← Miracle Mentality with Tim Storey (Motivation, Self Help, and Mental Health)
Miracle Mentality with Tim Storey (Motivation, Self Help, and Mental Health)
Joe Foster and Ben Weiss: The Importance of Mentorship, Collaboration, and Taking Risks | Leadership | E23
00:46:15
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- [00:00]
A
Hello, my name is Tim Storey. Welcome to Miracle Mentality. Remember, rooftops, drawing spaceships on the ground. It's for the dreamers, the doers, the believers in something greater. In each episode, I'll invite you to rise above the mundane, to push past the messy and learn to live boldly in the miraculous. Every episode will have practical wisdom, spiritual insight, and my guests will explore what it takes to activate your miracle mindset. Remember to subscribe, follow and like. Welcome to my podcast, the Miracle Mentality. You guys must like this podcast. I feel like Sally Field when she said, you like me. You really, really like me. Because when people were trying to get me into the podcast space, I just thought it was so crowded. But I think we're onto something because I'm talking to people about mentality, mindset, perspective from all walks of life, and I seem to draw innovators, creators, people who think outside the box. Today I'm excited about the two guests I have because in my opinion, what they've done on their own path with their own assignments has been so amazing. They're pioneers, but then to collaborate. And I love the power of collaboration because I think so many times a lot of strong individuals, they love to work alone. But when you collaborate, there can be really something to that. You think of people that write songs. Lionel Richie, he always collaborated with people. Elton John has been with Bernie Taupin forever. My friend Pharrell Williams was with Chad in the early days of the Neptunes. So these two gentlemen are collaborating together and it's going to be a great program today. So thank you for continuing to watch. Make sure and tell a friend about it. I think that's how we're really growing so fast. Tell a friend and then like. And subscribe. All right, so I just want to just say this. My two guests today, I have Joe Foster from Reebok. He is a co founder of Reebok and Reebok. Wow. I mean, to think that you have an idea and then to take it to the world and all of us wanted it. So I'm originally from Compton, California, from the inner city. I'm kind of a ghetto kid and I'm proud of that. But when they started doing things with people who look like me, that got me excited. When they came out with the pump shoe, I'm like, my, my God, I could pump up my shoe. What the heck's going on here? So what a privilege to have Joe on today. And then I like this young guy, met him one time, loved his energy. Ben is a amazing entrepreneur. Ben Weiss and comes up with these ideas that are a little bit out there, but maybe at the same time they're in there because they are finding their ways and working. And then he takes these companies to a billion dollar valuation, which says a lot about somebody. So I'm going to bring them on right now because they're collaborating on something new and I'm going to jump right into that and then we'll get into the companies that brought them together. So good to see Ben and Joe, thank you for being on my program today.
- [03:40]
B
Pleasure, Tim.
- [03:41]
C
Good to be with you.
- [03:42]
A
So, Joe, you are coming from the UK today?
- [03:46]
B
I am indeed.
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A
Can you tell us from what part? Because I love the uk the nearest.
- [03:52]
B
I can give you is Manchester.
- [03:55]
A
Manchester, I know Manchester well. I just did a conference there about eight months ago and I liked the downtown area. I was in a nice hotel. I don't know where I was, but I also loved their Starbucks so much I bought a cup. Joe, how did you meet Ben Weiss? How did this come together?
- [04:20]
B
Now that we have these wonderful computers and we can speak to people, it's so easy. Much easier than in my day when I started in business. But Ben just reached out to us. We're always open, we're always available. He reached out and we could feel his energy, as you probably could when you met him. We could feel his energy and his ideas were great. New, something different. At Reebok, we always look for white space, somewhere where we could make a difference, somewhere where we could do something different. And it just felt as though, well, Ben is looking in this different space and everything seems crowded, but there are plenty of little niches and Ben is in one of those niches and it can become a big story. So Ben reached out and since then we've been over to Florida a few times and we met up. But yes, Ben has got some good ideas. So he reached out and we got together.
- [05:19]
A
So, Ben, give me the reason why you felt a need to reach out to Joe.
- [05:25]
C
You know, in business you want to avoid mistakes and you want to give yourself as big of a competitive advantage as possible. And you know what Joe's done is he's written a book on his life called Shoemaker of how he started with no money, sleeping at the factory, barely affording equipment, and was able to build this brand from an idea to the best selling shoe company in the world. And I realized that by getting him attached to us and advising me and giving me insights into what we're doing, it's going to solve a lot of Problems. We're going to avoid a lot of mistakes and. And we're going to accelerate what we're doing, you know, substantially. Fortunately, Joe was in a position where he wanted to give back his knowledge and insights from his journey. He wrote this book on his life. I read the book. I really enjoyed it. And I was like, I got to get him involved in this. So I just reached out to him online, sent him an email, and said, I want to build a shoe brand about content creators with their own shoes, like athletes. I want to make this a technology category. Everything else is getting smart. This category hasn't been smart at all. Let's do it. And he and Julie said, we're happy to take a call with you, and had a great call. And I heard they were going to come to Fort Lauderdale, Florida, shortly after I'm in Boca Raton. So I was like, you know, I've got to go spend as much time as possible as I can with them in person and convince them to join me. So I did, and thankfully, he backed me. And the advice has been incredible. And we moved around to doing something with AI and realized that AI could design real shoes. And we're like, we got to launch something around this. And created the first shoes in the world that people are aware of, designed by AI and became breakthrough.
- [06:45]
A
Okay, so, Ben, what gave you the courage to come after someone that people call iconic, innovative, pioneer as Joe is? What gave you the confidence to go after him? Because it's one thing to sit back and admire, but you stepped up and you said, hey, I want to work with the Steven Spielberg of this business.
- [07:07]
C
Sure, Tim. Well, you look at what Joe's accomplished, and he's got this knowledge. He was in a point where he wanted to give it back and talk to people. So I thought he would be willing potentially. And what did I have to lose? You know, if I reach out to him, he could say, no, he cannot respond to me, and I lose nothing. I just spent a little bit of time crafting a great pitch, and that's it. But what I have to gain is massive. If I get him attached to this and I get him to advise me and get him to build this together, I mean, this can accelerate things substantially. So the risk versus reward, I mean, there is pretty much no downside, and the reward is substantial. So what do I have to lose by just sending an email?
- [07:39]
A
I love this. So, Joe, when I was watching these interviews on you, you use the word fun, that it should be fun, that you should have joy and that you should be curious, open, and that failure is not so terrible. Talk to me about this idea about being an entrepreneur at a high level and still believing in fun and joy. Because I'm a therapist, a lot of the CEOs that I work with don't look like they're having too much doggone fun.
- [08:11]
B
Oh, well, that's a pity. That really is a shame, because they're missing out on life. The only thing you should really be is enjoy your life. You know, if you spend half of it miserable and working too hard, working hard is not a problem, but have some fun with it. I first remember being asked the question, what's three most important things about running a company at the size of Reebok? And, well, number one, you got to have fun. Number two, you've got to have more fun. And number three, it's got to be a real hoot. So if you're not having fun, you're not going to enjoy it, and chances are you will not be successful.
- [08:45]
A
Yes. So, Joe, can I go to Reebok for a second? The founders yourself. And then you have relatives involved that I think are your brothers. Can you tell me about that?
- [08:57]
B
My brother was involved.
- [08:58]
A
Singular.
- [09:00]
B
Singular. My brother was involved, yes. Unfortunately, I had two brothers. Both have passed away. But my older brother Jeff, he and I, we worked for the family business, and the family business were very well known globally, but they were very much in the athletics business. In fact, my grandfather invented the spike running shoe. But his sons, my father and uncle, they took over the business, and they didn't move on that business. They just made the same shoes. And when Jeff and I joined in the business, they were just doing the same thing. And we were there at the time. Just after World War II, when National Service was being done, we both went away to do national service. Jeff went in the army, I went in the Air Force. And that gives you a little bit of an opportunity to look around in life and look at different things. And we came back from our time in national service, and we looked at the company, and the company was failing. I tattled my father on this, like, we got to change. We've got to do things. And he said, when your uncle's gone, when I'm gone, this business is yours. You can do what you like with it. And I said, dad, unfortunately, we don't want you to go, but this business will be gone long before you are gone. Made no difference. Didn't make any change in him at all. So Jeff and myself, we thought, there's only one answer to this, and that's to leave the company and set up our own company. And that's what we did. We did some college work at school. We went to college and learned a bit more about shoemaking. But the most important thing about that was we made a lot of friends when we went to college. A lot of people who knew a lot of things knew how to get machinery materials. So we did learn an awful lot more than just how to make shoes. And so eventually, 1958, Jeff and myself took that plunge and set up our own company.
- [10:56]
A
Ben, I want to go back to you. Let's set you up properly. So what company are you most proud of that you were the founder of or worked in? Give us a little your background on how you can then have enough confidence to collaborate with Joe. And I know a lot about this because I spent probably 37 years being around Lee Iacocca, and I used to be with him sometimes twice a month, and I would learn so much from him. And you had to be brave to go to his house and try to collaborate with him just because Lee knew his stuff. So give me one or two companies that you're proud of that you were part of. Just so my listeners can understand.
- [11:44]
C
When the NFT craze became a big deal, I was always in the blockchain space and aware of what was happening. And I built an NFT company that was geared towards helping people more hip hop artists do their own shoes with a digital component around that. So that got some nice traction. And then I also just did other types of digital tokens around that. But then I was involved in more of a development company backing people that want to do projects in that category. But footwear specifically has been something I've spent a couple years on working on building this company, Scintillay now, and we only fully launched in February. I mean, we unveiled everything in January, but February we fully launched. And it was a couple years of development to try to build this supply chain, you know, take the same quality that athletes get and give it to content creators. And that was a lot of work before we put this together. So it's been the majority of my focus since I graduated college, got a business degree, has been this company scintillay.
- [12:35]
A
Okay, so, Ben, slide us into what now you and Joe are doing together and how you plan to collaborate together.
- [12:44]
C
We realize that the most influential people today that are engaging with people all the time are these creators, and they just don't get the same opportunities as the athletes. Right. They all have merch stores, they sell hats, shirts, shorts, hoodies, everything you can in the merch category. But the most lucrative licensed product category is, is really the signature sneaker. And you see what some of these athletes are able to do. And of course, the Jordan deal being an example of that. It's really tremendous. And that opportunity has been brought to creators because of three big issues today. One being that to go and make a new shoe, it's quite expensive, lots of sketches, you're spending months designing it, so there's the design expense and timeframe. The second being molds. You have to commit to 2 to $4,000amold for size 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, you know, all the way up through 14 and all the half sizes. You have that commitment. Then you have, you know, the amount of inventory you have to take on. It can be thousands of pairs. That's substantial in storage of that. So that's usually an 18 month process, Tim, to go and make a brand new shoe. It's, you know, looking at seven figures potentially of an investment, if not hundreds of thousands of dollars. And that's kept These creators, these YouTube, TikTok Twitch stars from doing a shoe when they have just as much influence as the athletes. You could say Mr. Beast is more influential than most athletes in the world or Jake Paul, et cetera. We thought there's got to be a better way. So we decided if AI can generate great quality concept artwork, it can make a shoe design. And so that was kind of the initial thinking. And we Partnered with a 3D printing factory, Zellerfeld in Germany, to go and take this concept of what AI could actually make, which is generating a 3D model instead of doing it by hand, creating patterns and textures with the generative model instead of making that by hand as well and making that into a real design. So with 3D printing, no molds, you can print on demand. And what we were also able to do is to create this cool experience where you get to scan your feet with your phone camera, take photos of them. And with AI, we can gather the way your feet are shaped and give you custom made shoes to fit you perfectly because they're printed. You can have more flexibility with that. And so the experience is really very different. It's kind of like what the electric car did to the automotive space. It's a really game changing opportunity for footwear to make it smarter. And we debuted the first AI design slides, which became a big story. And off of that platform we're now backing creators with their own shoes.
- [14:51]
A
I did read a little Bit of that. And then also did watch the proper YouTube video about that and starting with the slides. And I liked the way the slides looked. So, Joe, in your skill set, what skill set are you bringing to this team with you and Ben?
- [15:10]
B
Well, I think what I can bring is that experience of having gone through it, seeing all the problems that you can get into and not worrying too much about making mistakes because you learn such an awful lot from your mistakes and being willing and Ben is so willing to go talk to people, go ask people, go work with these people. And it's that enthusiasm which really got me on board, because I know how difficult it is to take a product from zero and to try and build it. You need some luck, but you also need some ability to ask people, are we doing this right? And go talk to people? Ben has that. Ben has that in spades. He can go and talk to anybody. He gets what water can get. It's quite amazing. And that is so important. It's so important to tell people what you're doing. And when you find something, the white space that Ben is working in, then that's another plus. So working in these white spaces and being willing to be enthusiastic and meet people and talk to people. What I bring to that is maybe we should do it this way. Maybe we should do a bit more of this. Just a little bit of. You could call it coaching, or you could call it pointing in different directions. And Ben goes on with it.
- [16:25]
A
As you guys know, this lady, Carol Dweck, who teaches at Stanford, she talks about the growth mindset versus the fixed mindset. So, Joe, at this stage of your life, not age, but a stage, what are you learning from young Ben that's stirring you up a little bit? Because I like to keep the younger guys around me, too, because they do stir me up. And also guys my age and older. What are you learning from young Ben?
- [16:51]
B
What I learned from young Ben is his enthusiasm is infectious, that enthusiasm. And that's good. I learned that. But what I also learned is that, okay, I talk about white space, and white space these days is in a different place these days. So much technology is involved in that. And because of age, I don't take technology. Technology doesn't go in there, but I can understand it. I can't sort of do it, but this is great. So it's all a question of saying what makes things fly. For me, it's seeing people moving in those directions and moving positively. Not just using the negative side of it, but thinking about, why don't we think of influencers as content creators. Why don't we move in these different areas and why don't we put products into gaming things like this. So these are the things that Ben is bringing. And it's refreshing, it's different. And if I can add a little bit to it, then we're in business.
- [17:51]
A
So Ben, one time I was kicked out of Quincy Jones house. He asked me to do a project and I asked a friend to help me with it. He asked me to write three pages on something that he was working on. He wanted Tim stories perspective. And this person who was a great writer, she wrote an amazing movie and she made it too much about her style. When I brought the pages to Quincy Jones two days later, he took one page and crumbled it up and threw it behind him. And second page threw it like this. Next through it and he said, how long did it take you to come up with this crap? And he goes, you did not write this. I go, how do you know? He goes, your spirit is not on it. So with the guys that really carry weight, like I think Joe Foster does talk to me about working with somebody who really knows.
- [18:53]
C
Obviously having a name attached and based on Joe's reputation is something that's nice, but it's much more than that. Just even from the beginning, we are trying to think about shaping the strategy of what this brand, what we want it to be, what we want scintillate to stand for. And Joe's been instrumental in that. And I mean, I think we've had now it's gotta be a couple hundred meetings of just being involved in the design process, overseeing how we even make the shoe designs. Joe has this great principle, Tim, that he talks about a lot in his book as well, called vistech, which is if you make an innovation and that innovation is a great innovation, you don't want it to be invisible to the consumer. It needs to be something that they can see regardless if they understand technology or not. And a good example of this is the Zig technology or like the Reebok pump. You pumped it, you saw the air bladder would get bigger. And even with the Zig tech, you understood that you have to make innovation that really excites people that they can see. And it's a problem that sometimes happens in the industry. You don't see that. So we're building products all around that. And we embody this principle that he had that he explained to me in the way we designed our Explorer Slide, the first AI design slide. We made it really look like what AI would create. I mean, it was something that was purely, mostly generated by AI and we didn't change that form. We wanted to be as authentic as possible. And you saw this design that just looked like it was from aliens. It was just out of this world and how it was created, I mean, that's definitely one example and there's countless others. But, you know, even just giving me the over, just coaching on what we do in general and building a brand, where to focus on from marketing standpoint, which areas to target first. I mean, there's so many insights that.
- [20:22]
A
Are invaluable before we get into where we can get the product for the consumer. I want to ask Joe, the book that you wrote, I did see an interview where you talked about there were other books and other stories about Reebok, and some of them got it wrong. So you decided to write the right version. What is the title of that book?
- [20:44]
B
Oh, the title. Shoemaker.
- [20:46]
A
Shoemaker. We'll put that in the program and let people know that they can buy that wherever books are sold. In writing the book Shoemaker, what is one right that you wanted to correct that maybe was wrong in other books about how you were able to build this company?
- [21:07]
B
Mostly what happened is that somebody picked up on the story and they talked about my grandfather and his company, J. Edwin Foster, and they said, well, eventually the grandchildren, that's Jeff and myself, came into the company, and so I needed some marketing. So they changed the name of the company, which was totally wrong. We actually left the company and started something totally different. So that was one of the areas. We didn't just change the name of the company. This is one of the reasons we ended up with no money, because we left the parent companies. You can't expect parent company to start paying the opposition, as it were. We didn't really want to be the opposition to the parent company. In fact, we started making Cytal Shoes because we thought, no, the parent company's in athletics will do Cytal Shoes. We did quite nicely at Cytal Shoes, but there's a story there, it's in the book, and I'm sure people will read it. But eventually we did come to athletics. And by the time we got to athletics, in fact, the Foster family, the Foster business had failed, as we predicted. So it allowed us to get back into the family business and start working with athletics, which eventually came to sneakers. And sneakers, as we all know, sneakers took just taking the street. And that's one of the things that if we look back, we didn't have to work that hard in the business because it was expanding so rapidly. Our business expanded rapidly. So I think we had a great amount of luck. And you know, people say you make your own luck. Well, you make your own luck because you want to be part of it. But we were lucky to be in the right business at the right time.
- [22:55]
A
I'm believing that you're enjoying this podcast, the Miracle Mentality. And so the best way to help other people is to share it with a friend, a family member, or even a colleague. We work hard on getting the right types of guests that will make your life go from the mundane, the messy, the madness into the miracle mentality. Don't forget, your mindset is yours to set. So make sure and share this with someone else and then tag me at Tim Story Official. That's Tim Story Official. Thank you for making this one of the most listened to and watched podcasts out there in the world. And guess what? Get ready for miracles to watch. Come your way. Joe, I'm going to ask you one more question before I go back to Ben. I teach a lot to entrepreneurs and leaders and I do a lot of executive coaching to companies. And when I talk to people that have done well, I always ask them, do you feel like you had most of your life together while this big success was hitting you? And most people will say, you know what, Tim, to be honest with you, I felt a little bit undone many times because whether it was a relationship challenge or problem with the child or maybe health issues or finances, at the beginning, when Reebok really started to take off, did you feel like most of your life, your personal life, was very together, or did you feel slightly undone?
- [24:35]
B
I guess really that you are undone because that business demands so much of you that the rest of whatever your existence is, your life, your family, the business comes first. It needs to, because it needs you. You need to be answering that question all the time. You can't say I'm taking a day off because it's my son's birthday day or whatever. And that happens to be quite true because the NSGA show, the National Sporting Goods of America show in Chicago, always came at the same second week in February, which happened to be my son's birthday. So every birthday I was away, but I looked at it differently. I brought him something back from America. None of his friends had that. But still it was that drawn. The business needs me. I have to do this. You can't put the business down and just wait for another day.
- [25:32]
A
In hindsight, would you have wanted more balance now that you're looking backward. Do you wish you had more work, life, balance?
- [25:43]
B
There are some things you. You can't put down. There are some things you need to go with. I think I would have enjoyed more had the family been able to travel more with me and participate more with the business. That would have been better. And I guess when you've got kids, they've got school, they've got to have something. They can't be with you all the time. And it's difficult to say things may have been different. I'm sure things would have been different had I taken a different route on this. Plus, unfortunately, I lost my brother just as we got to America. So I had to make different decisions. And that meant that I was traveling even more. I was having fun, which is fair enough. And I'm not too sure whether my home life would have been better. I don't think so. Because if you're a dog with a bone, you've got to work with it. The dog doesn't put the bone down. He just keeps on working on the bone. Okay, maybe that's a sacrifice. I don't know. And towards when we really, really got big and my wife was able to travel and come with me, then she recognized how important it was to be part of the business.
- [26:59]
A
I love this answer, and thank you for being so transparent. So even with me, with my children, I have two children, they're in their 30s now. I came back to them and I apologized to them when they were in the early 20s. And I said, you know, I know that I've been on a roll and I was doing a lot of things, but I hope I showed you how important you always were. And I remember my daughter saying to me, dad, I tell you, you were always present, that even if you weren't physically there, you always called us. You were very caring. So I think there's different ways to show love and affection, and there is something about quality time and the face to face. So it's awesome because I'm still very, very close to them. So, Joe, I think that's a beautiful answer and that helps a lot of people because, again, we have a lot of leaders and entrepreneurs that follow me, and I think that so many of them are looking for the work life balance. So, Ben, even as you hear Joe's answer to that, what goes through your mind? And then we'll get into how consumers can step into your company and buy what you guys are doing.
- [28:14]
C
I'm 25 years old. I'm at the early stages of my journey in this. And I think that my 20s are meant for building and definitely my early 30s as well. So I'm really focused on that. But part of the reason of having somebody like Joe part of my company and what we're doing is to learn from him and to learn from people like you, Tim, to be around people that are more experienced and try to take lessons from them. And so just hearing that as well makes me think about how I want to act and what I want to do. But right now I'm just very focused on scaling this and building this, and that's my number one priority. And this is most of my time.
- [28:49]
A
Okay, so let's talk to the layperson. Ben, what is the product? How do we buy the product? How is the product going to make our life better?
- [29:00]
C
So there's two different products today. We have the Explorer Ultra, which is our fully custom 3D printed slide, which you can scan your feed online with your phone camera and then they're made custom to you. Or our sneaker, the Luminesce sneaker, which is the most AI generated physical product of any category, which is also made custom to you. Now, there's two different experiences around this. One is you can get them online in scanner feed like that, or you can go into an in person retail store in Times Square in New York City, which we just unveiled that we're part of this. And you get to walk onto a machine and it gets 5,000 data points of your feed, scans them and takes into account even the way your individual toes are shaped. Your heels design and get custom made shoes. So it's either on scintillate.com, our website, or at, at this experience at the Tomorrow store in Times Square. And how they make your life better. What they do is they give you a different fit experience. So you have a shoe that really understands your feet. And most people, we found out, have different feet. Maybe your left foot's a size eight and a half and your right's a size nine and a quarter, really? Or something to that extent. They're made custom to each individual foot and they're now actually the same price as pretty much of what you would pay for a normal shoe. The sneaker is $189. It's not that much more expensive. So we're trying to improve the way you walk in the world and hopefully you take each step forward with a better feeling.
- [30:17]
A
Okay, and then Joe, from your perspective, how do you see this shoe as being different? I think probably maybe the comfort. What other things Would you see as a person that understands making shoes?
- [30:30]
B
What I understand from where Ben is, he's offering something which is different in a time when we need something different. We need to be able to take opportunities and say, can we make shoes with 3D printing? I've known 3D printing, and Rebecca has been involved in 3D printing, but never, never making shoes that were always playing about doing bits and pieces with 3D printed. I think that we have to shake up this industry. We have to look at it and say, you know, what can we do to disrupt? Are we going to do that? And I think it offers so many different things. We're talking about my career. We didn't have computers when I went around the world. I couldn't get back to the family. I could send a postcard. That's about it right now. We're using computers, we're using AI, we're using all this knowledge. We're throwing it at shoemaking. Is it making a difference? Yes, it is making a difference. And I think that is what Ben is all about. It's what we're all about with Scintillate. It won't end with the slide. There are so many different things, so many more ideas coming through that 3D printing is challenging us with. And, okay, Scintillate at the moment is there to create visibility. We're giving things visibility. What Ben is doing is presenting things to different people. You probably wouldn't look to have a podcast with Ben if it was just making shoes in China, but he's not. It's AI. It's 3D. It's scanning, it's offering different things. That's going to give us visibility. We're also having this opportunity to disrupt, to take away the traditional manufacturing. But Ben will end up doing a mixture. There will be what we're learning, and there will be traditional. And when that happens, people will hear of Scintillate, will know of Scintillate and think, wow, we've got to try that product because it's different.
- [32:34]
A
Joe, I love that you're willing to be Michael Jordan and let the young guy come up with all his wild creative ideas, because I think so many times you don't see that. And Ben isn't that awesome for everything that Joe Foster has done because he's really paved the way in so many ways. But being willing to come back and be a player coach and say, hey, Ben, you might consider this, or this could be good, or I love that idea. What's that meaning to you?
- [33:07]
C
Well, I think you just brought up a great point, Tim, and this is something I did want to touch on, is that it's not like everybody will do what Joe's doing. There's so many people that have accomplished greatness in different categories that somebody young may come up to them and they may not advise them or want to be a part of what they're doing. It's not like Joe's just always an advisor. I've met with Joe hundreds of times. He's participated in so many different opportunities that we're doing, and he's really given a lot of himself to this, as has Julie as well. I mean, I really appreciate that a lot. I think it's a great example for what other accomplished entrepreneurs should be like. I mean, giving back to younger generation. There's nothing more rewarding, more fulfilling. I think when you're at a point like that and a lot of people miss out on that. And Joe has been instrumental in what we're doing at Scintillate and our success, and it's been incredible. I'm definitely very appreciative.
- [33:52]
A
What advice would you give to a young Ben about patience, about making sure you just flow in the proper timetable? Because some things in life, as you know, you decide some things you discover. What advice would you give to Ben in front of all of us? And then we can all take that advice.
- [34:18]
B
I think for Ben and for anybody who's trying to do something in life, make sure that what you looking at, you know as much as you can. You learn as much of the technology, you learn as much. And if you're having a problem, don't worry about that. You change the. The one thing that we learned at Reebok, we had to change our name. We started with Mercury. We had to change our silhouette. We started with two stripes and a T bar. We ended up with a vector. Is that you will have problems if there are no problems in your life. You're doing something wrong. There are problems, but the problems are opportunities. That's the main thing about the problem. Don't think of it as something that, oh, my God, what's going wrong? It's going right. Because you've got a problem, you've found something, and that's an opportunity. We ended up with a better name. We ended up with a better silhouette. And with Ben, we're going through things. The first idea, it's moving, it's changing. That wasn't a problem. That was an opportunity. And we're moving. And so during all this that you're doing really, really think of problems as, you know, look at them and say, wow, this is something we can work on. We obviously can change it. So we changing it, and you find something better all the time. And this is what will happen. So have the patience, be willing to change. And it took me 11 years to get into America, as you know very well. But I was having fun. I was having fun doing that, and we learned an awful lot. I failed on six occasions with six different distributors, but we got there.
- [35:54]
A
You do say on several interviews about the problem as an opportunity. I think that that's one of your hit songs. You know, like, every album has, like, several hit songs that you remember. Remember the old days, Joe, where they had side A and side B?
- [36:09]
B
I remember that. Yeah.
- [36:12]
A
Okay. That's one of your really good ones. Because I feel like a lot of entrepreneurs, they get so down on themselves because they think, I failed, I failed, I failed. But I love how you have this different perspective, different mindset of the opportunity. Just in one moment before I go back to Ben. Is that something maybe you heard from your father, your mother, from a priest, from a pastor? Where did you get this idea of looking the problem as an opportunity?
- [36:43]
B
Well, I think because it came head on. He came head on when we were told to register our name, which in those days was Mercury. And the guy, the agent said, don't bring me one name. Bring me 10. And I said, look, we got to be in love. This is going to be our life. We're working on this. So we brought him 10 names about the week. Reebok. Which again, the story is in the shoemaker. Reebok. I said to him, look, we got to be in love with this. We want Reebok. It took him two weeks to go through all the things that the agents have to go through. And he came back and he said, joe, you've got your wish. Wow, that's good. Same when Adidas challenged our silhouette. We pinned that letter on the wall. We pinned that on the wall and said, okay, what do we do now? Well, we do something better. And we had numerous challenges, and it did occur to us, instead of feeling down, that you got challenged and you got a problem. Look at it in a different way. Let's look. What can we do with this? Wherever we went, we decided that, yeah, that's a challenge. Okay, what can we make out of this? We thought on all these occasions, we've come up with something better. So why don't we have the attitude now that a problem or a challenge is not to be Looked at as something difficult. It's to be, you know, do you go around it? Do you go over it? But let's make it an opportunity.
- [38:10]
A
Ben, I can see why you like being around Joe, not just for business. I love your essence, Joe. Maybe someday when I'm in England, we'll go for tea together. Or when you're in Southern California, I really like to sit down with you just as a human being. I really appreciate who you are.
- [38:27]
B
That would be nice, Tim.
- [38:28]
A
So, Ben, in the last four minutes, if you can, you're a visionary, tell us where you see this company going. Go ahead and just speak it out. That's one thing that I get to do as a person that works with talent is I get to see these people go, you know, I kind of see it like boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. And then they doggone did it. So where's this company going?
- [38:57]
C
The big picture vision is two pronged. One is that we want to be this destination that backs content creators with their own shoes, like athletes, but where some of the most creative people in the world come in and work with us on making brand new silhouettes and new designs that capture their essence and enable a new generation to feel like they can walk in their shoes and they can be great in any category. You know, there's all this marketing done around the sportswear brands of being great like the athlete. You want to be like Jordan, play in his shoes, you want to be like X individual, you know, wear their shoes. What about the DJs, the YouTubers, the TikTok stars, the Twitch streamers? There's so many other categories of greatness that have never been able to be captured in shoes and we really want to translate that over. So scaling that to tons and tons of people is one piece of this. The other piece is going to be building out more technology oriented footwear, smarter shoes, shoes that make this a really a technology category. I would say in the same way that you've seen what's happened with the watch, how that's become a smart category, this category is a great opportunity for that. And we want to build out a lot of innovative technology that can improve your life in that avenue. And I think that that will unlock a lot more scale, broaden the category as a whole. We want to become a global brand, Tim, and that's the goal. And we think between these two approaches, we'll get there. And that's quite exciting.
- [40:09]
A
I love that. And I saw that again in things I read about you. I so agree. It's not just the athlete anymore. It's the tiktokers. I hang around a lot of gamers. I'm involved in gaming companies. But. Ben, have you ever thought of collaborating with Tim's story? Being that I'm in stages in 82 countries of the world.
- [40:28]
C
Let's do it, Tim.
- [40:30]
A
Joe, you see how I'm working business deals at the same time?
- [40:33]
B
Of course, of course, of course.
- [40:35]
C
Smart.
- [40:36]
B
Yes.
- [40:38]
A
I learned some stuff from Iacocca and Quincy. I'll tell you what. All right, Joe, anything you want to add to our viewers? We have a very strong group of people that watch us and a lot of creative innovators that you would respect in the space that seem to trust me as a spiritual leader and a person who can bring wise people together. Any final thoughts, Joe?
- [41:03]
B
I think the final thoughts for me is that if you have an idea and you're an optimist, and you must be an optimist because being a pessimist is not where you can be if you're going to be an entrepreneur, because you'll get the kicks, but you've got to enjoy those kicks. So if you have an idea, give it a shot, give it a try. Even if you fail or it doesn't work, you've not failed, you've learned an awful lot. And so give it a try. And don't just say, oh, I wish I'd have thought now, if you work for somebody and you think, I'd like to work for myself, go give it a try. It's surprising. You'll find somewhere you will make it, give it a try. Just get that feeling and make it go. And don't worry if you fail. Think I've learned an awful lot now, next time. I'm going to be better next time. But, you know, keep going, keep trying. And if you have as much fun as I've had, your life will be pretty interesting. And you'll meet people like Tim and you'll meet people like Ben and they will give you something that you can't, you'll never get just sitting there looking at your iPhone or whatever. You've got to live something.
- [42:17]
A
I don't want to give you one more job, Joe, but you're quite the speaker and I know you've spoken on many, many platforms and been many forms, but that was fantastic. Ben, let's close with you. Tell us one more time how we can get the product.
- [42:36]
C
So scintillay.com, s y n t I L A Y that's our website and you can purchase it there and we ship to every country in the world. Or if you want to get a really high quality scan done, the online scan's really good, but in person is like a bit better. You can go to the Tomorrow store in Times Square, which is in the Candler building right next to the Wax museum, Madame Tussard. And we're there. And you can get your feet scanned and find out if your left foot's bigger than your right and get something that, you know really is made custom to you that's going to feel like nothing else.
- [43:06]
A
Yeah. So today, as a consumer, I'm going to get the product. One of my assistants is here. I'm getting the product myself because I think that it's so creative, so innovative, and it's so much like both of you. This has been one of my favorite conversations I've had and. And I've been able to just interview some amazing people. So to Joe and to Ben, I appreciate you and I'm thankful for what you're doing and adding value to people's lives and also paying attention to the entrepreneur that's coming up of all stages of life and helping us to have the miracle mentality. So thank you for being on the program today.
- [43:49]
B
Been a pleasure, Tim. Absolutely pleasure.
- [43:51]
C
Thanks for having us.
- [43:52]
A
What a great conversation today with Joe Foster and to learn so many things about what he's talking about. You know, life is full of faults, flaws and failures, but you learn from them, you grow, you find a way, you make a way. And then to see what he's done and what he's doing. And life is not about a age, but it's about a stage that you don't see any retirement in him. And I like to see that and with Ben, to see what he's doing even at this stage of life and realizing this is a time that he's really got to go after it. So for all of you people that are watching, don't ever put yourself down. You may not be what you want to be, but thank God you're not what you used to be. We're all growing and we'll see you real soon. Thank you for sharing space with me on this episode of Miracle Mentality with Tim Story. If today sparked your courage or helped you understand why you're created for success, I invite you to carry that miracle mentality forward. Visit me@tim story.com that story with an EY on the end. Until next time, walk by faith, embrace possibility and create your own comeback Story.