Founder of Sporty & Rich: How To Build A $50 Million Empire At 26 (Emily Oberg)

0:00I remember I would like get mad at customers and I would just like go off on them. The next year was like 6 million and then it was like 12 million and it was like 30 million. The growth was fast. You know, I still own 100 % of my company and I've never taken on investors. It's definitely more noticeable how much the world dislikes women. Today we're joined by Emily Oberg, the founder of Sporty and Rich. Hi, I'm Emily Oberg, founder of Sporty and Rich. Welcome to The Burnouts. Take us back to when you were first working at Complex. so what did that look like and what were kind of the early beginnings of your career yeah I mean so I was working retail in Canada where I'm from and I was you know really into streetwear from a young age and I was doing photo shoots with friends just like for fun as like a hobby so I was working retail and I randomly got a call from Complex so they offered me the job of it was like editorial producer they were launching their video platform at the time this is when like all media companies were making like the pivot to video so every online brand was like you know it was print it was online and then it was digital it was video youtube that was like the big push um so I took it and it was like the best four years ever and um and yeah that's kind of how I guess I got started with the brand that I do now and then you moved to to Kith can you tell us about that so after complex I mean I knew Ronnie because we obviously like covered Kith a lot at complex and you know we had a personal relationship and I kind of mentioned that I wanted to venture into the brand side of things and get out of media that's never really where I saw myself long term so we discussed you know he was launching his women's brand at the time and we discussed like what a role would look like and if I could help.

1:57And he brought me on as like creative director of the women's brands. So that was a huge opportunity. So I left Complex, was really sad about that. And then was at Kith for about a year. I mean, these are like incredible roles and jobs you've had. I feel like something we hear from, you know, a lot of people is like there's, you know, how do you choose to leave a good job to go all in and to be a founder yourself? Do you remember? Was there a moment when you made that decision? I just don't think like the corporate world is for me and you know there's like a lot of politics there's a lot of just dynamics that I felt weren't aligned with with where I wanted to go with my life and who I was um and I kind of just always had this instinct of like wanting to build my own path and then what did that look like so you're at Kith and then Sporty and Rich was a blog at that time right so walk us through the process of how does it become a turn from a blog into a company?

2:56Yeah. So I was on Tumblr like early on and then started Sporting Rich as like a mood board account. Now there's so many of them, but it was definitely one of the first. I started that account probably in 2015, like a year after I moved to New York. And it was just a hobby. It's just something I did for fun and like kind of like the inception of an idea I had like no intentions of turning it into a brand I never I was kind of turned off of brands because covering them on complex I saw so many come and go and I just saw like how hard it was and I was like oof that just seems like a world that I don't want to touch and that I don't really know anything about so it was really again just like a passion project I like produced all the content I wrote um I you know found people all over the world to contribute just people whose work that I liked and admired.

3:46And so, yeah, it was a magazine and I did four issues. And then in that time, I would sporadically do like a sweatshirt or like a T-shirt or a hat. And it was it was just like very random. And it was it was still just me at this point. But I had my full time job, too. So I wasn't able to even dedicate that much to it. So, yeah, it was kind of just like always on the back burner. This is something we talk about all the time is that it's really interesting because social media, you might, you know, have a big following, but there's a difference in how loyal that audience is versus like a podcast.

4:19It's so intimate. Like if someone is actually taking, you know, an hour out of their week every week to listen to us, you know, talk to other founders, like that's a very like intimate experience versus, you know, social media is like the highlight reel. I'm curious as you think about now how social media has transformed and become, you know, largely like algorithm based for someone who's starting a brand today, how would you advise them to start out? Well, one, I think that there's a lot of people who maybe want to do it for the wrong reason. You know, when I started, I wanted to do it because I loved researching like archival images and clothing and just kind of like looking to the past for things that I was so inspired by, I guess.

5:04And yeah, my intention was to never build like this like million dollar business and have you know a team and have like a full apparel line that's never like what I wanted but um I think what made me happiest is and what still does is like creating imagery and building this world um so I think one it's like make sure you actually want to do it because you love it um and two I would say start with just start on like a small scale like we started on a pre-order model because I didn't have money to you know fund a huge production run um or do like a crazy marketing push it was literally just like I would do photo shoot for like two thousand dollars for the model for the photographer I would like do the hair and makeup I would do the styling I would like bring food to set like it was all so run and gun and we did the pre-order and that helped a lot um because we could obviously take everyone's orders and then produce everything and then ship it out.

6:05I would say, you know, I still own 100 % of my company and I've never taken on investors or any sort of loan or debt. And I think what a lot of people do now that I'm seeing is they start with like this huge amount of money from VCs or whatever it is they raise and then they go. And I think that's just tricky because there's a lot of pressure turn a profit really quickly and I think when you have that pressure um you kind of lose like the sense of authenticity and like why you're doing it there's not really a sense of you or like heart in that and how much money did you start the brand with honestly it probably was I mean to do a Shopify site probably was like a couple thousand the photo shoots were like no more than like a couple of I would say like no more than like five thousand dollars wow because all the pre-order, you know, they would, the factory would, I think we had good terms at the time.

6:59Like they would just produce everything and then we could pay at the end. And yeah, it was just like me doing everything. So I think that also helped. Like I didn't need a lot of people to run things at that stage. You were mentioning you have your operating partner. How did you originally end up meeting them? Yeah. So my operating partner is from Paris and he had his own brand he had a couple brands prior to mine and I actually really liked the brands like I was always a fan and like I actually covered them at Complex I wrote about them um yes it was very serendipitous and then one day we met um I kind of I just actually reached out randomly I was like I love your brand like I'd love to do something for you and at this point I was I was still figuring things out and I was doing some art direction for brands like on a consulting basis um so I offered that I was like I'd love to do this if like if you ever need help with that um and I did a shoot for the brand um and then we just started talking more and more and we started dating oh my god yeah no way um so that's definitely yeah people are always like how to do that um yeah we started dating and the brand was still super small and early but he you know he had the expertise and he had like he had a team you know he had the expertise of wholesale and logistics and production and e-com and back end and those things um so it definitely helped and it allowed me to just like do what I do best and so that was definitely like a big a big part of the brand success if you don't mind me asking are you guys still dating no okay how does that work with business yeah so we were together only like a couple years um and this was like seven years ago um so you know we eventually like our relationship just became about work obviously that's pretty natural um we just talked about work all the time we'd work together all day and then at nighttime it would just be like conversations about work so I wouldn't recommend that I think it works for some people but I think at the time it was just like okay we're probably just better business partners that's how the romance between us died right Sophia right Sophia we're not lovers anymore unfortunately it works for some people the spark died for me first it was I ended it some people it were like there's a lot of founders who are in relationships and it works I don't know how people do that yeah it's tough it's tough but we you know the breakup it was you know it's difficult for a moment having to go through a breakup and run a company at the same time um so we made it through that and you know I think it's just like people are put in your life for a certain reason.

9:45And I definitely think that was his reason for my life and it helped the brand so much. And yeah, it's like, you know, we've both obviously moved on and we have a good friendship now, but we're, you know, really complimentary business partners, I would say. And so you still are business partners on Sporting & Rich. Oh, wow. Yeah. Is that ever awkward if you're entering a new relationship? You're like, hey, my co-founder and I used to date. I feel like you'd have to unfortunately bring that up every time you get in a new relationship and explain that for sure I mean there's definitely been guys on my side and I I don't know about his side but guys on my side who you know don't love it I can't say that I would love it either what did they say I mean you know there's like a bit of jealousy naturally um not all guys there's been some but jealousy and just kind of like you know I I'm so close with this person I talk to him every day I would probably be crazy jealous too if that was if the roles were reversed but I think it's like when you have the understanding of like there's I think you can only be friends with someone if there's like literally zero feelings left and it's just strictly like I like you as like a human then it's fine because there's no residual of like they're not over you or like they're jealous there's none of that it's just like strictly like you're a great business partner like let's just keep doing yeah let's go make millions together yeah let's let's bring it home exactly win win And I'm curious, so in the early days when you guys first connected over all of this, when did the conversation turn into business and when did the conversation turn romantic?

11:23Yeah, so I would say the romantic part happened pretty fast, like pretty soon after we met. and business you know it was sporting interest still really small so again like I wasn't really thinking about turning it into this big thing but he definitely like encouraged me and pushed me and was like you should try like just see if if there's something real here and and so I remember doing like a pre-order launch like the first pre-order launch and it did pretty well so I think we were both like whoa this is maybe something so he was like okay well I'll help you with these things and it kind of just worked out that's such a win-win I'm so happy to hear that because I was curious also for him so did he ever make a conscious decision to stop working on his other ventures to focus on yours oh how did that happen yeah so I mean he so he had a brand way before me that that ended that stopped um and then he started another brand and eventually it was just like it was such a nice brand and I loved it um but I think it just lacked like I think the the world and the kind of like strong identity the product was great the designs were great but there was just something missing and I think at some point like he just you know Sporting Rich was doing better at a certain point so he just made the decision to close his brand and you know know, Sporting Rich is so big now that I think he's happy with that decision.

12:50But it definitely was tough because I think, you know, it was like his baby and I think it was maybe difficult to have to choose one over the other. And, you know, it worked out professionally. But I think like, you know, in your heart, if you have something that's like your baby, you want that to succeed, obviously. And for the first few years of the business, when you guys are working together, how fast does the growth happen? The growth happened really fast. I mean, we did pre-orders for maybe like six months and we would do maybe like$40 ,000 a month with that. And then we started to get some wholesale accounts.

13:33So Selfridges was our first. And it's funny because they're our biggest account today. It's like, yeah, still like they're our first and they're now our biggest and so you know I always like love and value those partners and relationships so much because it's like just that kind of visibility and reach um was so crucial at the beginning of the brand when we were just like had like I don't know five SKUs um so you know we started to do wholesale and and it grew more and more and I think you know I think the first year we maybe did like I don't know a hundred thousand in sales and then the next year was like six million and then it was like 12 million and then it was like 30 million the growth was yeah it was fast so a big part of it was wholesale and then it was COVID and COVID was like a turning point it it just blew up why what do you think made it blow up well I think during COVID everyone was home and online shopping and everyone just wanted sweatsuits and that's like at the time that's literally all we sold um and then you know just kind of like these it girls and models and celebrities wore the brand um and it just kind of became like I mean I hate to say this but like an Instagram brand I mean when COVID started I was like the brand's gonna die there's no way people are gonna be spending money right now when they're you know not working or just like at home doing nothing but I think it was the opposite for a lot of businesses the legendary crew neck drop got like 600 ,000 in one day.

15:06Can you walk us through what that felt like? Were you like panicked, excited, worried? Okay. Can the supply chain, you know, still deal with this scale and orders? What did that look like? Yeah. I mean, it was a combination of all those things. It was excitement. It was panic. It was like, holy shit, how are we going to make this happen? Like, there's no way, but it was also like, okay, wow. We've like, we really built something here because that like at the time I mean that's still like to do that meant many sales in one day is like crazy um I think for any brand and I was definitely scared and we we were like you know we spoke to the factory and we were like okay you're used to making this many we now have this many and they were kind of just like yeah we can't do that like there's no way so we like had to scramble we had to find a new factory we had to find like a logistics center at the time we were using some like guy in downtown LA who was just like shipping things out with like a friend of his and it was so random and like so bad um so then we had to find like a real warehouse um and set up all of these different systems on the back end like NetSuite and all of these different systems and backbones to the company that I had no idea about and um it was really like a scramble I remember it was like a month of like okay we need to like figure this shit out otherwise we're not gonna like this brand is not going to exist.

16:26Wow. That's crazy that it was actually a turning point that kind of was a little scary. I do want to know, what do you think are some of the best decisions that you guys made business wise that other people can learn from? I think you need to definitely know what you don't know. So I think some people like want to do it all. Some people want to like be the founder and be the face and do the design and do the marketing, but also like do the finance and like help with production, like the logistics, but it's like, no one can do all those things. Like there's just no way. Um, so it's like, I knew what my strengths were and I knew what they weren't.

17:05And so it was like, okay, let's get people, the best people to fill these roles and to handle these things. And let's work with the best partners, whether it's like a good factory, um, the good logistics center who we still, I mean, we still use all the same ones to this day. um and yeah i think just like surrounding yourself with people who know how to handle the things that you're not good at and that will really help scale the business i think you went from you know five grand in savings to a soho flagship and even now a sexual wellness brand central sport yeah how do you decide when it's the right time to go into a new category can you share any numbers or proof points that showed you yes okay beauty is working or yes retail is working let's now expand brand we were as I said before like such an Instagram brand and like an online only brand and I think a lot of brands have succeeded when they have like a physical footprint um I mean you see that with a lot of brands it's not every brand but most brands especially like legacy brands or brands that you know have been around for a long time and I think for us it was kind of just a feeling of like okay this is the right time like we want to be more than just like an online brand We want to kind of show people what the Sporting Rich world feels like and what it looks like.

18:23And, you know, I think that's such an important part of building a community is having that like physical in-person touch point where people can come and, you know, hear what kind of music a Sporting Rich store would play or like at the cafe, what kind of smoothies we would serve or what the staff look like and how they treat you. and obviously just like seeing the clothes in person that's like the easiest one but yeah I think for me it was just like okay it's time for like the next phase and I think that was the next phase for our brand you know we're lucky because we're able to test so many things because we are quite a small team and we don't have a lot of like red tape I guess like big corporations have where it has to go through so many departments it's like I'm kind of just like oh I like this we should try it and see if it does well and then we'll try it on a small scale And if it does, you know, we'll go further into that.

19:12And if it doesn't, it's like not a huge loss. Again, this was just something where I was just like, this is a fun product category and a world that like I'm kind of just personally getting familiar with myself. So like, let's try it and see if this would be something. And what has that experience been like so far? I love it. I mean, I love again, I think what I love the most is building a world and building like a strong like visual identity um and that's you know that's what I've done with Sporting Rich and what I continue to do with Sporting Rich and what I've done with Central Sport now um and I think just building this world where people can see themselves in and a world that doesn't really exist and you know just again like creating those images and that product and the packaging that I don't know for me it's just so exciting I'm so visual and I just love like beautiful things And so for me, that's like a big part of it.

20:09And it's been it's been fun. I want to know also for you, was there ever a moment when someone like a celebrity wore your brand where you just were so incredibly shocked and excited? Yeah, I mean, honestly, anytime anyone wears the brand, even when I'm out and like I'm meeting friends of friends and they're like, oh, I know Sporting Ranch. And I'm like, that's crazy. Like to me, it's still such like a small passion project of mine that when someone has heard of the brand or knows the brand or has bought the brand, it's like, whoa, that's crazy. It's like a pinch me moment every time. And yeah, there's been celebrities.

20:47I mean, like, you know, the models, there's been like Rosie or like Amrata or Elsa Hosk, like all those girls. But I think it's more just. and how did those moments happen were they organic did you guys seed it I think back then like this was when the brand was small when they were wearing it like at the early phases we didn't have PR so I think they just maybe discovered it and found it and bought it or yeah we weren't really doing gifting at that time in a big way um now you know we have a PR team so people get sent stuff but I think the fact that people like just discover it on their own is like super cool What's one mistake you made early on that you'd worn, you know, every 22 year old or any woman starting a business against?

21:35Oh, there's a bunch. I mean, I've made so many mistakes early on. This was during COVID. This was when like all of the courier companies were had an influx of, you know, orders and deliveries and packages. and we had major delays and we had you know people dming us and emailing and getting so mad and at the time I didn't have a customer service person it was me so I was running the Instagram and the DMs and the emails and I remember I would like get mad at customers and I had me I would just like go off on them and I'm not proud of it but like when you're bombarded with like thousands of messages a day of like people blaming you and like accusing you of like taking their money or like stealing it's like it wasn't that at all obviously it was just like we were barely keeping our head above water you know obviously you should never talk to anyone the way I talk to some customers like I would just go off sometimes um and lose my temper but I was I think I was just like so overwhelmed at the time and so frustrated and just like wanted people to understand that like one it's not our fault two it's like the factory I mean the factories were also I think everyone was just like bombarded it was like the factories the logistics the shipping companies and it's kind of like at some point it's like you need to just like give people a bit of grace even sometimes when you know small brands my order is delayed by like a month or I'm like it'll get here like it's fine I understand people want their their stuff but like at the end of the day it's Like it's not the end of the world.

23:11It's not life or death. So I think definitely having a customer service person, not running your own customer service. And again, just like knowing what you're not good at. I'm not good at that. I shouldn't be like dealing with customers on a support email or the DMs. So yeah, I think that was definitely a huge one. But there's so many, I think as like an entrepreneur, that that's what your life is, like making mistakes and learning from them and hopefully just getting better from them. And being a female founder can be so hard. People are incredibly tough. There's a lot of scrutiny. How do you feel like you've been able to navigate and deal with that?

23:49It is tough. I think, you know, in the past year, I don't know if it's like getting older, my age or like our government or just the social climate, political climate, but it's definitely more noticeable how much the world dislikes women and how the odds are stacked against women. um and you know it doesn't just come from men it comes from women too it's like it's it's kind of everywhere and it's all the time and I think naturally women are at a disadvantage um but I think that just makes us stronger um and I think I think you just have to grow thick skin like it's not gonna stop so there's no solution there it's kind of like what can you do and it's like you can't worry about what you can't control the world is the way it is we can hope it gets better we can do our part to make things better not you know perpetuate it but I think at the end of the day it's like you have to be a tough cookie and if you're not you might want to choose another job that's like I don't know be like hiding somewhere not so public facing yeah because for you I think it's so interesting that you are both of course building the sporty and rich brand and then you definitely also have your own personal brand and your own Instagram what has that experience been like of building in public yeah I mean yeah it's tough I think people just love to criticize and I was actually talking to my therapist about this the other day she's like the lowest forms of thought are like opinion and judgment and that is not like coming from a wise place or a place of love.

25:33So like you have to be above that. Instead, just like look at things with acceptance of like, okay, this is the way things are. I'm not going to criticize. I'm not going to judge. So I try to do that. People, most people don't do that, I think. But if you are ready to take it on, you can be an outspoken person. And you know, sometimes I am probably way less than I was because you'll always get some sort of backlash or criticism. But I think you just have to kind of know who you are and be able to kind of stand by the things that you say and support um but yeah how do you choose like what to post now um I definitely don't want to stir the pot ever so I think and I think these days it's like having an opinion at all is so controversial no matter what it is but I think you also have to remember and sometimes I forget it's like you can never please everyone we all have different opinions based on you know our family history where we come from, what we've been through.

26:31And that's okay. It's like, it's okay to have a different opinion. And sometimes when, you know, even I get upset, if people don't agree with something I say, I get upset. But you have to remember, you have to be like, oh, this person is a totally different human being and has a totally different brain. So why should they think the way that I think? So in that sense, I think there's just an understanding maybe that comes with that. But yeah, it's not easy out there. I mean, yeah, I love how empathetic you are. And I'm sure that also bleeds into the way that you lead and the way that you build your teams.

27:08As we're coming up on time, I also wanted to ask, what is your leadership philosophy? Like, how did you find early employees and people that you built sporty and rich with? I mean, I think being a leader is such an important part of having a company and starting a company being an entrepreneur because you know people do look up to you and they look to you for guidance and sometimes I forget I'm like oh wow like I have 40 people who are like looking to me for like what do we do like what is the answer what is the solution and the strategy I read this book really early on I think I was like 23 but everyone knows this book start with why by Simon Sinek.

27:50I love him. But he's I mean, he specializes in leadership. So it's just all about, you know, why you do what you do, leading with a purpose, leading with a vision, kind of empowering your team. And instead of the approach of coming at it like, oh, I'm your boss. I'm like, you have to do what I say. Like, I'm at the top. It's more of like empowering people to have their own opinions and ideas and inspiring each other and kind of, you know, being equals and on the same field and not looking down at people. You know, I've had bosses in the past and I've had so many random jobs like working retail or in restaurants where it's like they get off on this kind of dictatorship way of running things.

28:38And there's like an ego and being able to like tell people what to do, I think, and being in charge. but I think you realize like the powers and the numbers and in the people and it's not like the person at the top it's it's really everybody else because it's everybody else who's their contribution is what's making this thing go around and making this thing survive and sustain and move forward and I think when you realize that you lead to inspire rather than to like create some sort of fear maybe so I think that I mean that book is amazing I can't recommend it enough so I think anyone who wants any advice on leadership don't don't ask me Simon Sinek that's a great answer we will link it in yeah definitely do that so then final question would be where is the brand today and where do you see it going in the future I mean we're opening LA in a couple months so that will be our second store um I would like to you know expand retail in a bigger way um you know just continuing to open our own stores we have a lot of wholesale accounts but I think retail is the best way to kind of be in charge and in control of your image and your brand um I think just expanding the product categories doing for those who aren't familiar like do you have any like proof points or numbers that you can share for like what does the brand look like like what are you guys selling etc it's a lot um we do probably two well we do two drops every month sometimes three it's a lot and every drop has around like 35 skews in it so yeah do the math it's a ton um so I would like to kind of scale that back a little bit because I'm I've always been big on like quality over quantity and I think like less but better and it I think it would be nice for me and for the team and just for everyone for the brand to kind of like streamline things I guess a little bit more and I think I mean it's hard because the algorithm wants new things all the time so you get caught up in this cycle of like okay we need a new job here here here here here and it ends up being just like endless and non-stop and you're just on this hamster wheel but I think what I kind of want to do is scale back and just do things in a bigger and better way maybe to obviously sustain the growth and the sales that we're doing now but what does the growth in the sales look like if you don't mind yeah so this year we're gonna do around 40 million um and then next year we're targeting around 60 and yeah I mean the growth is steady and the growth has been I mean I'm happy with the growth and I think Like the thing about growth is you can have like, you can either have like a really big piece of a small pie or you can have a small piece of a big pie.

31:36And right now we don't have anyone else involved. And I think when you bring on investors and all these different people, you know, it's like you have a smaller and smaller piece. but I have so much control and I think that's what a lot of people that I know personally who've raised money or have you know co-founders or people who have equity you don't have that control anymore and you kind of lose some of it and you have a board and you have to listen to people and you have like crazy targets that you need to reach and that to me seems so stressful and just that would take away again like some of the heart of it so I think we could grow a lot faster if we maybe had outside funding um but sometimes I don't know if that's what I want to do and I think you have to like make that decision as a founder it's like you could yeah we could probably be like a 500 million dollar brand but like I don't know how much equity I would have at that point how much control I would have at that point would I be happy you know it's like that number sounds great but like it it comes with other things and I think I'm still doing this because I love it I wake up every day and I'm like so excited to work on whatever it is I'm working on and I think maybe that would change if we if we evolved into this like insanely high growth company.

33:02And yeah, I just think for me, that's not the intention for now. It could change, but that's just where I'm at. Well, thank you so much for sharing your journey and all your lessons with us. It was such a pleasure having you on today. Thank you so much for having me.