MBA2692 Extended Interview: Founder of Reebok Joe Foster and Ben Weiss of Syntilay - How To Dream Big & Serve The Underserved

28:00You never said, woe to me. You just get on with it. You know, just pick up the pieces and keep going. What is your advice as somebody who's right now having too many conversations in their head? You know, a lot of our younger listeners are over thinkers, in my opinion, and are thinking more than taking action. What would you say to them? Well, I mean, you've almost answered that yourself you know you you need you need to do things you need to get on you need to if it's if it's driving you crazy get out of the business do something else don't worry about it if that bit fails don't worry move on to the next one move on to something which is is is working that you can make work you know it's like many things if you you can invent something but if nobody wants it don't try and keep on making people want it if nobody wants it move on move on whatever so So whatever's driving you crazy, if it's marketing, go see somebody, go have a word with somebody, talk to somebody who really is good at marketing.

29:03And you'll find something different. But basically, are you in the right business if you have that much trouble? Are you really doing the right thing? Because you can enjoy the bad times as well as the good times. Some of the bad times, getting out of that problem is really fun. finding your way out is really good fun it's finding the key to the door it's whatever it is and uh you know if you have the the attitude that the people around you your team come on guys let's get it and somebody can just mention something that's the idea let's do that so as you say meeting meeting people we we built a team and you've got to listen to your team listen to people because that's where the answers are.

29:48Lots of people will come up with a simple idea. Wow, what's that? Like our guy in Los Angeles, his wife was going to these classes and he said, what are you doing, Frankie? And she said, aerobics. And he said, what? What's aerobics? We all know aerobics now, but in those days, what's aerobics? And so he followed up just a simple sort of what's happening? What are you doing? because she was coming home and she was full of it. She was so excited. And I think it's okay. So if you look at Reebok, we started off with my grandfather in athletics, in running, and we stayed in running. But what made Reebok into what we know now as Reebok, and that's women.

30:33Once we got into aerobics, our volumes grew, and then we had that horrible time when we said, what are we now? Are we in aerobics company? are we a woman's company, are we a sports company? What do we do? Because about 70 or 80 % of our business was aerobics at one time. And it was a question, well, let's become a sports company. Let's go into basketball because basketball was big in America. And the one thing I'd learned if you weren't going to get into a market, first of all, crack America. Go to America. If you can get into America, the rest of the world is easy. get into America because that generates all the awareness that you need is get it into America it's just like Reebok now Reebok is trying to come back and so they've gone back into basketball which will work but they've also got to get into the moles now get visibility you've got to get that visibility now in the moles and you'll get back again but you've got to think of new ideas is new ways.

31:41I love what you said, Joe. I get asked a lot, my journey of building and selling my software company, Webinar Ninja, and people ask me like, what was your like most proud moment? What are the things that you remember the most? And to be very honest, the thing I remember the most or the thing I'm most proud of is getting out of jams, getting out of a tough situation, solving a big problem that can make or break my business. I can remember them vividly where it's just like, I don't have the solution now, but I'm going to sleep and I'm going to wake up in the morning. I'm going to try again. I'm going to figure it out.

32:11I'm going to talk to some people. And that's, it's not the sales. It's not the 30 ,000 customers we had, whatever it was, you know, it was that ability to solve a problem. Okay. And I think that's something really important to be addicted to that feeling of like, I'm a problem solver. And I love that about business in general, but especially just building and growing a business. Ben, I want to move and shift gears a little bit and talk a little bit about your journey building Centelay, trying to get the word out. We talked about how unique it is to buy a shoe, but I want to talk a little bit about the future and what you perceive that you're going to be able to accomplish in your business with this brand in the next, let's say, five to 10 years.

32:57Yeah, we see ourselves becoming the content creator shoe company, but also we have another part of what we're doing which is backing brands that are you know have lifestyle appeal that are established they've never done shoes before so we think these two areas are going to be i mean i think they're gonna be massive but the content creator space in general could be the biggest niche today in footwear i mean you look at how many content creators there are there are more than there are top athletes in professional sporting leagues today their audience is derived from everyday engagement it's not a byproduct of the performance somewhere else So there's a massive competitive advantage in that.

33:31And they connect with their audience very differently than the traditional athlete connects with their audience. And you can see, I mean, even now from like sports like F1, everybody there has become a content creator. They're posting videos on training, on getting ready for the races. You know, like this is now the way of the future. I mean, you need to go and engage with your audience that way. That's what people are expecting from you. So the people that truly do that on an everyday basis, they have that advantage. And so we have partnerships we've already signed with different various people and brands, and we have more that we're working on today.

34:02And we think that we signed one recently with a brand as well. And I think that that will kind of bring forward this opportunity of giving these people the ability to be creative or brands in this space and do something from zero to hero in a couple months that's authentic to them and to truly find out, can they do shoes or not? You know, that's a big question that we just, it's kind of been evaded because there's this half a million, million dollar cost to go and do something in this space. You have no idea what you can do. And if you can do something well, you can potentially have the biggest, you know, revenue stream, especially for traders, the biggest revenue stream possible to you.

34:36So we want to do a couple of those and then ramp that up, you know, 3x, 5x, 10x, and then go in that becomes the market. And the appeal is already there in that space. But there's also a lot we want to do from a technology standpoint. We're developing new technology now that enables your experience to be better wearing shoes. We've seen already the trends are around lightness, but we think that there's more that can be done there. The perfect fit experience is really cool. We have something we're developing that's an in-person experience around that to get a really amazing fit experience done, even more than just what you can do from the phone, which the phone is still pretty good, but you can go even more high quality than there.

35:13So, you know, from a tech standpoint, there's a lot more we want to be able to do to push AI to its limits, to have it generate more designs, to give you the opportunity to use AI to make your own designs without maybe even us involved. So I think that there's so much that it can do, and it's just kind of doing one thing at a time so we don't overwhelm ourselves. Let's say, for example, somebody's a travel vlogger. Rick Steves. I love Rick Steves. Is the idea that Rick Steves can just create his own walking shoe and then have the Rick Steves shoe and he can promote that to his fans and followers and say, hey, if you want to walk in my shoes as I go through Europe, is that the idea?

35:49Yeah, essentially. He'd be able to come in and create his own shoe. Rick, if you're listening, this is your chance. Become the creative director on his own shoe. Work with our team. we automate four major stages of the process including the initial concept phase the 3d model creation we have a generative model that creates patterns and textures all around the shoe and we can go and work with him and or anybody make a new design and then they can help promote to their audience and we can help promote it and you know based on how it does we can say hey let's make something similar traditionally and go and invest in all those molds and at least we'll have an idea and find out we have to hit those that volume like joe mentioned but one of the best ways to just get going is without that.

36:29And to see what you can do with ad design, 3D printing, and then you can go into volume, which is a much better route instead of never giving any of these people a shot. And you can take more swings at bat, a lot more than what you can do traditionally because you don't have this huge cost expense. And you can test out the comedian sells shoes. Can UFC fighter sell shoes? Can WWE performers sell shoes? Can ex-musicians sell shoes? There's so many categories that have been just completely not tested yet because of the cost hurdle. And then once you find out if they can do shoes, my gosh, I mean, the market's massive.

37:02You could go and just, you have the case study, so you can go and get everybody else over there. And some of these areas are so big and they're just as influential, if not more than the basketball athletes. So I went through the process, like I mentioned, ordering your first model pair of shoes, which are a really cushy, nice pair of slides. I can't wait because I change out of my basketball shoes into slides after I play basketball because my feet are all sweaty and I don't want to have all funky feet. What are some challenges you're having with the types of shoes that you can create? And how do you guys look to overcome that?

37:39Or is it more of an adoption of an idea of like maybe we don't really need shoes with laces. We just need customers to understand that this is the evolution of shoes. yeah so i think our biggest hurdle right now has been cost you know it's just been fairly expensive to make a fully 3d print shoe it's been three times i would say more expensive than traditional so that eats away your margins in there and your ability to scale is not fully there yet you can do thousands of pairs but um and now we're seeing tens of thousands are possible but you know you need to do millions and more um so i mean those are some of the issues that we've experienced which is fine like we put something out to build awareness around what we're doing and it became breakthrough in this space to make the first AI design slide sheet that you can get is something different and exciting.

38:22We still also need to make more styles aligned with what is present out there. I mean, this is something a bit different. It looks like a yacht, the way the shoe is shaped, and then it has a yacht bridge on it. Then there's these patterns and textures that are influenced by sci-fi artwork that are generated all around it. It's something very different out there. I think we need to be different, but be a little more on trend with what's currently going. But still there's a room for these types of interesting products that you know push the category forward um so we we still want to make those of course but now make them for lower cost and be able to sell them at lower cost too i mean we're like when we came out we were the first we were the most affordable fully 3d printer you could get on more you know that was that was a big deal i mean adidas just came out with something at 140 10 cheaper like five months later and i think we're going to surpass that by a lot fairly soon which will be a big deal but i mean it's it's just It's pretty cost and accessible.

39:13And even, I mean, this has been$150. I think it's pretty good, especially for a custom-made shoe. You can get anything kind of custom for that cheap. So we really strive to make it as affordable as possible. But, you know, it has to have those margins built in, you know, as we go too. But, yeah, there's an education hurdle. But I think it's about making designs that are also more on trend, that fit within what's traditionally accepted. Yeah, I actually really love the style. It has this kind of avant-garde look to it, a little bit kind of eye-catching, like that doesn't look like a traditional kind of slider shoe.

39:47So I kind of I really love it. Joe, when you came on board, when you started working with Ben, obviously it was an exciting time. But what was one of the pieces of advice that you gave Ben from your experience in Reebok? Never become a shoemaker. Don't learn how to make shoes. Let shoemakers do that. You just have ideas. You just tell them the craziest ideas where a shoemaker would say, can't do that, can't do that. Like when we started out with aerobics and they wanted to make it out of glove leather. And I said, you can't do that. And you can't. And they were wrong because it broke apart. But they lined it with nylon to make it stronger.

40:35And I said, no, you can't do that because it stops it breathing. leather breathes. Oh, right. So what do they do? They punch holes in the front. And when they punch those holes in, they allow you to breathe. So being a shoemaker holds you back. You've got to have loads of ideas which are not shoemaking. And so marketing is key. Marketing is key to everything. Just have ideas. And eventually we got the leather right for the aerobic shoe. It was more like a garment leather than a glove leather. But if we hadn't started off with glove leather and worked our way through, and that's marketing. So marketing is always the best key.

41:17You'll never make a profit off 3D printing. Yes, will you? I don't know. It may come. Somebody may get the key to how we can print these shoes in three hours or 30 hours instead of, I think it's 30 hours now to print a shoe. Maybe you can do it in three hours. Maybe you can do it in less. but if you're a Nike and you want to keep your volumes up Nike must make between 15 and 20 million pairs of shoes a month so you've got to think well that's it I've got to get to some sort of quantity like that maybe whether it gets as big as Nike I don't know who knows where you can lead this to but you've got to think differently you've not got to you know you go to college we went to college to learn shoes and you learn a certain way of making shoes.

42:06And then it's how do you make them differently? That's where the marketing comes in. Somebody has to have an idea that you can do something different. I'm sure that you can go to any shoe college in the world and they won't show you how to put a bladder into an upper so you can pump it up. They won't show you back to what you're making. That's marketing. So you learn the rules so you can break them. Yes. Yes. Somebody has to break them. I love that. Yeah. That's the way to make a difference. It's the way to make people think, wow, that's odd. Let's have a look at that. And people are interested in something novel.

42:47But it might be novel. It has to work. It has to work. Yeah. One of the things that really struck me about your story was your drive to succeed with Reebok and pursue your passion of creating an innovative type of footwear and kind of superseding what your grandfather did. That was at the forefront of what I found very important in your story, more than trying to get rich. You know, a lot of people, they get into business because they're like, oh, I just got to become wealthy. I got to I got to put money as the top priority. I found that when you put money first in front of your customers, it's very hard for you to be successful.

43:25It's very hard for you to actually become a market leader, to become even just a profitable business. Tell me a little bit about how you tried to balance financial success with your passion to put out a great product. Well, I think if you really do get a great product, finance looks after itself. but uh you're quite right the uh we we go on we talk i do a lot of talking these days when people talk about you're an entrepreneur well what is an entrepreneur i don't think i am an entrepreneur in one sense one sense is and we have a good friend who uh who's just written a book which is uh start scale sell repeat that's the book start scale sell repeat and uh that's okay that makes you money if you've got some good ideas but uh i'd rather be known as a brand builder because people like entrepreneurs who can start scale sell do they ever own any brand do they have you know what is the ownership part of that whereas with reebok uh okay reebok is no longer in my hands but they i'm founder and they can't change the founder you know we made something that they can't change a founder.

44:42So whether they agree with me or don't agree with me these days, I'm still the founder. And that in itself, so building a brand is great. It doesn't necessarily have to be your first job. You could be doing other things. But if you've got in mind you want to build a brand, Sinterlay could become one of those brands where people just remember. Wow, you remember Sinterlay? Yeah, the first AI shoes. These are the things that really make a difference. there's certain things that stick in your mind when when you're growing up through life they stick in your mind like you say the first pair of shoes you got were the Hexalites and now you can still picture those shoes without a problem you can still feel them you can still think about that like well that was it ok so Jeff and myself we founded that brand that is something that's different that's something to hold on to with Sinterly Ben, he's formed his Sinterlay.

45:39Now let's make it big. Let's let it grow. Let's let more people know about that. And, you know, Ben's 25 now. By the time he's 30, he'll be a billionaire. You're totally right about this idea of building a business, building a brand that's integral into people's lives. You know, that's a core memory of mine, those first pair of Reeboks and just how meticulous I took care of them because I valued them so much. They were an extension of my personality. Like this is who I am now. I'm a person that wears Reebok. And that's the power of a strong brand. Ben, I want to ask you, what have you learned from Joe about building a brand as you're building Centelet?

46:18So there's, I mean, there's a lot I've learned from him. I mean, just one piece of this is just the level of persistence needed to make something happen. I mean, you read the book, so you understand the North American distribution, you know, in America. Just figuring out how to go and bring this to America, how many times he attempted. I think it was six times over 10 years to try to try to make this happen and then finally found the right person. And then when he did find the right person, I mean, the brand just took off. But he kept going, you know, he kept going to these trade show fairs to try to find this individual and didn't give up over over many years.

46:57And that persistence doesn't change. I mean, it's as essential today as ever. Or maybe it will happen faster with social media and stuff like that, with bringing the right partners and getting the right eyeballs on what you're doing. But that persistence is massive. And a lot of this stuff only happens when you have somebody that has that drive and a team that has that drive and will go to great lengths and never give up until they make something happen. But like Joe's also mentioned, you have to have fun in what you're doing. And I've heard him say this a couple of times when he talks. And I think it's so essential.

47:28I think people forget about that. you know it's like you really need to enjoy what you do i think you'll go much further if you are passionate about it you really enjoy the process and the experience solving some of these problems can be a lot of fun and joe's already shown that you know he's had the adventure of the life of a lifetime you know he's become a living legend through this incredible experience of taking a brand from nothing and barely affording his own equipment to make shoes be the best-selling shoe brand in the world you know and if he can do that and give and uh give me some lessons from there I'm in a much better place.

47:58So that's what I've been fortunate to get so far and looking forward to more of that. That's incredible. You can't really dream of a better partner, really, honestly. I just want to just talk about that brand element a little bit more, Joe. One of the things I noticed about Reebok in my life is that everybody, despite what they loved or do, wore Reeboks. I vividly remember my basketball team wearing Reeboks, but then also my uncle plays tennis and they wear Reeboks. And my aunt, she has a fast food restaurant. She's on her feet all day. And she's wearing Reeboks, like the walking shoes. How did it become so ubiquitous?

48:36How did it become the shoe for everybody? And it's a style icon. People wore them and cuffed their jeans in the 80s. It was just so popular in all these different types of lifestyles, regardless if you're an athlete or not. Did that happen by chance or did that happen by design? How did that all come about? there is an element of luck if you round at the right time in the right place and something happens as happened in uh in los angeles with arnold and frankie his wife and aerobics uh you could have been pushing on the running game for a long long time but we you know if you hit on something which is it catches the imagination i mean the thing about aerobics was and this again is Arnold Martinez, his idea.

49:21It was brilliant. We make it just for women, women's sizes, make it in glove leather to make it feel brilliant. And men couldn't get it. Men couldn't get it. And they were looking at these shoes and thinking, why can't we have this nice soft leather? Why can't we have soft shoes? So it creates images. And after a while, we moved it to tennis and basketball where this softness brought in comfort, a soft feel to it. and that hit something it hit and once that hit that was a good fortune you get your good fortune and then wow and when Jane Fonda wore them in her videos we were excited it just happened, one thing happened after another and there's a lot of brands out there today and a lot of making you look around and on, on have got something different they made a space like Seoul and their uppers are different And they're working.

50:18It's working very well. And the one thing I did. I just saw their quarter profits are crazy. Yes. Well, they're all over. It's great right now. And the one thing I didn't expect was Crocs. You know, they're a clog. And everybody, they've been going for some time. I used to know the CEO. They came back, yeah. Yeah. But, you know, somebody in marketing said, well, why don't, we've got these holes in. why don't we put things that can clip into those holes so that everybody's a star or something and now it's just it's crazy but yeah and yeah it's probably i just love that that comment about luck but also just timing you know i i was as i was reading your book and as i was looking back at the history of reebok and the timeline for example in basketball in the 80s people were ready for something new you know it was it was a bit of nike for a while it was a bit of converse for a while and you know adidas kind of had their foot in the game a little bit but people were ready for something fresh and something new and it was kind of getting stale and the designs are kind of getting the same like you know everybody's kind of copying each other you know if you look at the first jordans the jordan ones they kind of look like converse they kind of look like the all-stars right and then when reebok came out with the pump and they came out it just looked different people were just like i want something different i want something new i'm sick of everything else that's out there.

51:42So I think that boldness is rewarded when the timing's right. I think that's, you hit it on the money. You have to have that bit of luck and you have to have somebody with good ideas and then you have to carry it through. And we were very fortunate with aerobics because we were only a 9 million company when we got into aerobics. And in four years we became 900 million. But to do that, you have to, a lot of things have to work for you because financing that sort of work. In fact, financing wasn't the problem. It was finding manufacturing. How do you manufacture enough? We were up to 5 million pairs a month.

52:19Good problem to have. Yeah. You'd think it's a good problem, but factories can't do that. You know, you can't just build a factory overnight. And fortunately for us, it was a time when Nike really hit a wall. Nike hit a wall. They came out. About four factories just came out. and we went straight in. So the factories were lucky as well because they had to go back in and keep them full. So it works for everybody. But yeah, being in the right place, right time, have a bit of good fortune. And I mean, I know when I first started going to America, there were about 10 or 15 other British companies who were all sponsored by the government and we all went to America and Reebok were the only one to make it.

53:05Everybody else just didn't get that distribution. Because I remember my first visit to America, the Americans, they loved it. Oh, yeah, I like your product. Where do I get this product? And they're saying, is that New England? No, it's across the water. Oh, dear. They didn't want to import. That's when I realized I need a distributor. But that needs money as well. So we needed things to come together. Fortunately, when we got Paul Feynman, he had connections. and even though that connection was to the UK, can you believe it? Because he got his money from the UK. Yeah, he got his money in the back end.

53:42And that back end was just really a credit line. That's all we needed. Right. A credit line. Just to get the flowing. Yeah. So having the right people, right people, right time, and right product. So you need a few things there and a good bit of luck. Yeah, and I'm going to add something here, Joe, because I see history repeating itself. You know, with the people don't understand how big the aerobic space was in the 80s. It was kind of the first time exercises democratized. And it was especially big with women, which is more than half the population in most of the world. I find this as one of the smartest moves in business history because a lot of people don't go after underserved markets.

54:27You know, this is a very underserved market at the moment. It's a booming trend. people are into it. Jane Fonda was bigger than Whitney Houston. She was a celebrity, right? And she was the poster child of aerobics. And people had her VHS tape and pop it in and do the aerobics at home and all that kind of stuff. So this is a market that was kind of ripe for being served. And a lot of people, they're trying to go after all the same markets their competitors are going after. And they don't realize that there are people that actually need your product and service that are not being recognized, they're not being seen.

55:02And I see it repeating itself because with Centelay and with Ben, you know, influencers are being ignored and people for the longest time have been saying, okay, I want to sell shoes or I want to sell my shoes, I'm going to attach it to a celebrity or to an athlete. Forgetting the fact that media has changed in the last 15 years and especially the last five years with social media and influencers are now the underserved market that you're going after. Ben, I want to ask you, if there's an influencer listening right now, somebody who has a following, somebody who's kind of built a loyal fan base, and they love what they're hearing about Sentele, how can they kind of get started?

55:44Is there some newsletter they can sign up to? Is there something that they can learn more about? How can they get on the early track of being somebody who sells Sentele shoes? Yeah. So, I mean, the first step is really engaging with our team and talking to us and we can see, you know, is there an opportunity for them to make a shoe with us? You know, if there's somebody that wants to help more on the selling side, we are going to roll out an affiliate type program. I think drawing some inspiration from what Joe did in the running world, you know, going these, going direct like that. I think going direct is so powerful.

56:15I think if we can, you know, give influencers the opportunity to go and become, you know, their own salespeople for it and have a simple program where they get cut in, you know, that's something that really has a lot of potential to amp up and to scale. But when it comes to design, you know, design is something that we can have them involved in and work with us on. And, you know, it's just about seeing, you know, can we work together? Does this make sense? Do we think there's an opportunity, you know, in this space? And then that's just, you know, through simply reaching out. But I think we're more open than most brands in this sense is like, I think we're the most open of anybody in terms of trying stuff.

56:49Like I was mentioning before, like, can a comedian sell shoes you know can you have i mean there's just so many areas like that are just so unexplored and now it's like not as expensive and not as long to test something i don't have to wait a year and a half to find out can a comedian sell shoes you know like i can find that out maybe in three months you know so or even less than that it's it's getting even faster so we're more open like we want to try things we want to see what's going to work can the reality star from this you know type of show drawn or work for selling shoes and you know we want to So the net is wide.

57:20I mean, it's not infinite, but it is pretty wide. So reach out to us and let's see what we could do. I love this because, you know, I'm not a huge influencer, but I have over 100 ,000 followers on Instagram. And I take a lot, you know, Nicole, my partner in life and business, we love taking photos. And often people ask us questions like, oh, what shoes are you wearing in this photo? What is that? And I'm like, oh, this is this brand. And I'm like, wait a minute. Why am I promoting these brands? They're not giving me anything. It doesn't make any sense. So this makes total sense that you're allowing the influencer to actually be invested in what they're displaying, what they're wearing, what they're living with every day and experiencing.

58:00So I'm definitely somebody that absolutely loved the experience of buying this shoe. So I think that is really kind of that kind of turning point where people are going to start realizing, OK, we've been buying shoes the wrong way. Why am I buying shoes and trying to fit my foot into something that's already made instead of something that's made for me? So I think that's huge. Yeah, it's definitely a whole different experience. You mentioned earlier the electric car and some of these other things. It's a whole different experience. It makes customization much more accessible, which has been pretty rare.

58:33And once you try on shoes that are made to fit you, and you just realize, wow, I wish everything was like this. I wish all my clothes and everything I have is like that, all my shoes. because it's so good when it's done right. You know, and I mean, we're taking in information, 12 different data points we get from simply a photo of each foot next to a normal 8 by 11 piece of paper you get from your printer. We get your arch height, your length, your width, your instead of information, and we make each shoe individually to fit you, you know, per foot. So it's not like you just get like one profile.

59:05Like it's, and sometimes people like this is the first time ever they find out that my left foot's bigger than my right foot. My right foot's wider than my left foot. And they never even knew that. I found that out. Yeah. Why are my shoes not fitting me right? You know? So I think that it's something that is just so exciting and different. And like you mentioned, you need to do something different to really stand out. And I think people are ready for that. And they want something that's next. And they want something that is designed for the age we're living in now. I mean, we're just seeing so many rapid developments in software and digital stuff.

59:39And what about the physical world? What about the way we look? Everybody wants to look different. Now, each shoe here is one of one. Every single one of them. Only one pair exists like that in the world. Everybody gets to have something that's individual-oriented for them here. So I think that's something unique. Yeah. When I went through the process, the thing I thought of is a lot of people don't realize your feet change as you grow. You start growing bunions. Your feet start to have a different shape. some people develop flat feet all that kind of stuff that people probably buy shoes the same ways they've been buying since we're 18 and those shoes don't fit right anymore and i think that this is like such a no-brainer when i went through this experience i was just like wow this is how we should have been doing things all along uh joe i just want to touch on that topic and ask you have you when you you were in reebok when you were obviously trying on the shoes that you're creating, right?

1:00:37What was kind of the litmus test for you to say, okay, this shoe is going to be a hit or this shoe needs to be scrapped. It's not going to work. Well, I think really you've got, if you can produce 10 shoes, test them on the market, you choose the one that works because it's the market that tells you. It can be a color. It can be a design. It can be a soul, but the market tells you. So you produce enough for the market to tell you. I think it's probably too arrogant to say this one will work and you throw all the rest no, let the market tell you that's where you go with the market if the pump hadn't worked with the market, Rebot wouldn't have been selling pumps but the market chooses what you will sell and this is what Sinterlay is about Sinterlay is about giving people an opportunity to look at it and think just as you were saying, wow yeah i can i can get the shoe which is custom fit okay the bulk business in in shoes that can't happen but yeah but you can make some something nice and special and if we can say if we can speed up 3d processes then that is the future yeah and i i love the fact that there's so much it's almost like this is meant to be because you know reebok pumps were to help you have a better fit and scintilates are exactly that it's the perfect fit shoe and what i love about it too is that what Reebok did with a pump was that it allowed the customer, allowed the wearer of the shoe to interact with the shoe, like to pump them up, to release the air.

1:02:13And this process of scintillate allowing you to interact with the creation of your shoe, allowing you to kind of feel like you're part of the process. It's not like, okay, wear them and I don't want to hear any complaints kind of thing. You know, just deal with what I give you. So I love this idea of interacting with the product. And I feel like in a lot of ways, you value the product more, kind of like the IKEA effect when you build things yourself. What was like the initial feedback that you heard when people were, when the market was wearing those pumps? What were they saying? I think we got a lot of things.

1:02:47And that is that the youth, young people wanted them, they saw them. And I meet people probably your age and maybe a bit older when I come to America and say, oh, the pump. I was only a kid when the pump came out. And I just wanted those. My product wasn't too expensive. They wouldn't mind them. And I had to get a job. I had to go on a paper round and do something. I had to get a job. And it is that because people just found something that bit different and they enjoyed being different. And like you say, they also had a relationship with that product. They did something. Yeah. And I think that that was a uniqueness, probably one of the best uniquenesses that has come in footwear.

1:03:34I don't think anybody really has produced anything where you can actually do something like that with footwear. And it's out again today. I know that Reebok are not as well, we don't have as big an audience as we used to have. But Shaq now is in charge of that with Alan Iverson. And Shaka's employed his son because he said his son knows what they want today. Yeah, what's hip? So they're going after the youngsters again, which I think is a good idea. I think it's brilliant. I think it's brilliant. When you just shared, I was laughing and smiling a moment there because you shared a story that was my story.

1:04:17When I was about 12 years old, I want a pair of Iversons. The Iversons ones came out. They were incredible. They had the Hexalites on the outside. And I was just like, this is going to, I need these shoes. And my dad was like, hey, why don't you come to work with me? My dad was a car salesman in a car dealership. And he said, come to work with me and work in the wash bay, wash cars, and I'll give you a ride on Saturday. So I washed cars from nine to three every Saturday. You know, I was earning like something like$35 every Saturday. I saved up like three weekends in a row. And then I was like, okay, I'm going to go and get my Reeboks.

1:04:56I'm going to go get my Iversons. And then the crazy thing is that I bought them. I never wore them because I was like, I don't want to get them dirty. I don't want to crease them, you know. But I would wear them when I would watch basketball on TV while I see Iverson cross up Jordan. And I was like, oh, wow, this is incredible. It's surreal. but you are completely right. If you were living in the moment, there was a sense that this is what you want. It was a magnetic pull to the designs, to the shoes themselves. Also, I think the affiliation of the types of athletes were trendsetters. Shaquille O 'Neal has an incredible, I mean, people know him now because of TNT, but he is an incredible charismatic character.

1:05:39Alan Iverson changed fashion fashion and changed the culture in basketball. How did you guys choose who you're going to affiliate the brand with? That wasn't my job. That was, if you want to do things in America, employ Americans. Nobody wants a North of England Brit come and tell them what works. No, in America, Americans know what works. So that was on the market. They chose Iverson. And I think that was great because he was such a rebel and such a crazy man but you know i mean yeah unique as well unique and if you can get some of that uniqueness into your product it's great and you know those are things that people remember the brand and it's and he did all right with that lifetime deal i'm sure it's all right yeah he's still still got some money to come but he's employed now He's part of the company.

1:06:35That's great. He assists Shaq in helping bring back basketball. And I think if they concentrate on basketball, get that back, then we'll be back. They are back in tennis, but I think really where personalities are concerned and influences, do it in basketball. Do that really well. And really what we'll come back. Ben, Joe, I got a final question for both of you before we wrap up. I'll start with you, Ben. And as you embark, and you've been on this journey for a bit now with Sintelay, but as you start moving forward, as you start innovating, as you start growing the company, what is your personal ambition?

1:07:14What do you want to get out of this as a person, as an individual? Who do you want to become through this process? Well, I really want to make a difference in the world. I think that part of what we're doing here, and the reason we call it Sintelay, is it's about shining based off the word Sintelay. Right now, if you look at what a lot of brands have done, they've marketed themselves around greatness and are achieving greatness. You put on the shoes of X individual basketball player and you can feel like you can play like them. You can be like them. That needs to be extended out. Why can't you put on shoes and walk in the same shoes as your favorite YouTuber and TikTok star and maybe even business personality that has lifestyle appeal?

1:07:55You should be able to feel like you can get greatness in any aspect in life and not limited And today what I've seen, you know, half the youth wants to be content creators. This is who they aspire to be like. It used to be when a lot of these brands were built, they wanted to be athletes and shifted as, you know, media and influence has shifted online in general. So, you know, greatness needs to be democratized. You need to have the ability to feel like you can be great in any direction you want in life and you can go after your dreams. And by wearing the shoes of your favorite people, I think that gets you one step closer.

1:08:23You know, so building a brand around that that makes a difference in the world that, And it has a positive effect on people and makes them feel like they can be empowered to do that. I think we'll just make the world a happier place and have a lot more productive people. And we'll see a lot more exciting innovations that come out of that. So that's the goal here. And I hope that in five years time, 10 years time, we've backed enough people. We've done enough interesting shoes, brought enough unique technology to the forefront that there's many people that are chasing something and going after it with all they have.

1:08:53And they feel inspired to do that. I love it. and joe my final question to you you're 90 years old you have accomplished so much in your life and you're still going strong you're starting this new venture with with centele you're you're still just as excited about this project as you were with reebok what's your goal what are you trying to get out of this what would you like to see in the near or in the in the next five to ten years those 10 years i'd like to see those 10 years that'd be good reaching 100 I love it. I don't see why not. Why not? Why not? No, that's it. Ben can push me around that in the wheelchair.

1:09:31No, no. My uncle, my dad's brother, he lived to 99. But I remember he's tip top health. And I asked him when he was about maybe 91. I asked him, you know, how have you maintained your health? How have you been able to live so long and still have a good quality of life? And his advice to me was, don't let anybody affect your mood. Anybody calls you on the phone, bad news, hang up on them. Anybody who hurts your feelings, just walk away. And I just thought that was incredible. How do you feel about that advice? And what has helped you kind of just keep on going? What keeps me going is Julie, my wife.

1:10:14She's much younger than I am. and she is able to do the things that allow me to keep going. So that's right. And the fact that having written the book and having met people like Ben, you know, Ben has so much energy. And that's why success is built on energy. And just keep that energy. And that's the excitement. That's what we had when we were building Reebok. What can we do? What can we do different today? How can we make it different today? And, you know, not every day is a success. Not every day is happy. But if you get up in the morning and say, I'm not going to be happy today, just like you're saying with your uncle.

1:10:49No, you get up and every day, not every day can be happy, but really the bulk of them. And you can have some real fun. You can meet some real incredible people. You know, funnily enough, even today, today we received a letter from a man who is 95 years old. and he said, I've got my JW Foster spike running shoes and they were beautiful and comfortable but they still are. I've got my Welsh 3A's international vest more or less do you want them? We're going to go and meet them because in one month's time in Bolton which is where Reebok began the museum there is putting on an exhibition for six months all to do with sports and it's Reebok, it's JW Foster and it's to do with Bolton Wanderers the whole thing so and they said oh we'd love to have that vest and those shoes and and the letter so that that happened today so it just keeps on happening i want to thank you guys for this is was incredible i i mean this chat was just um something i'll always remember because of the impact you've both made in the world ben thank you so much for your time and i'm i can't wish you enough luck because I think you've really hit the nail on the next innovation in footwear.

1:12:07I can't wait to get my pair of scintillers in the mail soon. We're definitely wearing them and sharing them with my friends. Joe, thank you so much for taking a bit of your time to speak to our audience, speak to our listeners, speak to me. And thank you for the impact you've made in so many people's lives through the legacy of Reebok. I see you as a hero of mine because I see somebody that has created something out of thin air, made it successful, has built such an impact on the world. So thank you so much for sharing it with us. Thank you, Mo. It's been a pleasure. It has been an absolute pleasure.

1:12:43And thank you, Ben. Thank you so much. There you have it, guys. Wisdom from two founders who built things the world didn't see coming. Joe Foster, in our conversation, reminds us that timeless brands are born from relentless belief, from determination, from loving what you do. And Ben Weiss showed us that the next big wave is building something better and not necessarily faster. Big thanks to both of them for joining me today. If this episode got you thinking and got you dreaming, share with someone who needs that push today. And of course, visit Sintelay.com. That's S-Y-N-T-I-L-A-Y.com if you want to order your AI made shoes and have them custom fit to your feet.

1:13:25I couldn't believe the whole process. It was a ton of fun. I'm going to get my slides in a couple of days. They look fantastic. I got the red ones. And of course, if you want to go deeper and learn more about Joe Foster's story, I highly recommend you check out his book, Shoemaker. I gave it a read and absolutely loved it. And remember, whether you're starting your first idea or scaling your 10th idea, it's all about taking that next bold step, believing in yourself. If you found today's episode helpful and you want more practical business lessons to help you start, grow and scale your business, the best thing you could do is subscribe to this podcast.

1:13:57Hit subscribe or follow on your favorite podcast app, the one that you're using right now, whether it's Apple or Spotify or wherever you listen to podcasts. By hitting subscribe, you get our next episode automatically, and it's the best way to support the show. It's absolutely free, and it's a way for you to commit to growing your business. And now that you've subscribed, I'll check you in the next episode.

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