When injuries interrupted his plans to play pro baseball, this entrepreneur started a business that's now on track for $1 million in revenue

Matt Tesvich, 24, had a game plan when he enrolled at the University of Georgia’s Terry College of Business. He was going to play baseball there, get drafted and become a professional baseball player...and then, at some point in the future, start a business. "I always had that passion for entrepreneurship,” he says.

He was pitching for UGA when the first part of his plan went awry. He got hurt and tore the cartilage in both shoulders and injured his elbow, as well. “So God closed the door there for me as a pitcher,” he recalls.

A few days later, Tesvich found the inspiration for his business, SKUNK SKIN, which makes socks that prevent stinky feet.

“My roommate came home with this antibacterial towel,” he said at a panel I moderated at the New York Public Library earlier this year. “And that's really what sparked everything. I did 18 months of research and development and created a sock that doesn't smell.”

Matt’s launch illustrates the power of persistence. He contacted more than 130 different manufacturers in North Carolina to find one that would develop a prototype. But with that prototype, he was able to produce the stocks and start selling them online on Amazon and through his own website. Since then, he has won Amazon Prime's "Buy It Now" competition—where winners receive added visibility on the platform — and sold the socks to people on all seven continents and in all 50 states. He is on track for $1 million in revenue for 2025.

“It’s a huge blessing,” he says.

Matt is part of an exciting trend in the economy: the rise of million-dollar, one-person businesses. He's the only full-time employee at SKUNK SKIN and relies on tech tools and a handful of collegiate entrepreneurs he mentors to extend his capabilities.

The number of million-dollar, one-person businesses in the U.S. is at an all-time high. There were 116,803 nonemployer businesses—meaning those that don’t have any formal employees on payroll in 2022, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. That’s an increase from 57,222 in 2021. Most of these businesses are run by one person, but in some cases, there are partners or a team of founders who will eventually scale the business.

Ready to plan. your own personal Independence Day from the world of traditional jobs? Here are some of the tips Matt shared.

1. Break free of the employee mindset.

“In high school, I read a book called Rich Dad Poor Dad,” he said, referring to Robert Kiyosaki’s bestseller. “The biggest difference that I found as a young, impressionable kid was once you learn to make money for yourself, you're no longer a slave per se to your job or your boss. And the only true way to be financially free is to learn how to make money on your own.

So, the whole time I was in college, I was just trying to figure out: How do I create wealth? How do I build that freedom?”

2. Cultivate your inner resourcefulness.

Matt had to self-finance, so he used $23,000 he had saved from working at a golf course while in high school. He spent all of that money making his first 10,000 pairs of socks.

“I think one of the biggest things as an entrepreneur is being that bulldog — being creative, figuring out how to do something with no resources, with your back pressed against the wall,” he said.

With limited funds, he had solve one challenge quickly: How do we get as many eyeballs on our product as possible? He started reaching out to different media and landed on the front cover of USA Today, sparking runaway sales.

“And so we went from $0 in the bank account to, in the first week, around 40 grand,” he recalls. “We sold out of several of our SKUs. And that's really been my mindset for success: How do we bootstrap this thing? Meaning, how do we not take on investment and keep all the equity, all the ownership in the business? How do we do as much as we can and stretch our dollars as efficiently as possible?”

3. Open your mind to creative ways to raise funds.

Matt found university pitch competitions — which he likens to mini Shark Tanks—to be a great way to raise cash he didn’t have to pay back or trade for equity. He competed against other college students’ businesses as he pitched SKUNK SKIN. “We raised over $150,000 doing this without giving up any equity, any ownership in the business,” he said.

4. Stay connected to the reasons you started the business in the first place.

Matt found being a baseball player very self-glorifying. “It was me, me, me, me, me,” he recalls. “But that's not fulfilling.”

Once he sold his first pair of socks, he found fulfillment by tapping into the desire to help others that sparked the idea for SKUNK SKIN.

“Our very first customer was a dancer named Carly, and she almost quit dance because she was getting made fun of and bullied by her peers because her shoes and socks stunk so bad,” he recalls. “Imagine being a young girl embarrassed about this. When her parents called me and told me that these socks changed her life, and now, she couldn't wait to go back to dance — and she had that fire reignited in her — I was like, 'Wow. This is no longer self-glorifying. We're helping other people.’”

After the USA Today piece, he reached out to other customers, trying to understand why customers were buying. He kept hearing the same refrain: “Your product is the only one that works.”

That ignited his desire to grow the business further. “Once you start serving other people, the money starts to come,” he says. “And it’s not about you. It’s about helping other people. And I feel like I’m more and more passionate every day about the product and just seeing how this is really making an impact.”

5. Find ways to stay close to the customer.

As sales grew, Matt flew around the country and met with 10 customers around the U.S. He found that there were two primary demographics buying his products: “One was typically a blue-collar worker in boots or on their feet all day,” he explained. “And the second one was a mother of teenage athletes — anywhere from 10 to 24 years old. And they were all frustrated because they were embarrassed about foot odor — whether it was their own or someone else's. After all, they'd have to go into houses and take off their shoes and they were embarrassed, or other parents were saying, ‘Hey, little Johnny's feet stink.’”

He also gathered insights from them about how he could improve his offering. “We were getting critical feedback too — ‘Hey, we don't like this about the socks,’ or ‘We’d like to see this on the website.’”

After getting that customer feedback, he flew to China to meet with his manufacturer for a month, applying all that he learned. “We tried to design the best socks in the market today — all based on customer feedback,” he said.

6. Prioritize constant learning.

One book that changed Matt's thinking was The Magic of Thinking Big by David Schwartz. “There are so many athletes, so many entrepreneurs who read that book and unclog their mindset. I would highly encourage reading that book to anyone with a scarcity mindset. I think it's a great starting spot.”

For further inspiration, he listens to Alex Hormozi, the founder of Acquisition.com. “He’s got fantastic business advice, and he simplifies it so much,” Matt says.

Matt also looks to two Atlanta-based entrepreneurs, Jesse Itzler, a partner in Zico Coconut Water, and Sara Blakely, founder of Spanx, both of whom he admires because they built their wealth while maintaining a healthy family life.

“They’ve got a strong family unit. They’ve got a strong marriage. And they’re still going out living the lives they want to live,” he explained.

7. Obstacle-proof your mindset.

Matt starts his day at the gym to keep his energy high as he takes the next steps toward building his business.

“If I'm feeling kind of unmotivated one day or a little bit down, I'll put on ‘How I Built This’ by Guy Raz,” he said, referring to Raz’s popular podcast. “I'll listen to the stories of different brands. They'll be huge brands that you see in every store across America and across the world. And it seems that every single brand had at least one point of adversity that they had to overcome.”

When it comes to facing obstacles, tuning into the podcast reminds him that “It’s not just you — it's everybody.”

He also studies the constant improvements now-famous companies, such as Instagram’s rebranding from its original name, Burbn. “It’s amazing to see the pivots that these different brands make,” he says.

8. Make the most of automation and AI. While there’s no substitute for talking with customers, Matt recommended extending what one person can do through apps and creative uses of AI.

In Matt's toolkit are Shopify, the platform on which he built his store and the apps built into it, as well as Canva and Photoshop. He uses ChatGPT for legal research, marketing and SEO. "I joke that ChatGPT is my favorite $20-a-month employee,” he said.

9. Surround yourself with inspiration. Looking for one simple step you can take this week to accelerate your business toward $1 million in revenue? Matt’s advice is to look at who is in your inner circle.

“Who are you spending your most time with — those three to five closest people?” he asked. “Before I started my business, my three to five closest people were a lot different from who I am with now.”

Since launching his business, Matt has spent more time with other entrepreneurs who enjoy challenging each other. "My one buddy sells shoes — and it's like, ‘Hey, I sold $10,000 worth of shoes today. What did you do?’”

His response? “Hey, I didn’t do that, but I’m going to beat you tomorrow.”

But Matt’s life isn't all about business. Spirituality plays a significant role. He's a Christian and recently went on a mission trip to Costa Rica.

"It was awesome to be able to serve and see what really matters in life,” he says.