Showpo's Jane Lu Launched Her Biz With a Social Media Contest—Now It's Hitting $100m+

0:00Hey, welcome to the Female Founder World Podcast. I'm Jasmine. I host the show and I don't know, you see me in the group chat for Female Founder World. I'm at all of the events. I am doing all things Female Founder World. But today's guest is somebody that I have been trying to rope into this community for a really long time. She's amazing. Her name's Jane Liu. She's the founder of a nine figure fashion business out of Australia called Shopo. She also has a business course. She has a podcast. She is a judge on the first season of Shark Tank Australia, which is coming out pretty soon. She has kids, like she has a lot going on.

0:37So it took a while to line up this interview, but we finally got there and truly it did not disappoint. I focus a lot on launch marketing, which is going to be the theme over the next few weeks on the podcast. We are focusing on launch strategies on how people get things off the ground and not just new businesses, but how they're thinking about launching new products. So if you're somebody who's already got an existing business and you want to grow it and build out new offerings to your product line, this is going to be relevant to you as well. So we talk about her launch process, how she launched the business and got traction, but then also how they launch collections now as a massive company, how she thinks about influencers and UGC.

1:18It's a great conversation, but the best thing about Jane's founder story, which we talk a bit about, but I just want to flag right here is how she got started. It's just the wildest. I don't know. It's the story that I've heard it over and over again because I've been following her story. And so I feel like maybe we skimmed over it a little bit in the episode. So I want to give you the story now. Basically, Jane was raised pretty conservatively. Her parents wanted her to have a steady full-time job, that real immigrant mindset. And she thought that that's what she wanted to. She worked for a big accounting firm.

1:54And then one day her and somebody else like started a business. It was like this pop-up fashion store. She quit her job and went all in on this business idea and didn't tell her parents because like we said, conservative. They wouldn't have maybe understood at the time. She was nervous about what they would have thought. And so she got dressed every day like in a suit. She lived with her parents. So she like got on the bus with her mom to go into the city, pretended she was going to work, but then would go to coffee shops and like the library. and work on this fashion startup. Anyway, the pop-up store concept failed.

2:29Her and her business partner separated and she couldn't get another job because it was in the middle of the GFC. And so she decided to start another business. It became Showpo. It was a hit and it is just the most inspiring story about how she got this off the ground and continued to grow it. Before we jump into the show, I have a quick recommendation for you. It is another podcast. It's by Dolma Alton and the show is called Due Diligence. It is for entrepreneurs, founders, anyone in the tech and entrepreneurship space. Dolma is pretty big on TikTok. That's where I discovered her. And she recently released this pod where she dives really deep into brand building, founder stories, and the startup space.

3:11It's a little bit more tech focused than our show, but if you're interested in business in general, I think you're going to love it. Link in the show notes if you want to check out Due Diligence by Dolma Alton. Okay, let's get into the episode. You are now entering Female Founder World with your host, Jasmine Garnsworthy. Jane, welcome to Female Founder World. I'm so excited to have you on the show. This is a long time coming. Yes, thank you so much for having me. I'm so excited too. Okay, so I want to start by giving people a bit of an understanding. Like you have built a nine-figure retailer.

3:43You are going to be a judge on the first season of Shark Tank in Australia. you just launched a podcast like you have a lot of things going on but we're going to spend most of this conversation talking about showpo and how you built your fashion business I love your startup story I feel like it is one of the most like like funny relatable wild kind of startup stories you're working finance you lied to your parents and it just like all happened to work out but in the early days it didn't feel like that like talk me through what you were doing in the beginning and how you got this all off the ground.

4:20Oh my God, we're going way back. So this is now 13 years ago. Oh, sorry. This is now like 13 years ago when I was, I used to work in accounting at a big four accounting firm and I just absolutely hated it. And so I actually thought I actually quit my job to start another business and it was running pop-up stores and I just didn't care what the business model was. I was just so excited to start a business. I was just, you know, trying to like chase the dream and then um so I quit my job but then my business partner screwed me over and she left me high and dry and said that we were going to close the business down so then all of a sudden I was now unemployed I had a failed business I was in debt from the business and like from quitting my job from uni a bunch of things so I was in$60 ,000 of debt and then yeah and then I was like and it was in the middle of the global financial crisis so I couldn't get another job so my only option was to start another business so I started to show for by default so because I had quit my first business couldn't bring myself to tell my parents that I had done that because I we kind of immigrated from China so my parents would give me the chance of a better future and they wanted me to you know go to a good school uni get a great job and so all of a sudden to tell them that I've just thrown it all away to sell clothes online, which is just like.

5:46Also, people weren't selling clothes online then. People weren't selling much online. Exactly. And so my parents, there was no way I could tell them anything. I could tell them this. So I just kind of didn't tell them. I thought that was the only logical option. So for the first six months of starting Shopeo, I just actually pretended to go to work every day, get up early, put on my corporate suit. Then like my mom worked in the city, so I had to get the bus into the city with my mom every day and just like, oh God, just thinking what the hell have I done with my life? Oh my God. Okay. We know now that it did work out, but you're starting a business when you're$60 ,000 in debt.

6:25And like one of the questions that we get in our group all the time, it's like, how do I, how do I fund a business? I can't get Like access to funding for women full stop is difficult, but particularly if you're in like consumer, it's super, super hard. So people are bootstrapping, but you started from a place of being in debt. How did you manage those like huge costs that come up with starting a business? Like you needed to buy product and you needed to like market the business. What were you doing that was like scrappy and that other people can kind of think about when they're, when they're trying to start something now?

6:55So I, so I think your two main costs with signing a business is product and marketing and now when I look at a lot of small businesses I see people spending a lot on websites and like all these other like anything else you just it's it's unnecessary and I think that's what kind of um like dries up a business's funds and so for me it's it's all about marketing and inventory so in terms of inventory we bought stock on consignment so we found a supply that would sell to us on consignment which meant that we only had to pay for it after it sold now this is really uncommon but the only reason i even knew about this is because that's what we did with our first business our pop-up store so we had no well we all like me and two business partners at the time put in ten thousand dollars each and so we actually lost seven thousand dollars of that on the website which with hindsight i could have built myself you know so in terms of stock we didn't buy anything we went around to the markets and we handed out business cards and we're like hey if you want to stock with us we do it on consignment 50 cent markup and because we approached people at markets were emerging designers they were able to I guess there was they were desperate to kind of find stockists as we were desperate to find like stock so it was a good way of getting people to be able to work on consignment and then cut to for show pro using that consignment model again i think we got quite lucky finding a supplier that was happy to do that with us because we gave them exclusivity at the start as well um it wasn't at the time it was a brand that didn't have an online presence so we were kind of doing that for them because they were not at the time realizing that opportunity for themselves so that's how we got stock and so it meant that every day I would have to go into the supplier's office and pick up stock which is like a lot of effort but then at that time you know I had had plenty of time I didn't have money so it made sense and so that's that's what we did for inventory and then in terms of marketing we did everything on social media which at the time was still really uncommon and I thought it was a big hindrance that at the time I was like oh I knew I should have done a marketing degree as part of my commerce degree so I was really kicking myself because I was like this accounting and finance it's useless um but then I realized not doing that marketing degree was so good because it would have constrained me to being stuck in this traditional way of thinking thinking that oh my god I can't do PR I can't do billboards I can't do radio there's no way to market myself because I had to get like strappy I um strappy or scrappy anyway I had to like hustle and do it all on social media at the time this is Facebook marketing that's how long ago it was that was just like so yeah um we I heard you did like a competition on Facebook what or like face of showpo like what was that did it work how did that go so oh I was I remember I was like one night I was on my couch or my boyfriend's couch because this is when I just I finally as soon as he moved to um Sydney from Brisbane I just showed up at his house with all my stock and this is how I stopped pretending to lie to my parents and I'm like surprised we live together now anyway so I was on his couch one night feeling really sad for myself being like what am I doing with my life and I was watching America's Next Top Model as I was like you know doing website uploads and then they had this audience favorite segment for the first time where you're meant to vote on Facebook and I was like oh my god this is brilliant because this is back when there was facebook fan gate like fan gate was still on so you had to like and follow our page in order to engage with it and so we i basically put it out there that if you to our following which is 3 000 people at the time to enter a competition to be the face of showpo or showpenny at a time and then so these girls entered themselves and then they would then ask their friends to go and vote for them so they would the like girls went crazy like they went and like started facebook groups facebook pages like facebook events um tagging all of their friends and so their friends would vote for them and follow the page but then their friends entered themselves and it just started having this multiple and then reaching out to their friends it had this amazing multiplier effect where we went from 3 000 to 20 000 followers in the space of a month and it cost nothing and at that time back in 2012 20 000 facebook followers was like a lot and so you're an influencer yeah exactly combined with like that that many followers having like a name like show pony which just because it's a common turn of phrase it sounds more established having like a landline number having a bricks and mortar store like it just made us seem so established as an early like like an early e-commerce store and so every every little bit of that helped.

11:58I heard you say that, um, you know, a year into the business ish, like things kind of plateaued your business partner left. It was like all then on you. And I'm really curious about how you turned it around. I was listening to your, um, the podcast episode that you did about this. And it was like, when, when the business partner left, the business was doing like five grand a month or something. And then the next month you did nearly, you nearly doubled it. And then within two years, you had your first million dollar month, like what were you doing what did you literally just like posting on facebook like what were you doing it was so it was literally a bit of everything and i i almost wish that at the time it's a great whenever you have a baseline it's always good to almost like a b test things so you know what works because i mean obviously then you you would now you would have analytics you would be able to look into the metrics to see what works but at the time i didn't have that either so i wish i could just say that I did one thing and then could see if it worked or not but because it was that month of I was like oh my god it was all me I just literally did everything that I could so we I went and bought more stock you know if you have more stock you've got more stuff to sell and then I started doing more social media posts I started doing google ads um and then because I'm yourself you're just like learning as you go like on youtube or something at this point yes I I think it was yeah it was just like googling how to do it and I don't even know if it's done well um and I think I remember at that point before my business partner actually said to me she was like and I was like let's do google ads and because the business wasn't going well like I understand why she was saying that she's like let's just make more money before we spend more money and that was kind of her attitude I was just leaving the business and I was like oh my god and so anyway we started doing google ads we started we oh I removed the shipping charge um so it was free shipping um what do we do we took like yeah I think just like having having more content go out um but like quicker customer service quicker social media responses it was like literally I think the problem was as the business you know it got to the stage where it's been like a year and a half with my business partner and it wasn't going well and I felt like I was doing all the work I was probably getting a bit bitter as well so I wasn't necessarily doing that much I was like well you're if you're not doing much I'm not doing much so I wasn't really doing that much to be fair at that five thousand dollar mark as well and so we at that point also had um it's also like hard to put in like a quick story but we had a store in the city um in the in like a little kiosk area and that was doing quite well so that was taking my attention and you know that being December it was the store was doing really well um probably making like 50k that month although that's a lot yeah yeah sorry yeah it was doing like the store sorry the the city store was doing 50 ,000 and the online was doing 5 ,000 so it was just not taking that much my of my attention interesting okay and now like when I look at Shopo and I've been following you guys since you started like I feel like I've been shopping the brand I was working as a fashion editor when you were like getting all this going so I've been watching what you've been doing and like wearing Shopee forever and it's been really cool to see you like add just expand like adding new categories you did work where like seven years ago you brought in inclusive sizing you started doing like wedding I know that you wore you wore like a$300 wedding dress yeah from Shopee to your wedding and it looked amazing.

15:35I am curious about like how you think about adding in and launching new categories. Like what is it, is it fueled by like data that's coming through? Is it like an intuitive thing for you as a CEO? Like where does that, where do those insights and decisions come from? Um, it's a bit of both because you ultimately, you want to chase like what you want to do, what your customers actually want and you want to chase the money. Right. So in terms of categories, like we started by doing like formal because we had bought a few more formal pieces and they were selling really well and also the margins are there because ultimately like you're you can charge a lot more for a formal dress um and so that was kind of our first foray into having like our own collection um and then in terms of then the next thing was workwear I just remember that was more of a personal this is still because it was in our infancy you know you're kind of more driven by doing things that you want and you're trying to solve a problem that you see for yourself um and so that was when I was in terms like when I was working corporate my entire do you remember Q like the brand like that really yeah used to be my favorite store but it was my entire paycheck because I was on like a$24 ,000 a year salary and so um I wanted to find like a solution for affordable workwear and so that's our next that's when that's probably our first big formal like this is our collection our range new category that we've created and then in terms of extending our sizes it was just I think you can it was a response to what customers were saying were asking for and it just seemed like a very obvious natural progression for the business at the time we first said we should do this it seemed nearly impossible because we none of our suppliers wanted to do it and we were such a small fish for any of our China suppliers.

17:33So we just didn't think it was going to be possible, but, you know, it took a couple of years, but we got there. When you say that you're like listening to what customers are saying, is that literally like what they're sending in customer, like over emails? Is it Instagram comments? Like where does that feedback come from and how do you gather it? Yeah, it's in terms of, it's comments on social media, it's emails and then it's also I guess you're looking at you know in a way in a way you look at what global trends are I mean at the time that we did extended sizes it wasn't that clear I feel like it's very clear the movement towards size inclusivity at that time that that wasn't clear um and so you kind of have to like take like follow your gut on some things um but in terms of like listening to your customers it's a hard one because sometimes you have to also be commercial because if you try and please everyone that you're pleasing no one and then you know we sometimes people ask for longer dresses but then the bulk of our customers want short dresses and then we make them a bit longer like how do you say oh we've made more modest styles but you're not buying them so yeah and so it's like how it's it's hard to find that balance sometimes I think it depends on what you're trying to do like if you're not actually changing up what your production demands you can test things so it's all about even at our stage my biggest advice for any business is to like test and iterate and I know that's not it's not anything new but I guess for me to say that it's something that we still have to do at this size like we don't know what we're we don't just go oh we know what we're doing we're gonna back this 100 % like we're still testing and iterating um even at our size at very small quantities um because you know we've we've actually made the mistake of even at a bigger size of just like banking too much on you know gut feel I guess um even without gut feel even with data like you you can never be sure I think yeah I want to talk a little bit more about like launching those collections because we spoke about like you know marketing that got the business off the ground and I don't know I just feel like you are a really skilled like brand and marketing person obviously you're like the CEO and the business brains behind everything but I just feel like show post brand is really strong when you launch stuff like people know about it I see it everywhere what does uh what does a launch look like now when you're releasing new product or you're launching a big new like um a new category like are you doing launch events influencer gifting affiliates like what what what's some things that like work right now in 2023?

20:17Oh, that's a tough one. I feel like the, um, the environment for campaigns has really changed in the last few years. There's just so much noise that it's really hard to get airtime. And so I think in terms of campaigns, there's always a few things we'll do like a big campaign. You'll do a few hype posts, but we, I've seen, I've seen other brands doing very successful, like hype marketing and I, we don't do it that much because there's always so much going on that there's not enough room to build hype because you're actually already promoting another concurrently promoting another collection at the same time it really depends I do think like I guess for my podcast that was probably the most hype I've ever given something and that actually did work like that so maybe we'll re-evaluate our hype process actually as I think more about this um but in terms of like for our campaigns like we'll you know we'll have different tiers and then for each tier we'll have different like what we what we spend on the marketing in terms in terms of like influencer gifting influencer paid collabs and in terms of like whether we do an event or not um I mean I just I I personally love the idea of having little like intimate dinners like to celebrate the launch of the event because it's fun I think it does in terms of like reach it's it's a great it's a great value proposition in terms of like if you're looking at the paid part of it we'll calculate it based on like the cost per engagement um if that was like a paid compared to a paid post and I think it makes a lot more of an impact but that's not to say like I know that influencer marketing works but I think for a startup I'm I still I'm not fully convinced on influencer marketing as a whole for everyone because of how expensive it is and how much it can drain people's money it almost feels like and I feel like how influencer marketing now is almost like how PR can be I think it depends if you have a great PR a bull product if there's lots to talk about then then you can it's it's a great avenue but if you just it just I think I don't know I think it depends on the product I think it depends on finding the right influencer alignment I just have seen so many small businesses waste money on influencer marketing and it's gone nowhere whereas you know the other strategy is to actually pay for UGC and have a boosted paid strategy, but ultimately that does depend on the product.

23:02So Jane, I feel like you're like one of the few people that are saying this right now that like influences is not the move. And I'm super interested. Like when you think about doing UGC and boosting it, like for someone who hasn't done that before and who was like entering this, like, what does that mean? Like, what does that look like? Oh, sorry. Yes. I'm like, Oh my God. Even like when we're on Shark Tank, I'm like, they're like, stop using jargon. I always tell people off about using jargon and using abbreviations and I'm like, Oh my God, I didn't realize I was doing it myself. So sorry. Um, so user generated content.

23:31So basically getting content creators and now there's so the, the creative economy is huge. And I think it's, I love that. I love how like Tik TOK, Instagram has allowed anyone to be an entrepreneur by creating content. Like you don't need to have a physical product. Like you, it's your service. It's your brand. It's your, um, it's your time that you can monetize so I love that or basically getting the right um content creator to make content for your product and then getting usage on that and then boosting it as an ad I feel like when I buy random shit on the internet it's from like you know those Facebook ads that's like oh here's a problem you didn't know you have and here's our here's our product like how our product solves it.

24:17I think it's brilliant. Okay, I love that. That's super insightful on like how you're thinking about influencers now because I think I totally think you're right. I was literally having a conversation with somebody last night at one of our events about this and she has a really expensive like jewelry brand and she was kind of like, I don't know like how I work with, if I should work with influencers and how I should do it and whether it's worthwhile. And I was like, you just need to be like, if you're going to do it through a gifting campaign and not through paid, Like it's so hard to get them, get anyone to post about you.

24:48And you just have to be so like personalized and targeted about what you're doing and who you're gifting. There was this really cool, do you know, you know, a Twile Collective that like makeup brand, makeup case brand. Yeah. Yeah. So Michelle lives in New York now. She's an Aussie. And she did this campaign to gift Sofa Dofa, I think is her name. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And she saw that she was going away on like this big European holiday and like she loves her cat and her cat was going to be left behind. And Michelle literally like had her cases hand painted with this like Italian inspired lemon print.

25:26She filled it with this really fancy cat food that was like for the cat. She sent the gift to Soph's mom and to her so that it was like, you know, pulling at the heartstrings of that like relationship. they curated a playlist for like the cat to listen to while Soph was traveling like she went so all out and then she and then they got some free coverage um based on that gifting because like they went so instead of gifting a whole lot of people they just like picked one person and just like really went in on it and I thought that was such an interesting way to think about it because the influencer marketing thing is really hard yeah absolutely that's so smart because you know a post with sofa dofa would not be cheap so that's really totally I do have to say the best influencer content creator for any business is yourself so I feel like if you don't have the money and you don't want to take a risk with even content creators just turn yourself into a content creator for your own business and okay so this literally feeds perfectly into what I want to talk to you next which is you're like a superstar content creator I don't know how you're like the CEO and literally this like face of this business as well.

26:35You look like you're having so much fun all the time, which I feel like is really on brand for like the actual product that you sell. Also, I feel like that's just your vibe and who you are, but you are really forward facing. You're, you know, you're going on Shark Tank as a judge. And then you also say that you have imposter syndrome as well. And we always have people in the community being like, I don't want to go on TikTok. Like, I don't want to be the face of the business. I'm just going to like get other people to do it and I'm like dude you're missing such a big opportunity and you don't have budget to pay people to do it so you just need to get over it how did you get over it so okay well maybe I'm like I don't know so maybe I'm a bit of a weirdo because back in high school me and one of my friends used to like make skits and then just record it on a camcorder for ourselves they were like so bad it was almost like you know um scary movie or like you know those like spoof kind of stuff or like make spoofs of like reality TV shows and like movies.

27:29And anyway, so, and then it's not for anyone to see, cause it would be way too embarrassing. Like, I'm so glad those were before the days of YouTube and we never went, let's just see if anyone likes it. No, we just kept it. Oh my God. I think that's about everything. But I'm like, so glad I grew up before this. Yeah. So I genuinely actually enjoy content creation. I definitely get like, I'm so I definitely get nervous about putting stuff on the internet like I get even like if I'm like upstairs making a video and my husband I can hear him coming up the stairs I'll take the tripod and I'll go shove it in like the walk-in wardrobe because I'm like oh I'm not doing anything it's like as if I'm having an affair and I'm like go hide like I'm so um nervous about content creation but like when I do it with people I really kind of enjoy it it's like a creative outlet um but like I'm it took me a while to properly get on tiktok there was a while um I think I I think for me I enjoy it as more of a social group activity so I feel like that's when that's you know doing it at work I like it but then during COVID which would have been the time to actually do that content um when I was in lockdown I was too scared and too nervous and I was too self-critical because you're just like and so I didn't actually do that much then so that was that was a big opportunity miss but okay in terms of doing in doing content and being the face of the brand in a way I originally also tried to do PR for show pro back in the early days and because we were not designing our own products I'm not a designer um it was we were purely retailing now and you know and now we're designing most of our own clothes but because we were just a retailer at the start it was nothing pr-able right and so that's the that's when i say people shouldn't just get a pr agency and just be like go talk about this product that has no story so then anyways and also i couldn't afford to actually hire an agency so i was trying to do my pr nothing was working and then i found that people were interested in me as talking as an entrepreneur and back this is in the early like 2012s 2013 I found that like me as a female Asian entrepreneur like it gave me a point of difference like and so I'm like fuck man I'm gonna use being a minority like of course it's gonna work you know so I it was great so I was able to get a lot of PR um and then it just kind of you know why like why wouldn't I take the PR opportunity um so that's kind of how it wasn't a strategy um like even so I've launched a business course at the start of the year and I was writing the PR strategy and I make yourself the brand go do this to go do speaking blah blah blah like this is how you can um leverage from one thing to the other and build a name for yourself and your brand but then at the time I was doing it it wasn't at all a strategy because you didn't really know what you were doing it was just you know as a startup you're just trying to chasing the money you're chasing PR you're just chasing whatever opportunity you could possibly get for the business and so how which is actually amazing now that by doing so that's why I mean there's some lots of amazing businesses out there but for Shark Tank the production company to have found me it's because I have put myself and if you look at the other judges they put themselves out there too like you see like Sabri and Davey all over social media you see Dr.

31:07Kat Wallace she is well she she's on like 60 minutes Q &A she's like she's on like a lot more formal programs and she's in like the AFR. But anyway, she puts herself out there, right? You never know what door things will open for you, but I think it's, you just have to put yourself out there. Yeah. And you know what, you've been like creating content, putting yourself out there for years. And then there's like big opportunity came from it. So I think that's the thing as well. Like some people are like, well, you know, I do think you can post for a few months and get disheartened. And it's like a brand and a personal brand is built by telling your story over and over again.

31:40Like how many times have you told the story about how you started and like how you didn't tell your parents? Like you must've told that story literally thousands of times, right? Yeah. Yeah. It's like, it's not just you make one TikTok and then all of a sudden like a personal brand is made. Like this has been something that you've been saying again and again for years. Yeah. I feel like my team are like, Oh, the suit, the bus. Yes, we know.

32:06okay I want to like switch gears a little bit and talk about like hiring firing managing a team you are someone who who has been able to like really effectively scale something and obviously a big part of that is that you have found a way to like zoom out of the business and this is something that I think a lot of people have like you get to a certain point and it's like you don't know how to bring the right people in and to remove yourself from the right tasks so that you can focus on growth and other people can focus on like the operating stuff of the actual business. What advice do you have for people around this?

32:42Like what's worked for you? What hasn't, you know, what have you messed up? I mean, I think the biggest, the first step to scaling any business is to hire, start hiring and then put in systems and processes so that you can work on the business instead of in the business. And, you know, it's funny. I feel like it's, I think for so many people, it's so easy to get caught up in trying to do everything and trying to be a perfectionist for it. I'm also, it's interesting. I was actually thinking about this exact thing last night because I kind of treat my new podcast as a startup because it's kind of like a new little venture and I've realized that I was spending so much time in it I was like up until like midnight last night just like doing some of the editing and then I was like no this can be why are you editing your own podcast no I was like choosing I was like choosing the listening to it and then marking up the transcript or like the I was trying to try and I've been editing my own snippets because I'm like oh but get rid of that silence and so and then last night I realized oh my god it's not worth it this it's you're never this I realized I'm not going to be able to do this long term I'm going to burn myself out and then I'm not going to be able to like spend more time doing other parts like there's other parts of the podcast I could be doing like in terms of like finding like you know finding new speakers thinking about new questions think about ways to evolve the podcast like marketing if I'm just working on the day the working on the day-to-day tasks and I just need to let go and like actually yes if you didn't remove that pause or whatever or you remove that awkward word it's actually not going to make a difference like you're not actually like it's not actually worth it for what you're missing out on and so that I was it's literally what kind of happened at the start of the business I was literally doing everything when my business partner left I was managing the stores which meant like replenishing the stock managing the team um and then you know everything that comes with like managing a store and then like in terms of the online business taking e-com photos like cropping uploading I think I had one virtual assistant at the time so I was she was able to help but then I was doing social media customer service I was physically driving to buy this pick up the stock still um doing all the just like picking the orders writing thank you notes packing it packing them and taking them to the post office it was literally a full like I would just get up and get into work mode and go straight into and just working these crazy hours which I know like most a lot of like startups do but then that would have limited the business to a certain amount of growth and me thinking like oh how am I going to possibly have the time to train someone when I'm so busy doing this and what if they make a mistake um they're not going to be able to do this as well as I could I can and I remember at the time that you know minimum wage at the time was maybe like 23 dollars 20 I don't know but then I was I remember I was on 570 when I started at McDonald's which I was like 14 and you know it's stupid I was six dollars 80 that was exactly yeah but you're just like thinking like oh my god it's so expensive I should just do this myself and because I've been so poor like poor for so long in the lead up to this um anyway it wasn't this sounds so you're not gonna believe this is so silly but I when business wasn't going well but I had just started making some money for from the store I my I booked a trip to go to Miami for Ultra Music Festival in March so remember that January was when we started doing 9 ,000 a month.

36:26Feb, we were now doing 40. So I'm looking at the next month thinking, oh my God, like I've just started having momentum. It would be so reckless to go on this trip. But I also have really bad FOMO and I can be really convinced. Like I'm always like, if someone goes, have one more drink, I will be like, yeah, I'll have one more drink. I'm like the last person at every party. So I can be really, like I have a really, what is it, rubbery elbow? Rubber arm, yeah, yeah. Rubber arm, okay. so just just the elbow for you rubber arm okay oh and so I've said I swear I've said rubbery elbows so many times and people would have been like okay good good for you anyway um so I went on this trip I took I got one of the girls I was working at the store to come into my to come and work on the online business so this is my first like the first employee um for like show pony this the online store show pro the online store anyway this is still in my parents garage so she would have to go through my parents house downstairs to the garage to work and when i and then that month we we did 75 000 that month the business almost doubled that month i was away for like a week and a half um yeah so I went to Miami I went to New York had the best time and I came back nothing was broken and obviously she made a couple of mistakes but the business still kept growing and then I actually found out that she was billing me for and so that's the thing this is why you don't want to take these risks because you're like oh this person's gonna make mistakes they're gonna like um they you know they could if you hire someone they might do something dishonest Well, she did.

38:09She actually started, she was billing me till 9pm every night and just saying like, oh, there was a lot of work, blah, blah, blah. But then she, I could see the last, she was basically just doing dispatch and emails. Um, but then the last email was 3pm in the sent box, like an idiot. Anyway. And then you're not going to be packing orders after say 5pm or 530. Right. So I'm like, what were you doing? And I know that she had bad internet at home. So she was just doing her uni assignment at my house in my parents' garage. And then my mom is like, and I just couldn't believe like, this is like, my mom was making her dinner because she was working overtime.

38:48So she was there doing her uni assignment, charging me for it. And my mom was making her dinner. Like what? So how do you get over this experience and then decide, actually, you know what? I need to keep growing the team. That's the move. And not just think, oh shit, I'm never going to trust anyone with my business baby again. Um, yeah, I think I don't, oh God, what was my mindset back then I think I was just like oh my god$140 ,000 I could only see yeah at that time I was so happy and I was just had this amazing trip so I was pretty like um I was pretty happy with myself so I came back and then I and the fact that like I had this person now work she obviously I got rid of her but then I brought someone else in and we started growing the team the next month$140 ,000 in sales you know like it was just being able to then work on the business doing more like doing way more things I think we started like hiring like a um ad agency by that at some point around then so you know I I think there's all the no's for why you shouldn't do something but ultimately you have to look at the opportunity cost of like doing it yourself you know and I think of course there's going to be mistakes that's made like it's not going to be a perfect execution of scaling the business of course it's not that's the whole point you're meant to just overcome these challenges and had you not learned their mistake at the earlier stage when the business is bigger you're going to make it again because you are like human nature you are just the the type of person you are you're bound to make that mistake until you learn so you're better off making it when the business is smaller when you put more less on the line for at that point.

40:27That's such a good piece of advice. Jane, I could like talk to you about this all day, but we're nearly at time. And so I want, I've got one more question for you. And that is, is for a resource and like just something that's been helping you, you know, obviously you are, you've had to up-level as a leader, as an entrepreneur, the business has been growing, like what, what resource has helped you do that, that you think other people should check out? Well, I might use this to plug my business course, thelazyceo.com. So I do have a business course for growing and starting, starting and growing an online business.

40:59Um, and it's like just all about like sourcing product marketing and then the talking through the stages of growth that I have that I had. It's, um, just a bunch of videos. So if you want to get sick of seeing my face, but in terms of like, not to, I don't want to like plug it too much. So I'll talk about some of the things that I really enjoyed. I think in the show notes as well for people who want to check it out. Thank you. And then, um, in terms of like, what's really helped me, I think I feed off other people. So at the time I joined some like business course thing, which I don't think necessarily taught me that much because with hindsight, it probably would have helped someone who had to make B2B sales.

41:38Um, so it's, it's a lot of like sales skills, not a lot in terms of like online and digital marketing, but being in part of that environment really helped um having people to ask questions and like just being surrounded because this is again back in like 2012 2013 none of my friends had businesses everyone worked corporate I felt very like I had no one to talk to about things and you know all the ideas were just coming from me but being part of like surrounded by other business people really helped but I think okay that's all great advice because I'm sure people are surrounded by other entrepreneurs oh like find a bitch is drinking wine my business group yeah with 170 000 i do think community i mean like this is something that a lot of founders on the show recommend and it's because it is important like you need to find other people who are doing this you can't just be like hanging out with the people that you went to high school with who have are not going in the same place that you want to go like you need they can be a best mates group like you need to find people that are like your version of like colleagues if you're working on a business by yourself who can like help you with that and that's why yeah communities like like-minded bitches drinking wine we've got a group chat as well and like yeah find the people yes yes exactly love that jane thank you so much for coming on the show like your story is a wild one if like i could talk to you all day every day what um where can people find you where can they find all of your resources yes so you can find me on Insta, the lazy CEO and there's my podcast, the lazy CEO podcast.

43:12Um, not the one with the man, the one with the girl. There's like a guy with the exact same name as my podcast, but anyway, so pick the one. You were the lazy CEO first on Instagram. The OG, that's right. And then of course, come check out Showpo for all your fashion needs. Love it. Thank you so much. Thank you. quick shout out to all of our business bestie subscribers if you are loving this show and you are building a consumer cpg or e-commerce business or you're about to build one this membership will give you access to the people experiences and the tools that you really need to build your dream business head to female founder world.com forward slash subscriber for more