On today's episode, I sit down with Jamey Stegmaier, Co-Founder & CEO of Stonemaier Games — the studio behind modern board game staples like Wingspan, Scythe, and Viticulture. We dig into what it actually takes to run a board game company at scale: the economics of manufacturing in China, navigating tariffs and freight costs, the true timeline of bringing a game from idea to shelf, and how Stonemaier thinks about margins, value, and customer trust.

Jamey also opens up about the early Kickstarter era, budgeting mistakes that almost sunk the company, why they eventually walked away from crowdfunding altogether, and how that decision changed their business overnight. We talk art investment, digital vs. physical revenue, distribution strategy, working with retailers, hiring slowly, and why he’s far more interested in serving existing fans than chasing “growth for growth’s sake.”

It’s a transparent, thoughtful look at an industry that rarely gets discussed through an operational lens — and one of the most insightful conversations I’ve had about building a product-driven company. I hope you enjoy this one as much as I did.