Ep.95 How To Make The World Obsessed With Your Products With Cult Gaia Founder Jasmin Larian Hekmat

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1:15Jasmine Heckma is a true creative I have been a huge huge fan of her work for so long she is the founder of Colt Gaia who I'm sure you have seen before from so many of their it designs that have taken over the entire industry from the arc bag to the pearl bag to now ready to wear. I think it's fair to say that Jasmine's designs have absolutely captured the zeitgeist for over 10 years now and the company called Gaia just keeps growing and growing and growing and it is not hard to see why but it actually all started with some flower crowns and a Bratz doll and if that isn't enough of a cliffhanger to keep you watching I do not know what will.

1:49In this conversation Jasmine was so so open about how she manages to keep innovating as a whole, how the product has just gone from strength to strength, how the brand grew in the early years and generally why everything comes back to product and creativity. I'm honestly so grateful to Jasmine for having this conversation for me. As I've said, I have been such a huge fan for so long. Honestly, if there is a single brand that I know that I will come back to again and again and again and no matter what trends are happening in the rest of the world, I will love their designs. Genuinely, I know it just sounds like I'm playing up for it genuinely genuinely you will have seen me wear cult gaia so many different times for this very reason it just manages to break out of the mold and hit the nail on the head every single time and I really wanted to see what was in the secret source behind all of that success before we get into the podcast if you could just go and rate this on whichever podcast app you are listening to this on it makes a huge difference to the podcast and the types of incredible conversations we're able to have the types of guests we're able to get on so you know I know it's probably something you don't think about but if you could just go rate it now or follow it it makes a huge difference thank you so much thank you so much for joining me of course I'm so excited I'm very excited for this conversation as everyone probably knows I am a huge Colcaya fan and have been for a long time I feel like it's the one place that I can rely on to go there and no matter what the season and no matter what the collection want to spend all of my money so that's great it's great for you um great news well I'm sure I'm one of many many many um I'd love to know first I ask all of my guests this at the moment do you feel like you are more working hard or hardly working it's always a balance of both I mean I'm here so that's Hardly working, but I just came off of a lot of work.

3:48I think I'm always in flux. It's always both at the same time. Do you feel like it yo-yos a lot between the balance of being all in one side, or do you feel like you keep the same balance? I'm very good at moving on from fires, putting them out and moving on. I don't dwell very much. So even if I was just grinding, I don't really remember. I'm on to the next and very present in what's coming and what I'm doing. I feel like that's the best trait you can have as a founder. Yeah, I guess. Because it's just fires upon fires upon fires. Yeah, I don't dwell very much. So I'd like to talk a little bit before we move into, you know, your journey founding Cult Gaia and everything that went into that.

4:34I generally like to start kind of getting a bit of a sense of the context of your life, like your early life, who you were, what it was like to really be able to tell, you know, how how we got to this point. Would you mind giving me a bit of a kind of whistle stop tour of your of your kind of life into your early career? Yeah. So I was born here in Los Angeles and my dad was in the toy industry and both of them were immigrants. they moved here after the revolution. And my mother was a fashion designer who actually went to FIDM in downtown. And then they met. And I kind of grew up with a linen closet filled with things that my mom had from college and a lot of exposure to art and drawing.

5:20And, you know, she was a true artist. And my dad was very entrepreneurial. So always starting something, You know, bringing first started with electronics and micro games and then went into dolls and then eventually the Bratz dolls. So when I was around 12, I spent a lot of my afternoons after school and summers working there. And it was kind of like my first foray into fashion. I, you know, I always wanted to do fashion. There was never a question that I would do anything else. My mom said like my first words were sebos, which means dresses in Persian. I was obsessed with clothing and dresses and fabrics.

6:04I'd go into my mom's linen closet and pull things out and drape them on myself and pin them. And yeah, so I grew up around, you know, I was born for this, I guess. I mean, I think that you can always tell those people who've been like very surrounded by it. like it feels like your design references are very wide which I think that a lot of you know at any one time if you enter into the fashion industry there are going to be big trends or whatever it might be and as I said like before we started this podcast I feel like Colt Gaia has such a clear design frame like as in like you kind of you know what to expect not in a predictable way but almost in the way that it's always going to be pushing these different boundaries no matter what trends are about and I feel like you can kind of tell that that's come from having such like a rich knowledge of fashion and design and art yeah I think anytime something becomes a trend I don't really like it I'm very driven by anything that is out of the ordinary ordinary designs and things don't excite me so it's not why I do what I do and so I'm you know I create to create a new experience or something that doesn't exist i think trends when when when something gets oversaturated it's really not that exciting anymore and it is i think a lot about the fact that you know we use fashion as a way to express ourselves and yet the hyper commercialization of fashion has like rather than expressing yourselves you're expressing that you fit into this like specific group by dressing the same as everyone else within that group which in itself is completely the opposite of expressing yourself.

7:50I know. I think humans just want to be a part of something bigger in community. I mean, the reason why the name Cult Gaia is what it is, is great brands are cult-like in that it unifies, you know, a group of people that feel aesthetically and similarly together. So I do think that there's a way. And I think that's what we're doing. You know, you know what to come to us for. there will always be something special but yeah I'm grateful for the trends we've started it's obviously made us successful and made us able to continue what we're doing but in general we aren't driven we're not trying to make something for everyone I'd love to speak about obviously your your dad founded Bratz yeah that's a huge I mean that's a huge cultural moment Can you talk about the impact of that on you as a person, but also on your design?

8:51Yeah, I think I really learned the power of branding, the power of making something unique and different to anything that's out there in the world. If you look at a Bratz doll, it's looking at product through the lens of a child. And that's kind of something I try to do with my product is their minds are so pure and unpolluted that they notice every detail, every stitch. When you sit with a doll with a kid, they notice the quality of the hair. They notice the little charms. They notice the zipper. even the packaging is an experience of an in and of itself and when I make things for Kalkaya even the customer experience I think about it in that I I want the customers to have this childlike wonder you know I want you from the first time you see a product on someone else be like oh you know and then you go to the website and you're struck again and then you order the product and then you you receive the package and the packaging and that's also an amazing experience and then you know when you talk to someone from our team you're also touched and hopefully then you go to our stores and you get that same sense of this childlike wonder and joy and I learned I guess the value of that through toys and Bratz dolls I hadn't truly thought about how different Bratz dolls were from the other dolls at the time like I'm just thinking about you know things like Barbie and things like what you would kind of expect when you're you know looking at the different children's toys which I personally don't spend too much time looking at now but it's so markedly different like there's I can imagine at the time it would have either been like a huge success or you know with as with everything like this people being like okay which actually I can also see come through in your designs as well in the way that actually you have to kind of take those risks and step outside of what everyone else is doing in order to be able to genuinely make a difference.

10:59Yeah which I think is much harder now when there's eyeballs on you taking those risks. And you can just imagine like you can imagine one of those things where it's you know you put something out and people are like but you've got to you've got to be able to have those and we'll come on to like the you know how you've been able to evolve past each hit at a time because I do think you're one of the brands that have done that so well whereas you know there's a there's a cash need within a business and there's also you know the the desire to make more of something that's already making you money but also at the same time you've got to keep evolving otherwise you're just going to be you're going to be just the arc bag brand which obviously you you guys have never stuck within that and we'll we'll come on to speak about all of that I'd like to first speak about your decision to go to design college or to study design um could you tell me a little bit about that experience especially as someone who probably had a huge amount more experience than a lot of people who were there having grown up being literally surrounded by it right I so I went to FI I went to Otis for foundation year and then I transferred to FIT in New York because I to be in New York.

12:09And I thought it's so important for me to actually learn the foundational basics of sewing and pattern making and draping and marketing. I did a double measure. So it was, I was really bad at design school. I sucked. I was nothing compared to my peers. I was a terrible sewer terrible pattern maker a very good draper but i couldn't i could just didn't didn't take it like i glued dresses together perfect i can't wait to get by something and i was just like you get the picture right you get the idea and I had a professor who we had like a critique coming in and that we were going to be graded and I had a I had a professor come by and he says Jasmine you're not going to pass this test but you will be very successful one day and I'll never forget that gave me fuel sometimes it just takes one person to believe in you to give you you know the juice to keep going I can imagine having grown up around so much design inspiration and probably I can imagine that at that time especially in school you would have been just so much more surrounded by that kind of compared to everyone else but then actually going to study it officially and having as you say like real weaknesses that you were realizing I can imagine that wasn't easy to you know you can process it now looking back and being like well it just wasn't my strength but I can imagine at the time that would have been really hard very difficult so technical design and that kind of process and those kinds of things I wasn't very good at I was very conceptual I still am so I was around like wizards who are amazing and I it also taught me like you can partner with incredible talent to get you know your dreams realized no absolutely and how did you keep pushing at that stage was ever was there ever a point where you thought that maybe this wasn't for you based on the fact that you'd obviously had your challenges I kissed a lot of ass I made really good friends with professors that I knew I wasn't going to do well great um and I got help from roommates I would like do favors for them to do my patterns I made it happen I figured it out which is really what business is and like also it's I always think about the fact that within the education system obviously you know it's great to be to be able to do a wide range of things but realistically when you go into the rest of life like you can do great things well there's always someone better than you oh 100 but the biggest thing is you're all even at the peak of success you're still at the bottom you know my whole philosophy is like you're everyone's at the top and the bottom at the same time um and I learned that early on and obviously experience that all the time now but in school I'm like I feel like I have these great ideas I'm so excited to be there but there's always going to be someone who's better than what you are doing and do you think that's given you an underlying level of confidence based on the fact that no it's given me grit and a crazy work ethic desire to succeed no matter what so let's talk Talk about the start of Colt Gaia.

15:59How soon did the idea for it come in terms of, you know, in relation to your time studying? So it was kind of an accident. I, Colt Gaia was right next, I mean, Colt Gaia, I was right next to the flower district at FIT. It's like two blocks away. And I'd walk these streets to go to school. And they had these beautiful silk flowers. I'm a very inspired person. Like being able to just roam around and be inspired by anything I see is still a huge part of who I am. So I also love flowers still. And I'd see these beautiful silk flowers and paper flowers. And so I started making flower crowns for friends, just for like birthdays or you're sad or graduation or anything, you know, it's like, and here's my the jasmine gift right and everyone started wearing them around New York and the doorman used to be like oh you guys are the girls with the flowers in your hair kind of became this thing that everyone recognized it became a huge conversation starter so it made it really easy for people to come and approach you guys were like can I buy this please I want to give it to my date.

17:16And it kind of became this thing where you became a magnet. And simultaneously, I'd collected vintage fabric my whole life, a lot of vintage silk. So I grew up going to a place called International Silks and Woolens here on Beverly Boulevard. And they have a lot of dead stock silk. And I was, you know, obsessed with textiles. My uncles were in textile. So I've just collected fabric my entire life as well. And I started making these wired head wraps that I called turbans. And it just, it was great because you got to put this beautiful piece of fabric on your head. And these two things kind of just became a thing of things that I was making.

17:57Meanwhile, I was concepting my couture line that I called Gaia Osto. And it was going to be like very beautiful high price point gowns. And one night I was having dinner at my place with some friends. And they're like, why are you doing that? Everyone's trying to buy these crowns and turbans off your head, just do this. I was like, actually, that's a great idea. Well, I need a name. So I always love the name Gaia. It's the goddess of Mother Earth and the daughter of chaos. and to me chaos is an incredibly creative force and so is obviously mother nature and femininity and so I needed the name guy in it and cult because grape brands are cult-like like I said and girls with flowers in their hair like roaming around New York is kind of cult-like in a way so that night came up with a name took pictures of product on my friends heads name the product after them learned how to make a website through this there used to be a website called weebly before shopify and then goodsy and i just uploaded this stuff and then probably like a few months later i got a feature in daily candy which was really big subscription email subscription at the time and i got so much attention and orders and for me that was huge I still chase that feeling.

19:27I stayed up all night to wait for that article to go live. And then from there, I decided I needed to move home to focus on this. My parents weren't paying for my life in New York. So I needed to move into their house to do this. And I got some help and we started making flower crowns and turbans, like getting bigger and bigger orders. we were doing it all ourselves me and someone else named Agatha who still works for me and then from there I brought the Ark back and I ordered a thousand pieces and I was like this is it this is the best thing in the world it had the same kind of effect on people as the crowns did people were like what is that I need it but it didn't sell interesting it didn't sell for like two years really so it it sat there for a good while giving it away and what made you keep it it was that still the first a thousand orders yeah so it just I mean a thousand dollars a thousand bags I couldn't give it away I was trying to give it away I couldn't it was crazy and at the time flower crowns became so I moved kind of pivoted the business.

20:52And I made Kalk Gaia a flower crown cart company. And the way we made money and also kind of got our brand name out there is Levi's or Revolve or different. I mean, some bar mitzvahs or parties or showers, they'd ask us to come and make fresh flower crown. So it was kind of giving away something that died, but they'd pay us to make the crowns on site and I ended up training girls across the country so we could do this you know all across the U.S. and so I did that for a little bit. And so at this point you've obviously you've bought some stock of the ARC bag but the majority of what you're doing is you're doing this flower crown business.

21:37Yeah. How did that pivot into or like how did the arc bag even start to take off was that did that just sit there while a few other designs came out in between and then it took off no I was like fully doing flower crowns really so it was that fresh flower crowns I was like okay I'm making money doing this this is fun new I get bored very easily so I was like this is something a new challenge it made people really happy I got the same joy out of it that I do now out of making product. But I was giving the bags away at like the Revolve events in Coachella under the table. And I was giving it to influencers.

22:18And Instagram really started to take off and I took some good pictures. And after that, it was like selling like hotcakes.

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24:02That's how work gets handled. That's Asana. Visit us at asana.com. That's A-S-A-N-A dot com. What do you think turned the tide in terms of where the success started coming from? Marketing and Instagram. The right people wearing it and taking pictures of it and putting it on. At the time, Instagram had just taken off. So it was the first time you really saw people or influencers taking pictures of themselves with things. And this bag was perfect for that. It made people press like, you know, which was like an amazing form of currency at the time. And now still is. how did you know at that point whether to move on to another design or to just keep you know writing this very specific design wave I did write it for a little bit but I did new like I did it in acrylic right and I that also taught me I think great design you can do usually in many different fabrications and so I introduced an acrylic and I started to do like new different shapes using the same kind of technique and I also think what I think the name made it big as well and the power of naming your products appropriately you know it's the arc shape it's also looks like a half moon like the sun split in half it also radiates like the sun and it rocks back and forth like about.

25:38I can imagine getting a very successful design. I've heard a lot of people talk about the paralysis of moving on to a next good one. How long did it take you to hit your next like gold mine? So I quickly went into clothing, which is what I always wanted to do. And I knew that now I had an audience that I could deliver that to. And I didn't like, I was making some clothes for our photo shoots because I didn't want to shoot with other people's things. I wanted to be able to control the entire vision and the look. And so I quickly started doing ready to wear. And that was very well received. And we had a dress called the willow.

26:26And I'll never forget the first day you don't have high expectations the first time you launch ready to wear and this dress blew out and we're like whoa okay people care and then wholesalers started to take notice luckily so they started coming around but I was so lucky that I had I own my customer at that point I do not think cult guy would be where it is without that customer if it was just a wholesale business there's absolutely no way we would have evolved there's no way we would have been ready to wear brand I remember buyers saying you're an it bag brand you know how do we know it's not a one-hit wonder we're not going to pick up the collection we're going to wait and see and actually Moda Operandi was one of the first to pick us up so let's talk about that because I think that is very very important to talk about within the fashion industry and I think that we we hear a lot about the success of DTC brands and owning your audience and owning the way you present to them and the entire image and the brand and the shots and all of this but I also think there's an element of co-signing and this kind of you've made it effect of being with certain retailers and wholesalers and I think that those things often come at odds with one another because you want to make sure you know people know that you could be on revolve but at the same time what if they shoot it in a way that you don't want it how did you balance those two things trial and error but I do think obviously wholesale is extremely important for that reason when the bag really took off my friend Claire Distenfeld who owned the store called five story in New York, put the bag next to a Gucci bag.

28:19At the time, the bag was like$50. And merchandising them next to each other spoke volumes to me because it's what I believe. It's how I believed people shop. I don't believe people shop based on price point. Like when you go to a department store, there's the higher price point designer level versus the contemporary. and she proved that in her beautiful boutique and showed that that's what people want and I think other people followed and I think it set the stage for what we're able to do at Cult Gaia we're able to have you know very affordable or not affordable just entry-level pricing for something that's super beautiful and then we also have the five thousand dollar gowns with extreme workmanship on them no absolutely and I do think that's one of the things that you do so well as a brand in the way that you know you're going there for something special and yes it's it will be it's pricey like as in it's not you know it's not designer pricey but not high street but actually the I feel like the edge you really have is as well based on the fact that like there is no way that you could access that type of design anywhere kind of lower than that price point which I do think is a very valuable trait to have as a brand yeah and definitely something to kind of protect overall I think that your like your journey as a whole what strikes me as so kind of important about it is how much of it has come from things that have been quite natural to your journey like there was never a point that or from what we've heard so far that with the you know with the flower crowns for example you very much leaned into them you weren't necessarily like okay well now this has to be an only flower crown business for the rest of my life like this is what we're doing it feels like you were really led by the art at every different stage of the business which I think very much shines through now how did you really find your kind of design footprint when it comes to when it comes to ready to wear as a whole I can imagine from the first collection it would be something very specific but you probably want to evolve out of that and you want to evolve about out of that into something new how did you really established that kind of your take on ready to wear yeah I think at our core we are designing to make women feel like really beautiful and also be the best dressed in the room all the time you know and do so in a elegant but very creative way I think you know making women feel like goddesses when they wear our pieces is really important and drives us.

31:14I obviously have grown a lot as a designer since the beginning. Our fabric choices and our hardware choices and our fit has improved so much because I'm, you know, kind of learning as I go. But yeah, at our core, it's you know I choose fabric that has generally a little bit of imperfection you know like this dress I'm wearing you can see it's not just one shade it has two colors of yarn so I always say the more you look the more you see and that's how we approach our ready to wear so let's talk about the need or the desire to kind of scale a business at the same time as obviously you know you like me are very product obsessed.

32:05And there's an element of that where you need to scale the business, but you also want to make sure that every single product is as good as that product should be. How have you managed to balance those two things? I think a planner is extremely important. A good planner to help understand where there's opportunity and where to move forward. I recut something that does very well. And we do it for like one or two more seasons and I think that helps bring scale because you don't really sometimes you know sometimes you don't know I've been wrong you know and I think I'm at a place now where if I really believe in the product it's gonna do well and at the PP and the proto and SMS stage you just need to get it delivered properly but and have there ever been times where you've come out with a product that you especially at the beginning that you're kind of like you're excited about but you're not like this is game changing the eos bag is an icon i wasn't crazy about it right but i knew it would do so well and it surpassed all my expectations and now I love it but at first I felt like it was too easy I put beautiful ball and I varied the sizing I think it's a beautiful bag but the best product for me comes really easy it's in a moment that I design it or I like I literally dream of product like I wake up and my team knows because I schedule my slacks so I'm not blowing everyone up in the middle of the night and I schedule them at 9am and they probably could be like of all my ideas but I dream of product and usually it's those easy decisions and those easy quick moments of insight that make the best product and what rules do you have around releasing things that you're not actually that excited about?

34:20I won't release it anymore. I used to move forward. Now I won't. I'll hold it. And why do you think that's important? I think focus is really important. And I think whatever you put out into the world, you can't take back. You can't take it back. Especially within fashion when branding isn't just branding, like product is branding product is marketing like it's so easy to put something out that's overly commercialized that you're like yeah we know it will make some cash like we know that this is the like I can imagine a hundred things with logos that you guys could put out right now that you would know would absolutely I literally don't know how my the biggest joke is like I'm not commercial enough so anytime someone hears me try to make something more commercial they're like where's Jasmine where is she because I told you I don't like anything that I feel like I've seen anywhere else but that shines through and I feel like that you know I always always say when looking at like our product roadmap and looking at how we're going to build over time and what we've done too much of and all of these different things is like the there's so many things that you can create that's gonna get a lot of cash for the business yeah and don't get me wrong of course you need to balance that to a certain extent but the second you balance that over the core of the product offering and your kind of dna is it's it's not necessarily that it will come crashing down immediately to me that like sets off this timer it's like okay So if you saturate that, like, yes, that will be hugely successful for a proportion of time if you're lucky.

36:09But I always think that the second that becomes oversaturated and the second that starts being too much about the commercialization, you won't even know it's hit you and you'll be out the other side. Well, yeah. When it's oversaturated, you hit mark, you get into the markdown game. That's the hardest thing about wholesale. I think they are committed to what sold last year. And I understand it's hard to take risks. Right. You don't know what's going to do well. So now I launch product early myself because I'm willing to take the risk. And if it does well, I will tell them this is going to do well.

36:51Now is your turn. and it kind of increases like the life cycle of something good it's win-win wholesale is such it's a merchandising game it's not a design game right and actually that is great for some you know that's great for cash as we said but like in terms of actually you know are you gonna get the next big thing are you gonna take bets on something like I know if I absolutely love a design I will take the like the biggest bets on it and I don't know what it is because I'm not I'm not an overly risk taker but i when i'm sure of something like go hard yeah like we had this we this product called contour that just came out and it was it's essentially shapewear but it's it's designed to be worn without anything else so it's not got the obvious ruching it's not got the it's kind of in t-shirt styles in long sleeve styles in tank styles so that you wouldn't know it was shapewear um just because i wore shapewear under things and i found it was just like bulging me out a little bit and I remember trying the first samples and I literally went into work the next day and I was like double the order and they were like we just we were already like the MOQs are high and like we've we've you know we're buying a lot and I'm like double the order I'm like it's on me like it's on me but if you like the second we come out with this and lo and behold we came out with it and it literally sold out within like minutes and I think that it's like the ability to back yourself but also to build that like to build that knowledge over time of like you do get this sense you're like this is it believing in that instinct is to me now one of the most valuable things the next bit of the podcast is brought to you by indeed who we've been working with over the last few months they are the uk's number one job site which makes finding better work easier and more effortless.

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39:13In fact, I would say that in those situations, there can even be added pressure of wanting to make sure that everything goes just right. Trust me, I know. Thankfully, there are some really great resources in the Indeed Careers Guide to help with this, which should ensure that you feel equipped to be the best version of yourself from day one. I've stepped into a number of new roles in the past and welcomed many people into teams. And one thing which I've definitely learned is that no matter who you are or what the role is, there are so many shared or common challenges that we all face at this stage.

39:41Making friends with colleagues, interacting with your new manager, setting boundaries and creating a 90-day plan are all covered within this guide. However, from my own personal perspective, here are a couple of tips that I've picked up along the way. Firstly, you want to spend your first 30 days learning. When you start a job, you have a huge advantage, which is an outside perspective. You become blinkered and biased so easily and very quickly when you work inside a company. So you want to make use of that. That is a huge amount of value that you bring. I would really recommend collating your thoughts throughout your first month to present back to your manager when you're a few weeks in.

40:13Next up, use those notes from your first month to guide what changes or improvements you can make. Nobody is ever going to fire you for being helpful. So try your best to collate a set of actions in your first 90 days that you think will genuinely make a difference to the company and how it works. And finally, seek feedback. Your first few months of any job are always a test of how to merge your way of working with the company's. So start an open dialogue with your manager and get used to getting their feedback regularly. This means if you have a three-month probation period, any feedback there should not come as a shock.

40:45Hopefully some of these tips will come in handy for you in the future. Starting a new role can always be a very, very daunting task, but I always think it's best to remember that it is actually the unknown which makes us feel a little uncomfortable. Stepping into a new job comes with a lot of unknowns, so it's best to embrace the situation and just try and understand that to developers people we've got to spend a little bit of time outside of our comfort zones. I've loved thinking a little bit more about these topics thanks to Indeed and sharing some of my own experiences with you all. If you want to discover more tips on how to nail a job interview or email a recruiter just search for Indeed Careers Guide and you will find loads of handy articles and videos from a wide range of experts all designed to help you get where you want in your career.

41:27so how have you built that instinct over time I've had it I think I got surrounded by a lot of people who are very which is great but data oriented or have their own opinions and I'm a big listener I run my company in a way where everyone has a voice and it's my best and my worst quality so I listen and I want everyone's opinion to be heard and I'm curious about everyone's opinion So it kind of dims the inner instinct, you know, a little bit when you listen a lot. And so I've just learned that I'm here because, you know, a large part to my strong instincts and decisions and to have a little bit more value and confidence in that.

42:16No, absolutely. And I think that's very valuable to build. It's a lot of the time, people need to work backwards from that. Like a lot of the time people need to work out how to take in other people's opinions, especially like people who are particularly strong in their like craft. I think it's really, you know, I've spoken to a lot of people on this podcast who were like, oh, I actually needed to, you know, be able to listen to other people and bring people in and hire great people and all of this. and I think that that is incredibly important but at the same time as you've said like before you had all of the people in the room there was a reason why you struck gold a few times and it's it it must be hard to balance the idea of making sure you are being gracious and taking in opinions and not being like needing to be right for the sake of it yeah but at the same time understanding when your instinct is correct it's the hardest thing and so how big is the team now uh we're about 100 people wow that's huge yeah how does that feel I don't think bigger is better right yeah okay um but I it's a lot and what is your role specifically within that like what do you refer to your title as I am very involved in product and marketing and how have you also very much the business yeah I can imagine the strategy overall like that can't be done without I mean it's led by product and marketing as it is like if you know in terms of your trajectory in terms of leading teams in that way how have you found that journey as the company's grown and you've naturally had to lead more and more people when obviously the reason you were here in the first place was for a lot of it was design you know a lot of it wasn't necessarily I'm sure you're a great manager but it wasn't necessarily that you were the best manager in the game so how have you found that journey um it's honestly one of the hardest ones I think you're kind of thrown into it you know I interned at other places I didn't work at other places which is a huge difference and I consciously didn't you know work at other places because I knew it would probably I'd get stuck you know with the reward of the paycheck and working towards the next goal for someone else instead of just getting going.

44:38So I didn't have that experience. So I learned as I went. But luckily, it's been an amazing learning experience. And I've learned a lot from people I've worked with and over time. And I guess I'm very empathetic, which I think works in your favor as a female boss but also makes things a little more challenging because I think people have an expectation of you that you create by yourself that you need to hold up and that becomes really hard when sometimes the business needs to come first also. I often find it really hard the balance between being like an empathetic person and wanting to make sure everyone's okay and make sure everyone's really happy at work and all of this and at the same time like being in a growing business there are going to be like elements of that that are going to be really fucking hard and you have such different responsibilities in terms of being able to go into a room and make sure the work is the best it can be and also make sure that people are the happiest they can be and as the founder that comes back to you again and again and again despite the fact that a lot of the time I mean those aren't always at odds with one another but sometimes they are and like having to be the bad guy I don't mean walking and firing everyone I just mean being like being able to say do you know what this work isn't where it needs to be and we need to do this or I think we need to think bigger or whatever it might be and you know someone's put loads of work into that and that's not easy no it's not easy but I think yeah setting I've learned that setting the expectation up front is the most important thing you can do so I have a post-it on my because I realized like I don't like being told what to do so I don't really like telling people what to do and so I have a post-it on my computer that says clarity is kindness as a reminder that it's okay being clear doesn't mean you're telling someone what to do and other people sometimes like to be told what to do just because I don't enjoy it doesn't mean that's not what other people need so I've learned to be extremely clear about my expectations and forthright no I think that's really helpful yeah I think that's a really good point and I think that a lot of the time we especially as women and we're not a homogenous group and etc etc but like I do think that we are like a lot of the time we perceive softer and less direct to be kinder and a lot of the time I don't necessarily think that's the case and that's something that I very much had to build as a founder and as a manager like going in and kind of just being like well you know like it could be like this it could be like this or whatever and actually you've got a really clear vision and you know you've got a clear vision you know that no matter what that person comes back with if it's not what you wanted you're not going to be happy with it and actually therefore not being direct in that moment was not a kind thing to do now I've had situations where I'm like I told you guys that I didn't like this and my team was like no you didn't you said I'd be vague so it could also be their idea because I had this it's harder for me to be direct it comes less naturally to me but I think I totally agree it's so important what would you say the most key hires that you've made in cold guys journey were um the first hire I made was operations and then I think a planner is so important to be able to make the revenue you need and keep tracking towards that and then obviously product development production and has there been a do did you see like a clear inflection point at any point with growing a specific team so yes I have a right hand she's my CFO okay she wasn't always my CFO but we have amazing synergy and she taught me through our relationship and through some of the best teams in my company that synergy is so much more important than a resume or skill like shared vision same kind of work ethic and this shared obsession I guess and like you like each other it makes it easier to work No, I completely agree with that.

49:13And I think that like when you're a solo founder, it's quite a unique position in that like no matter what you build the company to be, there's to a certain extent, there's not necessarily going to be your equal. Like, yes, the shareholding could get so high that you don't have a large percentage. generally the success of the company is somewhat tied to especially if the founder has a good instinct the founder's ability to be like no we're not going to do it like i veto like i actually veto this like are we going to do it in this direction and i think that if you are a solo founder finding someone that might be a ceo might be ceo might be cfo might be chief of staff like so like a board member whatever it might be that have that synergy and balances out certain things that you don't necessarily bring right personally has allowed me to be a better version of myself in the way that I don't so much need to concentrate on mitigating all of my weaknesses or being someone I'm not like I'm not the finance person like I'm not like I'm just no one wants me to be that but actually being able to then lean more into like what am I good at and I feel like that was the biggest thing like I remember reading a book and it being like don't be a solo founder and I was like cool we're actually quite late for that now like we're a bit deep into the journey so like I'm not really sure what you want me to do but actually like that for me was the biggest thing because I was like if this was a co-founder we'd be able to sit in a room and we'd be able to like nicely argue and be like no it's this no it's this that is the only person who is going to have the like ability to like actually go at it with you and I feel like you need to have that somewhere you can't be in a room full of yes people who are just being like sure jasmine like you needn't be able to go out and i always say like the friction is good we need to get you it's okay to disagree the second you have you're scared to you know disagree or have conflict with your team is really dangerous um so i always say like let's please find a way to do respectfully but do not be afraid of it.

51:16I want to know with all of this and with managing an 100 person team, how do you stay creative? I get very creative when I travel, when I'm alone or when I'm in nature. I'm very inspired by. I'm very inspired. I'm looking at the lamp behind you and it's another product, you know, like inspiration is not my problem I'm actually too inspired okay I need to be less inspired no I don't think I don't think anyone wants that from more focus there's not enough time to put out all the things I want to put out I feel like that's a great place to be and has there ever been a point within your journey that you found you found kind of like creative block or being stunted yes I do but I know it'll come and it generally does and is that is there a trigger or something that you find I it could be a sound it could be a piece of art where it's like the flower in the art and I like those colors and those brush strokes and it it's becomes like a spool of thread you know you just keep pulling or I become obsessed with a word so I'm like what does this word mean visually and it's a thread that you just keep pulling and pulling and what do you think is to thank for the biggest growth moments in Colgai's whole journey it products that people are obsessed with I believe that has really pushed the needle for us I think we've been able to pivot and elevate really nicely.

52:59I mean, when I think of how I was hustling flower crowns for so long and now we're here, I think it's an amazing story. And I think a lot of it has to do with beautiful product, the it items and the magic of our campaigns. you know when I started I didn't believe in this is still a challenge for me I've gotten better but I didn't believe in collections I don't think it's logical that you will go buy five pieces that all have the same print or pattern or language in it even though it's going to look amazing on a rack you're only going to buy one so I really built the business around pieces at the beginning I was making pieces that everyone should have and then they can have more you know in a way like you go to a vintage store and you get this experience where everything is special and I always wanted our customer to feel that way as we've evolved I've obviously found a way for the language to speak through more of the things we make but it's still a challenge for me i think it's our best quality and our worst quality so about understanding what like can help designs complement each other without necessarily needing to like split sales because department stores want collections right and the more i think about it the more i think just how many it products cult guy has had yeah like i there have been like there have been so so so many for a brand of your age i know you must over index like through throughout it what makes an it product i don't know what makes it i don't think we always know but i rely a lot on um an exhale to know and in our line review or sketch review if you hear people like go I'm like or wow you kind of know that you're on to something I say our product should sound like an exhale when you see it it should feel like that moment of joy and wonder but I believe in product that photographs well, I think that's very important for an it item.

55:41I always say it's a great product if you pull it out of the bottom of a box and it's crumbled up and you pull it out and it's still beautiful. But yeah, I think bags, if you can do multiple fabrications, it's a good sign. I like bags that stand generally, but like our Hera bag was a crazy success and it doesn't stand so I think also the right timing is everything when you've like had that say like the product presentation to the team and you hear your exhales and you're like we've got a few it products in here do you over index on the campaign around those products in particular like do you take it and run with it now we do yeah now we shoot more content of what we're gonna what we think will sell more I always feel throughout the there's such different stages in the design process with like going from design even like sketch to proto to actually like getting the samples like I the the ones that I think are going to be the it product often change from those two specific stages but once I've seen the first sample of something like it is just that like it will be literally circled in every marketing plan like in red and my biggest belief always within a business is to strengthen your strengths like I would much rather us post 10 times more about the hero product if that one's not doing well like this is not a business just for commercials like as in like I'm not going to force it down your throats if you don't like it like you're never going to hear about it again so I say pour gas on it if something's doing well I'm like where's the gas yeah right and so what type of levers do you pull to be pulling gas on it we do instagram ads and we get girls to wear it and that's influence marketing yeah and do you generally do that via i mean it's a high price point product so gifting paid we'll reach out to like girls we work with and be like do you like this you want to wear this luckily call guys very organic i built it very organically we don't really pay people to wear us.

57:53I can imagine that's like that ties in so well with having a knit product like people want the product. Yeah I want to come on to speak a little bit about your journey into motherhood and running a brand at the same time because I can imagine there must be quite tricky times as part of that could you talk to me a little bit about how that's kind of impacted your overall journey? Yeah, I think it's made me value time more obsessive. Time to me is also a product. I'm obsessed with time and the fact that I can't get it back. So I'm, my days are, like if I need eyeballs on something for 15 minutes, it needs to be scheduled.

58:36So I'm extremely, extremely disciplined with my schedule. I'm very disciplined with when I'll be with the kids when I'll see them. I also, you know, in a way becoming a mother gave me like a superpower because when you look at time through the lens of a kid, you realize that it's not infinite. And so it kind of made me like Mario and Mario brothers, like the eating all that, like the babies are like the mushrooms that give me like the superpower. And I'm like, let's go. I don't have time. You know, I only have so much time to have my meetings. I only have so much time to make the best brand. You know, there's with kids, time is like constantly in your face.

59:26My husband is extremely helpful, which I think goes a really long way. My parents live here. It makes it much easier. I have a lot of empathy for women who do not have help and family nearby or partners who are helpful. I think that goes a really long way. And I don't want to take that for granted and say it's easy. You know, even though I make it look easy, I have a lot of help. um so but yeah I think it gives you a really different perspective on

1:00:04creating you know and what does a typical day look like for you I wake up my kids usually come in the bed either in the middle of the night or the morning we wake up we get the kids ready have breakfast take my son to school then I'll go to work luckily like convenience also plays a huge part of this my my son's school is 15 minutes from my house and five minutes from the office so I'm able to go and like volunteer if I need to for an hour 20 minutes and be as present as I can there and then I'll go to the office I'll have my coffee I'll have my meetings every day is different but lots of product meetings lots of approvals lots of working on the next seasons fittings fabrics meetings and then I'll pick him up at three o 'clock and or he'll either come to the office or he has an after-school activity and then I'm home probably by like five six and what would you say the biggest thing you've learned is since about having a business about managing people since having had children to have more empathy and that it's fucking hard it's really hard your priorities change a lot like I like working late love to work late when no one else is working my best ideas come in the middle of the night and I don't have that opportunity as much as I think I used to and that's challenging is there anything that you wish you knew before having had kids no I don't think too much about things I do before I do that I don't I just do it and I figure it out and again your best quality is your worst quality I yeah I don't think so much one of my favorite sayings is about not making the right decision but making the decision right and I think if you're an impulsive person which I absolutely am like I think people I'm impulsive I'm very considered about a lot of things I'm impulsive about a lot of things as well but if there's one thing about me it's that I will work every single second of every single day to make sure that that was the right decision and that you know it's gonna be all right in the end or it's gonna be the great like the best decision I ever made whatever it might be make the decision right I'd love to know before we finish what the best piece of advice that you've ever been given is my dad used to always say when a pomegranate's trees fruit and it's very very full the branches bow to teach me about humility and i think always being humble and having humility is extremely important i don't know if that's a business advice i think business advice my 2024 focus is clarity is kindness And for anyone who's trying to do something, I would say any movement is good.

1:03:25You know, it's almost like starting Cult Gaia, I had no expectations. And I just did it. when you have to start something new and there's expectations it almost steals momentum in a way so I always say just do it every day just do one thing that gets you closer to what you want to do like we see so much of other people's journey and don't get me wrong like that's an absolute blessing we're literally here right now like talking about your journey but I also think it instills in us this like such high expectations and I just think that like especially when it comes to starting a business it's not that you shouldn't have high expectations or high goals or whatever it might be it's the fact that this kind of rigidity of expectation kind of steals this momentum and it it feels like slightly misplaced it feels like actually that from my experience anyway every valuable thing there is to know about my business has been learned once it was already started even though I had every single illusion about what it could look like and I feel like that's just saying like sometimes done is better than perfect like just start make some movement learn some things is better than perfect I think I owe a lot of my success to that well now it should be perfect but perfect is perfect yeah it must be if anyone on my team listening we will not accept anything else but done is also very important acceptable sometimes done and perfect thank you so much you've been amazing thank you so much for sharing your journey so much this is great

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