TOMS Founder Blake Mycoskie — Fear{less} with Tim Ferriss

Tim Ferriss 0:00 [dramatic music]

Tim Ferriss 0:01 I'm Tim Ferriss, author, entrepreneur, angel investor, and now TV host. I've spent my entire adult life asking questions, then scouring the globe to find the answers. On this show, I'll share the secrets of pioneers who have faced their own fears. We'll dig into the hard times, big mistakes, tough decisions, and how they got through it all. The goal isn't to be fearless. The goal is to learn to fear less. [clapping] Welcome to Fearless. I'm your host

Tim Ferriss 0:31 Tim Ferriss, and on this stage we'll be deconstructing world-class performers of all different types to uncover the specific tactics and strategies they've used to overcome doubt, tackle their hardest decisions, and ultimately succeed on their own terms. By show of hands, how many of you guys own a few pairs of shoes? That is everybody in the room. How many of you own around 10 pairs of shoes? All right, more than half. How many of you do not own a single pair of shoes? All right, that's a big fat zero. My guest tonight has built a company that's given away more than 60 million pairs of shoes to those who need them most. During a trip to South America, he recognized the unique opportunity to blend business and philanthropy. Since its founding, TOMS has given away millions of shoes, helped restore eyesight, and provided safe drinking water to those in need across the globe. So ladies and gentlemen, please welcome to the stage the founder of TOMS, Blake Mycoskie. [clapping]

Blake Mycoskie 1:40 Good to see you.

Tim Ferriss 1:41 How's it going? It's been a few years, man.

Blake Mycoskie 1:48 Yeah.

Tim Ferriss 1:49 So Blake and I met quite a while back, and we'll get to sort of the origin stories of all that. But I thought what we could do is take a look at one of the ways that I was not necessarily introduced to, but reacquainted with TOMS. So we have a video that we're gonna start with.

Blake Mycoskie 2:04 Okay, great. [upbeat music]

Tim Ferriss 2:15 It's incredible to think that five years ago what has now become a global event started with a simple idea on a college campus. [laughing] I'm going without shoes so I can know what millions of children go through every day.

Blake Mycoskie 2:40 You don't really realize what a luxury we have to have shoes on our feet all day. Ah, it's actually kind of painful. One day without shoes. [upbeat music] [clapping]

Tim Ferriss 3:32 So why would I start with this video? Well, there are a few reasons. The first is that clearly I think it puts in perspective as one event the good that Blake and his company and all the people involved have done. Number two, this is a master of positioning and PR and events and a lot in between, and we're gonna come back to that and take a look at how it all came to be. But the apple doesn't seem to fall too far from the tree. Butter Busters.

Blake Mycoskie 4:01 Yeah. [laughs]

Tim Ferriss 4:01 Let's talk about Butter Busters. This is going somewhere. Bear with me.

Blake Mycoskie 4:04 [laughs]

Tim Ferriss 4:06 What is Butter Busters?

Blake Mycoskie 4:07 So Butter Busters is a cookbook that my mom, uh, wrote on a word processor in like 1993, uh, literally in our kitchen, that went on to sell millions and millions of copies. Um, and it was this crazy experience for me being 15 years old, seeing my mom who was, uh, you know, the, you know, married to my dad, he was a doctor, he was the breadwinner, all this. The next thing you know she's getting, you know, royalty checks for millions of dollars in the mail because she wrote a book, mainly because she wanted to help people lose weight and, uh, keep their cholesterol down. And she-

Tim Ferriss 4:42 Because she had high cholesterol.

Blake Mycoskie 4:43 She had high cholesterol. And so she basically, the story was is she went to the doctor and came home and had high cholesterol, and, uh, the doctor suggested her cutting some of the fat out of her diet.

Tim Ferriss 4:54 Mm-hmm.

Blake Mycoskie 4:54 And, uh, and so she started doing that, and she started losing weight as well, and, um, she wanted to just share what she learned with others. And I think I learned two things from that. One, at that very impressionable age, I saw like my mom had an idea that could help people, and she acted on it even though she had never written a thing in her life, you know, didn't graduate from college. Like it w- you know, just, just did it, and she didn't think about it. She just acted. And the second thing was is that like you can start something from nothing and, and a fortune can be made out of, out of literally your kitchen and a typewriter, so.

Tim Ferriss 5:27 And did she go to a bunch of New York publishers, and they had a auction, and one of them bought the book? Or how did-

Blake Mycoskie 5:34 Yeah, I mean, you'll appreciate this with your story. Uh, you know, she, um, she felt so connected to helping people and, and really reaching people directly that she didn't even go down the publishing route. She self-published it, and, uh, actually the first time that she published it, the publisher was, uh, kind of a crook. And, and her and my dad lost like $50,000, which was a ton of money to our family back then. And, um, and so she got a loan from the bank to publish it again the second time, and, and she started selling them literally out of our garage. And her big break was she le- landed the, uh, Sam's Club, part of Walmart.

Tim Ferriss 6:14 Huge.

Blake Mycoskie 6:14 And, uh, and next thing you know, she was selling hundreds of thousands of copies, and we had to get a little warehouse next to our house. And we were self... And which turned out to be a great business thing because she sold over a million copies before she had a publisher. So, [laughs] I mean-

Tim Ferriss 6:27 That's a lot of, that's a lot of envelopes.

Blake Mycoskie 6:29 Yeah. [clapping] So- You know, I, I, I think it's ... I had no idea that's where we were gonna start this conversation, but I, I think it's actually a wonderful place to start because it's so many people after you have had some success as an entrepreneur ask you, you know, where did it come from? You know, where did the drive come from? And for me, you know, the drive came more from my athletic background and, and all the lessons I learned trying to be a professional tennis player. But the understanding of creating something from nothing and doing it to help people clearly came from me seeing this experience at age 15 to 18, uh, you know, with my mom.

Tim Ferriss 7:09 Let's talk about SMU.

Blake Mycoskie 7:11 Okay.

Tim Ferriss 7:11 All right. So-

Blake Mycoskie 7:12 I was only there for 18 months, so [laughs]

Tim Ferriss 7:13 So right, so w- we, we won't, uh, spend, uh, uh, too much time on it, but you chose philosophy. Is that right?

Blake Mycoskie 7:20 Yeah.

Tim Ferriss 7:21 Why philosophy?

Blake Mycoskie 7:22 Well, I started because, um, I originally majored in archeology because my goal was to become Indiana Jones.

Tim Ferriss 7:30 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 7:30 That was, that was my career path.

Tim Ferriss 7:32 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 7:32 [laughs] Right?

Tim Ferriss 7:33 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 7:35 No, I mean, it's like, I was never really that into school. I was a tennis player, I was playing.

Tim Ferriss 7:40 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 7:40 But I thought, okay, if I don't become a professional tennis player, what would I wanna do with my life?

Tim Ferriss 7:44 Be Indiana Jones. [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 7:45 And I was like, I think Indiana Jones is the best job.

Tim Ferriss 7:47 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 7:47 So what did he study? He studied archeology. But no one told me until ... I, so I signed for, I set up all archeology classes freshman year, and I'm in these classes, and they're, they're more like chemistry and we're studying like the compounds of rocks and this ... I mean, it's like the most boring stuff in the world.

Tim Ferriss 8:03 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 8:03 So I was like-

Tim Ferriss 8:04 No whips.

Blake Mycoskie 8:05 Yeah.

Tim Ferriss 8:05 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 8:05 N- no whips.

Tim Ferriss 8:06 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 8:06 No talk about like tribes and, and, and cannibals and all the stuff I was excited about getting into and, um, or learning how to stay away from. And, uh, but, but so I dropped out of the archeology classes 'cause they were ... it was like watching paint dry.

Tim Ferriss 8:21 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 8:22 Um, and I thought, okay, so what else, you know, could I, could I be interested in? But part of my fascination, I think, with Indiana Jones and this idea of traveling the world and discovering, you know, people and, and, and, and ancient ruins and all this stuff also came with this idea of understanding like world religions and how we got ... you know, why some people think this way and other people think that way. And so then that led to, okay, philosophy could be a great place to, to really dig into from an academic standpoint and learn why people think different things, how, you know, how we've evolved as human beings. And, and so that was ... And I found once I got in the philosophy classes, I actually really loved them because they were pretty quickly into stuff that I felt like was relatable, uh, to my experience as a human.

Tim Ferriss 9:08 Mm-hmm.

Blake Mycoskie 9:08 And, uh, and so I, I, I really, uh, enjoyed philosophy. To this day when I have time for free reading, I read a lot of philosophy.

Tim Ferriss 9:16 Any favorite philosophers or books on philosophy?

Blake Mycoskie 9:19 Dick Hart I like a lot. I would say he's one of my favorites. Plato, Aristotle. I mean, kinda the classics sort of the ... I mean, they, they, they've been classics for hundreds of years for a reason, right? And so I feel like you can find, you know, you can, you can read some Aristotle and it's literally like as relevant as, as a, as another book you might read to improve some part of your life today.

Tim Ferriss 9:40 For sure. Yeah, I've been infatuated with and obsessed with the stoic philosophers-

Blake Mycoskie 9:46 Yep

Tim Ferriss 9:46 ... and that was 2,000 plus years ago in some cases with Marcus Aurelius and that.

Blake Mycoskie 9:50 Marcus Aurelius. I mean, that, I mean, Meditations, that book is like, I mean, if you really allow yourself to slowly read and allow those words and allow those phrases to be like imprinted in your mind, I mean, that book has more ... You could read only that book-

Tim Ferriss 10:05 Yeah

Blake Mycoskie 10:05 ... and have all the wisdom you need probably to live a, a, a virtuous, a successful, a, a adventurous life. I mean-

Tim Ferriss 10:13 Definitely

Blake Mycoskie 10:13 ... that's one of my favorite books of all time.

Tim Ferriss 10:14 So, so Meditations, just to put it in perspective for folks, so Meditations was written by Marcus Aurelius at the time, the Emperor of Rome, so he's the most powerful man in the world, and they are effectively entries in a war journal. So they were never intended to be published. So it's his notes to himself, which makes it very interesting. And actually, on that point, d- do you have a journaling habit or-

Blake Mycoskie 10:37 I do.

Tim Ferriss 10:38 When did you start that?

Blake Mycoskie 10:39 When I was about 15, and, and-

Tim Ferriss 10:41 Why did you start doing that?

Blake Mycoskie 10:43 Kinda goes back to tennis. I wanted to chart my progress. Like, that's how, that's how focused I was. I wanted to understand if I was really getting better, and I had read when I was young about other successful athletes that part of what they did was they journaled and they wrote positive affirmations, you know, kind of pre-game. But by journaling it, it was more im- im- imprinted in their mind, and I started, and it's fun to go back and read some of those journals, uh, when I was 15, like how serious I was [laughs] as a 15-year-old.

Tim Ferriss 11:10 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 11:10 It's also a little scary. Um, but, uh, but yeah, I started then, and then very quickly it became, um, a form of kind of therapy for me, you know, as an, as an early entrepreneur when, you know, things were really tough and, and you didn't know if you were gonna make payroll and you didn't have anyone ... you didn't wanna tell anyone 'cause you always had to show this air of confidence and everything's gonna be great. So then at night I could be s- scribbling about how, how concerned I was and, and kind of confessing a lot of things, uh, that were bothering me or I was worried about. And, uh, and journaling has been, um, probably the most constant, um, habit in my life. I mean, it, I do it every single morning, uh, sometimes twice a day. But it's interesting. One of the things I, I always say to people about journaling is I think it's one of the most powerful habits you can create 'cause a lot of the journaling too is goal setting and, and, and really, you know, having the goals and then writing about how you're trying to achieve them and then going back and seeing which ones you're achieving and which ones you're not and kind of understanding that. But the other thing is you can learn so much about, um, the things that end up working and not working. You can kind of go back and see, you know, you know, what led to the success or the failure of that idea through kind of the journal path. And you can also see that things that you thought were so important end up not being at all, especially with girlfriends and things like that-

Tim Ferriss 12:31 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 12:31 ... in the early days. I mean, so it's, it's, it's really interesting. I think you can learn a lot from, from journaling. Um, and it's something that I, I, I tell, you know, people all the time. Like, if there's one thing that can kinda help get your life on a more positive path, uh, journaling is it.

Tim Ferriss 12:48 So this is gonna be a bit of a left turn for me.

Blake Mycoskie 12:50 Yeah. [laughs]

Tim Ferriss 12:51 From business [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 12:51 From journaling.

Tim Ferriss 12:52 Easy Laundry.

Blake Mycoskie 12:53 Yes.

Tim Ferriss 12:54 Tell me all about it. So [laughs] Easy Laundry.

Blake Mycoskie 12:57 Well, Easy Laundry, I guess, was my first real business. I'm playing tennis, you know, like chasing my dreams at SMU. I partially tear my Achilles tendon. So that injury is six to eight months, leg cast, like, and already I was the last guy on the team. So eight months of no playing and new freshmen that are more talented coming in, like I started to realize like maybe my life pa- you know, path is not, uh, to be a professional tennis player. It wasn't until a couple weeks later when my roommate and I were, were discussing my huge pile of laundry that was growing in our room, because I couldn't do it 'cause I was on crutches. And so the laundry facility is down in the basement, and I'm on crutches, and, uh, and so it was kind of piling up and, and, and this is back in, hard to believe, when we looked in the yellow pages for stuff, right?

Tim Ferriss 13:47 Oh, I remember.

Blake Mycoskie 13:47 You remember that.

Tim Ferriss 13:48 I remember.

Blake Mycoskie 13:48 Some, some people listening or here today might not remember the yellow pages.

Tim Ferriss 13:51 The internet-

Blake Mycoskie 13:52 Yeah

Tim Ferriss 13:53 ... of yesteryear. Yeah.

Blake Mycoskie 13:54 Yeah, so, so I looked in the yellow pages, um, for someone to pick up my laundry, and there was-

Tim Ferriss 14:00 The slowest Google ever, by the way.

Blake Mycoskie 14:01 [laughs] Yeah.

Speaker 14:02 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 14:02 And, uh, and so it's, um, there's, there's nothing that does that. And, um, my laundry's piling up, so it's a real problem, and I think this is where a lot of entrepreneur ideas are born, out of necessity, out of, out of some- the service that you want that's not offered, right? And so I went to school at SMU. It was private school in Dallas, and there were a lot of, you know, kids who had plenty of disposable income and didn't like doing their laundry, too. So I thought, what if we had this pick-up-and-delivery laundry service? And we called it Easy Laundry, and the idea is, is that we would, we would basically pick up the laundry, take it to a facility, do a, you know, get a bulk rate with them, and then deliver it back the next day or two days later.

Tim Ferriss 14:41 Was it true that you guys would do fake deliveries to dorms to try to create the illusion of having a successful business to drum up demand?

Blake Mycoskie 14:50 This is true.

Tim Ferriss 14:51 Okay. [laughs]

Speaker 14:51 [laughs]

Tim Ferriss 14:51 So could you-

Blake Mycoskie 14:52 Yeah

Tim Ferriss 14:52 ... can you just, can you describe how that worked?

Blake Mycoskie 14:55 I- so no one wanted to kinda be first and be like, "Oh, I'm too lazy to do my own laundry. I'm gonna have someone else do it," or, "I'm gonna ..." You know, I mean, I don't, for whatever reason, the, the, the psychological, uh, kind of, um, herd mentality in college is very strong. And so we kind of somehow, I don't know how we realized this, but we did, and we thought, "Okay, if we start delivering even though we don't need to deliver all day long, and all people see is our s- is our truck driving around campus, and me or our employees going into, into dorms, out of dorms, they're gonna think everyone's doing this and they're missing out."

Speaker 15:30 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 15:31 You know? And, and that, and that also led to more customers because they're like, "Man, I see your truck everywhere." I'm like, "Yeah, business is great." [laughs]

Speaker 15:38 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 15:38 And business did become great because they thought that, that, "Man, if everyone else is doing this service, then I should be doing it, too." So that worked pretty well in the early days.

Tim Ferriss 15:46 It's ... And by the way, this is not uncommon at all.

Blake Mycoskie 15:49 No. I mean-

Tim Ferriss 15:50 So case in point, Benjamin Franklin. So most people think of him for, you know, the kite with the key and so on, whatever it might be, diplomat maybe, who knows? But he was very famous as a printer, and in the beginning days, to try to drum up business, he would go up and down the street with a wheelbarrow full of all [laughs] sorts of different printing equipment, back and forth, to show how busy he was-

Blake Mycoskie 16:13 Yeah

Tim Ferriss 16:13 ... to try [laughs] to get people to come in and, uh, and to, to drum up business. Turned out very well for you, I mean-

Blake Mycoskie 16:21 Well, this, it's, it, I'm, I think it's such an important point because the best ideas and the best companies that start always come from an entrepreneur who wants a service that he can't get, a product that doesn't exist, you know? It's, it's a frustration, you know? And it, and, and, and the solution is not a business, actually. It's like a crusade to, to, to get rid of that frustration, and it really is. And so I always caution people, say, "You can study entrepreneurship, and you can read books about great entrepreneurs, but if you think you're gonna build a great company, it's gotta start with a dissatisfaction, a problem, an itch you wanna scratch first-

Tim Ferriss 17:04 Yeah

Blake Mycoskie 17:05 ... and then you build the business. But don't think about, 'Okay, I wanna build a business. What am I gonna build?'"

Tim Ferriss 17:09 So what happened? You, 18 months, that, your tenure was up.

Blake Mycoskie 17:13 Yeah, well, I, what happened was is, is all of a sudden we had so much demand for this laundry service that we started, and we had customers in, you know, not just at SMU, but we'd, uh, we started to expand to University of Texas, uh, TCU, University of Oklahoma, uh, and it was clear that there was all this demand. And I was, like trying to do my homework at, you know, at night, running the business during the day. I think we had 30 employees at that point. I mean, it was just, was, it was just too much. But, uh, but yeah, I dropped out, and, uh, there were so many days after I did that I was like, "Oh, my God, I wanna go back to college so bad. It's so easy," you know?

Tim Ferriss 17:47 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 17:47 'Cause like all my friends are like, you know, going to a few classes and drinking beer and goofing off, and I'm like dealing with these 15 people's lost jeans every week.

Speaker 17:55 [laughs]

Tim Ferriss 17:55 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 17:55 And, um, and so, uh, it wasn't glamorous by any means. Uh, it's only glamorous in hindsight when you're like, "Yeah, it's a college dropout." You know, Bill Gates is a dropout, you know? Michael Dell is. I mean, it's e- it's kind of a nice badge to have now, but it definitely wasn't then.

Tim Ferriss 18:10 I have to ask because I honestly don't know the answer, how did reality TV come into all this?

Blake Mycoskie 18:15 In 2001, my sister and I were on the TV show The Amazing Race. I was 25 at the time, um, and this was at like the beginning of the reality TV craze that we're still, frankly, in. I mean, it's hard to believe all these years later. And, and really, this 15 minutes of fame, I mean, this is a real thing. So all of a sudden, like we're being invited to be on, you know, all these talk shows, late night shows, Jay Leno, invited to, you know, Will Smith's birthday party. I mean, just, just weird stuff, right? Because everyone was watching this show, and we were like one of the, one of the interesting characters on the show. And what I found was, as I was thinking about, you know, this, this fa- this thing, was that like- After the 15 minutes they moved on to the next season, there were still value in the entertainment value and the public's interest in these people.

Tim Ferriss 19:05 Mm-hmm.

Blake Mycoskie 19:05 The networks had to move to the next one because it was time to, you know, it was time to promote the next show.

Tim Ferriss 19:11 Right.

Blake Mycoskie 19:11 So my idea was is why not have a cable television network that would be 100% focused on reality? And now I knew we couldn't get the big ticket shows, but I knew we could get the stars after, because there's nothing worse than losing your 15 minutes of fame.

Tim Ferriss 19:27 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 19:27 You'll do anything to keep it going, right?

Tim Ferriss 19:28 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 19:29 So I could get these people to come on shows for nothing-

Tim Ferriss 19:32 Yeah

Blake Mycoskie 19:32 ... just for their own, you know, be excited, people to be interested in them still.

Tim Ferriss 19:36 Yeah.

Blake Mycoskie 19:36 And then possibly you could even create shows that are, like, you know, based off the characters, and then we could... What I knew we could do is we could buy clips of the shows. The part that I didn't know anything about, and which is the reason this business became a huge disaster, was there's only five or six companies in the country that controlled the distribution of the content. And so when we went to, you know, Comcast and Time Warner and DirecTV and all the different ones, and they're like, "Well, we have 500 channels right now. Is your channel, even if people love your channel, it's not gonna change our business, but we're gonna have to pay you for this content, so we're not that interested." And it was amazing to me. It's such a great business lesson that w- we had a product that the end customer wanted, and we could make amazing content that they actually really probably cared more about than the other 420 channels.

Tim Ferriss 20:26 Yeah.

Blake Mycoskie 20:26 But because the person who was controlling what they saw didn't have a business reason to do it, we could never make it work.

Tim Ferriss 20:33 Yeah.

Blake Mycoskie 20:34 And so after, you know, a couple hard years and running through millions of dollars, and many, a, a lot of it is my own money, uh, we had to go out of business. But I wasn't done. Even though I had shut it down and paid back investors and fired 40 something people, which was, you, you know, horrible, I wanted to continue to go. And so I kind of went into a, the first and only time in my life where I've had actually some real depression and got on, like, antidepressants and, like, things that I never thought in my life I would experience. It wasn't because of so much that we had failed and that we had lost money and that we had to fire people and all that. It was because, like, I still wanted to do this, but I couldn't.

Tim Ferriss 21:10 Oh.

Blake Mycoskie 21:10 Like, it was like, it was not... I couldn't, like, solve a new way to do it. And so that was a, a tough, you know, four or five, uh, months afterwards, uh, which I ultimately got through. But, um, but man, what a great lesson. I mean, the thing is-

Tim Ferriss 21:22 Where were you at the time? You were in LA?

Blake Mycoskie 21:23 I was in LA. And so the, so I think the lesson as you're thinking about business ideas is definitely when I think about any new thing, even within TOMS now, is like, no matter how good your idea is, you have to make sure that you, it, it, that if your success is, falls in the hands of a few companies, that y- you don't even start to go forward unless you can make sure that at least you get one of those cu- companies as a customer.

Tim Ferriss 21:49 Yes.

Blake Mycoskie 21:49 Because if... And, and that's why I think it was so great when we started TOMS in the shoe business or, or apparel, whatever. Like, there's thousands of stores that could potentially buy your shoes.

Tim Ferriss 21:58 Yeah.

Blake Mycoskie 21:58 So it doesn't mean I had to get one of the big guys early on.

Tim Ferriss 22:00 Yeah.

Blake Mycoskie 22:01 You know, you could just get a couple and then build from there.

Tim Ferriss 22:03 Yeah, you de-risk it-

Blake Mycoskie 22:04 Yeah

Tim Ferriss 22:04 ... a whole lot. Now, I wanna come back to, if you don't mind-

Blake Mycoskie 22:07 Yeah

Tim Ferriss 22:07 ... just that period of depression.

Blake Mycoskie 22:09 Yeah.

Tim Ferriss 22:09 So I've had extended bouts of depression.

Blake Mycoskie 22:12 Yep.

Tim Ferriss 22:12 Runs in my family, and I'm not gonna blame it on that, but that's-

Blake Mycoskie 22:15 Sure

Tim Ferriss 22:15 ... probably a component. Uh, what was it like in your darkest periods during those five months?

Blake Mycoskie 22:23 I think the hardest thing was is, like, not wanting to get out of bed.

Tim Ferriss 22:26 Yeah.

Blake Mycoskie 22:26 Like, I'm a very energetic person. I, like, usually jump out of bed with both feet on the floor well before the sun has come up my whole entrepreneurial life. And, like, not having a business to go to, having just kind of lost a lot of credibility with potential investors or, you know, because I was now, you know, a failed entrepreneur, not just a successful entrepreneur, and having run through a lot of my own financial resources. Like, it was like, "Well, what am I gonna do today?"

Tim Ferriss 22:54 What, what did bring you out of it? I mean, what were the things that helped get you back on your feet?

Blake Mycoskie 23:01 At the time I was reading a lot of Richard Branson stuff.

Tim Ferriss 23:04 Mm-hmm.

Blake Mycoskie 23:04 And I was, uh, I read Losing My Virginity-

Tim Ferriss 23:07 Yeah

Blake Mycoskie 23:07 ... which is a great book-

Tim Ferriss 23:08 It's a great book

Blake Mycoskie 23:08 ... if you've never read it.

Tim Ferriss 23:08 That's one of the books that sort of kickstarted me.

Blake Mycoskie 23:10 Yeah. And it was just, I was like, and I loved his approach to taking, like, businesses that had been around forever and turning them on their head by basically just making them fun, sarcastic, sexy, et cetera. And so I looked at the driver's ed business, and this is something that's been around since my k- my parents learned to drive, right? And they were brick and mortar buildings. They were usually connected to, like, a Sears or something. And, and, and, and they didn't try to, um, accommodate their students. They just, like, pushed them through this like cattle.

Tim Ferriss 23:41 Right.

Blake Mycoskie 23:41 So I did two things. I, it's called Driver's Ed Direct, and this is how I got the swagger back, 'cause I, I really got excited about this idea for a number of reasons. Uh, the first was is we were gonna have no classrooms, so we were just gonna eliminate that cost, and all the classwork would be online. Now, they would have to learn to drive in a car, but the online part, they, we make it fun, and then we do it online. And we, uh, would make sure they were paying attention because they couldn't get to the next part of the class until they passed real-time quizzes. But the second thing I did, and this is what I think was the thing that really made it take off, is I recognized in Los Angeles you have a lot of models and actors that need part-time work, and they need flexible schedules. Instead of these teenagers learning from old ladies, what if they're learning from Abercrombie & Fitch models? That's gonna keep a teenager girl's attention.

Tim Ferriss 24:27 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 24:28 Right? I mean, if this girl has this hunky guy-

Tim Ferriss 24:31 Yeah, yeah

Blake Mycoskie 24:32 ... you know, teaching her to drive, she's gonna pay attention to him, and she's gonna tell all her friends on MySpace how hot her driver's ed teacher is.

Tim Ferriss 24:40 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 24:40 And it's the same thing for the guys. And so we hired, like, the hottest models and actors who needed part-time work in between auditions. We were totally flexible with their hours. And, and it went fire- it went crazy on MySpace. I mean, every kid is like, you... I mean, I think people signed up who'd already completed driver's ed just 'cause they-

Tim Ferriss 24:56 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 24:57 I mean, it was like, it was crazy.

Tim Ferriss 25:05 So we talked about Drivers.Ed Direct.

Blake Mycoskie 25:06 Yeah.

Tim Ferriss 25:08 Then in 2006, you went to one of my favorite places.

Blake Mycoskie 25:12 A place you know well.

Tim Ferriss 25:13 Argentina.

Blake Mycoskie 25:14 Yeah.

Tim Ferriss 25:15 Why'd you go to Argentina?

Blake Mycoskie 25:17 I would take the month of January off every year, no matter what. No matter what was going on business-wise, I would take a month, I would go somewhere that was totally different, uh, have a totally new cultural experience, get away from work, and then come back and then just immerse myself for 11 more months, and have that month to look forward to. And so I decided that for my month this year, uh, in 2006, I would go to Argentina. One thing that I had already noticed and already had a, a big impression on me, and this started when we were on The Amazing Race, but even more so in Argentina, was just how much poverty there was only an hour outside the city. And I mean, there were, you know, kids on the street not wearing shoes.

Tim Ferriss 25:59 Oh, it's a shantytown.

Blake Mycoskie 26:00 Shantytown.

Tim Ferriss 26:00 Yeah, it's like Slumdog Millionaire.

Blake Mycoskie 26:02 Exactly.

Tim Ferriss 26:02 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 26:02 I mean, it's exactly what it looks like, you know? People living in homes built of aluminum siding, um, no electricity, no water. I mean, it was... I just, I couldn't believe it. And it was on the third week that I was there that I was in this cafe, this wine cafe, and I heard some, uh, women speaking in English. And, uh, they had been doing volunteer work. They were working with this nonprofit in Argentina, and one of the things that they were doing was a shoe drive. And they explained to me that, uh, it was, uh, getting time, about time for, uh, school again the next semester, and there were many kids that, um, were not able to go to school 'cause they couldn't afford the uniform or the shoes, and shoes was part of the uniform. They had to wear a closed-toe shoe. And so I agreed to go on this, on this, on this trip and they picked me up, uh, couple days later, and we got in a van, and we had a big U-Haul full of shoes, and we went to this, this town. And at first, not having ever done anything like this, I was a little bit just kind of standing back and watching. And wa- And, and these girls, they were just right on their hands and knees and putting shoes on kids and giving them hugs and, and it was just like this joyful thing. So I very quickly just jumped in and, and started to try to figure it out. And I remember that night I came home. Um, I was staying at the polo camp still, and, uh, my polo teacher, Alejo, um, he asked me wh- where I was that day 'cause I wasn't playing polo. And I said, "Well, I, actually I did this." And he's like, "Did that on your vacation?" And he says to me, he says, "You know, Blake, um, it's awesome that you guys gave them shoes and, but you're leaving like in five more days, and these women are going back to their countries. Like, who's gonna give them their next pair?" And I was never prepared for this question. And when I, when he asked this question, 'cause he's like, "You know, kids' feet are gonna grow fast or they're gonna, if it's the only pair, they'll wear out of them. And if they need them for school, you know, you've now given them this pair, but who's gonna give them the next pair?" And at that point, I actually questioned whether we had done anything good at all. Like, maybe what we did that day was just made ourselves feel great.

Tim Ferriss 28:03 Right.

Blake Mycoskie 28:03 Because we got this great, you know, kind of feeling and oh my gosh, we did something nice for someone and they loved on us, and we left feeling so full. But if we just set up a future, you know, disappointment, like we'd actually caused more harm than good if there wasn't a way to sustain these kids in shoes. And so talk about like some difficult moments in life, I remember going to bed that night, like having kind of that joy and the excitement almost ripped out of me and thinking, "Gosh, this is like, like this is, this, this... I don't know what the answer is, but there's gotta be something, a way to, to, to, to, to, uh, make sure these kids get their next pair of shoes." And so the next morning, woke up, got the journal out, [laughs] uh, had my cup of coffee, sitting on the farm, uh, where the polo camp was. And I was just writing, you know, in my journal, and I was saying, "You know, maybe I could go and ask all my friends to donate, you know, 50 bucks a year, and that would buy four pairs of shoes. And that way every, every three months they get a new pair. Or we all have too many shoes in our closet, right? I mean, I'm sure we could all get rid of half of our shoes and it would not have any effect on our life whatsoever. Maybe I could get those." And then I started thinking about adult sizes are different than kids sizes and all these things and, and, and I just, I, I just quickly got to the part of like, I don't think charity is the answer. Like, I don't think asking for donations or handouts is really gonna sustain this. Now, this might work for a year or two, but then it's gonna be even a bigger problem if I don't get the donations or don't get the, the handouts. And then that's when my mom-

Tim Ferriss 29:34 Well, not only that, but you have to spend all your time fundraising and not focusing on building out the organization and so on.

Blake Mycoskie 29:39 Well, yes, but at this point I'm not even thinking about an organization.

Tim Ferriss 29:42 Yeah.

Blake Mycoskie 29:42 I'm thinking about 250 kids.

Tim Ferriss 29:44 Yeah, right.

Blake Mycoskie 29:44 I mean, that's my only... That's, I mean, I'm only emotionally connected to 250 kids.

Tim Ferriss 29:48 Yeah.

Blake Mycoskie 29:48 Not in the world thinking about anyone else or the fact that there's kids in Cambodia that don't have shoes, or kids that have frostbite in Mongolia, or kids that have podoconiosis in Ethiopia. I mean, I knew nothing about any of this at that point. But I do care about these 250 kids. I spent all day with them. I, I connected with them. I, I, I, I saw the joy that they got. And so, so in my journal that morning, I just turned in a pretty natural flow to business. Like every... My life for 10 years, I mean, I'm now 29 years old, so I've been, been, I've been an entrepreneur for 10 years and I had used business to solve problems. Like, that's the way I looked at entrepreneurship. Something I don't like, as we were talking about earlier, or something that I don't think is fair or right in the world, let's see if we can change it with business. And so I was just writing in my journal. I said, "You know, what if we started a, a, an actual business that had a very simple model? You sold shoes to people who wanted them and you gave shoes to people who needed them. And, and, uh, we'd call it One for One." And that was just, it was like, you know, just literally this much of one of hundreds of journals. But as I'm finishing that thought, the, the great Alejo, and this is, he's one of the greatest human beings you'll ever meet, most enthusiastic people I've ever met, comes up and he, and he says, "It's time for breakfast before the polo match. Da, da. You're running late. Let's go, let's go." And I said, "No, Alejo, I, I think I have an answer to your question." I said, "You know, instead of a charity, what if there was a business that sold these shoes that you guys all wear here in Argentina and that we don't have in the United States?"

Tim Ferriss 31:20 Alpargatas.

Blake Mycoskie 31:20 Yeah, the alpargatas. I mean, you remember when you were there. And every time we sell a pair, we give a pair. And over a month we got the first, it was 250 pairs were the, the initial prototypes Um, because there were 250 kids in this village that we wanted to come give another pair to after we sold them. And we stuffed them in three duffle bags we bought at the, at the local, you know, kind of equivalent of a Foot Locker, and put them in, you know, checked them in and got through customs somehow without getting them confiscated-

Tim Ferriss 31:46 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 31:47 ... or, you know. And, uh, and, and, and, and literally got them back to LA to my apartment in Venice.

Tim Ferriss 31:53 How did you get your first retailer? Your first key retailer, if that makes sense.

Blake Mycoskie 31:57 So I was going just cold calling these stores, and what I found out really quickly, if you emailed or called a store and said you wanted to sell them shoes that they didn't know anything about the brand, you never got a response. You had to go there in person. So I was going in person and, but very often I was going in person on the weekends because during the week I'm running the driver's ed company still. And so there aren't usually shoe buyers working on the weekends, it's just staff. But luckily I got on, on American Rag on a Saturday. I got, Courtney was working that day, and so she's like, "Yeah, I'll look at it, whatever." And she was a pretty curious, kind of cool, interesting person. Um, and I showed her the shoes, and, and e- even before I got to the story she kind of thought, "This is kind of cool." Like this is, they're a very progressive fashion retailer. They like the new thing. And she's like, "I'll buy..." She's like, "How much inventory do you have?" And I was like, "Well, I got, like, 210 pairs left." I had sold, like, 40 to friends and family, a couple online. You know, I had a little rinky-dink website that, like, my, you know, parents were reordering from from Texas and stuff.

Tim Ferriss 32:56 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 32:57 And, um, and so, uh, but she's like, "I need a way to tell the story." And so we, I, I showed her a picture and, and w- put it, and she put it, like, by the display, and on a piece of cardboard we wrote what we thought was our kind of mission, and that was, with every pair you purchase, we will give a pair to a child in need. One for one. And we put that there, and, um, and she bought, I think, 85 pairs, which was, like, a third of my inventory, which I was super excited about. And, um, and, and the funny thing about that, and I mean, that led to so many other things, but w- the main thing that led to was a, a woman from the LA Times saw these shoes, and saw on the cardboard that we were gonna give away a pair for every pair we sold. And this woman's name is Booth Moore. And, uh, at the time she was the leading fashion writer at the LA Times, and one of the most syndicated fashion writers in the world. I mean, everyone read her columns. And so she asked Courtney for my information, and Courtney gave it to me, and I did the interview, and was, like, super excited and, and, and, and... But I didn't really have a, a- idea of, like, what this would potentially do to what we were calling this, as a time, as a project. We didn't even call it a business. It was the TOMS project.

Tim Ferriss 34:05 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 34:05 You know, 'cause I had a business, was the driver's ed business. This was the project. And so I didn't know what was gonna happen with the project when this article came out, but two weeks after the interview, on the cover of the LA Times there were two headlines. This was the calendar section. It was Da Vinci Code opens with 300 million in box office sales, which, you know, people in LA care about these things. And then the second thing is, [laughs] uh, TOMS shoes. Listen to this. We sold 2,200 pairs on our website before noon that day.

Tim Ferriss 34:36 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 34:37 Now, I only had 130 pairs in my apartment.

Tim Ferriss 34:40 [laughs]

Speaker 34:40 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 34:41 So, like, this is the first of many supply chain problems.

Tim Ferriss 34:43 This is the good news, bad news.

Blake Mycoskie 34:44 Yeah. This is the good news, bad news.

Tim Ferriss 34:46 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 34:46 So I mean, it was like, it was crazy. Had this little article, it wasn't even a big article, had this response of, of people in Los Angeles to go on this little tiny website and, and somehow trust it, and buy shoes, and then the website said you would get your shoes in four to five days, because we, you know, we're just shipping them out of my apartment one at a time.

Speaker 35:06 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 35:07 So now I have, you know, an order for 2,200. We've already charged these people's credit card, by the way.

Tim Ferriss 35:12 Yeah.

Speaker 35:12 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 35:12 Because it just automatically goes through. I have no idea if Alejo and Juan can make these shoes. I mean, I don't even think they think they're ever gonna see me again. And so I literally land at the airport, I've got a little duffle bag, like toiletries, maybe two things of clothes, and the LA Times, and I take a taxi directly to Juan's house. They're both there, you know, drinking their mate like everyone does in Argentina.

Tim Ferriss 35:33 Nice.

Blake Mycoskie 35:34 Just totally chilled out.

Tim Ferriss 35:35 Yeah.

Blake Mycoskie 35:35 Like they had no problems in the world.

Tim Ferriss 35:36 [laughs]

Speaker 35:37 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 35:37 And I, like, come in, like, you know, bat out of hell, and I'm like, "Muchos zapatos rapido." [laughs]

Tim Ferriss 35:44 [laughs]

Speaker 35:44 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 35:45 That's all the Spanish I knew.

Tim Ferriss 35:46 Yeah.

Blake Mycoskie 35:46 And that's all the Spanish I needed.

Tim Ferriss 35:48 Yeah.

Blake Mycoskie 35:48 And I showed them that article, and they just couldn't believe it.

Tim Ferriss 35:50 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 35:51 And so Juan calls his friend, and their friend, and next thing you know there's, like, all these different Argentines making these shoes as fast as they can in their garages, which ultimately became a barn, which became our first factory down there. Two weeks later, um, and let me just preface this with, because it's important to understand, uh, get a picture of what our apartment's like at the time. So we had this apartment in Venice, um, and had three interns. So two weeks after that article comes out, I'm walking by, it was in the kitchen. I'm walking by the kitchen area, and the phone rings, so I pick it up and I say, "Hello, this is Blake, TOMS Shoes." And there's this guy on the other line, and you can tell he's a little bit agitated from the first minute. And he says, "Yes, yes, um, I need to order 100 pairs of women's TOMS. I need red, I need blue, I need natural, and I need them to go out tomorrow." Now I'm like, whoa. Like, I mean, we've had people maybe order two or three pairs, but 100 pairs, one person? This is, like, not, this doesn't make sense. 'Cause all we're doing is selling online at this point. And, and I say, "Well, gosh, first off, like, this is amazing. 100 pairs, like, who is this? Like, where are you calling from?" And he says, "Oh, yes, I'm the assistant women's shoe buyer at Nordstrom in Seattle at the corporate office." Now, I don't know a lot about shoes, but I know that Nordstrom is like the holy grail of shoes at this point. Like, people had been talking to me about Nordstrom, Nordstrom. And I know that, like, they don't call you at your apartment. Like, it takes-

Tim Ferriss 37:08 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 37:09 Like, you beg to get a meeting with these guys, right?

Tim Ferriss 37:11 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 37:11 So I'm a little bit like, is this really, or is this a prank?

Tim Ferriss 37:14 Yeah.

Blake Mycoskie 37:14 But I can tell this guy's, like, really focused on, on, on this order. And so as I'm thinking about this I realize, you know, we have no shoes, right? We've sold out. So I said to the guy, I'm like, "Okay, this is awesome, 100 pairs. We can do that. It's probably gonna be about two or three weeks." And he's like, "No, no, I need them tomorrow. Like, my boss wants them yesterday. I need them tomorrow."

Tim Ferriss 37:34 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 37:34 And I'm like, "Well, we're sold out." And he goes, "No, you can't be sold out. Just bump someone else's order."

Tim Ferriss 37:39 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 37:39 "Like, this is Nordstrom calling. Like, no-No one tells us we're sold out.

Tim Ferriss 37:43 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 37:44 So I'm like, "Okay, sir, but like, I don't think you really understand the situation. Like, I'm not, I can't bump someone else's order. Like, I literally don't have any shoes to send you." And at this point, the guy gets pissed off.

Tim Ferriss 37:56 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 37:56 And he goes... This is what he says to me. He goes, and my phone's like, you know, about to start beeping, and he's like, he goes, "Listen, buddy, if you can't help me, put me in touch with the sales department."

Tim Ferriss 38:06 [laughs]

Speaker 38:10 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 38:12 So, but the be- but the best part of this whole thing is, while this conversation's going on, my three interns are sitting there eating breakfast tacos that they just got from Rose Cafe.

Tim Ferriss 38:25 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 38:25 And one of the girls, Lena, is like laughing 'cause she can overhear this conversation.

Tim Ferriss 38:29 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 38:30 And, and after that I didn't really know what to say, and so she's like, "Blake, give me the phone. Give me the phone."

Tim Ferriss 38:34 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 38:34 So I literally, it's about to start beeping, so I just toss it to her anyways. And without even, I- this was my favorite moments in the history of TOMS, without even blinking or hesitating, she just goes, "Hi, this is Lena, head of sales."

Tim Ferriss 38:45 [laughs]

Speaker 38:48 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 38:50 So... [laughs]

Tim Ferriss 38:54 We're gonna pull up a photo of-

Blake Mycoskie 38:56 Oh, my God

Tim Ferriss 38:56 ... early days, some TOMS, I think, in one of your original apartments.

Blake Mycoskie 39:02 I have a funny story about these bags, too.

Tim Ferriss 39:04 Let's hear about the bags.

Blake Mycoskie 39:05 So these bags almost sunk the company.

Tim Ferriss 39:08 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 39:09 Literally, we were almost out of business because of the bags.

Tim Ferriss 39:14 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 39:14 So, and, and most people don't know this, and I'm glad you showed this picture 'cause it's something that never comes up in interviews. I actually had two big ideas with TOMS. The first idea is that we were gonna give a pair to a kid for every pair we sold, and we were gonna help kids in Argentina who needed shoes to go to school. That's the idea that became famous, and that people know us for. The second idea is we were gonna be the first shoe company to eliminate the horrible waste of cardboard boxes.

Tim Ferriss 39:39 Boxes.

Blake Mycoskie 39:40 Think about when you buy a pair of shoes, what do you do with the box? You throw it away, and most of you probably don't even recycle it. I mean, you get... It's hard, you know? It's not easy to recycle sometimes. And, and especially 10 years ago, very few people were recycling stuff like boxes. And I hated the fact that there was so much waste being created by the shoe industry. And so I got these recyclable, you know, um, bags, linen bags, that were made of, of, of materials that could be repurposed, and also it could be used for something. You could put stuff in it and whatnot. And so we were gonna be the first company to only use bags. So that worked great when our initial sales were online, because someone would order a pair, you stick the bag in the, in the, in the box, or the FedEx envelope, or whatever you sent, and you sent it, and you did not have to waste another box. But then when we got into Nordstrom, they said, "Okay..." I mean, this is, we were starting to get some press. We're in Vogue. It's exciting. Like, you know, they're like, "Okay, we're in, and we're gonna give it a shot. We're gonna give you five stores, Southern California." And, um, they said, uh, "But we need boxes." And I was like, "No, there are no boxes." And they're like, "Yeah, but that's... You don't understand. Like, the way that our business works is we have stockrooms, and every brand gets a stockroom, and they have boxes by size. And so when someone wants a seven, they come and get a seven. It won't work with bags." And I'm like, "Well, then we're not gonna do business." And they're like, "What?"

Tim Ferriss 40:56 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 40:56 And I'm like, "Well, we're, we're not gonna create waste in the world with these boxes, so we're gonna use bags." And the buyer was just like, first off, I, I don't think anyone ever told Nordstrom, like, they're just not gonna do business.

Tim Ferriss 41:07 [laughs]

Speaker 41:07 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 41:07 But I mean, I, once again, I wasn't thinking of it like a business.

Tim Ferriss 41:10 Right. [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 41:10 And I was, and I was adamant about this bag thing, 'cause I was getting really good feedback, 'cause like people love the fact that, I mean, they, they connected with the idea. So anyways, so the guy who was the buyer said, "Fine. Like, we're, we'll try it. I mean, but I'm telling you, this is gonna be really-

Tim Ferriss 41:24 Hard to stack bags. [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 41:25 ... really hard to stack bags. And, and if our s- associates who make money on commission have trouble getting your shoes, they won't sell as well." I was like, "Well, let's just give it a shot." So the first week, it's actually pretty easy to stack bags. Our sales the first week are, like, doing great. Like, I'm calling, I'm like so excited, whatever. Second week, it's like an abrupt halt. I mean, not a, I don't think a pair sells. And I'm like, "What happened?" And he goes, "Go to, you know, La Brea Nordstrom and look in the stockroom."

Tim Ferriss 41:54 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 41:55 I go in there. It's a tangled mess.

Tim Ferriss 41:57 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 41:58 'Cause each bag has a string, and then a tag on it-

Tim Ferriss 42:00 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 42:00 ... and they get caught. And I mean, literally, you can't pull these bags apart.

Tim Ferriss 42:04 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 42:04 So now when the customer comes in and says, "I want a size seven," the person's not gonna waste their time and lose commission, and say, "Well, how about a pair of Vans instead?"

Tim Ferriss 42:11 Right.

Blake Mycoskie 42:12 You know? Or, "We're sold out." That was the thing. Everyone's saying, like, "They're sold out." I'm like, "They're not sold out. They're in there."

Tim Ferriss 42:16 Yeah.

Blake Mycoskie 42:16 And so literally, Nordstrom said, um, "Until you get boxes, like, no more business." And so we actually got kicked out of Nordstrom's. It took us about six months or so before we finally got into, like, boxes, 'cause it wasn't just so easy as, like, getting any old box.

Tim Ferriss 42:30 Right.

Blake Mycoskie 42:30 We wanted to design the box and all this. And so literally, it's like, it's so interesting because I feel like in business, you, breaking rules sometimes leads to innovation, and new companies, and all these things, but you gotta know which rules to break, 'cause there's some rules that you just can't break. And I mean, we have boxes today, so.

Tim Ferriss 42:49 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 42:49 So, you know, I mean, it's funny, those early memories are, are so great, but it, and it, but it, hopefully it shows other entrepreneurs and people thinking about businesses, like, they all start, you know, in a garage, in an apartment, i- with an idea, with a group of people who believe in it before anyone else. You struggle with all these crazy things. And then if you just keep at it long enough, enough good things start happening.

Tim Ferriss 43:13 So what, what I wanna do, we, we have, there's so many things. We could go for a five-hour-

Blake Mycoskie 43:16 [laughs]

Tim Ferriss 43:17 ... talk here, but before we do that, what I'd like to do is take some audience Q&A.

Blake Mycoskie 43:21 Great.

Tim Ferriss 43:21 So we have some questions that were gathered during the break, and so I'm gonna start with, as an entrepreneur, we all face fear. What was your greatest fear in business? And then part two, what does failure look like to you?

Blake Mycoskie 43:35 Hmm. That's a really good question. Um, so I had different fears at different businesses, but I wanna stick to TOMS, because I think it was probably the, the- Most motivating fear. Um, I think sometimes fear can, um, paralyze you in business or in life or in relationships, and sometimes it can be the greatest motivator and, and the greatest catalyst for success. So I go to Argentina after that first giving trip. We've given 10,000 shoes. We originally were trying to do 250 kids, so 10,000's amazing, right? But also what I created now is 10,000 kids who need another pair of shoes. So the very problem that I was trying to alleviate through the business idea actually was exasperated with that initial success. 'Cause I was not thinking about 10,000 kids when I had 250 shoes made. I was thinking, uh, something that seemed very manageable, and that is these 250 kids, getting them shoes. But now once we sold and gave away 10,000, I had this... I left that trip not as excited as I should've been. I left thinking, "Oh my gosh, I can't let these communities down." Like, they think we're coming back in four months and giving another 10,000 pairs of shoes away. So I've got to make sure that I can sell these shoes, and frankly, I didn't know how I was gonna do it. I mean, we had had some luck with this media and we got some momentum, but I mean, there was no guarantee that anyone was placing more orders for 10,000 shoes. And so I remember, like, I mean, I was barely sleeping. I was definitely not healthy in terms of the hours I was working. And it wasn't because I was loving it or it was fun or I was having the high from the joy of the kids. I was literally afraid of having to go back there and be like, "Uh, we don't have any more shoes," or, "We only sold 2,000 pairs, so only at 20% of you get shoes." So, so, so fear really was a motivator and, and, and has been in many different chapters in TOMS, not because I was afraid of failing as a business. I'd already done that before with my reality channel. But failing other humans is a much heavier burden to wear, especially when they have so little and they're expecting so much. So that's really how fear has been a great motivator for me.

Tim Ferriss 45:50 Uh, what are two to three books you can't live without?

Blake Mycoskie 45:53 Hmm. The 4-Hour Workweek.

Speaker 45:54 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 45:56 I mean-

Tim Ferriss 45:56 I- [laughs] I did, I did give him a 20 earlier.

Speaker 45:59 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 46:02 I, uh, I didn't have the mental toughness to get through The 4-Hour Body, so, um... But no, I mean, in all seriousness, like, that book was a huge influence, as I said before, which I'm super grateful for. Um, you know, I'd say, uh, the books that have had the biggest impact on me in, in the last few years, one of 'em is, uh, it's called The Art of Power. It's by a Vietnamese Buddhist monk named Thich Nhat Hanh.

Tim Ferriss 46:28 Oh, yeah.

Blake Mycoskie 46:29 And, and the great thing about it is it talks about the d- when he's talking about the art of power, it's definitely not the way we think of power in the West, but really the p- power of mindfulness and really of, of being able to be present in the moment in everything that you're doing. And I've found that that book, which I've read multiple times now, has had a huge, a huge, huge influence on just how I try to approach my day, my business, parenting, my marriage, everything. So I, I highly recommend, uh, that book if you, if you haven't read it. Um, Meditations, we talked about earlier-

Tim Ferriss 47:04 Marcus Aurelius

Blake Mycoskie 47:04 ... is an, Marcus Aurelius, is another really, really great one. I think depending on where you are in your journey, I think both of Howard Schultz's books are amazing for entrepreneurs. His first book, uh, was called Pour Your Heart Into It. It's the early story of Starbucks and how it was created, and I think it really illustrates a lot of amazing things that entrepreneurs can learn from. And then his second book, which is, was a really important book for me to read at a point when which I actually left the business for a while and then came back to it, was called Onward, and that was about some of the struggles that Starbucks went through and, and how they kind of rebuilt the culture in the company in the last 10 years. And so I'm really thankful that Howard was so vulnerable and open with that book, 'cause I think it, it, it answered a lot of questions I was having at the time, uh, as, as well. So those are a, a couple of, of, of good ones that I would recommend.

Tim Ferriss 47:54 And, uh, note on, uh, so Thich Nhat Hanh, the Vietnamese Buddhist monk, he was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize by, uh, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Really fascinating guy. And his first book, which was kinda like Meditations in the sense that it wasn't intended to be a book, called, I believe it's Peace Is Every Step.

Blake Mycoskie 48:09 Peace Is Every Step, yeah.

Tim Ferriss 48:11 Is fantastic.

Blake Mycoskie 48:11 Yeah.

Tim Ferriss 48:11 And it was actually a guide intended to be given to new monks and visitors to his, uh, center in, I guess it was at the time perhaps it was in Vietnam. He's-

Blake Mycoskie 48:22 It's in France.

Tim Ferriss 48:23 It's in France, right?

Blake Mycoskie 48:25 Yeah.

Tim Ferriss 48:25 Uh, fantastic, fantastic book.

Blake Mycoskie 48:27 Oh, one more just 'cause we're in California, and it's a, someone I've also looked up and learned a lot from is, and it just came out with the, I think maybe the 10 or 20th year anniversary version, is Yvon Chouinard, who started Patagonia.

Tim Ferriss 48:40 Yeah.

Blake Mycoskie 48:40 Uh, Let My People Go Surfing.

Tim Ferriss 48:42 Great book.

Blake Mycoskie 48:42 It's, it's a fantastic book, um, about company culture. It also shares some really tough times in the Patagonia ups and downs that I, that I learned a lot from. Uh, and also I think it was interesting because when he wrote the book 10 years ago, it was kinda the beginning of internet sales, and it really shows how they did not, um, they did not risk their business by having too much of their sales in one place. They have a wholesale business. They have retail stores. They have online. They have catalog. And that's something that we've done with TOMS over the years, is to move away from just online to now wholesale, and now we're spending a lot of our energy building our own retail stores, so.

Tim Ferriss 49:18 Mm-hmm. This next one is if you lost everything today, what would you be thankful for?

Blake Mycoskie 49:23 Hmm. Well, I mean, the truth is, is it's impossible for me to lose everything today because everything that I have has very little to do with what I have materially. The experiences I've had, the memories I have, the friends, the family, that's what I have, and that literally can't be taken away. So I mean- [audience applauds] Thanks And, you know, no one's really asked me that question, but I, I could respond that quickly because that's immediately what I think about when I think of the, the greatest memories and moments of my life, and that's why this has been so much fun is I'm getting to go down memory lane, and those are memories that even if the business i- you know, blew up tomorrow, I would still have those memories.

Tim Ferriss 50:10 Have, have your experiences, let's just say at TOMS, but it could be-

Blake Mycoskie 50:14 Yeah

Tim Ferriss 50:14 ... across the board. And I also wanna highlight one thing for folks which, which we, well, I glossed over earlier, I didn't dig into. So you mentioned all these businesses that seem to have nothing to do with one another.

Blake Mycoskie 50:24 Yeah.

Tim Ferriss 50:25 But what are the meta skills that you're developing? You're learning to negotiate.

Blake Mycoskie 50:29 Yes.

Tim Ferriss 50:30 You're learning how to attract and manage talent. You're learning how to mitigate or evaluate risk, right? So even though the businesses, the industries seem totally unrelated, the skills he's developing do carry from one to the next.

Blake Mycoskie 50:43 Absolutely.

Tim Ferriss 50:43 They're not domain-specific. So how have your business experiences affected how you parent?

Blake Mycoskie 50:52 Yeah. I- I'm, I'm really glad you asked this question because it's something that I have a lot of personal energy around right now. One of the big things is what my wife have is a monthly calendar date. And I say date, like, it's really not a date, sometimes a battle. [laughs]

Tim Ferriss 51:07 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 51:08 But, uh, it usually ends pretty good, uh, because we drink enough wine to, like, you know, compromise.

Tim Ferriss 51:13 Swoon at the end. [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 51:13 Yeah. But, but the calendar is king. Like, if you have a busy life, if you have, uh, if you're driving hard in work and family, like, I mean, the calendar is, is the king 'cause w- we put things on the calendar, they stick. You know, that's kind of our thing. Like, and so we make sure, like, if I wanna say my goal right now is to spend either two mornings or two afternoons every week at home with our son, just me and him, not with my wife. Just, like, we either take him on a hike in the backpack, take him to the beach, you know, just play in his room, whatever, but that's my goal, and it will never, ever happen if it's a goal in my journal. It will only happen if, in my case, my wife, my assistant, and I all put it on the calendar.

Tim Ferriss 51:56 [laughs]

Blake Mycoskie 51:56 'Cause if it's on the calendar, you're accountable to it.

Tim Ferriss 51:58 Right.

Blake Mycoskie 51:58 She's like, "You put this, I mean, no meetings," and then nothing gets scheduled. So for me, the way that we do it is very much focusing on, on, on booking things and, and scheduling even little things which might seem ridiculous, like you put play with your son on the calendar? Like, that could seem, that could come off, like, really, like, I don't know what, just off-putting. But the truth is, if it's on the calendar, it happens, and even if that seems ridiculous, as long as it happens, that's what's the most important thing.

Tim Ferriss 52:23 Yeah.

Blake Mycoskie 52:23 So yeah, so-

Tim Ferriss 52:24 Great.

Blake Mycoskie 52:26 Um, that, and, and, and that's also beyond, you know, just time with my son. Like, I, one thing that I've always had is a lot of hobbies. Like, I love to surf. I love to snowboard. I like to fly-fish. I have lots of friends that like these hobbies. We climb together in the summer, and so it's the same thing. Like, just as I'm planning that business trip to Asia to do a press tour because we've opened a lot of stores there, if I'm gonna give two weeks to that, I'm also gonna make sure I'm giving two weeks to doing stuff with my buddies and making sure I stay connected to them. Because one thing you find, uh, as we get older and you, you know, especially, especially unfortunately this happens more with men, I think, than women, is we really lose touch with our guy friends. Like, we focus on our family, and we focus on our jobs, and, and that's, like, one of, my dad has always said one of his biggest regrets as, as he's had this amazing life is that, like, he focused so much time on his family and his jobs and my mom that he didn't, as, when he got older, in his 40s and his 50s, he looked around, and he didn't have guys to really depend on. And so that's another thing that I've always, since learning from my dad that, have placed an importance on. It doesn't have to be a lot of time, but it has to be quality when you do it.

Tim Ferriss 53:32 Yeah.

Blake Mycoskie 53:32 And, and that usually comes from, once again, scheduling it on the calendar.

Tim Ferriss 53:36 Yeah, if it's not on the calendar, it's not real.

Blake Mycoskie 53:38 Yeah.

Tim Ferriss 53:38 For sure. If you had a gigantic billboard or a side of a building-

Blake Mycoskie 53:42 Okay. [laughs]

Tim Ferriss 53:43 ... and you could put any message on it-

Blake Mycoskie 53:45 Hmm

Tim Ferriss 53:45 ... meaning, like, getting it out to a lot of people, right?

Blake Mycoskie 53:48 Yeah, yeah.

Tim Ferriss 53:48 What, what would you put up there?

Blake Mycoskie 53:49 I- It's, it's, it's the easiest question you've asked because it's something that has been, uh, is literally been my mantra since I was 19 years old, and that is carpe diem, seize the day. Because we have no, we have very little control whether we'll be on this planet tomorrow. I mean, I could die in a fatal car crash on the way home, and that's it. And so if I don't literally live every day as if it might be my last, then I am, I am, I am not doing a service to the life I've been given. And unfortunately, that became my mantra after, um, one of my best friends died in a plane crash when I was 18. And I realized I could do nothing to get him back, but I could honor his life by living every day if it was gonna be my last. And so every email you've ever received from me, there's never a yours or a thank you or a truly. I sign every email, every letter carpe diem, and I have since I was 19. And you know, some people that don't know me feel like, oh, that's kinda a little cheesy. It's a little too optimistic. That's a little too much to think of, like, seizing every day. But I believe that is a mantra that has served me so well because I have, I have, I've committed my life to doing that. Like, if I do that, then I'm giving the most I can to what I've been given.

Tim Ferriss 55:07 Ladies and gentlemen, Blake Mycoskie.

Blake Mycoskie 55:09 Oh, thanks. [audience cheering] [upbeat music] [graphic squelching] [gentle music]