Episode Transcript
[00:00:11] Speaker A: Right. Welcome to the Feel weird podcast. We are on series two now and today we have such a sick guest, don't we, Lee?
[00:00:18] Speaker B: We certainly do. We certainly.
[00:00:20] Speaker A: Would you like to roll the red carpet out?
[00:00:22] Speaker B: I certainly will. So in our hot seat today, we have a former Nike front page model, a Hirok's alumni with a 42 minutes ten k, the man who beat ADHD, who's come a long way from a teenager, running events, advertising, filthy vibes, selling cds and running train line ticket refund apps, a ten year sneaker business veteran, the founder and CEO of the soul supplier, George Sullivan.
[00:00:48] Speaker C: Wow.
[00:00:49] Speaker B: Now, we did research, serious research.
[00:00:52] Speaker C: That's the best intro I've ever heard.
[00:00:53] Speaker B: We'll take it. Thank you.
[00:00:54] Speaker C: That's unbelievable.
[00:00:55] Speaker A: Can you tell me what she's hot ones.
[00:00:56] Speaker C: I love that you, you got filthy vibes in there.
[00:00:59] Speaker B: Yeah. It took me a good hour and a half to went through every single TikTok and YouTube video you've done.
[00:01:04] Speaker C: That business I forget about sometimes. Yeah. But that was like, pivotal.
[00:01:08] Speaker B: Well, this is what you mentioned about the first sort of the fail ones that really got you onto where you are at the moment. But we're gonna get through all of that. Certainly. Sam, do you want to kick us off with our first.
[00:01:18] Speaker A: So we've had musician guests on so far. I mean, we always wanted creatives on in general, but. So the musician segment we've had was called Desert Island Discs. I'm sure you've heard it all before. Three albums that you could take with you on a desert island, last three albums you'd ever listened to. But we want to tailor it a little bit different to you.
[00:01:36] Speaker C: Okay.
[00:01:37] Speaker A: So it's a bit of a weird question because really, you're not going to take three pairs of sneakers to a desert island.
[00:01:41] Speaker B: Sure.
[00:01:42] Speaker A: But humorals.
[00:01:43] Speaker B: Humorous for it.
[00:01:44] Speaker A: Three pairs of trainers for the rest of your life. For the rest of your life.
[00:01:47] Speaker C: I like the music question. Well, you can do both if you want. We'll do trainers first. Yeah. Three pairs of trainers I take with me on a desert island. I. I've actually had to answer a similar one before. So first up, we're going to go with a pair of sliders.
[00:02:01] Speaker B: Smart.
[00:02:01] Speaker C: Okay.
[00:02:02] Speaker B: Smart makes sense.
[00:02:02] Speaker C: You have to have sliders when you're on the beach. Yeah.
[00:02:04] Speaker B: Essential.
[00:02:05] Speaker C: Yeah. I'm going to take with me. That's where it gets tricky. A pair of air force ones.
[00:02:11] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:02:11] Speaker A: Classic.
[00:02:12] Speaker C: They're pretty versatile.
[00:02:14] Speaker B: Durable as well.
[00:02:14] Speaker C: They're pretty durable.
And then I'm going to take with me a pair of Vermeeros.
[00:02:21] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:02:21] Speaker C: Oh, because, so you can tell I'm pretty Nike heavy. The Vermeeros are good because they're the most comfortable, comfiest shoe that I own. I've got four pairs of them. I was a big air force one guy. So if you're on a desert island and you need to go hiking, you need to walk along the beach, you need to do anything. The Vermeeros are your friend.
[00:02:37] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:02:38] Speaker C: So Air Force one, if you're at the beach at night, you know.
[00:02:41] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:02:41] Speaker C: You're having some drinks by the beach there. Your nice shoe, the day sliders and then the hiking. Versatile Vermeer.
[00:02:51] Speaker A: It's a fantastic three.
[00:02:52] Speaker B: It's a great answer. It's a great answer.
[00:02:54] Speaker A: That's three that you're going to survive a long time with as well.
[00:02:56] Speaker C: Exactly.
[00:02:57] Speaker A: There you go.
[00:02:57] Speaker B: That'll do the trick.
[00:02:58] Speaker C: That'll do the trick. Do you want the music on? Yeah, I'm going to do three songs.
[00:03:02] Speaker A: Three songs. Okay.
[00:03:03] Speaker C: Three albums. So not really an album.
[00:03:05] Speaker A: Sure.
[00:03:06] Speaker C: That makes sense. Very much into, like, my songs individually. So we're going to have one drum and bass track.
[00:03:11] Speaker A: Nice.
[00:03:12] Speaker C: Which is true romance by dbridge.
[00:03:14] Speaker A: Oh, I don't know.
[00:03:15] Speaker C: It's a great tune. It's like a deep bass roller.
[00:03:17] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:03:18] Speaker C: It's great for the vibes on the beach. And then we're gonna have. We're gonna have finally by kings of tomorrow, a house track.
[00:03:27] Speaker A: Oh, nice.
[00:03:27] Speaker C: Yeah, classic feel good house track.
[00:03:29] Speaker A: I remember that one.
[00:03:29] Speaker C: And then we're gonna have led zeppelin stay away to heaven.
[00:03:32] Speaker B: Nice. It's a nice mix.
[00:03:34] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah, exactly. Every mood, every emotion. Yeah. You've got a lot of emotions to.
[00:03:40] Speaker A: Go through on your own on the desert island.
[00:03:42] Speaker C: That's what music's all about.
[00:03:43] Speaker A: Yeah, man, I like that.
[00:03:44] Speaker C: Certainly is.
[00:03:44] Speaker B: You know what, speaking of music, Sam, do you want to get us onto, briefly mentioned before we got going?
[00:03:52] Speaker A: Yeah. Well, I want to ask a big question. Cause Liam here is the big sneakerhead. I love my sneakers, but I actually will safely say to big up Liam's ego, I definitely go into it more because of him.
[00:04:01] Speaker C: I put him on.
[00:04:02] Speaker A: Cause I've always been the musician footballer side of it all. But I've been watching a few documentaries recently about the partnership between music culture and sport culture. But it also got me thinking a lot about the obvious connection between fashion culture and music culture, you know, and the likes of, like, Travis Scott and his cactus Jacks, etcetera. Like, do you guys lean into what the musicians are wearing? Or, like, do you get to spot any trends far ahead because of what musicians are doing? I know that might be a bit of a weird one, but.
Cause they get to wear a lot of stuff that's not released yet. Do you know what I mean? Do they see a lot of. Do you see a lot of trends.
[00:04:36] Speaker C: Coming before collaborations in sneakers are almost dead?
[00:04:40] Speaker A: Really?
[00:04:41] Speaker B: Really think so?
[00:04:41] Speaker C: Yeah. I. I think the peak of it was Yeezy with Adidas. He set the bar high, too high. And before that it was Michael Jordan with what he did with the whole Jordan brand, releasing up to like, 25 of his own jordans. Yeezy came in or Yee came in and he set the bar high in a different way, designed, like, minimalistic shoes that were really comfortable and lifestyle driven. And then everyone else has tried to follow since. Right?
[00:05:10] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:05:10] Speaker C: Travis Scott's been huge, I would say one of the biggest collaborators in recent years, apart from perhaps Virgil Abloh, of course, releasing the ten collection way back in 2018, 2017, maybe so. And they were talking about re releasing the ten, I heard.
[00:05:25] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:05:26] Speaker C: But it's like, what sets these things apart is the question. You know, you had Jordan, he was like the front runner for designing his own shoes. You had yi doing the lifestyle thing and then you had Travis doing this whole heavily just music influence. They loved him as an artist. They were buying any shoes that he bought out. How much of it was the shoes themselves? How much innovation was there in the shoes? Not much. And that was where, for me, you start to see not the death of collaborations, but a little bit of the decline. Everyone's trying a collaboration now. Every brand is trying Nike, Adidas, plume.
[00:06:07] Speaker A: It's special, I guess.
[00:06:09] Speaker C: Exactly. The things that are worth having are sometimes rare. And when everyone's collaborating with every brand and every genre, not just music, but art, acting, everything, everyone's getting involved. It decreases the hype around it. The consumer sees what's going on and they start to go, maybe this isn't as rare as it once was. Maybe we're just being marketed to. It's a dangerous game they put themselves in.
[00:06:36] Speaker B: I think it's more about availability and it certainly speaks to, like, Amine's got a new balance. Sneak, canal and action. Bronson does as well. And Drake has got Nocta and that whole side of his Nike division. I'm yet to see anyone with any of those in real life, like in Manchester.
[00:06:52] Speaker C: So I think it's like the Nocta Drake stuff.
[00:06:54] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:06:54] Speaker C: The clothing, some of it's all right. The shoes are a bit wild.
[00:06:58] Speaker B: They are a bit banana sport. It's more the fact that and certainly we get on to the sole supplier before it how years ago to try and get any of these shoes, I'd have a list of a mountain of names of stores, of brands that I knew that were doing raffles. So go size raffle n raffle, collusion raffle, all these other brands. So I know I'm going to hit at least one or, you know, the old school way of just going in front of the store at 06:00 a.m. at a foot locker and guaranteed to get it. And obviously that certainly goes into where the niche a sole supplier is. So I wanted to kind of go back to the start of that. I know you've spoken about this a few times, but take us back to, I guess, the first, that Hirachi triple white momentous, where that was, I guess, first the real scaling point for the business. What was the mindset around you guys and the team then?
[00:07:44] Speaker C: I guess, yeah. So the craziest thing is that for nine months I was running the business whilst I was working full time in recruitment and I wanted that business thing bad. Like, I wanted to do something of my own. I'd started businesses before and I saw the sole supplier as, like, this could work. I know this industry inside out. I love it. And I know that people need the information on the shoes, where to get them, what are the best ones. The market timing was perfect. So it's a big thing, timing.
And I started it and I was running it during lunchtime and in my evenings.
[00:08:20] Speaker A: Nice.
[00:08:21] Speaker C: I was pretty burnt out. After nine months, we weren't making any money. Yeah, but I was always trying to get the pages from the website ranking in Google, and ten years ago, that was a lot easier than it is now.
[00:08:31] Speaker A: That's a good point.
[00:08:32] Speaker C: Now Google, the decline of Google has happened. AI search engines are taking over. But back then, it was a lot easier to get stuff ranking. Still hard. For nine months, I couldn't get anything ranking, but then after that nine months, I was ready to give up. It's that classic thing. I was like, I'm burnt out, I'm working all hours under the sun, I'm not going on holiday. I haven't been boozing either. I've just been all in on this work and business.
And we got number one in Google for the triple white hirachi, which was the shoe of the summer, and we made thousands of pounds in a day. Website traffic went through the roof. The spike on the chart was nuts. And I run downstairs, I said, mom, dad, look, it's working. We've made money. And they were like, yeah. I was like, look, I'm refreshing. Look, we're making money. And I remember refreshing the screen. And they were like. I was like, look, traffic website people, they're like, what the. My dad knew about people making money online, and he was always telling me, get into it. But for them to actually see that as older, more traditional, they were just like, this is mental.
[00:09:34] Speaker A: I was going to ask, actually, how open minded were your parents with this kind of venture?
[00:09:39] Speaker C: My dad has always been entrepreneurial mindset, but worked in jobs, in sales, in print, but he always was like, look at this business. Look at that person doing this. You know, my dad was a big influence in the business sense, and my mom was just. My mom and dad were just straight up hard workers. So I got that kind of, actually, I didn't have any work ethic early.
They give me so much. They sacrificed and broke themselves to give me so much that actually, that created minimal work ethic for a period of time growing up. You could say I was almost like the spoiled kid at one point. But then my parents got hit by the financial crash. They lost everything.
There was literally no money going around at all. They had to move out of the house, sell their house because their interest rates went through the roof. They got into negative equity. Everything went wrong. And then for a few years, I was dusting around, smoking weed, thinking, oh, life's good, man. I'm fucking stoned all the time. It's all going to be okay. And then I realized, if I don't get this hunger now, no one's gonna save my family and no one's gonna save me.
[00:10:48] Speaker A: Good point. Yeah.
[00:10:48] Speaker C: And, like, it was the absolute making of my motivation and hunger.
[00:10:52] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:10:53] Speaker C: Because if that had happened when I was 1516, I probably wouldn't be sitting here now today talking to you because I would have thought, like, life's gonna be all right, you know, maybe I don't need to work as hard.
[00:11:05] Speaker A: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:11:06] Speaker C: And that made me. That made me what I am today, that moment.
[00:11:09] Speaker A: Totally. I mean, that leads quite nicely onto. I mentioned before the cameras came on, but I wanted to hold off for this question. But you mentioned before that you've been kicked out of school growing up. So I really wanted to ask the question, because for those who don't know, this studio was built on without some dramatic the ashes of the charity I worked for, that was for young, underprivileged and vulnerable young people.
And we did a lot of getting kids out of gangs, and it was basically. It was like we were a bit of a prue. You know, people refer a unit, and this was the music department. And the big story we kept telling through, we had a couple of documentaries going, was that so many people don't have that figure that when things have gone south at that age, just to lean you a little bit and just to show you the right way instead of pushing you further down and blah, blah, blah. I just wanted to ask, was there a moment that you can particularly think of? I know you just said about that moment in your life, but was there a moment that the penny dropped or was there a moment where somebody in particularly showed you the right way? Could it have gone completely a different way?
[00:12:15] Speaker C: I think my mom and dad were always there as good role models, like hard workers. They weren't perfect. There is, yeah. But I decided whether that was because I was the ADHD child from when I was six years old, got diagnosed early with ADHD. That put the label on me. I became that label. And then I decided that I would carve out this path throughout my younger school days and older school days of chaos and find the people that wanted chaos as well, whether that meant drink, drugs, parties, just doing crazy shit. When I was younger, I would find the chaos at school and in the early days. So even though there was positive role models around me, I didn't really want to know them.
[00:13:03] Speaker A: I get you.
[00:13:04] Speaker C: I just was like, I want the chaos. And that went on for a lot of years. And so for people around me, like my mum and dad, who were like, we've given you the best chance. What is wrong with you?
But you have to have things happen before you wake up and realize. I woke up and realized maybe when I was about 2021, I actually got a good job in recruitment where I could work hard with people I respected. They taught me the way in that. And then I started clocking onto, wow, my dad, you know, my mom. Look at what they've been doing. You start waking up, of course, and then you start thinking, this chaos isn't gonna get me anywhere.
I'm still involved in some of it, but you start to wake up. You start to see things. Some people, I guess, don't wake up, but I had those wake up moments. And to be honest, bro, I struggled throughout my twenties with staying disciplined, looking after myself, eating right, not drinking too much, not going out, partying too much, even growing the soul supplier like it was a. It's been a fucking struggle, is the truth. I'm here to keep it absolutely real, like, especially when you get that taste of success.
[00:14:14] Speaker A: And, like, it's important to pass that to people, though, that it's not all sunshine and rainbows.
[00:14:18] Speaker C: Yeah. It's like. So I've gone from having no money, relatively working all different jobs after getting kicked out of school, to then having this success and money coming in, money that I'd never seen before and my family had never seen that levels of money coming in to just being like, now what do we do? You know, and going through this rollercoaster of, like, oh, we're doing really well. I'm disciplined. Everything's going well. Right, okay, we'll party a bit now. And then things go off kilter a little bit. But the very lucky thing is the business still grew for eight years consistently.
[00:14:48] Speaker A: That's crazy.
[00:14:49] Speaker C: And we were still holding it down. But it doesn't mean throughout that there weren't just these mad moments of pain and chaos. Cause I'm still associated to that younger old life of, like, the chaos and what I was growing up with.
[00:15:00] Speaker A: Right.
[00:15:01] Speaker C: So for me, it's just been this, like, this long road of trying to find that flow within, which is like, this peace. This kind of, like, balance. Yeah, that balance. Like, cultivating balance is a difficult thing.
[00:15:14] Speaker A: You need a bit of chaos, don't you?
[00:15:15] Speaker C: You know, chaos is great. Like, life and experiences, adventures, like chaos, whether that's like going on holiday of your misses and doing some crazy stuff on holiday, whatever that is you do. But you need these spontaneous moments of, like.
[00:15:30] Speaker A: Of course.
[00:15:31] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:15:32] Speaker B: On this. I wanted to get to this only because you already mentioned it. I saw the multiple videos you did about the struggles the business had last year or the year before and the sort of peaks that already well into an established business that you've come into these problems. When you look back, obviously, over the ten years and this coming at the end, what's the sort of overarching connotations or the things that you take most away from? So the success and then the struggles you've had.
[00:15:57] Speaker C: Yeah. So the last 18 months, even though we were ten years old two weeks ago, has been the toughest we've had in business. So I said, like, people think when you get to year ten, you're in the clear. I just say, like, you got more experience and knowledge to deal with things.
[00:16:13] Speaker A: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:16:15] Speaker C: The truth is, maybe I thought I had a different plan. You know, I thought maybe by year ten I might have sold the business, I might be doing something else. But the truth is, I still love the business and what we do and the people that I work with. We've got some amazing people that we work with, right, that have stuck together for a long time, so that, for me, just keeps it fresh all the time.
And I appreciate that I get to go in, in that environment every day because I didn't always have that, of course.
But to answer your question, the last 18 months we lost hundreds of thousands of pounds. We had to let go of ten people, ten people that were tight in the team, talented. It was tough on everybody. And I learned more in that 18 months than I did in three years of success.
Because when you're flying, things are successful. Maybe you're not looking at things in as much detail, you're not scrutinizing every spend like you should.
Maybe you're putting money into projects that you shouldn't be. And there's like an ADHD entrepreneur. I've always got new ideas. So when money's coming in, you're making good profit, the cash flow's good. I'm probably putting time and money into things that are more risky, not validated as much, and that ultimately sometimes don't pay off. And you've spent money that you could have on something that you know is working well. So, yeah, the 18 months of struggle has absolutely taught me, like, the power of being more critical of spend and the consequences of not focusing the spend and the time. Because when times are tough, you start to see you're paying the price.
And I'm not saying it's all down to where we spent money, et cetera. There's been economic factors. The UK's had a shit time, everybody has. We're heavily situated in the UK. Our audience is like 70% UK. So we formed, like, this sneaker community is like one of the biggest sneaker publishers in Europe, but mostly the UK. So that came to bite us as well, because being that focused in the UK meant that the UK economy shit hit the fan and some of the mistakes we made were amplified by that.
[00:18:35] Speaker A: Oh, I see.
[00:18:36] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Cool, isn't it?
[00:18:38] Speaker B: So I used to work for Nike for a couple of years, like, in the whole brand, I guess when you're that big is not profit first, it's always customer experience first, above all else. And it's just trying to understand who, whenever someone comes in the store, whatever sport they're here for or physical activity, it's trying to give our knowledge to them and how we can cater that to them the best. And I think for you and your business, what would you say the ethos is, or the real message that you want the sole supplier to be seen for in your team and for the consumers that are obviously buying into your product, your service?
[00:19:14] Speaker C: Yeah. So we started out as very much like, community focused. I was in all the content, I was talking to the community, I was involved. And then we started making more money and doing well. And then I stepped out of the content to do, like, more of the development with the tech team and more of the strategy. And we lost that kind of community and homegrown feel a little bit. We became more of a commercial driven business that was a bit more about sell, sell, sell product, drive sales.
And what's changed for me in the last few years? A friend of mine, a good friend of mine, now, Ben from Lux Collective, he came to me and he said, george, I need to talk to you. He said, you gave me some advice three years ago when I was just starting my business and you sent me voice notes on Instagram, and now the business is here. And Lux collective was blowing up at the time. They was getting millions and millions of views on TikTok. He said, I want to come talk to you to say thank you, and I want to tell you a few things. Right, so Ben's like ten years younger than me, right, right. But he's bold, he's intelligent, he's just so driven. Right? And he came to the office and he said, george, you've lost that homegrown community element. You need to be back in the content. He said, what are you doing, Mandy? Look at the content we're doing. And he said it in a loving, caring way.
[00:20:33] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:20:34] Speaker C: And that just switched the light back on for me. I was like, we've lost that community angle. We've been to take, take, take from the audience that we built and nurtured. So the 10th anniversary especially has cemented the community thing. So today we was in Manchester. We were up in Manchester. We gave out almost two grands worth of free shoes.
[00:20:54] Speaker A: Amazing.
[00:20:54] Speaker C: We gave out goodie bags to people. There's loads of people coming to meet us on the street. We've got the soul supply of Facebook groups and discords for the community. We're doing events to give back. It's all about nurturing the people that have supported the brand. And that, for me, is something I love doing. Like John and Taylor. John's our creative lead. Taylor's at one of our big content creators and an influencer in his own right. We all just was like, you know, shake Tanzan at the end of the day and was like, how good was that today? The love that we was getting on the street, the conversations we just having with people, that's what fires me up. It's great to make money, but if you're doing it and you're also giving back, it's much better.
[00:21:38] Speaker B: But I think like you said, the ROI for you and that is two k you've given out in terms of products, but the impact it's had on everyone that's not only seen that on a digital space, but that's been there and come and met you guys in person is so much more than that. And the return is huge.
[00:21:54] Speaker C: Exactly. It's like content's all about creating memories for people, like what you're doing here, you know, I think.
[00:22:00] Speaker A: Thank you, man.
[00:22:01] Speaker C: Podcasts are like the most authentic way to do it. Creating real conversations with people, going back to back on topics that are important. But like the free shoes, content, people getting to see real interactions from people, people that are like absolutely loving it, getting the free shoes, they're like, yeah, me, I'm getting the shoes. Yeah, great. And yeah, it's just something I buzz off. Yeah, yeah, brilliant.
[00:22:22] Speaker B: Before you introduce the next segment, I did, I was curious on, I don't know how much time you've spent in Manchester, but I feel like certainly Mancunians treat the Air Max 95 as like, that's the Manchester shoe.
[00:22:34] Speaker C: Yeah, we gave out a few of them to the.
[00:22:35] Speaker B: I know, I'm sure you would, but I want to know sort of the difference between what you saw on feet today and what you might see when you're walking down London. What would you say are the sort of the distinctions or obviously the obvious that are in like the ten, like the air force ones which are going to be everywhere.
[00:22:47] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:22:47] Speaker B: What were the sort of the distinctive ones that you see more of, bro?
[00:22:50] Speaker C: I have to say, like in London, there's a lot more diversity in the footwear that people are wearing.
[00:22:54] Speaker B: I can believe that brands or specifically.
[00:22:58] Speaker C: In brands, but actual styles as well, you know, like people wearing more loafers, people wearing more sock type shoes. There's a lot more high end luxury sportswear like the christian diors, you know, like. And in Mani, I see like a lot more trainers. Yeah, you were a lot more trainers, a lot of Nike. It's almost like, and not in a bad way, but how London was maybe two years ago and maybe that hasn't translated as much Manchester as not. I mean, like I didn't see loads of people wearing loafers and these big mad boots like some people wearing in London.
Right. But yeah, so that's, that's the difference for me and, and that's another reason why it's tough for us over the last 18 months because we've been focused on sneakers for ten years.
[00:23:45] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:23:45] Speaker C: And we rode the wave of the sneaker market growing. We were in there early and then we rode the wave and the sneaker market bubbles popped a little bit. And this is the example I like to give, or I've thought a lot about recently. So Stockx had 600 million investment, Goat had probably 6700 million investment. So over for those two brands that were targeting the UK in particular as well, us mainly, they had between them 1.2 billion in investment. Right. So we're self funded and we always have been. You know, I've always been reinvesting now. We've been lucky to grow and continue to grow when there's been that sort of VC money in the market. But what happened over the last 18 months is that VC money was pulled out of the market. So you can imagine the vacuum of market created when that money's not being spent to get awareness. They're still spending. But a lot of the VC's went well. No, we're not playing anymore, we're putting our money somewhere else into. Aih. So the kind of sneaker bubble, let's call it, has popped a little bit temporarily where we were so focused on sneakers and not all these other styles and brands as much, quite heavily. Nike and Adi, we've really been affected by that as well. So again we've had to go back to the lab and start looking at what are we missing, what brands are we not covering? We haven't been covering Hoka, we haven't been covering on running as much. You know, it's shoes like that. We haven't been keeping up with the running lifestyle trend.
[00:25:11] Speaker A: Those on trends have gone crazy. Everyone's wearing them now.
[00:25:13] Speaker C: Aren't they on in particular?
[00:25:14] Speaker A: The new face of that I think.
[00:25:16] Speaker C: But that's been going for two years. Right? Like on is like it's so again going back to the lab, like what have we missed? Where did we go wrong?
[00:25:25] Speaker B: You know, I think it's more just where the sneaker market has gone in terms of like we said earlier, availability. How say obviously on your platform and you'll say x place has got a discount on this shoe at the moment. So you can find that I think before then and it was just a case of money and certainly because of where the UK is at the moment trying to find those opportunities, and there's very few places I know that are in Manchester now that still have sneaker drops where they'll have 200 pairs, you get one each, you come and wait for them in the morning and you're guaranteed to get them as long as you get there early enough. Where now it's so automated. Bots are obviously a huge thing now and I'll miss out on a shoe I really want, but I'll see a reseller and a guy who's got a whole living room and he's got two pairs.
[00:26:07] Speaker C: But you know what's going on now as well. So, like, the resale market fuels the retail market. It always has worked like that. So the prices and that demand in the resale market makes people buy more in the retail market. But again, where that bubble's popped a little bit, whether that's because of VC money's not there anymore or brands aren't innovating as much, the resale market prices have gone a little bit flat. I mean, there's not as much profit for people. So resellers are having to, having to sell sometimes a loss or at retail, so they're not making much money, meaning they can't buy as much retail stock. And then when the retail stock's not selling out, the normal consumers don't want to buy it as much because like you said, Liam, it's like there's not as much demand or scarcity because they're seeing the shoes sit on the shelves.
So it all feeds. Even though people hate resellers and resale, trust me, the resale market is driving everything in retail.
And it's the same with tickets as well.
When like Paul McCartney, tickets sell out instantly, everyone wants them more. No, it's true, you know, when people get, see England get to the final, the ticket prices through the room, it's like it's all the same principles, isn't it? Which is like that scarcity model. But if that doesn't happen, the demand starts to drop and it fuels this downward spiral. So will it come back? Absolutely. Everyone needs footwear.
[00:27:28] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:27:29] Speaker C: You know, will it take a year, a few years maybe.
[00:27:32] Speaker A: That's fashion though, isn't it?
[00:27:33] Speaker C: You know, but is the money going into other things? I say if we, we had Covid for like two years, people couldn't go on holiday, a lot of people, or they didn't want to go away. So now I empathize with people who they might not want to buy two or three pairs of shoes. They want to go away on holiday. Yeah, they want to go to Tenerife. You know, they might get their pair of, like you said, discount shoes and go to Tenerife.
[00:27:54] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah.
[00:27:54] Speaker C: Right. Rather than buy three pairs of Jordan fours, which have gone up from 150 to 200. So the point I'm making is sole supply is still here. We're now covering a lot more discounts from a lot more brands, covering a broader spectrum of brands and giving back, because I think the best thing you can do in a time when the economy's struggling is be there, give back a bit more and be there listening to the audience. Right?
[00:28:19] Speaker A: It's refreshing, man.
[00:28:20] Speaker C: And we had to learn that again, because when that shit hit the fan in the economy, saying January 2023, we were still in this, like, sell, sell, sell, take, take mindset. And the audience were just like, stop. This is just painful. Like, stop selling. So, yes, we still sell, of course, but there's more of this message now as well. There's this sneaker community, there's this footwear community, which we're tapping into. So that's refreshing.
[00:28:45] Speaker A: As a business, though, I've got to say, like, good for you guys. I mean, because at the end of the day, you build a community. You're supposed to. When you build a community, you can't just better off the community. You've got to help them when they're down.
[00:28:55] Speaker B: Sure.
[00:28:55] Speaker A: Like you're saying that. I remember the time in 2023, no one could afford a pair of trainers. They could barely affair, barely afford a week's food, you know? So it's.
[00:29:04] Speaker C: But you said it earlier, right? About, like, the experiences and people remembering it and those engagements. It's like, if we were VC backed, they'd be trying to quantify everything. They're like, why are you going out spending two grand giving away free shoes? You know, like, what's the return on justifying that? How do you quantify that? I'll be like, well, you know, I saw these people commenting on the account, really positive sentiment. And I see that changing over time, but it's hard to quantify. They're like, what's the return on that spend? It's like, yeah, it's harder to quantify, but we just know. We see it instinctively, anecdotally, and all of the little metrics in the engagement, et cetera, over time. But if you VC asked and we were VC backed, I'd struggle to quantify it, but it just feels right, because people are people and they're not just people. That give money to somebody. They are people. They've got their own lives. They've all got their own ideas. So we gotta respect that a little bit, whether you're in business or not. And Nike do this very well, or did. Do you know, they've always been that, like, community, local hub of, like, sportswear and sport. Yeah. So it goes hand in hand, like, the lifestyle of sport and performance and elevating people, the faces behind it, the Jordans, et cetera, all of the people like Travis, elevating that lifestyle, making people feel connected, whether it's just very clever marketing from them or not, but it works. They had that feel of, like, Nike are a brand that are there for the people, you know?
[00:30:34] Speaker A: Yeah. I mean, I think it's the way you guys have used social media, though, and to build your community. I mean, I think it's a fantastic use of it because I know for a fact that I became a fan of souls, a player from probably four years ago, from seeing exactly those videos of you walking around buying stuff for people. And he'd been banging around about them for years. Do you know what I mean? But it was the videos that I saw, and I was like, wow, they're putting the money where their mouth is. Because it's so refreshing to see a business do that. Cause, you know, when for me is like, Liam is a fan of you guys telling me, who doesn't know anything at the time, you know, I'm just gonna hear, okay, another company. But seeing you do the work in the streets for the people. Yeah, that's what so many people are doing.
[00:31:13] Speaker C: Such a difference maker, I think, as well. I had, this thing is, like, kind of got too big for my own boots in my head for a little bit.
[00:31:20] Speaker A: I see.
[00:31:21] Speaker C: There's nothing wrong with, like, knowing your value and your work. Of course.
[00:31:24] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:31:25] Speaker C: And there's nothing wrong, as a business owner, like, putting yourself in the right seat to do the right job, but you're never too big for any of the jobs in the business.
You need to be on the ground, and you need to be in the clouds. I like Gary Vee. I like that he goes, clouds and dirt. He says, like, you got to do the big picture thinking, and you've got to do the dirt, the nitty gritty task.
[00:31:47] Speaker A: Fantastic advice, that is, because then you're.
[00:31:49] Speaker C: Connected to what's going on on the ground.
But there was a period of time where I was like, you know, I'm the founder. I'm the CEO. We've grown now to 40 people. Let's say. And I need to be doing these sort of tasks all the time. Become disconnected with what was going on on the ground. Didn't know the product knowledge as well. Didn't know the social media game as well. And that's when someone like Ben comes along and he goes, what you been doing, man? And then when I stepped back into the social media game and the product game and some of the guys in the office, all the girls in the office are ripping me going, your product knowledge is weak now, you know, like that. And they're like. And then I'm like, on TikTok, like, learning about TikTok and live, et cetera, and I'm just like, where have I been? This is the main. Yeah, it moves quick. I need to be doing this every day. Yeah, that's what we've been doing the last few years, like, and we encourage everyone in the business to be on the ground as well. No matter what your position is, you need to be connected with the team. Why is someone going to listen to someone that's just pure, like, doesn't do anything on the ground when they come with an idea that the junior or mid team members are like, do you actually know?
Have you done it? Have you tested this? Are you on Instagram or TikTok trying these things? You've got to come with that informed knowledge.
[00:33:04] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah.
[00:33:06] Speaker B: I think you already mentioned it on Gary Vee, and I love Gary Vaynerchuk, because I've been watching this stuff for years. There's so many times when he's mentioned how some of the best ideas he's had in vain and media wherever have come from. A guy he was talking to in the bathroom when he's taking a piss that was just going, oh, I saw this. I've got a really good idea. And he's gone. That's exactly what we're going to do. And made sure that the integrity of his business. Cause I think now everything's so public facing. And you think about how, I don't know if you saw on TikTok how labor and conservative and lib dems, everyone had a TikTok account and they were trying to all trash each other, and it was just a battle of them knowing we're gonna win votes and win young people by using social media, and it's all about our image.
[00:33:47] Speaker C: Oh, bro, how crazy was it? Like with. I don't know if I can mention the word. Cause it gets, like, banned. Right? But Covid, I already mentioned it where they used, like, influencers to push, like, the rules and the vaccines as well. So you were seeing, like, love island influencers.
[00:34:04] Speaker A: Oh, my God, yes.
[00:34:05] Speaker C: Like pushing get the vaccine. I'm like, who's paying for this campaign? Like, this is crazy. So exactly what you just said there.
[00:34:12] Speaker A: Very metal on it.
[00:34:13] Speaker C: Even like, the politicians and the government are clocking onto this people and content strategy. Yeah, cool. To push the incentives that they want. It's nuts off.
[00:34:23] Speaker B: Yeah, it really is crazy. We wanted to get into a little fun segment just before we go through some others with some quick this or that. Quick fire questions.
[00:34:30] Speaker C: Yeah, love of this or that.
[00:34:31] Speaker B: So I'm gonna do the first half, and so I'm gonna take over. So first starts off Nike or Nike.
[00:34:39] Speaker C: Nike. Even though it's Nike.
[00:34:42] Speaker B: That's what you would've been punching at. Nike.
[00:34:44] Speaker A: That's me.
[00:34:44] Speaker B: I guess it's a british. It's a british thing.
[00:34:46] Speaker C: Call it what you want.
It's your life. Nike.
[00:34:50] Speaker B: Adidas or Adidas.
[00:34:52] Speaker C: Adidas. Who's calling it Adidas in the UK?
[00:34:58] Speaker A: I have since I was a kid. I said something to someone the other day, Lauren. It was like, if you turned around and was like. And said to me, mum is pronounced moon. I'd still call her mom. Yeah, it's my fucking mom. So I'm gonna call it Adidas.
[00:35:10] Speaker C: You have a bacon bap or a bacon bomb? Bacon.
[00:35:13] Speaker A: But in Manchester.
[00:35:17] Speaker B: Chip is pretty normal.
[00:35:19] Speaker C: Shout out Christian there, he's head of partnerships. He's nine years in the business. He loves a bacon bomb. He teaches me all the. All the.
[00:35:28] Speaker B: All the linguists a couple months ago, that in, like, burger, they say Cobb, which doesn't have cob, like Chip. Cob or.
[00:35:36] Speaker A: Yeah, which I think north of Birmingham, though, where the lingo is, you can move a mile in each. Did he say Stockport?
[00:35:43] Speaker C: Stockport, yeah.
[00:35:43] Speaker A: So my mom, like, I'm from, like, Glossop, near Stockport. But the difference between that and even my own family 20 minutes down the road is butty and barm join. It's that different.
[00:35:52] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:35:52] Speaker B: It's british idioms, but carry on. Stussy or stussy.
[00:35:56] Speaker C: Stussy. But it's stussy. I call it stussy, though.
[00:36:00] Speaker B: I would just argue that I've got Stussy or Cortez.
[00:36:04] Speaker C: Well, if it's the shoes. Cortez. Yeah, if it's the brand, Cortez.
[00:36:08] Speaker B: Oh, nice.
[00:36:09] Speaker C: Yeah. Again, a weird one, though. I used to think that Cortez had just stolen the shoe name.
[00:36:14] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:36:14] Speaker C: Yeah.
How'd they get away with that? But then you see the different spelling? It's like.
[00:36:18] Speaker A: Yeah, it's cause of the font though, innit? I didn't see it for a while. I was a bit. Yeah.
[00:36:22] Speaker B: The rest of them are just opinion based. Air Force one or Jordan one.
[00:36:25] Speaker C: Air Force one.
[00:36:26] Speaker B: Sambaz or speziales?
[00:36:28] Speaker C: Sambaz.
[00:36:29] Speaker A: Shout. Go on, I'll give you the next ones. Air Max one s or MX 95?
[00:36:34] Speaker C: Air Max ones.
[00:36:36] Speaker A: Dunk or SB dunk?
[00:36:38] Speaker C: SB dunk.
[00:36:39] Speaker A: Really?
[00:36:39] Speaker B: Do you like that fat, like tongue? You like the wide shoe?
[00:36:43] Speaker C: Yeah. I've got two pairs of SB dunks. I don't really have any normal dunks, so just going by what I own, I guess. SB dunks. Yeah.
[00:36:50] Speaker A: Cool. You were laughing at me the other day. I don't have any dunks. I only have SB dunks.
[00:36:53] Speaker C: Yeah. There you go.
[00:36:53] Speaker A: I prefer the fat ones.
[00:36:54] Speaker C: Yeah, it's nice anyway.
[00:36:56] Speaker A: Bit more general. Messy or Ronaldo?
[00:36:58] Speaker C: Ronaldo.
[00:36:59] Speaker A: Nice shout. He's got my heart. Lebron or Jordan?
[00:37:03] Speaker C: Jordan.
[00:37:04] Speaker A: Nice. Virgil Abloh or Sean motherspoon?
[00:37:06] Speaker C: Virgil Abloh. It's gotta be Virgil. Yeah. Virgil Abloh's the ultimate, you know, sneaker, designer and innovator. What he did with the ten was the most unbelievable thing going. I think I had like seven pairs from that collection.
[00:37:19] Speaker B: Did you?
[00:37:19] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Most of them went yellow, sadly. Yeah.
[00:37:22] Speaker B: Cause the first edition, they were all like the white ones, that all obviously thingy.
[00:37:26] Speaker C: Yeah, like the exposed tongues, everything, the materials. So they go yellow over time. But you can dye them back, put them in sunlight and that works. You leave them out in the sun. Yeah. And they have like these machines with lights that you can get your shoes back. White shout out Lewis from you by. We clean as well. He does all of the work on this stuff. Nice. He's got the business that sorts out your crepes if they're dirty or faded. So.
[00:37:46] Speaker A: Yeah, Virgil Abloh is just the goat in so many different, even fields as well.
[00:37:50] Speaker B: He really is.
[00:37:51] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:37:51] Speaker C: Oh, absolutely. It's a shame he's gone.
[00:37:53] Speaker A: Yeah, it really is. Anyway, and a big one.
[00:37:56] Speaker B: Last one.
[00:37:57] Speaker A: England or Spain. Is it coming home, mate?
[00:37:59] Speaker C: It's coming home.
You got to be optimistic.
Why would you not be?
[00:38:06] Speaker A: You know, anything could happen in one game, my friend.
[00:38:08] Speaker C: This is it. Look at them scoring in the 90th minute.
[00:38:10] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:38:11] Speaker C: Yeah. Hey, that was mad.
[00:38:12] Speaker A: It was crazy.
[00:38:14] Speaker B: They can do it. Just because you touched on a little earlier last few things and you mentioned certainly your resilience and certainly something I got from watching all your TikToks journey, I guess for yourself and productivity and find yourself. I want to get three books from you that you would recommend to anyone who's trying to better themselves, whether that's their mental, their productivity, their task management. Just someone that wants to get on a straight and narrow path and be more focused. What would be some books you recommend to them?
[00:38:44] Speaker C: I think one of the ultimate communication business books for me is one of the oldest communication and business books, which is Dal Carnegie, how to win friends and influence people. And I think the name is a little bit misleading because it's like, how to win friends and influence people. It sounds a little bit manipulative. It does, but it's really not. The principles in the book are just as simple as things like when you walk into a room, smile, listen, you've got two ears and one mouth. Use them in that ratio. It's that classic saying, remember someone's name is the sweetest sound that they'll ever hear. So people don't remember names. It's an easy win if you remember people's names. These are not manipulation tactics. These are just general communication principles that ultimately make you get on better with people.
[00:39:32] Speaker A: There's nothing manipulative about being a good person. There's not, you know, being nice to people.
[00:39:35] Speaker C: There's so many principles in that book, like, you know, let people save face in an argument, you know, don't give them feedback in public, do it directly. These are all principles to live by that are just like for people, you get more respect.
[00:39:51] Speaker A: Fantastic management as well, isn't it?
[00:39:53] Speaker C: It's a great book. We did a leadership course from the Dal Carnegie Academy and it was one of the best ones we've ever done in ten years because the principles embedded into like a work environment just make people more respectful, more caring, more thoughtful and. Yeah, so that one for business ultimate, I think it translates across life.
[00:40:10] Speaker A: Yeah, that's a great show.
[00:40:12] Speaker C: The power of now by at Cartel Eckhart Tolle. Yeah, that one for me got me into like this kind of more spiritual way of thinking, which is, you know, he's absolutely moving away from the chaos and like, how do we find happiness with what we're doing? Stop thinking too much about the future, being present, stop thinking too much about the past and be present. It's hard to cultivate, but I meditate every day. Meditation's like my religion. It gives me so many insights, it gives me peace, it stills my mind. It makes me a better person in relationships. You know, I can listen better to my girlfriend. I'm not as reactive. For instance, I can be more thoughtful at work. Meditation, for me, with my mind, is everything.
[00:40:54] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:40:55] Speaker C: So, yeah. Eckhart Tolle powere now, really got me into that way of thinking. Life changing book. Had to read it a few times. It's one of those. Quite a tricky read, but there's so many gems in there. And then one last book.
That is a tricky one.
You know, this is a. This is a. It's not a controversial one, but there's a lot of disputes on morning routines. But there was. There was a book called the Miracle Morning. I can't remember who it's by, but when I read this book, the principles in the book and the morning routine that he gives you are really good tools to use in your life, generally.
[00:41:34] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:41:35] Speaker C: Whether you do them in the morning or nothing. Everything from, like, meditation to setting your intention for the day, to journaling, to reflect on your thoughts, these are all good practices that I've brought into my life over the last five years that make me more reflective. They help me learn more, they give me more peace that guide me to be focused. So whether you do a morning routine or not, you can waste, like, an hours doing morning routines. The principles from the morning routine are packaged up in a way that are really good tools for life, I think. So there's one on mindset, there's one on business, and there's one on Trinity that is on presence.
[00:42:12] Speaker B: He's pr trained. He knows what he's doing.
[00:42:15] Speaker A: That's my Amazon cart fill for my birthday.
[00:42:17] Speaker C: But, guys, the truth is, right, I've got a bookshelf full of maybe. I've probably got, like, 300 books that I've bought since I was 15.
[00:42:23] Speaker A: Nice.
[00:42:24] Speaker C: And I would say that 95% of them are rehashing old shit. The self development books are all using principles from, like, the Dal. Carnegie books, rehashing them. There's not loads of true new gold that comes out, you know?
[00:42:38] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:42:38] Speaker C: So might sound like you might have.
[00:42:41] Speaker B: To write one yourself, then.
[00:42:42] Speaker C: Yeah, I would love to. I would.
[00:42:44] Speaker A: But don't sound like you have the time, mate.
[00:42:47] Speaker C: I think what's happened up until maybe the last six months is a little bit of imposter syndrome. What have I got to offer in a book? You know, what would I share in a book? And that just comes in. It's like. And then I don't find the time to do it, because I think, what would I write about and where would I start?
[00:43:01] Speaker A: Well, I have to say it was quite refreshing, because, I mean. And this is our fourth episode of this series with a creative guest on and every single one of them. So no surprise has come on and said they suffer with imposter syndrome. And me, as an artist included, and I'm sure you, too, but we all suffer from it. And it's refreshing to hear someone who's had real success still at the top think of that kind of stuff. And, I mean, imposter syndrome, it's evil, isn't it? But, like, we all deserve to sit there and just look at ourselves in the mirror and go, no, I've done good today.
[00:43:28] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:43:29] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:43:29] Speaker A: Because it's.
[00:43:31] Speaker C: I think that that, for me, is, like, something that has got better over the years. Like, you know, I think that as you get older, if you're working on yourself, you get to know yourself better. Very good point. And then, like, you become more comfortable in your own skin. Yeah.
And ultimately, everyone's unique. Very much is what I've learned. You know, I've done a fair bit of therapy and, like, self reflection, like, kind of, like, spiritual coach or whatever you want to call people that I've seen, and. And to kind of, like, get that piece around what is, who you are, how you can go about your life. But I think that thing of, like, imposter syndrome or not feeling good enough for a lot of people drives them to want to, like, escape, to drink, to use drugs, whatever it is. And that can be, like, varying degrees for people at different points in their life. I think it's got. The last six months has been a blessing for me in terms of, like, how I've felt.
[00:44:23] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:44:24] Speaker C: And I've just been so accepting of reality and life.
Will it always be like that? Maybe. I've done a lot of work on things and myself recently to try and get that, but I tell you the truth. Like, when? In February, when we. When in January, when we realized, like, that January wasn't starting good again in terms of where we were at with our numbers and that if the rest of the quarter is going to be like this, how much money we're gonna lose? And we had to make that tough decision to, let, say, ten people go. I went into a bit of a hole for a little while, I'd say from mid December to then. And Maya, who I work with, our chief product officer, said to me, george, you seem beaten and depressed. I've never seen you like this. So I was generally on, like, this quite a good plate path for, like, a year or two. She's like, but, you know, last four, six weeks, you've not been right. Need to go on holiday. I hadn't been away for ten months because I thought, because the business is struggling and I need to be here. And I went away, I went skiing. And even though we were losing money at that time, I was still checking results. I was like, this is a bit painful being up in the mountains. I had time to reflect and I was like, what have I been doing? Like, I've been giving off this to people in the team. I've not been able to be there as much for them. I've not been able to make clear decisions. So what I'm trying to say there is, it's essential to step away and reflect.
[00:45:49] Speaker A: That's a good point.
[00:45:50] Speaker C: Holidays are important, even if things are tough.
[00:45:53] Speaker A: Stopping.
[00:45:54] Speaker C: Stopping working outside of the business and not just in it, grinding away every day, because you need perspective. So, yeah, it changed everything. When I come back, fresh mind. Fresh mind.
[00:46:07] Speaker A: It's fantastic advice for anyone, really. But I think especially creatives, because I think we all fall victim to because of the erratic and the spontaneous lifestyle. I mean, I know personally, my mind's always alive with ideas and whether it's good or bad, you know, and thinking about the next job or, like, it's just always deconstructing things and, you know, stopping can just be the best refresh because otherwise it all gets so overwhelming. Because it's not a nine to five you leave there, is it? You take everything home with you, because it's not just ideas, but especially you at the top. You know, you're at the top of your tree. You must take everybody's weight on top of your shoulders. Well, like you say, if you can't, I. Oh, there's a fantastic analogy that they say on, this is really random, but on in planes, if the plane's crashing, to put your mask on yourself before you put it on the baby, because you can't help the people you love.
[00:46:57] Speaker C: I like yourself. I've heard that one.
[00:46:58] Speaker A: You know what I mean?
[00:46:59] Speaker C: Yeah. I think if you said about, like, the choppy mind and the thinking of ideas, I think again, if you're in this place where you're not feeling good enough or you're feeling that imposter syndrome, you're more likely to chase ideas, new ideas, because they're validation, of course, so you're more likely to chase something new. And the shiny object, because, you know, inside, if I can pull that off, it will make me feel better. So I believe in exactly what you said there. Like, you need to put your own mask on before you can put someone else's on. Because if I'm in the wrong place, I am not making decisions in the right way. My mindset is more choppy. So it does start with that, like, business success or life success for me is just so dependent on what you're doing to look after yourself more than ever, I realized that. And my friends or people watching this might know me as, like, there's been some roller coasters over the years of where my mindset's been at, but you learn a lot from that.
And for me, it's just so important to look after me first so then I can be there for others, including my family, my missus, and people at work. Now that my missus come to me sometimes and be like, you know, you're all invested in work. You're training, doing high rocks triathlon stuff all the time. You're not really showing me much love. And I'm not. I'm just blocked.
[00:48:26] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:48:26] Speaker C: I'm like, it's all about training and money and work and blah, blah, blah, and there's no love within them. Sometimes it's just this cold, stone cold person. And it's like, it's not nice for people to be around to go over to my parents for dinner, and I'm just, like, stone cold on my phone, like, looking at things and trying to work still. And I'm like. I'm like, if I look back on my deathbed, am I going to be happy that I treated those that I loved like that around me? It doesn't mean like that now. I'm perfect around them all the time. It's like, put some value on these things and fucking and respect it, because they might not be here forever, especially your family. And I know when I lay down in bed, sometimes at night, and if I haven't been present with my family.
Cause I've been focused on something, in the grand scheme of things, not as important as them. I feel bad about that, but it's easy to lie to yourself and be like, oh, next time. Yeah, next time I'll be present. Then next time you go around and you're doing shit on your phone, and you're telling your dad how to live his life, and then you walk away from it and you're like, what am I doing all this for?
[00:49:34] Speaker A: Yeah. Might not always get a next time.
[00:49:36] Speaker C: Might not always get a next time, exactly. No.
[00:49:38] Speaker A: I mean, I've got to say, though, it's quite refreshing to hear people talk. I mean, to hear yourself talk about looking inwards, you know? Because that's the difference we can all make, isn't it? You know, we can all walk around saying that we want to change the world and do everything we want to do, but changing. Working on yourself is the hardest bit.
[00:49:56] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:49:57] Speaker B: The most important.
[00:49:57] Speaker A: And it's the most important. Yeah, well said.
[00:49:59] Speaker C: Yeah, absolutely.
[00:50:00] Speaker A: And for someone who's ten years into that, well, more than ten years into your craft, but, you know, for recent ten year birthday, a sole supplier, like, for you to still be working on those things that other people would think, no, no, it's business, business, business.
[00:50:12] Speaker C: It's a lifelong mission. Exactly.
[00:50:14] Speaker A: Success isn't linear, is it? You know, no.
[00:50:16] Speaker B: Speaking on lifelong mission, just really to close out. I wanted to ask for those who've celebrated the ten years now.
[00:50:22] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:50:23] Speaker B: What does the next sort of ten years, you think, for the sole supplier, have you had these meetings of what you would hope 2034 to look like or where the business would like to be? Or have you had to think about what the next ten years is going to be?
[00:50:34] Speaker C: A long way off. I think right now, we serve people at retail and at resale, we've got the comparison and aggregation service for all the retailers, and then we've got the marketplace when you want to buy resale. So if you need a pair of shoes, we solve both of those things. There's a few things we're looking at, but community is a big focus.
Subscription based models for the community, so they can get shoes easier and they can get different benefits.
[00:51:00] Speaker B: Good idea.
[00:51:01] Speaker C: We're looking at a discount model as well, which I can't say too much about at the moment, but where will it be in ten years? I want to take it to the US. I want to take you to Asia.
But right now, the reason I don't sound 100% sure on some of these things I'm saying is because I believe. And again, this is like a new way of thinking for me, or a newer way of thinking. We've got plans, we've got like a six month roadmap of the developments we want to do, how we want to improve the website, the app. Yeah, but we just need to be doing the right things each week and stay focused on it, and then the rest will follow. It's that classic thing of, like, you know, if I want to get massive in the gym, it starts from today and then doing the right thing tomorrow. So now it's like this philosophical kind of self development.
[00:51:53] Speaker A: I completely agree with that.
[00:51:54] Speaker C: It's literally just like, you can focus six months down the line or ten years down the line. But the digital world moves fast anyway. So all we need to do is look at the right metrics now, nurture the community in this right way and go with the flow and what feels right and looks right in the numbers and then the rest will follow. Absolutely follow the signs is what I say. You know, like the free shoes and the content around the community stuff, it feels good, it's working. We're seeing it. Keep following that sign. Where's it gonna go? I don't know, but in ten years I've seen if you follow the signs, you trust that intuition and you're looking at the numbers behind some of it as well. Of course, the rest does follow. You have to go with what feels right within here because I think it's very easy to get jaded by. Oh, that's going to be the right move for money. Well, that's going to be the right move for this. It's like, no, what feels good and authentic to you and your team and then does it stack up in terms of the numbers sense? You got to have a bit of both.
[00:52:52] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah.
[00:52:54] Speaker B: Fantastic. Brilliant. Well, it's been a joy having you on. Delivered some good life lessons for everyone listening, told some good stories about the brand and you know, who knows, maybe we'll have an episode in ten years time and we'll have a, we'll have another look back 20 years round up.
[00:53:09] Speaker A: And thank you so much for taking time out of your short trip to ancestors. It really means a lot.
[00:53:13] Speaker B: We hope you enjoyed the sitting. You certainly come back.
[00:53:15] Speaker C: It's a wicked studio, this.
[00:53:17] Speaker A: Thank you very much.
[00:53:18] Speaker C: Absolutely. It's been great talking, appreciate it.
[00:53:20] Speaker A: Thank you, man.
[00:53:20] Speaker C: Thank you.
[00:53:21] Speaker A: And thank you everybody for listening.
[00:53:34] Speaker C: Welcome to the Feel Awake podcast.
