, and there's you know, a lot of times that's really interesting. There's reasons we have not gone down the RO route. It's it's just it's not very efficient for the R V community, and and then like we talked about, we lose a lot of the minerals.

SPEAKER_03 30:31

That's really interesting. I want to talk about Blue's mission because I love this so much. I love any company that has a mission that goes beyond just the bottom dollar. So I I know that you guys partner with water.org um to get clean water access globally. How did that mission become part of the company's identity? Can you talk about that a little bit?

SPEAKER_01 31:02

Yeah, so part of that was we wanted to start with a more philanthropic approach to our business and especially during the early stages when we were testing things and seeing where these water filters and and systems could be used. Since then, we have involved more into the RV space and um as you know, but it was always a priority to try and not only give back, but also see what other avenues we could use our systems for. And that continues to be something that we think about. So not just, hey, what you know, what's the next RV product can we make? It's more, hey, what's the next community that we can serve, right? It's not just the RV community. Can we serve other types of communities, right? That whether it's in our country or outside of our country, um, that are potentially underserved uh when it comes to water. So it's just finding another avenue for your product to be used, I guess.

SPEAKER_03 31:58

Yeah. And then to your point, I mean, you've mentioned it several times, but there is also an environmental angle here, in addition to just the microplastics that are being avoided in the water that we drink, you guys are eliminating a large number of plastic bottles. I mean, even just in the RVing community, there was a number, it was like a family of four generates 174 pounds of plastic bottle waste a year, which is unbelievably frightening. So, how can blue technology help that family change kind of how they contribute to the planet's sustainability down the road?

SPEAKER_01 32:39

So I think we've touched on a lot of those in terms of your the bottled water usage is probably the most immediate change that we can see, right? So um, you know, we we all see it in the waterways at campgrounds and and things where you know people leave you know 50 water bottles behind and it's nobody bats an eye, and it's just just the way things are, and that's one thing we wanted to really get away from, not only for the environmental side, but also who wants to go buy cases of water and carry them. And you know, they they also weigh quite a bit. So, you know, that our system weighs less and has less of a footprint than most of those water cases. Um, and then the other our other part of that is how can we make these systems more environmentally friendly in terms of the long-term costs, you know, associated with, you know, whether it's replacing one of the parts or components. And we do we have plastic canisters or plastic components that need to be replaced and thrown in the trash every few years or every year or whatever. So luckily, most of our systems are like I talked about as stainless steel and aluminum, and those are things that can either be recycled and they're not as they're they're not, you know, plastics that are gonna sit around in our landfills for hundreds of years. So there's there's definitely that component to it as well in terms of sustainability of our of our products uh long term.

SPEAKER_03 33:56

I love that. So blue has become a trusted name in the RV industry to the point, and you kind of you talked about this a little bit, you know, you specialize in the B2B side. Can you talk a little bit about how the relationships opened up? You're working with brands. You you guys are now kind of industry standard for being installed into some of the the big RV brands that people can go. I mean, I I could go buy some of the brands off of a lot today and find blue technology water filters already installed, right?

SPEAKER_01 34:31

Yep, yep. So one of our biggest partners right now is the Alliance brand, and um they've been they've been a great partner for us. So I think I think most of the RV manufacturers, and it still is honestly, water tends to be somewhat of an afterthought in terms of filtration. And they figure the customer can figure it out after they buy their RV and they don't really have to mess with it. Unfortunately, you know, that does that just continues to happen. And we are seeing some manufacturers, especially um in general, I guess, start to make changes, whether they use other manufacturers' you know, components, you know, plastic. You know, we obviously we we hope for them to switch to blue and use our components, but um we start, you know, as of a few years, a couple years ago, probably we started to see more and more manufacturers actually include at least a single stage filtration system that gives gives people something in terms of filtration. Unfortunately, that's really not enough to replace bottled water, um depending on what filters go in those things. So, so yeah, that's been it's been a good uh avenue for for trust um and in with the RV community when they see, hey, manufacturers are trusting the the blue tech products. Um, we should probably take a look at that, whether it's an RV that already has it on board or if it's something aftermarket that they're gonna go buy. So um it's been it's been a it's been a good avenue for us to to gain trust and exposure, right? Because these a lot of these manufacturers are looking for ways to create value for their cut consumers, and our our brand also provides that, right? It's it's no different than saying, hey, our home has a I don't know what's a high-end fridge, right? And you know, it's just okay, it has a blue tech system that that has a value of, I don't know, this canister has a value of$200 to the customer, right? So um that's just passed down value and perceived value that the that these manufacturers can pass on. So um at a at a at a very easy way to integrate, too, because a lot of these guys are using 10-inch canisters that uh we also provide, and so it's just an easy swap. We're not asking them to, you know, re-engineer their whole wet bay or plumbing system. It's these are easy to swap things, and there are some people that are are starting to consider things like three-stage systems on board from the factory, and as well as things like you know, UV, you know, sterilization of the water. So it's starting to catch on. And also we wanted to provide more of a premium, premium option for folks instead of the I mean, these some of these folks are buying million dollar RVs and you got a white plastic 10-inch canister in them, and it's like that's the same thing that that$50,000 RV has in it. How how is that how's that possible, right?

SPEAKER_03 37:25

Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 37:26

So it's a it's a very mutually beneficial relationship for yeah. Also providing other solutions for the RV manufacturers. So we're not just a hey, we'll sell you this component that came from China. We also engineered the product and also we later down the road, if you need other solutions, we do have other solutions available from our brand as well.

SPEAKER_03 37:46

That's awesome. So I want to talk a little bit about um the NSF certification, because that's a big deal. It is to me anyway, as a consumer. So in my AR3 system that I have, the off-grid filter, and then I believe it was the tasty filter as well. I believe is NSF certified, which means it's been lab tested, the off-grid filter was third-party tested, it's it's been factory audited, it's it's done all of that stuff, but not everything that's out on the market, like I had mentioned earlier, has gone through all of like they can go to market without having that performance standard testing done and that safety standard testing done. Why was that certification so important to your team to get before they went to market? I mean, this is it you hear a lot from different brands about how it's just a hurdle. It's just a hurdle that keeps people from being able to get the product that they want. But you guys managed to do it and you managed to do it pretty quickly. I mean, going from 2020 to 2026, and you guys are already in the market with this. Why was that so important for you guys?

SPEAKER_01 39:08

Um, so it was trust. I mean, uh, we want people to be able to not just say, hey, here we're the best. We use this best materials and you know, trust us on that. We wanted to also provide third-party validation on that. So um we started out by, you know, certifying our our systems as a whole and saying, hey, if you know, when you buy all these components together, there's an NSF certification behind it that um gives you uh gives you the ability to have that peace of mind, right? So that the NSF certification is is going to tell you that you're not that the materials used are not gonna leach harmful chemicals or you know, you know, leaching anything into your water that as time goes on. And then also, you know, whether it's a temperature component, if those the hoses or the fittings get really hot, you know, with hot water or or things like that, or or get left out in the sun, which a lot of times do in the RV community, how are those things gonna react to, you know, are they gonna start breaking down and dumping stuff into your water? So there's there's a lot of pros to it that we wanted to make sure we covered our bases on and not have to backtrack later. Um, and then like you said, we do have our off-grid um 0.2 micron filter um has a third-party performance testing behind it, where not only do they say, hey, these materials are 0.2 micron and you know, all the you know, the materials are certified, but they also say they also go by and test here's all the impurities that this filter has removed during our testing. So now we can also provide NSF and and third-party validation as far as the performance of the filter and not just the materials used as being safe. There's different layers to NSF, and that's a whole nother conversation that I I also still don't a hundred percent get into, but there's a whole lot of different avenues you can go with that. But we we wanted to make sure we covered that from the beginning.

SPEAKER_03 41:05

I love that. I think it is very important with um products where you are promising a safety for um for a family. I mean, you know, you you're promising a product that is going to improve the lives um of your of your consumer. I think it's important to be able to back that that claim up. And I love that that is something that you guys have done. It makes me as a consumer feel prouder to put my my dollar there. It makes me feel more comfortable with saying this is what I'm going to invest in, this is what I'm committing to, this is, you know, versus just going, well, I think that this might work. And so I really hope that my kids don't get sick. I really hope that this keeps us all safe and I'll continue to buy these filters and we'll just, you know, on a prayer and a whim, we'll see if we'll see if the water comes out clean. So I love that.

SPEAKER_01 42:11

Yeah, and as as a you know, as a dad myself, I I definitely, you know, resonate with that. It's just it's you know, when you're young and gun and you're just, you know, I'll just drink out of the hose and just it. But once you start, you know, bringing families on board and especially a lot of these families that are full timing now, that's just it's not just a weekend of exposure now. Now we're exposing ourselves all year round to these water sources that are are questionable. So then there's so many more families now that are full-time RVers that that are that that could potentially be exposed at a higher level because it they're they're doing it on a on a daily basis. So it was an important factor that that we continue to implement into more and more of our products as far as NSF certification. And uh so we just got done with a whole nother round of other products that we're still pending at. We were we were pending on those certifications, and now we've pretty much done with those too. So we we continue to add to that NSF portfolio of ours for sure.

SPEAKER_03 43:10

That's awesome. Well, if um if our listeners want to find Blue Tech products, um, what's the best way to get their hands on an AR3 like I've got or any of these other products that you've got coming out? Are you guys gonna be, I know I met you guys at or was introduced to you guys at the Hershey RV show. Are you guys gonna be out there again with us this year?

SPEAKER_01 43:36

Yeah, so the big two shows that we do on a corporate level that we partner with Gen R V is Hershey and Tampa. Those are the two big, big shows we go to. Um, we have partners that set up at other shows, such as TechnoRV, is one of our big show partners that set up sets up booths at different shows and rallies and things like that. So you can also get our products through them. We have we keep adding new retailers that that you could, you know, most of the major online RV and camping retailers do do have our products now and we continue to add partners and products. So some things are exclusive to to Blue Tech and we we keep them only for our our our website. So feel free for the newest products especially come check out go blue tech.com and come see what's coming out. So there's there's a lot of new products that we we make sure that they go through validation and make sure we're we're not running into any major issues before we release them to our partners. So if you wanted want to see the newest and latest things we do we do go through our our website for that.

SPEAKER_03 44:40

I do like new I I do like being in the new camp so I may have to haunt your website a little bit.

SPEAKER_01 44:49

Last question keep an eye on it we uh we have I will have quite a few product launches I'm sure scheduled for for the next few years.

SPEAKER_03 44:57

So last question if there's one thing that you want someone to remember the next time that they pull up to a campground and connect their RV to on-site water what is it?

SPEAKER_01 45:07

When you go R Ving it you never want it to be a health risk to go RVing and regardless of what filtration system you decide to use a filtration system preferably some sort of third party or third three stage filtration system but filter your water that's coming out because potentially that water if you're if you plan on drinking it or cooking with it anything that's the one thing coming out of your RV and coming out of that camps campsite that's going to go in your body whether you know drink it, cook it, whatever you end up doing with it. And personally like I always say you get one body make sure you take care of it. So yeah that's that's my two cents on on when you go hook up your water make sure you're just being cautious and and taking the right precautions to to filter your water.

SPEAKER_03 45:52

Yeah absolutely well Rodrigo thank you so much for joining us around our campfire today. And please thank the blue team for sharing the AR3 off grid system with us and all of the information about it. I just kept reading it over and over again the 20 microns to the 0.2 microns made my head hurt. I just that number alone scared me and elated me at the same time to know that I had made such a difference in possible filter of my my own personal water. So if you guys want to learn more about the great products that Blue Tech offers you can find them at go bluetech.com and it is g-obt e-c dot com and then keep an eye out for them at the Hershey R V show this September and all of the other different places that Rodrigo just mentioned with their great partners and don't forget to like subscribe and follow learn to R V the podcast and we'll catch you tomorrow around the campfire for this week's community spotlight. Thank you guys for joining us