0:06

Hello and welcome to

0:08

Million Dollar Monday. I'm your

0:11

host, Greg Mazzello , bringing

0:13

you real successful people with

0:15

real useful advice for people

0:17

with big dreams. I

0:20

understand big dreams. I turned

0:22

an investment of $200 and

0:24

a lot of great advice from some

0:26

really successful people into my

0:29

big dream proforma that

0:31

today is a half billion

0:34

dollar company.

0:41

Well , hello and welcome. I have

0:43

a first for today, and it is a brother

0:46

and sister team that

0:48

are very cool. They , uh, have developed

0:50

a clothing line , uh,

0:53

that not only is super cool, celebrating

0:55

the simplicity of summer, but

0:57

also dedicated to our environment.

1:00

They are both recognized by Forbes

1:02

Magazine and they're 30, under 30.

1:05

And so I'm excited to introduce brother

1:08

and sister and co-founders

1:11

of Fair Harbor Clothing, Jake

1:13

and Carolyn , Dana Heat , Jake

1:16

and Carolyn , welcome.

1:18

Thank you so much

1:19

For having us. Really appreciate it. Excited

1:21

To be here.

1:22

Yeah. We're, I , I I , I , I love

1:24

your story and , uh, uh, especially

1:27

how you don't just have a cool clothing line,

1:29

but how you're really dedicated to our environment.

1:31

Let, but let's start at the beginning. Talk

1:34

to us about your growing up years

1:36

and, and maybe your school years

1:38

and, and where did you first

1:40

of all learn a passion for business

1:43

and then eventually where did you learn

1:45

a passion for the clothing industry and

1:48

most importantly, our environment?

1:50

Yeah, so thanks for asking the question.

1:53

Um, we, so kind

1:56

of our story in a nutshell is we grew up going to

1:58

this place called Fair Harbor and Fire Island.

2:00

Fire Island is a , it's a island

2:03

off the coast of Long Island, and the island's about

2:05

27 miles long, but only about a hundred yards

2:07

wide. And so there's no cars in the island. Um,

2:09

it's pretty much covered in Boardwalk. And , um,

2:12

when we were kids, really all we need was

2:14

a surfboard and para swim trunks, and that was it.

2:16

And kind of ran around as we learned how to surf and fish.

2:18

And , um, it

2:20

was incredible. You know, it , it's funny when

2:22

we have , we don't really talk about this often, but

2:24

we had a , a strong business acumen

2:26

, um, from the beginning. We

2:29

used to, would , would collect seashells

2:31

from the shore and paint them and sell them , sell

2:34

them to people. We'd have lemonade stands, we'd

2:36

create lanyards and we'd sell them. And that was our

2:38

, um, first lesson on margins

2:41

and trying to figure out how to turn a profit

2:43

by selling goods. So , um, well ,

2:46

And because there's no cars on the island, the only way to

2:48

bring everything around is on wagons. So we

2:50

would kind of create our own wagons on

2:52

different corners, street corners , um, on

2:54

the docks too , people were going down for a sunset. So

2:57

we've kind of made those wagons. Our , uh,

3:00

our mobile, our mobile workshops,

3:02

<laugh> . I love it. I love it.

3:05

Um, but yeah, it continues. So that's definitely like

3:07

our first, I guess, business and entrepreneurial

3:09

, um, or project.

3:12

But , uh, what we

3:14

notice with Far Island in Fair Harbor

3:16

in particular, it's a glorified sandbar. So

3:19

if plastic waste wasn't disposed of correctly, it

3:21

went into the waterways if they on one side ocean

3:23

on the other side. And we started , cuz we, we grew

3:25

up, we started to notice more and more plastic waste washing

3:28

up on the shorts. Oh . And , um, fast

3:30

forward a bunch of years , um, I went to Colgate University

3:32

, um, I played the cross there and , um,

3:35

I went in with the expectation of being

3:37

an economics major. Um , but

3:39

then I started taking some geography classes and

3:41

was learning about global ocean occurrence and climatology

3:44

and ultimately this massive plastic problem.

3:47

And , uh, Caroline at the same time had always been

3:49

super into fashion. She had a fashion

3:51

blog since she was in middle school called

3:54

Case Cook is in Cardigan. So Caroline was

3:57

on the latest trends, but she was also , um,

3:59

considered the tree hugger, our family, so very, you

4:01

know, into sustainability at a, at a very young age.

4:04

And so , um, basically

4:06

with all of these issues going on with our

4:08

environment, I actually ended up running a thesis on

4:11

plastic waste and fact and erosion. So I spent an entire

4:14

semester with the professor really digging down the

4:16

nitty gritties and nuts and bolts of what was happening. And

4:19

in my study , this is back in 2014,

4:21

I found a mill that was actually converting

4:23

plastic bottles in a yarn . And

4:25

so I turned to Carolyn , I was like, we need to do something

4:27

about this issue. And so that's when the idea

4:30

of her harbor was born. And our objective

4:32

was to create a platform to help promote the mitigation

4:35

of uced plastics by making an awesome product

4:37

that people wanna wear and love. And so we make all

4:39

of our products out of recycled plastic bottles,

4:41

about 11 going into each of our shorts. And

4:44

, um, yeah, so really like what

4:46

our mission statement is in a nutshell is we create

4:48

products for people who enjoy the place that

4:50

they love, like Fair Harbor is for us. And

4:53

while they're protecting those places at the same time,

4:55

And it's, it's fine too , based on what Jake

4:57

said, part of my fashion blog , I started

4:59

it actually when I was in sixth grade. So it

5:01

was a way for me to kind of have a foot in the fashion industry while

5:03

still in school. Um, the whole premise

5:06

of it. On the weekends, I would come into the city and go

5:08

to consignment shops and vintage shops

5:10

and try to find a way to make,

5:12

you know, old clothing new again , um,

5:14

by kind of changing the way the styling and

5:17

finding different treasures and finds. And it was

5:19

a way to kind of give fashion a second life

5:21

by, you know, going through that process too.

5:23

So , um, from I think both of our

5:26

standpoint, we've always really had this passion deep

5:28

inside of us and this is just a , a way to kind

5:30

of make a larger impact through , uh, the work that

5:32

we're doing with Fair Harbor.

5:33

I love it. I love it. All right , so at

5:36

some point you talked about having this idea

5:38

and you've discussed the idea and feeling that

5:40

you really needed to do something. Talk

5:42

to our listeners about how do you go from

5:45

this idea, and I think we need to do

5:47

something and some passion about the environment,

5:49

some passion about the simplicity of

5:51

summer clothing and living, right?

5:54

And uh, uh, uh, um, how does that

5:56

go from an idea to

5:58

a real business? Talk to us about those detailed

6:01

steps, like how long did you talk about

6:03

it and then when did you start incorporating

6:05

designing some clothing, putting some

6:08

stuff online? I mean, how did you go

6:10

from an idea to a real business?

6:12

How long did it take and then start

6:15

really designing and selling stuff?

6:18

Yeah , so we first kind

6:20

of discovered this technology in

6:22

the summer of 2014. Um,

6:25

and then in the spring of 2015 or

6:27

the fall of 2014 , um, we

6:29

applied to Kogi University, had

6:31

an entrepreneurship program called Thought Into

6:33

Action. Um, and so basically,

6:36

kind of like what you're saying , um, their idea was like,

6:38

let's take a thought and let's turn it into action.

6:40

So cuz Colgate's a liberal arts

6:42

school, so we didn't have an entrepreneurship major or business

6:44

major or anything like that. And so what

6:47

they did is they connected aspiring entrepreneurs with

6:49

alumni, entrepreneurs who could really help them

6:52

start and mold their businesses. And

6:54

so we started working on it in this fall

6:57

of 2014. Um, we had

6:59

no idea anything about the apparel industry.

7:01

Our our dad was in real estate and , um,

7:04

our mom was a stay-at-home mom. And so again

7:06

, like apparel in general was a

7:08

super foreign concept to us of how to actually get

7:10

stuff made. But we found

7:12

this mill that was converting pla balls in

7:14

the er . And so we thought about what,

7:17

what can we make outta this product? And, and

7:19

Bor Schwartz in particular is the first product that

7:21

we started with. It was a really kind of natural segue

7:24

into starting our business because it's

7:26

where you spend the most time around the

7:28

water. And, and so people typically

7:31

who spend time in the water, around the water

7:33

should have a strong appreciation for the environment.

7:36

Um, and so that was kind of what we started. And

7:38

then we , um, part

7:41

of this program , um, we reward

7:43

the opportunity to pitch at a mock shark tank competition.

7:46

So , um, Colgate put together a Shark Tank

7:48

competition every year and , um, in the

7:50

spring we reward the opportunity show. So we pitched in front

7:52

of Jessica Alba , MC Hammer, Neil

7:54

Blumenthal from Morby Parker, Jessica Oh

7:56

Wow.

7:57

The runway. And uh, yeah, we ended up winning $20,000

8:00

in grant money from the university to start the

8:02

business. Carolina was a senior in high school at the time, and I was a junior in

8:04

college. And , uh, that's how we initially got started.

8:06

You know, I I would say it's a

8:08

lot of, it's a lot of just like cold calls

8:10

trying to figure out, you know, different people that could

8:13

help us , um, and with,

8:15

you know, manufacturing products. And so that was,

8:17

that was quite the journey to figure

8:19

out how to actually get something made. Um, but

8:22

so I , I'd say that that was definitely a very interesting

8:24

part of the , the journey.

8:26

Okay . So you wrote up a business plan and you pitched

8:28

the plan to this shark tank kind of group

8:30

people at , at Colgate, you

8:33

won $20,000, you have

8:35

a source for recycled

8:37

fabric. Um , yep . But

8:39

I still don't know. How do you actually start

8:42

designing and constructing clothing

8:45

and get to the first real cell

8:47

? Tell us about that.

8:49

Yeah , so we actually , um, prior to pitching

8:51

at the Shark Tank competition, we had a consultant who

8:53

had a factory in Guatemala. So

8:56

he had actually, we hadn't designed

8:58

our first pair of board shorts before. So

9:00

it took about a year from the,

9:03

actually more like six months. So from the

9:05

start of 2014 to

9:07

when we pitched in the spring of 2015.

9:10

That's , um, when we actually

9:12

, uh, had our first samples and

9:14

we had a whole production ready to rock and roll.

9:16

So we had a consultant that we hired that really had

9:19

a factory that they worked with in Guatemala. And then we

9:21

manufactured , uh, the fabrics

9:23

, um, in China where we, but

9:24

Before the consultant actually, we

9:27

had ordered some sample yardage of

9:29

this fabric and Jake and I were running around

9:31

the garment district of New York City just

9:33

trying to convince a single sample factory

9:35

owner to allow us to make one simple

9:38

product. Um, and we just

9:40

realized from that that wasn't scaled, like we needed

9:42

to kind of take the next step . So that's when we hired

9:44

the consultant after Jake and I were sweating,

9:47

running around trying to find a , a sample

9:49

maker in the city. Um, so that was kind

9:51

of the first step there too.

9:53

So you're still no revenue , um,

9:55

you're trying to find somebody that you

9:57

got , you got the cloth or the fabric , um,

9:59

yeah , that , that , that , did you design

10:02

the clothing, Carolyn? Was that

10:04

you that actually designed it?

10:06

So Jake and I really compliment each other in that

10:08

sense because Jake focuses

10:10

more on the fit and the construction of

10:12

the garments. And then we collaborate on the actual aesthetics

10:15

and the color and the inspiration for the seasons. Um,

10:18

but that's, we , um, yeah, we kind

10:20

of worked that way.

10:22

So you're both young, you're in, you're,

10:24

you're in , you're in college, Jake and Carolyn's

10:26

, uh, in high school. Where

10:28

does the money come from to hire a

10:31

consultant and do some of these things still

10:34

pre-business formation?

10:36

Our consultant was paid

10:38

a commission on the amount of products that

10:40

we produced. Ah ,

10:41

Clever.

10:43

So basically , um, we

10:45

had our samples. We didn't pay them anything until

10:48

we actually won the grant. And

10:50

then with the grant money we

10:53

basically utilized it to

10:55

purchase our first line of production.

10:57

And after that too, because, you know, we're

11:00

still figuring it out and we didn't really have,

11:02

we had our website but um , weren't really spending

11:04

on digital or anything like that in terms of actually getting

11:06

people and traffic to the site . So

11:08

Jake and I took it to the, to

11:10

the road and we did trunk shows. So in

11:12

the first four years of the

11:15

company , um, we did over 500

11:17

trunk shows , uh, just going out and

11:19

we traveled up and down the east coast going to

11:21

small beach towns, talking to everyone, at anyone

11:23

who would hear our story and touch and feel our product. And

11:26

at the same time, you know, that was really our market research

11:28

that people were giving us feedback on,

11:30

you know, the product that fit the customer experience.

11:33

And that was really kinda those pivotal years.

11:35

What is a trunk show defi , help

11:37

me understand, is that where a group of people put on a fair

11:39

by a beach or is that you just going to

11:41

the beach and saying, Hey, look at our swimsuits,

11:44

or what is that beach trunk show ?

11:46

A little everything <laugh> . We

11:48

, we, we had a plastic table, like

11:50

a fold up table that we put in the back of my car and

11:53

we had a bunch of like product and

11:55

we would like, we would talk to different store owners

11:57

and we'd set up in front of their shop or we would

11:59

set up in a park or we'd set up on a beach or

12:02

there'd be an event. And yeah,

12:04

so really, you know, no, no event

12:07

was really too small. We were actually joking cuz I actually

12:09

did a , a trunk shot of pumpkin patch one time

12:11

. <laugh> .

12:14

I love it. There's a lot of

12:16

hustle. I say hustle builds muscle. So good

12:18

for you guys. But wait a minute, I'm

12:20

still a little confused though, Carolyn , you're

12:22

still in high school and then college, so how

12:25

are you able to straddle school

12:27

and trunk shows and

12:30

all this other stuff?

12:31

It was definitely a lot. Um, and I think

12:33

it, you know, it seems a little less painful

12:35

looking back in terms of cuz every, you

12:38

know, every summer that's really when we did

12:40

our trunk shows . So it was, you know, my summer, ah

12:42

, summer off and then, yeah, really

12:44

since my senior year in high school I've been doing

12:47

Fair Harbor. Um, but every Sunday, you

12:49

know, I would sit down and map out my, my week

12:51

in terms of when I had classes, when I'd do my homework,

12:53

when it was fair harbor time. Um,

12:56

and ultimately just, I, we've

12:58

been so passionate about this from the beginning

13:00

and so make you make the time. Um,

13:03

and so

13:03

Yep , yep . Yeah , yeah , yeah , yeah . And how

13:06

were you feeding yourselves? Um

13:08

, or , or did you start making pretty

13:10

good money from these trunk sales right away?

13:14

Uh, no, I, I lived at , thankfully

13:16

my parents are are good people

13:18

and let me live at home for the first few

13:20

years after school. My parents

13:23

was in college, so yeah, no, I, we didn't pay ourselves

13:25

for quite some time. It

13:27

was really just , um, I, I

13:29

know people say the , the ramen diet, I wasn't quite on

13:31

the ramen diet, but pretty close to it.

13:33

<laugh> , I get it. Yeah , no , it's

13:36

all good. I love it. I love it. So , um,

13:39

it, that sounds like you stopped doing

13:41

these trunk shows three years

13:43

ago, four years ago, something like that. Yeah,

13:45

In 2017 we realized that

13:48

the trunk shows were not scalable

13:50

in terms of, so we could do a lot of 'em . They're

13:52

profitable, they're a good way for us to get the brand

13:54

out there and talk to people. But they weren't

13:56

scalable in terms of what we actually wanted to, you

13:58

know, make the company how big that we saw that

14:01

this company could be and aspirationally

14:03

where we wanna take it. And so that's

14:05

when we raised a small round of friends and

14:07

family funding to invest into

14:10

our D d C infrastructure. And so that was really making

14:12

sure that we had the infrastructure to

14:14

really build out to support some growth from

14:16

an econ perspective ,

14:18

Pay per click the money mostly went to your

14:21

pay click PPC strategy is what

14:23

you're saying? Um, no , I

14:25

Wouldn't say so. Most

14:27

of our marketing was paid for through

14:29

credit cards. Um, it really went

14:31

into developing , um,

14:34

it really went into developing kind of

14:36

the infrastructure from an e-com standpoint.

14:38

Revamping our website , um,

14:40

went to , um, making sure

14:42

that we had the proper consultants or

14:45

agencies to work with. Um,

14:48

and, and yes, we wanted make sure that we did have

14:50

an ad budget , um, to go alongside

14:53

that growth.

14:54

But we have been pretty, I mean we've

14:56

been really bootstrapped since the beginning and as we

14:58

mentioned before, we actually shipped all of the

15:01

product out of our parents' garage up

15:03

until 2019 and

15:05

oh , it was, it was a lot. Um , but ultimately

15:08

we needed to have a proof of concept

15:10

, um, and keep the low , you

15:12

know, overhead lean .

15:13

It got crazy at one point we

15:15

had, you know, we were sending up to 500

15:18

to a thousand orders per day from our parents' garage.

15:20

That's alright . I guess if

15:22

, uh, I guess if it's okay for Amazon

15:24

to start from a garage, it's okay for you guys. So

15:27

that's exciting. But come on, you're

15:30

brother and sister, you fight sometimes,

15:32

huh? Come on.

15:34

I have to say it's, it's kinda we,

15:37

you know, I think we do compliment each other and we

15:40

had, I think, you know, we have complimenting

15:43

skillsets and if we didn't we wouldn't be, you know,

15:45

where we are today. And I think we

15:47

can support one another respect to another and ultimately

15:49

trust one another. Yeah . Uh , you know , obviously, you

15:51

know, family dinner tables are, are one thing,

15:53

but ultimately, you know, there's, it's been, it's

15:55

been really great to be able to do this together

15:58

and um , yeah . And share the ups and

16:00

the downs and our whole family's been incredibly

16:02

supportive too from day one as we were mentioned. How

16:04

fun

16:05

Mm-hmm .

16:05

<affirmative> . Yeah. From shipping to the, you know, out of our garage

16:07

and um, everything like that.

16:09

How fun. Well I'm excited for

16:11

you. So , um, and I

16:13

love the idea about how you , um,

16:16

were a part of a pitch competition, you know, especially

16:18

we've had a few other folks who are Forbes

16:20

30 under 30 and I'm learning that these

16:23

competitions really are a great way

16:25

to raise money and some of them aren't even limited

16:28

to students at the school. There are

16:30

some of them that outsiders can even come

16:33

in and then there are other incubator competitions.

16:35

So it really is a great way , way

16:38

to bring in at least uh , an initial seed

16:40

round. Alright . Tell us about

16:42

a couple of the things that maybe

16:45

mistakes that you made

16:47

along the way that gave you what

16:49

I call, you know, a very expensive mba

16:51

. What were the lessons you learned from

16:54

some of the things uh, that didn't

16:56

go quite right?

16:57

I would say the first mistake

16:59

that I made that, or that

17:01

we made that was incredibly important was

17:04

, um, in our first line of production.

17:07

Um, it was , uh, so our first line of production, we

17:09

had the fabric we manufactured in Guatemala

17:12

and uh, you know, like I mentioned before, we

17:14

didn't have any idea how to actually build

17:16

or manufacture a product. We were taking our consultants

17:19

work for it, we had our general ideas

17:21

of how we wanted the garment to construct and look

17:23

and everything like that. And we were

17:25

having a launch party at the Delania

17:27

rooftop. We only made, we made 500 shorts,

17:30

we had five different colors, so a hundred of each

17:32

color. So really, really small production. But

17:35

it was, it was a great way to get started. And

17:37

we're having a launch party at the Delane

17:39

rooftop in, in , um, lower Manhattan

17:42

in um , lower East Side. And um, I

17:45

am going to the bathroom and I'm opening up my

17:47

fly to go to the bathroom and the Velcro completely

17:49

comes off and I'm like, oh my God,

17:52

this is horrible. Turns

17:54

out that on one color of the shorts,

17:56

the factory had actually glued down the

17:58

Velcro instead of sewing the Velcro down .

18:00

Ooh . Oh, you were wearing one of the products,

18:02

Correct. I was wearing, I

18:04

was wearing one of our shorts cause

18:06

We have a fly failure <laugh> .

18:08

Correct. And I was like, this is horrible. And

18:10

so , um, it was our

18:13

first lesson and we had already sold 20 of

18:15

the products. Oh . And so it

18:17

was our first lesson in customer experience

18:20

and also product quality. So we reached

18:22

out to all 20 people that got it. We got them to send it back.

18:24

We sent it to, we found a local seamstress who

18:26

sewed them down, sent it back to them. And

18:30

um , those are still some of our best customers today, you know,

18:32

and I think that sure , it was a mistake in

18:34

not understanding really how to make a

18:36

garment then we should have been looking for these things. Um,

18:38

but then a lesson in how

18:40

important customer service is and that, you

18:43

know, if you treat a customer well, you have a great

18:45

product that they'll keep coming back.

18:47

You know, one other thing too, looking back

18:49

, um, when we were first diving into digital

18:51

marketing, we outsourced it to

18:54

begin with and um, you know, while

18:56

we worked with a few different agencies here and

18:58

there, we didn't actually know what we were looking

19:00

at. And so we decided to take it in house and

19:03

do it ourselves and learn every part of it so

19:05

then we can, you know, bring people on. And

19:07

once, you know, we really understand everything

19:10

that goes into it. And I think that was a big lesson too for

19:12

us because ultimately we needed to do

19:14

everything ourselves and really understand

19:16

it so then we can help teach and coach people , um,

19:19

once we kind of are able to do it that way

19:21

too .

19:21

Yeah. Nobody cares

19:24

as much about your product and

19:27

your sales as you do. And um,

19:30

yeah, I completely agree and understand

19:32

that decision. Alright . Talk to

19:34

us about a couple of the massive successes,

19:37

the great successes that really

19:39

taught you , um, that you were going

19:41

in the right direction that taught you some other

19:43

great lessons.

19:46

That's a good question. Hmm

19:49

.

19:50

Um, a massive success

19:52

that has taught us that we're going in

19:54

the right direction

19:56

Or that just was a great decision. I don't

19:58

Know if there's been like, there's hasn't been like

20:00

an aha moment, like, that was awesome.

20:02

I'd say there's been a lot of little wins throughout

20:05

the way. We had a , a nice breakout

20:07

year in 2019 and in 2020

20:10

that was gonna be a kind of our, our growth year

20:12

and we haven't placed a bunch of inventory bets

20:14

. And , um, we

20:19

had in March of,

20:21

you know, March 13th, we, it was

20:23

at , that's kind of when the country started shut down. And

20:26

then in April , um, men

20:29

swimwear was the fourth quickest clowning

20:31

online category online. And

20:34

we had to really figure out how we

20:37

were going to continue building our business and how

20:39

we were gonna continue forward. Like, we had a lot of inventory.

20:41

And so I , I'd say that was a

20:43

huge lesson for us because we had to be

20:46

incredibly scrappy and, and learn how to

20:48

pivot the business. So we figured out how to

20:51

sell our shorts in a different way, how to portray

20:54

how to , and we film some our , of ourselves, we

20:56

collaborate with influencers, we

20:58

leverage our email list. There was tons of different things that we

21:00

did that, you know, we wouldn't

21:03

have been able to do if we hadn't had that

21:05

pressure. But it was because we had that pressure that

21:07

we were able to make these small little victories

21:09

and test out new things. And then once we had something

21:12

that was working, we put our kind of foot

21:14

down the pedal and then we continue to , to scale

21:16

it that way.

21:17

You know, there's a lesson in that and that lesson

21:19

is that sometimes there really aren't

21:21

massive victories. And a lot of, a

21:24

lot of people that I know that are angel investors

21:26

or a venture capital type people

21:28

would say they don't believe in hockey sticks.

21:31

You know, hockey sticks is when somebody says maybe sales are

21:33

gonna go like this and then they're gonna go like that. Kinda

21:35

like shaped like a hockey stick and there

21:37

are no hockey sticks. And um , and

21:39

so sometimes there are no massive big wins.

21:42

There are just grind , grinding

21:44

it out. Great little decisions

21:46

that at the end of the day lead to a

21:49

big business. Jake and

21:51

Carolyn , I've really enjoyed our time together. Thank

21:53

you very much and all my best to

21:56

Fair Harbor Clothing. Thank

21:58

You very much. Thank you for having

21:59

Us. Really appreciated it.