From Aerospace Engineer to Outdoor Gear Founder at ReadySpaces Denver Centennial
He Modified Aircraft for the Air Force. Then He Started Making Fire.
Before Outdoor Element was a full-time job, Mike Mojica was a mechanical engineer at Sierra Nevada Corporation, modifying aircraft platforms for the Air Force and running a systems integration lab.
In 2012 he started building camping gear on the side, out of a garage and a basement. The idea was narrow and specific: fire. Fire starting carabiners like the Firebiner, fire starting knives, and a growing line of accessories built on the belief that knowing you can make fire changes how you feel when you are out there.
“We create adventure camping gear, accessories designed to create some confidence in the outdoors.” — Mike Mojica, Founder, Outdoor Element
In 2017 he left the engineering job to run the company full time. That took a family meeting first.
“I had to convince my wife and four kids, like, hey, let’s be broke for a while while we chase these dreams down.”
Mojica kept designing, kept launching on Kickstarter, and kept proving the products had an audience. Along the way he built a following of his own. He is very active on social media, and Outdoor Element’s Instagram has grown into a community of more than 25,000 followers. He shoots a lot of that content himself.
The business grew. The square footage did not.
Two Garages, Two Basements, and the Kitchen Table
For more than a decade, Outdoor Element ran out of residential space. Two garages, two basements, and the kitchen table whenever a project needed somewhere to spread out.
“We’re busting at the seams and wife’s like, are we gonna get our, you know, sometimes I take over the kitchen table.”
The bigger cost was harder to see. Product development was capped by square footage. Mojica had designs he could not bring to market because there was nowhere to receive them, count them, or stage them.
So he went looking. He toured traditional warehouses and converted RV garages, and every option came with a three to five year lease and a list of pass-through costs attached.
“It’s intimidating to go sign a three or five year lease. And then there’s always gotchas to it.”
The Building He Used to Work In
Then his business partner drove past a ReadySpaces facility and looked it up. The two of them went through the terms line by line, waiting for the fine print to show up.
“We’re like, okay, what’s the catch? What’s the catch here? And after we had reviewed everything, I don’t think there’s a catch here.”
The space they found was 1,400 square feet at ReadySpaces Denver Centennial. It came with a twist.
“October 2024, we discovered ReadySpaces, which ironically was my old building I used to work at my 9 to 5.”
It also sits five miles from his house, with no highway between the two.
The unit is enclosed and split down the middle. Warehouse on one side, a built out office on the other, with HVAC he can run up in winter and down in summer. He put up wallpaper so the office would not be white walls every day.
The terms closed the deal. Wi-Fi, electricity, and utilities roll into one monthly number, and after an initial three-month term he is month to month. For a founder who had just spent weeks reading five-year leases, that was the whole pitch.
Double the Revenue, Six New Products, Two Kickstarters
Revenue doubled from his first year in the space to his second. Six new products and two Kickstarter campaigns have launched out of the unit, the same pipeline that sat stuck when the business had nowhere to put it.
The daily rhythm shows why. Orders come in every day. His employee pulls them, writes thank-you cards by hand, and walks the packages down the hall to the USPS and UPS pickup area. Once or twice a week a container shipment from overseas comes in off the dock on a pallet jack, gets counted into inventory, and goes on the shelf.
In between, the same 1,400 square feet handles product design, bracelet assembly with a crew of high school kids, quality control at a table by receiving, and staging for the van and the trade show booth.
“It’s just awesome, like this operational space where we can both work in.”
Inventory counts used to mean driving to whichever basement had the boxes. Now it is a walk around the corner.
Kindred Spirits Down the Hall
The neighbors turned out to matter more than he expected. ReadySpaces hosts member gatherings a couple of times a year, and those have turned into working conversations about Amazon accounts, ad strategy, and the ordinary problems of running a product company.
“All kindred spirits here at ReadySpaces, right? We’re all entrepreneurs.”
And when something goes sideways, it gets handled. A heavy rainstorm once produced a few drips in the unit. The team came and fixed it.
“Good people, good landlords to have. They stay out of your way unless you invite them in.”
What He’d Tell a Founder Still in the Garage
Asked what he would tell a founder still working out of a basement, Mojica keeps it practical: stop waiting for a traditional lease to make sense, and go find space that can grow with the business.
Asked for the one piece of advice he actually lives by, he gets shorter.
“Filter out the noise and listen to the signal.”
You can see the full Outdoor Element line at outdoorelement.com, or follow along at @outdoor.element on Instagram.