Final Advice and Closing Thoughts

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And stick around to the end because we checked back in with the callerers to hear what's happened since this episode first aired back in August of twenty twenty five We'll be back next week with a brand new adviceeline episode featuring Christina Tosi from Milk Bar. Super fun episode. Can't wait for you guys to hear that And without further ado, here is the episode for this week. Enjoy. Hello and welcome to the Avice Line on How I Build this Lab. I'm Guy Ros. This is the place where we help try to solve your business challenges. Each week, I'm joined by a legendary founder, a former guest on this show who will help me try to help you. And if you're building something and you need advice, give us a call and you just might be the next guest on the show. Our number is one eight hundred four three three one two nine eight. Send us a one minute message that tells us about your business and the issues or questions that you'd like help with And you can also send us a voice memo at hIBt at . wondery. com and make sure to tell us how to reach you And also, don't forget to sign up for my newsletter. It's full of insights and ideas from some of the world's greatest entrepreneurs. You can sign up for free at guyRS dot com or on Substack. And we'll put all of this info in the podcast description. All right, let's get to it Joining me this week is Tim Ferris. He's an entrepreneur, investor, host of the Tim Ferris Sh, and author of many books, including the fourour hour workk week, Tim. It's great to have you back on the show Thanks for having me back, so nice to see you You too, Tim, you were first on how I buuilt this back in twenty twenty. And's always, for anyone listening, if you haven't heard that episode, it's so good. We'll put a link to it in the episode description so check it out. In that episode, Tim, we talked about time as a student and learning Japanese and how you got a sales job out of college, and then you started your own business, a supplement company, and then of course publish your first book, which many people know you for the four hour work weeknd initially you couldn't even find a publisher. and the story of how you managed to use your blog to get it out there, and sold millions of copies, became a massive bestseller. And of course, since then you've written several other books. You've launched a massively successful podcast, which hit a billion downloads last year. Congratulations. Thank you Give us a little bit of an update about what's been going on in your life since we last spoke Well, there are a number of simultaneously running chapters. So supporting a lot of early stage science. And then I would say every M three to four years, I want to try something completely off menu professionally to see what I can learn The Angel Inesting after the success of the first book, the podcast after the third book. etcetera. And now I've spent two years working on a This is a tabletop analog game that is called cooyote is now launching everyverywhere I think part of your story for people who haven't heard it is that you kind of follow your your passions and your interests in ways that led you to do not just interesting things, but things that have been lucrative that have worked out. Like your podcast was just kind of started out as just a fun little project which turned into a real business. Now you're doing a card game which is totally out of left field. Tell me about how you pire this idea. So I tend to explore these off menu Adellet field things for skill development, learning and new relationships. right? So the podcast, I launched it as a Lark, but I I basically wanted to ask myself, how could this win even if it fails? And I did the same thing with Angel investing, just treated it as paying for a business degree. So In this particular case, I'm looking at it the same way and it came about because I have seen in my audience is sorely needed as an antidote to digital malise and loneliness, which is in person social time with something that is a light lift. So could I design game that takes about two minutes to learn ten minutes to play can help people offset their screen time and all of the things that come with excessive screen time. with family, with friends that hopefully makes you a little bit smarter, right And I wonder whether some of that came out of your own experience. Like did you find yourself maybe at certain points in the last decade, just Being You know, a slave to screens to your phone to whatever was in front of you Oh, for sure. This is basically creating what I want more of in my own life, certainly for the last I'd say two, maybe three years, I've had no social media apps on my phone because if you think if you think you're going to use discipline to be schems of ational neuroscientists and statisticians and computer scientists who have billions of dollars at stake in ensuring that they can overcome any type of resistance you have to using their program or platform compulsively, you're just bringing a butter knife to a gunfight. And I think it's uncontroversial when you look at scientific literature these technologies like there are costs So my thought is J just to offset it Try to offset it a little bit And I think that in person still counts. We are not evolved for two dimensional screens at eighteen inches ten hours a day. That is not what were evolved to handle at all But I really think that there is a quality of life value to in person. and we see some countervailing trends, so for instance, in New York City, these massive game nights in person have become a big thing running clubs, people getting off of dating apps. I think that at the very least, you know, microdosing analog is a good idea Yeah with other people. I agree with you. I mean, we just had there's a crisis in a attention. And this is relevant for entrepreneurs, right? Because I think Many of the entrepreneurs I interview on this show also have multiple interests. I mean, their passion might be their business or the thing they started. But I think that in many examples sort of the underlying foundation for their success has to do with being interested in lots of different things. And I wonder how you find those things. I would say that just I throw a lot against the wall and part of the reason that I do Many different things. by the way, some of them have been dead ends and failures. But if you look at say, the Angel Investing, it's still going. If look at the podcast, it's still going. And these are things that provide energy and recharge the batteries All right, so the energy that you might get playing a game. spending time with. two particular friends You can transfer that to everything else that you do And that's part of the reason why I think a lot of startup founders in particular could benefit from a little bit of identity diversification If your entire identity and self worth is wrapped up in your company. There are too many factors outside of your control that can give you a real curveball type of damage. And I just know dozens of founders where If they have a bad quarter or they have a bad here They feel like a failure. and for that reason, having a few current. projects allows you to make progress in other areas to offset lack of progress in another And then you just you're like, okay, this is the one out of twenty that seems to get me super excited for some reason. Let me just follow that scent trail and see where it goes I love that All right, Tim, let's go ahead and bring in our first caller. You ready I'm ready All right, hello caller, welcome to the Avice Line You're on with Tim Ferris. Tell us your name, where you're calling from and just one quick line about your business Hi Gy, Hi Tim. I'm Lauren Menard I'm usually based in San Francisco actually, but I'm in my hometown in Beakmontown, New York right now. I'm the CEO and founder of Gob, and we are on a mission to reinvent single use personal care products that disappear after you use them as they should All right, so what's your product? ur first product is a single use foam earplug made entirely out of mycelium which is for mushrooms Yes, it's the root structure of a mushroom. Amazing. Congratulations. Thanks for calling in So Lauren, the product that you have now They're earplugs, like regular earplugs, except I guess, and I've always wondered this because I've used earplugs a lots of you like, you throw them away probably mainly plastic. Ys, what they biodegrade Yeah, so normal foam earplugs, they're all made out of pure petroleum. They're polyurethane or PVC and they're really bad for you and the planet. And ours are a bioengineered material foam that's actually biofabricated, It's grown into its form Wow, and how did nobody ever think of this before You know, that's exactly why I started the company guy. When I had the ideas like, why has no one done this yet Yeah, tell me how you came up with this. arere you an engineer by background? or tell me a little about what you were doing before? So I'm an industrial designer. I was running a design agency. thought that was going to be the rest of my life working with large Fortune five hundred companies helping them bridge the gap between mass manufacturing and better materials. And you launched the business when, when did you launch it Gob Just the middle of March this year Wow, and tell me a little bit about how you're doing so far. I mean, you're selling mainly to who and kind of traction are you saying Yeah, so we sell directly on our website currently and also in a number of music venues. and That's a bit about like why I'm here and asking you a question Go ahead Lch. what's your question So we're really lucky to be gaining mega traction in the live event space with actually a national partnership with a massive company that owns many venues And at the same time, we're growing a really strong direct to consumer customer base for sleep So my question and I'd love both of your advice is around How to successfully scale T very different verticals simultaneously without losing focus. All right, awesome questions. I'm going to bring Tim Ferrison and Tim questions maybe for Lauren or thoughts about her question Lauren, if you had to focus on, say the venues or the DTC Oh God. Which right now, let's just say you had to make a decision, whichich way would you go and why Oh, that's really tough because on the sleep side of things, we're getting customer feedback like we're getting a lot of rave reviews of I feel like we're really finding that need and we're meeting that need. On the venue side of things, however, you know, we have access to guaranteed eyeballs Thousands, sometimes tens of thousands in a night And Basically, we're meeting people in these culturally emotional moments. And Tim, you were mentioning IRL experiences. That's where people really connect with brands. So that's why I'm so torn Guide, you mind if I ift for a second? Yeah, please I would actually be curious to know if you think it could make sense build up your coffers and generate a nice, healthy, reliable stretch of income with the music venues and that puts you in a position to experiment with different ways of acquiring customers on the D toC side. And then you can make an informed decision based on at least some math and history, which way you want to go Do you have any any feelings on where you want to go with this company for yourself. Do you want to be some type of investor backed company or do you want to maintain control. and remain private Great question. So we are actually investor backed. We raised a pretty seed last year of a million dollars and I'm currently raising our seed on a safe note So we do have that outside investment, but basically because my dream and my vision of this company is to build it into a new category, And I intend to find these kind of forgotten aboutal single use personal care products and adopt biomaterials that can meet the need Right? And because of the nature of biomaterials, there needs to be a little bit of R and D that requires some funding. So basically, that's why I've had to do that thus far, but I intend to build this into a very large company. I want to take on three M. If you're if you're I'm an ambitionious. I know three M. I can tell. All right, I want to pass it over to guys like I'm hogging the mic. No, no, it is great, Laurea. I'm curious with AEG, how does that relationship or how will it work? Will they sell the earplugs at their concerts Yeahes, so we pay a marketing fee or sponsorship fe to be there for the full year at each venue And we keep one hundred percent of the revenue And we sell both at concessions. So we have these little light boxes near all the cans of drinks. And we also have gob green bright vending machines Okay. Are you able to work to make independent deals with other music festivals and or you do you are you exclusively tied in with AEG now? We are their exclusive hearing protection, but we are not exclusive. We can definitely work with other venues One of the things I think of, of course, where you are in San Francisco, outside lands, one of the biggest festivals where people would be more receptive to really listening and hearing about the story. But the other thing I keep thinking about is airlines. where people have time to really look at a package and open particularly in first class when they get do people get these kits in first class and they get a card with all the information about the products in there. And to me, it seems like an opportunity to get this in front of pretty influential group of people. approach airlines We have, yes, and we're definitely going down that path. It takes a bit of time, but what's interesting is some of our angel investors have invested because they have received those kits in business class. and everything is quote unquote, sustainable, but they still have the little foam earplugs in the plastic pouch. So that's actually a fun fact that that's what actually led quite a few people to investing in my company When you are so you're planning on raising around in the not too distant future What is the slide in that deck going to say for how we plan to use all your money, dear investors? the deck is together. So there we go. I'm in it, I'm in it. So basically the funds will be used to set up operations. so we manufacture in the United States and we need to scale up our operations because right now we're building all of our product in a tiny little space in San Francisco and definitely need to move that into a three PL on the east coast because that's where a lot of our attraction is. And we're also using that capital, but I would be lying if I said I wasn't using some of it for marketing, right? Yeah. I do have a bit of an allergy these days to advertising heavily on social media because it's just like so competitive and saturated. So I want to use that in smart ways to do IRL experiences actually Well and also I don't know if this is part of your deal, but if you have spponsorship deals, right? Hopefully you have the ability, I don't know if this can be negotiated, but to use that brand on your website as right exclusive hearing protection provider to X. I don't know if that's something you can finagle, but using that as part of your marketing for social credibility for some of the deep to seea stuff. Yeah. But what I'm hearing from you, Tim, is that This ability to capture eyeballs and capture people in real ways in these BW B spaces is maybe more impactful gaining trust of consumers. is that what I'm hearing I think that that's one way to approach it I wouldn't say it's more effective wr large, but it may be more effective for your stge of funding If that makes sense. Right. Because if you were like, all right, we're gonna to go full D to C, you're gonna need more than one person do everything that willll be required to make good use of investor funding to make that count as like you said, in a very competitive certainly online landscape, which is why you lean towards IRL But if you had the right employee or contractors for selling into more Let's just call it venue conglomerates that run multiple locations. you could actually get a lot done with one like one full time, one part time or several part time And I think that's harder to do consumer If that makes sense. It doesense. I agree. I keep thinking about monster energy drinks, right? And what they did and how they scaled so quickly was they made a decision when they were launched that they were going to work with Motocross and MMA and heavy metal concerts. And so they focused on those three areas, targeted those fans, those kinds of people. They were going after men who loved heavy metal music and Monster became the number two best selling energy drink very quickly. And it's interesting here because you've got the music venues, but it sounds like the sleep side is really where you see an opportunity And I wonder whether there's an opportunity to partner with some of these brands that are known for sleep, you know, a certain mattress brand or somethingomet connected to sleep if if that's something that you want to Tours Yeah, that's a really great thought. and it's complicated, right? Because the use cases that we're attracting are so opposite And so those brand partnerships feel very And because they already have leverage and they already have an audience, which is really nice and good for us. And I will note, you mentioned Monster Energy. I am very lucky to have just hired the XVP of Cult indoctrination from Liquid Death. We just joined our team this week. He's going to be going out there and trying to get as many new brand partnerships as possible. So I'll give him that task of looking more into the sleep side just as much as the venue side. Awesome. Luren, what is the the retail price. Yeah, so we sell our smallest skew, which is two pairs for five dollars. four pairs for ten And before us, the venue was selling One single pair of foamies for between five to ten dollars., yeah,. So we're right in there. Yeah, in a really good position There you go Lore Menard brands called Gybirth. Congrats, good luck, keepe us posted Thank you so much. What a exciture in All right. Thankk you. Thanks a lot Aesome. thans I love that idea. It's a cool idea. One earirplug like hack that I used when my kids were little when they were babies, we would go and we'd get on an airplane Because you get an airplane with a baby and you almost oftentimes you'll sit next to somebody and you can just tell they're just like, oh my God, I gotta sit next to this person with a baby for the next four hours. And what we would do to disarm people is I would go to the people in the room in front and behind and say, Hey, I have a baby. There's a chance he's gonna cry. but I've brought some earplugs, and if anyone would like some, please take some bag and I'd pass it around and nobody would ever take the airplugs, but they would always be so nice to us. becausecause we just made that gesture. So have bring parent. I love that. Bring a bag of airplugs cost you four dollars CVS or nine doars ninety five cents if you get gotob. My buddy had an adjacent strategy, which was anybody want a vodka tonic? I'm buying everybody drinks. I love it. That's great. That's great. A little bit more expensive than yourugs, but yeah, not also. Usually exclusive All right, we're gonna take a quick break, but we'll be right back with another callar and another round of advice. Stay with us, I'm Guy Ros, and you're listening to the advice line right here on how I built this lab When it comes to your health and well beinging, the right care can change everything That's why Cleveland Clinic has been elevating world class patient care for over a century. Fom the most specialized heart, neurology, and cancer treatments to the latest surgical innovations and beyond. Cleveland Clinic is here for every care in the world whether you're exploring advanced care or just looking after your health All the info you need is waiting for you at clelevelandclinic. orgot Work can be a little weird. I've had plenty of those moments early in my career and honestly even later. I remember stretches where I wasn't totally sure what the next step was supposed to be. And that's the thing, work isn't always a straight line And that's where LinkedIn comes in LinkedIn helps you tap into ideas and insights from people who've been where you are Connect with others in your field, grow your network, and access tools that can actually help you find the right next steps Whether you're just getting started, thinking about a change or trying to accelerate where you are LinkedIn is built to support you at every stage. Because LinkedIn is the network that works for you. Visit linkedIn dot com slash h IBT to learn more Every business is now asking the same question How do we make AI work for us? The possibilities are endless and guessing is too risky But sitting on the sidelines is not an option because one thing is almost certain Your competitors are already making their move. No more waiting. With Netsuite by Oracle, you can put AI to work today Next week is the number one AI cloud ERP trusted by over forty three thousand businesses. It's a unified suite that brings your financials, inventory, commerce, HR, and CRM into a single source of truth connected data is what makes your AI smarter doesn't just guess, it knows how to automate routine tasks, deliver actionable insights, and help you cut costs From software and IT services to healthcare, equipment manufacturing, financial services, and many other great American industries, Netuite delivers a customized solution for your business If your revenues are at least in the seven figures, get their free business guide deemystifying AI at netsuite d. com slash built The guide is free to you at netssuite dot com slash built. netssuite d. com slash built Welcome back to the Vice Line on how I built this lab. I'm Guy Ross. and my guest today is entrepreneur and investor Tim Ferris, and we are taking your calls. so hello, hello caller Hi. My name is Emily. I own EB and C, which is a women's accessories brand based out of Kansas City, Missouri. We specialize in sizeless gifting and we have mainly hair accessories and jewelry. We were founded in twenty twelve and yeah, a Midwest girly Nice, Emily, welcome to the show. So EB and and co accessories. So like hairbands, like are you selling rings, earrings, bracelets All of the above and more. earrings are kind of the big hero products for us. I have a manufacturer in India that I work with that does hand beaded stuff. so we have some custom headbands Scrunchies, all the fun things that make an outfit look more finished when it's not. Awesome. and you have a brick and mortar store in Kansas City? I have two brick and mortar stores. I also wholesale at the airport and I rent booths inside other stores as well And are most of your sales coming in through the store? Are you also selling online? whereere you seeing most of your revenue come in from Well, last year was a bit of an outlier because Taylor Swift wore my ring and we went v. She wore one of your rings. A bit of a the ring What was the ring she was wearing Well, it was Travis Kelsey themed, of course, guy. Oh jersey. and we developed a relationship with Donna and we kept gifting her things that were Travis Kelsey themed that we created. and Donna's his mom, right? Yeah, my apolog. Okay I got you. Okay. So you made rings that had a like his jersey was on the ring. Like like it's okay, I gota. So Taylor Swift wore one of your rings Yeah to the AFC championship, which go or the Super Bowl. So if you can imagine my mind being blown and then all of a sudden like that shopified ding happening you it just like ding ding ding ding ding d. Okay. now'm now I'm looking at now I see it because you have all you've got these rings with the jerseys. So you have Taylor Swift wore one of these rings and I imagine It had an impact on your sales, right Yeah, so my sales went up fifty percent from twenty twenty three to twenty twenty four. Wow Wow, amazing. So yeah, we doubled And it's been bananas. It's been a wild ride, and I hope to give her the biggest bear hug someday. I bet. All right, so tell us what your question is for us today So my question is in twenty twenty four My brick and mortar sales went up thirty seven percent My wholesale orders went up over three hundred percent And so I'm trying to decide, even though the majority of my business, about ninety percent of my revenue coming in is in that retail direct to consumer. My wholesale side is what has a much significant more growth So should I follow what is where the money's coming from or should I follow areas growing most aggressively All right, lots to think about. Tim Ferris. I want to bring you in here questions for Emily Yeah, sure. Well, congrats on a lot of different aspects of the business. You've made it past a lot of places where other companies do not cross the river so to speak. so congrats on that Yeah, I don't even know what to say about Taylor Swift, I would say You know, that may be a non reccurring phenomenon And so I probably don't want to bank on that, but God, congratulations Let me ask a couple of questions related to products. Are the earrings the best selling category of products? Yes. Okay By how much ' say about fifty percent Okay, so so the earrings are huge In terms of this is coming to your question related to wholesale and say the brick and mortar. So you're talking about revenue. If we're talking about bottom line profit, however you want to define that What What is actually contributing the most at the moment? It's still the is it still the brick and mortar, would you say Yes, the retail side for sure. So DaC definitely gives us more revenue. Last year it accounted for eighty nine percent of all the revenue and thirteen percent was wholesale. You know, the great thing about wholesale is that, you know there's not as many expenses, right? At the same time, it's just not accounting for as much revenue. So that's why I'm having a hard time deciding which area to focus. If you were to Bically get the wholesale up to the point that it was generating the same as your current brick and mortar. How would you feel about that versus keeping the wholesaleer where it is and basically doing the same doubling, but with Fickin and mort I mean, wholesale is great because it essentially acts as a Sopify order. It's just bigger. And I already have all those systems in place. You know, I have a fulfillment manager, I have an assistant manager. We ship out of our store. So it doesn't take more calories for me to execute that But opening more stores takes a lot more energy, right? Like I have to approve everything and you know go sites and find what feels good, negotiate, know wholesale is just another online order, which doesn't take any energy for me. So I would love that. and that's one reason why we're putting so much energy into growing that. But it's just hard to prioritize it that much when ninety percent of the revenue is coming from direct to consumer. Emily, do you have a sales team or a sales person who focuses on wholesale? me. you Yeah. Yeah. ye. I mean, is there a world where you can hire somebody maybe even on a part time basis to only focus on building the wholesale business Yes, totally. I mean, I think that has some lgs to it for sure. I'm really trying to focus also on like customized pieces too. and that was a new area that we're developing So I've been really focusing a lot on building those direct to other business like relationships, but that's definitely something that I want to work on. And have you done trade shows? any trade shows I haven't, I haven't. No. becausecause that would really be the the fastest way for you to get some wholesale deals done I mean, it sounds like you really want to build the wholesale part of your business out. that what you're saying is potential is greater there, which I agree with. and In some ways, it it's easier. There are obviously downsides too, but it's easier with what you are doing rather than trying to open up, you know, other brick and mortars because brick and mortar is expensive. It's challenging. There's a lot of A lot of moving parts there and depends and relies on foot traffic Yeah, for sure. And it's done really well for me. And so I think that's another thing that's like Man, it's a lot of fun to have a space where people enjoy, you know talking about your digital detoxing, like getting out of your house, getting off of your computer, walking around a store, trying things on. So I enjoy creating those spaces. Well let me hop in here for a second just to say I don't want to discount that So If the only thing that mattered for your quality of life were growing the business, then there would be one line of thought and a certain set of advice that we could give People start businesses and run businesses for a million different reasons and not everyone's trying to build the next startup that they sell to meta or Google or whoever, right? So If you really enjoy the time in those spaces, I think that number one, they're not mutually exclusive, but you could take attention on growing brick and mortar and apply it to wholesale for a period of time. right? You decide like for six to twelve months, I'm really going to focus on wholesale. can still keep the brick and mortar running, but maybe there are places where we can streamline, Maybe there's extra help I can bring in. And I agree with guy that Trade shows could be interesting also, you don't necessarily need a booth. If you just have samples of your products, you can meet not only direct wholesale customers, but also potential distributors. That's going to affect your profit margins. So I think it's relatively speaking, very low cost way of doing a lot of really valuable in person research Yeah, totally. And you know, when people get their hands on it, they are like, I'm in. And so yeah, I think I can definitely see your point in that. When people try it on, it's It's easy y I think Tim's idea is great Make makeake a decision that you're going to spend six to twelve months on this thing on this wholesale side and test it out And and you're trying to position yourself for the day after the Taylor Swift bump ends, but then you won't need it anymore because you've built out the wholesale business Yeah, I think that sounds great. You know, I try to get some brain quick in today and I couldn't get my hand. I was like what's gonna make me a sharper shooter?cing. Yeah it's been a few decades. I sold it, so I'm not sure what they did with it, maybe G God set out to pasture for all I know. Emily Bordner, the brand is called EB and C. Conggrats, goodood luck. Keep us posted Thank you. and I just want to say you both have been so instrumental in inspiring me to make my business. So thank you Thank you. Thanks for saying that. Yeah. that's awesome Okay, nextxt up after the break, another collar with another business challenge Guy Rz and we're answering your business questions right here advice line on how I built this lab. Building a marketplace is easy. Building one with a soul is hard In an industry where healthcare is being handed over to AI and algorithms, Mochi Health's founder Mayra Ahmad saw a gap that needed fixing She built a positive disruptor that proves you can scale technology without losing humanity Mochi is already a powerhouse in weight loss. They've helped four hundred thousand members lose over five million pounds. 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Framer is a website builder that turns dot coms from a formality into a tool for growth, helping thousands of businesses from early stage startups to Fortune five hundreds build better websites faster Whether you want to launch a new site Test a few landing pages or migrate your full. com Framer has programs for every size of business to make going from idea to live site as easy as possible. Learn how you can get more out of your d. com from a framer specialist or get started building for free today at framer d. com slash built thirty percent off, a Framer pro annual plan frramer d. com slash built percent off. Framer d. com slash built. Rules and restrictions may apply Welcome back to the advice line on how I Built this lab. I'm Guy Rosz, and today I'm taking your calls with entrepreneur, investor, author, and podcaster Tim Ferris. Tim, you ready to get our next call on I am ready. let's do it. All right, let's bring in our final caller. Welcome to the Iice Line. You are on with Tim Ferris. Tell us your name where you're calling from and just a little bit about your business Hey, Tim and Gy, thank you so much for having me. I'm Kimberly Becker and I'm a clothing designer calling in from Woolwich, Maine brand is Kay Becker It's a collection that I've designed with a focus on women over forty years old, which is me. And this is a group of women who have been looking for high quality clothes for quite a long time. It's an underserved population in the fashion industry. And you design all the clothing? I did really Wow, amazing. And they're manufactured overseas in Asia? No, I have a team in New York City and the fabrics are sourced from Japan and Italy, mostly Wow. A lot of deadstock fabric. so most of the fabric is quite sustainably sourced and really high quality. And deeadstock means fabric that was that one manufactured too much of and so was available. Yeah. That's awesome. I love that. And I'm looking at your website now and it'd beautiful. I mean, amazing You studied as a fashion designer is that your background? I'm actually a textile designer by training, which I bring a unique angle to the apparel industry. I worked in almost every cotton mill in America before they all closed. Wow. And it's got a little bit of an Eileen Fisher kind of vibe to go in for a little bit. Yeah. so I listened to your interview with her years ago, yes. Yes. She really, I mean changed the fashion industry for women, gave women a way to dress in that sort of Japanese aesthetic is so timeless and so beautiful I almost think of myself as her alter ego. We're not trying to make sort of a simple boxy silhouette. We're trying to bring style, fashion forward, sort of whatever was on the Paris runways so that it's not dumbed down. It's not timeless.'s shapeless. How many years have you been doing this? So I launched in october twenty twenty three, so I'm quite new From year one to year two, we've doubled our sales. I sell direct to consumer on my website, but Really primarily, I'm doing this all in person. So you are the designer and the CEO and the sales rep. It's all you, basically. Basically. Yeah. And have you broken past one hundred thousand in sales, two hundred thousand sales? At the end of this year, I believe we'll be at seventy five thousand in sales Slow and steady here. Awesome. All right, let's hear your questions and then we'll dive in a bit deeper. Okay, so I want to shift away from an inventory model to a pre order model. In other words, you're carrying inventory and you want to shift away from that model. Yeah. So being a small sustainable indie brand, we can't compete with the huge corporations that massively over prodduce and then deeply discount and unload at the end of the season It doesn't work for us financially and it's also just not sustainable. It's not good for the Eth to be doing it that way. However, the US population isn't so gameed to wait five, six, seven weeks for a garment. So the idea of pre order is that we actually take the orders and then manufacture what's ordered. So my question is sort of twofold, when do I make that move from an inventory model? And how do I shift the mindset fromom instant gratification to patience knowing you're going to get something great at the end of the day. Yeah, a lot to think about here. And as you know, we've done a lot of apparel on the show and for people who are unfamiliar with the industry, you've got to anticipate what somebody' is going to order and the more you make the higher the chanceces you're going to lose money because you're making these all these high quality material making it in New York. So I understand the challenge and you're looking at a way to basically show off a design, but but get taken pre orders. So then you've got the money in hand And then you only order what you neede of instead of having all this excess inventory, right? Exactly. Okay Tim Ferris, I want to bring you in here. lots s bike Kimberly's I know, she's doing is awesome. but you know, consumer behavior is consumer behavior. Mhm All right, so I'm looking at the website. I like the website, by the way. F very elegantly done. I had a definition question for me because I've sadly no fashion since. But what does choose the first piece of your capsule closet today mean? what does capsule closet? So in the sustainability world, the idea of a capsule closet is that you can have ten, fifteen, eighteen pieces that you can mix and match, you can wear again and again That's the idea. I actually have clients that are basically every time I release a new piece, which I think of as the next piece in the capsule closet. They are buying it. They're like, I'm building my capsule through you Okay. Tim, you do have a capsule closet. I do do Ians. It wast match So couple of thoughts I would say One company you might want to check out It's runun by a friend of mine, but it just so happens. there might be some parallels. It could be pretty interesting. His name is Sep, but it's spelled S pH Sart. propercloth. com is his company and He makes people wait And the company has been going for I wantna say ten years now It started off with something like ten different fabrics and one type of shirt in his apartment. and now it's this very successful company So I would There are exceptions to the U. S. customers not being ready to wait. So I would go out of your way to try to find some of those outliers The second thing is that in terms of when to make the switch, I would reframe that question. How do I experiment Because that's a risky switch And so what I thought of were say, limited drops where donon't make a full switch. but you test the waters to say Hey guys, we're running a really limited edition as an experiment. Here's why it's exciting The race goes to the Swift. We're only accepting this many orders and then You're going to have to wait four to six weeks, right? But you make it a feature instead of a bug. That's a great idea. And it would go right it would dovetail beautifully with the short amount small amounts of fabric I'm sourcing in those dead stock Like It beautiful Italian fabrics I can only get eighty seven yards of or something. So that. Yeahah, like that That's part of the story. I wonder if the term pre order be could you could you say made to order? I don't know if that's going to make a difference or move the needle that much, but maybe pre order scares people because they think, oh, it's like a kickstarter. you Right. You know, how many times have you given money may or may not get sh E ever arrives But maybe made to order like hate you know, we're going to you put the you make this order and we're going to start we're going to right away. It's worth trying. againg, I may not move the needle, but it's worth trying playing around a language. That's a great idea. Yeah. Kimberly, I'm wondering, I mean, are you hoping to move exclusively to this model so In the long run, yes, it's