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Making It with Jon Davids
243 - How Two Brothers Hustled Their Way to $1B (and still growing) | Vineyard Vines founders, Shep and Ian Murray
00:52:27
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- [00:00]
A
These two guys started selling neckties in 1998, and today they're doing almost a billion dollars in sales a year. And it's a lot more than neckties. Their names are Shep and Ian Murray, two brothers who quit their nine to five jobs, moved to Martha's Vineyard, and built Vineyard Vines. It's an all American brand that's got a look and feel all of its own. And how it all happened is kind of nuts. Shep and Ian joined me today to share their very unlikely story of success and how it all started with Bill Clinton. Well, sort of. You'll hear all about it in a second. That's coming up. If you're getting any value from this show, let me know by leaving a rating and review. So I know to keep making episodes like this. I promise, the more noise you guys make, the bigger and better the guests will get and the better this show will be. And it just makes me feel good to hear from you. Get my best stuff to your inbox@johndavids.com and now let's get to the show. Foreign.
- [01:02]
B
You're listening to Making it with John Davids.
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A
So, Ian, in 1998, Bill Clinton is going through a big, big scandal. He hooked up with his intern, Monica Lewinsky. Everyone's talking about it. And you guys are a couple young entrepreneurs on Martha's Vineyard, and you have an idea to sell neckties to really hijack this worldwide conversation. Can you tell me about this crazy story?
- [01:33]
C
Yeah.
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B
So prior to that, Shep and I had quit our jobs, and we decided that we were going to start a company called Vineyard Vines, which made neckties that, in our opinion, represented the finer things in life or said something about you. So for us, we loved Martha's Vineyard. We took the street signs from Martha's Vineyard, reduced them down to a small scale, and put them on a necktie and sold them into stores. And people could buy them, really, in place of buying a T shirt that they could wear them to work. And so Shep happened to actually be in New York one day. We were like, you know, a month into business, and he called me. He said, there's something going on. President Clinton is on the Vineyard where he vacationed in the summertime. There's something going on in the press with Monica Lewinsky, and he wore a tie that she gave him or something. It really has nothing to do with us, but it's a light news day, so why don't you get on your bike and go over to the Edgertown Elementary School, which is our Town where the press corps is and just bring a bunch of ties and just. I don't know, but they need something. So I was like, okay. I didn't even really know what was going on. So I. It was very. It was a very honest thing. I just brought my bike there. I put a whole bunch of ties around my neck. I was wearing like just a polo shirt. And somebody came over to me and said, what are you doing? I said, well, I just read, you know, in the paper that Bill Clinton accepted ties gifts from young people. And, you know, my brother and I started a Thai company called Vineyard Vines. We're here on the Vineyard. Vineyard, and he's here. I thought he might want one of our ties.
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C
But it has spawned a cottage industry.
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A
Here on the vineyard where entrepreneurs like.
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C
Ian Murray are trying to cash in.
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B
We heard that Clinton was wearing ties that people were giving them, some people in particular. So we decided that be kind of fun to see if he would wear one of our ties, considering they got vineyard themes on them and stuff like that. And everyone thought it was like really funny. There was no real news coming in and it was sort of a feel good thing. And literally that night, a month into business, we were featured in the evening news on all the major networks. And this is in 1998. So that was like the most amplified version of getting yourself out there for free and just like not missing an opportunity. So we had a lot of fun with it.
- [03:36]
A
That is insane. And was this like a common thing you guys were doing at the beginning when you. This is like 30 days in. So were you doing lots of this, lots of these stunts and this one took off or, or was this like a one time thing?
- [03:48]
B
I mean, I think what we learned, because I worked for like a small PR marketing firm for only six months and Shep worked for a larger advertising firm, is that we learned very quickly that you can get your name and your product in the press without having to spend any money to do it. So very early, from day on, even when we couldn't afford to, we sent our ties to all the anchors of the morning shows and the financial shows and the various networks. And they were so grateful that we would just be sending them stuff. And they loved our product. And in return they would talk about us on the air. And as the years progressed, we. We develop relationships with them. And when they had slow news days, we were always a feel good story. So they would bring us on about these two brothers who were bootstrapping. And Shep and I were always like, hey, if you don't buy one of our ties, we're gonna have to go back to work, and nobody wants that to happen. So we always were, like. We just had a lot of fun with it.
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A
So, Shep, what was the entry point here? There's some story like, you guys are working nine to five jobs, and one day you quit and you started selling neckties. Can you tell me the actual origin of all this?
- [04:51]
C
Yeah, I mean, I think what happened was Ian and I were both working in Manhattan, and Martha's Vineyard is this special. It's like, almost like this fairytale, like, place for Ian and me, and we wanted to figure out how to make a living and then also be able to go on the Vineyard. And so we thought that the idea of making neckties with the finer places and things in life, you know, we actually thought of it as, like, a summer job. Like, let's go see if we can sell these. I think it was like eight or nine hundred neckties. And we did, and we did it immediately. And we're like, oh, we've got something going on here. But the idea really was for us to go live the life we wanted to live. And then if you're going to have to wear a necktie, you may as well bring the good life to work with you. Those things that you loved. And there was a guy at the ad agency I worked for. His name is Ken Wyden, and he and his brother started Wyden and Kennedy, which is a very, very. You know, it's. They do Nike, and actually, Ken did just do it and, you know, came up with those three words. And he was like. He wanted to see an account guy go do something on his own. And that's sort of what happened is Ian. And I said, hey, let's go do this. We have nothing to lose. Yeah, it just took off.
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A
And you guys had tons of experience selling apparel, right?
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C
You know, I think we had no experience.
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A
No zero experience selling apparel.
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C
We only. You know, what. What we found in life is that they're all of these great communities. You know, people are passionate about cars, they're passionate about places. One of our inspirations was Jimmy Buffett and his contingency of parrot heads. All coming together at a show or a concert or a Parrothead fan club was just like. It was like a place where everyone got to feel good. And we thought that if we could take neckties, which are these things that are choking and they mean you have to wear uncomfortable clothes and all that sort of stuff, if we could at least make those neckties fun, that it turned into, like this happy experience. And this was about the time when David Neeleman at JetBlue said, you know, flying can be different. You know, let's take off the terrible food from airplanes and the traditional flight attendants and let's treat people normally. Let's give them leather seats, TVs, and potato chips, you know, or popcorners or whatever it was. And, you know, I think Howard Schultz did a great job with coffee, Starbucks, making coffee and experience. We always say Pike's Place Fish Market in Seattle, they made buying fish. I'm sure you've been there, and they're hucking fish for us. How can we make neckties an experience? How could we evoke emotion?
- [07:49]
A
This episode is brought to you by my social media selling challenge, available now@johndavids.com challenge Imagine waking up to new customers flooding in, all coming directly from Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn, Facebook, YouTube. No more chasing likes or worrying about how many followers you have. Well, a lot of businesses are actually doing this right now, and I can show you exactly how it's done in just 20 minutes a day. Once you have the system in place, you'll wonder why you waited so long. Spots are limited, so join now. Visit johndavids.comchallenge. So why neckties, though? And I'm curious about not just drilling down to, hey, we're going to sell clothing, apparel, men's clothing, but we're going to sell neckties. What was it like? You guys had to have done some amount of research into figuring this out.
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C
Yeah, I mean, I think we looked at what was going on in the market. You know, I had to wear it. I was in the city for about five years. And we got advice early on, like, keep your ears open, your mouth shut, and look the best you can. And that meant buying, like, an Hermes tie or a Ferragamo tie. And they sort of, like, went, you know, all sort of drab colors. They went from being fun to not fun. And it was about the time that Steve Jobs was saying, it's okay to wear black mock turtleneck to work. We said, you know, there's an opportunity to make fun neckties. And we actually cut up all of our ties that we owned and we learned how to make a tie.
- [09:24]
A
Well, that's where my mind's going. Let's just paint the picture for the listener here. It's a single SKU item. There's not really a lot of sizing difference, or maybe there's just one size. And I'd imagine there's just all kinds of cost efficiencies in production and sourcing. Was that not something you realized on day one?
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C
No, we did. And, you know, it's funny, like, 10 years into the business, I was reading Ralph Lauren's biography, and it was just amazing, the similarities, you know, in terms of how we got started. And it was almost like I didn't want to finish the book when I got to the place where we were. But, like, you know, I think, what. Listen, Ralph is a genius, and he's one of our. Like, there's only one guy like him in the fashion industry. And we remain huge fans of his and pressed to this day, what he continues to achieve. You know, but what we. What we did is we said, hey, look at what Ralph is doing, and, you know, let's go sell. He always prides himself on being authentic, but it was almost like you couldn't get into these stories, these worlds that he created. And so we were just sort of like, you know what? You can buy a tie, you can go. And then it, you know, became a bathing suit or a polo. You can do that. And by the way, the lifestyle really is just. Every day should feel this good. You don't need to have a ranch. You don't need to have. All you need is a beach. All you need is a wedding. All you need is a family vacation, whatever it was, where you can go live the vineyard vines. Every day should feel this good motto.
- [11:01]
A
So that. That was your positioning. So. So, Ian, I love, obviously how you started, and you, 30 days in, have this great marketing stunt. What was the actual grind, though? Because these are all kind of good news, feel good moments. What was it like the first year? The first two years? Were you guys hustling? Were you guys eating ramen noodles?
- [11:21]
B
Yeah. I mean, fill in some of the gaps around what Shep was talking about. Before we quit our jobs, we signed up for every credit card that we could because we had an income. And at that time, there are very low interest rates. You could write a cash advance check to yourself, essentially. So we seeded the business with $7,000 on, like a. It was like a 90 day, 0% interest, and we'd roll it over to the next credit card, sort of like, I think at some point it got up to, like 40 or $50,000 that we were, like, kiting this money around. And like Shep said, we cut up our ties. And then, you know, the Internet was just, like, sort of coming along. I remember going to, you know, the New York Public Library, looking in the. The Thomas Crane registry of, like, clothing manufacturers and driving around to various places all around New York City and Long island to try and figure out how to actually get the components that were necessary to build a tie. And then we ended up screening, making silk screens overseas at different mills, and they would ship the stuff over to us. I can remember being in, like, flip flops and, like, my Ford Bronco or Shep's Jeep at, like, Receiving Bay, you know, at the commercial part of the terminal with, like, all these semis and 18 wheelers, and we're, like, picking up, you know, rolls of silk that we're going to drive someplace that's going to get cut and sewn into ties. And then what we did was very early. So we sold on Martha's Vineyard. One of the stores that we sold our products into had a store also in Nantucket. So they brought some over there and they were very successful, even. Maybe even more successful early on on Nantucket than they were on Martha's Vineyard. And people started bringing the ties back to their hometowns. And our customers early on became advocates for us. They were telling their local mom and pop retailer that they should carry our product. So Shep and I would get in the Jeep and it was like, reminiscent of, like, a scene from the movie Tommy Boy. You know, we'd be. Get all we'd like getting dressed in a parking lot, like, putting our tie on. How do I look? You know, is there a booger in my nose? Or whatever it is. And like, we'd walk in and we'd be. I mean, I can only imagine how we presented, but I think there was some empathy and some excitement and all those things about us trying to make it. Because it was very early days. We were inspired by Tom and Tom from Nantucket Nectars and like Shep said Neilman from JetBlue, and all these people who are doing things differently. Sort of basically a disruptor before there was disruptors. And so we were doing all that, but also working jobs as a caterer. We were waxing cars. Shep had a little car detailing business. I was playing guitar. Yeah, whatever we could do to make money. And then I remember I was working at a ski shop and I, like, skipped a couple of shifts because I was going to sell neckties somewhere. And I got an answering machine message from the boss, who's a great guy, but he's like, I just want to let you know that we actually permanently removed you from the schedule. So those things happened.
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A
And how long was it before it was a full time business, was a couple of years.
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C
No, it became, you know, really what happened was, you know, every, every single person has that, that moment in life. And we had been working on this for five or six months and I had my review and I worked with a bunch of the people on my team were not my favorite and I had my review and they told me I needed to think more inside the box. And I went up to HR and I was like, hey, listen, this isn't working for me. The team you have here, in my opinion, isn't doing what's best for the company or the brands they represent. And here's my three week notice. Because we wanted to get to, I think it was like July 1st for health insurance that we could get through COBRA. And so I quit. I called Ian, I was like, hey, listen, I just quit. Now it's your turn. He said, give me five minutes. He called me, five minutes later, he quit. We met at the, at the bar car, got hammered on the bar car. Our dad picked us up because we were both living at home. And then our parents were furious at us for quitting our jobs. My girlfriend, who's now my wife, was absolutely, you know, furious because she wanted to get married. So we quit.
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A
And how old were you guys at this point?
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C
We were 22 and 26, I think 23, 27. And I think as Ian was saying, people would say, well, who are your investors? And we said MasterCard and Visa because we had all this credit card cash advance. But it was really about. I was at lunch in Palm beach yesterday with an old account. We were talking about what it means to be an entrepreneur. And an entrepreneur is like, you wake up every single day and you almost have to have body armor on because it's like every single day you wake up and it's like, who's going to punch you in the face? And you sort of just have to keep going. This has been like a 27 year boxing round, but what you have is you have to do it not only for all of the people that depend on you and trying to make the customers happy, but because that's what an entrepreneur has in them. You know, like, we wake up every single day. We don't have to work another day in our life. We do this because we love it. We love the challenges, and there are challenges every single day. And so I think that's like, that's why I wake up and do it.
- [16:39]
A
So I'd love to talk about the phases here because the reality is we're Talking about these early days, and that was 20 plus years ago, but you guys have scaled to, you know, really, really high numbers, especially considering the fact that you're a private company still bootstrapped, I believe. And so the fact that you had your initial investors of Visa and mastercard unwilling investors, and now you're running this big company. Can you talk about the growing phases I'm always curious about? Getting from zero to a million is one mission. Then you have to go from 1 million to 10 million. Then you have to go from 10 to 30. And doing this, especially in an E Commerce or not in E Commerce, a physical goods business where you're reinvesting for that next capital cycle. Can you just talk about what the growth phases were like and what you remember about those kind of battle scars?
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C
Yeah, I mean, I think what we've learned is every single hurdle that you go from, like the steps, you know, when we reach 50 million, when we reach 100 million, when we reach 250 million, when we reach 500 million. We've always had to have a different set of skills.
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A
So, Todd, I wanted to, because that's what's super interesting to me. Let's just start from like 1 to call it 10 million. What if you can remember, what was that like? What were the challenges that you were waking up facing every day when you were doing 1, 2, 3, 4, 10 million?
- [18:02]
B
You know what I think about the early days? For example, we would sell ties in a gym, right? And it was really, it sucked, but. And our friends would be working in a training program at Goldman Sachs or something like that, where they knew where their path was going to be. And we would walk out of that gym with like $50,000 of cash selling ties. And they might make that in a year or six months at the time. So that was sort of our first hurdle, was not to let our pride get in the way of what it is actually we were doing. Our eye was always on the prize. We knew it was going to be hard in early days. And I think as to get from a million dollars to $10 million, I'm trying to think about it. A lot of that scale came from realizing that we couldn't. We could only sell as much as we could sell ourselves, that we really needed to be in other stores, you know. So like I said earlier, Shep and I spent a lot of time on the road going to visit accounts. And when we couldn't visit accounts, we hired a lot of recent college grads who, you know, basically people that we had met along the way to work for us and do it on our behalf.
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A
And when you say visit accounts, you're talking about visit independent retail stores.
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B
Yeah, because those did two things. One, you already had foot traffic. They were coming in there to buy whatever else they were going to buy, and so you get customers there. Two, we hired people who we felt were very like minded, and so they put the same fun and enthusiasm into Vineyard Vines as they would into, like we said, if we had a guitar company or a fly fishing company. Like, we just tried to make it exciting and fun. And so we did a lot of entertaining. And what we found was that if we hired people who are really magnetic, that our accounts and our customers wanted to be with them and that made them want to buy more product from us. So we always have tried to have this atmosphere of like, bring the party with us everywhere we go. And you can see, like, Shep and I are like, we're a little awkward, a little quiet. You know, we're actually relatively shy until you get to know us. But bringing these sort of like, you know, very energetic group of people, like, surrounding us with them was probably the best thing that we could have ever done. And by the way, we're not like great athletes or great anything. You know, we're not particularly good at anything. But we always had those people sort of around us. And that was really. That really helped.
- [20:17]
A
So I bet you there's some story there, because that's super important. Culture first. And the personalities of the people you hire are so important. Because I bet you if a lot of those early hires were duds, we probably wouldn't be talking like this today.
- [20:29]
C
That's what gives us the momentum and also the motivation. You know, we work with JP Morgan as one of our banks, and, you know, sort of the unofficial thing is like, you know, no jerks, like, they don't have jerks on their team and they get to choose who they work with.
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A
First class business with first class people. Something like that was J.P. morgan's motto.
- [20:52]
C
And I think that, you know, we've seen is we've had, you know, terrible buyers from our important accounts where Ian and I will call and say, hey, listen, you can't treat our team like that. We're willing to drop the account unless you're willing to start having some respect for our team. It's really about like, everything has to be part of every day should feel this good. And if there's not anything that's within our control that doesn't live up to that line, then we're not doing it.
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A
But that's really, it's one thing to say that, it's another thing to practice that. I mean, it all sounds good until someone offers you a million bucks and you go, okay, well, here's a real.
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B
Time example of that. So here we are, we're 27, 28 years into the brand Chef's talking about. Every day should feel this good. And we value relationships above all else. I mean, at the end of the day, we do have branded products, so people love to wear our brand and feels like you're part of a tribe. But we make khaki shorts and button down shirts and bathing suits and people can get that from similar product from, from other brands. And there are times, you know, over our run, we've been steadily going up, it goes, you know, it goes like this a little bit. And what we have found is that our customers, whether it's our direct customers or our wholesale accounts or our partners or vendors, they love to work with our team and they hold those relationships above all else too. So even when things, when there's bumps in the road, because things we can control, oftentimes things we can't control, our customers come back because they love to work with our team. Like, I just, you know, we were just down in Florida at a trade show and a lot of our, you know, the guys on our team and the girls on our team have been working with these accounts for over 20 years. And in our industry, you have a lot of, a lot of people, you know, anyone now with a credit card and a phone can start a brand. And, you know, and you'll see some brands that shoot out, you know, they'll raise money from private equity or whatever it is, and they'll shoot to the, to the sky. And sometimes they do great and they continue well, but often they sort of summit pretty early and then they start to taper. And our best customers, whether it's our direct customers or our partners, are the ones who've been with us for a long time. They like the consistency of the relationship.
- [23:04]
A
This episode is brought to you by Influicity's new tool, the AI Ads Generator. Available now at johndavids.com ads Great ads aren't about luck. They're about leverage. The brands that win are the ones who can launch faster, test smarter, and outspend everyone else without wasting a dollar. That's exactly what the AI Ads Generator gives you. Instant ad copy that speaks to every customer and feeds the algorithm high performing variations. Your competitors can't keep up with. It's like strapping a jet engine onto your marketing. And right now it's free. Yes, it's free. Go to johndavids.com ads. That's johndavids.com Ads. So what were. If you remember any of the kind of big breaking points, I'd imagine, as you're scaling to 20, 30, 50, 100 million, both on the capital side and then also on the operations side, just figuring out how you double or triple in size at that kind of scale. Do you remember, Shep, any moments where you're like, oh, crap, we're in for it now.
- [24:09]
C
So the answer is yes, every single day. You always have that. But again, it's like, if you're in a ring and you're boxing and you get, you know, knocked down, you're going to do whatever it takes to get back up, you know, because you want to win. I mean, there's been so many examples of that. And I think sort of like always doing the right thing is the right thing to do. Right? And that's a Martin Luther King quote.
- [24:34]
A
Do you guys have these things written down? Like, do you guys have, you know, here are three non negotiables, or is it just, like, in your heart?
- [24:42]
C
I'll give you an example. Like, during COVID everybody was laying off everybody in the company, you know, in their headquarters, in the stores. We had all these stores that were closed for a long time, and we kept everybody on the banks thought we were crazy. Everybody thought we were crazy. And we said, you know what? We win and lose as a team. And, you know, like, we didn't think that doing what was the right business thing to do was the right thing for our business. I don't know if that makes sense to you, but, like, we've always done whatever we can do to treat our team and our customers well. And that's. That's sort of the mission. And it's sincere. And everybody who meets us is like, that's who we are. And, you know, if you know us, we're very, very constant. And we may not have those virtues that you're talking about written down, but that's part of our DNA and our brand.
- [25:46]
B
People often say that this is what Shep would do. It's just sort of known.
- [25:50]
C
Yeah, it's also like, sort of like going back to Buffett. What would Jimmy Buffett do? We tell our teams in the stores if there's an unhappy customer, whatever it is. What would Shep and Ian do if they were in the store right now and Empowering the teams with that ability to act in that way creates a loyal customer and a loyal team, because you have to have trust.
- [26:19]
B
Shep, thinking about this, a lot of the decisions that we make is really about we want our brand to be around in 100 years. So every decision we make is not about a short term gain. It's like, are we going to get the sale today or is the brand going to be stronger a decade from now as a result of our actions? And one of the things that we do have written down, which could be applied to just about any industry, any business, is our company goals at the highest level. Very three simple goals. And you ask anybody who works at Vineyard Vines, they'll hopefully they're going to be able to tell you what they are. But the number one goal that Shep and I wake up every morning is we want to make sure that Vineyard Vines is a great place to work. We want to make sure that we take care of our people and that they love their job and they're passionate about it and they feel like they're appreciated. The second thing that we want to do is we want to deliver an incredible customer experience. So that's through all the touch points that our customers interact with us. And then the third thing that we want to do is make sure that we're always working towards driving profitable sales growth, that we're not just looking to take market share and we're not just looking to make money. We're looking to do a little bit of that at a time. And you know that we're growing at a rate that we can substantiate. And the reason we say it like that is we have to have a happy team to deliver a happy experience to people so that we can make money. As soon as that gets flipped over, we start making decisions for the wrong reasons. And we don't always get it right, but we like to think we get it right more often than not. And that has been something. What do you think, Shep? We've probably been marching to this for like 15 years now.
- [27:49]
C
It's all about Richard Branson, who's another one of our idols, if you will. And he said, train people so they can go work anywhere and treat them so they'll never leave. And I think that that's sort of where we are, where we try to be. There's always that person that's been around for a long time that leaves for whatever reason. It particularly hurts when they go work for a competitor, but that's part of life. And Yesterday I was talking to a buddy and we were talking about. He was saying how he likes to only do things himself. He doesn't trust the way other people do it. And I said, you know, that's good, but you can't grow that. You know, that mentality. I said, and so, you know, where we are is we have to a. They have to know the mission, they have to know what we want and training them there. And so it's like, in order to scale a business, you can't do everything yourself, because if we didn't empower and trust other people, then you'll never grow. And so he's like, how many? What percentage? I said, well, you know, I think on average, it's like sort of 75 to 80% of what we would do. I said, but you know what? When we go in and 75% is done, and then we can go tweak that last 25%, that's where you can scale because, you know, in order, you know, because you're only spending a quarter of the time to do, you know, 100%. Does that make sense?
- [29:20]
A
The other way to think about that, it makes a lot of sense is. And especially somebody who says, oh, well, I need to do everything myself. I mean, I get that inclination. But you're never going to be a leader who scales a big company with that mentality. The other way to think about it is, let's say you find someone who can do 80% of what you can do or 70% of what you can do when they're fully trained up. Okay, that might be a little frustrating, but now get a hundred of those people, now they're doing 700 times what you can do or whatever that number is. And so, yeah, you, as you scale, yeah, of course you're going to take a couple steps back, but then you're going to be so far ahead of where you ever would have been on your own.
- [29:56]
C
That's what I was telling him. And he said, I've never thought about it like that. And I said, you know, Ian and I really focus on getting another point or two out of all of a percentage or two or five or whatever it is out of all of these people. That's how you scale a brand. It's never going to be perfect. And in fact, if you were to talk to anybody, Ian and I will always say, great job, you know, in a meeting, great job. But let's go try and go from, you know, good to great or fair to good, whatever it is that, you know, we Are, you know, we're never going to get it perfect. And that's why we wake up every day, because that's the quest to make it perfect. I think that that's how you scale a business, by knowing it's not going to be perfect. But how do you, as a leader, get people who understand it, who want to get to that place and want to learn and want to be coached and want to be developed? And that's the fun part about what we do. And for the rest of our team, you know, the managers, the whoever, you know, the leaders, getting the rest of the team to swim in that direction as well. And by the way, just, you know, as we were speaking about teams, Ian and I are only as good as the two of us, but Ian and I are as great as our team is. And so we can't do anything without our team. And we would be remiss if we didn't do a special shout out to them because they're the ones that are on the front line that really bring, every day should feel this good to life. They're the ones that march to one, make Vineyard vines a great place to work, two, create a great experience for our customer, and three, drive profitable sales growth. And that's amazing.
- [31:44]
A
I get a sense that you tell them that every day and that they feel it. I can tell that from this conversation.
- [31:50]
C
We hope so. But again, listen, we can always be doing a better job, but on an average day, everybody has our phone number when we're in the office. And we're in the office a bunch. I'm down in Florida now, but they come into our office. The door is always, the door is always open. And, you know, we treat them the way that we would want to be treated. That's the goal.
- [32:15]
A
So you have grown in a industry that I don't think people that are outside the industry quite understand. A lot of people tuning in now maybe have service businesses or businesses that aren't quite capital intensive. I've talked to a lot of people who have scaled big retail and physical product companies, and they've almost always hit a point where they have to raise money. There's a, you know, there's a few that don't, but you guys didn't. And I'm curious to know, how did you like. We understand the tactics from the early days. You know, you start on credit card, but at a certain point, do you ever feel like, okay, we need $25 million. Oh, we need $35 million. Do you ever not get tempted to say, let's just bring in some private equity at this point.
- [32:57]
C
Listen, we, we, we actually entertained it and we did a process and, and it didn't, we ultimately didn't do anything. But the reality is that when you take any money, the dynamic shifts completely in the company. And we've seen that even in so many other companies. You have to answer the two of us. And one thing we didn't talk about, I think is having world class partners. They help and they also tell you what the opportunities are. You don't just have to raise money from private equity. If you have a great business and a strong balance sheet and great partners, there's a lot of other options. For example, our business, when we need debt, we reach out. We have a line of credit with a syndication of banks. So they're our private equity. We're just borrowing against ourselves 100%.
- [33:57]
A
I talked to so many and like, let's face it, I'm talking about younger entrepreneurs here who are in their 20s and 30s and they're building an app, a piece of software. Maybe it's a physical product, but their first instinct is we need to go and raise venture capital, which, which, which to me is like, I'm repulsed by that. But the, the shark tank ification. The idea that if I want to open a coffee shop, I got to go raise $35,000. Like, I think it's pathetic. Honest. If I'm being honest with you guys, I think the way you've done it, I actually think the way you've done it is in the extreme, but there's something about it where you're also kind of repulsed by it. You don't like the idea of letting somebody else onto your cap table.
- [34:38]
B
I also think part of the things that is very hard to do as an entrepreneur is to instill some discipline. Shep touched upon it earlier, but set some goals that are realistic. In the very early days, we used to make a list of 10 things we wanted to accomplish that day that we knew we could do. We wanted to call 10 accounts. We wanted to, you know, whatever it is we needed to do. And now today it's like, okay, well, I don't know, let's use an example. Like sweaters, for example. We want to make, you know, sweaters, okay? So we're going to make two styles of sweaters. We're not going to introduce a third style of sweater until we get those two styles where we want them to be so you don't get too wide too quickly. And so that was, you know, like Shep said, we started with neckties. We wanted to get that to a certain dollar amount, and then we'd layer on another product. And sometimes where we have lost focus or we have had excess inventory is when the assortment gets too wide and we get out of our core competency in a way that is not adopted by our customer the way maybe we think it is going to happen, or we simply just buy too much inventory. You know, in our business, inventory is a tough thing, but I think it's all about, like, setting realistic goals, achieving those goals, and then layering on your next thing rather than trying to do everything all at once. Because it can be. It's almost like putting your chips all in on something and then losing that bet. And I don't think you want to do that.
- [35:56]
A
I think you just said something so profound that people might have missed because you sort of said it like it was so smart. It's actually the focus of it all, because the idea that you would launch a product and say, I want this product to be making a million dollars before we even have a conversation about product number two. A lot of people don't have that discipliny in there. They're saying, I'm gonna launch this product. Yeah, it's been 48 hours. Let's just launch a second product to see what happens. It's like, no, no, no. We're gonna wait till this thing gets to a million. So all that excess energy and time we have, let's use it to actually, you know, do even better on that first product. Let's not launch a second thing. A lot of people don't do that. Did you always have that discipline?
- [36:35]
B
We don't always have that discipline. We'd like to, I think. Right. But, like, you know, it's sort of like the sophomore effort for the album, too, because you know that that first product is not going to sell forever. So you always need to be, like, trying some new things alongside it to make sure that there's something else to move your customer into when they get tired of that one.
- [36:55]
C
I have a couple things. One, there was a mentor that we had. His name was Ira Neemark, and he was the guy that put Bergdorf Goodman on the map. And he dressed everyone from Lady Di to He was the guy. And we were fortunate to have him in our corner for a long time. And he sat us down. He said, listen, until you do 5 million bucks in ties, don't do another product. Focus on that. Do that well. And that was great advice. I think the other thing too. We've been fortunate. Someone quoted me and I think it's great. Ian and I wanted to have the fun of Jimmy Buffett and the business acumen of Warren Buffett. And we were fortunate enough to meet both of them, have dinner with Warren Buffett a couple of times. And just even watching him order dinner, he's like, I eat anything a five year old does. I think what it was, it was keep it simple. And so we have a bunch of little quotes or isms that have driven us. Henry Ford said, if you think you can or think you can't, you're right. Walt Disney said, if you can dream it, you can do it. There's another one that says experience is what you get when you don't get what you want. And then I think what we would say to that is that experience is if you can take that negative and turn it to a positive, that's great. And then the last one we always talk about is Ben Franklin and he said, the harder you work, the luckier you get. And I think that those are all very, very simple to understand. It's what we try and do every single day. You work hard, we dream, we get that bad experience or great experience, whatever it is. And that is applicable to every single business. And I think that that's something that everybody says the same thing, they just say it in a little bit of a different way. But all those people scaled businesses with these really, really simple ideas, really simple.
- [39:12]
A
Ideas, and then a lot of discipline to actually execute. I mean, the Warren Buffett example, he famously now famous said, most of our gains came from the five investments out of the 500 we made. And the idea that you would buy something in 1980 and then still own it in, you know, 2026, like, that's a lot of discipline.
- [39:33]
C
You know what's so funny is I listened to the guy and you know, like, I don't know, it was 20 years ago and I put a couple of chips into the market that I really believed in and I've never sold anything in 20 something years. And so, and that's actually worked out very, very well. I mean, you have to pick the right place things and you can't let the news sway you. It's again, it's like, do you think that brand or that company is going to be more successful five years from now than it is today? Or are you going to let a bad quarter make you take your chips off the table? I've sort of had a steel stomach as, as some of these economic Collapses have happened. I just said no. I feel like they're gonna be better than everybody else.
- [40:26]
A
The people who do the best in the stock market are the ones that lose the passwords to their brokerage accounts. It's true. It's actually a real stat. They do tremendously well. This episode is brought to you by my Playbook website selling machine, available right now@johndavids.com playbook. Most companies want websites that look nice, but a lot of nice looking websites don't. What you really want is a website that grabs attention, builds trust and turns visitors into buyers while you sleep. That's what this Playbook gives you. Based on 10 years of work we've done at Influicity optimizing websites for 7, 8 and 9 figure brands. Download the Playbook now at johndavids.com playbook. That's johndavids.com Playbook. So let's talk about. I understand how you guys, you have a lot of grind in you and you obviously have the experience. You both worked in advertising, so you know how to promote products, which is like super, super important. You obviously figured out how to make products. Pricing, positioning, when did you bring MBAs and like leadership. I'm sure there were weaknesses. You talked about lawyers, accountants. When did you start to say, okay, we need some more hands here. And what, what, what did that, what did those early days of talent look like?
- [41:45]
B
I mean, very early on we like put together an operating agreement and those types of, we set it up like a proper business and an LLC and all those things, which is still what we are today. And I think what we've realized is that we've had a couple of leaders who've been with us really for 20, 25 years who have grown with the business. And they're a critical part of the culture. A, their talent has, you know, their talent level has grown and they've, you know, they've been lifelong learners working with us two. They also help us keep and maintain the culture. That's a big piece of it.
- [42:19]
A
So you guys started grinding it out. And obviously you had backgrounds in promotion and you knew how to, how to build the word and the kind of brand about this business. But when did you start to bring on the accountants, the lawyers, the operators, all the kind of talent that you needed to build? Do you remember what revenue you were doing? Was that like something you did on day one? Was that when you were past 10 million in revenue?
- [42:43]
B
I think there's multiple stages to it. On day one we did, you know, or close to day One, we set up an operating agreement, an llc, which is actually still the structure that the business is in today. And over periods of growth, there's been two. It's been two parallel paths. We've essentially had some of our team has been with us for over 20 years and they have been learning along the way, building the airplane as we fly it type of thing, and learning tons of skills. They've also been incredible partners, thought partners. And also we trust them implicitly, which is totally critical. And they're keeper of the cultures. And then along the way, we've had different people in and out of our management team. Sometimes they opt out because the business has surpassed their skillset and sometimes there have been other issues along the way. But what we found is that the skill set that I think there's a book, what got you here won't get you there type of thing. So that there are different people along the way. So our first CFO or our first bookkeeper to who our CFO is today, it's changed over time and we've seen it's like basically from 10 million to 50 million, 50 million to a few hundred million or 500 million and then 500 million to a billion type of thing. There's different stages. And while we're not a public company and we don't have investors, we do take our business very seriously in terms of we audit all of our financials and we do measure ourselves so that we always leave the optionality open that we operate totally properly to whatever life was to throw at us. We're always ready for it.
- [44:28]
C
I'd love to just add to that. One of the things I think that's really, really great about our company is to Ian's point, we've had people in and out. But when you look at the leadership of our company, it's Ian, me and our two presidents, one of which has been with us for 25 years. He was our first employee and then one, you know, she's. She's been with us, I think, for almost 15 years and she was just promoted to president last year. But when you think about the leadership of our company, it's all sort of from within, because they live and breathe and work towards every day should feel this good. And we have had some people in and out that haven't done that. And so that's very, very important. And I mean really, really proud to think that the leadership we have is all homegrown at the four top positions. So I think it's a. That's something that Ian and I think is actually very amazing.
- [45:33]
A
It's so clear that you have such a culture first business from this whole conversation. And just in that last point, it sounds like the people who maybe had the right skills but didn't have the right cultural fit couldn't live and breathe that mission and be a part of the family that you've built. It doesn't matter that they know how to do the job. That's kind of secondary to wanting to work with them every day. Can you talk about. You're both very, you know, you both have families. You both seem to be well adjusted. You're like two normal guys, which doesn't always happen when you. You've had the experience that you've had. Were you grinding and hustling the whole time? Were you able to have family lives and kind of do all that at the same time? Or was. Was that something that came much later?
- [46:18]
B
You know, I'll. I'll share something with you that you may not know that I think has helped to shape who we are today. When we started the business, even when I was in college, our mom was sick and she battled cancer for a long time. And she passed away in 2003, which is about four or five years into the business. And she used to always come to me, our office is not what it is today, but we had a whole bunch of people and a lot of energy and a lot of fun, and she always came to the office. One of the highlights of working for ourselves is that we could set her on schedule. Not many people know this, but we went to every single doctor's appointment. We did everything with her, and we got tons of time with her that we probably wouldn't have gotten if we were working a typical job. And then, you know, within. Within two years of that, our father passed away, too. He got sick after our mom passed away, and then he died. And so we learned very quickly that those types of things are finite. They don't last forever as the years Progress. Shep has three kids. They're all 10 years older than mine. But, you know, we're the dads who drop the kids off at school every morning. We are there for the games. We are there for all the stuff. And we have always made that a priority. And not only that, we started the business. We haven't lost sight of it because we love to spend the summer on Martha's Vineyard. And so we set up our calendar. We set up everything that Shep and I still live on Martha's Vineyard, you know, June, July, and August every year. And we learned very quickly that our team would much rather come visit us on the Vineyard for a day than have us come back to the office to catch up with them. So like, there have been a lot of things that, you know, while it seems like it's been a storybook ride, we've had certainly our share of challenges within the business and then outside the business too, that have shaped us as who we are and make sure that, you know, at the end of the day, when you really think about it, we have a brand that has a smiling pink whale as a logo. We make clothes, we don't save lives, you know, and we're thankful that we get to employ thousands of people, we get to work with companies around the world and we get to make people's days brighter, you know, and that that is what we do. And if any of that stuff is going to take away from us being able to spend time with, you know, with our families or pursuing the things that we love to do as like human beings, then, you know, we think we have our priorities in the wrong place.
- [48:39]
C
Yeah. And I would just add to that. We've been doing this for however many years, 27, 28, whatever it is, we've never been away from our family for more than three or four days. And like Ian said, drive our kids to school every single day, take phone calls, whatever it is, our kids and our wives are our priority. I think one of the really exciting things, and Ian has, you know, just experienced it this summer and I've been experiencing it now for 10 years is having the kids. They've all been. And our niece and nephew have worked in our business in the stores since time they were 14 or 15 years old. And now two of my kids have joined the business full time and it's like having like mini me's all over the place. They spent every weekend either working at a store or visiting a store because that's what Ian and I do during the weekends, like and you know, understanding, you know, see how things are merchandise, see how the quality of a product is, see how people are greeting, they know all of that stuff. And so, you know, we always talk about like being family owned and operated and now we're going to the next generation and I think that that's exciting. But we've never done anything to put our families second to grow our business. And I think that's what everyday should feel is good means to us.
- [50:07]
A
Wow. Well, that is a great place to end it. It's an amazing story. I think People are going to seriously be inspired because what you guys have achieved, keeping the values, keeping the morals, the culture, and the reason you started to do it in the first place, to not have to go to a 9 to 5 grind every day.
- [50:24]
C
One thing we didn't talk about is the origin of the whale.
- [50:28]
A
Please, let's end there. Go ahead. What's the origin of the whale?
- [50:31]
C
So people asked us. We started with Vineyard Vines, Martha's Vineyard, and we just took the Nantucket Red color and the navy, which was the uniform back then. Murray's Toggery Shop on Nantucket Reds and a navy polo is what every single person was wearing. When it came time for a logo, our father carved whales, and we always had a whale above our door. And when he passed away, there were 15 whales. And so on top of our doors at our homes are all whales that our dad carved. And so when it came time for a logo, we just decided it made sense because Martha's Vineyard was an old whaling colony. And why not make it pink and blue and have it smiling and sort of be a remembrance of our mom and dad and. And we thought it really embodied. Every day should feel this good. So that's how Vineyard Vines whale came to be.
- [51:27]
B
Actual whale that our dad covered there was above our door as we were kids growing up. Yeah, that whale's got to be from the early 60s.
- [51:36]
A
All right, we're going to include a photo of that. That was awesome. You guys are great. Thank you so much for doing this.
- [51:42]
C
Thank you, guys.
- [51:43]
B
Thanks, John.
- [51:44]
A
Thanks for listening. Get my best stuff to your inbox if you@johndavids.com talk to you soon. Quick break. So I can tell you about Influicity. That's the little marketing agency I started in my apartment about 10 years ago. Well, fast forward. It is not so little anymore. Influicity works with some of the biggest brands in the world, building customer communities that drive revenue. We do this through influencers, podcasts, paid media, social media, content, AI, and so much more. You can learn more@influicity.com and hey, while you're there, check out our case studies. We have a lot of them. That's influicity.com.