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For Rick Cytrynbaum, BA'96, the entrepreneur life can feel like a game of snakes and ladders. Yet rolling the dice, doesn’t have to be a game of chance.
Through years of hard work and hustle, Cytrynbaum has built a diverse and innovative career in the fashion space, where he has developed footwear for New Balance, co-founded House of Harlow 1960 with Nicole Richie, worked with celebrities like Kanye West and Heidi Klum, and owned multiple brands like Modern Vintage, Champion, and Kendall & Kylie. He was also an influential player in the rise of the direct-to-consumer model that brought a wide range of celebrities into the fashion industry.
Cytrynbaum joins Eric Morse to share various aspects of his journey; from finding the white space in an industry, and cultivating one’s gut feel, to the critical role failure plays in the life of an entrepreneur.
The Entrepreneur Podcast is sponsored by Connie Clerici, QS ’08, and Closing the Gap Healthcare Group, Inc.
Transcript
Eric Morse
You are listening to the Entrepreneur Podcast by the Western Morrissette Institute for Entrepreneurship Powered by Ivey. My name is Eric Morse and I’ll be the host of this session.
For Rick Cytrynbaum, the entrepreneur life can feel like a game of snakes and ladders. Yet rolling the dice, doesn’t have to be a game of chance.
Through years of hard work and hustle, Cytrynbaum has built a diverse and innovative career in the fashion space, where he has developed footwear for New Balance, co-founded House of Harlow 1960 with Nicole Richie, worked with celebrities like Kanye West and Heidi Klum, and owned multiple brands like Modern Vintage, Champion, and Kendall & Kylie. He was also an influential player in the rise of the direct-to-consumer model that brought a wide range of celebrities into the fashion industry.
Cytrynbaum joins Eric Morse to share various aspects of his journey; from finding the white space in an industry, and cultivating one’s gut feel, to the critical role failure plays in the life of an entrepreneur.
Rick Cytrynbaum
Direct to consumer, maybe just explain what is that and why was it different a new kind of in those early days? Well, I mean, I think I think what happened in the apparel space, or in any sort of fashion business, in the last, you know, 50-60 years, was everything was curated by a handful of stores. So you know, your whole life in regards to fashion, marketing, design, creative was all curated by, you know, a certain number of people. So let's just say you go to the US, you know, you'd walk into, you'd walk by the Bloomingdale's store, and you'd see in the window, they'd be showing, you know, pink dresses, or they'd be showing, you know, yellow and it all be curated by their vision of what they're doing the same way the movie business was being curated by, you know, Universal Pictures, you know, Sony and so on, you know, they chose the people that would be the celebrity and then say, we're going to promote you market you and then literally put you into a movie. And then if you're a designer, at Bloomingdale's, you know, if you ever see that Halston movie, you know how they went to Bergdorf Goodman. And if Bergdorf Goodman would be the one that would actually, you know, present you they would be the ones that be like the front page of the magazine for the consumer to see it, I think in the last 10 years or 15 years, based on internet and you know, social media, and so on and so forth. Every single person in this room here is a curator of their own business of their own life. So a direct-to-consumer model allows anybody in the industry today or anybody sitting here today, to be able to speak directly to the consumer without a middleman involved, i.e. the retailer. That's the concept of direct-to-consumer fashion was the first part of direct-to-consumer, just based on the fact that fashion is such... ahem... I don't want to say fashion is such an emotional purchase, that it was the fastest thing to be able to attain traction in direct-to-consumer just based on the fact that it was an emotional purchase. So as opposed to going into a store that's curated, if someone else who has social influence, who has, you know, is able to attract or get to you, then you're able to say, "Oh, wow, I can speak directly with that person." That's why, you know, social media, and then you know, switching into direct-to-consumer based on social media has become such an important part.
Eric Morse
Yeah, just really cool. Yeah. But you added to that, I mean, there you used influencers, celebrities, your, you know, kid from Western BA '96. How did that happen? How did you reach out to those folks? How did you get involved,
Rick Cytrynbaum
I mean, I, I got involved, I mean, just, you know, sheer, sheer grind. I came from the I came from the real, the real, I have to say like the real hustler mentality coming out of school. I wasn't given - I don't wanna say I wasn't given very much - but I, I aspired in my life to take my business and take myself. Once I came to Western to be very, you know, truthful, I would came to Western and I saw the ability of who was at Western, I was living in Montreal prior, and then coming to Western and seeing international students and, you know, visiting Vancouver with some friends the first time and then coming to Toronto more often and having that more experience, I believe that this was for me what I always wanted, you know, I wanted to grow myself. And I think that I had a guerilla sort of a type of approach differently than in today's model to do that.
Eric Morse
Okay. And so when you made those connections, you know, going into business with some of those folks, was that an easy decision for you? Is that was that part of a plan? Or did it all kind of just work out?
Rick Cytrynbaum
You know, definitely wasn't a plan. And this is really difficult to plan. I think, I think what happened to me, which was actually really good is that in 2000, when I started my business, I sold my first business in 2006. So when I sold my... 2007... So I sold my first business in 2007. So I'm born in '75. So you know, it's probably my you know, late, you know, 30s, early 30s, whatever. At the end of the day for me, I made such an enormous amount of money that for me, what what happened that was successful for me is I was able to then take that money and then go into different businesses and try different things, and get involved in sort of different aspects of it and, you know, work with other friends that were in that in a different business and invest with them and sort of create that, that sort of structure. But the first one was, like pure hustle. And I worked, you know, 300 days straight, I was running doing weekends, everything my priority was, I mean, it's, it was a bad mixture, but it was my priority. My priority was, was success. And it wasn't, yeah, full grind. Just full grind, just got to just grind through it.
Eric Morse
So lots of success in the fashion industry makeup as well.
Rick Cytrynbaum
Yeah. I mean, we found, you know, I figured out different niches. So when you talk to someone, like, you know, I always took the meeting, you know, the funniest thing is that, you know, you call these different, you know, anybody here wants to call up, a business wants to go meet, as you said before, wants to go meet a company that's doing something, maybe you can sell them something, and you can be involved with them. Like the most, the worst businessmen are the ones who are like, I'm busy, you know, I'm making an appointment... I'll give you an appointment in three months, or have no time for you. Like, the actual time that I'd spend learning from other people or trying to get, you know, that's what I would do is I would push my way through, and then I'd figure out, you know, what that guy was thinking about it and figure out my way to do something with them, if that's the structure that I wanted to do at the time.
Eric Morse
Yeah, yeah. And you've talked about in the past, just the importance of listening, you know, can you talk about how that helped and making those connections perhaps.
Rick Cytrynbaum
Because you know, as you want to make the connection. So let's say, let's say you go and you want to meet you meet someone, and you want to know what they're all about, and you want to know, hey, how can I connect with them. So you're not going to look through a crystal ball, that doesn't work, you're not going to sit there and just keep talking about yourself, or keep talking about what you do to understand what they want. But if you sit there and you flip the script, and you put it onto them, I always believe in putting it out to someone else saying, hey, just tell me a little bit about yourself. I'd love to know more about what you're up to what you're doing. Just tell me you're so smart. And I want to understand everything, you know, and they would always sit and they'd be like, well, you know, sort of my business and they would go through the process. And then as they're going through certain things, I'd say, oh, wait a second. Oh, so you make sunglasses? Oh, yeah, I want to I own Marchon which is not me. But the other gentleman, I own Marchon you know, a large Italian manufacturer. So I'm... so I work with Nicole, Richie and Nicole does glasses like this like this, why don't we manufacture them together, you know, saying, or I offer the guy something and then in turn he responses as "Oh, I can help you." So its about wash your hand wash your back of some of somebody else. But you know that that's listening, listening and listening to understand and and figuring out within that listening, like what that whitespace is or what that opportunity costs or what that spot is that you can wiggle your way in.
Eric Morse
It's really hard to find opportunity when you're talking all the time.
Rick Cytrynbaum
Yeah! Super true (great) super true! Especially as an entrepreneur, and everybody is an entrepreneur, wants to be spoken, wants to speak out, everybody here for sure, wants to overspeak, overtalk, and tell everybody how amazing their product is, what they're doing, and the whole nine yards, which conceptually doesn't always work and actually works against you. But we don't know that till later on in life.
Eric Morse
Yeah, cool. Rick, I know you're a serial entrepreneur. And I've heard you talk about failure in the past. It's a lot like Michael Jordan. Yeah, he's made a lot of clutch game winning shots. Yeah, but he missed 10 times as many (Yeah). What do you what is it you learn from failure? And maybe share one or two If you would?
Rick Cytrynbaum
Yeah. I mean, you know, failures. You know, I guess failure. Failure comes from different ways. I mean, comes from the ego, it comes from acting too quick, moving too slow. I mean, there's, there's this like, right balance between like, and I always believe fully, like going with your gut. So if you go with your gut, your gut is never gonna, you know, never gonna sort of lead you in a wrong direction. But I mean, failures, you know, really frame the person, I think that there's such a framing that has to happen and failure, that if everything is success, and everything success, you don't really understand how to like, you know, balance yourself, or at least understand the balance. And it also doesn't make you think that you know, what you're doing could be right could be wrong, think of it different ways. So the failure structure for me actually allows you to sort of like, rethink, rethink, you know, it allows you to have empathy for other people a lot. It allows you to have gratitude to understand sort of what you have, and it sort of sets a new bar for yourself personally, to not know that everything that you're doing is going to work. So I think there's a... I love I love a good I mean, I've had so many so many crazy failures, you know, but you know, trying to you know, build something that was completely unique. I had a I mean, I created this this idea when I was came out of Western whatever it was a baby carrying suit. Yeah, I had a baby seat so, so I was walking in Tokyo, Japan, literally, I was walking in Tokyo, Japan, and I saw this thing that I'm like, Oh my God, that's the coolest thing ever which was like a belt that you wear which has like a little seat, and then you pick up your and you're walking with it. And you can actually put on the belt and there's like a little mini seat. So pick up your kid and instead of holding on to your, your kid like this the whole time, yeah, you're not wearing a Baby Bjorn, but you'd put the baby on the seat, and all the weight of the kid would sit on the structure of your waist. So I realized that's really cool. So I went like hardcore on it. And then I went, you know, I got Angelina Jolie to wear when she had her first baby, Shiloh. I mean, I had everything and then I was like, the one mother likes to hand off the kid that kid falls off, the business is zero! you know what I mean, like, so you start to realize how could there be a failure, what mother's gonna let go of their children, but like no retailer, actually believed in it. And it was pre direct to consumer because that would have been successful B2C. But I couldn't! I literally went so many times, like, buybuyBaby and all these different places to try and get it done. And it wouldn't, it wouldn't work and I just burned a ton of money. The idea conceptually was very cool. But it didn't work. And my other big failure, or semi failure was we created a magnetic - my daughter is going to laugh - a magnetic shoe closing system. So I invented an idea with neodymium sort of magnets, which when you put your shoe on, and it sort of clicks the shoe together and your laces, you can adjust and it's done through these like small little magnets that are very hard, which are super cool. No one actually we it was called Zubits. We actually got like we went, we did like...
Eric Morse
Your daughter is laughing.
Rick Cytrynbaum
That's okay. We did. We did a Kickstarter campaign. We got like 700 grand, like everybody was buying it. And it worked. It was just as you walk, like, you'd have like quarters on your foot, and you'd have like, random metal things... walking around everywhere on your shoe. It was the coolest idea. I actually went to Reebok I sat with them. And I showed them that they're like, oh my god, this is amazing. I just couldn't get the cost down. And people just couldn't handle having like metal things like flung to their... clung to their shoe. So and it was a great idea. It was like, it was like an easy way, like laces that were rubberized. But or elasticized. But it didn't work anyway. So those are my...
Eric Morse
Yeah, those were great! yeah, great examples.
Rick Cytrynbaum
Too funny. I still have Zubits in my office, if anybody wants some Zubits.
Eric Morse
Well, maybe one more question, then we'll turn it to the groups. You guys be thinking of some questions. But, you know, if you had one or two things for young people coming out of university to be thinking about that want an entrepreneurial career, you know, one or two pieces of advice you might share with them?
Rick Cytrynbaum
I mean, my opinion is the real, the real. The real advice is, you know, I always advise to go into an industry that you that, you know well. If you understand the industry understand the space, then you can navigate through it, there's nothing worse than actually trying to be an entrepreneur or going into an industry that you don't really know, you know, the industry is so well and trying to, like disrupt that industry. You don't I mean, I look at I look at a friend of mine, you know, my friend, Michelle Romanow, like when she gets into a business, you know, she's so specific on kind of what she looks at what the actual model is, to be able to grow. So I truly believe like, the main thing for entrepreneurs is to understand the space. And if you don't understand space, get a mentor to work with you and sort of help you through that space through that process to understand the different sort of permutations and combinations that need to sort of have to happen within that space.
Eric Morse
Any questions from the from the group ror Rick? Yeah.
Student Question
Okay. So going back to your first business, right before that, were there any people, professors, organizations that really changed the way that you operate? Like, you kind of looked at them and copied what they did for yourself?
Eric Morse
Can we broaden it to mentors as well? (Yeah)
Rick Cytrynbaum
yeah. I'm sure. I mean, of course, I mean, part of my whole life. I mean, I think every week I try and, you know, meet with someone or talk to someone. I mean, I had some great high school professors that were that were great at some great university professors that were fantastic with the law school after university. So definitely had some some people in that space as well. Yeah, I mean, I think I think, you know, once I found the industry, I guess what I would do is I would find, sort of find the industry that I liked, like, let's say, in the apparel space, you know, the apparel space, one of the largest apparel guys in Canada or the world is Lawrence Stroll. So for me, you know, owns Michael Kors... owns Michael Kors, owns Aston Martin today, lives right around the corner from me. So for me, you know, spending time with him, we're going to learn from him, we're going to learn from people in the industry to mentorships that really shaped my understanding of the market, and give me ideas and conceptualized ideas that were, let's say, different than, than the way I would look at things because, you know, I, you know, as an entrepreneur, as a, as a business leader, or the business owner, not a leader, but as a business owner. You know, I look at everything sort of laser focused in one way, and sometimes that's a really good positive and also quite a big negative between the two. So that the best is to sort of be all run and realize what your limitations are. For me, I know fully what my limitations are. So I know that if I'm going to build a business that if I don't have a certain structure or a team that I can hire, work around, you know, it's more, more difficult.
Eric Morse
Yeah. Cool. Next question.
Student Question
How do you figure out how create the business structure at the start. How do you figure out who the partners are? How to split the partnership and the ownership of the company? And how do you resolve conflict between?
Eric Morse
Start with an easy one?
Rick Cytrynbaum
Let's put a board up and just throw (darts). I mean, I happen to be quite lucky that I'm only like, I've only made seven businesses. I've only been in the to my to my latest businesses, it's been with a bunch of partners, but...
Eric Morse
Most of them have been with a single partner right?
Rick Cytrynbaum
Yeah. I mean, word myself, I mean, I would say the most important thing in any partnership is full communication. And I think that's the most important thing. But, you know, resolving conflict on a, there's two parts of conflict, like day to day conflicts about the actual operations of the industry, or like, I hate you as a partner, and I need to get you out of my deal. And I want you to leave like there's are two very distinct differences. So the second one, I would say, have an amazing lawyer structure, shotgun in a million different clauses that you can exit, if you have to exit or figure out what that is, if it's inter-day conflict, or whatever it is, it's just either bring in mediation or just just be very transparent in your conversations, to understand that that's the hard part. So there's positives to having a partner, you share the risk, you share the reward, you share, whatever, but there's also that inner community conflict, that can be a little bit difficult, but, you know, saying it, you know, just just always go through with integrity. You know, that's the most important thing. Shady, people just don't just, they just don't work overtime. You know, unfortunately...
Eric Morse
For sure, Nicole?
Rick Cytrynbaum
Did I miss part of what you asked or no? If I did just go go, like I lose track pretty fast.
Student Question
So even, like, just like, the two of us are working together, and we chat about it with our friends. And they...
Rick Cytrynbaum
Two of you work together. Okay.
Student Question
No..
Eric Morse
So shady. Is that what you're saying?
We've got this idea (Yeah). We talk about it with our friends (Yeah). Our friends are like, we want to be involved (Yeah). How do you figure out who should be involved? Like, it's probably gonna be the two of us that are at the forefront of it. But yeah, how you do you...
Rick Cytrynbaum
Simple, simple, I mean. The way I look at is simple. So you have to look at the six fundamentals of starting the business. So one is like, you know, purpose, cause, you know, all the different sort of permutations of starting the business. Now, the question is, like, do you have cash, you don't have money, like, you know, you bring in a partner, because they're a cash partner, like, you have to understand like, when, when I when I look at the pizza, like I say this all the time, when you look at the pizza, like you're not making a pizza of just dough, you're not making a pizza of just cheese, you're making it with different ingredients. So you have to understand sort of what those ingredients are, what do you bring to the table? What do you bring to the table? What does your partner bring to the table? And what are you missing? You have to be very honest about those things that you're missing. Because if you think that you're everything to everybody, which most of you guys probably do in some way, like, you know, I can, I can, excuse me, I can do it. 100% I know what I'm doing. But realistically, sometimes you need a little bit of that help so that when you choosing a partner or whatever, it's, it's, if you have a few friends, it's like, well, what do you do? What are you thinking sort of like, especially if they're friends, you can also go back and understand like, where they came from, what their, you know, how they grew up, or what they learned, or what was their job structure. I delivered newspapers when I was nine years old till I was 14, every morning before school started. So I figured out like, not only that, I figure out how to how to sell newspapers, my brother and I everyday with our wagons. But we also figured out like how to sub it out to like, six other people in the neighborhood too. And also then get, you know, a royalty based on time, even there's different ways of doing it. So it's really about partnering with someone who can actually make you greater than what you are today. But understanding what your limitations of greatness are, in my opinion. Good luck, guys. Don't fight.
Eric Morse
In the very back Yeah.
Student Question
So when you begin to pursue an idea to determine whether it's viable or profitable. Do you have any tips on determining, like, finance, numbers wise, what works and it's a good idea and viable; to factor in all things...
Rick Cytrynbaum
Yeah, so I mean, I think I think there's two there's two schools of thought on that. I have a very specific school of thought on that. So most people sit down, they run pro formas, and they'll you know, go through market structure and, you know, market cap and figure out what their you know, what it isn't, you know, I always look at it like... listen, you know, look at the overall whatever whatever business it is, look at the overall market that you're in. So whether it was like you know, cosmetics or cannabis or selling of chairs, whatever it is, look at the... and once you understand that there's a market, like you just have to go with your gut and just roll with it; meaning there's no if you sit down and like I have friends of mine that a year later after talking about their startup and their idea are still like you know my financials aren't perfect and you know, I'm like I can say openly like I've done you know many financials and you know, many different pro formas and, and future projections and stuff. It means zero because conceptually, it doesn't, you don't really know what's going to happen between today and next Friday, let alone be able to map out two years and in two years or sell whatever. So it really comes, as I say, innately from your gut, you know, in apparel different than in one of the industries, there's a lot of competitors. And some, in some markets, there's no competitors. So there's positives and negatives to that. So if you're alone, and you have to roll with no competitors, you have to sort of figure out your own path. Whereas you're, you're alone. And there's a lot of competitors, you can use them as guides, or their businesses as guides. So there's different ways there's different ways of doing it. But But yeah...
Eric Morse
So Rick what I see, when, when you're looking at a market, you would convince yourself that the market is big enough here that if I get it, right, there's enough of it. (Yeah) and that's enough.
Rick Cytrynbaum
You have to have a little bit of that gray, that little bit of like that elasticity, because if you don't have that elasticity, you don't have it. No business is gonna sit down and fit in your box. And realistically, I mean, I started off in the footwear business 20 odd years ago, I mean, that was not exactly, you know, what I thought that I would, would be my first my first business to make, you know, super dress shoes and whatever. But that was kind of the first business because it fell into a market. I analyzed the market. I said, Wow, here's the market. Here's this, imagine if we made this at this price. And I found someone that can do that. Hmm. And this is just to give you an example. This is before Michael, Michael Kors, or Michael Kors, like very similar business, I mean, to what I had, you know, to figure out that a sort of affordable luxury, and where does that sit? You know, how does that sit? So I knew the market. I know anything more than that, no, I just knew my gut was gonna roll the dice. And then slowly, you know, kept reading about it and figuring out my yellow brick road until you figure it out. Hopefully, every time you get to a scarecrow or tin man, you kind of like have enough of a system around you, of friends, people, whatever, that can help you navigate through that specific spot, which is, which is difficult sometimes. But that's, that's.. Yep.
Eric Morse
Perfect. Perfect. Any other questions? The back? Yeah, Dale?
Student Question
Can you talk a little bit about operating from Canada, having successful businesses in the US.
Rick Cytrynbaum
Yeah, so yeah, I have homes in the US and I buy a flight pass. Now. I mean, being in Canada based it's I would say it's almost somewhat somewhat of an advantage in some way. Because it allows you to like, come into the come into different states or province... states in the US and understand the market figured out work for business doesn't actually leave. I haven't had an issue with that at all. Luckily, I have good partners in the US but I haven't had an issue. I chose Canada just because of kind of where I live and the fact that I love living in Canada, but I don't have any there's no negative there's no negative to living in Canada and working in the US if that was the question, I'm there's no, there's no negativity to it, I enjoy it very much. Because I love I love the travel, I love the knowledge I learn from other people, I like to hear what everybody else is kind of doing whether it's on vacation or somewhere it gives you like sort of a global perspective, whether it's in Europe, you know, or in the US gives you sort of a wider variety of and the more that you travel to meet with clients or people in those different states or cities sort of see the way different people live and and maybe adds to the adds to the overall function of your of your life, at least in Canada, but Canada living years is a full another choice for me.
Student Question
Yeah. Do you have a particular framework or process that you go about for developing conceptual framework of an industry? Any tips in regards to that?
Rick Cytrynbaum
Yeah. So you know, I do I have about four people that I work with that work for me, not partners, that are kind of like, you know, guys that I bounce all my ideas off of, and my two of them are like one of my two of my really good friends. And two of them are one of my creative director. And another good friend of mine lives in Maryland. And yeah, my whole process is like, sounds crazy. I'm like, dude, let's just all get together for four days. And I just want to talk about what the hell we're up to, and just talk talk talk until we come to a solution. So there's no real, as an entrepreneur, there's no real... I don't want to say algorithum... There's no real structure. I'm like, Okay, I'm gonna do this, this, this, I'm gonna, you know, and follow any kind of guidelines, but my guidelines are, you know, identify the issue. And is the market big? If it is, okay, great. I love that. So I'll figure out the middle, like, slowly, kind of like the white part of the Oreo between the two sides. So it's like, I look, I say, Okay, I love this industry. And then I say, Wow, the industry is really big. And that doesn't really have this. And then I'll kind of like slowly take the walls and bring them in where a lot of people will sit and conceptualize and idealize from the top to understand the market, make sure they feel very good about it before they jump in. I'll always make sure that, you know, do I understand the industry and if I understand the industry, how big is that and like where disruption happening at this moment? So I'll be able to, you know, I look at I look at Clearbanc, you guys find a Clearco for you guys. So I look at Clearco, my friend's the CEO of Clearco. So I looked at it, she sat with me in the plane about I don't know, two years ago before COVID just talking about these two businesses that she invested in one was called Sheertex, you know what Sheertex is? It's a hosiery company that doesn't rip? Period. So she's, she's a founder and that, to me, I'm like, Wow, that's amazing. She's like, Yeah, they're $200 on mine, I don't know what that but I would assume that, you know, it's a great model, because I think that's a huge problem. And this is a solution, whether it cost too much, or you bring it down over time. But the other part was in the direct to consumer business tell you openly, you can't get funding, it's very tough to get funding. So if you if you have a business model, that you're gonna be selling something online, and you have to put out of capital out of your out of pocket $100,000 to buy this, this, this and this, and you have a great turnover every month of of sales. You go to the bank, I mean, I've never had, I mean, I go to the bank like this, because I mean, the banks are you mean... the banks don't really help, not gonna really sit there and be like, Oh, we love your idea, you seem like, you know, there's the positive thing, and, you know, we're gonna, just based on the fact that, you know... we're gonna give you some money, it doesn't happen. But if you have a direct to consumer model, and you understand the model, people are buying it, and you can show traction. Clearco offers you a financial solution, what they do, just to give you an assumption for you understand is that the last year, you know, if you do $100,000 a month, and they know that you do $1.2 million a year in sales, and they know that you can afford $10,000 a month in June in interest, or however you do. They'll lend you some money to buy your goods. And then they do all your payment processing every month, and take away a piece every time before they remit the payment to you. So it's an opp... So I look at it, like when she told me the story, like Yeah, we're gonna be doing this, this this, I literally said to her work for work sitting there on the plane, I'm like, genius, because no one does that. And if I was in that situation, thank God, I wasn't. But if I was in that situation, in my 30s, and I needed to build a direct to consumer business, I'd be all I would be doing is raising, raising, raising... diluting diluting diluting and where this one allows you to actually own it, you have to put seed in yourself. But once you get it to a point that it's actually working, you don't have to dilute and sell to anybody else, you actually can get funds from a source in a different way than a normal bank. I'm saying that that just means disruption or in some way, like what you know, some of the opportunities that are out there in the space, you know, that are different and direct to consumer. Go for it. Yeah.
Student Question
When you're reaching out to influencers and celebrities to represent your brand or your product or whatnot, what type of cost benefit analysis would you do there to determine the name value of what they bring? And how much would you pay them? What revenue would be for you in that way? And I'm coming out of...
Rick Cytrynbaum
Yeah, so I have, I have like a very, very unique approach on this. So I believe that if you actually go and you meet with a celebrity, or influence, or anybody, and you tell them, Oh, my God, I love what you do. It's amazing, you know, I'd love to hire you or whatever. They just ever it is just gonna hold tight on price. So the angle I always use is like secret Rick 101 is, I always go in and I'm like, I'm like, Oh, my God, I love what you do. And I totally tell them what I do in some way and be like, Oh, my God, how come you don't have your own brand or your own something? So I always come at from the angle of like, how do I make you money? My asking you to make me money? How do I make you money, because once I make you money, then the authenticity will come out of it. I'll be pouring out of it. Once they realize how much money they can make with what we're doing to then bring them into a business that I'm doing, if that makes sense. So the paid influencer model is a really unless you're a retailer, it's really tough to quantify. I have a friend of mine was just talking about it this morning with my brother and you know an influencer in Montreal, she has 88,000 followers, not so big. But 80,000 followers, she has zero return, you give her something she posted he had zero sales, zero, then you have another influencer has 100? 50? Another one has 50,000 followers, who if I do a deal with her, she'll do like 40 grand this month, you don't I mean, so it's very hard. Everybody thinks that they're better. So I never liked the pain advanced to understand what I was until I actually get some quantum, some sort of quantified data at the end. So but I always go in myself and be like, This is what I do. I'd love to do something with you. I think you deserve to have your own brand. You know, I come from a specific angle. And then once I once I get them to understand what I'm doing, then I'm able to say hey, why don't we and then they'll they'll want to do it with they'll want to do it for you with enthusiasm, because the pay as you play model. It's a tough one. It's cost unless you have you know, a lot of money in the bank. You know, I know the CEO of boat rocker, you know, Boat Rocker (Media). Surely you should look into boat rocker. It's great, great with largest production film companies in Toronto here. They just went public a few weeks ago. Great, great group, do a lot of Netflix series, whatever, but they have a very similar methodology to what to way? I the way I think as well.
Eric Morse
Cool. Nice.
Student Question
You talked a lot about gut feel. And I know that gut feels can change and people have different gut feels for different ventures (For sure). How did you ... get started different ventures? How did you figure out which one would be successful? Which gut feelings to listen to? Was there a trigger point in your career? And if so, how did you know something was a trigger point?
Rick Cytrynbaum
I mean, yeah, it's a great question. I mean, luckily for me, I have a very close knit family, between my self, my kids. So we talked about it all the time, and the fact that they've been involved in my business since day one. It's about having people around you, I think you'd have a gut feeling that you can actually like, Give me time to tell you how many times I've like told someone, I feel this idea. And they'll be like, Yeah, I don't know. I'm not I'm not too interested in it. And yeah, I don't think so I'd be like, Oh, okay, and I'd walk away from it. Then here a month later, that guy was like, super jealous of the fact that I did this thing, or I could have done this deal. So I think it's really about having an inner circle, I think that really makes good sense. And being able to test your gut feeling. Because I can be like, I love this, this, this and this. And then like, my partner will call me and be like, I love this idea. And the guy's like, Yeah, but let me tell you one thing that like, that doesn't work like that. And in fashion, remember, I'm like, You're right. But if I didn't have that open discussion with him to be able to discuss it as like part of my milieu of my inner circle, you really wouldn't get that sort of response back. So I think it's about bringing the right people around you that can either emphasize the emphasize or make you feel in your gut feeling and help you read what your gut is. And you can be expressive to someone about what you're feeling in your gut for someone to help sort of navigate which way for you to go. I've made many times a few gut feel, you know, many times I'm mad at myself for doing a deal or getting involved in something or investing in something and having a gut feeling many times someone's like, oh, this stocks gonna be amazing. It's $21 gonna be 50 bucks. Great, you know, go ahead, put in 100 grand and give it a shot. It's, you know, $6 Because you had your gut feeling was like the operator was weird. Like, that's no good. But so it's really about having a great nurse, a great circle of people that you can talk to you like close people that only want to see you succeed and only want to together benefit from the success in some way to keep that to keep that gut together. I don't know if that...
Eric Morse
That's the trust, but verify gut model I think...
Rick Cytrynbaum
Yeah, yeah. He'll say it better than me.
Eric Morse
I want to thank you so much... Any any last thoughts you want to leave with the group before we cut off?
Rick Cytrynbaum
Yeah, I mean, I just, I always truly believe in the hustle. So even in today's day and age, people are so calculating. They're always trying to figure out every little intricacy and make sure everything looks perfect on paper, nothing looks perfect on paper, nothing will look perfect on paper, learn from your peers, like learn from your teachers, learn from the environment around you. And just go with your gut and roll the dice because and you know, try and mentorship in some way. But go with your gut, if you feel that there's a good market, the only thing you can do is what is fail, okay, what's gonna happen, don't get pick up your socks and do it again, like, so I believe as an entrepreneur, not everybody is meant to be an entrepreneur. There's people that work in companies that people work in businesses. I've personally never had a job in my life. I don't even know I don't I think I'd be the worst employee personally. But I think that as an entrepreneur, it's really just about rolling the dice and doing some sort of calculated, you know...
Eric Morse
Get out there and start getting action, right? You'll learn.
Rick Cytrynbaum
Get out there. Talk to people learn, ask questions. And if you feel you're not getting the right answer, you're asking the wrong person. Keep figuring it out through the snakes and ladders. Life is... entrepreneur... an entrepreneur life I tell you is Snakes and Ladders. You go up, you slide down you figure out there's no right or wrong. It's true! (love it) There's no right or wrong. So you just got to roll the dice and you can email me if you have any questions anytime. Absolute pleasure.
Eric Morse
All right. Well, thanks Rick for your time.
Rick Cytrynbaum
Thank you.
Eric Morse
Thanks the entrepreneur podcast is sponsored by Quantumshift 2008 alumni Connie Clerici and Closing the Gap Healthcare Group. To ensure you never miss an episode, subscribe to the show on your favorite podcast player or visit entrepreneurship.uwo.ca/podcast. Thank you so much for listening. Until next time.