1
00:00:00,120 --> 00:00:03,680
Speaker 1: Hello, Oddlots listeners. It is that time of year again.

2
00:00:03,840 --> 00:00:06,280
Speaker 1: Joe and I will be doing and ask me anything

3
00:00:06,559 --> 00:00:09,240
Speaker 1: episode and we need your questions.

4
00:00:09,400 --> 00:00:09,640
Speaker 2: Yep.

5
00:00:09,680 --> 00:00:12,160
Speaker 3: If you want to ask me and Tracy a question

6
00:00:12,200 --> 00:00:18,680
Speaker 3: about anything, our careers, the podcasting industry, economics, finance, markets, business,

7
00:00:18,840 --> 00:00:22,680
Speaker 3: whatever it is, Tony, labor market, monopsony. If you just

8
00:00:22,720 --> 00:00:25,439
Speaker 3: want to hear your voice on the Odd Lots podcast,

9
00:00:25,480 --> 00:00:26,520
Speaker 3: you can send us in a question.

10
00:00:26,760 --> 00:00:31,080
Speaker 1: That's right. The deadline for sending us questions is December thirteenth.

11
00:00:31,200 --> 00:00:34,160
Speaker 1: All you need to do is record a short voice

12
00:00:34,200 --> 00:00:37,599
Speaker 1: memo and then email it to us at Oddlots at

13
00:00:37,640 --> 00:00:42,120
Speaker 1: bloomberg dot net. Please include your name and your location.

14
00:00:53,040 --> 00:00:57,360
Speaker 3: Hello, and welcome to another episode of the Odd Lots podcast.

15
00:00:57,440 --> 00:00:59,240
Speaker 2: I'm Joe Wisenthal.

16
00:00:58,760 --> 00:00:59,800
Speaker 1: And I'm Tracy Alloway.

17
00:01:00,480 --> 00:01:02,560
Speaker 2: Have you ever been to a dry bar?

18
00:01:03,680 --> 00:01:06,240
Speaker 3: I just I just thought i'd start this conversation as

19
00:01:06,240 --> 00:01:07,240
Speaker 3: simply as possible.

20
00:01:07,360 --> 00:01:10,039
Speaker 1: You don't mean a bar that isn't serving alcohol.

21
00:01:10,280 --> 00:01:12,679
Speaker 2: No, but if there were, I would like that. But

22
00:01:13,080 --> 00:01:13,679
Speaker 2: those are.

23
00:01:13,600 --> 00:01:16,040
Speaker 1: Called coffee shops, Joe, No, I have in fact been

24
00:01:16,080 --> 00:01:19,279
Speaker 1: to a dry bar. I remember when dry bars first

25
00:01:19,360 --> 00:01:22,679
Speaker 1: became a thing, and it was the sort of novel

26
00:01:22,800 --> 00:01:25,840
Speaker 1: concept that you could go someplace and have your hair

27
00:01:25,959 --> 00:01:29,759
Speaker 1: blow dried by a professional, sometimes while having a drink,

28
00:01:29,880 --> 00:01:33,640
Speaker 1: or like watching silly movies on TV. And it was

29
00:01:34,120 --> 00:01:36,960
Speaker 1: it was different to how it had worked historically, because

30
00:01:37,000 --> 00:01:39,160
Speaker 1: normally you would, you know, maybe you would go to

31
00:01:39,200 --> 00:01:41,920
Speaker 1: your local hair salon to get a blow dry, or

32
00:01:41,959 --> 00:01:43,800
Speaker 1: often you would just have a blow dry after getting

33
00:01:43,800 --> 00:01:46,000
Speaker 1: your hair cut or something like that. But it became

34
00:01:46,080 --> 00:01:47,240
Speaker 1: this really big thing.

35
00:01:47,840 --> 00:01:50,840
Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely, And I remember, Okay, so I will say

36
00:01:50,880 --> 00:01:52,800
Speaker 3: I have never you've never been. I assume I have

37
00:01:52,920 --> 00:01:56,160
Speaker 3: never gotten I think, a proper blowout, but you know,

38
00:01:56,200 --> 00:01:58,480
Speaker 3: I've gotten my hair done for TV, and so I

39
00:01:58,480 --> 00:02:01,880
Speaker 3: guess that's the closest gutten. But also I just sort

40
00:02:01,880 --> 00:02:04,480
Speaker 3: of remember when they started popping up, and it felt

41
00:02:04,520 --> 00:02:08,399
Speaker 3: like one of those businesses and business models that sort

42
00:02:08,400 --> 00:02:13,080
Speaker 3: of defined the twenty tens maybe or defined a certain era.

43
00:02:13,280 --> 00:02:16,360
Speaker 3: And this sort of idea of the fusion of brick

44
00:02:16,400 --> 00:02:19,480
Speaker 3: and mortar with booking on an app and the proliferation

45
00:02:19,800 --> 00:02:22,320
Speaker 3: of new times of stores like that felt like a

46
00:02:22,320 --> 00:02:25,520
Speaker 3: big part of the twenty tens economy.

47
00:02:25,720 --> 00:02:29,280
Speaker 1: Stores which were providing a service and also an experience

48
00:02:29,480 --> 00:02:33,000
Speaker 1: because I remember the experiential portion of it was a

49
00:02:33,040 --> 00:02:35,679
Speaker 1: big part of the offering. So again, you could go

50
00:02:35,800 --> 00:02:38,639
Speaker 1: get your hair blow dried for forty or sixty minutes

51
00:02:38,720 --> 00:02:40,800
Speaker 1: or however long it takes, and you could have a

52
00:02:40,840 --> 00:02:43,160
Speaker 1: cocktail while you did it, and a lot.

53
00:02:43,000 --> 00:02:44,880
Speaker 2: Of these they did do it. You could have a cocktail.

54
00:02:45,040 --> 00:02:47,200
Speaker 1: Yes, oh my gosh, yes, that was a big like

55
00:02:47,800 --> 00:02:50,040
Speaker 1: part of it. And a lot of the stores, well,

56
00:02:50,080 --> 00:02:52,560
Speaker 1: I'm thinking of one in particular because it is going

57
00:02:52,600 --> 00:02:56,400
Speaker 1: to be the topic of this podcast. The original dry

58
00:02:56,440 --> 00:03:00,280
Speaker 1: bar offered. You know, they would have movie screens like

59
00:03:00,280 --> 00:03:03,120
Speaker 1: the TVs built in and you could watch like rom

60
00:03:03,200 --> 00:03:05,880
Speaker 1: coms from the early two thousands. It was great.

61
00:03:06,320 --> 00:03:08,840
Speaker 3: The experience economy, You're right, that was like such a

62
00:03:08,840 --> 00:03:10,560
Speaker 3: big part of the story where that was such a

63
00:03:10,560 --> 00:03:12,840
Speaker 3: big part of what people talked about people wanting to

64
00:03:13,320 --> 00:03:16,480
Speaker 3: have high quality experiences something above maybe some of the

65
00:03:16,560 --> 00:03:21,239
Speaker 3: old dingy physical retail physical service locations of the past.

66
00:03:21,560 --> 00:03:24,119
Speaker 3: I do think that it really sort of redefined a category.

67
00:03:24,400 --> 00:03:28,200
Speaker 3: And I'm interested, you know, like obviously that exploded during

68
00:03:28,200 --> 00:03:32,920
Speaker 3: a specific era in time, the rise of smartphones, low

69
00:03:33,000 --> 00:03:36,480
Speaker 3: interest rates, so vcs investing in fast growing concepts, of

70
00:03:36,560 --> 00:03:41,440
Speaker 3: various sort digital and physical, loose labor markets and the

71
00:03:41,440 --> 00:03:43,840
Speaker 3: ability to hire lots of people fast and so like.

72
00:03:43,920 --> 00:03:48,840
Speaker 3: Thinking about those business conditions, modern business conditions, how they've changed,

73
00:03:49,080 --> 00:03:51,640
Speaker 3: Lessons learned from that period of course sort of a

74
00:03:51,720 --> 00:03:54,760
Speaker 3: go go era for fundraising and so forth. I think

75
00:03:54,760 --> 00:03:55,440
Speaker 3: there's still more to.

76
00:03:55,440 --> 00:03:58,920
Speaker 1: Learn, absolutely. I mean things have changed, as you just mentioned,

77
00:03:58,960 --> 00:04:02,760
Speaker 1: but I think the desire for services slash experiences is

78
00:04:02,800 --> 00:04:04,560
Speaker 1: something that we still hear about today.

79
00:04:04,720 --> 00:04:07,880
Speaker 3: Well, I'm excited. We really do have literally the perfect

80
00:04:07,920 --> 00:04:09,680
Speaker 3: guest to talk about all of these things. We are

81
00:04:09,680 --> 00:04:11,920
Speaker 3: going to be speaking with Ali Webb. She was the

82
00:04:12,000 --> 00:04:15,400
Speaker 3: founder of Drybar, also author of the New York Times

83
00:04:15,440 --> 00:04:18,680
Speaker 3: best selling book The Messy Truth How I Sold My

84
00:04:18,880 --> 00:04:23,240
Speaker 3: Business for millions but Almost Lost Myself amazing title, and

85
00:04:23,279 --> 00:04:26,760
Speaker 3: she's also gone on to found more businesses, including a

86
00:04:26,920 --> 00:04:30,440
Speaker 3: franchise chain of massage therapy location. So it sort of

87
00:04:30,600 --> 00:04:33,719
Speaker 3: sounds like Drybar for massages. So, Alie, thank you so

88
00:04:33,800 --> 00:04:36,120
Speaker 3: much for coming on. Odd lots thrilled to have you here.

89
00:04:36,560 --> 00:04:39,400
Speaker 4: Well, thanks for having me, and I love your conversation

90
00:04:39,440 --> 00:04:40,240
Speaker 4: about Drybar.

91
00:04:40,320 --> 00:04:41,200
Speaker 5: You guys really nailed it.

92
00:04:41,640 --> 00:04:43,760
Speaker 2: The title of your book is so good. How did

93
00:04:43,800 --> 00:04:44,920
Speaker 2: you almost lose yourself?

94
00:04:45,400 --> 00:04:48,120
Speaker 4: Well, I mean, if you know, the book really goes

95
00:04:48,120 --> 00:04:50,719
Speaker 4: into a lot of it, but it was a long

96
00:04:50,760 --> 00:04:54,000
Speaker 4: story but more or less, you know, building a business

97
00:04:54,120 --> 00:04:57,679
Speaker 4: over the last ten years, which is an incredible journey,

98
00:04:57,720 --> 00:05:00,440
Speaker 4: and we definitely kind of you know, capture lightning in

99
00:05:00,480 --> 00:05:03,640
Speaker 4: a bottle and it was intoxicating and exhilarating and amazing.

100
00:05:03,720 --> 00:05:06,400
Speaker 4: But you know, and a lot of my personal life

101
00:05:06,440 --> 00:05:09,280
Speaker 4: in the background kind of fell apart. You know, there

102
00:05:09,360 --> 00:05:13,200
Speaker 4: was divorce and rehab and depression and you name it.

103
00:05:13,760 --> 00:05:16,080
Speaker 4: And so it was you know, a lot of like

104
00:05:16,200 --> 00:05:20,560
Speaker 4: navigating real life stuff alongside growing this you know, massive,

105
00:05:20,600 --> 00:05:23,160
Speaker 4: amazing business. And you know, it's kind of like if

106
00:05:23,200 --> 00:05:26,040
Speaker 4: like a business book met a memoir and had a baby.

107
00:05:26,600 --> 00:05:29,279
Speaker 4: That's kind of what this book feels like to me anyways,

108
00:05:29,320 --> 00:05:33,120
Speaker 4: because it's really the coming together of the stories of

109
00:05:33,360 --> 00:05:37,159
Speaker 4: all the things that I learned and lessons and takeaways

110
00:05:37,160 --> 00:05:39,520
Speaker 4: from building a business as someone who didn't go to

111
00:05:39,560 --> 00:05:41,960
Speaker 4: college and doesn't have a you know, fancy business degree,

112
00:05:42,240 --> 00:05:44,359
Speaker 4: but then also like you know, the underpinnings of it

113
00:05:44,360 --> 00:05:46,960
Speaker 4: all and how it's you lose yourself. And if you

114
00:05:47,240 --> 00:05:49,480
Speaker 4: ask any entrepreneur, they will tell you the same thing.

115
00:05:49,520 --> 00:05:51,720
Speaker 4: It's like, you know, you get so invested in this

116
00:05:51,760 --> 00:05:54,080
Speaker 4: thing that's like a baby to you, and you kind

117
00:05:54,080 --> 00:05:56,320
Speaker 4: of easily lose sight of a lot of other things

118
00:05:56,360 --> 00:05:58,880
Speaker 4: personally in your life and yourself, and you know, and

119
00:05:59,160 --> 00:06:02,560
Speaker 4: the response to it has been overwhelmingly positive and just

120
00:06:02,680 --> 00:06:05,480
Speaker 4: helped so many women and people are just relating to

121
00:06:05,560 --> 00:06:07,040
Speaker 4: it and like, oh my god, that's me. And I

122
00:06:07,040 --> 00:06:09,000
Speaker 4: felt like I was reading about me and that's my story,

123
00:06:09,240 --> 00:06:11,919
Speaker 4: which is fascinating to me that to put out stuff

124
00:06:11,920 --> 00:06:14,760
Speaker 4: that I don't think people talk about enough in such

125
00:06:14,760 --> 00:06:17,120
Speaker 4: a public content, and then for people to relate so

126
00:06:17,160 --> 00:06:19,839
Speaker 4: heavily to it has been, I mean, such a joy

127
00:06:19,880 --> 00:06:20,599
Speaker 4: and privilege for me.

128
00:06:21,560 --> 00:06:24,159
Speaker 1: I should say, first of all, thank you for coming

129
00:06:24,200 --> 00:06:27,840
Speaker 1: up with this idea, because it has been enormously helpful

130
00:06:27,960 --> 00:06:31,440
Speaker 1: in my own life as someone who has like fairly untamable,

131
00:06:31,600 --> 00:06:36,240
Speaker 1: very thick hair that gets super poofy in the summer especially.

132
00:06:36,760 --> 00:06:41,320
Speaker 1: And nowadays we take the concept of dry bars, I mean,

133
00:06:41,360 --> 00:06:43,960
Speaker 1: it's gone beyond the brand, right you think about dry bar,

134
00:06:44,040 --> 00:06:47,440
Speaker 1: you think about a hair salon that is exclusively operating

135
00:06:47,600 --> 00:06:51,520
Speaker 1: like drop in blow drys basically, So it really became

136
00:06:51,680 --> 00:06:54,880
Speaker 1: a thing. But back when you founded the company, this

137
00:06:55,120 --> 00:06:59,560
Speaker 1: was obviously a new and novel concept. Maybe just to

138
00:06:59,600 --> 00:07:03,960
Speaker 1: begin with, could you talk about the business opportunity as

139
00:07:04,000 --> 00:07:06,640
Speaker 1: you saw it back then, Like what was the gap

140
00:07:06,720 --> 00:07:08,920
Speaker 1: in the market that you were able to identify?

141
00:07:09,240 --> 00:07:11,200
Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean, you know, I shouldn't say that.

142
00:07:11,240 --> 00:07:13,560
Speaker 4: I wasn't, you know, a business person looking for a

143
00:07:13,560 --> 00:07:14,720
Speaker 4: hole in the marketplace.

144
00:07:14,800 --> 00:07:16,840
Speaker 5: You know, although you know that's great if you are.

145
00:07:17,360 --> 00:07:18,360
Speaker 5: I just wasn't, you know.

146
00:07:18,440 --> 00:07:20,920
Speaker 4: I just felt like there was not a place to

147
00:07:20,960 --> 00:07:22,800
Speaker 4: go get a good blowout at an affordable price.

148
00:07:22,880 --> 00:07:24,680
Speaker 5: And I think I had felt that my.

149
00:07:24,800 --> 00:07:27,040
Speaker 4: Entire life, you know, just as somebody who also has

150
00:07:27,080 --> 00:07:30,040
Speaker 4: hair that's curly and prison and hard to manage. I

151
00:07:30,120 --> 00:07:32,160
Speaker 4: was always kind of frustrated, and as a kid, I

152
00:07:32,200 --> 00:07:33,800
Speaker 4: would go to the hair slump and beg my mom

153
00:07:33,840 --> 00:07:35,440
Speaker 4: to blow out my hair. I mean, I was always

154
00:07:35,440 --> 00:07:37,679
Speaker 4: on the hunt, you know, and I was always into

155
00:07:37,720 --> 00:07:39,680
Speaker 4: my hair as a kid, and you know, so I

156
00:07:39,680 --> 00:07:43,000
Speaker 4: think on some level, subconsciously I wanted something like dry

157
00:07:43,000 --> 00:07:45,400
Speaker 4: bar my whole life, you know. And fast forward to

158
00:07:45,400 --> 00:07:47,960
Speaker 4: becoming a professional hairstylist in my early twenties and then

159
00:07:48,360 --> 00:07:50,440
Speaker 4: spending my life you know, so much of my life

160
00:07:50,480 --> 00:07:51,880
Speaker 4: doing hair and working in salons.

161
00:07:52,520 --> 00:07:55,120
Speaker 5: I think I intuitively, instinctively.

162
00:07:54,560 --> 00:07:57,400
Speaker 4: Knew that there had to be a better way to

163
00:07:57,440 --> 00:08:00,800
Speaker 4: get a blowout, you know, and there was pretty bad

164
00:08:00,920 --> 00:08:03,239
Speaker 4: choices out in the market, which was like the discount change,

165
00:08:03,240 --> 00:08:05,760
Speaker 4: which I'm sure you've been to, or you know, your

166
00:08:05,800 --> 00:08:08,120
Speaker 4: fancy hair salon where they're charging you so much money

167
00:08:08,160 --> 00:08:10,320
Speaker 4: and upselling you on other things, and you know, there

168
00:08:10,720 --> 00:08:13,120
Speaker 4: just wasn't anything like it. But what ultimately led me

169
00:08:13,160 --> 00:08:15,800
Speaker 4: to Drybar was that I started a mobile blowout business.

170
00:08:15,840 --> 00:08:17,480
Speaker 4: And when I was you know, I had been a

171
00:08:17,520 --> 00:08:18,960
Speaker 4: stay at home mom for a couple of years.

172
00:08:19,000 --> 00:08:20,880
Speaker 5: My boys were two and four, and I.

173
00:08:20,840 --> 00:08:23,720
Speaker 4: Started running around La and my niece on like Sarah

174
00:08:23,800 --> 00:08:27,160
Speaker 4: blowdrying my mommy friends really because that was the world

175
00:08:27,200 --> 00:08:28,560
Speaker 4: I was very much in at the time.

176
00:08:28,640 --> 00:08:31,080
Speaker 5: And you know, I posted an ad that said I'll come.

177
00:08:30,960 --> 00:08:33,040
Speaker 4: Over and blow out your hair while you're baby sleeping,

178
00:08:33,080 --> 00:08:36,160
Speaker 4: and it was I would charge forty bucks. And again

179
00:08:36,200 --> 00:08:37,600
Speaker 4: it was it was for me. It was like if

180
00:08:37,640 --> 00:08:39,840
Speaker 4: I don't charge that much money, more people will call me.

181
00:08:40,320 --> 00:08:43,360
Speaker 4: You know. It wasn't a very like sophisticated business plan,

182
00:08:43,720 --> 00:08:45,280
Speaker 4: but that's you know, what I hope.

183
00:08:45,120 --> 00:08:46,439
Speaker 5: For, and sure enough they did.

184
00:08:46,640 --> 00:08:50,319
Speaker 4: And I realized during that because I got so busy

185
00:08:50,320 --> 00:08:54,080
Speaker 4: while I was operating my mobile business, because I was really,

186
00:08:54,440 --> 00:08:56,000
Speaker 4: you know, it was pretty good at what I was doing,

187
00:08:56,080 --> 00:08:57,520
Speaker 4: and because I was only charging.

188
00:08:57,280 --> 00:09:00,560
Speaker 5: Forty bucks, like I was so crazy busy, you know.

189
00:09:00,600 --> 00:09:03,600
Speaker 4: That that's when like the kind of light bulb went

190
00:09:03,640 --> 00:09:06,400
Speaker 4: off for me and was like, wow, you know, at

191
00:09:06,400 --> 00:09:09,120
Speaker 4: the right price point, women will do this a lot,

192
00:09:09,480 --> 00:09:12,080
Speaker 4: you know. And I, because I got so busy and

193
00:09:12,120 --> 00:09:14,600
Speaker 4: I was, you know, came to a crossroads. Am I

194
00:09:14,600 --> 00:09:17,040
Speaker 4: going to expand this thing mobilely or do I open

195
00:09:17,040 --> 00:09:18,600
Speaker 4: a brick and mortar instead of me going to them,

196
00:09:18,679 --> 00:09:21,080
Speaker 4: have them come to me, which is obviously ultimately what

197
00:09:21,160 --> 00:09:22,760
Speaker 4: I decided to do. And I went to my brother

198
00:09:22,840 --> 00:09:24,480
Speaker 4: and asked him to help me with all of this.

199
00:09:25,000 --> 00:09:27,679
Speaker 4: But I just it was such a great learning even

200
00:09:27,720 --> 00:09:29,760
Speaker 4: though I didn't make any money at my mobile business,

201
00:09:29,800 --> 00:09:32,200
Speaker 4: but who cares, because it, you know, informed what would

202
00:09:32,240 --> 00:09:35,960
Speaker 4: become dry bar, you know, because I realized during that time,

203
00:09:36,240 --> 00:09:38,560
Speaker 4: it all really crystallized for me that like, at the

204
00:09:38,640 --> 00:09:41,560
Speaker 4: right price point in a beautiful space, a great blowout

205
00:09:41,640 --> 00:09:44,920
Speaker 4: can be something and affordable luxury that women, do you know,

206
00:09:45,000 --> 00:09:47,240
Speaker 4: once a week, twice a week, whatever it is, and

207
00:09:47,520 --> 00:09:49,800
Speaker 4: we have plenty of clients who don't even watch their

208
00:09:49,840 --> 00:09:52,079
Speaker 4: own hair anymore. I mean, because the price point was right,

209
00:09:52,120 --> 00:09:54,960
Speaker 4: the experience was great, and I realized nobody else was

210
00:09:54,960 --> 00:09:57,160
Speaker 4: doing anything like this, and so it was like a

211
00:09:57,200 --> 00:10:00,200
Speaker 4: prime opportunity that I really felt like I kind of

212
00:10:00,080 --> 00:10:00,920
Speaker 4: of stumbled into.

213
00:10:02,160 --> 00:10:04,400
Speaker 2: Can you talk about growth?

214
00:10:04,559 --> 00:10:08,240
Speaker 3: And when I think about twenty ten's business culture, I

215
00:10:08,280 --> 00:10:11,960
Speaker 3: think of magazine coverers were like this founder just raised

216
00:10:12,080 --> 00:10:15,679
Speaker 3: X million dollars, this founder just had a huge exit.

217
00:10:15,720 --> 00:10:18,160
Speaker 3: This twenty eight year old is now a billionaire.

218
00:10:18,280 --> 00:10:20,720
Speaker 1: And in total addressable market, total.

219
00:10:20,400 --> 00:10:24,640
Speaker 3: Addressable market, this just sort of like money growth culture.

220
00:10:24,800 --> 00:10:27,880
Speaker 3: And you know, obviously as you as you talked about

221
00:10:27,920 --> 00:10:30,720
Speaker 3: there's a sort of presumably you are not the only

222
00:10:30,760 --> 00:10:32,800
Speaker 3: one that there was like a real dark side to

223
00:10:32,800 --> 00:10:35,600
Speaker 3: this and a personal cost, et cetera. But can you

224
00:10:35,679 --> 00:10:38,920
Speaker 3: talk a little bit more about the sort of decision

225
00:10:39,720 --> 00:10:42,400
Speaker 3: to take your idea and make it of you know,

226
00:10:42,440 --> 00:10:45,840
Speaker 3: you raised money and you expanded it became a national

227
00:10:46,120 --> 00:10:49,080
Speaker 3: maybe international brand. Can you talk about that sort of

228
00:10:49,120 --> 00:10:52,040
Speaker 3: like choice to like, Okay, we have to go for this,

229
00:10:52,160 --> 00:10:54,120
Speaker 3: and we have to grow big and we have to

230
00:10:54,160 --> 00:10:55,040
Speaker 3: deliver results.

231
00:10:55,840 --> 00:10:59,000
Speaker 4: Yeah, and it's certainly a choice, and not everybody wants

232
00:10:59,080 --> 00:11:01,080
Speaker 4: to do that. I mean, you know, but you get

233
00:11:01,120 --> 00:11:04,560
Speaker 4: like a little taste of that, and it's hard to

234
00:11:04,559 --> 00:11:06,480
Speaker 4: walk away from it, you know. And I think we

235
00:11:06,520 --> 00:11:09,040
Speaker 4: all knew that we were onto something really special, and

236
00:11:09,080 --> 00:11:12,240
Speaker 4: it was we did to have to make some hard decisions, like,

237
00:11:12,400 --> 00:11:16,680
Speaker 4: you know, obviously, this is going to change our lives significantly.

238
00:11:15,920 --> 00:11:17,120
Speaker 5: Do we really want to go for this?

239
00:11:17,280 --> 00:11:19,600
Speaker 4: And you know, you know, there was so much demand,

240
00:11:20,040 --> 00:11:22,920
Speaker 4: there was so much request, you know, to open more

241
00:11:22,920 --> 00:11:25,600
Speaker 4: stores and more markets, and you know, and it was

242
00:11:25,640 --> 00:11:28,079
Speaker 4: going to be a whole thing, you know, to really

243
00:11:28,080 --> 00:11:30,040
Speaker 4: go for this and to really grow this thing.

244
00:11:30,200 --> 00:11:33,080
Speaker 5: And we had to really lock arms and decide that that's.

245
00:11:32,960 --> 00:11:34,439
Speaker 4: What we wanted to do because it was going to

246
00:11:34,520 --> 00:11:37,560
Speaker 4: really change our lives, which it did in every conceivable way.

247
00:11:37,960 --> 00:11:39,520
Speaker 4: And you know, and I think I see lots of

248
00:11:39,559 --> 00:11:41,600
Speaker 4: businesses that decide not to do that, you know, to

249
00:11:41,679 --> 00:11:44,800
Speaker 4: grow at a more organic, slower pace. I mean obviously

250
00:11:44,840 --> 00:11:47,760
Speaker 4: for us, maybe not obviously, but for us to grow,

251
00:11:48,440 --> 00:11:51,080
Speaker 4: we were going to have to raise capital because even

252
00:11:51,120 --> 00:11:54,760
Speaker 4: though drive Bar was successful, our first two stores were successful,

253
00:11:55,240 --> 00:11:57,760
Speaker 4: they didn't throw off enough money to grow the way

254
00:11:57,760 --> 00:12:00,320
Speaker 4: we wanted to, or the pace in which not all

255
00:12:00,360 --> 00:12:02,400
Speaker 4: I shouldn't say wanted to, I should say like the

256
00:12:02,400 --> 00:12:05,079
Speaker 4: pace that we needed to, because we knew a lot

257
00:12:05,080 --> 00:12:07,160
Speaker 4: of people were on our tail, and they were, you know,

258
00:12:07,240 --> 00:12:09,839
Speaker 4: there were so many copycats like popping up left and right,

259
00:12:09,880 --> 00:12:12,760
Speaker 4: who humbly were just not nearly as good as we

260
00:12:12,760 --> 00:12:16,880
Speaker 4: were and didn't totally understand what we were doing, but saw,

261
00:12:17,040 --> 00:12:19,440
Speaker 4: you know, an opportunity. It's like you open up a

262
00:12:19,480 --> 00:12:21,840
Speaker 4: salon and throw some chairs in. It's like it's just

263
00:12:21,920 --> 00:12:24,120
Speaker 4: so not that simple. And so, you know, I think

264
00:12:24,120 --> 00:12:25,959
Speaker 4: we felt a little bit of pressure, like if we're

265
00:12:25,960 --> 00:12:27,680
Speaker 4: going to like really go for this, we got to

266
00:12:27,760 --> 00:12:30,199
Speaker 4: like move fast, and in order to move.

267
00:12:30,040 --> 00:12:31,480
Speaker 5: Fast, we need to raise money.

268
00:12:31,520 --> 00:12:34,640
Speaker 4: And so then we raised like our first two or

269
00:12:34,640 --> 00:12:37,320
Speaker 4: three million with friends and family because they were and

270
00:12:37,360 --> 00:12:39,840
Speaker 4: this is also like not super common, but you know,

271
00:12:39,880 --> 00:12:42,199
Speaker 4: friends and family were like practically throwing money at us

272
00:12:42,240 --> 00:12:45,000
Speaker 4: because they saw the writing on the wall that like

273
00:12:45,040 --> 00:12:49,120
Speaker 4: this was a great opportunity, you know. And and so yeah,

274
00:12:49,160 --> 00:12:51,200
Speaker 4: I mean we you know, ultimately came together to make

275
00:12:51,240 --> 00:12:53,120
Speaker 4: this decision that we're going to really go for this

276
00:12:53,200 --> 00:12:56,000
Speaker 4: and grow this thing, and that meant so many other

277
00:12:56,080 --> 00:12:58,800
Speaker 4: things that I at the time I knew nothing about,

278
00:12:58,880 --> 00:13:00,720
Speaker 4: you know, about like how you grow and scale and

279
00:13:00,840 --> 00:13:03,760
Speaker 4: hiring and and all the complexities that go into that.

280
00:13:04,000 --> 00:13:06,720
Speaker 4: But there was a lot of pressure because if we

281
00:13:06,720 --> 00:13:08,400
Speaker 4: were going to do we had to do it now,

282
00:13:08,600 --> 00:13:11,080
Speaker 4: you know, and otherwise we were gonna we were gonna

283
00:13:11,080 --> 00:13:14,240
Speaker 4: fall behind. My brother found an investment banker and we

284
00:13:14,280 --> 00:13:17,120
Speaker 4: went out and did like a formal process in probably

285
00:13:17,280 --> 00:13:21,320
Speaker 4: year like two maybe, and you know, decided to you know,

286
00:13:21,400 --> 00:13:24,240
Speaker 4: to really, like no pun intended blow this thing up.

287
00:13:25,400 --> 00:13:27,800
Speaker 1: Could you sorry, I'm a fan of puns.

288
00:13:27,920 --> 00:13:29,400
Speaker 5: Uh, could you have a lot of that?

289
00:13:29,600 --> 00:13:29,760
Speaker 4: Oh?

290
00:13:29,800 --> 00:13:32,680
Speaker 1: Good, excellent. Can you talk a little bit more about

291
00:13:32,760 --> 00:13:36,079
Speaker 1: the business model itself, because you know, I mentioned in

292
00:13:36,120 --> 00:13:39,280
Speaker 1: the intro like going to a dry bar was a

293
00:13:39,400 --> 00:13:43,240
Speaker 1: nice experience. It wasn't like you're going to a budget

294
00:13:43,360 --> 00:13:45,640
Speaker 1: hair salon and just getting this thing done for the

295
00:13:45,720 --> 00:13:48,840
Speaker 1: cheapest price. But at the same time, the price you

296
00:13:48,840 --> 00:13:53,800
Speaker 1: were charging four blowouts was very reasonable, especially when compared

297
00:13:53,840 --> 00:13:56,200
Speaker 1: to a more higher end salon. So how did you

298
00:13:56,240 --> 00:14:00,000
Speaker 1: actually contain those costs? Like where did the savings actually

299
00:14:00,080 --> 00:14:01,160
Speaker 1: we come from.

300
00:14:01,240 --> 00:14:04,360
Speaker 4: Well, I mean, it wasn't easy, and our margins were

301
00:14:04,640 --> 00:14:07,600
Speaker 4: razor thin to your point, because the amount of money

302
00:14:07,600 --> 00:14:09,800
Speaker 4: we spent on the build out, you know, to make

303
00:14:09,840 --> 00:14:11,560
Speaker 4: it look the way it looked and to make it

304
00:14:11,600 --> 00:14:14,080
Speaker 4: feel high end, we just not have the high end

305
00:14:14,080 --> 00:14:14,600
Speaker 4: price tag.

306
00:14:14,880 --> 00:14:18,000
Speaker 5: The name of the game for us was volume. Like

307
00:14:18,400 --> 00:14:19,760
Speaker 5: I'll see there's another ton.

308
00:14:21,320 --> 00:14:24,880
Speaker 1: You we all of these are flying right over Joe's heading.

309
00:14:25,040 --> 00:14:26,520
Speaker 2: No, no, I got I got that one.

310
00:14:27,000 --> 00:14:29,000
Speaker 5: You know, we have in like volume, big hair. So

311
00:14:29,120 --> 00:14:30,360
Speaker 5: anyway we need.

312
00:14:30,800 --> 00:14:32,400
Speaker 2: Closer to God, right, isn't that?

313
00:14:32,240 --> 00:14:35,120
Speaker 5: That's right? That's right, and it is a true statement.

314
00:14:35,280 --> 00:14:38,800
Speaker 5: Don't let anybody tell you different. So we knew that we.

315
00:14:38,760 --> 00:14:41,240
Speaker 4: Needed to do a ton of blowouts to day, and

316
00:14:41,280 --> 00:14:42,600
Speaker 4: like just to give you an example of.

317
00:14:42,560 --> 00:14:44,480
Speaker 5: What I mean by a ton, like we thought in

318
00:14:44,520 --> 00:14:45,600
Speaker 5: our Brentwood.

319
00:14:45,120 --> 00:14:47,560
Speaker 4: Location, which was our first location that had eight chairs,

320
00:14:47,800 --> 00:14:50,000
Speaker 4: we thought, you know, if we do thirty to forty

321
00:14:50,000 --> 00:14:52,560
Speaker 4: blowouts a day, like that's a good business and whatever.

322
00:14:52,840 --> 00:14:55,680
Speaker 4: We completely underestimated the demand and we were doing more

323
00:14:55,760 --> 00:14:59,240
Speaker 4: like eighty ish blowout today, which very quickly turned to

324
00:14:59,280 --> 00:15:02,080
Speaker 4: one hundred blowout today once we were fully staffed, you know,

325
00:15:02,200 --> 00:15:04,640
Speaker 4: So we were open from seven am to like nine pm,

326
00:15:04,720 --> 00:15:08,240
Speaker 4: so you know, you could theoretically do that. So once

327
00:15:08,280 --> 00:15:12,080
Speaker 4: we realized that, you know, we could do so many blowouts,

328
00:15:12,080 --> 00:15:14,040
Speaker 4: were open seven days a week, you know, twelve hours

329
00:15:14,080 --> 00:15:17,239
Speaker 4: a day, that we could we could theoretically do it.

330
00:15:17,240 --> 00:15:19,280
Speaker 4: It really was about volume. We had to get those

331
00:15:19,360 --> 00:15:21,840
Speaker 4: numbers in in order to make the business work, which,

332
00:15:21,920 --> 00:15:24,920
Speaker 4: by the way, didn't always work because, as you might imagine,

333
00:15:24,960 --> 00:15:27,920
Speaker 4: like you know, supply and demand was a real thing,

334
00:15:28,000 --> 00:15:31,520
Speaker 4: and for us, the supply was hairstylusts and it was

335
00:15:31,600 --> 00:15:35,800
Speaker 4: hard to get extremely hard to get great hairstylists in

336
00:15:35,880 --> 00:15:38,400
Speaker 4: and it's just an interesting market. And having been I'm

337
00:15:38,400 --> 00:15:41,720
Speaker 4: a hairstylist myself, it's like our strengths are our weaknesses.

338
00:15:41,760 --> 00:15:44,120
Speaker 4: Like I'm a little flaky, I'm not the most you know,

339
00:15:44,160 --> 00:15:47,520
Speaker 4: I'm usually late to most things, and so our most

340
00:15:47,560 --> 00:15:51,240
Speaker 4: hairstylists not all, but you know, and just getting hair

341
00:15:51,240 --> 00:15:53,960
Speaker 4: stylists who were okay, just doing blowouts all day long,

342
00:15:54,000 --> 00:15:56,520
Speaker 4: you know. Understandably, so many stylists wanted to grow their

343
00:15:56,560 --> 00:15:59,440
Speaker 4: business and do cuts in color, and drybar was more

344
00:15:59,520 --> 00:16:02,600
Speaker 4: like a stuff for them, not like a destination, you know,

345
00:16:02,680 --> 00:16:05,160
Speaker 4: And so that part of it was really hard getting

346
00:16:05,200 --> 00:16:07,880
Speaker 4: and training stylists, you know, to the level of which

347
00:16:07,920 --> 00:16:09,800
Speaker 4: we wanted them to be, you know, all of that.

348
00:16:10,280 --> 00:16:14,320
Speaker 4: So it was a tough business model in terms of

349
00:16:14,360 --> 00:16:17,320
Speaker 4: like getting that to all work. And you know, we

350
00:16:17,800 --> 00:16:20,600
Speaker 4: in some stores and sometimes we did it better than others.

351
00:16:20,600 --> 00:16:24,840
Speaker 4: We had a gajillion different strategies on recruiting and staffing

352
00:16:24,880 --> 00:16:27,440
Speaker 4: and all of that, but the business model, you know,

353
00:16:27,560 --> 00:16:31,040
Speaker 4: only worked if we did x amount of blowouts per

354
00:16:31,120 --> 00:16:33,920
Speaker 4: day per store, you know, which we were, for the

355
00:16:33,920 --> 00:16:35,640
Speaker 4: most part, able to really pull off.

356
00:16:50,800 --> 00:16:54,080
Speaker 1: I'm glad you mentioned recruitment and training because I got

357
00:16:54,080 --> 00:16:56,280
Speaker 1: the sense that this was kind of important for the

358
00:16:56,280 --> 00:16:59,160
Speaker 1: business model as well. So talk to us a little

359
00:16:59,200 --> 00:17:02,080
Speaker 1: bit more about how you identified the right hair stylists

360
00:17:02,120 --> 00:17:04,359
Speaker 1: for the business. As you mentioned, it might not be

361
00:17:04,640 --> 00:17:07,600
Speaker 1: that every stylist wants to spend their entire day just

362
00:17:07,680 --> 00:17:10,600
Speaker 1: blow drying hair. And then secondly, how much of the

363
00:17:10,680 --> 00:17:14,640
Speaker 1: labor force was flexible? Was everyone working full time or

364
00:17:14,840 --> 00:17:17,040
Speaker 1: were people coming in and doing it for like three

365
00:17:17,119 --> 00:17:20,680
Speaker 1: or four hours to sort of add on to their

366
00:17:21,400 --> 00:17:21,920
Speaker 1: main job.

367
00:17:22,040 --> 00:17:23,040
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, exactly.

368
00:17:23,119 --> 00:17:25,040
Speaker 4: You know, we tried to be as nimble and flexible

369
00:17:25,080 --> 00:17:27,840
Speaker 4: as possible as stylists because of that reason, Like you know,

370
00:17:28,040 --> 00:17:31,000
Speaker 4: it is very labor intensive, and I really always understood that,

371
00:17:31,119 --> 00:17:33,960
Speaker 4: Like you know, some stylists really loved it and would

372
00:17:34,040 --> 00:17:36,399
Speaker 4: and could do like a six seven, eight hour shift.

373
00:17:36,520 --> 00:17:38,520
Speaker 4: Other stylists were like, you know, I can't do this

374
00:17:38,560 --> 00:17:40,439
Speaker 4: for more than a few hours. Like I get it,

375
00:17:40,520 --> 00:17:42,959
Speaker 4: no problem, you know, especially in the early days, I

376
00:17:43,000 --> 00:17:44,480
Speaker 4: was like, I will take whatever you can get.

377
00:17:44,480 --> 00:17:46,080
Speaker 5: If you can only come in and do four.

378
00:17:45,880 --> 00:17:49,439
Speaker 4: Blowouts, fine, you know, Like it was that diet and

379
00:17:49,480 --> 00:17:50,840
Speaker 4: the dyer is not the right word, but it was

380
00:17:50,880 --> 00:17:53,800
Speaker 4: that like crazy and busy that and of course I

381
00:17:53,880 --> 00:17:56,119
Speaker 4: was doing tons of blowouts in those early days to

382
00:17:56,160 --> 00:17:58,800
Speaker 4: accommodate people. I would sit or stand at the first

383
00:17:58,840 --> 00:18:02,040
Speaker 4: chair and blow hair and be able to like manage.

384
00:18:01,720 --> 00:18:04,399
Speaker 5: The front desk. I mean that was those were crazy times.

385
00:18:04,440 --> 00:18:07,400
Speaker 4: But you know, so we were really flexible in terms

386
00:18:07,440 --> 00:18:10,359
Speaker 4: of what stylists what they wanted to do and how

387
00:18:10,400 --> 00:18:12,080
Speaker 4: many days a week they wanted to work, because we

388
00:18:12,160 --> 00:18:14,560
Speaker 4: knew we had to be in order like to get

389
00:18:14,800 --> 00:18:17,560
Speaker 4: people to like it was like a hodgepodge of stylists

390
00:18:17,560 --> 00:18:19,320
Speaker 4: getting them in and then you know, and then the

391
00:18:19,359 --> 00:18:22,720
Speaker 4: other big challenge, as you might imagine, is like making.

392
00:18:22,480 --> 00:18:24,800
Speaker 5: Sure that those stylists are you know, are really great.

393
00:18:24,920 --> 00:18:26,840
Speaker 5: And that was the other thing, is like, you know,

394
00:18:26,880 --> 00:18:27,560
Speaker 5: there was there was.

395
00:18:27,520 --> 00:18:29,480
Speaker 4: Like a subset of stilists who'd you know, been doing

396
00:18:29,520 --> 00:18:32,000
Speaker 4: this for a long time and they just you know,

397
00:18:32,080 --> 00:18:33,760
Speaker 4: they were great and we didn't need to do a

398
00:18:33,760 --> 00:18:34,439
Speaker 4: lot of training.

399
00:18:34,440 --> 00:18:37,120
Speaker 5: And then there were stylists who were newer out of beauty.

400
00:18:36,800 --> 00:18:38,480
Speaker 4: School and they didn't have a lot of training, and

401
00:18:38,520 --> 00:18:40,240
Speaker 4: so we needed to spend a lot of time with them.

402
00:18:40,240 --> 00:18:41,359
Speaker 5: But we didn't have that time.

403
00:18:41,520 --> 00:18:43,600
Speaker 4: You know, we weren't doing much training, which was getting

404
00:18:43,680 --> 00:18:46,000
Speaker 4: us in trouble, you know, because for me, it was

405
00:18:46,040 --> 00:18:49,440
Speaker 4: obviously really important that the blowouts were top notch amazing.

406
00:18:49,480 --> 00:18:50,760
Speaker 5: We do one thing, and we.

407
00:18:50,760 --> 00:18:53,159
Speaker 4: Better do it really well. So you know, it was

408
00:18:53,240 --> 00:18:55,320
Speaker 4: really stressful to get a stylist in there who wasn't

409
00:18:55,440 --> 00:18:57,520
Speaker 4: at the top of their game, you know. So that

410
00:18:57,560 --> 00:19:00,359
Speaker 4: piece of it was challenging. And I would eventually build

411
00:19:00,400 --> 00:19:02,639
Speaker 4: out a very robust training program, but that wouldn't be

412
00:19:02,840 --> 00:19:05,640
Speaker 4: you know, for years, or would take years, and we

413
00:19:05,640 --> 00:19:08,760
Speaker 4: were always tweaking that. But I felt really strongly about

414
00:19:08,880 --> 00:19:11,000
Speaker 4: a certain like culture that I wanted to have in

415
00:19:11,040 --> 00:19:13,560
Speaker 4: the shops. And so it was like there was stylists

416
00:19:13,640 --> 00:19:15,879
Speaker 4: that were just not the right fit for dry bar.

417
00:19:15,960 --> 00:19:18,120
Speaker 4: They didn't want to just do blowouts. They didn't want

418
00:19:18,160 --> 00:19:20,280
Speaker 4: to be washing their clients hair. They wanted to take

419
00:19:20,280 --> 00:19:22,600
Speaker 4: a break in between every client. And you know, for

420
00:19:22,680 --> 00:19:25,159
Speaker 4: better or worse, it was like you would do, you know,

421
00:19:25,200 --> 00:19:27,199
Speaker 4: a handful of blowouts and then take a break or

422
00:19:27,200 --> 00:19:29,199
Speaker 4: take your lunch or whatever, but you were working the

423
00:19:29,200 --> 00:19:31,359
Speaker 4: whole time. I mean, you were on dry bar and

424
00:19:31,400 --> 00:19:33,560
Speaker 4: so that you know, and that wasn't something that every

425
00:19:33,600 --> 00:19:37,359
Speaker 4: stylist wanted and not the typical culture of hair salons.

426
00:19:37,520 --> 00:19:39,720
Speaker 4: Even as I grew up in hair salons, it was like,

427
00:19:40,119 --> 00:19:42,160
Speaker 4: you know, people would take smoke breaks all the time

428
00:19:42,240 --> 00:19:45,119
Speaker 4: and there was like a more casual nature about it.

429
00:19:45,240 --> 00:19:47,480
Speaker 4: Not always you know, the really really busy salons weren't

430
00:19:47,520 --> 00:19:50,240
Speaker 4: like that. But you know, we were really really busy shop.

431
00:19:50,359 --> 00:19:52,680
Speaker 4: So we you know, we needed that kind of work

432
00:19:52,720 --> 00:19:55,600
Speaker 4: ethic and not and that just wasn't for everybody, which

433
00:19:55,640 --> 00:19:58,840
Speaker 4: was totally okay. And that was so that was something

434
00:19:58,880 --> 00:20:02,240
Speaker 4: that I always would preface with stylists when we were like,

435
00:20:02,440 --> 00:20:04,520
Speaker 4: you know, opening a new store because you know, we

436
00:20:04,520 --> 00:20:06,800
Speaker 4: have one hundred and fifty locations. I'd say the first

437
00:20:06,920 --> 00:20:09,440
Speaker 4: like fifty or so, I went to every single opening

438
00:20:09,880 --> 00:20:12,520
Speaker 4: until I just like physically couldn't anymore. But I used

439
00:20:12,560 --> 00:20:14,800
Speaker 4: to say to the stilust, I would do this like

440
00:20:14,960 --> 00:20:18,160
Speaker 4: kind of raw raw like what we'd call the new hire,

441
00:20:18,560 --> 00:20:21,479
Speaker 4: you know, orientation, where I would sit and like you know,

442
00:20:21,520 --> 00:20:23,760
Speaker 4: basically in a group setting and talk to the silist

443
00:20:23,800 --> 00:20:26,800
Speaker 4: about who I was, why this idea came to be,

444
00:20:27,040 --> 00:20:28,880
Speaker 4: what our core values were.

445
00:20:29,119 --> 00:20:29,840
Speaker 5: And all of that.

446
00:20:29,960 --> 00:20:32,040
Speaker 4: And I would and I would also say, every one

447
00:20:32,040 --> 00:20:34,200
Speaker 4: of you sitting here may not end up staying here

448
00:20:34,280 --> 00:20:36,320
Speaker 4: because this may not be the job for you. You

449
00:20:36,400 --> 00:20:39,320
Speaker 4: may not like this. This is a like very fast

450
00:20:39,320 --> 00:20:42,919
Speaker 4: paced hustle bustle. You've got to like thriving chaos, enjoy

451
00:20:43,000 --> 00:20:44,879
Speaker 4: this that part of it, or it might not be

452
00:20:44,920 --> 00:20:45,679
Speaker 4: the best job for you.

453
00:20:45,720 --> 00:20:47,919
Speaker 5: And that's okay. You know, it doesn't have to be

454
00:20:48,040 --> 00:20:49,200
Speaker 5: for everybody.

455
00:20:48,880 --> 00:20:49,080
Speaker 4: You know.

456
00:20:49,160 --> 00:20:50,960
Speaker 5: And so that was like, you know, the mentality of

457
00:20:51,000 --> 00:20:51,359
Speaker 5: the shop.

458
00:20:51,400 --> 00:20:54,119
Speaker 4: And we didn't have access to like every single hairstylist

459
00:20:54,160 --> 00:20:55,040
Speaker 4: that there was out there.

460
00:20:55,280 --> 00:20:57,240
Speaker 5: You know, we were pretty picky from.

461
00:20:57,080 --> 00:21:00,520
Speaker 4: Both a you know, a technical styling point and like

462
00:21:01,160 --> 00:21:03,600
Speaker 4: we want you to be a really nice person who

463
00:21:03,720 --> 00:21:06,280
Speaker 4: you know has over the top customer service, because that's

464
00:21:06,560 --> 00:21:08,840
Speaker 4: a huge part of the business model, and it was

465
00:21:09,119 --> 00:21:10,840
Speaker 4: the most challenging part of the whole thing.

466
00:21:11,280 --> 00:21:13,960
Speaker 3: So I mean, what I imagine the challenges that you

467
00:21:14,200 --> 00:21:18,119
Speaker 3: faced early on with hiring and recruiting and retaining talent

468
00:21:18,560 --> 00:21:21,919
Speaker 3: or like this precursor to probably what like hundreds of

469
00:21:21,920 --> 00:21:25,399
Speaker 3: thousands of entrepreneurs across the country these days, particularly in

470
00:21:25,440 --> 00:21:29,440
Speaker 3: the COVID era of hire labor tien are like tearing

471
00:21:29,560 --> 00:21:31,600
Speaker 3: their hairs out, And I have to imagine you know,

472
00:21:31,640 --> 00:21:34,359
Speaker 3: as you said, you couldn't eventually, you couldn't go to

473
00:21:34,480 --> 00:21:37,879
Speaker 3: every opening. Not every new stylist got to hear a

474
00:21:38,080 --> 00:21:42,080
Speaker 3: pep talk from Elieweb. What are the broader lessons that

475
00:21:42,160 --> 00:21:46,399
Speaker 3: you imparted to hiring managers at locations, at drybars or

476
00:21:46,520 --> 00:21:50,280
Speaker 3: some of your newer ventures including Squeeze the I know

477
00:21:50,320 --> 00:21:53,359
Speaker 3: you're not the CEO, but the co founder of the massage,

478
00:21:53,440 --> 00:21:58,200
Speaker 3: Like what do people need to know about identifying talent

479
00:21:58,240 --> 00:22:00,640
Speaker 3: who will be committed to the operation? Like what did

480
00:22:00,640 --> 00:22:03,400
Speaker 3: you learn about how to scale that sort of identification?

481
00:22:03,680 --> 00:22:06,600
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean we always did these like pre hires

482
00:22:06,680 --> 00:22:08,639
Speaker 4: before anybody even walked in the door. You know, we

483
00:22:08,680 --> 00:22:12,720
Speaker 4: had a team of people who we talked to potential employees,

484
00:22:13,040 --> 00:22:14,639
Speaker 4: you know, just to get what we would call the

485
00:22:14,640 --> 00:22:17,639
Speaker 4: cultural interview piece of it, which was like a pretty

486
00:22:17,680 --> 00:22:20,560
Speaker 4: candid conversation just trying to.

487
00:22:20,480 --> 00:22:21,720
Speaker 5: Get to know somebody.

488
00:22:21,760 --> 00:22:24,080
Speaker 4: And and that was even like in the early early

489
00:22:24,160 --> 00:22:26,040
Speaker 4: days before we opened the first location, I used to

490
00:22:26,040 --> 00:22:28,480
Speaker 4: have hairstylist come over to my house to blow out

491
00:22:28,520 --> 00:22:31,040
Speaker 4: my hair. That was like the job interview, which was

492
00:22:31,760 --> 00:22:34,919
Speaker 4: awesome and not always awesome, but anyways, and part of

493
00:22:34,920 --> 00:22:38,440
Speaker 4: that process, just for me in that very very small scale,

494
00:22:38,720 --> 00:22:41,480
Speaker 4: was you know, getting to know their personality. And it

495
00:22:41,640 --> 00:22:43,200
Speaker 4: kind of goes back to what I was talking about

496
00:22:43,200 --> 00:22:47,680
Speaker 4: that this job isn't for everybody. So as we scaled

497
00:22:47,720 --> 00:22:52,560
Speaker 4: and grew, those culture interviews became essential because you could

498
00:22:52,600 --> 00:22:56,120
Speaker 4: tell very quickly the conversation was like, you know, why

499
00:22:56,200 --> 00:22:57,800
Speaker 4: do you want to do this, and like what do

500
00:22:57,880 --> 00:23:00,760
Speaker 4: you love about this? And for me and for our team,

501
00:23:00,800 --> 00:23:03,240
Speaker 4: what we always like would listen for is for somebody

502
00:23:03,240 --> 00:23:07,639
Speaker 4: who really enjoys being in the service industry, you know,

503
00:23:07,800 --> 00:23:10,720
Speaker 4: like enjoys like making people feel good and that and

504
00:23:10,800 --> 00:23:13,840
Speaker 4: like giving and sharing this amazing talent they.

505
00:23:13,720 --> 00:23:16,359
Speaker 5: Have as a hairstylist with others, you know.

506
00:23:16,560 --> 00:23:19,359
Speaker 4: And and just like the way people would show up

507
00:23:19,400 --> 00:23:24,000
Speaker 4: on calls like prepared and ready and you know, answer

508
00:23:24,200 --> 00:23:27,240
Speaker 4: and questions with a lot of excitement and enthusiasm about

509
00:23:27,240 --> 00:23:30,520
Speaker 4: the brand, you know, on the contrary, as you would imagine,

510
00:23:30,560 --> 00:23:33,680
Speaker 4: you know, the stylists who were you know, really quiet,

511
00:23:33,800 --> 00:23:36,000
Speaker 4: really self spoken, didn't get the sense that this was

512
00:23:36,000 --> 00:23:38,639
Speaker 4: like something they're really excited about or loved. And it

513
00:23:38,720 --> 00:23:41,119
Speaker 4: might sound it feels like it sounds simple coming out

514
00:23:41,119 --> 00:23:43,720
Speaker 4: of my mouth, but it is that like basic, like

515
00:23:43,960 --> 00:23:46,280
Speaker 4: I really want to do this and be a part

516
00:23:46,320 --> 00:23:48,119
Speaker 4: of this brand, and I love this company and I

517
00:23:48,160 --> 00:23:50,919
Speaker 4: love hair and I love styling and making women feel great.

518
00:23:51,160 --> 00:23:54,520
Speaker 4: Like that's like the first barrier to entry for us

519
00:23:54,520 --> 00:23:57,040
Speaker 4: is like making sure that that at least that piece.

520
00:23:56,800 --> 00:23:58,960
Speaker 5: Is there and you're going to show up and be

521
00:23:59,119 --> 00:23:59,960
Speaker 5: kind and nice.

522
00:24:00,320 --> 00:24:02,560
Speaker 4: You know, that is an you know, an intangible that

523
00:24:02,600 --> 00:24:06,080
Speaker 4: you that you must simply have in order to be successful.

524
00:24:06,119 --> 00:24:08,320
Speaker 4: So if you don't even have that, there's no point

525
00:24:08,359 --> 00:24:10,600
Speaker 4: in going any further, you know. And like I said,

526
00:24:10,600 --> 00:24:13,320
Speaker 4: as we grew, there was a team that was instructed

527
00:24:13,320 --> 00:24:15,080
Speaker 4: to really listen for this kind of stuff and make

528
00:24:15,119 --> 00:24:18,800
Speaker 4: sure that we were bringing in the right personalities as

529
00:24:18,800 --> 00:24:20,440
Speaker 4: well as great hairstylists.

530
00:24:20,920 --> 00:24:24,040
Speaker 1: So you talked a little bit about the grind and

531
00:24:24,280 --> 00:24:28,280
Speaker 1: how intensive this whole process of building a business actually was,

532
00:24:28,359 --> 00:24:30,800
Speaker 1: and of course, you know that's a big portion of

533
00:24:30,800 --> 00:24:33,119
Speaker 1: what your book is actually about, this idea of losing

534
00:24:33,160 --> 00:24:36,919
Speaker 1: yourself in your business your baby. I'm curious though, like

535
00:24:37,160 --> 00:24:39,800
Speaker 1: it sounds tough and you're sort of like working and

536
00:24:39,920 --> 00:24:43,280
Speaker 1: working until you get presumably to like the big payoff

537
00:24:43,400 --> 00:24:47,200
Speaker 1: of some sort. And I always wonder with new startups,

538
00:24:47,200 --> 00:24:50,080
Speaker 1: like how much money are you able to take off

539
00:24:50,119 --> 00:24:53,800
Speaker 1: the table in the beginning, Like how do you balance

540
00:24:54,440 --> 00:24:58,960
Speaker 1: building the business and investing in it versus rewarding yourself

541
00:24:59,240 --> 00:25:01,800
Speaker 1: for the hardware that you're actually doing well.

542
00:25:01,840 --> 00:25:03,840
Speaker 4: I love this question because I think it's such an

543
00:25:03,840 --> 00:25:07,560
Speaker 4: important thing to point out that people. You know, it's

544
00:25:07,600 --> 00:25:10,960
Speaker 4: a tricky one because I know that there's obviously, you know,

545
00:25:11,040 --> 00:25:13,639
Speaker 4: people want to ultimately make money and they want to

546
00:25:13,680 --> 00:25:16,720
Speaker 4: be successful, and that largely looks like making money.

547
00:25:17,520 --> 00:25:18,880
Speaker 5: I get that, and I feel that too.

548
00:25:19,160 --> 00:25:21,600
Speaker 4: I mean, just like anybody else, I really like making money,

549
00:25:21,640 --> 00:25:24,160
Speaker 4: and I like money and nice things, but money wasn't

550
00:25:24,160 --> 00:25:27,600
Speaker 4: the big driver for me in this business. And I

551
00:25:27,680 --> 00:25:31,639
Speaker 4: feel like it feels to me like a mistake that

552
00:25:31,720 --> 00:25:35,920
Speaker 4: a lot of entrepreneurs make, is like they're only looking

553
00:25:36,160 --> 00:25:40,240
Speaker 4: at the money and the opportunity to make money, sell

554
00:25:40,280 --> 00:25:45,480
Speaker 4: a company, whatever, versus doing something that they just really love,

555
00:25:46,359 --> 00:25:46,560
Speaker 4: you know.

556
00:25:46,600 --> 00:25:48,320
Speaker 5: And I feel so strongly about this.

557
00:25:48,400 --> 00:25:49,960
Speaker 4: And if you look at like some of the most

558
00:25:50,000 --> 00:25:53,159
Speaker 4: successful companies and are in the last couple decades, like

559
00:25:53,600 --> 00:25:56,320
Speaker 4: you know, and you hear the founder's story, it has

560
00:25:56,480 --> 00:25:59,359
Speaker 4: always started from some sort of personal necessity, something that

561
00:25:59,400 --> 00:26:01,119
Speaker 4: they felt like in their heart of hearts, that they

562
00:26:01,160 --> 00:26:02,560
Speaker 4: could make better and do better.

563
00:26:02,960 --> 00:26:06,280
Speaker 5: And the reward is it working and.

564
00:26:06,200 --> 00:26:09,760
Speaker 4: The success of the company being you know, being felt

565
00:26:09,880 --> 00:26:13,000
Speaker 4: and growing this thing, and the excitement and the adrenaline

566
00:26:13,040 --> 00:26:16,159
Speaker 4: that you get from building something that people love, you know,

567
00:26:16,200 --> 00:26:18,879
Speaker 4: and then and then you know, providing all these jobs

568
00:26:18,960 --> 00:26:21,080
Speaker 4: and all this opportunity and all of that, you know.

569
00:26:21,160 --> 00:26:22,840
Speaker 5: I mean, for me, that was really.

570
00:26:22,680 --> 00:26:25,840
Speaker 4: What I loved a lot more than like, oh, we're

571
00:26:25,840 --> 00:26:27,440
Speaker 4: going to build this thing to sell it.

572
00:26:27,440 --> 00:26:30,080
Speaker 5: It was never ever that conversation for us, you know.

573
00:26:30,359 --> 00:26:32,280
Speaker 4: I think I started to realize after a couple of

574
00:26:32,359 --> 00:26:35,680
Speaker 4: years in this thing, like you know, having never had

575
00:26:35,720 --> 00:26:38,919
Speaker 4: any experience in like M and A and going public

576
00:26:38,960 --> 00:26:40,600
Speaker 4: and all of that stuff that I you know, I

577
00:26:40,680 --> 00:26:42,760
Speaker 4: didn't even know that that happened in the world.

578
00:26:42,960 --> 00:26:45,440
Speaker 5: Like, you know, I was so naive back then.

579
00:26:45,480 --> 00:26:48,040
Speaker 4: And as I started to like pay more attention to that,

580
00:26:48,160 --> 00:26:50,480
Speaker 4: and I was, you know, starting to become friends with

581
00:26:50,560 --> 00:26:52,320
Speaker 4: more founders, and I was starting to be in these

582
00:26:52,400 --> 00:26:55,320
Speaker 4: rooms where people were talking about buying and selling companies,

583
00:26:55,400 --> 00:26:57,880
Speaker 4: I was like, oh my god, that might be us

584
00:26:58,320 --> 00:27:00,520
Speaker 4: one day, you know, And that was like an exciting

585
00:27:00,640 --> 00:27:03,160
Speaker 4: like part of it. I mean, obviously, we sold it

586
00:27:03,240 --> 00:27:06,159
Speaker 4: ten years after we built it, and you know, I

587
00:27:06,160 --> 00:27:08,880
Speaker 4: would say in a year like after we had raised

588
00:27:08,880 --> 00:27:12,080
Speaker 4: a bunch of money, obviously everything changed and you know,

589
00:27:12,280 --> 00:27:15,240
Speaker 4: ultimately we raised seventy five million, and that now you

590
00:27:15,280 --> 00:27:17,640
Speaker 4: have investors, and now you have that's that is what

591
00:27:17,680 --> 00:27:20,280
Speaker 4: they're thinking about, and that you know, is good for

592
00:27:20,320 --> 00:27:22,399
Speaker 4: them to be thinking about and moving the business in

593
00:27:22,440 --> 00:27:24,840
Speaker 4: the right direction. But all of that was so new

594
00:27:24,880 --> 00:27:26,640
Speaker 4: to me when I started. I Mean, this whole thing

595
00:27:26,720 --> 00:27:28,679
Speaker 4: was really just started out of like a passion to

596
00:27:28,800 --> 00:27:31,640
Speaker 4: like find my purpose in my life and to do

597
00:27:31,720 --> 00:27:34,800
Speaker 4: something that I really loved to do, and I loved it.

598
00:27:35,040 --> 00:27:37,439
Speaker 4: I mean I loved building that business and I loved

599
00:27:37,720 --> 00:27:39,680
Speaker 4: every second of it. I was in that shop seven

600
00:27:39,720 --> 00:27:42,159
Speaker 4: days a week. I mean I couldn't get enough of it.

601
00:27:42,240 --> 00:27:45,000
Speaker 4: And that is so, I mean, so much more valuable

602
00:27:45,080 --> 00:27:48,680
Speaker 4: than any dollar amount to have that, Like, I love

603
00:27:48,840 --> 00:27:51,000
Speaker 4: what I'm doing and what I get to do every day,

604
00:27:51,080 --> 00:27:55,080
Speaker 4: you know. So you know, again, once I realized like, oh,

605
00:27:55,160 --> 00:27:56,840
Speaker 4: we might actually be able to sell this thing, like

606
00:27:56,920 --> 00:27:58,320
Speaker 4: oh we're going to actually be able to make a

607
00:27:58,320 --> 00:28:01,440
Speaker 4: lot of money, like that was really awesome, but just

608
00:28:01,480 --> 00:28:04,760
Speaker 4: not you know what. I went into this thing thinking,

609
00:28:05,040 --> 00:28:05,480
Speaker 4: I want.

610
00:28:05,359 --> 00:28:08,640
Speaker 3: To ask you a question about fundraising. I have heard

611
00:28:09,400 --> 00:28:14,520
Speaker 3: that vcs or investors don't still necessarily have a great

612
00:28:14,720 --> 00:28:19,720
Speaker 3: grasp of the business model of rapid growth physical locations.

613
00:28:19,760 --> 00:28:22,199
Speaker 3: And so there's sort of like investors who sort of

614
00:28:22,240 --> 00:28:25,840
Speaker 3: like understand physical operation, and then there's vcs who probably

615
00:28:25,840 --> 00:28:29,480
Speaker 3: often think in uh, you know, the idiom of software

616
00:28:29,520 --> 00:28:32,159
Speaker 3: and five people in a room growing to something that

617
00:28:32,200 --> 00:28:34,800
Speaker 3: a billion people can use, and that a lot of

618
00:28:34,840 --> 00:28:38,800
Speaker 3: these sort of like modern concepts of physical growth locations,

619
00:28:39,000 --> 00:28:42,120
Speaker 3: whether it's like a dry bar or a kava or

620
00:28:42,160 --> 00:28:44,560
Speaker 3: something like that sort of exist in this middle space

621
00:28:44,880 --> 00:28:47,720
Speaker 3: and investors don't have a great understanding of it. Was

622
00:28:47,800 --> 00:28:50,160
Speaker 3: that the case for you when you first went out

623
00:28:50,200 --> 00:28:52,680
Speaker 3: trying to explain to them your vision? And do you

624
00:28:52,720 --> 00:28:55,280
Speaker 3: think investors these days like feel like they have a

625
00:28:55,320 --> 00:28:57,360
Speaker 3: better handle on these types of startups?

626
00:28:58,120 --> 00:29:00,520
Speaker 4: Well, I mean, it's such as it feels the wild

627
00:29:00,560 --> 00:29:03,000
Speaker 4: West right now, you know. I mean, I think retail

628
00:29:03,080 --> 00:29:06,400
Speaker 4: is so like tough right now that I you know,

629
00:29:06,440 --> 00:29:09,680
Speaker 4: I don't blame in you know, vcs and all these guys.

630
00:29:09,840 --> 00:29:11,520
Speaker 4: It's like it's like you just don't know. It's so

631
00:29:11,600 --> 00:29:13,800
Speaker 4: hard to predict what's going to happen right now. So

632
00:29:14,160 --> 00:29:16,480
Speaker 4: it's such a funky time. And I actually had this.

633
00:29:16,560 --> 00:29:19,280
Speaker 5: Thought not not long ago, like I wonder, you know.

634
00:29:19,640 --> 00:29:21,800
Speaker 4: I mean, part of the success of Drybar, I think

635
00:29:21,880 --> 00:29:24,280
Speaker 4: was when we started it, we only wanted to raise

636
00:29:24,320 --> 00:29:27,600
Speaker 4: like ten or fifteen million that first round, and you know,

637
00:29:27,640 --> 00:29:30,000
Speaker 4: we ended up raising twenty five million because we went

638
00:29:30,000 --> 00:29:32,680
Speaker 4: with private equity. We never went down the venture capital

639
00:29:33,240 --> 00:29:36,600
Speaker 4: and they wanted to put in more as they do.

640
00:29:36,960 --> 00:29:38,960
Speaker 5: And I think it was again.

641
00:29:38,800 --> 00:29:43,000
Speaker 4: A very different time, and retail was very sleepy at

642
00:29:43,040 --> 00:29:45,320
Speaker 4: that time, you know, in two thousand and nine when

643
00:29:45,360 --> 00:29:48,320
Speaker 4: we when we first started Drybar, and then dry Bar

644
00:29:48,560 --> 00:29:52,040
Speaker 4: you know, resonated and took off and we raised the

645
00:29:52,080 --> 00:29:54,440
Speaker 4: first like three million with friends and family, which got

646
00:29:54,560 --> 00:29:57,360
Speaker 4: us like to a couple of stores. But the buzz

647
00:29:57,480 --> 00:29:59,920
Speaker 4: was there, and the pr was there, and women were

648
00:30:00,080 --> 00:30:02,800
Speaker 4: like telling O their friends, and so we had that

649
00:30:02,880 --> 00:30:04,760
Speaker 4: in our corner. And so by the time we were

650
00:30:04,800 --> 00:30:09,640
Speaker 4: in these rooms with these private equity guys, granted you

651
00:30:09,640 --> 00:30:13,280
Speaker 4: can picture the scene. It's like me and my big

652
00:30:13,320 --> 00:30:17,400
Speaker 4: personality and then these guys in suits and they're.

653
00:30:17,120 --> 00:30:20,120
Speaker 5: Like, what are you doing. You're blowing women's hair?

654
00:30:20,640 --> 00:30:23,760
Speaker 4: Is you know, like and talk about puns and the

655
00:30:24,000 --> 00:30:28,680
Speaker 4: ridiculous jokes so annoying, but they didn't quite get it yet,

656
00:30:28,720 --> 00:30:29,320
Speaker 4: but they're.

657
00:30:29,120 --> 00:30:30,960
Speaker 5: Like, you know, my wife's been talking about this thing,

658
00:30:31,040 --> 00:30:32,280
Speaker 5: or my daughter's you know.

659
00:30:32,360 --> 00:30:35,120
Speaker 4: There was that kind of general like in the air,

660
00:30:35,200 --> 00:30:37,240
Speaker 4: we've heard about this and it seems to be getting

661
00:30:37,240 --> 00:30:39,120
Speaker 4: a lot of attention, and you know, and then of

662
00:30:39,200 --> 00:30:41,160
Speaker 4: course there were really conversations of like are you going

663
00:30:41,200 --> 00:30:43,840
Speaker 4: to do nails and makeup too? Because you can and

664
00:30:44,120 --> 00:30:46,000
Speaker 4: you're doing one hundred women a day, and why don't

665
00:30:46,000 --> 00:30:47,680
Speaker 4: you do this, which of course, and I had to say, no,

666
00:30:48,320 --> 00:30:50,080
Speaker 4: we do one thing, we do it really well. And

667
00:30:50,120 --> 00:30:52,440
Speaker 4: that turned off a lot of investors who didn't want

668
00:30:52,480 --> 00:30:54,920
Speaker 4: to get involved in drive Bart, which was like, no problem,

669
00:30:55,040 --> 00:30:57,360
Speaker 4: but not the right fit, you know, So there was

670
00:30:57,400 --> 00:30:59,920
Speaker 4: a lot of trepidation of how do you scale the

671
00:31:00,200 --> 00:31:02,560
Speaker 4: thing when they didn't really understand it to begin with,

672
00:31:02,720 --> 00:31:06,280
Speaker 4: you know, like and again back to our initial projections

673
00:31:06,320 --> 00:31:08,960
Speaker 4: of doing like thirty to forty blowouts a day, when

674
00:31:09,000 --> 00:31:11,800
Speaker 4: obviously we far outseated that, but.

675
00:31:11,880 --> 00:31:14,280
Speaker 5: That was like we were in La and.

676
00:31:14,480 --> 00:31:17,280
Speaker 4: Our second location, which is a franchise, was in Dallas,

677
00:31:17,360 --> 00:31:19,760
Speaker 4: which obviously makes a lot of sense, but there was

678
00:31:19,800 --> 00:31:21,880
Speaker 4: still a lot of like, how, you know, how we

679
00:31:21,960 --> 00:31:24,120
Speaker 4: proved the concept? You know, how is this something that

680
00:31:24,160 --> 00:31:26,880
Speaker 4: really works far and wide across the country. And then

681
00:31:26,880 --> 00:31:29,160
Speaker 4: there was still kind of a question mark for a

682
00:31:29,200 --> 00:31:31,240
Speaker 4: lot of people, my brother included, you know, who was

683
00:31:31,240 --> 00:31:32,760
Speaker 4: always like, we got to prove the concept, We got

684
00:31:32,760 --> 00:31:34,520
Speaker 4: to prove the concept. And I was like, I just

685
00:31:34,560 --> 00:31:38,840
Speaker 4: think it works where women have hair, like real hair,

686
00:31:39,280 --> 00:31:40,880
Speaker 4: this will work, and that, you know was.

687
00:31:40,840 --> 00:31:44,160
Speaker 5: My very bullish and maybe naive idea.

688
00:31:44,240 --> 00:31:46,280
Speaker 4: But we kept going and we knew we knew we

689
00:31:46,360 --> 00:31:49,240
Speaker 4: had something really special and magical, and so we kept

690
00:31:49,440 --> 00:31:52,520
Speaker 4: going until we found the right partner and they really

691
00:31:52,560 --> 00:31:54,800
Speaker 4: understood our vision and didn't want to change it and

692
00:31:54,880 --> 00:31:57,120
Speaker 4: wanted to, like you know, really lock arms with us

693
00:31:57,120 --> 00:31:59,440
Speaker 4: and partner with us, which was Castanea, which is now

694
00:31:59,440 --> 00:31:59,960
Speaker 4: known as Strung.

695
00:32:00,440 --> 00:32:01,920
Speaker 5: And so yeah, that's not all went down.

696
00:32:17,280 --> 00:32:20,280
Speaker 1: So I want to move on and talk about your

697
00:32:20,440 --> 00:32:24,560
Speaker 1: new business, Squeeze, which I've seen described as sort of

698
00:32:24,600 --> 00:32:28,240
Speaker 1: the dry bar for massages, and so I guess my

699
00:32:28,280 --> 00:32:32,600
Speaker 1: first question is listening to you describe again like the

700
00:32:32,760 --> 00:32:36,520
Speaker 1: grind of starting another business, why are you putting yourself

701
00:32:36,560 --> 00:32:39,440
Speaker 1: through all of this again? And then secondly, how much

702
00:32:39,520 --> 00:32:42,960
Speaker 1: overlap is there in terms of the business model between

703
00:32:43,240 --> 00:32:48,280
Speaker 1: you know, Squeeze offering massages and the dry bar offering blowouts.

704
00:32:48,800 --> 00:32:51,120
Speaker 4: Well, first of all, I am not in the grind,

705
00:32:51,360 --> 00:32:52,160
Speaker 4: thank you very much.

706
00:32:52,280 --> 00:32:55,320
Speaker 1: I'm fair enough.

707
00:32:55,840 --> 00:32:58,120
Speaker 4: Because yeah, it's a great question, like no thanks, And

708
00:32:58,360 --> 00:33:01,160
Speaker 4: it's funny when my brother this is really my brother's idea,

709
00:33:01,560 --> 00:33:04,680
Speaker 4: and when he as you know, a bald dude who

710
00:33:04,720 --> 00:33:08,760
Speaker 4: never got blowouts, his frustration in the market place was

711
00:33:08,800 --> 00:33:12,360
Speaker 4: around massage because as someone who went to you know,

712
00:33:12,400 --> 00:33:14,920
Speaker 4: the local chain which you know who I'm talking about,

713
00:33:15,160 --> 00:33:17,800
Speaker 4: you know, and had a pretty bad experience from having

714
00:33:17,880 --> 00:33:20,880
Speaker 4: to call every location to book and the decor was

715
00:33:20,920 --> 00:33:23,240
Speaker 4: like eh, and the massage is very hit or missed,

716
00:33:23,240 --> 00:33:25,920
Speaker 4: and the whole process was just so clunky. You know

717
00:33:26,080 --> 00:33:28,760
Speaker 4: that he was so frustrated that there wasn't a great

718
00:33:29,040 --> 00:33:31,800
Speaker 4: place for him to go for massage as someone who

719
00:33:31,840 --> 00:33:34,000
Speaker 4: liked to get like a weekly massage, even though the

720
00:33:34,040 --> 00:33:34,920
Speaker 4: price point.

721
00:33:34,680 --> 00:33:36,720
Speaker 5: Was was good at you know, at a local chain.

722
00:33:36,800 --> 00:33:38,360
Speaker 4: And then if, of course, if you went to a spa,

723
00:33:39,000 --> 00:33:40,480
Speaker 4: you know, it was the same conundrum that you had

724
00:33:40,480 --> 00:33:42,760
Speaker 4: a drive Bar. The spa would be really expensive, just

725
00:33:42,800 --> 00:33:44,880
Speaker 4: like a high end hair salon was really expensive for

726
00:33:45,000 --> 00:33:48,560
Speaker 4: blow up. So the similarities and the problem was pretty

727
00:33:48,600 --> 00:33:51,760
Speaker 4: much the same. And so when we were like in

728
00:33:51,800 --> 00:33:54,400
Speaker 4: the last couple of years of Drivebar, Michael really wanted

729
00:33:54,440 --> 00:33:56,880
Speaker 4: to start this. Obviously, we didn't have a bandwidth for it,

730
00:33:56,960 --> 00:33:59,560
Speaker 4: and I, to your question, did not want to go

731
00:33:59,640 --> 00:34:02,080
Speaker 4: back into like the early stages of building a business.

732
00:34:02,120 --> 00:34:04,880
Speaker 5: So I was like, Nope, not doing that.

733
00:34:05,520 --> 00:34:08,479
Speaker 4: But you know, then we went to Brittany Driscoll, who's

734
00:34:08,520 --> 00:34:11,360
Speaker 4: the CEO and our co founder and who ran marketing

735
00:34:11,400 --> 00:34:13,560
Speaker 4: at dry Bar for several years, and she was on

736
00:34:13,600 --> 00:34:15,840
Speaker 4: her way out of Drybar was like going to explore

737
00:34:15,880 --> 00:34:17,759
Speaker 4: new opportunities, and we said, hey, you know, we have

738
00:34:17,880 --> 00:34:21,080
Speaker 4: this idea for a massage concept because for the reasons

739
00:34:21,120 --> 00:34:23,759
Speaker 4: I just mentioned, you know, we wanted something different and

740
00:34:23,800 --> 00:34:26,239
Speaker 4: better that didn't exist, you know, which is always my

741
00:34:27,000 --> 00:34:29,880
Speaker 4: advice to entrepreneurs is like, you do not have to

742
00:34:29,920 --> 00:34:32,760
Speaker 4: reinvent the wheel. Like obviously we did not invent blowouts

743
00:34:32,840 --> 00:34:35,840
Speaker 4: or massages. We've just created a much better experience and

744
00:34:35,920 --> 00:34:39,440
Speaker 4: price point and a million other details around them that

745
00:34:39,560 --> 00:34:44,000
Speaker 4: nobody's paying close attention to. And the big differentiator of Squeeze, though,

746
00:34:44,560 --> 00:34:47,000
Speaker 4: is that there's an app that you even though it's

747
00:34:47,040 --> 00:34:48,400
Speaker 4: a brick and mortar and you go in for a

748
00:34:48,400 --> 00:34:51,879
Speaker 4: physical massage, there's an app that you book all your

749
00:34:51,920 --> 00:34:54,160
Speaker 4: preferences on from like if you like a litter elotion

750
00:34:54,360 --> 00:34:56,520
Speaker 4: and the type of music in this if you know,

751
00:34:56,520 --> 00:34:59,839
Speaker 4: there's a very like intuitive body that you you know,

752
00:35:00,040 --> 00:35:01,600
Speaker 4: press on like I like a lot of you know,

753
00:35:01,680 --> 00:35:04,160
Speaker 4: pressure here but not here. And so by the time

754
00:35:04,200 --> 00:35:07,080
Speaker 4: you walk into Squeeze, the therapist already knows all of

755
00:35:07,120 --> 00:35:09,279
Speaker 4: this stuff because you've had to have you know, gone

756
00:35:09,360 --> 00:35:12,240
Speaker 4: through the app and really filled out all your information

757
00:35:12,280 --> 00:35:14,400
Speaker 4: and that that was a big undertaking. It took us

758
00:35:14,400 --> 00:35:16,719
Speaker 4: over a year to build out this app that you

759
00:35:16,719 --> 00:35:18,760
Speaker 4: know had all these bells and whistles. That was super

760
00:35:18,800 --> 00:35:21,320
Speaker 4: intuitive and nobody else has this and it is the

761
00:35:21,360 --> 00:35:24,879
Speaker 4: biggest differentiator of Squeeze. Not to mention, it's the same

762
00:35:24,920 --> 00:35:27,879
Speaker 4: founding team as Drybar. My ex husband Cam did. All

763
00:35:27,880 --> 00:35:30,359
Speaker 4: the creative are the same architect who built dry Bars.

764
00:35:30,400 --> 00:35:30,920
Speaker 5: Everything is.

765
00:35:30,960 --> 00:35:33,359
Speaker 4: It's the same team and it is the dry Bar

766
00:35:33,400 --> 00:35:36,359
Speaker 4: of massage because it's it's exactly the same thinking as

767
00:35:36,440 --> 00:35:38,759
Speaker 4: Dry Bar. It's like this is not being done well,

768
00:35:39,200 --> 00:35:41,080
Speaker 4: We're going to go do it much better, you know.

769
00:35:41,200 --> 00:35:43,680
Speaker 4: And if you if you read the reviews on Squeeze,

770
00:35:43,680 --> 00:35:46,560
Speaker 4: they're all like they're literally all five stars. I mean,

771
00:35:46,560 --> 00:35:48,920
Speaker 4: we've had such great experience, and so much of that

772
00:35:49,040 --> 00:35:51,480
Speaker 4: comes from the learning from drive Bar, you know, especially

773
00:35:51,520 --> 00:35:54,560
Speaker 4: Brittany having you know, lived this world with us for

774
00:35:54,640 --> 00:35:56,799
Speaker 4: many years and you know, we knew what was working,

775
00:35:56,920 --> 00:35:59,440
Speaker 4: what wasn't working, And to date, I think we've we're

776
00:35:59,440 --> 00:36:02,279
Speaker 4: doing it completely franchise model where Drivebar was a little both,

777
00:36:02,719 --> 00:36:06,160
Speaker 4: but we've sold over eighty locations across the country, so

778
00:36:06,200 --> 00:36:08,399
Speaker 4: you'll start seeing them popping up all over the place

779
00:36:08,400 --> 00:36:09,440
Speaker 4: in the next year or so.

780
00:36:10,200 --> 00:36:14,040
Speaker 3: Speaking of those locations, that actually fits right into what

781
00:36:14,080 --> 00:36:15,759
Speaker 3: I was going to ask next. You mentioned sort of

782
00:36:15,840 --> 00:36:19,800
Speaker 3: generally Drybar you saw as being successful anywhere that women

783
00:36:19,840 --> 00:36:22,160
Speaker 3: have hair, which is everywhere. But you must have thought,

784
00:36:22,200 --> 00:36:25,879
Speaker 3: you know, specific about the types of locations, whether they're

785
00:36:25,920 --> 00:36:29,600
Speaker 3: in high end malls or busy areas, that are really

786
00:36:29,640 --> 00:36:33,040
Speaker 3: optimal for opening a location. These days, obviously there's all

787
00:36:33,160 --> 00:36:35,760
Speaker 3: kinds of questions about what is even the future of

788
00:36:35,760 --> 00:36:38,520
Speaker 3: offices and where and how are people going to work?

789
00:36:38,920 --> 00:36:42,080
Speaker 3: What have you like seen in terms of our Where

790
00:36:42,120 --> 00:36:45,759
Speaker 3: is your thinking in terms of selecting locations in the

791
00:36:45,840 --> 00:36:48,839
Speaker 3: year twenty twenty three where you feel confident that it'll

792
00:36:48,880 --> 00:36:51,120
Speaker 3: work at a time in which I think it's still

793
00:36:51,200 --> 00:36:53,040
Speaker 3: very up in the ear even where people are going

794
00:36:53,080 --> 00:36:53,600
Speaker 3: to be working.

795
00:36:54,280 --> 00:36:56,200
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's such a good question, and I you know,

796
00:36:56,719 --> 00:36:58,960
Speaker 4: I think we're trying to figure that out right now too.

797
00:36:59,080 --> 00:37:01,360
Speaker 4: I mean to go back in time a little bit.

798
00:37:01,400 --> 00:37:03,680
Speaker 4: I mean with dry Bar, which I still kind of

799
00:37:03,960 --> 00:37:06,719
Speaker 4: feel and I do just for the record, far be

800
00:37:06,800 --> 00:37:08,960
Speaker 4: it for me to predict the future. But I really

801
00:37:09,000 --> 00:37:12,800
Speaker 4: believe the pendulum is going to swing back to experiences.

802
00:37:12,880 --> 00:37:17,080
Speaker 4: You know, I think people are desperately hungry for being

803
00:37:17,160 --> 00:37:21,160
Speaker 4: out in the world with other people again and having experiences.

804
00:37:21,200 --> 00:37:21,360
Speaker 4: You know.

805
00:37:21,400 --> 00:37:23,200
Speaker 5: I think it's just taking a minute to get back

806
00:37:23,239 --> 00:37:23,520
Speaker 5: to it.

807
00:37:23,680 --> 00:37:27,000
Speaker 4: That said, with Drybar, it was like we realize very

808
00:37:27,120 --> 00:37:30,520
Speaker 4: quickly that being like in you know, a woman's like

809
00:37:30,680 --> 00:37:33,959
Speaker 4: daily routine, you know, like being near a grocery store,

810
00:37:34,080 --> 00:37:37,520
Speaker 4: being near you know, her workout, or where she liked

811
00:37:37,520 --> 00:37:39,600
Speaker 4: to shop and where she liked to have lunch or

812
00:37:39,840 --> 00:37:42,279
Speaker 4: you know, we knew the importance of being in that

813
00:37:42,520 --> 00:37:45,400
Speaker 4: mix of like your daily use and that was always

814
00:37:45,480 --> 00:37:47,840
Speaker 4: the guiding light of where we put a drybar, like

815
00:37:47,960 --> 00:37:50,800
Speaker 4: near and you know, in the right area.

816
00:37:50,440 --> 00:37:52,120
Speaker 5: Which, by the way, can be really tricky.

817
00:37:52,160 --> 00:37:54,640
Speaker 4: I mean we certainly experienced this the hard way that

818
00:37:55,440 --> 00:37:58,040
Speaker 4: you could move. You could open a store in the

819
00:37:58,120 --> 00:38:01,400
Speaker 4: right like mile radius, but if you were in the

820
00:38:01,440 --> 00:38:03,680
Speaker 4: wrong shopping center on the wrong side of the street,

821
00:38:03,760 --> 00:38:06,440
Speaker 4: that was, you would never know unless you were unless

822
00:38:06,480 --> 00:38:09,840
Speaker 4: you tapped local knowledge to know that, Like it's really

823
00:38:09,880 --> 00:38:12,640
Speaker 4: hard to park there, and nobody likes to go there

824
00:38:12,680 --> 00:38:15,640
Speaker 4: because of the way the shopping center. Who knows you know,

825
00:38:15,719 --> 00:38:17,760
Speaker 4: it's like from an out you know, when an outside,

826
00:38:17,760 --> 00:38:20,480
Speaker 4: big corporate company comes in and it looks really pretty

827
00:38:20,840 --> 00:38:23,480
Speaker 4: and the other stores are good, You're like, yeah, this looks.

828
00:38:23,320 --> 00:38:23,920
Speaker 5: Great, you know.

829
00:38:23,960 --> 00:38:26,400
Speaker 4: But unless you get that local knowledge, which again we

830
00:38:27,000 --> 00:38:30,040
Speaker 4: have been burned on that before, you don't really understand

831
00:38:30,120 --> 00:38:32,959
Speaker 4: the neighborhood and how it functions, you know, and how

832
00:38:33,680 --> 00:38:37,319
Speaker 4: women really use it. So it's it's an important but

833
00:38:37,520 --> 00:38:40,279
Speaker 4: small and often overlook nuance when you're when you're looking

834
00:38:40,280 --> 00:38:42,840
Speaker 4: at real estate to make sure that you really understand,

835
00:38:42,840 --> 00:38:43,879
Speaker 4: like where do people park?

836
00:38:43,960 --> 00:38:46,279
Speaker 5: Is parking a total pain? You know? Is it? Is

837
00:38:46,280 --> 00:38:48,319
Speaker 5: it easy to park? Is the is the location easy

838
00:38:48,360 --> 00:38:49,319
Speaker 5: to access if you're in.

839
00:38:49,280 --> 00:38:52,080
Speaker 4: A mall, which you know malls are such a dying

840
00:38:52,400 --> 00:38:55,760
Speaker 4: dinosaur anyways as well, But you know all those factors,

841
00:38:55,800 --> 00:38:58,359
Speaker 4: like we opened in Fashion Island mall in Orange County.

842
00:38:58,320 --> 00:38:59,919
Speaker 1: So I've been to that one.

843
00:39:00,080 --> 00:39:02,960
Speaker 4: Yeah, but you know then that we are strategically placed

844
00:39:03,000 --> 00:39:03,879
Speaker 4: near the parking lot.

845
00:39:04,000 --> 00:39:05,799
Speaker 5: You know, it would not make sense for us to

846
00:39:05,800 --> 00:39:07,160
Speaker 5: be like deep in the mall.

847
00:39:07,600 --> 00:39:09,880
Speaker 4: For like you if you're like, oh, I'm popping in,

848
00:39:10,000 --> 00:39:11,600
Speaker 4: I have to go over to Fashion Island, which is

849
00:39:11,640 --> 00:39:14,720
Speaker 4: already could be a pain, which how is how busy

850
00:39:14,760 --> 00:39:17,399
Speaker 4: that place is, you know, but like at least we're

851
00:39:17,440 --> 00:39:19,400
Speaker 4: at the very tip, you know, we're near the Barnes

852
00:39:19,440 --> 00:39:21,160
Speaker 4: and Noble. I don't know if that's still there where

853
00:39:21,200 --> 00:39:23,120
Speaker 4: you're like, oh, I can just park and run into

854
00:39:23,160 --> 00:39:25,600
Speaker 4: dry Bar, you know, and there's an old sail right there,

855
00:39:25,600 --> 00:39:27,680
Speaker 4: and there's a whole foods and you know. So all

856
00:39:27,719 --> 00:39:30,359
Speaker 4: of that was very strategic and how we always thought

857
00:39:30,400 --> 00:39:33,400
Speaker 4: about our locations making it as easy as possible for

858
00:39:33,480 --> 00:39:35,480
Speaker 4: women to access us, you know, and then for her

859
00:39:35,520 --> 00:39:37,240
Speaker 4: to be able to do two or three other things.

860
00:39:37,520 --> 00:39:40,239
Speaker 4: So dry Bar seamlessly fits into her day, which you

861
00:39:40,239 --> 00:39:42,880
Speaker 4: know is similar thinking for Squeeze and you know, in

862
00:39:42,960 --> 00:39:45,359
Speaker 4: any location, I mean any kind of business that we open,

863
00:39:45,640 --> 00:39:47,719
Speaker 4: And it's tricky like when you're going into like New

864
00:39:47,800 --> 00:39:50,160
Speaker 4: York City because it's obviously a different animal than like

865
00:39:50,200 --> 00:39:53,320
Speaker 4: the suburbs. But even still, are we near a subway?

866
00:39:53,440 --> 00:39:55,440
Speaker 4: Can like a bunch of women walk to us. Are

867
00:39:55,440 --> 00:39:58,320
Speaker 4: we near where they're going for other stuff? And sometimes

868
00:39:58,320 --> 00:40:00,720
Speaker 4: it's like we always said, we didn't we couldn't afford

869
00:40:00,760 --> 00:40:02,719
Speaker 4: to be on Maine and Maine, but we could be

870
00:40:02,760 --> 00:40:05,239
Speaker 4: on the little side street off Main Street, so we

871
00:40:05,239 --> 00:40:07,439
Speaker 4: could afford the rent but still be close enough where

872
00:40:07,440 --> 00:40:08,480
Speaker 4: she can easily pop over.

873
00:40:08,920 --> 00:40:14,000
Speaker 1: What's been the biggest I guess noticeable difference between doing

874
00:40:14,520 --> 00:40:18,160
Speaker 1: Squeeze in the current environment versus Dry Bar, you know,

875
00:40:18,280 --> 00:40:21,680
Speaker 1: ten or twenty years ago, Like what has most markedly

876
00:40:21,840 --> 00:40:22,520
Speaker 1: changed for you?

877
00:40:23,239 --> 00:40:26,200
Speaker 4: I think the biggest thing is like is costs and

878
00:40:26,320 --> 00:40:29,720
Speaker 4: like getting stuff, you know, for lack of a better word,

879
00:40:29,960 --> 00:40:33,760
Speaker 4: to our stores, you know, real estate deals seem harder.

880
00:40:34,440 --> 00:40:37,440
Speaker 4: The construction prices are so much higher than we were

881
00:40:37,600 --> 00:40:39,160
Speaker 4: than they were when we started Dry Bar.

882
00:40:40,000 --> 00:40:43,000
Speaker 5: Not always, but we could often go into a shopping.

883
00:40:42,600 --> 00:40:45,800
Speaker 4: Center that had a hair full service hair salon because

884
00:40:46,000 --> 00:40:49,000
Speaker 4: we would explain to them, listen, we're coming in and

885
00:40:49,040 --> 00:40:50,680
Speaker 4: we're not going to take your lunch. Like, we're not

886
00:40:50,760 --> 00:40:52,920
Speaker 4: doing cotton color, We're just doing blowouts. And if you're

887
00:40:52,960 --> 00:40:55,959
Speaker 4: really smart, you'll leverage us, you know, and we'll send

888
00:40:55,960 --> 00:40:57,560
Speaker 4: you clients, and they'll send us clients.

889
00:40:57,600 --> 00:40:59,759
Speaker 5: You know, And a lot did and really got it.

890
00:41:00,040 --> 00:41:03,280
Speaker 5: But you know, some landlords and some you know, tenants,

891
00:41:03,280 --> 00:41:04,280
Speaker 5: if there was already a hair.

892
00:41:04,160 --> 00:41:07,800
Speaker 4: Salon, which there usually was in most shopping centers, could

893
00:41:07,840 --> 00:41:08,719
Speaker 4: easily block.

894
00:41:08,600 --> 00:41:10,879
Speaker 5: Us from coming and the same. You know, it's true

895
00:41:10,920 --> 00:41:11,440
Speaker 5: of Squeeze.

896
00:41:11,440 --> 00:41:14,480
Speaker 4: There's a lot of massage concepts in a lot of places,

897
00:41:14,520 --> 00:41:17,920
Speaker 4: albeit some of them aren't great, you know, but they're there,

898
00:41:18,040 --> 00:41:20,399
Speaker 4: so that impedes us from coming there as well.

899
00:41:20,480 --> 00:41:22,120
Speaker 5: So that is, you know, just a.

900
00:41:22,160 --> 00:41:24,520
Speaker 4: Challenge that you know, anybody deals with you or if

901
00:41:24,520 --> 00:41:27,920
Speaker 4: you're going into any kind of business that already exists.

902
00:41:27,560 --> 00:41:30,520
Speaker 5: Which it did for Drybar as well as Squeeze.

903
00:41:30,800 --> 00:41:32,120
Speaker 4: But you know, so you just have to get a

904
00:41:32,160 --> 00:41:33,719
Speaker 4: little more creative with where you're going.

905
00:41:33,840 --> 00:41:35,920
Speaker 3: I was gonna wrap it right there, but just real quickly.

906
00:41:36,120 --> 00:41:39,600
Speaker 3: So do tenants of shopping centers and malls do they

907
00:41:39,640 --> 00:41:43,960
Speaker 3: have stipulations frequently about the types of competitors or adjacent

908
00:41:44,040 --> 00:41:45,560
Speaker 3: companies that can move in.

909
00:41:45,920 --> 00:41:47,760
Speaker 2: I didn't. I'd never thought about that before.

910
00:41:48,080 --> 00:41:49,080
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, they totally do.

911
00:41:49,160 --> 00:41:52,720
Speaker 4: I mean, and it definitely is not like one rule

912
00:41:52,760 --> 00:41:56,480
Speaker 4: that it changes in my experience, it changes from center

913
00:41:56,560 --> 00:41:59,840
Speaker 4: to center. And but yeah, I mean, especially when you

914
00:41:59,840 --> 00:42:02,600
Speaker 4: think of like less probably in a mall, but and

915
00:42:03,000 --> 00:42:04,680
Speaker 4: I don't have a ton of experience with malls, but

916
00:42:04,800 --> 00:42:08,640
Speaker 4: in like a strip center shopping mall, they will have

917
00:42:08,840 --> 00:42:10,880
Speaker 4: in there A lot of those tenants in their leases

918
00:42:10,960 --> 00:42:13,680
Speaker 4: will have something that says you cannot another air slon

919
00:42:13,719 --> 00:42:14,680
Speaker 4: cannot open in here.

920
00:42:15,120 --> 00:42:15,880
Speaker 2: Makes a lot of sense.

921
00:42:16,120 --> 00:42:18,640
Speaker 3: Ellie Webb, the author of the new book The Messy

922
00:42:18,680 --> 00:42:21,600
Speaker 3: Truth How I sold my business for millions but almost

923
00:42:21,640 --> 00:42:24,160
Speaker 3: lost myself. Thank you so much for coming on, odd Lass.

924
00:42:24,239 --> 00:42:24,719
Speaker 2: That was great.

925
00:42:24,880 --> 00:42:26,760
Speaker 4: Thanks for having me. It was a fun conversation. I'ven't

926
00:42:26,760 --> 00:42:28,360
Speaker 4: talked about this stuff in a long time.

927
00:42:28,280 --> 00:42:29,239
Speaker 2: So awesome. Thank you.

928
00:42:30,400 --> 00:42:31,400
Speaker 1: Yeah, that was great.

929
00:42:43,719 --> 00:42:44,920
Speaker 2: That was really fun.

930
00:42:45,239 --> 00:42:48,640
Speaker 3: Tracy, First of all, I mean, it's obvious when she

931
00:42:48,680 --> 00:42:50,400
Speaker 3: says it, but like for example, at the end, it

932
00:42:50,440 --> 00:42:53,279
Speaker 3: hadn't occurred to me that such things would be in

933
00:42:53,320 --> 00:42:55,960
Speaker 3: a leases. That Okay, if you're going to open up

934
00:42:55,960 --> 00:42:59,200
Speaker 3: a nail salon or a sneaker snore, a sneaker.

935
00:42:58,800 --> 00:43:03,320
Speaker 1: Store, or a hit sneaker stores, sneaker snores, sneaker snores.

936
00:43:03,400 --> 00:43:06,000
Speaker 3: Or a karate studio or whatever you see in strip malls,

937
00:43:06,040 --> 00:43:08,239
Speaker 3: that you have some stipulation like you can't just open

938
00:43:08,280 --> 00:43:09,080
Speaker 3: another one next door.

939
00:43:09,080 --> 00:43:10,160
Speaker 2: But it makes a ton of sense.

940
00:43:10,239 --> 00:43:12,719
Speaker 1: Yeah, it does. I think also for shopping malls, I

941
00:43:12,719 --> 00:43:15,600
Speaker 1: think like the owner of the shopping mall wants differentiation

942
00:43:15,719 --> 00:43:17,880
Speaker 1: and like variety, right, so they try to build that

943
00:43:18,000 --> 00:43:21,400
Speaker 1: into a lot of their leases. No, that was really interesting.

944
00:43:21,719 --> 00:43:24,839
Speaker 1: So it seems like Ali really kind of hit a

945
00:43:24,920 --> 00:43:28,520
Speaker 1: sweet spot at that time period, where like she was

946
00:43:28,680 --> 00:43:33,360
Speaker 1: offering a service rather than a good, and at a

947
00:43:33,400 --> 00:43:37,280
Speaker 1: time when you know, brick and mortar retail was experiencing

948
00:43:37,440 --> 00:43:41,080
Speaker 1: a downturn. We had that episode recently on dead malls

949
00:43:41,160 --> 00:43:44,040
Speaker 1: and commercial real estate and in two thousand and nine. Yeah,

950
00:43:44,080 --> 00:43:47,080
Speaker 1: that was really the era of the dead mall in

951
00:43:47,160 --> 00:43:50,680
Speaker 1: competition from online shopping and things like that. So she

952
00:43:50,800 --> 00:43:53,920
Speaker 1: was able to identify something that people would still pay

953
00:43:54,000 --> 00:43:56,920
Speaker 1: for and have to go to to receive in person.

954
00:43:57,760 --> 00:44:00,400
Speaker 1: And then secondly, I think one of the things that

955
00:44:00,440 --> 00:44:02,799
Speaker 1: I found really interesting was the idea of having that

956
00:44:02,880 --> 00:44:08,400
Speaker 1: flexible workforce. Yeah, and you know, offering stylists the chance

957
00:44:08,480 --> 00:44:12,400
Speaker 1: to come in for two or four hours versus a

958
00:44:12,440 --> 00:44:15,240
Speaker 1: full time position. So it feels like she also tapped

959
00:44:15,239 --> 00:44:18,480
Speaker 1: into that sort of upswell of I guess gig work,

960
00:44:18,560 --> 00:44:21,240
Speaker 1: which was also just beginning at that time.

961
00:44:21,600 --> 00:44:21,799
Speaker 2: Yeah.

962
00:44:21,880 --> 00:44:24,400
Speaker 3: No, Like I said, you know, it really felt like

963
00:44:24,440 --> 00:44:28,279
Speaker 3: they sort of nailed a huge aspect of what I

964
00:44:28,320 --> 00:44:30,480
Speaker 3: think of is that even though I have never been

965
00:44:30,480 --> 00:44:33,120
Speaker 3: in a dry bar, my intuition sense of it. I

966
00:44:33,200 --> 00:44:35,680
Speaker 3: guess it's strong enough that I associated one of those

967
00:44:35,719 --> 00:44:40,560
Speaker 3: like defining brands of the twenty tens economy. So many

968
00:44:40,560 --> 00:44:43,720
Speaker 3: interesting details. I mean, just in you mentioned that aspect

969
00:44:43,760 --> 00:44:46,800
Speaker 3: of the labor force, and I feel like what Ali

970
00:44:46,960 --> 00:44:50,280
Speaker 3: was dealing with early on, it's probably so many people

971
00:44:50,280 --> 00:44:52,400
Speaker 3: are dealing with in the last few years ago. Now,

972
00:44:52,440 --> 00:44:55,000
Speaker 3: how do you hire people that are going to maintain

973
00:44:55,600 --> 00:44:59,320
Speaker 3: the quality that you expect for your outward facing quality,

974
00:44:59,560 --> 00:45:01,880
Speaker 3: that are going to stick around, that are going to

975
00:45:01,960 --> 00:45:04,560
Speaker 3: maintain the brand, Like it felt like she had to

976
00:45:04,600 --> 00:45:06,160
Speaker 3: deal with a lot of those things, like from the

977
00:45:06,200 --> 00:45:09,000
Speaker 3: beginning in a way in which many business operators probably

978
00:45:09,000 --> 00:45:12,200
Speaker 3: never really struggled with that up until maybe year twenty

979
00:45:12,239 --> 00:45:13,359
Speaker 3: twenty or twenty twenty one.

980
00:45:13,520 --> 00:45:15,920
Speaker 1: Absolutely, and it'll be interesting to see her sort of

981
00:45:15,920 --> 00:45:18,680
Speaker 1: replicate it in the massage market as well, like where

982
00:45:18,719 --> 00:45:20,480
Speaker 1: do you get all the excuses from?

983
00:45:21,040 --> 00:45:23,479
Speaker 3: I also really like that point, and maybe we should

984
00:45:23,520 --> 00:45:25,759
Speaker 3: do an episode on this at some point, like the

985
00:45:25,920 --> 00:45:28,960
Speaker 3: art of location selections for a brand, you know, and

986
00:45:29,000 --> 00:45:31,120
Speaker 3: the idea of like yeah, when she said it makes

987
00:45:31,120 --> 00:45:32,920
Speaker 3: ton of sense, like if the ideas you're going to

988
00:45:32,960 --> 00:45:36,240
Speaker 3: be a convenient stop for women to get a blowout.

989
00:45:36,400 --> 00:45:38,160
Speaker 3: Then you want to be on the perimeter of the mall,

990
00:45:38,440 --> 00:45:40,080
Speaker 3: not the inside of the mall. If you're at the

991
00:45:40,080 --> 00:45:42,680
Speaker 3: inside of the mall, it obviates the whole thing. But

992
00:45:43,000 --> 00:45:44,960
Speaker 3: you know, in the idea of like proximity to parking,

993
00:45:45,040 --> 00:45:48,520
Speaker 3: I think our friend who've had on, Patrick McKenzie, has

994
00:45:48,560 --> 00:45:50,359
Speaker 3: talked about this a couple of times with banks that

995
00:45:50,440 --> 00:45:53,200
Speaker 3: like that is a big thing in terms of you

996
00:45:53,239 --> 00:45:55,920
Speaker 3: can have two locations that look very similar, but if

997
00:45:55,920 --> 00:45:58,080
Speaker 3: one is not on the right corner and the right way,

998
00:45:58,400 --> 00:46:00,399
Speaker 3: it's going to fail. And so maybe we sh do an

999
00:46:00,400 --> 00:46:02,840
Speaker 3: episode on how it would talk to it like a

1000
00:46:02,880 --> 00:46:06,080
Speaker 3: commercial real estate broker about finding good locations.

1001
00:46:06,280 --> 00:46:08,160
Speaker 1: Oh, that would be so interesting. Yeah, and then we

1002
00:46:08,160 --> 00:46:10,319
Speaker 1: should go to strip malls and like observe in real

1003
00:46:10,320 --> 00:46:13,040
Speaker 1: life totally. I would do that. Okay, shall we leave

1004
00:46:13,080 --> 00:46:13,359
Speaker 1: it there.

1005
00:46:13,440 --> 00:46:14,200
Speaker 2: Let's leave it there.

1006
00:46:14,520 --> 00:46:17,320
Speaker 1: This has been another episode of the Odd Thoughts podcast.

1007
00:46:17,400 --> 00:46:20,680
Speaker 1: I'm Tracy Alloway. You can follow me at Tracy Alloway.

1008
00:46:20,480 --> 00:46:23,360
Speaker 3: And I'm Joe Wisenthal. You can follow me at The Stalwart.

1009
00:46:23,600 --> 00:46:27,000
Speaker 3: Follow our guest Ellieweb on Instagram. She's at Ellie Webb

1010
00:46:27,080 --> 00:46:29,440
Speaker 3: and check out her new book, The Messy Truth How

1011
00:46:29,440 --> 00:46:32,400
Speaker 3: He sold My business for millions but almost lost myself.

1012
00:46:32,960 --> 00:46:37,120
Speaker 3: Follow our producers Carmen Rodriguez at Carmen Arman, Dashel Bennett

1013
00:46:37,120 --> 00:46:40,799
Speaker 3: at Dashbot and Calebrooks at Cale Brooks. And thank you

1014
00:46:40,840 --> 00:46:44,120
Speaker 3: to our producer Moses Onam. And for more Oddlots content,

1015
00:46:44,160 --> 00:46:46,440
Speaker 3: go to Bloomberg dot com slash odd locks, where we

1016
00:46:46,480 --> 00:46:49,160
Speaker 3: have a blog, transcripts in the newsletter, and you can

1017
00:46:49,239 --> 00:46:51,680
Speaker 3: chat about this topic twenty four to seven with fellow

1018
00:46:51,719 --> 00:46:55,400
Speaker 3: listeners in the discord Discord dot gg slash oddlins.

1019
00:46:55,600 --> 00:46:58,319
Speaker 1: And if you're a Bloomberg subscriber, you can listen to

1020
00:46:58,320 --> 00:47:02,279
Speaker 1: odd Thoughts ad free by connecting on Apple Podcasts. Thanks

1021
00:47:02,320 --> 00:47:02,760
Speaker 1: for listening