For founders building consumer brands
Two rounds of golf in Bend, May 20 to 22, 2027, and four working sessions with operators who’ve solved the problems you’re working on now. You’ll leave with ideas you use the week you’re back, and fifteen founders to call when the next problem shows up.
Where you are
Somewhere past the first few million, the questions stop being in any playbook. How to fund the next inventory order. What to do when ad costs double. Whether retail is worth it. Who to hire for the work you’ve always done yourself.
The answer usually sits with a founder who solved it last year. But most of us build remotely, far from anyone at our stage, and the events we go to are full of people selling to us.
Country clubs work. They tend to arrive after you’ve made it, with a waitlist and members a generation older. The Range is that room for founders who are still building.
The trip
Two rounds put you on the course with the group for about eight hours.
The working sessions give everyone a specific problem to dig into, and the conversations keep going over dinner.
The sessions
They run Thursday evening, over breakfast on Friday and Saturday, and Friday afternoon after the round. Each one takes about an hour.
An operator spends the first 20 minutes on one problem they’ve solved: what they tried, what it cost, what worked and what they’d change. For the rest of the hour the group works out what applies to each of your businesses.
The topics come from your applications. The form asks what would make the trip worth it for you, and the answers set the agenda.
Topics on the table
This list is a starting point. The final four depend on what applicants ask for, and each speaker is named here once they’re confirmed.
The golf
Juniper Preserve, Bend
Oregon’s only Jack Nicklaus-designed course, on the high desert northeast of Bend, 25 to 30 minutes from Redmond airport.
West Bend
David McLay Kidd’s Scottish-style course on the west edge of town: firm fescue fairways and big changes in elevation.
We’re choosing between the two now. The venue is named here once it’s booked, by December 15, 2026.
What you leave with
Each session is one operator on one problem they’ve solved, and then the room works on it. You fly home with a short list of things to try on Monday.
Over two rounds you’ll play with half a dozen of the group and have dinner with all of them. When the next hard question comes up, you’ll know who to text.
The sixteen in Bend become founding members, with calls and a shared library of what’s working between trips. It doesn’t end at the airport.
Golf in Bend in late May, dinners that run long, and three days that feel more like a trip with friends than a conference.
Who you’ll meet
Agencies and vendors come in as partners rather than members: see Partners.
Your three days
Thursday
Land, loosen up and meet the room before anyone tees off.
Friday
The scramble puts you with three new people for four hours. Most of the real conversations start here.
Saturday
A second round with a different group, then home with a list for Monday.
Founding members
The sixteen in Bend become The Range’s founding members. With your seat:
Bend is the first of two golf trips a year, each with its own focus. Membership opens to new members after Bend, and founding members get first pick of seats.
Price
Your host
At Flatline Van Co., where I was a co-founder from 2019 until we sold to a private equity firm in 2023, every stage brought a question my partners and I couldn’t answer alone: funding inventory, rising ad costs, new channels, and finally an M&A process while still running the business.
The Range is the room I wish we’d had. I’m in Bend now, launching a new consumer brand in 2027, so I’ll be in that room with you.
How to get in
Two minutes. Every applicant is carefully vetted, and you’ll hear back within 48 hours.