897 Andrew Rose: Founder of Montauk Man

29:10And Oud is like a deep wood. So there's Oud, saffron, rose, patchouli, some leather. This is the fragrance I was telling you that was a little bit more masculine leaning. To me, it's not seasonal, but it would lean more towards a winter, colder weather, more of a nighttime scent. Then we have Amber Boom. So that is our gourmand. When I say gourmand, I'm talking about edible ingredients in a way. So we have dark cherry, we have bitter almonds, vanilla, tonka, almost ingredients that you can find in a bake shop. So it's extremely delicious. I find that to be our most seductive of fragrances. To me, it leans more autumn.

29:54Also, like, you know, with a nice cardigan on or something while you're walking around town with a cup of coffee. and then our final scent is Rough Riders. This is the scent that is most inspired by Montauk. This is more every day from day to night. It could be any season. It's a spicy tobacco. So it's pineapple, bergamot, tobacco, a little bit vanilla. It's very addictive. I also think it's seductive. So out of these four, they all kind of check off different boxes. As I was saying earlier, we have our summer citrus, daytime, wear to the pool, wear to the beach, North Bar, you could wear with a tuxedo, a ball gown, something more formal, nighttime leaning or winter.

30:32Amber boom, I'm thinking a little bit more fall. It's sweet. It's gourmand. I think those edible ingredients. And then rough riders, which is that every day, almost like just everyone loves rough riders. It kind of checks off everyone's preferences. We put ingredients in there that people just love. So out of those four, I think they all kind of, I don't want to say they solve anyone's problems, but they gravitate towards someone. Someone can gravitate towards them, I should say.

31:05Kara Goldin:This episode of the Kara Golden Show is brought to you by LinkedIn Hiring Pro. Hi, Kara here. For small businesses, every hire matters, but so does your time. I felt that pressure firsthand. You know, a bad hire isn't just frustrating, it's expensive in time, money, and team morale. And yet hiring the right person can feel like a full-time job on top of everything else you're already doing. Sifting through applications, trying to spot the real standouts, second-guessing decisions, it can get overwhelming fast. That's why having a way to save time without sacrificing quality isn't just nice to have, it's critical.

31:50Kara Goldin:Luckily, LinkedIn Hiring Pro is built for that reality. It's your hiring partner designed to help you hire with confidence by surfacing only the right candidates without turning hiring into another full-time job. Posting a job isn't always the hard part. It's finding, connecting with, and screening the right candidates. Hiring Pro streamlines the entire process from drafting your job to shortlisting candidates and conducting AI-powered interviews for initial screenings. Their updated conversational interface lets you describe what you need in plain language, no recruiter jargon needed. Nearly 60 % of hires find a candidate to interview within a week.

32:32Kara Goldin:With Hiring Pro, you spend less time searching and more time connecting with the right talent. Join the 2.7 million small businesses using LinkedIn to hire. Get started by posting your job for free at linkedin.com slash Kara Golden. Terms and conditions apply. Today's episode is brought to you by Whatnot. I've been spending time on Whatnot as a buyer and what I really like is that it doesn't feel like traditional online shopping. You can discover great products without paying full price, but you're also interacting with sellers in real time, asking questions, seeing what they're showing next and becoming part of the community around them.

33:14Kara Goldin:And as an entrepreneur, I find the seller side really interesting. Whatnot is the largest dedicated live shopping platform with everything from beauty and collectibles to electronics, luxury fashion, even cookies. Anyone can sell, whether your business is big, small, or yet to exist. People selling on Whatnot sell 10 times more than on other major marketplaces because you're not just listing products, you're building real connections with buyers. And across Whatnot, the number of sellers making over$1 million a year has doubled. I use Whatnot as a buyer, and if you've ever thought about selling, I definitely think you should check it out.

33:58Kara Goldin:Search Whatnot, W-H-A-T-N-O-T, in the App Store, download, and you can start selling right away. This episode of the Kara Golden Show is brought to you by Rippling. If you've ever led a team, you know that making decisions is only as good as the information behind them. Waiting days for reports or piecing together data from different systems just slows everyone down. That's where Rippling AI comes in because it's built on your live people and business data. It gives you one unified view of your business. From there, it can instantly generate accurate real-time reports, dashboards, workflows, and more so you can move from insight to action much faster.

34:44Kara Goldin:Let's say you find out your sales team is at risk of missing quota. Instead of waiting days or even weeks for someone to build a report, just ask Rippling AI. It instantly pulls real-time data from Rippling and Salesforce into a presentation-ready dashboard showing quota attainment, headcount plan, and monthly revenue to quota by region. In seconds, you can see exactly what's behind your quota risk. But here's what I think is really powerful. Rippling AI doesn't stop at insights. It turns those insights into action by creating an automated recruiting workflow whenever it notices open sales roles and lagging time to fill are directly impacting quota attainment.

35:29Kara Goldin:And because permissions are automatically inherited and actions flow through your existing approval chains, all you have to do is review it and tap confirm to set the workflow in motion. Question answered, action taken, problem solved before it has the chance to happen. Ready to rule your business? head to rippling.ai slash Kara Golden and get the only AI built to give you full visibility and take complex actions across your entire organization. That's r-i-p-p-l-i-n-g dot a-i slash Kara Golden. Sign up for exclusive access today. What surprised you the most in creating a brand. So you are a first time, I guess, consumer, luxury consumer brand entrepreneur.

36:22Kara Goldin:You're not new to business, but what has surprised you the most? There's so many different things that have surprised me. I honestly, the creating of the fragrances took so much time and thought and consideration. Every fragrance took multiple, we call them mods for modifications of so many different rounds of editing and trying to nail the right exact fragrance or note or balance. So that was really methodical and time consuming. But I would say the biggest challenge in a way has been probably with production. I mean, that's all business. There's nothing really fluffy about that in terms of having the product arrive, mixing the oils with the alcohol, getting everything ready and shipped off, regulatory requirements, a lot of all the kind of nitty gritty, I would call it.

37:09That has been a huge learning curve. It's all about timelines, reaching deadlines, definitely keeps me on my feet. And I could do the creative process all day long. I could talk creativity forever. And at the end of the day, it's still a business. So it's time to get more serious, talk about numbers, when things are arriving, ship dates, order dates, all that kind of stuff.

37:33Kara Goldin:So when you're talking to these perfumers teaching you about fragrance as you were beginning to develop these, what changed once you actually started developing fragrance? I think probably you had changes along the way, not just in the manufacturing of it, but then when the consumers started purchasing it, were there things that, you know, really stood out to you? For example, was there one scent that is far and away the killer scent for you? Did you ever think about that you should have more or less scents too? And just focusing on that. How did you think about the business overall when you were first getting going in manufacturing versus what you're seeing today?

38:21I guess to answer that question, I would say, I mean, there's so many ways to answer it. There's so many different, you know, parts to it. Fragrance is so personal at the end of the day. And I think a challenge in that is we want to create fragrances that people love and purchase and want to repurchase and feel connected to the brand as a whole. so in that i really wanted us to create fragrances that people can relate to and love that is in their price point that they can understand the ingredients that what went behind the fragrance to justify that price point we are 350 fragrance we used really high quality ingredients very high oil concentration we're at 25 so it really performs really well for a long time and hand polished bottles.

39:14Everything was so custom and bespoke. I think for me, what I'm realizing is that I'm so detail oriented and that's very important. But at the end of the day, the customer just wants to like the product. I don't know if they really care so much about all the little tiny details that I was obsessing over at certain times. I don't regret obsessing over any details because I think that's what makes a successful product. But for me, it's almost learning about when to, I don't say walk away, but learning when to say, wow, this is a finished product. Let's market it now, put it on the shelves and see what the customer thinks.

39:47I think all our fragrances are great, but they're not for everyone. One of our fragrances, Amber Boom, is extremely, again, gourmand. It's sweet. If you don't like Amber, you're not going to like Amber Boom. It's a very Amber heavy fragrance. So not to take that personally, but I guess it's navigating also what the consumer wants. And that's why I think we did a great job with Rough Riders. I do think that fragrance kind of nails it on the head of reaching most people. Again, I think all our fragrances are awesome. I think they're incredible. I love all of them personally, but fragrance is, I think, more than any other product out there.

40:24It's so personal.

40:26Kara Goldin:Yeah, definitely. How big is, or how important I should say, is packaging for you in a brand? I think packaging is everything. I mean, presentation to me is everything before someone smells the product, they see the product. So whether that be on our website, Instagram, or on the shelf, they're still visually looking at our product before they're picking it up and spraying themselves or spraying the fragrance to test it. so I wanted to create a product that was extremely classic but unique and very sophisticated so our packaging is all really minimalist it's black and white our cap is bespoke it's very heavy I think we have one of the heaviest caps in the game I could I wouldn't want to drop it on your foot it's a really heavy cap but it's it's beautiful we have our secondary logo on top I spent so much time on the logos and the font and picking out even the right material for the the label because I think packaging is really the first, it's almost the first thing the consumer will experience before they experience the scent.

41:27And if you can't convince them with the packaging, I think, I don't want to say you lost the plot, but it'll be hard to convert them into being interested in the fragrance.

41:36Kara Goldin:This episode of the Kara Golden Show is brought to you by LinkedIn Hiring Pro. Hi, Kara here. First of all, businesses, every hire matters, but so does your time. I felt that pressure firsthand. You know, a bad hire isn't just frustrating, it's expensive in time, money, and team morale. And yet hiring the right person can feel like a full-time job on top of everything else you're already doing. Sifting through applications, trying to spot the real standouts, second-guessing decisions, it can get overwhelming fast. That's why having a way to save time without sacrificing quality isn't just nice to have, it's critical.

42:20Kara Goldin:Luckily, LinkedIn Hiring Pro is built for that reality. It's your hiring partner designed to help you hire with confidence by surfacing only the right candidates without turning hiring into another full-time job. Posting a job isn't always the hard part. It's finding, connecting with, and screening the right candidates. Hiring Pro streamlines the entire process from drafting your job to shortlisting candidates and conducting AI-powered interviews for initial screenings. Their updated conversational interface lets you describe what you need in plain language, no recruiter jargon needed. Nearly 60 % of hires find a candidate to interview within a week.

43:03Kara Goldin:With Hiring Pro, you spend less time searching and more time connecting with the right talent. Join the 2.7 million small businesses using LinkedIn to hire. Get started by posting your job for free at linkedin.com slash Kara Golden. Terms and conditions apply. Today's episode is brought to you by Whatnot. I've been spending time on Whatnot as a buyer, and what I really like is that it doesn't feel like traditional online shopping. You can discover great products without paying full price, but you're also interacting with sellers in real time, asking questions, seeing what they're showing next, and becoming part of the community around them.

43:45Kara Goldin:And as an entrepreneur, I find the seller side really interesting. WhatNot is the largest dedicated live shopping platform with everything from beauty and collectibles to electronics, luxury fashion, even cookies. Anyone can sell, whether your business is big, small, or yet to exist. People selling on Whatnot sell 10 times more than on other major marketplaces because you're not just listing products, you're building real connections with buyers. And across Whatnot, the number of sellers making over$1 million a year has doubled. I use Whatnot as a buyer, and if you've ever thought about selling, I definitely think you should check it out.

44:28Kara Goldin:Search Whatnot, W-H-A-T-N-O-T, in the App Store, download, and you can start selling right away. This episode of the Kara Golden Show is brought to you by Rippling. If you've ever led a team, you know that making decisions is only as good as the information behind them. Waiting days for reports or piecing together data from different systems just slows everyone down. That's where Rippling AI comes in because it's built on your live people and business data. It gives you one unified view of your business. From there, it can instantly generate accurate, real-time reports, dashboards, workflows, and more, so you can move from insight to action much faster.

45:14Kara Goldin:Let's say you find out your sales team is at risk of missing quota. Instead of waiting days or even weeks for someone to build a report, just ask Rippling AI. It instantly pulls real-time data from Rippling and Salesforce into a presentation-ready dashboard showing quota attainment, headcount plan, and monthly revenue to quota by region. In seconds, you can see exactly what's behind your quota risk. But here's what I think is really powerful. Rippling AI doesn't stop at insights. It turns those insights into action by creating an automated recruiting workflow whenever it notices open sales roles and lagging time to fill are directly impacting quota attainment.

45:59Kara Goldin:And because permissions are automatically inherited and actions flow through your existing approval chains, all you have to do is review it and tap confirm to set the workflow in motion. Question answered, action taken, problem solved before it has the chance to happen. Ready to rule your business? Head to rippling.ai slash Kara Golden and get the only AI built to give you full visibility and take complex actions across your entire organization. That's r-i-p-p-l-i-n-g dot a-i slash Kara Golden. Sign up for exclusive access today. So Montauk Man has the four scents. Do consumers typically just buy one scent or do you see that consumers want a choice every day?

46:54Kara Goldin:Once they find one scent, do they just stick with that? Or what do you see in the fragrance industry overall for your product? I'm seeing in trends that people, you know, maybe many years ago, everyone had a signature scent, quote unquote, where they had their one fragrance, maybe a second fragrance. And that was, you know, their fragrance. Now people have what people call now a scent wardrobe. So that's why I think a lot of people almost like smaller sized fragrances to have many options for their mood, for which occasion they're going to, again, seasons or weather or whatever have you. I've noticed in our sales, so many people, as we are a new brand, don't want to fully commit to just the full-size bottle right away.

47:34So that's why we have our discovery set, which is 2ml vials, and that displays all four of our SKUs. And that has been doing really well, at least with our online sales. I think most people really want to smell the product and test it for themselves, see how it develops on their skin. You know, you could read the notes online and the reviews, but at the end of the day, you have to experience it for yourself. so i'm noticing that people are buying a lot of discoveries and the travel sets so they get the full collection that's a part of our offering versus the single bottles and then they're converting and then or unless they smell the in store before you know just diving into a full size bottle because that's a big commitment again it's 90 ml it's a lot of liquid it'll last you a while um you want to enjoy what you're buying does fragrance or i should say montauk man does it go

48:23Kara Goldin:bad at some point? Is there a shelf life? I mean, what is a typical shelf life for your fragrances or in general? That's a great question. Honestly, fragrances don't really have a shelf life. I think from a regulatory selling point, it's like maybe two to three years, but they don't really go bad. I mean, at least if it's a fragrance and alcohol base, they might lose a little bit of their potency. Our fragrances are designed, again, to last a long time at that 25 % oil. I think it depends per fragrance and the percentage of oil that is used. I think that's more of almost like a regulatory question.

49:01Like what can you introduce to the market? I don't actually know that answer, whether it's like two years or three years, but it will, it will last. It'll last a long time. They're designed to, uh, perform. We did the whole stability testing. They'll, uh, last you a long time.

49:16Kara Goldin:So Montauk man, you and I were chatting a little bit before we hit record is really unisex. I mean, it's not just four men. That's what you're finding. And I find that many fragrances are really focused on unisex as well. So when you look at the brand name, obviously Montauk and the Hamptons, it's very romantic in that respect. When you look at kind of going beyond your initial launch of direct-to-consumer into stores, do you see Montauk Man expanding into Tokyo and London and Los Angeles? I mean, just other areas. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. I mean, I really want to convey the world of Montauk and the idealism of it, the romanticism, as you kind of put it, into these fragrances, continue to grow fragrances.

50:17And I love to be, you know, national, international. Right now, we're really just in New York. We're the few select retailers here in New York and our online platform. But we're growing slowly but surely. Right now, we're actually in development of three new fragrances just to have in our library for next year. It's always good to start rolling things out. You know, it's all exciting and creative, I want to say. I love it. So success.

50:44Kara Goldin:So what is success for you and Montauk Man? I mean, how do you measure that, right? I feel like so many entrepreneurs, you just kind of get stuck in this grind of just doing so much every single day. I mean, it's so hard being an entrepreneur. So I know firsthand in building a company that it just takes a lot of resilience and creativity and time, right? Definitely. You always have to push the needle and, you know, breathe life into a brand. So what is success for you and for Montauk Man? Success for me in the literal sense is to keep growing, to have our products become, you know, nationally known first and really have a customer base, a fan base, if you will, and to continue to grow our fragrances, to have more SKUs, for Montauk Men to be known as an amazing American luxury fragrance brand.

51:45A quick example of almost like a little success, I remember our first week when we launched, we were in a store in Bridgehampton and a random woman, I guess, went into the store and bought Rough Riders, one of our fragrances, and put on her story. I had no idea who this woman was, and she was raving about Rough Riders. And she went online about it to Instagram, put on her story, said she bought it for her husband. It's the best thing she's ever smelled in a long time. And that, to me, I thought was a moment of success. Even though it was just one sale, it was someone who I have no connection to, were on the shelves for the first week.

52:25And it was great to get an unbiased opinion of this fragrance from a consumer who was not only excited about it, but bought it for someone in her life and felt so passionate about it that she took it to Instagram and had to just say something about it. That to me is success. I would love to have more of those stories. Those are really impactful to me. To me, a big part of the brand's success is to ultimately make people happy. Fragrance makes me happy. that's why we're creating these fragrances is to make people just enjoy themselves to feel happy to feel good about themselves so that was a great little success uh example but from a from a brand and a business i would of course love to grow more products and skews and uh be in department stores and and grow that way have ancillary items one day whether it be body wash shampoo besides just perfumes.

53:17Kara Goldin:I love it. Well, Andrew, thank you so much for coming on. And I love what you're doing with Montauk Man. So such a great, great story. But also, while it's in the early stages, I think you're really onto something. I mean, it's super, super terrific. So for everyone listening, check out Montauk Man and follow Andrew as well on social to see what is happening with him and the brand. And until next time on The Kara Golden Show. Thank you. Thanks again for listening to The Kara Golden Show. If you would, please give us a review and feel free to share this podcast with others who would benefit. And of course, feel free to subscribe so you don't miss a single episode of our podcast.

54:05Kara Goldin:Just a reminder that I can be found on all platforms at Kara Golden. I would love to hear from you too, so feel free to DM me. And if you want to hear more about my journey, I hope you will have a listen or pick up a copy of my Wall Street Journal bestselling book, Undaunted, where I share more about my journey, including founding and building Hint. We are here every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Thanks for listening and goodbye for now. This episode of the Kara Golden Show is brought to you by LinkedIn Hiring Pro. Hi, Kara here. For small businesses, every hire matters, but so does your time.

54:50Kara Goldin:I felt that pressure firsthand. You know, a bad hire isn't just frustrating, it's expensive in time, money, and team morale. And yet hiring the right person can feel like a full-time job on top of everything else you're already doing. Sifting through applications, trying to spot the real standouts, second-guessing decisions, it can get overwhelming fast. That's why having a way to save time without sacrificing quality isn't just nice to have, it's critical. Luckily, LinkedIn Hiring Pro is built for that reality. It's your hiring partner designed to help you hire with confidence by surfacing only the right candidates without turning hiring into another full-time job.

55:36Kara Goldin:Posting a job isn't always the hard part. It's finding, connecting with, and screening the right candidates. Hiring Pro streamlines the entire process from drafting your job to shortlisting candidates and conducting AI-powered interviews for initial screenings. Their updated conversational interface lets you describe what you need in plain language, no recruiter jargon needed. Nearly 60 % of hires find a candidate to interview within a week. With Hiring Pro, you spend less time searching and more time connecting with the right talent. Join the 2.7 million small businesses using LinkedIn to hire.

56:16Kara Goldin:Get started by posting your job for free at linkedin.com slash Kara Golden. Terms and conditions apply. Today's episode is brought to you by Whatnot. I've been spending time on Whatnot as a buyer, and what I really like is that it doesn't feel like traditional online shopping. You can discover great products without paying full price, but you're also interacting with sellers in real time, asking questions, seeing what they're showing next, and becoming part of the community around them. And as an entrepreneur, I find the seller side really interesting. WhatNot is the largest dedicated live shopping platform with everything from beauty and collectibles to electronics, luxury fashion, even cookies.

57:01Kara Goldin:Anyone can sell whether your business is big, small, or yet to exist. People selling on WhatNot sell 10 times more than on other major marketplaces because you're not just listing products. You're building real connections with buyers. and across Whatnot, the number of sellers making over$1 million a year has doubled. I use Whatnot as a buyer and if you've ever thought about selling, I definitely think you should check it out. Search Whatnot, W-H-A-T-N-O-T in the app store, download and you can start selling right away. This episode of the Kara Golden Show is brought to you by Rippling. If you've ever led a team, you know that making decisions is only as good as the information behind them.

57:51Kara Goldin:Waiting days for reports or piecing together data from different systems just slows everyone down. That's where Rippling AI comes in because it's built on your live people and business data. It gives you one unified view of your business. From there, it can instantly generate accurate real-time reports, dashboards, workflows, and more so you can move from insight to action much faster. Let's say you find out your sales team is at risk of missing quota. Instead of waiting days or even weeks for someone to build a report, just ask Rippling AI. It instantly pulls real-time data from Rippling and Salesforce into a presentation-ready dashboard showing quota attainment, headcount plan, and monthly revenue to quota by region.

58:40Kara Goldin:In seconds, you can see exactly what's behind your quota risk. But here's what I think is really powerful. Rippling AI doesn't stop at insights. It turns those insights into action by creating an automated recruiting workflow whenever it notices open sales roles and lagging time to fill are directly impacting quota attainment. And because permissions are automatically inherited and actions flow through your existing approval chains, all you have to do is review it and tap confirm to set the workflow in motion. Question answered, action taken, problem solved before it has the chance to happen. Ready to rule your business?

59:22Kara Goldin:Head to rippling.ai slash Kara Golden and get the only AI built to give you full visibility and take complex actions across your entire organization. That's r-i-p-p-l-i-n-g dot a-i slash Kara Golden. Sign up for exclusive access today.