← Her Style Podcast | Shopping, Color Palettes, Fashion, Wardrobe, Outfits, Clothing
Her Style Podcast | Shopping, Color Palettes, Fashion, Wardrobe, Outfits, Clothing
245 | The RealReal Founder, Julie Wainwright, on Redefining Trends and Going for Your Dreams
00:38:33
Today’s guest is someone I’ve admired for years, and I know you’re going to walk away from this conversation feeling seriously inspired. I had the privilege of sitting down with Julie Wainwright, founder of the billion-dollar luxury resale...
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- [00:00]
Julie Wainwright
Today's guest is someone I've admired for years, and I know you're going to walk away from this conversation feeling seriously inspired. I had the privilege of sitting down with Julie Wainwright, founder of the billion dollar luxury resale powerhouse, the RealReal. Julie launched the RealReal at age 52, not long after someone labeled her unemployable. Fast forward just a few years and she became one of only 23 women in history to take a company from startup to ipo. And if you've ever sold or shopped designer pieces on the Re RealReal, you've personally experienced her revolutionary impact on the fashion industry. In this episode, we dive into what inspired Julie to launch a company that changed the way we shop. Luxury fashion. Her advice for becoming a better problem solver and taking bold action in your life. Her perspective on how to spot trends and shop smarter online. And maybe most importantly, how to rewrite the narrative around age and self worth. Because Julie is proof that it's never too late to chase your big dreams. Plus, she's sharing a sneak peek into her brand new book, Time to get How I Built a Billion Dollar Business that Rocked the Fashion Industry which drops tomorrow. Fashion and business. You know I am all over this one. So whether you're here for the style talk, the business brilliance, or just some good old fashioned motivation, trust me, you are going to love this conversation. Let's get into it.
- [01:29]
Heather Riggs
Welcome to her style podcast where we're all about empowering you to show and get dressed every day with confidence. I'm your host, Heather Riggs, a 15 year and counting certified image consultant and color specialist, ready to build a wardrobe and a personal style you love. Let's get started.
- [01:55]
Julie Wainwright
Well, I am, as I said, incredibly honored to have you on the show and I want to hear a little bit about you on a personal level so we can all get to know you. But I also want to ask the question that I think all of my listeners are dying to hear about, which is what inspired you to create the RealReal, which so many of us shop and love to this day. And I'm curious, what need you saw that filling in the fashion industry? So tell us a little bit about you and then let's dive right into that part of your story.
- [02:22]
Well, I've been a tech entrepreneur for a very long time and to be honest, after I had one big failure and pets.com years ago and I was one of those people that was a CEO to hire, all right, not a founder and a recruiter, basically said you're washed up no one's going to hire you again because you're a big failure and you haven't done a lot after that. And I had had success after success and then I did have a failure. And so then I had to make a decision, start my own company or figure out a whole different lifestyle. So the first thing I did was analyze this is back in 2010, what Amazon could do and can't do well, since you're always going to be competing with them on some level. And I thought one of them was luxury. And I thought, well, I'm not going to start a luxury brand. It's never going to happen. But I had it in the back of my mind and I thought, Amazon will never do luxury and I'll still stake my claim on that. And then I was shopping with a girlfriend. So again, I have to figure out my own business now, right, to play the playing field. But I have no ideas. I had ideas. I was exploring them. Nothing was panning out. But I'm shopping with a girlfriend in a beautiful full price boutique that has a little bit of consignment in the back that the owner of the boutique called the Vault. And that's where my girlfriend shopped. And I'd never seen her buy consignment before. And it was all luxury brands. I'd never seen her shop on ebay. So when we got out, I asked her about her shopping, what just happened in front of my eyes. And she said, julie, I bought Louis Vuitton, Gucci, Prada at an amazing price. Who cares if they're previously owned? I don't care. And I said, but would you ever shop on ebay? She said, no, too many fakes. I said, would you ever shop in a consignment search? She goes, no, I don't like them. I'm like, but you will buy, you know, consignment. She goes, I didn't look at it that way. I looked at beautiful things. I trust the owner because she knows the people gave it to her that these are authentic. I bought beautiful things at a great price. And I thought, that is it. That's when I'm like, you know, because I already had this framework in my brain and I knew it right then. I and I knew the exact structure of the business. So I went home, I researched the luxury market. I and it's huge, obviously, you know, and then I looked at my own closet because I had never consigned before and I had 660 things that I were sort of shoved in the back. And I thought These could be making money for me. I tried out ebay, which was very, very difficult, not satisfying. Brick and mortar stores, both for jewelry, which were, I write in the book, which are really creepy because you had to go to a pawn shop and they were really creepy. And then brick and mortar consignment stores. And I knew I could build a phenomenal business. And here's the other thing I knew. This is all from that one shopping excursion. I knew I had to authenticate things to give trust to the consumer. I knew I had to focus only on luxury and make sure it's these curated goods. Because the other thing that she said pretty clearly was I don't want to dig through, through all these things to get to something. I knew I had to provide a service to go to people's home because it's too hard to consign. If I have to think about what goes in a box and then send it to someone, it's not going to happen. So I knew we needed a service component and I knew the market would be huge. So I started that was in November 2010. And I raised a little bit of money, had a name, had everything going in March, did all my research, had a plan in March, and we opened our doors in June. And I had one employee because I know your podcast is her style, because I am not a merchant, all right? I am not. I love luxury products. I love luxury brands, especially if it's resale and. But I'm not a merchant, and I knew I needed a merchant. So that was the hire I had to make because I also knew we had to revolutionize the way people were viewing previously owned goods. If we did it the way other people were doing it, instead of showing how cool they are and not breaking the romance of the brand, we would lose. We had to change perceptions and make sure that we show these amazing brands in their space where they're honored. So as opposed to just putting something in the back of a closet or something. So editorial and. And merchandising was critical and I knew I couldn't do it because that's not my skill set. So my first hire was a great merchant who's turned out to be a great executive over time and is now the CEO of the RealReal, Rachi Levesque. She was Rachi Sahi at the time, and so she and I basically started in my house, in my kitchen.
- [07:25]
Oh, my goodness. This is incredible. You absolutely accomplished everything that you set out to do with that company. And it's just amazing to hear how this One little seed of an idea exploded and so quickly. And I'm already gleaning wisdom from you on how you knew your strengths and your weaknesses right as the founder, and how you really set out to solve this problem in a way that was going to appeal to your ideal client. Just so many things that you did right. And obviously it was a huge success and is still loved by, I know so many of my listeners today, and I would love to hear what tips you could share to help us all be better problem solvers and action takers like this in our lives.
- [08:06]
So I think the best thing is, and I know this is an issue, but I'm actually a really good thinker this way. And for me it's like, what is the most important thing that will change the trajectory of my business? It could be your life, but let's just stick in business. So if you look at it and the real world had more than one, we had to authenticate for the consumer. We had to offer service for the consigner. There was another one I knew we had to do. I knew the Internet would price better because. Because so many more people than anyone. Like, then you would have. It would provide better data in a marketplace than an individual would. And I also knew personal experience. If I paid $3,000 for a dress and the market says it's 500, I'd be like, wait, what? I would price it much higher. But in fact, it may never sell. So I knew that we had to let pricing algorithms and the Internet price set the price, even though the real rail sets the price, it's based on a very complex data set. So all of those things I knew. And then. But I'll tell you the overall thing I knew. If I didn't have good supply, nothing mattered. So I had to solve the supply. So what I created, which everyone can do, is like reverse engineer, what's the most important problem you have to solve? Put a plan in place for that. Now, I did for supply and I tried multi. And the other thing is, once you put a plan in place, try multiple things, because there's a good chance maybe it will work, maybe it won't, and you have to be objective on that. So the other thing I always say, which is so true and no one believes it, but I'm telling you it's true and entrepreneurs know it. You have to be at the beginning, only 51% right. If you're 51% right, everything will start working and then you fine tune it to raise your odds up. But if you're below 50%, you won't get your results. So you have to be more right than wrong. But not, you don't have to be a perfectionist. This is I, I consult with someone in the business who's spending so on another business. She's starting so much time on the wrong thing and, and it won't matter. And she's already 51% right, but she can't let it go. And honestly, I don't know how she's living, to be honest, because she's not rich and the business is a year late in launching. So all I would say is you need to reset your mind. 51% right? You're going to have some success. If you have some success, then you set up what are you looking for on your measurements and you start fine tuning your dials. But you have to understand your high order bit. And if you don't, you're going to fail. So for me it was getting in great supply. Nothing else mattered. All those other, you know, so. But part of getting in great supply is offering the service to go to your house. And we wanted to minimize returns, which are bad for the consigner and really bad for the company because the company paid for those returns. Again, how do you solve that? You have a list, but you go to their house so you don't pick up things. The other thing is, which would have been horrible, you don't try to just using the real real. As an example, we had to have centralized experts on authentication because people out in the field should not be authenticating. It's not their job. It really isn't their job. And you need that data centralized so you can then put scaling technology behind it as it evolves. So there's a lot of moving parts here. But I don't know if I answered your question, but I would say you have to be more right than wrong. You have to do the most important thing first. And the other thing, which I see people happen all the time, they get caught up in stuff that isn't going to move the needle, you know, but it doesn't mean it's not great. But it's not. It won't today. It won't make a difference. Put it on a list. Don't let maybe, you know, or we used to say put it in the parking lot because at some point you'll get to it. But you can't boil the ocean to start. You need to, yeah, start with the most important things now. Have a long vision, but just do that most important thing First, I think.
- [12:34]
That'S fabulous advice, and I have a lot of listeners who are entrepreneurs or working in corporate or business spaces, you know, But I think that that's something that we can apply, as you said, in every area of our life. And any goal that we have is just to be able to really picture where you want to go. Be okay to not have it all figured out. Right. Just get your feet started and keep your eyes on the most important thing. And another thing I really heard you say, too, is that it's okay to experiment. Right. Not everything's gonna, oh, you have to.
- [13:04]
Know it won't work. I mean, it shouldn't work. You can't have it all figured out. But the other thing I was gonna say is I manage the company and manage myself, really, on quarterly goals. What do I want this year?
- [13:19]
And it's changed everything.
- [13:20]
Every better.
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Yeah.
- [13:22]
And the concrete goals. And. And so instead of saying, I want to be here at the end of the year, it's too hard to get there unless you break it into smaller steps. And it always works because if you break it into a quarter, then you assess, are you doing well or not against that, then you fine tune, and then you can then. And it just gives you a stair step. And I use it analogous to if you're going to start a workout routine. And let's say you really want to build. You want to build up your strength, because your strength training is not great. You don't start with £10 or £15. You maybe start with three. And maybe by the end of the year, you're. You're actually doing 20. And. But you never, you know, you don't say, oh, I can do this. You can't. You can't do. If you haven't built up your arms or done any strength training, it would be extraordinary for anyone to go up if they've never done it, to start lifting 20 or 30 pounds right away in repeated reps. I mean, you could lift it once. So you think, I'll start at 5. And then once I know I've got that, I'll go up and up and up. It's the same idea. You set your goal, you break it into small steps. The quarter seems to be a really good thing because 90 days, you can get a lot of good information in 90 days. It is a game changer. It really is. I've always run companies that way, and it makes everything easier. Because the other thing is, you have employees, they know what they have to accomplish in those 90 days. And the tasks get distributed and then, you know, you can have an honest conversation why things worked or didn't and what we're going to do next.
- [15:02]
Right. It definitely does keep the momentum going for sure. I've experienced that as well this year. So I'm all about that advice too. And I know, as you just said, you have run many different companies and not all of them have been fashion related, but I do feel like you must have learned quite a bit working with the RealReal for quite some time. And so for the sake of my audience and that we really do love to talk about fashion here, I would love to know any advice that you have around spotting trends in the industry or thinking differently about the way we shop online.
- [15:32]
So I'm going to talk about the shopping the RealReal for a minute. Then I might talk about where the industry should go. So the RealReal is the best indicator of trends because they have so much data across every single brand. So. So when you see things that say it's trending, it really is trending, by the way. It's not like a market know if.
- [15:54]
Sometimes it's just like a gimmick to get you to buy this.
- [15:56]
No, no, no, no. It's really not.
- [15:58]
And not from you specifically. But, you know, a lot of companies will.
- [16:00]
Well, I don't know about other companies.
- [16:02]
But the real real is real about that.
- [16:04]
Yes, they are. And then I think the great thing about fashion right now is you can really, especially since the real world has hundreds of hundreds and hundreds of thousands of products, you can actually do your own style. And nothing, you know, if you look, it's sort of all over the board. But what isn't all over the board is finding your unique style. Now, I mean, I've said. So here's an interesting thing. I'm going to a gala this weekend. I'm very excited about it. It's a organization I support. And I'm like, huh? Should I? You know? And like, I'm pulling things out of my closet, I'm shopping my own wardrobe, and I'm like, well, I could do this or I could do that. And they're polar opposites, by the way. So one is this gorgeous Dolce gold dress that looks more traditional. And then I have this Dries Ben Noten coat that's brocade with matching pants. And it's a little out there, but it's, you know, it's dressy enough. And I thought either extreme one is more like what you would expect to see, you know, because there's red carpets and Step and repeats and all that. And I'm on the board. So if I'm in the mood, I will get photographed. But then I'm like, well, why not mix it up? And it's fine. It is fine. You know, And I think that's the fun thing about styles now. We're in a weird time in the fashion world and there's not a lot of innovation right now in case, you know, it's like every designer's moving around. And then I would say, how do you shop? I think you go back to what you love and your client and look for deals everywhere. And because the fashion world's not doing well, there's deals everywhere, so look for the deals. I still only buy things I can resell because I do the math, and most people do the math. So if I do buy full price, I'm like, I just stay away from brands that have minimal resale value. Because why? Because if I can find something in a brand and I let's say there's two things that cost a thousand dollars. One has good resale value, the other doesn't. I'm going to be in with the resale value because in two years I may not want it, you know, and so that I always think about doing the math. I think it's economical, I think it makes sense. And then for jewelry, I. The real, real is the place because everything's already lowered in cost. So I buy both fashion jewelry and expensive jewelry on the realreal. But I do buy full price quite a bit. The only other thing, which I'm going to tell you what I'd love in a minute to see which nobody's doing. The only other thing is I really consciously stay away from fast fashion because it's so bad for the planet. And I know that may not be popular with your group, but it really is bad for the planet. And they're saying now a third of all microplastics are due to fast fashion in the ocean, which means in our food, right? So that's a scary statistic. The other thing just to share, people with dementia, they've been doing a lot of studies and brain slicing. If they've donated their brain to science, they found there's enough plastics in their brain to. To actually make a plastic spoon. So I would say just would do whatever you can to stay away from products that actually do damage to the environment. I know everyone wants a deal. Then you go to full cotton. Go to full cottons. You know, try to stay with things and try to stay with things. That do have resale value because it's a smarter way. Now, let me tell you what I would love, all right? And I would real. I would love this for the real world. I don't think they're going to do it, but somebody should do it. I don't know about you, but I tend to shop in the same stores most, most of the time. And occasionally I'll venture off, especially if in a great brick and mortar, you know, if I'm in a walk, I'm like, oh, that's interesting, I'll pop in. But for fashion, you know, it's even gotten smaller. But I tend to shop the same places, which means they know who I am, which means that online they could be using machine learning and AI to when I actually start shopping to say, oh, Julie, welcome back. We have some things we think you're going to be interested in. Because they know me not. Because if they're pushing something that's not selling, because I won't buy something that's like, you may also like. I very seldom have found things that I may also like, but I tend to wear same styles. My size doesn't change that much. They could actually. And if I'm looking, if I'm there, I'm looking for something. And if I typed in what I'm looking for, they should be able to show me things that map to my style, to my color preferences. I shouldn't be doing the filter thing. I shouldn't have to go through 500 products, which, you know, no one does anyway. But I sometimes I do go through at least 100. I did it today because I'm thinking, oh, maybe I need, if I go with this outfit, some extra fashion jewelry thing. And it's, it's, it would change. It would be a game changer. They could have a virtual room built for you, a dressing room that would map to your past preferences. Now, I don't know about you. I always like to, like, try something new once in a while, get out of my system, you know, which is a good salesperson will do. But they can do that electronically. Or if you walk into a brick and mortar store, you've shopped online. They could have the virtual room built as a starting place, and then the guy and the woman or whoever's helping you could say, you know what, why don't you try this? This might look good on you. It would be a game changer. It's not that hard to do. The technology's there and I don't know, I don't know about you. I would get excited about shopping again for fashion because now it's not exciting. It's just not exciting. If you walk into a brick and mortar store and you've shopped online, especially if it's a boutique, there's a good chance they don't have what you looked at online in the boutique. And one of my pet peeves is my pet peeve. I've got a lot because I love. I still shop a lot. One of my pet peeves is, oh, we can order it for you and send it to your house. You're like, no, I am here in your store.
- [22:17]
I want to try it on.
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I want to try it on. I want to have that experience of trying it on and see how it works and see what else I can wear it with. I don't want it. I love shopping online, but at times you don't.
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You know, if you've gone to the trouble of going to the store. And that's one of the issues too, is that sizing can be so limited in stores. So if you need an outlier of a tall length, they don't carry that. Or petite sizing or whatever.
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I was going to say, never is happen to me the tall but the petite.
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Yeah.
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Things like, you know, they're like, well, we only got one size, whatever. And I'm like, you got one? Do you have more? Oh, we can get more. I'm like, no. You know, it's like. Like how fast they'll say, well, I can get it. Let's say you're shopping on a Saturday. Well, I can get it here next Thursday. I'm like, next Thursday? I'm going to be moving on. You know, I'm on a mission. I want to, you know, shop now. And it's that type of bad, I think bad service, not creative thinking, not using technology to enhance your experience that is slowing down the fashion industry. Besides, the prices have risen really, really high, and they're not interesting. I mean, again, like I said, I'm not a merchant. I am a buyer. And when something's really exciting that's come in the market that I think will work for me, I will buy that in lieu of buying maybe even what I was looking for. Because I know, I love. If I love it, I'll buy it. I'll figure out a way to buy it and postpone other purchases unless it's crazy, you know, But I would say if there's something between 500 and $1200 for me and it's special, I'll figure out a way to buy it. And I won't buy what I was gonna buy. But. But I haven't seen that many things that are special right now except in the resale market. And by the way, I've left the real world two years ago, so I'm not pushing.
- [24:15]
But there's no incentive for you to say that.
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But it's true. But I didn't stop shopping. I do think it's true. I think we're in a transition where the person who applies technology that really knows you and your style because it's there, that technology is there and, and then embraces the brick and mortar and the online experience is going to win. Yeah, it's really going to win. Because the other thing is. Can I just say, the other thing is I shop on my phone a lot more than I do anyplace else. I don't, I don't know about you, but I'll be shopping all the time. And what's the best way to shop on your phone? If you have an Apple Phone, Apple Pay and the people that have not incorporated Apple Pay. It's insane. So I would say, you know, I hope people in the industry are listening to this.
- [25:04]
I do too. I know. I want all of these. You're so right. Well, and two things that I'm really hearing is kind of the theme of all of the advice that you just gave and your personal preferences are number one, personalization and the need for that. And that is what I am all about for my business and on this podcast is not giving generic advice but personalizing it for what each individual needs which would really be filled with what you're saying if they kept all of your data and gave you more personalized recommendations when you came in. And also intentionality. So I loved hearing your thought around I'm going to buy this versus this because of the resale value and thinking beyond just this is a pretty thing. I want to have it now. But also the impact on the environment, the impact on your long term budget and the wearability. So yes, you are speaking a lot of my fashion love language right now as you're sharing all of that so important.
- [25:57]
Look, when the RealReal came out, it did change everything. Everyone can do math. I always love it. We have the smart. I always. And it's true. The consumers on the RealReal are so super smart. Do you know, before we had the wide range of products and we had a really good app, people would call and say I am shopping and I'm considering this brand or this brand what brand has that best resale value? And we give them advice on the phone. And I'm like, women are so darn smart. Not that men aren't, but, you know, why wouldn't you want to maximize the value of your money? Why would you want to buy something that you throw away bad for the environment or you can't resell? It doesn't make sense. Especially because you can buy resale under a hundred dollars. So you can be really smart. You can buy a pair of my beautiful shoes just sold for $50 on the real. Real. And I'm like, $50 anyway. But, you know, they'd been there a while. The price had to come down. But those shoes are awesome. Whoever got those shoes and spent $50. Yes. And, you know, that's the other thing. Basics always sell at a lower price and resale. So, like, let's say you want a black skirt. I've had Daltay and Gabbana black skirts that have sold for $35 because it's black and not. But it's a, you know, a pencil skirt. It's a standard, you know, and the only reason it's on there is I lost ten pounds and I don't want to gain it back. Yeah. That's the only reason that skirts on that site instead of still in my closet. Yeah. So, you know, things like that. Look, basics, you can always get a good deal on and shop natural fibers. It's really, really good. And always consider the resale because you work too hard for your money to throw it away.
- [27:45]
You're so right. Well, Julie, I want to shift gears just a little bit because there is a comment or topic that comes up in my community a lot, and you have been very open about being labeled unemployable in the past. Your age. Right?
- [28:00]
Well, no, it wasn't just age. It was also the fact that I had a failure.
- [28:04]
Right.
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The age didn't help. The age did not help. Right.
- [28:08]
I have a lot of women in my community that come to me with the line of, you know, assuming I'm typical, I'm older than your typical client, or, you know, I'm really late in life to be taking an interest in my style. So I want to know what you would say to the woman listening who has some limiting beliefs like this about her age in particular.
- [28:27]
So, honestly, I never considered my age. I know that the venture capital world does all right. And they considered also that I had one big failure. To be honest, if I was a man in my 30s, and when I had It. It would have been fine, but I wasn't. I mean, it's silly. Age is silly. Don't. Your life isn't over till it's over. And, you know, I hate those things, like 50, the new 30. 50 is not the new 30. You know, 40 is 40. 50 is 50. But you can't. We know a lot more about taking better care of yourself, constant learning. And I would say you can start anytime, whatever. Get rid of those age shackles. It's absolutely ridiculous. I had a little fight today and with someone about that, because I love for occasionally a look, you know, and I'm in my 60s, occasionally I like to have a stylist come in and put snap on hair extensions. And they look fabulous. They do, but they're, you know. Are they. Was it my attempt to look young? That's what he said. Oh, you're trying to look too young. I'm like, no, I'm just trying to look fabulous. And they look fabulous. So I would say all of these critics that want to age pin, you know, put you down or put you in a box because of age, that's their issue. Don't make it your issue. As long as you're healthy and you can think and you have passion about something, just drop the age. It's not worth it. Like I said, I never worried about my age. I was conscious when I was raising capital because most of these young guys would be asking me about my failure. You know, they'd go, oh, what? You know, what about peps.com? and at one point I looked at them and I said, you were 10 years old when that happened. It's a long time ago.
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Yeah.
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You know, so I don't know what your point is, but you were a baby and the Internet was a baby. So can we move on to my business at hand? That didn't go well, by the way, so I wouldn't recommend it.
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But I love your honesty, and it's so true.
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But, you know, it's like, that was a veiled ageist comment.
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Yeah.
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And, you know, it's like, stop, Just stop. You know, it's not worth it because people do great things at all ages, and the only thing you have holding yourself back is yourself. Really? It's so true. It is so true. Because as soon as you put a construct around what you can and can't do, you will do what you. You will do only what you think. And why limit yourself like that? Because I would say most people don't know how great they can be to be Honest, I saw it at the Real Real when I hired employees. Most of the early employees were young women in their early 20s or early 30s. Maybe it's their second job ever, first. And some of them just took on more and more and more. And they're. And they were awesome. I mean, Rotzie's an example. She was running a brick and mortar store. She's running the company now. A multi billion dollar company. And you know why? She never put limits on herself. She never said, I can't do this. Everything she, when we were working together, everything I gave her, I'm like, you can do it. Watch, I'll help you. And she just could take more and more and more on. But if you say I'm only this, that's all you'll be. Why do that to yourself? Life is short.
- [31:51]
Yes. So true. And oh my goodness, you have definitely dreamed big and achieved so much as you said. You built and sold a billion dollar business. And I, I just hope that all of the women listening right now who have big dreams like that or whatever it is in their lives are hearing you and that they are the only things stopping themselves. And I'd love to know if there's anything else that you want to speak to on that point of things that you've overcome personally to really build up that mindset and how you would encourage other people to do the same.
- [32:22]
Well, look, I'm. I do want to say it's not easy. I want to acknowledge when you have outside critics. And it took. I mean, I bought into it, by the way. That's why I'm saying don't do it. Almost don't do what I did when, When Pets failed and my marriage also failed, it became a burden and I wore it. And at some point I had to stop it because I was bringing the past into the future. And I knew that both things could not define me because my, you know, you play the long game. But it took a long time. Time for me to get there. It took me being around people that love me. It took me being around and being out in nature, exercising, being around creative people. But all, I think, more importantly, it took me valuing myself more than what other people say about me. And once that snapped in, there was no stopping me. And, and that's not a. That's not an journey. That's overnight and. But it is a journey that I. Hopefully people have that as a goal to really love themselves and honor themselves and recognize that there are a lot of negative forces out there that you have to push aside, that doesn't mean they don't get in your psyche, because they do. You know they do. But then you have to quiet yourself, take a breath and say, is this me? Is this from someone I trust? And chances are it's not. It's just someone who's miserable about themselves and they, and they put, they're just venting on you because their life didn't work out well, you know, it's not about you. Most, most comments people say to you are not about you. You're like, they're about them.
- [34:10]
Absolutely. And to come full circle, like you said, really having your mind on what it is that you want to accomplish, staying focused on those small goals and just continuing to take the next right step. So, oh my goodness, yes.
- [34:22]
That's it.
- [34:23]
You've been such a wealth of information. I'm so grateful to you. And you have a new book coming out tomorrow, June 10th. Well, this episode is airing on the 9th, so when it comes out, it will be tomorrow. And I know I can't wait to get my hands on a copy because it's called Time to Get Real how I built $1 billion business that rocked the fashion industry. Obviously two of my favorite things to talk about and to learn about our fashion and business. So I'm very excited for the launch of this book. I'd love to just hear and kind of wrap up the episode with what led you to write it and definitely tell everyone how we can find it and connect with you further.
- [35:00]
So I wrote it because this is the book I wish I would have read before I started the company. You know, it's first of all, it's generally a fun book, but I do, I mean, it's fun, it's fast paced, there's some dark moments in it, but there's a lot of key learnings and some of it I already knew, but I had to relearn. And some things I really didn't know till it I did it wrong. And I wish I would have had this. If I would have read this book, I wouldn't have made the same mistakes. That's number one. And number two, that was the prime reason for writing turned out to be really a fun thing to do for me. But that wasn't the primary thing I enjoyed writing the dark areas required a lot of wine, but in general I enjoyed writing it. But I wish I would have read this book before I started the company. So I may even have to read it again. Because, you know, there's. Because you forget key learnings when you're working really hard. You're juggling a lot of things. It's available on Amazon, it's available on Barnes and Noble and hopefully it's in stores on the 10th. I'm going to do a little store check to see what stores, but I hope people love it. I love writing it. It's a, it's funny, it's sad, it's raw and it's. But there is good advice. And I have to say, for some reason, men don't think it's funny. But women, when I, when I talk to men, I go, did you. It hasn't had a lot of readers. These are early readers. The men are like, no, I didn't see it was funny. The women laugh out loud. So I think there's a little unintentional gender bias in there because, I mean, I was laughing when I wrote some of it and men are like, I don't, you know, we have our own.
- [36:45]
We know it might be just more relatable to women in that way.
- [36:49]
In that way on the humor side, but hopefully it's relatable to anyone who wants to be an entrepreneur or is an entrepreneur.
- [36:55]
Yeah. Well, I'm gonna follow up with you and let you know if it made me chuckle or not.
- [37:00]
I would love to know. I mean, you know, it does take you, it takes you on sort of year by year, how the real, real evolve.
- [37:07]
Awesome. Oh, I'm so excited for that. And I know I said we were going to wrap it up, but I would just love to hear what's next for you.
- [37:13]
What?
- [37:13]
Are you all right right now?
- [37:16]
All right. So right now I am focused on getting this book out. So I've got very short term goals and I'm on a speak a little bit of a speaking tour which is really fun. I'm speaking to entrepreneurs and women in business on speaking tours. So that's fun.
- [37:30]
I love that. Well, thank you for taking the time to speak with us today, Julie, it was such a privilege to have you here. I know everyone's going to be really excited to check out your book and thank so much for sharing all of your wisdom and experience with us. It means so much.
- [37:43]
Thank you.
- [37:46]
Heather Riggs
Thank you for listening to today's episode. If you want to stop copying everyone else's style and start dialing in your own swoon worthy signature look, head over to take my free 5 minute personal style quiz which you can find at.
- [38:00]
Julie Wainwright
The link in the show notes.
- [38:02]
Heather Riggs
If you've enjoyed our time together, please be sure to rate, review and subscribe to her style podcast so you never miss an episode. Finally, I invite you to make this a two way conversation and send me a DM over on Instagram eatherigstyle to let me know how I can best support you on your style journey. I'm always here for you in style and service. Until next time.