0:10

Welcome to another episode of At The Table with

0:12

Patrick Lincione, where everything we talk about is related

0:14

to organizational health and the world of work. I'm

0:17

your host, Pat Lincione, joined by the

0:19

regular crew today, Tracy Bow Cody.

0:21

How are you guys doing? Fantastic.

0:24

Pretty good. Matt

0:27

is producing. Karen's sitting here next to me. Cody,

0:29

what are we going to talk about today? What's the title of today's show?

0:33

Abnormally Normal. That's right.

0:35

Abnormally Normal. I had

0:38

an experience this week with

0:40

a company that I thought would be an unpaid ad. I was

0:42

going to do an unpaid ad for it, but

0:44

it provoked and inspired me to make

0:46

it a topic for our show. And

0:48

I think it applies to so many

0:50

businesses and organizations, both for customers and

0:52

employees. And the company that I want to

0:54

tell you about is called The

0:56

Normal Brand. That's right. It's The

0:59

Normal Brand. And so

1:01

that's the impetus of today's title. That

1:04

word normal has a few different meanings.

1:06

We're not talking about lacking individuality or

1:08

anything like that. For today's

1:10

show and what we're going to talk about today, normal

1:12

really gets to simple, fundamental,

1:15

common sense, not unnecessarily

1:17

flashy. And so that's

1:20

what we're going to talk about today. The attraction

1:22

of something that is commonsensical

1:25

and normal. So how

1:27

did this come up, Pat? It sounded like

1:29

there was a story connected to you intersecting

1:31

with this brand. Yeah,

1:33

actually the story started probably

1:35

a couple months ago when

1:38

Tracy and Karen and I were in Nashville.

1:40

And we went downtown on Broadway and there's

1:42

a big shopping center there and then all

1:44

the hunky-tunk bars. And we went and listened

1:46

to some country music. It was really fun.

1:49

But we were walking through this little outdoor mall

1:51

and there was all the stores and the lights

1:53

and the signs. And then we looked, there was

1:55

this one store and it said The Normal Brand.

1:58

And we were like, that's weird. And for some... reason,

2:00

we said we got to

2:02

go check this out. Remember that, Tracy? Yes,

2:04

we were drawn to the name, first of

2:06

all. And then just the

2:09

whole storefront was really basic and

2:11

simple and normal. So

2:13

it absolutely drew us in. So

2:17

we were like, this is really cool. We asked the people

2:19

working there, what's the deal? And it's headquartered in St. Louis,

2:21

where they had a couple stores. So

2:23

then last week, I'm shopping and I'm on

2:25

Nordstrom site because I get stuff at Nordstrom.

2:27

And I see the normal brand, they carry

2:29

some of their products. So I went

2:32

to the website, and I was

2:34

blown away by how many good things they

2:36

had. So I made a big purchase. And

2:40

I went to check out. And

2:42

I needed it. We celebrated Christmas

2:45

early this year, because two of my sons are

2:47

going off with their girlfriends to their families. And

2:49

so I couldn't check out because

2:51

I couldn't get the stuff in time.

2:53

So I had all this good stuff picked out

2:55

for my family, because I love their clothes. They're

2:58

just so relatable and solid

3:01

and really attractive, but stuff you can

3:03

relate to. Like, I could see myself wearing that. The

3:05

models they use are the kind of people you're like,

3:07

yeah, that kind of reminds me of the kind of

3:09

people I might want to have a beer with or

3:11

hang out with. So I couldn't get it.

3:14

I didn't know what to do. And I was frustrated.

3:16

So I just literally found a phone number on their

3:18

website. And I called and left a message saying, this

3:20

is my name. I wanted to buy this stuff. I

3:23

need it by this Sunday. And it doesn't seem like

3:25

it's possible. And thought, I'll probably never hear back from

3:27

them. But I just threw it out there. The next

3:29

morning, I get a call. And

3:32

it's this woman, Colby is her name. And

3:34

she clearly worked from home doing customer service.

3:37

And she went and found my order. I hadn't even

3:39

processed it. So there was this open cart. Is this

3:41

what you bought? She figured it all out for me,

3:43

found a different way for me to get it on

3:46

time was just fantastic. Like talking to her, I felt

3:48

like I made a friend. The

3:50

stuff gets here, everybody loves it. Well,

3:53

so after it arrived, I said, I'm gonna

3:55

do something I want I like to do

3:57

more. I sent her an email. A

4:00

really detailed email saying, Colby, you made my day

4:03

because I really needed this stuff. And you

4:05

made me, you saved your

4:07

company money. I'm telling all my friends about it. People

4:09

are shopping there. And, and I even

4:12

said, I'm going to do a, I'm going

4:14

to mention your company in a podcast. And I said,

4:17

you know something, Colby, you should send this note to

4:19

your, the leaders of your company. I didn't know what

4:21

that meant. And just tell them what you did.

4:23

Cause they, they love to get that. 15

4:25

minutes later, I get a text from her CEO saying,

4:28

thanks for the feedback. We really appreciate it.

4:30

And we use your stuff and it really

4:32

helps our business and they're growing and they're

4:34

doing great. And so I thought, that's neat.

4:36

And then I thought about what,

4:39

what are they doing? Well, they're doing the

4:41

basics. Well, whether it's their

4:43

clothes and the way they, they present

4:45

themselves, whether they deal with customer service. And

4:47

I thought, isn't it interesting

4:49

that that stands out that they,

4:51

they just do the simple things

4:53

really well. And the message

4:56

to, to, to listeners here

4:59

is if we stick to doing

5:01

the basics well, we can stand out

5:03

in a world that is so interested

5:05

in always looking like

5:08

it has to be exceptional in a, in a,

5:10

in the wrong kind of way. Anyway,

5:12

I want to explore this with you guys. Cause

5:14

what is so attractive about a

5:16

company that is good at the basics? Well,

5:19

it also, it speaks to me of what is

5:21

often so frustrating with the company is when they

5:24

complicate the wrong thing. Exactly. I know

5:26

it's a bit the inverse of what you're talking about,

5:28

but we, Cody and I have a new office. So

5:30

we have been getting lots and lots of things for

5:32

the office. In fact, I'm recording it from our card,

5:34

our cardboard room where all of the boxes for all

5:36

of our stuff is here. It's amazing

5:38

how many items require you to download

5:40

an app for the simplest thing.

5:43

We have a little speaker, we have a little

5:45

air purifier. We have a little espresso maker. All

5:47

three of them require an app, which is absolutely

5:51

absurd that I can't even use an air

5:53

pry, purifier without downloading your app and giving

5:55

my email. Oh,

5:58

unnecessarily complicated things. are

6:00

so frustrating. So it's wonderful to

6:02

experience a company who has chosen

6:05

to double down on the simple.

6:09

Yeah, and you know what I loved? Because I was like,

6:11

Am I going to have to go through a bot here

6:13

and type something in, they're going to make me categorize it.

6:15

And I found a phone number and I just left a

6:17

random message and it took care

6:19

of everything. And, and

6:22

she saved her company so I was going to lose

6:24

that order, I was just going to go, Oh, well,

6:26

I'll just go someplace else. Now she has a raving

6:28

fan. And the other people in

6:30

our office heard about it and we're using it.

6:32

And this is exactly how a company goes from

6:34

a small company run by these three brothers in

6:37

St. Louis to a

6:39

brand and an organization that impacts

6:41

lots of people. You know, that's

6:44

actually one of my favorite parts of the whole

6:46

story you told was I found a phone number

6:48

on the website, that's surprising in and of itself.

6:51

And then a real human being called you back.

6:53

So I love when you say getting back to

6:55

like the simple basics of things, because that feels

6:57

like, you know, every other company in the world

6:59

is going to say, you know, we're going to

7:02

have we're going to have an AI chat bot

7:04

that can help our customers at any hour of

7:06

the day. And they want these moonshot things that

7:08

is going to differentiate them. When would I love

7:11

what the message that we're talking about is boy,

7:13

these basic blocking and tackling, like

7:16

the whole world has been caught up in these unicorn

7:18

startup ideas of like, we got to do something

7:21

totally different. But the majority of businesses and the

7:23

ones that are doing it really well, get

7:25

the simple basic stuff done well

7:28

over and over and over again. And even

7:30

you just receiving a call from a customer

7:32

service agent is so is such

7:34

an anomaly now. Yeah,

7:36

you just articulated better than I did

7:39

earlier. And, and it stands out in

7:41

a world full of automation and, and

7:44

complication. And it makes

7:46

me want to tell people about them.

7:50

It's such a crazy thing, you know, and when you

7:52

automate it, like let's get a chat GPT thing, blah,

7:54

blah, blah, we need four engineers to support it. It's

7:56

like hiring two people to answer the phone, we

7:59

were at a hotel. recently, a

8:01

company event, and it was a beautiful hotel, but

8:03

the service wasn't great. As

8:06

I was leaving, I saw the guy who was in

8:08

charge of customer experience, and I gave him some feedback.

8:10

I said, hey, the service, he goes, oh, really? Why?

8:13

I'd been there a number of times before, and it's always the same. I said, well,

8:15

first of all, every time you call down

8:17

to the front desk, nobody answers. Literally,

8:20

you can have the phone ring for 15 minutes. I

8:24

don't care all the other things they did at that hotel.

8:26

I don't want to go back there when

8:28

I know that I can't even call the front desk

8:30

and have a question answered. Pat,

8:33

I was on hold for 15 minutes

8:35

at that hotel, and even more infuriating

8:37

than being on hold for 15 minutes

8:39

is the hold music is this robot

8:41

sounding guy that says, nothing is

8:43

more important to us than your call right

8:45

now. And just for 15 minutes

8:47

repeating that over and over again really poured

8:49

salt in the wound of not being able

8:52

to get a hold of anybody there. Exactly.

8:55

How common is that? Gosh. Pat,

8:57

I had never heard of this company until you told us

9:00

we were going to talk about this on the podcast. So

9:02

I went to their website, and

9:04

I really like the language of their

9:06

self-awareness of who they are. So

9:09

I'm just going to read it. It made me think about

9:11

something you talk about in the advantage in terms of organizational

9:13

clarity that I wonder if you

9:15

could comment on anything you hear about their

9:17

clarity that they have in terms of why

9:20

we exist or how we behave or any of that. So

9:22

this is from their homepage. It says, we aren't designers. We're

9:25

brothers who make clothes. Headquartered

9:28

in St. Louis. We make

9:30

normal clothes much better. That's

9:34

it. I love it. And

9:37

you know what's crazy? When I went on their site, every

9:40

single item they had, I was

9:42

like, yeah, I could see by now. I

9:44

could see. Usually I'm like going through and out

9:46

of 10 items, nine of them are like, who in the world

9:48

would wear this? Oh, there's something I could relate to. And

9:51

here's the other thing, Beau. My

9:54

20-year-old son, 21 now, he, when I told

9:56

him about it, he was like, oh, dad's

9:58

an old fogey. And he goes, I went

10:01

to that site. Man, I bought a bunch

10:03

of stuff. I love it. And

10:05

so it's really universally,

10:08

there's something so universally attractive

10:10

about basic, really good things

10:12

that people can use. I

10:14

like in their website, they also talk, I'm

10:16

scrolling through while we're recording, they say, you

10:18

know, they say, we will always cater to

10:20

you because we are you. And

10:23

I think sometimes the companies that have

10:25

the most relatable and usable products are

10:27

people who actually use their products. I'm

10:29

sitting at a desk by VeriDesk, and I

10:31

promise you, they use the desk at VeriDesk.

10:33

It's so high quality. It was very

10:36

easy to assemble. It's very, very usable,

10:38

right? Like how many times have you been

10:40

through a drive-through or been on a company's

10:42

customer service website and thought, I

10:44

bet that nobody on the executive team has ever

10:46

tried to actually submit a complaint on this form

10:49

before. Yeah, most of the big

10:51

airlines, when I fly there, I think, I

10:53

wonder when the last time the CEO sat in coach

10:56

and actually had

10:58

to experience what I'm experiencing here. So you're

11:01

right. I love that. I've never

11:03

seen that on their website. We are you. That's

11:05

so great. So what

11:07

do you think these companies are doing

11:09

that makes them so comfortable with getting

11:14

back to basics? What are they

11:16

doing? How are they doing things internally? Well,

11:20

you know, it's interesting because, and

11:22

I always say this, Matt, my son says it

11:24

makes me sound old, but so

11:27

many companies are looking for that really

11:29

sophisticated or kind of public

11:32

relations inspiring thing

11:35

to do for their employees or somebody

11:37

else. Like we have an infinity pool

11:39

or we have organic produce in our

11:41

company cafeteria. That's like, how about just

11:43

paying people a fair wage, treating them

11:45

with respect, rewarding them when they

11:48

do a good job and sharing in the

11:50

joy of doing that. And I think sometimes

11:52

people skip over that and

11:55

they go to what's the latest and

11:57

greatest thing. And we've talked about this on

11:59

podcasts before how we can get enamored with

12:01

the complex and the flashy when

12:04

really what we need is just to be authentic, simple,

12:07

and courageous about providing people what

12:09

is important to them. Does

12:11

that make sense? I love that. I love

12:14

that. Yeah. You know, Pat, something I feel

12:16

like as a society, and maybe this speaks

12:18

to why they've decided to zig and when

12:20

everyone is zagging this way, is like there's

12:22

something about so often where

12:26

we get all of these messages

12:28

from products that we use about

12:30

how incredible it is. Like, oh,

12:32

this underwear will raise your IQ or

12:35

like, I mean, they're making these claims

12:37

that are outrageous. And so, like,

12:40

the idea that you need an app for

12:42

your espresso maker or something like that. And so for

12:44

a brand to just say, hey, we're not gonna take

12:46

ourselves too seriously. We make clothes and we want to

12:48

make, we want to do that really well. I feel

12:51

like we've got, as a society, we're so

12:54

fatigued from these sort of

12:56

starstruck promises that this is going to

12:58

help you become a better entrepreneur or

13:00

make a million dollars or do something

13:02

that the core product actually does not

13:04

accomplish. And so for a brand

13:06

to just go very straightforwardly and say, hey, we

13:08

make really good clothes for normal people

13:10

because we're normal people, that is a refreshing

13:13

breath of fresh air. Yes.

13:16

Yeah, it's so humble. And it seems

13:18

like they have great clarity about their

13:20

answer to what we'd say is question

13:22

three, what is it that

13:24

we do? They have as good a

13:27

clarity of what they do of any

13:29

company that I've ever seen. We make

13:31

clothes. I feel like clarity and that

13:33

simplicity takes humility. It takes

13:35

humility to say, we're not trying to

13:37

put somebody on the moon. Okay, we're

13:39

not trying to win any awards. We are

13:41

not going to be celebrated at any fashion

13:44

conference. We're just trying to make clothes. Yeah,

13:47

I know. And do it well. You know,

13:49

that's what every business should be like. What are

13:52

we here for? Let's just do that

13:54

really well. And Karen wrote something

13:56

and that is that these kind

13:58

of companies understand what all companies know

14:00

and that is that ultimately word of mouth

14:02

is what makes a company successful. You

14:05

can market everything all you want, but it's

14:07

only through the experience of getting something you

14:09

like and being treated

14:11

well that you tell other people.

14:14

All the marketing in the world isn't going to

14:16

fix a problem if word of mouth

14:18

doesn't do it. Very little marketing

14:21

can inspire like In-N-Out Burger is one of my

14:23

favorite companies to talk about. If you're on

14:25

the East Coast, we're sorry, that doesn't exist here. Most people have heard about it,

14:28

but they do no advertising. Your

14:30

customers all tell other people, you got

14:32

to go there. It's been. Pat,

14:35

I'm sort of reminded. I

14:37

think I've purchased like maybe six books in the last

14:40

couple of months and on the back

14:42

of every book, I promise you there's

14:44

an endorsement. At least one of the six endorsements

14:46

on the back, somebody has said, this book will

14:48

change your life. I'm

14:51

kind of like at the stage

14:53

where I want the endorsement to say, this book

14:55

probably won't change your life, but

14:57

it's just going to give you a few very

15:00

usable things that is going to make your life

15:02

a little bit better. And

15:04

I'm ready for that book because I feel like

15:06

this is the same thing we're experiencing is all

15:09

of this overwhelming praise

15:11

and what's like hyperbolic

15:15

way of marketing their things when

15:17

it's just a book or it's just a piece of

15:19

clothing or it's just a piece of software. And

15:22

it's super refreshing. I love it. I'm

15:24

on the website right now. I actually think that

15:26

it builds trust when somebody does an over

15:29

promise when they just say, this is simply

15:31

who we are. I'm also now

15:33

playing around on their website and I

15:35

really like this family dynamic that they have.

15:38

So again, it's not part of every company, but

15:40

it's started by some brothers. They even talk

15:43

about how their mom helped to design their

15:45

space. They feel very human. And

15:47

I wonder if there's something to that too. Maybe

15:50

working with your family forces you to be humble and

15:53

keeps you kind of grounded. I

15:55

like that as a consumer. I don't like when it's forced.

15:58

I hate when on Christmas albums. people have their

16:00

kid come and sing. I'm like, I don't want to

16:02

hear your kids sing, but I like this family dynamic

16:04

for some reason that this company has. But

16:07

wouldn't you say working with me keeps you humble?

16:10

We're not family, but I feel like we accomplished

16:12

that. Yeah.

16:14

It's working one way. I would say I don't

16:16

know that it's working both ways. You

16:20

know, something happened to me that reminded me of

16:22

this and I loved it. I was driving to

16:24

pick up my son at the airport. So I

16:26

was driving through San Francisco and there's all these

16:28

tech billboards and they try to outdo one another

16:30

and how they're going to promise to change your

16:32

life through some technology. And I came into one

16:34

billboard. I'd never, I had never seen anything like

16:36

it. It was a white billboard with black letters

16:38

on it. And it said one,

16:40

one dot, and then had a sentence like

16:43

our company does this. Dot

16:45

point two. Here's what we do that

16:47

makes us better than other companies. And

16:49

that was it. It was like the world's

16:51

worth PowerPoint slide. And yet among all the

16:54

exaggerations and hyperbole, it stood

16:56

out. And I thought, how cool of it.

16:58

They just said, we want you to know two things. That's

17:01

it. And I think maybe that's like

17:03

the normal brand. We were walking through that mall or

17:05

like, what the normal brand. We

17:08

were like, Oh, this is so nice.

17:10

It's so simple. So if

17:12

you were sitting with a team and they were listening to

17:14

this and then they said, how do we

17:17

declutter? What, what, what do we

17:19

do to help our brand become more

17:21

simple or to be able to be more like

17:23

that, be more normal? How should they do that? Yeah.

17:27

That's a great question, boat. How do we make this

17:29

practical? And I think you go back

17:31

to the six critical questions, which is like, why

17:33

do we exist and, and

17:35

really understand and say, let's

17:38

stop doing things, anything

17:40

we do that doesn't really fit

17:42

with that. Let's, let's,

17:44

let's stop providing products

17:47

or services or advertising or, or

17:49

policies within our company that's not

17:51

really contributing to that. And what

17:53

are our values? Let's declutter what

17:55

we do so that it becomes

17:57

so simple and then let's.

18:00

realize what business are we in? Let's not

18:02

do all the things that are ancillary. We get

18:04

so easily caught up in that. Then

18:06

when you figure out what are our strategic anchors, let's

18:09

eliminate all the noise. Literally,

18:11

a clothing company would just be like, show

18:14

us the 100 items we're thinking about. Let's

18:16

get rid of the 30 that nobody's going

18:18

to buy that doesn't look like

18:20

something we would want to wear. People will

18:22

go, but maybe somebody would buy it. It's like, that's

18:24

okay. They can get it somewhere else. I remember when

18:26

I did a talk for In-N-Out Burger. At the time,

18:29

I wasn't eating. I don't eat a lot of beef,

18:31

but I like it. I said, I

18:34

like turkey. Do you guys think you'd make a turkey burger? They

18:37

were just so nice. They said, no, people

18:39

that come here really like hamburger and like beef.

18:42

There's other places you can get that. I was

18:44

just like, you rock. Every time I

18:46

get a burger, I'm going to go there. I

18:50

love that, Pat. There's other

18:52

places to get that. That's

18:54

such a confident position for

18:56

a company to take. Even

18:58

as you were describing that, it's not just getting

19:01

the clarity around the six critical questions. It's how

19:03

committed you are to it. You

19:05

think about all these other companies that

19:08

we talk about like imitation is the sincerest

19:10

form of flattery. In a company, imitation

19:13

is a surefire way of undermining

19:15

your clarity, being distracted by the

19:17

wrong thing, thinking that, oh, there's

19:19

this other brand in our space

19:21

that made XYZ a new piece

19:25

of clothing. Maybe we should imitate them. It's

19:27

just like the in and out answer is

19:29

like, oh, you can go there to get

19:31

that. We're comfortable in our own skin. We're

19:33

confident about what we make. I

19:35

think that too often, businesses and

19:38

leadership can get entertained or drawn into

19:42

what's the hot new thing that we need

19:44

to capitalize in that market. They've

19:46

just stuck to their guns. It's been working

19:48

for them and created great success. I

19:51

should finish this. I totally agree, Cody. I like

19:53

the way you said that. I did the first

19:55

four questions. I said the six critical questions. The

19:58

last two are, what's most important right who

20:00

does what to make that happen. But it's those

20:02

first four that are kind of foundational. And it's

20:04

like, we should constantly be cleaning out the garage

20:07

of our companies. Like what

20:09

are we doing that's not core? What

20:12

are we doing that's not? And it makes

20:14

the core so much cleaner and so much

20:16

clearer. And you know, this company, the normal

20:18

brand, I think if a year from now

20:20

I go on their site and I see

20:22

things that are like, oh my gosh, I

20:24

can't imagine, I should probably call

20:26

them and go, Hey, I don't, I think you guys

20:28

have strayed and that will be their

20:30

temptation because they will be successful and

20:32

people will want to tempt them to be things they're not.

20:36

And will they have the courage to not

20:38

make a turkey sandwich and

20:40

stick to the burger to

20:42

use an analogy. All

20:44

right. The normal brand, I, you

20:47

know, we're in the holiday season and they

20:49

have so many great things. I

20:51

can't believe it from my 18 year old, my 17

20:53

year old son to my, to my wife and I

20:55

and friends and family. We've really, so

20:57

that's our unpaid ad today too. I don't think we

20:59

can throw another one in there unless you guys have

21:01

a real strong feeling. Bo, you're always bursting with unpaid

21:04

ads. Do you have a, do you have one? I

21:06

love that as the unpaid ad and I'm in

21:08

size large normal brands. You want to send us

21:11

stuff. Very good. Very

21:13

nice to know. All righty. Okay. Well,

21:16

thanks for joining us and we appreciate you listening. We love talking

21:18

to you and talking to one another and we'll talk to you

21:20

next time on At the Table.