Advice Line with Miguel McKelvey of WeWork

Summary

Podcast Summary: How I Built This with Guy Raz

Episode: Advice Line with Miguel McKelvey of WeWork

Original Airdate: March 5, 2026
Host: Guy Raz
Guest Advisor: Miguel McKelvey, Co-Founder of WeWork

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Overview

In this "Advice Line" episode, Guy Raz is joined by Miguel McKelvey, co-founder of WeWork, to take live calls from three entrepreneurs seeking guidance on scaling, marketing, and customer acquisition. Throughout the episode, McKelvey shares personal reflections on WeWork’s journey, lessons learned, and specific, actionable advice tailored to each caller’s business dilemma. The episode is rich in practical insights on brand storytelling, marketing innovations, and navigating rapid growth while staying true to core values.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Reflections on WeWork & Entrepreneurship (04:06–09:25)

• McKelvey on Looking Back:
  Reflects that the WeWork experience is still a huge part of his life, provides ongoing lessons, both good and painful, and continues to bring him fulfillment when hearing from former employees.
  • Quote:
    “Every one of those experiences is an opportunity to grow from and learn – about myself, about how to treat other people, about how to do business in the right way.” (05:40, Miguel McKelvey)
• AI Bubble Parallels:
  Draws a comparison between the WeWork/tech startup bubble and the current excitement (and anxiety) around AI company valuations.
  • Quote:
    “With AI...because they can do so much and it’s not yet clear exactly how to monetize them, it is a bit confusing... It’s like the dot com boom – everyone’s super excited, but no one’s exactly sure if the business models are sound.” (07:43, Miguel McKelvey)
• Mentorship Role:
  McKelvey values advice-giving and mentoring, finding fulfillment in helping others see challenges differently.

2. Caller 1: Jane Barthel, Founder of Coppa Threads (09:59–20:39)

The Business

A small-batch, high-quality women’s pants brand bridging the comfort of scrubs with the sophistication of trousers, manufactured in Minneapolis with U.S.-sourced fabrics.

Challenge

How to scale and build demand while maintaining local, ethical production (and the resulting high price point).

Discussion Highlights

• Brand Storytelling as Differentiator:
  Emphasize the “why” behind the product’s price and values. Clearly communicate the story of local manufacturing, artisanal process, and handmade quality on every channel—not just once, but repeatedly.
  • Quote:
    “You gotta do a better job at explaining why. ... Go to your website: nothing that you’ve told us is here. ... Now I need to know why I’m paying $295.” (16:31, Guy Raz)
  • Quote:
    “You need to be on Instagram telling your personal story and why you care... And then also have the story of the people making it and the story of where the fabric comes from.” (17:54, Miguel McKelvey)
• Leverage User-Generated Content:
  Showcase real customers (“ambassadors”) wearing the unique pants; encourage them to share on their own social channels.
  • Quote:
    “When a woman is standing with three others and her pants compared to theirs – you’re like, those are some great pants.” (18:55, Miguel McKelvey)
• Grassroots Local Marketing:
  Suggests “seeding” pants with local restaurant servers or coffee shop baristas to drive organic word of mouth.
• Stay True to Brand:
  Don’t dilute the uniqueness by chasing black/neutral pants requests—lean into the artful, colorful identity.

Timestamps

• Storytelling & values: 16:31–19:10
• UGC/ambassadors: 18:00–19:10
• Local marketing: 19:11–19:44

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3. Caller 2: Melissa Jensky, Co-Founder of Good Grief (23:31–36:15)

The Business

Online care package company for “life’s twists and turns” (from loss to illness to mental health), featuring curated, practical products and supportive services.

Challenge

Growth plateaued at ~$200k per year; difficulty breaking through with paid digital marketing due to intent and emotional context; seeking new channels and strategies.

Discussion Highlights

• Content and SEO as Core Strategy:
  Create highly targeted, situation-specific landing pages and content for every grief/loss scenario imaginable—both for SEO and for visibility in new AI-driven search experiences.
  • Quote:
    “Having a webpage for literally every single web search you can imagine that someone might make in one of these scenarios would be really smart...If [they] go to AI to ask that question, they're going to find you as well.” (27:54–28:35, Miguel McKelvey)
• Social/Video Content:
  Short TikTok and YouTube videos answering “what do I send someone who...?” kind of questions; meet audiences in their moments of need.
• B2B Partnerships:
  Collaborate with hospices, funeral homes, HR departments, and local organizations for employee gifting or direct referral.
  • Quote:
    “It would seem to me that, and it sounds like you're trying to [do] that channel, that B2B gifting channel–working with HR teams could really be game changer.” (30:53, Guy Raz)
• Experiment with Direct Mail:
  Establish physical brand presence for top-of-mind recall when the need arises.
  • Quote:
    "...It's almost like that thing you want to have on the refrigerator for when that time comes..." (31:18, Miguel McKelvey)
• Problem-Solution Messaging:
  Frame the offering as the solution for those who want to help but “don’t know what to say or do” (i.e., “We are your solution”).
  • Quote:
    “What you want to telegraph is your problem is you don’t know how to help, and we are your solution.” (34:09, Guy Raz)

Timestamps

• Content/SEO advice: 27:54–29:20
• B2B discussion: 29:48–31:04
• Direct mail/recall: 31:12–32:23
• Messaging: 34:09–

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4. Caller 3: Lee Wright, Founder of The History List Store (36:58–46:43)

The Business

E-commerce for history lovers: original T-shirts, hats, jewelry, and rare antiques—all designed by the team and made in the USA, rooted in the original “History List” content site.

Challenge

How to leverage the upcoming 250th anniversary of America’s founding to grow the customer base and reduce customer acquisition costs (currently ~$20 CAC, $80 average order value).

Discussion Highlights

• Cost Analysis:
  McKelvey calls out that Lee’s current CAC is quite low given the order value and margin, suggesting scaling ad spend could be a strong, immediate next step.
  • Quote:
    “$20 per customer? ... I would love to acquire customers for $20. That sounds great.” (39:57, Miguel McKelvey)
• Expansion Via Content Marketing:
  Lean into storytelling across channels—especially TikTok and Instagram—even if target audiences skew older, since social platforms' age demographics shift over time.
  • Quote:
    “People love to learn through TikTok. You might need to go post a TikTok a day with a cool historical narrative, and people will start gravitating directly to you.” (41:44, Miguel McKelvey)
• Niche Podcast Collaborations:
  Consider both advertising and co-branded merch partnerships with history podcasts, particularly mid-sized to niche shows.
  • Quote:
    “Some of them probably don't have merch. Maybe you can be a merch person for them.” (43:30, Guy Raz)
• Newsletter & Email:
  Lee’s high open rates (50%) are a major strength—suggests leveraging newsletter further for launches, pre-sales, and retention.
• Broaden Appeal Beyond “History Nerds”:
  Experiment with content that might pull in more casual fans—obscure but accessible facts, behind-the-scenes product stories, etc.

Timestamps

• CAC/margin discussion: 39:48–41:44
• TikTok/social strategy: 41:44–42:35
• Podcast/collab suggestions: 43:30–44:57

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• McKelvey’s fundamental advice to his younger entrepreneurial self:
  “Be more critical about the things that I was bad at, to think more critically about things I avoided. ... You have to be responsible for everything when you’re a founder.” (47:14, Miguel McKelvey)
• On instant execution:
  “If I do all this stuff and come back tomorrow, it'll seem like we were planning it for weeks in advance.” (49:00, Miguel McKelvey, describing early WeWork hustle)
• On finding core customer connection:
  “When people say to me, ‘When are you going to make black pants?’ I say, ‘Well, go to Banana Republic. I’m not making black pants.’” (14:37, Jane Barthel)

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Episode Structure & Key Segments

• 04:06-09:25: Miguel’s post-WeWork reflection & AI bubble insights
• 09:59-20:39: Caller 1: Coppa Threads (Jane Barthel)
• 23:31-36:15: Caller 2: Good Grief (Melissa Jensky)
• 36:58-46:43: Caller 3: The History List Store (Lee Wright)
• 47:14-48:18: McKelvey’s advice to his younger self

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Tone & Language

The tone is supportive, practical, and conversational, with Guy and Miguel interjecting personal anecdotes and humor, reinforcing a “master class” feel for founders at any stage.

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Takeaways

1. Storytelling and clear articulation of your “why” is especially crucial for premium, ethical, or niche brands.
2. SEO and AI-driven content indexing are essential frontiers for businesses addressing specific emotional needs.
3. Experiment broadly with content and channels—even if your audience seems “set”—to find surprise sources of growth.
4. Strong customer retention, community, and owned channels (like newsletters) can be levers for sustainable growth.
5. Entrepreneurs benefit by confronting their weaknesses rather than outsourcing them completely, especially in early stages.

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This summary captures the actionable advice, entrepreneurial wisdom, and engaging dialogue from this episode—providing real-world strategies and inspiration for founders and would-be founders alike.

Transcript

[Guy Raz]

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[Miguel McKelvey]

Thank you. Happy to be here.

[Guy Raz]

It's great to have you back on. You've been on the show twice, first in 2017 and then again in 2022. And for anyone who hasn't listened to either of those shows, I really encourage you to go back and listen. We'll put a link to it in the show notes. But basically the stories about how Miguel came to entrepreneurship with a background in architecture. In 2007, he met a guy named Adam Newman. They shared an office space in Brooklyn. And then from there, so much more detailed story. WeWork was born. By 2019, the valuation reached $47 billion. Now, a lot of people listening know what outlines of what happened from there. Adam Newman faced some accusations of mismanagement. He was forced to resign. The company withdrew a long anticipated IPO filing and then Miguel left in 2020. WeWork, by the way, still exists today. There are about 330 locations around the world. But you know, obviously down from its peak. Miguel, you know, it's been over six years since you moved on from WeWork and we've talked since then. But now that you've had even more distance, how does it feel? And I should point out you were never accused of mismanagement. You come out great in a lot of these documentaries and in the dramatization that was. That was put out there, we crashed. How does it feel when you look back on your experience there?

[Miguel McKelvey]

You know, I still look back a lot. It obviously played such a huge role in my life, and I get the opportunity to talk about it. Not publicly that much, but, like, last night, I spoke to a group of entrepreneurs at an accelerator, and of course, they're very curious about the experience. And I love to share the stories of both the good times and the hard times. And, you know, entrepreneurship is a roller coaster no matter what scale you're at. You know, there's so many emotional layers to everything that happens. And I think my perspective is that every one of those experiences is an opportunity to grow from and learn something about myself, about how to treat other people, about how to, you know, do business in the way that I think is the right way to do it. And I still get lessons from it because people, you know, I run. I literally will run into someone on the street, a former We Work employee, who will share something with me about how we work, change their life. Something I may have known and forgotten or something I, you know, never even knew about. And, you know, I get this incredible feeling of, like, wow, we did something really powerful and it touched a lot of people. And that is just endlessly fulfilling. And so I don't shy away from it at all. I'm happy to go back into it. Even though there's a lot of pain there, I think going into that pain is productive.

[Guy Raz]

Yeah. It's interesting because right now, right, we're looking at this moment where, and I wonder, I'm just curious to get your take on it, where there seems to be, at least people are talking about a kind of a bubble with AI businesses, right? Companies. I mean, there's just. The valuations are unbelievable, right? You, You. You experienced this with a company that you were at and companies around you where you just saw, you know, valuations go through the roof. And I wonder whether you think there are any parallels between, you know, some of the crazy valuations you saw even at WeWork, and what could possibly happen with some of these emerging AI companies.

[Miguel McKelvey]

One of the biggest differences I see is that We Work was a very real world problem. It was very tangible, right? And similar to Uber or Lyft, you know, Airbnb. Some of these companies that of my era that achieved great valuations, you could really see, like, the value in them in a tangible way. Like, does. Do people need a ride in a car? For sure they do. Do they need a workspace for sure they do. The AI applications are so incredibly powerful and amazing, but because they can do so much and it's not yet clear exactly how to monetize them, it is a bit confusing to understand. How will they be evaluated? You know, I kind of go back to, like, even the earlier days of, like, the dot com boom, where it was like, everyone's super excited about what this technology is going to do, but no one's exactly sure if the business models are sound, you know, and who knows? I mean, I know I'm diving into every AI tool I can find and loving it. Yeah, I'm barely paying anything for it. I don't even know if I pay at all. Like, you know, it might be a part of my Google bill, but I'm. I'm getting the benefit of incredible technology and not paying, so that always feels a little bit scary of, like, what's going to happen. And of course, when you have big players who are competing, you know, it can be a race to the bottom. And that's scary, too, because if Google wants to give their AI tools for free, what happens to ChatGPT? You know, these kind of things, they get dicey, you know?

[Guy Raz]

Yeah, for sure, for sure. Well, a lot of interesting things that you're part of, and you are. I mean, you've done some mentoring, and I know you still, you know, go to incubators and talk to founders about their experiences. So it sounds like a big part of what you've been doing and what you will continue to do is just, you know, kind of be an advisor and mentor.

[Miguel McKelvey]

For me, that's super fulfilling. I like engaging with people. I'm super curious and ask a ton of questions. Regardless of I know anything, I think I can be helpful in just getting people to, you know, think about things from different directions, different perspectives. So I really enjoy it. It's what kind of lights me up the most.

[Guy Raz]

Yeah. All right, well, let's, let's. Let's put it to the test, Miguel, and bring in our first caller. You ready?

[Miguel McKelvey]

Yep, I'm ready.

[Guy Raz]

All right. All right, let's bring in our first caller. Hello, caller. Welcome to the Advice line. You're on with Miguel McKelvey. Tell us your name, where you're calling from, and just briefly about your business.

[Jane Barthel]

Hi. Hi, Guy. Hi, Miguel. Thank you so much for having me. I'm a huge fan, so this is such a treat. My name is Jane Barthel. I live in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and I am the founder and owner of Coppa Threads, a women's pants brand that features small batch, fun, comfy, beautifully constructed pants.

[Guy Raz]

Awesome. Well, thanks for calling in, Jay. So what kind of pants are they like at leisure or leisure or dress or what? Tell me a little bit about what they look like.

[Jane Barthel]

I consider them a colorful and fun trouser. They are intended to have the comfort of athletic pants, but definitely have more sophistication. Like a pant that you could wear out to dinner, you could wear traveling. They're made of primarily 100% cotton canvas. So they actually have some structure. So they have like a nice silhouette. They're not like flowy pants. And the main fabric is all printed. So they have colorful designs, floral, geometric, birds. They're just fun.

[Guy Raz]

Cool. And is this your main business right now?

[Jane Barthel]

I mean it's a side hustle. I have a full time job in another industry.

[Guy Raz]

Tell me what's your full time job?

[Jane Barthel]

My full time job is I am a neonatologist. So I take care of newborns in the newborn intensive care unit.

[Guy Raz]

Cool. I'm looking at your website and I wonder whether there's, I mean they're obviously more elegant than scrubs, but is there. They seem like kind of easy to wear. Is there a connection there?

[Jane Barthel]

Yes. I found coming home from work when people put on their more comfortable clothing that it was a conundrum because I wear scrubs every day and they're just the most comfortable pants you can wear. So one day I deconstructed a pair of scrubs and started making pants just for fun, not to wear to work, but out of really fun, colorful, funky fabrics. And that's how this whole thing was kind of born. Because I would wear them around town, I wore them to a concert and I would have friends, family, even strangers saying, oh my God, I love your pants. So that's kind of how it all started.

[Guy Raz]

Are you selling the pants in stores or is it mainly through website?

[Jane Barthel]

Almost all my website I have just a few pairs at a local boutique in the suburb of Minneapolis where I live. Yeah.

[Guy Raz]

And where are they being manufactured, the pants?

[Jane Barthel]

In northeast Minneapolis at a woman owned factory.

[Guy Raz]

Wow.

[Jane Barthel]

And the material comes. The main canvas comes from a manufacturer in Florida. And that's. I get that via a fabric sourcer I met who's out of Chicago.

[Guy Raz]

Got it. And, and before we get to your question one, one last question for you. Give me a sense of how, how you you're doing. I mean overall sales, let's say for the last year or so.

[Jane Barthel]

So I just started last summer at the end of last June of 25 and I've done about $15,000 in sales.

[Guy Raz]

Great. That's a good start.

[Jane Barthel]

Yeah.

[Guy Raz]

All right. All right. Before I bring in Miguel, what is your question?

[Jane Barthel]

So my question is about scale. I've built my business around local manufacturing with very high quality standards, leading to high costs and price point. So how do I build demand and scale when my values limit how fast and how cheaply I can grow?

[Guy Raz]

Got it. Okay. Miguel McKelvey, I want to bring you in. Thoughts for Jane or questions that you might have for her?

[Miguel McKelvey]

Yeah, first thing, the pants are great. I'm sad you don't have them in men's size or 6 foot, 6 foot 8, because I love the patterns. Very cool.

[Melissa Jensky]

Thank you.

[Miguel McKelvey]

I am curious. Just one question. I know you're getting attention for these beautiful patterns, but do people want them in black or gray or, you know, more neutral colors?

[Jane Barthel]

Yes, yes, I've definitely heard that request. Which is. Which could be another whole conversation, you know, because I hear both that I should be following my customers demands, but then also kind of staying true to my brand, which is meant to be colorful, exciting pants.

[Miguel McKelvey]

And what is your exact bottleneck? Is it that the factory can't produce as many pants as you need to sell, or is it also that you need enough customers who can spend $300 on a pair of pants?

[Jane Barthel]

Yeah, it's really more the latter. It's finding the customer base of people who value high quality local manufacturing. And really, I think of the pants as like, wearable art. When people say to me, when are you going to make black pants? I say, well, go to Banana Republic. I'm not making black pants. Like, the whole idea is that these are like an art form you're wearing.

[Miguel McKelvey]

Got it. And one more question on that. Where have you gotten the customers who have spent $15,000 so far?

[Jane Barthel]

I mean, of course, a huge part of my customer base is my friends and family and people who graciously want to support me. But then also, the boutique where I sell things locally is all local designers. It's all high end. It's all kind of in that price range.

[Guy Raz]

So right now, the price point is high, about $295 for a pair of pants. And you know this. And part of it is because it's made in a small factory in Minneapolis and you're sourcing the. The material, the fabric from the US So that makes sense. But before I address it, what do you want this to be? Do you want this to be a bigger brand? Do you want it to be a bigger side hustle? What Is your ambition here?

[Jane Barthel]

I would love for it to be a successful side hustle that could kind of slowly grow and eventually become potentially something bigger when I'm kind of more toward the end of my career in medicine. Right now I'm 54. I'll probably work in medicine for another, I don't know, six, eight, 10 years. And it would be nice for this to be something kind of on the side that would evolve. I've actually thought I'm working with my manufacturer on a new design for spring and I was thinking maybe it could evolve into a business that has drops quarterly. So I maintain the small batch, high quality standards.

[Guy Raz]

Yeah. Miguel, I'm curious to get your take on what I'm about to say because I mean there are two obvious paths, right? There's manufacture this more cheaply, right? Which is maybe outsource it, go overseas. Or the other option is keep it where your price point is at, but you gotta do a better job at explaining why. So Miguel is an owner, part owner of brand called American Giant. We featured on the show. It's a great brand. Made in the U.S. fabrics are sourced in the U.S. cotton is even picked in the U.S. and you, from the moment you go to the website, you understand that it's a little bit, it's a little bit more expensive than what you might pay for a Hanes T shirt, but you understand why go to your website. Nothing that you've told us is here. You don't know. It's made in a factory in Minneapolis by a group of women. It's handmade. These are hand sourced. It's all. I mean, because now I need to know why I'm paying 295 and then. But that story starts to make sense. Miguel, do you think that moves the needle? That you know, when people know those things, it moves the needle 100%.

[Miguel McKelvey]

It moves the needle. But I think you have to tell that story over and over and over. It's not just a one time thing. Like you need to be on Instagram telling your personal story and why you care about the product and the way it's made and then also have the story of the people making it and the story of where the fabric comes from. All those things are really meaningful. And giving your why will be what really translates to people. So I would say doing that would be really powerful. And then the other thing is the products look great. The UGC like the reviews looking at like the women wearing the pants when they've taken their own photo. Those are amazing. If you could get some of those ambassadors who would do the same thing, who would go on to social media and share their story of why they love the pants to their networks. That would be great because it really translates, you know, the fact that these bright, funky patterns are so beautiful in a photo. And there's one where actually a woman is standing with three other women and her pants compared to theirs. It's like you're like, those are some great pants.

[Guy Raz]

Oh, yeah, I'm looking at that. With the one that she's at, like a music festival.

[Miguel McKelvey]

Yeah. I mean, that sells the product itself, but you got to get that out there as much as you can and then put the why behind it.

[Jane Barthel]

Right.

[Miguel McKelvey]

Another thing I would suggest would be going to a local restaurant and gifting the pants to some of the servers and asking them to wear them, or a coffee shop where people can see them behind the counter because they really jump off the page. I'm sure the more they're in public, people will say, hey, where are those pants from? Yeah, just brainstorm everywhere. Someone could see these pants because they don't need to work that hard. They just showing up does a lot for these pants, but you need to get them out there.

[Jane Barthel]

I've said, like, a big marker of success for me would be if I saw a stranger, someone I don't know, wearing my pants at our local grocery store. That's one of my goals.

[Guy Raz]

Yeah, yeah. No, I mean, it's awesome. I think you need to really double down on. On the story here and not just on the website, but anywhere you can so people understand what they're buying. I mean, they're buying something that's. That's artisanal. Right. That's a real craft made product that isn't just made in a giant factory and put on a huge container ship. So that, that to me is. Is critical, I think. And as Miguel said, you want to use any channel you can to. To tell that story and to. And for people to understand where it's coming from.

[Jane Barthel]

Yeah.

[Guy Raz]

And how it's made.

[Jane Barthel]

Right. For sure. Yeah. That makes a lot of sense.

[Guy Raz]

The brand is called Coppa Threads. Jane Bartel, thank you so much for calling in. Good luck.

[Jane Barthel]

Thank you.

[Guy Raz]

All right, we're going to take a very short break. Back in just a few minutes. I'm Guy Raz, and you're listening to the advice line on how I built this lab. When I first started how I built this, one of the very first tangible things I ever made was a stack of business cards. Nothing fancy, just my name, the logo and the title. But I remember holding those cards in my hand and thinking, wow, this is real now. And that moment actually inspired me to think bigger. If I can make business cards, why not make something for listeners? T shirts, sweatshirts, stickers. You know, things people could wear and share and see out in the world. Well, that's exactly what Vistaprint helps small businesses do. Turn ideas into real tangible products you can be proud of. Vistaprint supports you at every step from choosing the right product to getting the design just right. They've got you covered. Whether you need a small tweak or a full on rebrand. Vistaprint offers design services that fit your style and your budget. Vistaprint print your possible right now, new customers get 20% off with code NEW20. [e-mail] when you're starting off with something new, it seems like your to do list keeps growing every day with new tasks. And that list can easily begin to overrun your life. Trust me, I know. Getting my production company Built It Productions off the ground was no easy feat. Finding the right tool that not only helps you out, but simplifies everything can be such a game changer for millions of businesses. That tool is Shopify. Shopify is the commerce platform behind millions of businesses around the world and 10% of all e commerce in the US from household names like Heinz and Mattel to brands just getting started. With hundreds of ready to use templates, Shopify helps you build a beautiful online store that matches your brand style. Shopify is also packed with helpful AI tools that write product descriptions, page headlines and even enhances your product photography. Start your business today with the industry's best business partner, Shopify and Start. Sign up for your $1 per month trial today at shopify.combilt go to shopify.combilt that's shopify.combilt. Welcome back to the advice line on how I built this lab. I'm Guy Raz and my guest today is Miguel McKelvey, co founder of WeWork and we are taking your calls. And let's bring in our next caller.

[Melissa Jensky]

Hi Guy and Miguel. My name is Melissa Jensky. I'm in Santa Fe, New Mexico. I'm the C.O. founder of Good Grief. We're an online gifting company that specializes in care packages for life's twists and turns. So anything from loss of a loved one, loss of a pet, infertility, miscarriage, cancer and illness, mental health and wellness, breakup, job loss and more.

[Guy Raz]

Wow. Okay, well, welcome to the show. So all right, so good grief. These are care Packages that you send to somebody who's going through a rough time.

[Melissa Jensky]

Yeah. So we've intentionally chosen products that are practical and support healing and self care. So we have a ton of books and journals focused on specific type of losses. Consumables like teas, cookies, chocolate for all the emotional eating, cozy things like socks and candles, sleep masks, hot cold packs and then some beauty and wellness. So bath soaks, aromatherapy type products, lots of eye gels for all the puffy crying eyes. And then we also have some services that you can add to your care package to book things like one on one grief coaching and things like that.

[Guy Raz]

That's cool. How did this idea come about?

[Melissa Jensky]

Yeah, so we are a family run business. My sister is, my co founder, Kristin. She's in the UK and it was really born out of personal experience. I always like to joke that I got the short straws in the family. When I was 29, I was diagnosed with an autoimmune condition called rheumatoid arthritis. And then in my 30s I experienced infertility and a miscarriage. And around that same time we had a family member whose spouse died by suicide. And it really just hit me that I think as a society we're not super great, you know, we are super great at celebrating all the good stuff, the weddings and anniversaries and new babies. When it comes to the tough stuff, I think we can really fall short. We don't know what to say.

[Guy Raz]

We don't know what to say.

[Melissa Jensky]

Exactly. We don't know what to say. We don't know what to do. Sometimes we say the wrong thing, sometimes we don't say anything at all. So I really wanted to fix that. And during the pandemic we were home working like everyone else and my sister and I just started talking more and I think we were both pretty frustrated with our jobs. And I was like, hey, I have this business idea, what do you think? And she was like, yeah, let's do it. I don't, I think I was crazy because I was working full time. I had a two and a half year old at home. I don't even know how I pulled it off. But we, we launched in six months. So we launched in April of 2021. And you know, I think, you know, we, I know that a box of stuff isn't going to fix anything. It's not going to take away grieving, but we really just hope it provides an icebreaker or a bridge for people to connect and really show up with

[Guy Raz]

genuine care and empathy and Melissa These are you're selling on entirely through your website?

[Melissa Jensky]

Yes, all direct to consumer online.

[Guy Raz]

And tell me a little bit about how the business is doing.

[Melissa Jensky]

Yeah, so for the past three years, we've been right around $200,000 in revenue and just can't seem to break past that. This past year was pretty challenging for. And so we were down like 7% from the year before.

[Guy Raz]

And how are you marketing? Mainly?

[Melissa Jensky]

Yeah. So previously we were doing all Google Ads. That's where we saw the best roas. I think one of the challenges, I think with us is the intent to buy isn't always there when people discover us.

[Guy Raz]

Right.

[Melissa Jensky]

So when we first launched, we tried some social, but we ended up. We had such a limited budget that we ended up just going to Google Ads. We were getting great returns, and for whatever reason, it completely collapsed last summer. And so now we're really in a place where we're having to diversify our marketing efforts. And I think it's also challenging because we have so many scenarios and we touch upon so many different types of grief and loss. It's great because we have lots of opportunities, but it's also, like, sometimes overwhelming because it's like, where do you go with it and what do you do?

[Guy Raz]

So sounds like that's kind of your challenge or the question that you brought, right? Yeah.

[Melissa Jensky]

Like what growth channels should we prioritize especially? I think AI has really changed how paid media works and how customers are discovering brands. So, yeah, we're trying to just find. Yeah. Where do we put our effort, you know, limited time and resources and what will move the needle.

[Guy Raz]

Nice. All right, Miguel McKelvey, once you jump in here, meet Melissa. Thoughts about the business, the dilemma, Questions.

[Miguel McKelvey]

Yeah, I mean, the first thing that came up for me when I was looking at your website was the content side of things. Because I would be so confused in one of these moments of what to do. So even before I was going to buy a gift, I was thinking, could I have a guide of just how to think about it or how to feel about it? And especially now with AI, I imagine I would go ask, you know, Gemini or someone like, hey, this just happened in my life. What do I do? And so it seems like tuning your. The content side, both for SEO and also for AI, is essential. And I don't know how much you have this, but having a webpage for literally every single web search you can imagine that someone might make in one of these scenarios would be really smart because, you know, if someone goes in and they say X just happened. What do I do? You want to come up first in that, in that search and, and then if you optimize that page for AI crawling, you know, it's possible that when the person goes to AI to ask that question, they're going to find you as well. I would look at the same thing across everything. Like, can you make TikTok videos that answer these questions? Can you make YouTube videos that answer these questions? Like everywhere you could have content to answer this question, you want to be there to help people deal with it.

[Melissa Jensky]

Yeah, that makes sense.

[Guy Raz]

Melissa, I wonder, aside from marketing through influencers or doing social media ads, have you done any work with partners at all? Not sort of paid media, but with hospice organizations or oncology centers or I mean even funeral homes or. I don't know. Have you tried any of that?

[Melissa Jensky]

Yeah, so we've definitely have done like lots of cold outreach for like funeral homes and things like that. We did work with Erica Sinner to launch a Pets. Pets. She wrote a book called Pets are Family. So we worked with her to launch a custom care package. This past year we also have, we launched an employee gifting program as well. We get a lot of repeat customers. We were seeing lots of orders come in from places like Chewy, Nike, Microsoft, Gates foundation. But it's just so hard to get a foot in the door. I basically begged the Gates foundation customer to put me in touch with hr and she was like, no, I can't do that. And so there's just so much potential. But yeah, it's just hard to get a foot in, I think. And I think maybe part of it's like starting. Maybe starting more locally.

[Guy Raz]

Yeah, I mean, for sure I would start locally in Santa Fe. You know, I mean you've got obviously smaller price, smaller businesses there. But it would seem to me that. And it sounds like you're trying to that channel, that second channel. Right, that B2B gifting channel. Working with HR teams could really be game changer.

[Melissa Jensky]

Yeah, definitely. Yeah. Right on. I mean unmanaged grief in the workplace costs employers, you know, $75 billion a year and up. So like it's a huge, huge opportunity.

[Miguel McKelvey]

I was wondering, have you tried any direct mail? Have you ever, you know, have you made any printed cards that you sent out to people or anything like that?

[Melissa Jensky]

We haven't, no. Besides just like some flyers like in local coffee shops. But no direct mail to direct mailers? No.

[Miguel McKelvey]

Yeah. I mean to me it seems like this is like a back of mind thing that, you know, it's, it's almost like that thing you want to have on the refrigerator for when that time comes. That's the way I would imagine it is that if I just saw the brand out of context, I would probably forget about it. But if I had it in the back of my mind when that time came up, I would go, oh, that's where I go. But that recall is difficult. So I don't know, I kind of imagine if you've got this thing and you sort of remembered you put it on the refrigerator, you put it in a drawer somewhere and then that time comes and you go, oh, let me go find that card that I saw a couple of months ago. You know, that's the kind of thing you need is for the person to have, you know, recall of, of this option when they are searching for something. That again, is a very difficult problem, problem to solve.

[Melissa Jensky]

So yeah, that could be really interesting.

[Miguel McKelvey]

The more times, you know, someone touches a brand, the more likely they are to recall it and you might need to touch them three, four or five times. And that card could potentially one, I would say canvas your neighborhood with some cards through the mail slot and just see does that result in anything?

[Guy Raz]

Maybe it would, yeah, I love that idea. Also, Miguel, you mentioned the socials and the messaging and increasingly the AI scrapers are going to be what matters. That's the new SEO, right? And so when people ask, hey, where do I go for X, Y and Z? You know, these AI assistants are going to be making decisions based on what they're seeing out there and the language they're seeing. I mean, are you, when you do put a little bit of money into socials, are you direct in the way you are connecting, trying to connect with people like what to send someone after a miscarriage, like when you don't know what to say or something like, do you have language that's really clear like that?

[Melissa Jensky]

Not really. I mean most of our Google paid ads were Google shopping and stuff like that. We tried some. We had to bring on an ad agency last summer to try to fix things and get us back on track and it didn't work. But we did try meta and did some more kind of out there messaging and just didn't really see much happen. We are focusing a lot on SEO and blog writing to try to get those AI crawlers. We have seen a handful of orders come from AI, but I think this

[Guy Raz]

idea of just a clear message that Miguel was alluding to, people want to help. When something happens to somebody, our instinct is to help and often we don't know how to help. And so maybe it's like literally a message is like, how do you help somebody who just got a horrible diagnosis? Here's how you comfort somebody who had a miscarriage and they click. Or, or here's how you show support to somebody, you know, who's struggling with infertility.

[Melissa Jensky]

Yeah.

[Guy Raz]

What you want to telegraph is your problem is you don't know how to help. And we are your solution.

[Melissa Jensky]

Yeah, we can solve the problem.

[Miguel McKelvey]

Yeah. I would just as a point on that, I was speaking to someone who worked on SEO for a payments company. I won't say which one. They said they have literally thousands of of SEO pages for every single thing that someone might need a payment for. And, and that's. I was overwhelmed by that. But I was also like, it's so smart. You want to be the answer in that moment when someone needs you. And a lot of that is just you've got to be at kind of the top of the list, cranking out.

[Melissa Jensky]

Yeah, all of that.

[Miguel McKelvey]

And also, are you doing any email follow up? Like do you send out a weekly or a monthly newsletter to the people who have purchased?

[Melissa Jensky]

Yes, we do have an email that goes out a couple, twice a month.

[Miguel McKelvey]

Got it. So you are staying in front of mind with the people who have purchased before and what's your repeat business like? Are people typically coming back after they buy the first time?

[Melissa Jensky]

Yeah, return customer rates around 20% and I do, you know, once in a while I have to field some customer service calls. I just had one the other day and I asked her how she found out about us, about us and it was she had been gifted something. So I think that happens a lot. Someone's gifted, been gifted a care package and then they come back to buy it for someone else.

[Miguel McKelvey]

Got it. Yeah. I mean, again, it seems like because this is so situational, you need people to think of you in that exact right moment. So the more often you touch them, and this is, I think a big debate amongst email and I'm not an email expert, but email, when it's there, you find it. When it's push down 200 emails in your inbox, the chance that you find it is low. So maybe experimenting with, you know, one of these AI products that can help you with some email automation to just test some different things would be helpful because, you know, you want to stay front of mind for your customers. So whenever that moment comes, you know they think of you first.

[Melissa Jensky]

Yeah, definitely.

[Guy Raz]

Yeah, absolutely. The brand is called Good Grief. Melissa Jensky, thanks for calling in. Good luck.

[Melissa Jensky]

Thank you so much.

[Guy Raz]

All right, we're going to take another quick break here. I'm Guy Raz, and you're listening to the Advice line right here on how I built this lab. Welcome back to the Advice line on how I built this lab. I'm Guy Raz, and today I'm taking calls with WeWork co founder Miguel McKelvey. Miguel, ready for our next caller?

[Miguel McKelvey]

Let's do it.

[Guy Raz]

All right, cool. Welcome to the Advice line. You're on with Miguel McKelvey. Please tell us your name, where you're calling from, and just a little bit about your business.

[Lee Wright]

I'm Lee Wright. I'm near Boston in Marlboro, and I'm the founder of the History List Store. We provide things for people who are passionate about history. Nearly everything we offer is designed by us. Nearly everything we offer is made in America.

[Guy Raz]

Awesome. Welcome to the show, Lee. So the History List is a. It's a help me understand a little bit. I'm looking at the website, but help me understand what you sell.

[Lee Wright]

So I started out as a content site, the History List, for information about events and so on, so forth. And this is really an outgrowth of that. I was looking for a way to cover some of those costs and so designed a history nerd T shirt. And that was back in 2016. We now have hundreds of SKUs covering a wide range of historical topics, a wide range of product types and so

[Guy Raz]

forth with, like, T shirts, hats, pins.

[Lee Wright]

Exactly, exactly. And like our, you know, we do some fun things. The Thomas Jefferson breakup letter T shirt for Valentine's Day. We do also offer very selected antiques and rare finds, things that could be a ship's passport signed by John Tyler, a World War I or World War II.

[Guy Raz]

Oh, wow. Yeah.

[Lee Wright]

Coaster. Yeah, that sort of thing.

[Guy Raz]

So, all right, so it's a combination of, like, products like T shirts and prints and caps, even jewelry. But then you also have some antiques that you sell. And I guess the thing that jumps out at me is the T shirt that says huzzah, which is cool. Which is the right. Which is what they would chant during the Revolutionary War. Like, that was sort of a right.

[Lee Wright]

It is. It is. And then you see in the dot in the exclamation mark, it says 1776.

[Miguel McKelvey]

Right.

[Guy Raz]

All right. And tell me how the business is doing.

[Lee Wright]

So we did about $750,000 last year, and it's really been driven by my passion for helping connect people to history. And we have, you know, customers that come in, they're going to buy Something for a relative, perhaps. And we have other customers who place 50 different orders, 60, 75, and so forth. And we get great feedback, great reviews. People really love the things. People.

[Guy Raz]

Okay. And mainly you sell through the website or entirely through the website?

[Lee Wright]

The vast majority through the website. We sell through some selected historic sites. We have some partners that go, for example, to reenactments and so forth.

[Miguel McKelvey]

Right.

[Lee Wright]

They'll set up a tent and offer our things.

[Guy Raz]

Awesome. Okay, before we dive in further, what's your question for us?

[Lee Wright]

So this is the 250th anniversary of the founding of the country.

[Guy Raz]

Yes, indeed.

[Lee Wright]

How do we increase our customer base and drive down the cost of customer acquisition?

[Guy Raz]

All right, Miguel McKelvey, I want to bring you in a cool. Really cool stuff on the site. And here we are, year 250 of America's founding. Thoughts, ideas, answers?

[Miguel McKelvey]

Well, first, you said you wanted to bring down the cost of customer acquisition. What is it costing you now?

[Lee Wright]

Blended CAC. Around 20. 20 bucks.

[Miguel McKelvey]

20 bucks? Is that not very low? That sounds. I would love to acquire customers for 20 bucks. That sounds great.

[Lee Wright]

It's not bad. A lot of the things we do are through Facebook and so forth. We have tried a number of kind of the obvious things in terms of either reaching out, partnerships to publishers, trying to do more with historic sites. But the thing that we just keep coming back to is social.

[Miguel McKelvey]

Right. So what's your average order value?

[Lee Wright]

$80.

[Miguel McKelvey]

Okay, so you're spending $20 to get an $80 customer. And then how. What's your margin? If someone spends $80 on that, what's your gross margin?

[Lee Wright]

Yeah, so overall, the margin's around 50%, you know, not bad. One of the challenges, of course, is making things in the United States, but our customer base, I think, values that. I certainly value that, and it reinforces our Made by America message.

[Miguel McKelvey]

Yeah, I mean, I'm thinking this all sounds pretty good. You got $750,000 on a 50% margin. You're only spending $20 per customer. Like, all that sounds great. If I was going just on that, I would be saying, just spend more money on more advertising. At $20 per customer, it sou you have great stories to tell, and you just may need to go directly to the public with these stories. You know, you. I don't know if you have a TikTok for example, but people love to learn through TikTok. You might need to go post a TikTok a day with a cool historical narrative, and people will start gravitating directly to you.

[Lee Wright]

So TikTok is interesting. We've talked a lot about it. We have about 60,000 followers on Facebook, about what, 14,000 or whatever on Insta. We've debated whether or not our, our, our target market is on TikTok, but I think it's worth giving it a try. Generally, our target market skews older, and

[Miguel McKelvey]

it's only a matter of time. You know, we always say, like, the older people are on these other platforms, but, you know, age is always elevating and, you know, the platforms people are on are always changing. And again, I think what you find in the difference between TikTok and Instagram is narrative, rough storytelling, real people in front of a camera. That's really on TikTok these days, and it's less so on some of these other platforms. So it's worth experimentation at least.

[Lee Wright]

That's a great idea.

[Guy Raz]

Let me throw something out there, because you mentioned that your audience is older, and I think that's probably true. And that's still a very valuable audience. I mean, you definitely don't want to ignore those folks. I wonder a couple things here. First of all, Facebook is where I would really focus because that's where there's an older crowd. But forget about social media for a sec. I think that there are two opportunities here. One is if you've got some cash and you don't need a whole lot, I would seed little advertisements on history podcasts and, or try and collaborate. See if you can contact some of these history podcasts. They're huge, by the way. And see if you can make bespoke things for them that would drive their audience to your site. Like, some of them probably don't have merch. Maybe you can be a merch person for them.

[Lee Wright]

Absolutely. So that's a great idea. We tried that early on and it didn't. It didn't pay off. I, some time ago talked directly to a fellow, puts together just a great podcast series. It's one I think you guys are probably familiar with. And that was the pitch, right? Like, hey, you don't have merch. I can help you there. And the answer was, we're going to do our own merch.

[Guy Raz]

Well, but maybe you can buy advertising, right? I mean, that's what I'm saying.

[Lee Wright]

Well, exactly. And that was my next question. And they are a podcast that's carried by one of the larger podcast networks. And, you know, they're handling the advertising and it's going to advertisers with large budgets, more brand budgets than look for smaller shows.

[Guy Raz]

I mean, yes, you can ask the big one. Go to a smaller show that doesn't. Isn't doing that, that has an audience of 10,000, not 100,000. What I'm saying is there's always a way, especially if you're trying to reach a very specific audience. The other thing I would consider doing is make your own. I mean, if you have your own, even if you are reaching just a fraction of your followers on TikTok and your customers, maybe you've got a newsletter, you know, now you've got a podcast that you can once a week where maybe you're highlighting some cool thing in history and you're also talking about how it inspired something that you guys make or sell.

[Lee Wright]

That's a good idea. Our newsletter is very successful. We have a 50% open rate. We mail to folks every. Every Saturday with the new merchandise, every Thursday night with our rare finds.

[Miguel McKelvey]

One other thing would be, you know, finding those really niche, interesting facts. I don't know how much you're doing this on social media already, but, you know, sharing things that are surprising, that are, oh, wow, I didn't know that. You know, in small bits, people, a lot of people, this is a niche for. Right? It is. You, you know your niche, right? Then there's a whole other group, people who don't put themselves in that niche, but could be attracted to it with something, you know, a little less obscure or maybe something obscure that's really accessible and fun. So I would sort of continue to expand the edges of your appeal and just experiment, you know, try whether it's podcast, whether it's one of these other platforms, just try to get more experiments out there to see what catches on.

[Lee Wright]

Well, we're very fortunate. We have one of the most successful history folks on social history. Dame doing our social. And she just does a fabulous job doing exactly what you're talking about, putting out some of these things, whether or not that's something obscure or something that is just very timely, like the 250th.

[Guy Raz]

Awesome. Well, it sounds like you've got some momentum there. And listen, I mean, it sounds you got some ideas in place, and I think you should try podcast, Lee. You should try it.

[Lee Wright]

Well, thanks, thanks. And Guy, I think you had a master's degree in history, isn't that right?

[Guy Raz]

I do.

[Lee Wright]

Well, I hope we see you someday. And I really want to thank you both for the great podcast. I think this is one of the really indispensable resources for sure.

[Guy Raz]

That's our goal here. Lee Wright. The brand is called the History list. Good luck. Thanks so much for calling in. All right, Miguel, one of the questions I ask every founder who comes back on the show is if you could go back to when you were starting out building your business. Certainly we work and others. And you could go back and give yourself advice about something, you know, now that you've learned that would have been helpful for you to know back then. What. What could you have. What could have been helpful back then for you to know?

[Miguel McKelvey]

I think what would be helpful for me to know is to be more critical about the things that I was bad at, to think more critically about things that I avoided, you know, because I think I knew, for example, that I really didn't care about money. It wasn't a motivator for me. So as soon as I had an opportunity to hire a CFO and never think about money again, you know, I did it. But that sort of out of sight, out of mind. It's not a great model for entrepreneurship. You know, I think you have to be responsible for everything when you're a founder. And. And so that's what I would say is, like, really go back and, like, go through all the things and say, okay, you love this. You don't like this, but if you let that go, what's going to happen? And I would encourage people, you know, myself and others to do that, to kind of go into the things that you don't like as much as you do the things that you love.

[Guy Raz]

I love that. That's Miguel McKelvey, co founder of WeWork. Miguel, thanks so much for joining the show.

[Miguel McKelvey]

Thank you.

[Guy Raz]

And by the way, if you haven't heard Miguel's original How I Built this episode, you've got to go back and check it out. Both of them. We will put links to them in the podcast description. And here's one of my favorite moments from those interviews.

[Miguel McKelvey]

So they showed it to us. I'm like, wow. Like, for me, as coming from a design background, I'm like, this is sick. This is as good as it gets. And they're basically, okay, here's the building. What would you do with it? So basically, I go home and I start thinking of a concept of a name. I buy the domain, I build a website, I design some floor plans, really simple. Do, like, a quick, like, business model. I stayed up all night.

[Guy Raz]

Wait, you did this in one night?

[Miguel McKelvey]

Yeah, basically because we had been challenged with, like, what are you gonna do? And we have no credibility. Right? So my thought was, if I do all this stuff and come back tomorrow, it'll seem like we were planning it for weeks in advance.

[Guy Raz]

Hey, thanks so much for listening to the show this week. And by the way, please make sure to check out my newsletter. You can sign up for it for [e-mail] or on substack. And of course, if you are working on a business and you'd like to be on this show, send us a one minute message that tells us a little bit about your business and the questions or issues that you're currently facing because we would love to try and help you solve them. You can send us a voice Memo [e-mail] or call us at 1-800-433-1298. Leave a message there and make sure to tell us how to reach you. And we'll put all of this information in the podcast description as well. This episode was produced by Sam Paulson, with music composed by Ramtin Arablouei. It was edited by John Isabella, and our audio engineer was Kwesi Lee. Our production staff also includes Alex Chung, Elaine Coates, Noor Gill, Neva Grant, Casey Herman, Chris Masini, Catherine Cipher, Carrie Thompson, and Rommel Wood. I'm Guy Raz, and you've been listening to the advice line on How I built this Labor.