0:00

Makeup artist and influencer Desie

0:02

Perkins has a little bit of a golden

0:04

touch. In twenty sixteen, she

0:06

had a collab with a major sunglass company.

0:09

So they offered me this deal and they said, it'll

0:11

just be a quick, little three month collaboration.

0:13

You'll have about four sunglasses.

0:16

It'll be great.

0:17

While this was originally intended to be a collaboration

0:20

between Desi and the sunglass company, Desi

0:23

was way more hands on.

0:24

I showed up to the first meeting with them and

0:26

they laid out a bunch of sunglasses on the table. They

0:28

said, is there anything that you like here that you can pick?

0:30

We can put your name on it, market it whatever.

0:33

I said, I would really love to design

0:35

my own sunglasses if that's a possibility.

0:38

So when it came time to renegotiate their contract,

0:41

Desi wanted to be recognized as more than a collaborator.

0:44

She was designing, marketing,

0:46

and successfully selling. She asked

0:49

for a contract that reflected her work.

0:51

We had met with the company to try and

0:53

renegotiate a more fair contract,

0:56

and the CEO at the time, he

0:58

was there running the meeting, and he

1:00

really downplayed my contribution

1:03

to the brand and as

1:06

we were sitting there trying to negotiate, he

1:08

looked over at me and said, that's

1:11

a lot of money for a little girl.

1:13

I was actually in disbelief.

1:15

For me, that was something that there was really no coming

1:18

back from. And after

1:20

that, we all looked at each other and

1:22

we all walked out.

1:28

Welcome to The Unshakables from

1:30

Chase for Business and Ruby Studio from

1:33

iHeartMedia. I'm

1:35

Ben Walter, CEO of Chase for Business.

1:37

And I'm Tanya Neibo, a lawyer and consultant

1:39

for business owners.

1:41

Well it's hard to believe we're here, but this

1:43

is the final episode of season one of

1:45

The Unshakables. For the past

1:47

few months, we've been sharing the daring moments

1:50

of small business owners facing their crisis

1:52

points and telling the stories of

1:54

how they got through it. We're

1:56

going to close out this season with the story of an

1:58

influencer turned entrepreneur who

2:00

was willing to take the biggest risk of them all on

2:03

herself.

2:04

Hey Tanya, Hey Ben, I'm

2:07

so sad the season is over, but I am pretty

2:09

excited to hear this next story. I

2:12

loved Desie's design. They're so stylish

2:14

and they're unique, and I just I love

2:16

them.

2:17

Well, this one's a doozy.

2:18

Well, I'm here for the doozy. Let's

2:20

get to it.

2:22

On today's episode, Desi Iwear

2:25

from Los Angeles, California.

2:30

You just heard from Desie Perkins, who

2:32

today is a designer, makeup artist,

2:35

and beauty influencer, but years

2:37

before that, she was a cocktail server

2:39

and her husband, Stephen Perkins, was a freelance

2:42

photographer.

2:43

I was a cocktail server.

2:44

I had a toxic work environment, really

2:47

hated my job, and Stephen

2:50

came in to visit me one day and I just started

2:52

crying because I was so stressed

2:54

and my manager, you know, was horrible.

2:57

So I just looked at it and I was like, look, you don't have to work

2:59

here. We're going to figure this out, Like literally,

3:02

you should quit tonight and we are going

3:04

to go from there.

3:06

Well, Desi was figuring out her next step. Stephen

3:09

was working as a club photographer, and in

3:11

October of twenty twelve, Stephen

3:13

asked Desi to help him with a costume for a Halloween

3:16

party he had to shoot. Desi

3:18

had always loved makeup, so

3:20

she helped Stephen with his before he went to work

3:22

for the night.

3:24

Because I was a painter and artist.

3:25

I watched this YouTube video and it was telling

3:28

me how to do special effects

3:30

makeup, and I said, listen, I've never done it before,

3:32

but let's try it. And I did

3:34

this really cool special effects goal.

3:37

It was really awesome.

3:39

At the party, everyone asked who had done his

3:41

makeup, and he said that Desi had.

3:44

He went out that night and all of these people asked

3:46

if he had got his makeup professionally done. I

3:49

was with him and he said no, my girlfriend did it. And they

3:51

said, do you do this for a living? And I said yes. I

3:53

had no kid, no experience. I

3:55

just said, yes, I do. And then I

3:57

started taking appointments for like fifty dollars

4:00

a face out of our apartment.

4:03

I faked it till I made it, let me tell you.

4:06

Soon Desi was getting off her gigs doing makeup

4:08

for TV. Even though she had no

4:10

experience, she still said yes. To

4:13

help drum up even more business, Stephen

4:15

recommended she joined a new social media site

4:17

you may have heard of it.

4:18

Instagram was brand new at the time, and convinced

4:21

her to download Instagram. She

4:23

used it as kind of like a portfolio, as a creative

4:26

escape and it took

4:28

off. You know, someone reposted

4:30

one of her photos and it got ten

4:32

thousand followers overnight.

4:35

I remember sitting in our apartment

4:37

and my phone was on the couch and

4:39

it.

4:39

Just started going through.

4:41

Like notifications were going

4:43

off like crazy.

4:50

Someone commented on one of her Instagram photos

4:52

that she should launch a YouTube channel.

4:55

We had no idea what we were doing with YouTube either, but

4:57

Stephen had his camera that he did club photography

4:59

with, so we took and we got a couple of lights

5:01

and we set it up and I just went

5:04

and started filming.

5:06

Stephen was her de facto manager. He

5:08

helped film all of her content and after

5:10

a year he left his job to focus on Desi

5:12

and her brand full time.

5:14

And it was just makeup tutorials and it kind

5:17

of just took off. She had a really good personality.

5:19

People loved her story and

5:21

just like hanging out getting ready with her next

5:23

thing.

5:24

You know, I'm doing this for a few

5:26

months and I get an

5:28

email from a company and they say, we would

5:30

love to.

5:31

Send you some free product.

5:34

And I was shocked.

5:35

It wasn't a thing yet to get paid to

5:38

post videos or pictures

5:40

or promote product. All of that we were learning

5:42

and the brands were learning at the same time, so

5:44

it was really tricky.

5:45

It was a wild West of influencing

5:47

because no one knew what was going on

5:50

or how it could be. Like when Desi got that first offer,

5:52

it clicked in my business mind, like, wait a minute,

5:54

there's an opportunity here. If they want to send you something,

5:57

they might have money behind it. And

5:59

that's where like we kind of went back in and we started

6:01

negotiating these deals.

6:03

After a few years, Desi's YouTube

6:05

channel had a million followers. A

6:08

big following brought bigger opportunities.

6:11

In twenty sixteen, a sunglasses

6:13

company reached out in hopes of collaborating

6:15

with Desi. She and Stephen took the meeting.

6:17

This sunglass company approached me and they said, hey,

6:19

we've done collabse with a few

6:22

other celebrities and we would love

6:24

to do something with you.

6:25

So they offered me this deal.

6:26

It was a one page, typed

6:28

out paper napkin contract deal, and they

6:30

said, it'll just be a quick, little three month

6:33

collaboration. You'll have

6:35

about four sunglasses, it'll be

6:37

great. I showed up to the first meeting with

6:39

them and they laid out a bunch of sunglasses

6:42

on the table. They said, is there anything that you like here

6:44

that you can pick? We can put your name on it, market

6:46

it whatever. I said, I

6:48

would really love to design my own sunglasses

6:50

if that's a possibility.

6:52

The company agreed, and Steven and Desi

6:54

dove in.

6:55

Desi scoured her archives of sunglasses

6:58

that she's had. We've gone online and we

7:00

started pulling just different inspirations

7:03

into photoshop and Desie and I were

7:05

literally sitting together at night dissecting

7:08

sunglasses, putting them together in Photoshop

7:10

and making them into the exact frame that

7:13

she wanted to develop.

7:15

Finally, the collab launched with four

7:17

different styles. Desi promoted

7:19

the glasses on her social media.

7:21

I remember the day before launch.

7:22

I was super anxious and I said, are we sure

7:25

everything's okay? And they said, we've

7:27

done this before, Everything's going to be perfectly

7:29

fine. The day of launch happens

7:32

and the traffic for launch was

7:34

so massive that their whole

7:36

website shut down. Wow,

7:39

everybody was panicking. We were freaking out.

7:41

All the sunglasses sold out, and

7:44

I was shocked. I had no idea that I

7:46

even had that selling power. It

7:48

was an incredible feeling.

7:50

The line was originally supposed to be a limited

7:52

release, but it was a home

7:55

run.

7:55

Everyone loved the glasses and then it

7:58

instantly became a call from them like, hey, we

8:00

need to keep going.

8:02

Desi and Stephens signed on for another

8:04

year. While they were hard at work designing

8:06

their next round of styles, the sunglass

8:08

company grew and had even been acquired by

8:10

a private equity firm.

8:12

We'd go in their meetings with them and they'd show us

8:14

drafts of Desi trending and totally

8:16

attribute a lot of the success of

8:19

the company back to Desi. The

8:21

sunglasses she created became the number two selling

8:23

skew in nordstromp So after

8:25

a while we decided, hey, we

8:28

want to get a little bit more stake in

8:30

this game.

8:31

At this point, the brand got so big,

8:34

and once they got acquired, we

8:36

went into a meeting to really renegotiate

8:39

and see what we could do to make

8:41

it more fair.

8:44

They came to the next meeting prepared for the discussion

8:46

of a new contract and they made their ask.

8:49

The CEO at the time, he was

8:51

there running the meeting, and he really

8:54

downplayed my contribution to

8:56

the brand, and really

8:58

through the whole meeting kind of of devaluing

9:01

me as a business partner.

9:04

And as we were sitting there trying.

9:06

To negotiate, he looked over

9:08

at me and said, that's a lot

9:10

of money for a little girl.

9:12

Wow.

9:13

The room fell silent on both sides.

9:16

I was actually in disbelief.

9:18

The only thing I remember doing is turning around

9:20

like, I know you're not talking to me.

9:22

I couldn't believe it.

9:27

Hold on, Ben, what that's

9:29

a lot of money for a little girl. The

9:32

audacity of that guy to

9:34

say that?

9:34

What an ass?

9:35

Yeah?

9:36

Really, Well, as awful as that was, I

9:38

think you're gonna love what happened next in the meeting

9:40

Tanya, in.

9:41

The moment where I was actually shocked,

9:44

couldn't get a word out, one of

9:46

my agents stood up and

9:49

looked at him and said, well,

9:51

this little girl has made your company

9:54

a lot of money.

9:55

Oh so he came back with the little girl line. I mean, that's

9:57

pretty fantastic he did.

9:59

He said, this little girl has made you X

10:01

amount of dollars. It is the reason

10:03

why we were.

10:05

He dropped every fact that we had done for that company

10:08

and every number that we had sold for them.

10:10

That's really powerful.

10:11

After that, we all looked at each other and

10:13

knew it was time to go, and we all walked

10:16

out. That meeting was a turning point for

10:18

me, and I think for a lot of women

10:20

in business, moments like this happen all

10:22

the time. I knew that it was time

10:24

for us to start our new chapter, and it was a

10:27

scary decision because this is

10:29

at this time my only collaboration

10:31

that I've ever done, my only form of steady

10:33

income. It was a huge passion

10:36

project that I was in love with

10:38

doing. I was so sad to walk away from, but I

10:40

just knew that it was the right thing for me.

10:42

After that disastrous meeting, Desi

10:45

and Stephen decided they'd start their own eyewear

10:47

company. This was a huge moment, taking

10:49

a social media brand to a physical product,

10:52

but they'd get to own one hundred percent of the company

10:55

and all the profit. It also meant they

10:57

were now on the hook for everything, funding,

10:59

source, product, you name it.

11:01

It all fell on Desi and Stephen.

11:04

Did we know the first step to

11:06

do that? Absolutely not.

11:07

We had learned all the creative side of the sunglass

11:10

business, but not so much the other

11:12

side. So it was definitely going to be a

11:15

journey into the unknown for us.

11:17

While they knew how to design and market eywear, they

11:19

still had no idea how to manufacture

11:21

it. So they brought on two consultants.

11:24

Through that year.

11:25

I had them teach me the ropes, teach

11:27

me manufacturing, teach me logistics,

11:29

teach me freight forward, and teach me

11:31

all the behind the scenes stuff.

11:33

By twenty nineteen, they were ready to

11:35

design their first line of original eyewear.

11:38

That brand would be called desi Ewear, not

11:40

dies either way Desi spells it, but

11:42

Desi with a Z.

11:44

I named the brand after myself.

11:46

I felt like there was a lot of power in that, and

11:49

I wanted it to be all

11:52

of me. I think people told me, yeah,

11:54

maybe you shouldn't name it your name, and so I

11:56

said, all right, fine, I'll change it to a DEZ

11:58

instead of dees.

12:00

Okay.

12:01

They were like, you're not being slick. It sounds the same, and

12:03

I'm like, it felt right, So that's what I named

12:05

it.

12:06

Desi's digital brand had also grown significantly

12:09

in that time. She now had four

12:11

million followers watching her every

12:13

move, and if they wanted to launch, they

12:16

had to go all in and launch big.

12:18

We didn't have room for air like

12:20

most businesses do.

12:21

If we were to launch something in it was a complete flop,

12:24

like that's all going to fall back on us. And

12:26

knowing the numbers that we did with the sunglass

12:28

company, we knew what the volume

12:30

would be. So it made our margin

12:32

for air extremely small because we had

12:35

to launch at scale. Was obviously a

12:37

huge risk for us because you could start

12:39

a business right for close to nothing

12:41

and grow it over time.

12:43

But we didn't have that luxury.

12:44

But they did have the luxury of doing everything

12:47

exactly the way they wanted to.

12:49

They had to be certain their line of sunglasses

12:52

was perfect from the beginning.

12:54

The whole point of DESII Weear is like luxury

12:56

product and an affordable price. Desi

12:59

will never put anything out that she truly

13:01

would not use or wear herself.

13:04

So now a huge challenge is how

13:06

are we producing the quality that we

13:08

want for the price point

13:10

that we're going to sell it at as a public

13:12

figure and having a significant

13:15

following.

13:15

Like that, everything is under the microscope, and that's.

13:17

Why you know, when it came to product quality, everything

13:20

was meticulously designed.

13:22

After months of development, they were

13:24

ready to roll out the sunglasses. They

13:27

targeted their launch date for drum roll

13:29

please March of twenty twenty.

13:32

This was a really stressful time for us because

13:35

we were trying to sell sunglasses when nobody

13:37

was allowed to go outside, which I feel like

13:40

was really stressful for me. I

13:44

was sitting there. We had put everything

13:46

into this brand, and we felt

13:48

like, not only was it a bad

13:51

time, I thought to myself, it's not

13:53

an appropriate time.

13:55

They delayed the launch three months, but

13:57

every day they waited was just another day

13:59

the product was sitting unused,

14:02

wasting money in a warehouse.

14:04

So now this is a situation we're in and we're

14:07

just sitting on our hands and just like what

14:09

are we going to do? Like, shit, what did we

14:11

just get into? How are we going to pivot from

14:13

this? And then just decided like, okay,

14:15

we need to at least put something out there.

14:17

We can't sit on this. We need to launch it.

14:19

Let's just go. Let's see what happens.

14:21

They finally chose a launch date. Now

14:24

all that was left to do was announce.

14:26

They chose one day in July twenty twenty

14:28

for the announcement, and Desi started

14:31

this business the same way she launched her brand.

14:33

With a social media.

14:34

Post, Dasi had mentioned

14:37

like Okay, I'm coming out with a product. This

14:39

is the Instagram go follow it, completely

14:41

blank Instagram, nothing on it. Within

14:44

the first i think it was twelve hours

14:46

at gained three hundred thousand followers.

14:48

We were just like, oh my god.

14:50

The huge response to Desi's video wasn't

14:53

just from her fans.

14:55

We were getting calls and emails from

14:58

every brand that had worked as a

15:00

wholesaler with the other sunglass company

15:02

because they knew the power and the movement that Desi

15:04

could do with her eyewear. But we

15:07

turned down every single one of those because we wanted

15:09

to launch as a DTOC brand, so we wanted

15:11

to get it to our customers and

15:13

knew that we wanted to hold on to that

15:16

control.

15:17

And with that, it was finally time.

15:19

They launched Desi Eyewear in July of

15:21

twenty twenty.

15:23

It was amazing. It was a huge success.

15:26

I think we were crying. We

15:28

were like in disbelief, and then

15:30

we went straight into panic mode after

15:33

like the first moment of celebration, it

15:35

was like, oh my gosh, we're customer service

15:37

now too. We are handling all

15:40

of the after now. Also it's

15:42

us.

15:43

We ended up selling through you

15:45

know, ninety percent of our inventory

15:48

within the first I think four hours.

15:53

Turns out there was no need to worry

15:55

if anyone would buy the sunglasses. Now,

15:58

the problem was getting their sunglasses to

16:00

the customers. The shipping company

16:02

had picked up all the sunglasses, but

16:04

they never got mailed out, and customers

16:07

took to social media to complain.

16:09

Packages were getting lost for weeks

16:12

and there was nothing that we could do as

16:15

a company, and now we're sold out of product

16:17

and customers are writing in my package

16:19

never got here, and we're just riding them like normal

16:21

customer service and just saying, hey, you know,

16:24

packages delivered personally out of the warehouse,

16:26

it's on its way to you. Come

16:28

to find out that FedEx parked

16:30

our truck behind another truck and

16:32

they never got offloaded at the FedEx's warehouse,

16:35

and it took I would say, probably

16:37

seven days for them to find that truck.

16:40

And we were.

16:41

Responding to now thousands of customers

16:44

that have this trust and DESI

16:46

and the brand that we're going to deliver,

16:48

and our packages are nowhere to be found.

16:52

Steven estimates that twenty percent of that first

16:54

release got lost in shipping. For

16:57

reference, usually only one or two percent

16:59

of shipment, let's get lost. So this was a

17:01

major issue for Desi.

17:02

Iware the problem with a

17:04

brand as an influencer is that

17:08

you look at a bigger brand, there's no one

17:10

really to talk to to yell at except for

17:12

customer service. With us at being

17:14

a personality, there's multiple avenues.

17:16

There's the YouTube comment section, there's Instagram,

17:18

there's Desi's personal pages, there's the brand

17:21

pages. So what happens with

17:23

customer service is it floods to every single

17:25

channel and it becomes very transparent to

17:27

what's going on, and you have to handle that in

17:29

a very careful way.

17:31

I think for me, it's just that I have

17:33

had such a direct closeness to everyone

17:36

that subscribes to me, and so they feel

17:38

the closeness to be able to then tell me when there's

17:40

a problem, and one of the things that

17:43

hurts is that they're disappointed in their

17:45

experience, and it weighed very

17:47

heavy on me.

17:48

So all I could do in that moment is be

17:50

super.

17:50

Upfront and say exactly

17:53

what had happened and apologize

17:55

and rectify the situation.

17:57

We spent literally two weeks of

17:59

just responding to people like, hey,

18:02

you know your package is on the way it's going to get

18:04

to you. Check tracking. That didn't

18:06

work. They respond back in and it's like, where's my

18:08

shit.

18:09

After days of that, Stephen decided

18:11

to take a more personal approach.

18:13

I would go in and I'd be like, Hey, this is Stephen.

18:16

I swear to you. I personally back your

18:18

package. It's on the way, And

18:20

it's funny enough like when we would give that personal

18:23

touch, it would diffuse the situation to

18:25

where now we were able to maintain that

18:28

trust and keep those customers and they

18:30

continually come back and they are purchasing

18:32

every single time something new comes out.

18:34

Well, I mean, you must have been writing emails until

18:37

four o'clock in the morning.

18:38

But yeah, I was just going to say that, Yeah, it was exhausting.

18:41

Definitely learn some lessons from that. Built

18:43

a team around customer service,

18:45

was able to train them and let them

18:47

know the tone of the company, the voice

18:49

of the brand.

18:51

So they'd figured out the shipping catastrophe,

18:53

and finally the brand started to really

18:55

cruise. They released more styles.

18:58

The company was by all accounts of success.

19:01

They had made their initial investment back and then

19:03

some desi iware is obviously a

19:05

huge success. It sounds like every time you come out with

19:07

a new set of sunglasses, people snap them up.

19:10

And then you decided to launch another company, right

19:12

yeah, is for punishment

19:15

because I'm crazy.

19:16

This was This was also after having one

19:18

baby, so we have a one year old. We launched

19:21

this company, Desi Eyewear, and then

19:23

we decide that we're going to do skincare

19:25

as well.

19:26

They reinvested the profits from Desi Iware

19:28

into the skincare line and just a

19:30

few months after Desi Eyware launched,

19:32

Desi Skin was born. Three

19:35

years later, both brands are still going

19:37

strong, and Desie and Stephen have worked hard

19:39

to find the right balance of working together

19:42

as a couple.

19:43

When we first started working

19:45

together, there was arguments,

19:47

there was fights. It was like things weren't,

19:50

you know, working out, And I think the problem

19:52

was we needed to find our proper

19:55

positions, our roles right like. So

19:57

in the beginning, Stephen was very much

19:59

a content cre her husband, and he hated that.

20:01

I think like, deep down, you know, I'd be like, can

20:03

you take my picture? He hated it. We would argue

20:06

it was not it.

20:07

But once we started the businesses, I

20:09

think that's where he really shined because of a lot

20:11

of his background was in

20:13

these kinds of tasks and websites

20:15

and business management, and he started

20:18

thriving. And then I feel like for me,

20:21

that is not my place of expertise.

20:24

Mine is the creative, the designing, the marketing,

20:26

all of these things. And so we were both

20:28

able to find our passions within building these

20:31

companies. And I think that's what all of a sudden

20:33

made us okay, working together.

20:35

You found your swim lanes, yes, and that's.

20:38

What key was finding your swim lanes.

20:40

And now it's easy. It just like

20:42

makes sense. I trust him. There's not going to be

20:45

somebody else who cares about it more than him,

20:47

you know, and vice versa.

20:48

There used to be a rule, no business before coffee

20:51

and after the kids are asleep.

20:52

No, there is that rule for me. After

20:55

dinner. No, we do not talk about work.

20:57

I said, there has to be a line here because

20:59

for so many years.

21:01

We were all work.

21:02

And I said, after six pm, now

21:04

let's not talk about work, let's just be And

21:07

that works out really well.

21:08

So tell me where is the Perkins Empire

21:10

going next.

21:11

I'm tired, you know, I got two kids,

21:13

two companies. I think I'm good, Like

21:16

my mom told me in the past she

21:19

said, you know, you have too many passions,

21:21

And I think now what I see is

21:23

me seeing these passions through, but

21:26

again in a more collaborative sense,

21:29

so things that I've really been wanting to do, but

21:31

in collaborations with companies.

21:33

That already do them.

21:34

And I think that's something that I'm

21:36

excited to see

21:39

today.

21:40

Desi Iwaar sells over twenty different styles

21:42

of sunglasses and can be found on Nordstrom's

21:45

website and in twenty three store locations.

21:47

And yes, Stephen still sometimes

21:50

answers customer service emails.

21:52

I think a lot of my life experiences

21:55

have made me feel.

21:56

A little bit out of control and.

21:59

People sort of dictating what

22:02

my life is going to be like, whether

22:04

that's in personal things or work

22:07

situations. And so for

22:09

me, simultaneously starting

22:11

this company and also starting a family

22:14

that we so badly wanted

22:16

and at the same time really

22:18

made us stronger as a couple, as business

22:21

partners, as parents, and I

22:23

really love knowing that my son can like

22:25

see what we're doing day to day and

22:28

aspire to also want to

22:30

go down his own path and my daughter,

22:33

Now that I've had my daughter, it

22:35

especially means more to me to see how

22:38

you know your mom is kick

22:40

ass and you can be too, and

22:42

it just makes me so excited to see her

22:45

grow up and have the same

22:47

courage.

22:55

Tanya, what did you think?

22:56

I loved that interview?

22:57

I think pretty cute.

22:58

I mean, come on, yes.

23:00

They're very cute.

23:01

And when there's so many lessons that

23:03

came out of that story, so it was exciting.

23:05

I mean, I really liked it.

23:06

It's interesting because it's a different set of lessons

23:09

than we have learned in other interviews, because

23:12

there are very few where they say sort of like we started

23:14

this thing and it just blew up and took off and it was out

23:16

the Usually that part is sort of the hard part,

23:18

is like making your first sale or getting your

23:20

first contract. Whereas for them, because

23:23

she was already a social media presence, like that was not

23:25

even an issue. She was just like they knew

23:27

they could sell, and they were selling, so that a whole different

23:29

set of challenges they did.

23:30

There's so many different ways to get this entrepreneurial

23:33

thing done, and I like that

23:35

this was another example of

23:37

how you could do it differently and instead

23:40

of, you know, like Steven said, kind of grow in

23:42

a way that a more typical small business would

23:44

grow. They had to jump in at scale, and they knew

23:46

it from the beginning.

23:47

I was taken by the conversation about

23:50

what happened when they launched their brand and the fact

23:52

that the packages didn't get delivered because

23:55

we talked about they had to do it at scale, and they had

23:57

to do it at scale quickly, but clearly, Like you

23:59

know, they couldn't deliver the packages themselves.

24:01

They had to rely on logistics companies

24:03

and shipping companies. And I think

24:06

there's a real lesson in there. Just

24:08

because you outsourced something doesn't mean you

24:10

can assume it's taken care of. You can have the best

24:12

contract in the world, tell me about it, but if

24:14

you don't have a way to know that it's done, then it might

24:16

not be done.

24:17

Yeah, that is so true. And I hear this

24:19

a lot. You probably hear it from entrepreneurs

24:21

as well. You know, folks want to get into business

24:23

and they want to kind of set it and forget it. They

24:25

wanted to be passive income that kind of

24:27

thing. And what we learned from this story

24:30

is that they really had to get their hands dirty too.

24:32

They had to jump in when things weren't going the way that

24:34

they were supposed to go. Because you can't

24:36

just say yes, and I paid so and so to get

24:39

this thing done and then just assume that it's going

24:41

to get handled. It's on you to make sure

24:43

that it actually gets done.

24:44

Yeah, it's never really passive, is it.

24:46

It's not.

24:48

Look and I give Stephen and Dezi even a ton

24:50

of credit because they owned it different ways, right.

24:52

So Desi went on her social media

24:55

platforms and owned it and

24:57

Steven got to work customer

24:59

by customer and owned it in a personal

25:01

way. The one other thing they did when

25:03

they had that customer service challenge Tanya

25:05

is they both were willing to say

25:08

I'm sorry, I let you down. We'll

25:10

do better next time. And my experience

25:12

with brands that when they make a mistake, they own

25:14

it is much better than when they try to deflect

25:17

and dissemble. You know, they told the truth,

25:19

they were honest, and they did what they could to make it right,

25:21

and I think people appreciated that direct honesty.

25:24

I think people definitely appreciate that honesty.

25:26

But they use the word transparency,

25:29

and that goes along with kind of the

25:31

relationship that Desi had been building with

25:33

her community from the beginning, and when things

25:35

didn't go as expected, they kind of fell on

25:37

their swords and said, like, listen, we're sorry, this

25:39

is what happened, and we're going to do our best to fix

25:42

it. And I admire companies who

25:44

take that approach and I try to do the same

25:46

in my business as well. Like, mistakes

25:48

happen, things don't go as planned, and it's

25:50

just how you address the issue that matters

25:52

the most.

25:53

Yeah, there's just no such thing as not my problem.

25:55

If you make a mistake, it's your problem. If your partner

25:57

makes a mistake, it's your problem. If someone done

26:00

stream makes a mistake, it's your problem.

26:03

The buck stops with you.

26:05

Can we talk a little bit about this. We've had

26:07

a few husband and wife teams come

26:10

on this show, so it's a common theme that we

26:12

see successful husband wife teams.

26:14

Do you work with a lot of them, What do you find makes

26:17

them successful or less so in

26:19

your experience?

26:21

That's a good question. I

26:23

would say, like what we saw with

26:25

the Desi and Stephens story is the importance

26:27

of playing your position. I

26:29

find that the couples who do the best

26:31

in business are very clear on who

26:34

is doing what in the business and what you

26:36

know, what their responsibilities are, what

26:38

the roles are, and working together just

26:40

like one would if they weren't married. And

26:42

when it comes to my married clients and even

26:44

just folks in a relationship, it's understanding

26:46

what they're supposed to be bringing to the table in the

26:48

business and being consistent in that regard.

26:51

So, Tanya, what percent of your clients would you say

26:53

have more than one business? Is it a lot or is it very

26:55

few?

26:56

I would say that a lot

26:58

of them have had more than

27:00

one business.

27:02

That's interesting, That's what I would say, say, more.

27:05

They have had more than one business.

27:07

But typically there's one business

27:09

that is doing particularly well. But what

27:11

I don't see much of is what we saw

27:13

here, where there are multiple

27:15

ones that are doing extraordinarily well,

27:18

all at the same time. So, Ben, what

27:20

do you think about, you know, running two

27:22

major companies at the same time.

27:25

Well, look, so, first of all, as I reflect

27:28

on it, I think it's two companies, but they're

27:30

sibling companies. They're not even cousins. They're siblings

27:32

because they're both selling physical products

27:35

that are based on her social

27:37

media personality as the core sales

27:40

generator. So these are very closely related

27:42

businesses, which does make it easier.

27:44

That said, we didn't get into the detail,

27:47

but what I would be interested to know over

27:50

time is how they plan to staff up to

27:52

support that, because really, what

27:54

I have found is that, and this is true in the

27:56

corporate world and it's true in the small business

27:58

world, is when you don't wake

28:00

up every day worried about

28:03

something all day long, it's easy

28:05

for bad stuff to happen. And so

28:08

I apply that at work. You know, if there's something

28:10

that is really important to my business, I make

28:12

sure there is someone who is that's their job, not

28:15

part of their job, not some of their job, but all

28:17

of their job. And so I'm sure it's

28:19

working quite well. But I would imagine as they continue

28:21

to scale those brands that they

28:23

will find that they need some infrastructure of their

28:25

own.

28:25

That's such a good point. If it is that important,

28:28

it needs to be someone's sole job.

28:30

Yeah. So look, I have to say, like we've talked

28:32

to a lot of businesses, what I love about their story

28:35

is that they are completely self made,

28:37

and they are self made on their own

28:39

belief in themselves and their capabilities,

28:41

whether that was Desi's ability to design

28:45

or her ability to generate following

28:47

in sales, or his ability to rely

28:49

on the things that he knew and to support the business.

28:52

They totally bet on themselves. They

28:54

took their hits in stride and they stuck with

28:56

it, and they've built something I think is going to last

28:58

and create sort of last sting value for them

29:01

and their family.

29:02

Yeah, it's awesome that they're in Nortrom

29:04

and just continuing to grow, and I look forward

29:06

to seeing what else they do.

29:08

Tania, you and I have pulled a lot of lessons from there,

29:10

but let's go listen to the advice that they had

29:12

for our listeners.

29:14

I think I would tell somebody who

29:16

wants to start a business to sit down and

29:18

try to have conversations with people

29:21

who have started businesses and

29:23

really get all the information

29:25

about what the hard points are.

29:28

What I've heard from a lot of my friends who have started businesses

29:30

is that they were so blindsided by all

29:33

the difficulties and all

29:35

the things that go into starting a business.

29:37

So I think having as many conversations with

29:39

business owners as you can and

29:41

really getting all the information so

29:43

that you can be prepared going into it.

29:46

When we were building these brands, nothing

29:48

ever goes as planned. It's kind of like raising

29:51

kids, and every stage is different.

29:53

You have to adapt to every stage of the

29:55

business. Every time you launch a new product,

29:57

something else is going to happen. But it's really just

30:00

about adapting to what's happening, to

30:02

be able to roll with those punches and act

30:04

quick on your feet. You're not going to get all the advice

30:07

from a book. It's really about adapting

30:09

and like experiencing the business and

30:11

then figuring it out as you go.

30:14

Before we wrap up, I want to take just a

30:16

moment to reflect on this season's eight episodes.

30:19

We call this show the Unshakables because

30:21

it's no easy feat to start a small business.

30:23

The stories we've told show the tenacity and

30:25

guts it takes to build a business out of what

30:28

was once just an idea. There's

30:30

something to take from each and every person's journey,

30:32

whether it's Alex Vega's newfound appreciation

30:34

for contracts, Desi and Stephen perkins

30:37

dedication to customer service, or Doug

30:39

in Jason Barrow's business saving risk

30:41

management strategies. By any measure,

30:44

these are great lessons to learn and fantastic

30:46

triumphs to celebrate. Thanks

30:49

so much for listening to the first season of The Unshakables.

30:52

If you haven't already, please rate and review

30:54

the show. It'll help us reach more listeners.

30:57

I'm Ben Walter and this is The Unshakable

31:00

from Chase for Business and Ruby Studio

31:02

from iHeartMedia.

31:04

The Unshakables is a production of Ruby

31:06

Studio from iHeartMedia and Wheelhouse