Stairway to CEO

• How she discovered, that she really loved retail and how that was helpful as she began to build BOXFOX
• How wanting to send a thoughtful and comforting gift box to a friend who was sick sparked the idea for BOXFOX when Chelsea and two good friends saw that there wasn’t really a great way to do this yet
• How the three Co-Founders work together and get a long and how they worked to get ready for launch in 2014
• What companies Chelsea and her Co-Founders look for when building partnerships with brands that will be part of the platform for their boxes and why these characteristics are important to them and to their customers
• How they managed to build this company without any investor help and what steps they took to stay the course and grow organically with self-funding and revenue
• How they have navigated COVID, what positives and negatives came from it all, and how they continue to move forward with every job still in tact within the company
• Why partnerships BOXFOX has entered into with companies like Nordstrom, Anthropologie, The Bachelorette, Girlboss, and others have been impactful and meaningful 
• What Chelsea looks for when hiring, what she’s learned as the company has grown, and what advice she has for others

Shopboxfox.com

“It is kind of interesting how certain qualities lend themselves to ending up being entrepreneurial, or you could just be straight up, I want to be an entrepreneur, and then those qualities, find you.”

“We were not going to shut it down for anything. Like come hell or high water we were just going to keep going now with time. That was our attitude at the time.”

“I remember we were like, “What are all the reasons and seasons?” Which is a phrase we use. And we are trying to figure out what was the need for people? And that's really what dictated the original curation.”

“It's really important for us that they're utilitarian and useful products. They're not throwaway products, and they're well designed and beautiful and they come from companies run by good people.”

“We had a phenomenal year in that sense because part of our ethos is being there when you can't physically be there. We've been saying that for six years and it just became super true last year.”

“The management of people is really hard...that's stuff that weighs on us. And in a good way, like we care about it. But it is a lot of work, too.”

“Honestly, putting my phone down when I get home, if I'm done for the day, I'm done for the day. And that alone will set me up for success the next day because I just feel refreshed and better.”

“Being a manager means you're responsible for guiding and shepherding and advocating for the people that work for you.” 

“Being super open and honest with people, being super kind to one another, and also just empathetic... We're really pro humanity here.”

“It's a lot of responsibility, but don't feel like you need to do everything at once. Nobody's an overnight success at all. I mean, there's so many things you need to get your ducks in a row when it comes to supply chain, operations, marketing. And it's OK if it takes a little bit of time.” 

• How growing up with an entrepreneurial dad helped him experience the ups and downs of business at an early age and how being on the water polo team, even though he wasn’t good at it, taught him perseverance and time management
• How his time in investment banking after college went and why he was thankful to move on to something else after being laid off, but then had to deal with being laid off a few more times within the next few years 
• What led Daniel to fall in love with retail, what ideas that love for retail sparked, and how he got started in the retail industry 
• What he learned during his time at the Gap, Old Navy, and American Eagle and what finally gave him the push to start Fourlaps
• What difficulties he experienced in the beginning of getting his company launched and why a trip to China revealed what he needed to do to save the business
• How lots of good press led to some growing pains, but ultimately set them up to be ready to be catapulted forward because of their partnership with Peloton and the fact that so many people were working out at home and looking for good athletic apparel during the pandemic
• How he has worked through anxiety and depression and what he has done to make sure he stays connected with his community in valuable ways that help him stay grounded
• What advice Daniel shares for those who are entrepreneurs and who have an idea and want to go for it but perhaps don’t feel ready or feel afraid to make that leap

Fourlaps.com

“I think the best bosses that I've had have embraced my energy and my craziness and my ideas and motivated me by encouraging those things, but also teaching me different ways of doing things.”

“I learned so much there. I would say from a career point of view, it was the best career decision I could have made. But it was a very tough personal move.”

“Our tagline for the brand is "Start before you're ready." And that's also my personal mantra, I would say, because if you wait for the perfect moment, it will not present itself.”

“I think failure was the biggest thing that was holding me back. And I think you actually learn way more through failures than you do through successes.”

“I think when you come out of a really tough situation, then it kind of puts things in perspective. And I think what I thought was what's the worst thing that can happen to me is that I have to find another job.”

“I just knew that it was the right thing. And I just knew that what was out there was lackluster and was overseen and over logo-ed and neon and made from nasty materials, and I saw that people were going to start dressing differently. “

“I did not pay myself a salary until last year, the middle of last year, like four years later.”

“The combination of the pandemic plus Peloton, I think kind of catapulted us.”

“In the beginning, your gut is all you have. You don't have data. You don't have data. You don't have science. You just have your gut. And if you have a bad feeling about something, you need to listen to that feeling.”

“One of the things that I learned, now that I have a team, is that you really need to focus on the things that you're good at and you need to hire people to do the things that you're not good at.”

“You have to be surrounded by people that you love, that are positive, that are going to encourage you and want to be on this journey with you.” 

• How his parents’ business and his upbringing created the drive to work hard and how Amit’s always been an entrepreneur
• What he learned in college at Penn, why he went into investment banking upon graduation, and what got him back into being an operator 
• What valuable business lessons he learned while in private equity working with a variety of companies and processing a lot of what would become a part of his leadership style
• What he learned from his ten years of building Arctic Zero, self-funded, with a supportive team and why his wife won’t go grocery shopping with him anymore
• What led to the start of Velocity Snack Brands and why they are able to create incredible opportunities for great brands who serve a niche better-for-you snack market
• What lessons were learned and difficulties persevered through during COVID and what has changed within the organization because of it
• How Amit and his team do meetings differently and why they are always striving to make meetings more efficient, more decision oriented, and time sensitive for everyone on the team
• Why the way interviews are conducted at Velocity helps train the whole team to be more equipped for future leadership and also gives everyone ownership in the process
• Why Amit believes that vulnerability and transparency are crucial in leading a successful organization and scaling a company for the long term

VelocitySnackBrands.com

“I feel like this is why representation actually matters so much. You have to be able to see something and see yourself in that position in order to achieve it.”

“Really if I can do your job better than you, you shouldn't work for me. I really shouldn't be able to do anyone's job.” 

“I really believe in the best idea winning regardless of the position or title.”

“I also think there's no job that I won't do. I mean, whether it's wiping counters, taking out the trash, I believe no job is beneath any of us. And we're all rowing on the boat together. So all the efforts help.”

“At some point, you have to understand that there has to be a market and a price fit for your product.”

“I always tell my team, never, never accept the status quo. Never accept no. Or "That's the way it is." Or "That's the way other people do it." 

“I think bringing a data driven approach to both pitching the product, to developing the product, to selling the product is really critical in today's marketplace.”

“You have to have some emotional connectivity to consumers. You have to resonate with them.”

“I think the magic is really in figuring out what consumers love your brand or what consumers to target and what is the true messaging that resonates with them.”

“My belief is that there are a lot of great brands out there who do have that emotional connectivity to their consumer base and do service a niche demographic. And they deserve to be.”

“If you're only in a swirl, you can't think upstream. And it's really as a leader, it's our job to think upstream.”

“Meetings should not just be informational, because then you should just share the info. Send an email. Right? And so just even little things like that free up people's time and energy to focus on strategy.”

“All meetings need to have in the first sentence of the invite, "This meeting is to discuss X in order to decide Y." And so that forces a decision from each meeting. Meetings should be 10 percent informational, 50 percent discussion, 40 percent decision or action oriented.”

“I think that I get the best out of my team when I'm honest with them, when I'm human with them and we make mistakes like the rest of them. And so I think just being able to say that allows you to be human.”

“I can't expect transparency and accountability from my team if I can't be transparent and accountable to them.”

“Hopefully every mistake and everything you want to change, you change. There's always time. There's time now. Let's make that impact and move forward.”

“You have to empower the team to do the work, and you have to empower the team to make the decisions. And part of that is trusting. Part of that is verifying. And part of that is training.”

• How growing up in Whiteland, Indiana and going into public school after his parents’ divorce led to years of bullying, fighting, and eventually juvenile detention
• Why goal setting and processing what he could do differently led Dylan to a complete turn around in high school and beyond
• How his grandparents were examples of entrepreneurship and why working with his grandfather in his TV repair business was influential in his drive to work for money any way he could
• How a good idea sparked from the realization that there were devices that were not as easy to repair that could be a good business, like iPhones and iPods, and why that led to Dylan’s first company
• Why his time at Purdue to pursue engineering was actually short lived, and why he left school to focus on his growing business
• How he came up with the initial idea for BrüMate and why his first plan to sell his products in a local brewery ended up being a great success
• Why they were positioned uniquely in the drinkware space to benefit when brands like White Claw and Truly were growing in popularity
• What advice Dylan has for hiring and building a team, letting yourself dive in to building the business you’ve created, and why seeing feedback as constructive criticism that can help you move forward is imperative to not giving up

BruMate.com

“I understood that I was the reason this was happening to me and I understood where I went wrong and like what I'm doing to correct it. So that sort of signified what I call the new beginning.”

“From a pretty young age, I had the drive. I've always been super ADHD. I can't stop, can't sit still. So I've always got to be fidgeting or doing something.”

“My pipe dream as an entrepreneur was I wanted to be able to build and create something that I walk around and see people using.”

“We would basically start doing pre orders 30 days before the production would actually be leaving. We would use that to pay the 30 percent deposit. And then once the inventory would come in, we'd fully sell through it, and then pay the manufacturer.” 

“By 2018 White Claw, Truly, and all these other brands that were using slim cans were really booming, and we were the only brand in the world that had a solution for those.”

“If you're working with our brand, I want to make sure that you're coming, stepping into a role that they not only have the expertise with, but like they understand how to use that situationally for a brand like ours.”

“Be a little less concerned about how you be a leader for the people, but more of like how do you be a leader for the company? How do you drive the company forward and focus on what the future of the brand is going to be?” 

“When I actually took the dive and kind of jumped off into the deep end and said, "I can do this, I am going to do this, I have no other option but doing it." That was when things really changed for me.”

“You should be starting a company because you believe you can create value and value creates money and money generates wealth. There are steps in between.”

“The ones that do succeed are the ones that are able to look at it and go like, "Well, here's why it's not working and I'm going to change it to try and make it work. It's not a failure.’”

“I think the biggest thing that I've learned over the years is the ability to listen to feedback and not take it as criticism, but rather like try and pick out little things that can help me become better or help the company become better or products become better. That is how you see evolution of a brand, is the capability to listen.

• Why as a kid she thought she’d one day be involved in the fashion industry and what kind of dreams and aspirations that desire led to
• How her parents, who are both doctors, were instrumental in the mindset Nina grew up with of listening to the body and taking care of yourself in as many natural ways as possible
• How she gained a wide array of experience with internships during college and learned a lot about business and people at companies like Theory and Kekst
• Why her time at Bain was a great way for her to learn and understand so many aspects of business and be exposed to a variety of different industries, which led her to falling in love with startup culture
• How the idea for Hilma came about after an aha moment between three friends and how the name Hilma was chosen for the company
• What the process of starting a company like Hilma was, how they measured success and proof of concept, and how they took off from there
• What it is like to have Co-Founders and Co-CEOs and why that works really well for Nina, Hilary, and Lily
• What is next from Hilma and what they’ve learned as a DTC brand that is going to help them in their launch into retail
• What it is like to be a Founder and CEO and what advice she has for other aspiring and/or existing entrepreneurs out there

Hilma.co

“My parents are both doctors. Their approach to medicine and caregiving in the home is very much focused on kind of listening to your body and waiting before you take anything or kind of overreact to something.”

“I knew I wanted to be in business, but I really hadn't picked a lane yet. And I thought that consulting was a great way to get exposure to a lot of different types of businesses, a lot of different industries, and also just gain that quantitative skill set that I felt was really important.”

"Why is it that the medicine cabinet really feels stuck in the past when all of these other consumer categories have leapfrogged towards natural as being totally mainstream?" 

“We didn't even know what products we were going to start with. So talking to people and getting advice and just hearing how they react to you and engage with you was a very important part of the process.”

“Our metrics for success were did people think the product worked and did people want to recommend it to their friends and family? Both of which very much we were able to prove.”

“I think, in the beginning, a really big thing that we kind of misunderstood was the mindset of our target customer.”

“I think viewing an investor as a potential consumer and kind of testing out what rationale works with them if I'm trying to convince them and how do I bucket this type of person and think about how to use that to my advantage in the future is kind of the positive thing that we're able to take away from those experiences.”

“There also is a lot of interesting research that's been done on women as Co-CEOs and Co-Founders versus men, which tend to struggle in those types of relationships, whereas women tend to thrive, which is not shocking in my opinion.”

“We are a category that the vast majority of consumers, even today, shop in-store. And so for us, it was less of an if. It was really a when. And I think having that in our sights and as part of our focus from day one was really important because as you know, like there's a million different priorities. And if you want to make a true retail launch work, it needs to be a focus.”

“There are a lot of good moments and there are a lot of bad moments. And both of those moments need to be kept in perspective. Not one thing is going to make your business and not one thing is going to break your business.”

“Those at bats of having negative things happen to you just naturally make you stronger over time. And you view them as opportunities, number one, to make a positive interaction, if you can.”

“I really view "negative pitches," whether it's to an investor or a manufacturer or whoever it might be, as opportunities to get better at what you're doing, because you can always get better at selling your vision and your brand.”

“One thing that worked for us and our founding team is just I do think that it's worthwhile to work on your idea for as long as you can before committing to it, mostly as a test of commitment to yourself.”

###In This Episode You’ll Hear About:

• How being born and raised in New York City and growing up as a gymnast gave her a drive for setting big goals, handling challenges, and working hard
• Why walking into the wrong room by accident during a Harvard Crimson information session changed her life trajectory because it was there that she fell in love with branding, marketing, and finance as career options
• How her time at Goldman on Wall Street and in private equity taught her so much in a short period of time with a lot of hard work and long hours
• Why Amanda’s time at Estee Lauder was an incredible experience where she was able to learn from great leaders and grow in her own leadership style
• How a networking friendship led to an opportunity to become President and later CEO of Supergoop!
• Why team building, company culture fit, and great training within the company are a priority and why they are making a difference at Supergoop!
• How Amanda led, and still is leading, the company through COVID meanwhile embracing challenges along the way
• Why morning runs are an important part of her day and a crucial part of being a great leader
• What is coming up at Supergoop! and why they are committed to going where no SPF has gone before

###To Find Out More:
https://supergoop.com/

###Quotes:

“I was always listening to what was going on around me and trying to sort of soak it up as a sponge. And I would just take on whatever was thrown at me.”

“I remember going to my boss and sort of talking to him about how I was really interested in the "other side of the table" and him being really supportive of me applying to go. And that's sort of what pivoted me to apply to business school. And I did write my business school essay about how I wanted to be a beauty CEO one day.”

“Finding people who've been on common paths is often a great way to open doors because they understand what you're bringing to the table in a way that somebody who doesn't have your background maybe needs a little bit more education to understand.”

“I just felt like I was speaking a language that was my native tongue and that I kind of just instinctively knew how to do it. It didn't seem so hard. And that to me was a sign of it making sense.”

“I think that real leadership is about seeing the future, piecing together where the world is going and being brave enough to kind of go for it.”

“You don't get anywhere by being stressed out or being angry or not handling things in a professional manner. People look up to you, you're the calm, and you've got to reflect that.”

“A team is really successful because of all the different kinds of voices in the room and different sets of expertise and different viewpoints and different ways that people are looking at information.”

“The number one thing is building the team, and building the culture that supports that team. The first thing I think about this morning and the last thing I think about before I go to bed.”

“It is my responsibility to make sure that there's a very clear idea of what our goals are, of what order of operations we're going to do things in. And then also along the way, I also think of it as sort of my job to clear the hurdles, to open the doors and clear the hurdles.”

“I think really creating a space where people are encouraged to take risks. There's nothing wrong with failure, and there's a premium put on learning. I think it's really, really important. Because you don't grow and you don't learn unless you are given the freedom to go and do that.”

“I think that a great board is meant to give input. I always say I look forward to our board meetings, that I want the input, I want the advice. So that's why we have to shape the materials that we present to sort of help us extract that advice from our board.”

“You can either decide to survive or you can decide to thrive.”

“A great CEO is also sort of knowing when you don't know and being OK with that and sort of thinking through who might know the answer.”

“When you're in my shoes you don't go home at night and put down your laptop and stop thinking about it or stop caring about the people or stop caring about the business. It is a 24/7 job.”

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###Quotes:

“I'm a firm believer that you can't be what you can't see.”

“I think all of my friends and family were just sick of hearing that idea every single week and kind of sighed a unified sigh of relief when I finally started Farmgirl.”

“I would go pick up burlap at the coffee shops. I'd come back and cut it. I'd make the arrangements, have them ready for them to pick up, and then I would do customer service and I would do sales and all day long and I'd go to bed around midnight and get back up at 3:00. And I did that for the first two years from my dining room.”

“I think you have to be very realistic and be self aware... Like everything in life, be really self aware of what you're doing.”

“I honestly did not think there was another way. “I never thought that I could bootstrap to a hundred million dollars. I did not think that that was possible. I just had never heard of it.”

“I've decided I'm not wasting any more time. There are years that I wasted. Thirty percent of my time was trying to fundraise. Thirty percent.”

“So now I'm making the decisions, we're buying the properties, and we're providing benefits that I would never be able to do for my team.”

“We need to do the hard things no matter what.”

“I think that I made a lot of mistakes as a leader that I'm OK with because I learned from them and then hopefully become a better leader.”

“Moving very quickly to the solution phase and the problem solving phase, I think has really made me a strong leader and has kept us alive, especially this last year where I don't get so emotionally tied to what the issue is. Let's just get to the outcome.”

“I decided very quickly that we might go under. We very much might go under, but I'm going to give it the fight of my life. So if I do go under, I have no regrets later on.”

“I think I would have not given thirty percent of my time to try to raise capital. I would have if I have a two percent chance as a solo female founder, I would give it two percent of my time.”

“You don't fall quietly anymore because everybody is writing about it when you fall. And social media or the press, but just don't worry about it. Don't look around. Just get back up and do it.”

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“I would say that kind of throughout my life and throughout my career, I've never had a shortage of ideas. So my brain was always thinking, ‘Is this something I could pursue?’”

“They kind of taught me to really invest in my education, invest my career, and that's what's most important. And all of a sudden, I was this young mom and my priorities were totally changed. So it was like a huge identity crisis.”

“One of the things that I would say is probably most surprising about the Senreve journey is that the business plan that I wrote back in the day, kind of off the cuff on that plane ride, is pretty much still the vision for the company. And we haven't deviated from that.”

“There're so many responsibilities, demands, and facets to a woman's life. But products and brands haven't really kept up with that.”

“I think my philosophy at a high-level about fundraising was that I wanted to raise capital that was appropriate for the stage that we were at, not ahead or behind that.”

“Late 2019 I took on institutional capital and that was really because I felt like the company was at a juncture where it really needed to scale and professionalize and again meet the demand that was in the market.”

“Don't take it personally. And it's actually objectively true. Because oftentimes the rejection has nothing to do with you, the idea, your traction, the company, the data, or the team that you built. It really has certain things to do with them, like where they are in their fund cycle or their partnership dynamics or where they are in their own career as an investor.”

“It's like once you take that investment, I mean, you are really in it together, and it's so hard to unwind.”

“So to me, it was really important that our investors understood and embraced my vision and really embraced some of the strategic risks that we were taking.”

“We have a really sustainable manufacturing model where we focus on zero waste and we never overproduce. And so having two and a half months of gap in terms of production was really incredibly challenging for our business. So that was something that we had to overcome.”

“Obviously, 2020 in the US also had a lot of social and political issues that really affected people. And so that was something that I was very intentional about in terms of allowing the team to support each other.”

“It's an obsession and you really have to be that passionate about it. And you really have to wake up every day feeling as energetic as you were the prior day, even if things are not going well or things are totally sideways.”

“It's the type of thing where once you do it actually in a way becomes a lot easier. So it's really that first step to me that's the most intimidating.”

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“And after going through the summer interning for her {Tory}, it was so clear that this was something different and that it would absolutely last and did have staying power. And just sort of the passion that she had for her business and how much people respected her was really amazing. And so that was definitely a turning point for me.”

“But my passion was always product. And so I really just wanted to follow where the product and the merchandising roles were.”

“It's amazing how much you can actually take on and how you can compartmentalize. And no one can do it all perfectly, but you can do a lot more than you think you can.”

“It helped set the path to really understanding the importance of culture and being approachable and making sure that your team feels comfortable talking to you and admitting when they make mistakes because everyone does.”

“If you invest in your people, and it doesn't have to be from a monetary perspective, but if you really make them feel like you love working with them and that you want them there, it just makes a big difference in the end result in what you're trying to achieve.”

“I think that if I can make the right hires and build a team of people that are experts in their divisions or their sort of competencies, that we all work well together.”

“I think the biggest motivation is my family for sure. My kids seeing their mom go to work every day even while trying to sort of figure out the home school thing in the early days of COVID. That was really motivational for me. And just showing them that you have to persevere and if you believe in something, you have to continue to work at it.”

“I realize that you can't do it all and that you have to delegate and that you have to trust the people that you work with. You also have to hold them accountable.”

“I think if you as a leader don't communicate that someone is missing something or not delivering, then you can't expect them to hold themselves accountable.”

“I'm a young female CEO and I had been consulting for a period of time, so it wasn't sort of a natural progression. But I knew that I had the right skill set. And I also know that you learn every day, and I know that if you hire the right team, that anything's possible.”

“I think transparency is so critical in a small business. So I think that I encourage my team to give me feedback about how I lead and my management style. I encourage my investors also to give me feedback. And so I think listening is how I improve myself.”

“I think it's not about me saying I don't know the answer to this question. It's more about, "Ok, we have an option to go down path A or path B, what does everyone think we should do? Let's collectively have a discussion about it.’"

“Working harder than everyone else actually does does pay off.”

###In This Episode You’ll Hear About:

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###Quotes:

“I've never felt super intimidated by reaching out to people.”

“I have tried a lot of things in my life and found that when you take that first step, there's been a lot of rewards.”

“Just like going on these journeys and seeing what you'll find or what you can do has been really, really a big part of my story.”

“When you get around good talent, good things happen. So get yourself in the right position and don't worry so much about your job. I got myself around what I consider greatness, got great training from awesome people. And again, I was able to get myself in a really good position.”

“Create your own opportunities.”

“While I've gone deep into a couple areas, this idea of a generalist has been really helpful for me as I've stepped into greater roles of responsibility and leadership.”

“A healthy dose of knowing where your impact can be greatest and not needing the spotlight at all times I think is important.”

“If you ever have an opportunity to blend your passion with whatever you're good at and do it in a social impact way, like to me, it is just this jewel of an opportunity.”

“And so it has taught me along the way to be much more aware of the lateral or the other opportunities of learning things and experiencing new things because you can't tell where it's going to build.”

“So I wish I had gone back and told myself, like, it's not a straight line. That's part of it that got me to where I am now. And so I would embrace the non straight line.”

“My kids are a little bit older now, and I am so thankful that I listened to kind of what worked for me and what worked for them, dialed up and dialed down as I needed to, because it matters in the long run.”

“Surrounding yourself with great talent and people that you can ask questions of is also, when I experience either self-doubt or have questions or don't know what to do next, that sounding area, for me, female CEOs, it's been really, really helpful.”

“We play to win, but we're going to play nicely.”

“I try to be very transparent and I also try to be very accessible.”

“The expectation is not that everything goes perfectly, it's that you keep getting better every step of the way.”

“You know, hard work, perseverance, like kind of the standard things. But getting yourself in the right spot to be able to do that comes from knowing yourself and trusting your gut on the decisions.”

“About women and about female leadership... I see this over and over again. Get yourself a seat at the table. I mean, look, get yourself in the room. Get yourself a seat at the table. Don't wait for an invitation. It's not probably going to come.”