Know Your Customer or Lose Your Brand | Emily Blumenthal & Alex Greifeld

What separates brands that grow from those that stall? In this episode, growth marketing consultant Alex Greifeld shares why defining your ideal customer is the foundation of every successful fashion brand. Drawing on experience at FIT, Jones New York, Tibi, and Tapestry, Alex explains how leading brands balance creative instinct with real market data. From building a clear unique selling proposition to understanding customer acquisition costs, unit economics, and digital marketing, she offers a practical roadmap for founders looking to grow smarter. Alex also shares her approach to content creation, short-form video, and what unconventional brands like Brandy Melville can teach designers about standing out in a crowded market.

Key Takeaways:

• Know exactly who you're selling to — Clear customer definition drives every successful marketing decision.
 • Growth starts with the numbers — CAC, unit economics, and positioning matter as much as great design.
 • Content builds trust — Consistent, authentic storytelling is one of today's most powerful growth tools.

🎧 Listen now for actionable marketing strategies every handbag designer and fashion founder should know.

Our Guest:
 Alex Greifeld is a fashion growth marketing consultant who helps brands scale through customer strategy, digital marketing, and content. With experience spanning FIT, Jones New York, Tibi, and Tapestry, she combines merchandising expertise with performance marketing to help fashion businesses build stronger brands and sustainable growth.

Host Emily Blumenthal is a handbag industry expert, author of Handbag Designer 101, and founder of The Handbag Awards. Known as the “Handbag Fairy Godmother,” Emily also teaches entrepreneurship at the Fashion Institute of Technology. She is dedicated to celebrating creativity, craftsmanship, and the art of building iconic handbag brands.

Find Handbag Designer 101 Merch, HBD101 Masterclass, one-on-one sessions, and opportunities to book Emily Blumenthal as a speaker at emilyblumenthal.com. 

Transcript

Start With The Real Customer

SPEAKER_00 0:00

So I think that's the first step is no matter what your your end goal is, you need to know who your customer is. You need to define who that is, why whatever you're producing is a good fit for her. You need to think about the other brands that she'll be shopping because she's going to compare you to those things. That's going to like benchmark the category for her. And you need to be able to give an elevator pitch of like what is it you're selling and why is it unique?

Meet Alex Greifeld And Her Path

SPEAKER_01 0:31

Hi, and welcome to Handbag Designer 101, the podcast with your host, Emily Blumenthal, handbag industry expert, and the handbag fairy godmother. Each week we uncover the stories behind the handbags we love from the iconic brands and top designers, the creativity, craftsmanship, and culture that define the handbag world. Whether you're a designer, collector, or simply passionate about handbags, this is your front row seat to it all. Welcome, Alex Greyfeld, growth marketing consultant, specifically with a specialization in fashion. Welcome to Handbag Designer 101. Thank you for joining us today. Thank you for having me.

SPEAKER_00 1:17

It's great to be here.

SPEAKER_01 1:19

Yeah, I spotted you on Instagram. And then I think we continued our friendship on LinkedIn as most people do these days. I love, love, love your content. And then when I took a personal deep dive, and you know, as I tell my students, the old people hang out on LinkedIn. That's where the flexes go. And I looked at your background, and not only did you go to FIT, but you've worked at Tapestry, you had a plum internship at Gap. All these things are pretty hard jobs to get. And I said, oh, this is a girl in the know if she's able to score all of that. So welcome. Thank you for being here.

SPEAKER_00 2:00

Yeah, thank you. Yeah, I've been working in the fashion industry, I guess, more than 15 years at this point, which is kind of crazy to say.

SPEAKER_01 2:10

Well, you look great, not a day over 22. Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 2:14

Thank you.

SPEAKER_01 2:16

So you went to FIT. Was that your intention? I know they have, and they have a major that they've rebranded about 30 different times. Now they call it FBM fashion business marketing. Is that what you were focused on? Because you know, I taught my students you are one of the chosen few who go and get into the school because so many people apply. Like people don't seem to realize how difficult it is to get into that kind of school. So was that your dream school?

SPEAKER_00 2:47

Yes. I mean, honestly, I wanted to get into FIT since I was in like sixth or seventh grade. Oh. And I applied and got into the design program initially. And that was what was your portfolio? It was a lot of garments that I'd made. Like I got really into sewing in high school and took lessons. And so it was a lot of things I'd made and then some sketches. And what I really liked about FIT were two things. First was that they were so focused on like the technical aspect of learning how to actually make clothing. And then the second was that it's it's a state school. So the tuition is a lot lower than like a lot of like Parsons or Pratt. So yes, that that was like absolutely my dream. I wanted to be a fashion designer. I actually did get a job in fashion design. My first summer internship was at Jones, New York. And then they offered me a full-time job halfway through school. So I switched to what was then called fashion merchandising. Yep. Between like between year two and three of my degree, so that I could complete some degree, like essentially nights and weekends, because you you couldn't do that. Like you couldn't complete the fashion program like that. So now yeah, that was kind of like my my intro to the industry. That's crazy.

SPEAKER_01 4:12

It's such a I mean, I teach entrepreneurship. I have to have you come in as a guest speaker for sure. That's one of a I love bringing people back, especially people who've gone. But it is a labor-intensive program. And I think a lot of people tend to poo-poo people in design and don't seem to realize how much work goes into finishing that and then getting to the point. And the fact that the school is broken down technically into two different chunks, like it's very much almost like you're getting a double degree, essentially.

SPEAKER_00 4:46

Yeah, it was people were not sleeping. I mean, I I need my sleep, so I wasn't one of the most intense people, but yeah, it's like an incredible amount of work.

SPEAKER_01 4:56

But to get a job in Jones, New York, now Jones is a is a at least at that time, Jones is a really interesting company because it was a large-scale company. They had licenses, it's a very busy, corporate-heavy, not beautiful people, fashion-related, bottom line company. Were you kind of, did you take that job? I did.

SPEAKER_00 5:22

And the reason I took the internship, I mean, I think like a lot of people, my goal initially was to work at like a designer price point. And I wanted to get an internship that first year, like transparently, because I, so I grew up in New Jersey commuting distance of the school, and I didn't want to have to go back and just like spend my summer in New Jersey working at a restaurant or something. Right. So I really wanted an internship. And I got that internship because through almost through like a family connection. Like my aunt's neighbor worked in HR there. So they were able to get me in the interview pipeline and they pay and they paid. And it was, it was like I interviewed at some of some smaller, higher price

Internships, Networking, And Corporate Culture

SPEAKER_00 6:05

point designers, and they were all unpaid internships. So I just like for purely practical reasons, that's what I decided to go with.

SPEAKER_01 6:13

I think you also bring up an interesting point. And I and I talk about this a lot with my students, that the opportunity of using every connection you have, because there's a lot of, and I have found this specifically, there's a lot of bitterness of people, oh, I don't have these connections, I don't have this. There are ways to network without having connections, and even so much as using the friends, neighbors, like never ever underestimate putting it out there what you want, because had they not known what you were looking for, they wouldn't have said, hey, let me let me hook you up, Alex, let me make a phone call on your behalf. Right. And just because you got that intro didn't even necessarily guarantee you a job. Like you still had to deliver.

SPEAKER_00 7:00

Yeah. And actually, this is a still kind of an embarrassing story, but I almost got let go from the job within like my first week there because, and I only bring this up because I think like I was basically a first generation corporate employee. Like my parents and their siblings all worked either blue-collar jobs or like government jobs. Like my parents were both in the safe jobs. Yeah, safe jobs. So I didn't like my my frame of reference on what it means to be a good employee is kind of like show up, shut up, work hard, do what people tell you. And like in a corporate environment, you're supposed to be showing like more initiative. It's kind of like the relationship between employer and employee is kind of different than if you're working at a grocery store or something. So yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 7:52

I didn't really think put my head down, do what I'm told. And what you're looking for is a shining star. Let me know your thoughts, like have an opinion, have a voice, but do it respectively. And yeah, you're so right to go into that environment and have no voice because it's expected from your experience, your home experience, not to have a voice because you go and do your job and come home. It's very, very different, juxtaposed with you being a design major at the time where all you're doing is showing your vision, which is probably what got you in the door to begin with.

SPEAKER_00 8:27

Yeah, I mean, it was I was fortunate that they gave me feedback and that I was able to figure out how to execute on that feedback. And and so at the end of the second summer, my second summer internship there, they offered me a full-time job. So I was able to figure things out essentially.

SPEAKER_01 8:47

So, you know, like because your your background is is very high-level impressive, even from you know, someone at a junior level, you were at very impressive places that had a lot of high expectation, right? So even if you are a cog in the wheel of a big company, you were still had like top-level expectation that you still needed to deliver. It's not like in a smaller company where you're doing everything and hopefully it'll work out. I find this also fascinating, taking us to understanding the essence of what a growth marketing consultant within the e-commerce space really means. So can you speak a little bit about your background in these places that uh really gave you this insight to say, okay, I see how the market functions. I even think now I can possibly go off on my own because in a lot of design environments, and it really depends where you are, they sometimes have designers sit in sales meetings and sometimes they don't. And sometimes design follows sales and sometimes they don't. And I think in those larger environments, they're so bottom line focused that you need to pull the emotion out of what's being designed and what's being created and say, okay, this didn't work. Done next, let's move on. We didn't understand our customer well enough. So can you speak a little bit about that?

SPEAKER_00 10:24

Yeah. I would say that. So I worked at the denim group within Jones, New York. So that was like, I wonder if anyone's going to remember any of these brands, but it was like nine West jeans, Bandolino Blue. We did a lot of licenses for Jessica Simpson. And then, like we did that time was massive. Yes, was like huge a huge business. And then we did a lot of private label for different department stores. So it was a very department store-driven business. And I entered, I think I started there full-time basically right before the economy collapsed in 2008. So, like the timing on that was very fortunate. And I was lucky I didn't get laid off like purely for that reason. But I could within, you know, a year of being there full-time, I could kind of see the writing on the wall where like the department store as a business model was kind of

Department Stores Fade And E-Commerce Rises

SPEAKER_00 11:20

entering a period of decline. And we would get insights about what worked and what didn't, but it was always filtered through the buyers at the department store is none of our brands really had an e-commerce or a direct-to-consumer presence. So I could sense that there was like this missing on information that could have helped us design better, but like that we didn't have it.

SPEAKER_01 11:44

Were you in a position to say something or you just you were too low? I mean, the reason why you were kept is that you were so inexpensive to keep. You were so low level. But, you know, I I always say, listen to what everybody has to say, never not use your voice. And I'm sure because it's so corporate, it's not like you, of all people, was in a position to be like, hey guys, I I've noticed that, you know, retail is kind of in a downswing and this mall thing, not so good, huh? What do you think? What can we do to change that? Right. It's not like you were in a position to say that.

SPEAKER_00 12:16

Yeah. And at that time, it was a lot harder and more technically involved to set up an e-commerce operation. Like that was pre-Shopify. So you were building your website from scratch. You needed like a true software engineer to do it. So it was basically the whole field of e-commerce and like digital marketing and social media, it was something I was just getting a lot more interested in and kind of exploring on my own time. But it was, it just like was not going to be happening within our business because it's your classic story of like the legacy player who really leans on a certain business model. They don't have a lot of um intrinsic motivation to jump to something totally new. The same way a lot of cable companies are getting like hurt by streaming. It's the same deal. But it was all that aside, like it was a compared to like a more design-driven brand, which I have, I so I worked at Tibby in my digital marketing career. That was like a truly design-led brand. Jones, New York, and all of our brands. We got a line plan from merchandising at the start of every season. And it's like, you have to go out and design five variations on our bestsellers and like five pants at this hem length. And it was like very cut and dry in that way.

SPEAKER_01 13:45

I mean, Tibby is still, she's very hands-on. It's not a big company, she's super savvy, but was it weird to go from big to small like that?

SPEAKER_00 13:57

You know, it wasn't that strange because I think a little context will be helpful for people to understand this. So after my time at Jones, I basically made a decision where I'm like, design is not the career for me. I'm gonna pivot to digital marketing. So I left without any real backup plan. I spent about a year kind of like freelancing and doing internships and working at this very, very small company, doing like a jack of all trades kind of support role. Then I transitioned over to Viacom, actually working for one of their cable networks, doing digital marketing. From there, I went to a footwear company called Donald Pleiner. They were private equity owned, but they were pretty small, especially compared to Jones. From there, I went to do an MBA for two years and then I went to Tibi. So I had at that point, I had experience with like very corporate environments and then smaller, scrappier environments. So it wasn't, it wasn't that much of a shock, but I think what was the hardest adjustment was the fact that sometimes it almost like the long-term focus. Like everywhere else that I had worked before was like, what what do we have to do this quarter? And how does that it's like very business-driven decision making on the creative side. This was like we want to be, we're at point A in two years, we want to be at point B. That might mean short-term pain for sales numbers, but we're gonna like see this through.

SPEAKER_01 15:31

Right. To have an MBA within this kind of fashion-related field, you never are gonna get the remuneration that your contemporaries are getting, right? Like

Pivoting Careers And Getting An MBA

SPEAKER_01 15:45

I got my MBA and I started my handbag brand during that time, and I was the only one who was thinking remotely fashion or anything. And everyone else was it was really an interesting thing, like, oh God, uh I guess I got this degree for education because clearly this isn't going to get me a bigger paycheck. So, was that something that was in the back of your mind, or were you like, I can finally feel confident to go into the space that historically I didn't have that kind of experience?

SPEAKER_00 16:14

Well, I think I was in a little bit of a unique situation because my degree was so creative focused. So, what I was I finding was I was in a manager level role at Donald Pleiner and I was like trying to apply for new jobs and progress up and like at least get to like a senior manager, ideally become a director. And I knew I had the kind of like the technical capabilities to do it because just because of like what I had been doing up until that point. But a lot of the roles I was applying to or wanted to apply to explicitly said like MBA is preferred. And just most of what I was getting in terms of interviews were were basically lateral moves to companies that were going to be a very similar situation. So for me, it was a way to resolve a career block. And I thought, like I even wrote in my my application essay, I want to become a director of e-commerce and digital marketing at a fashion brand. So it did, for me, it did improve my salary prospects, but obviously you don't make as much as someone going into banking or consulting.

SPEAKER_01 17:29

So at some point you make it to tapestry, and it was already tapestry at that point, right? They had already done the transition. So what was that like going from Tibby, which was smaller, still, you know, one captain of the ship, versus now you're back into a big, not so much Jones like situation, but the coach is tough. Like it is a tough environment. The expectations are high, they keep you on your toes. They're so success-driven, which I think speaks to obviously where they're at right now. But was that like a new kind of boot camp in terms of making you probably where you are now?

SPEAKER_00 18:14

Yeah, there were two sides of it. The first was it was everything you said, but amplified because the first day that I interviewed for the job was the first day that like New York and the tri-state area shut down for COVID. So I woke up planning to go into the tapestry office. It was like March 2nd or something. Yeah. And they emailed me and they're like, no one's coming into the office. You're gonna have to do all these interviews over the phone. So I actually went into the tapestry offices one time, like through my entire two years there, because that was like a full overlap with the the COVID period. And I worked for a tapestry versus one of the brands specifically. So our job, like the the whole reason my department was built out was um we were building out like a like a customer data insights platform that was consumer-facing. So it wasn't like a database you had to code to get your answers and your audiences out of. It was like a like a consumer-friendly platform. So basically like onboarding all the brands onto that and like teaching them how to use it. So it was a role that required a lot of kind of like relationship, well, training,

Tapestry, Data Platforms, And Going Solo

SPEAKER_00 19:35

relationship building, explaining highly complex technical concepts to non-technical people. I think it would have been easier if we were all in the office, honestly. I'm sure. But but it was like, you know, I learned so much from it. I think the biggest thing I learned was that comparing that to my work at Tibby or Donald Pleiner, like the things that really lit me up were not necessarily like consensus building. It was implementing new things and like testing and learning and seeing numbers go up. So I kind of got it was interesting. I got about two years in, I had my daughter. And then I was kind of like, okay, this is my opportunity to go out on my own, but it also overlaps with this major life event. So I'll try it for six months, 12 months, whatever. And if it doesn't work out, I can always, you know, just chalk it up to life transition and find a full-time job again.

Handbag Designer 101 Masterclass Offer

SPEAKER_01 20:35

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Define Your Buyer And Your USP

SPEAKER_01 22:10

But the takeaways are having been at those two other companies or many other companies and understanding this. I have done a lot of programs with designers, and I've hosted two incubators with some successful independent designers. And it was really interesting. And again, I talk about this so much. So anyone who listens to this podcast will know that most designers feel their customer to be this beautiful people person, very chic, very metropolitan, modern day carry from Sex in the City. And we talk about like, and God, I'm sure you could you could talk this into the ground, but the very rudimentary, like, look at the zip codes of your customers. Go into C where they live socioeconomically. And there's a strong chance that your customer is living in tiny dot USA, potentially plus size, lives in a small town with a stop sign, a church, a Walmart, a bar, and a school. So to understand how to sell, you have to understand the ethnography of your customer, like where they eat, where they shop, what they buy, what car they drive, all of that. So how much of that did you have to dive in? Because I doubted the other places you were so focused on the lifestyle and the consumer, because you can't sell to someone if you don't know where you don't know how to fit into what their actual needs are. The needs and the wants are so different.

SPEAKER_00 23:59

Yeah. I think the biggest misconception or shock in the fashion category is most designers, yeah, you're right. Like they do, they're designing for this person in their mind who is 25 years old, size zero, and somehow lives in like a floor-through loft in Soho, I guess because they're they're an heiress or something. And that's that's not a lot of people, and it's not really enough to build a business off of. So that's that's just something you kind of have to grapple with. And it doesn't mean that you have to make all of your advertising about that woman, but it's and it also doesn't mean there's not a market for like really like a mini, like a strapless mini dress or something. Maybe she does wear it. But the more that you try to fight that reality in whatever it is you're doing, obviously the harder the time you're going to have. And I think a lot of independent designers start off their business online with like digital advertising. And it's especially like if you're going out to find your customers on Instagram, Facebook, Google, you have to take what I said about the 40 plus year old woman and like times it by 10, because those are the people who are using those platforms and clicking through ads and buying things from them. So again, it doesn't mean that your all your models have to be over 45 and all of your ads, but it's just something to keep in mind.

SPEAKER_01 25:44

So I saw your content. Talk a little bit about what you speak about on your platform, where you think sweet spots are, where you think opportunities lie within this space, keeping in mind that the people who listen to this is twofold. It's we have a creative community and then we have a handbag community. So again, and and and one of the special things I'd like to say about my podcast is that we cover everything within the realm of handbags, whether it's retail, wholesale, buying, online, e-com, trends, and so forth. Because I know within your tenure at this point, you you have a lot of, you have a lot of thoughts. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 26:35

So I'd say there are two different ways to think about it if you're trying to start a brand, whether it's handbags, footwear, apparel. You can either go into it like this is my personal perspective on design. And like, this is what I want to create. And I want to go find some kind of market for that so that I can like sustain myself financially for this. Maybe I'll never do a million dollars a year in revenue, but I'll be able to do this and like support myself. I won't have to go out and get a full-time job. So, like, that's one frame of reference. And then the other is I want to go find white space in the market so that I can grow my brand to be like at least doing 10, 20, 50 million dollars a year in revenue. So the concerns and like the way that you think about opportunities are different for both of those. I speak with a lot of, especially since I started posting online and like people DM me. I speak with a lot of people who are actually doing the first thing, but they kind of think they're trying to do the second thing. They're not really sure. And they don't actually, at the end of the day, it's like they can't elevator pitch what they're trying to sell and they don't understand who they're selling it for. So I think that's the first step is no matter what your your end goal is, you need to know who your customer is. You need to define who that is, why whatever you're producing is a good fit for her. You need to think about the other brands that she'll be shopping because she's

Building A Content System That Ships

SPEAKER_00 28:05

gonna compare you to those things. That's going to like benchmark the category for her. And you need to be able to give an elevator pitch of like what is it you're selling and why is it unique?

SPEAKER_01 28:17

Your USC, your unique selling point. So talk a little bit about your content and what you post and like what we can expect when we start tuning in to your feed channel and content.

SPEAKER_00 28:33

So I started posting at this the beginning of this year because maybe another embarrassing thing to admit, but I didn't spend a lot of time on Instagram or TikTok before that point. I actually built my social presence on Twitter and it was like very writing driven. Like I hadn't have a newsletter and I had this Twitter account. And I was mostly speaking to people in the e-commerce space. Like I had some followers who ran fashion brands, but a lot of it were people who had like skincare brands or they sold like diet supplements or whatever. So I was like, okay, you know, video short form video is like where things are moving. It's how people are spending their time. I'm gonna make it like my New Year's resolution to figure this out and start to build some kind of following on Instagram and TikTok. And so I did a number of things to that end, and I can talk about them if you want, but it's kind of like inside baseball. But the things that I posted, I decided to post about fashion versus e-commerce and marketing generally, because it's just more interesting to people. Like even if you've never worked in marketing, you don't know anything about advertising, your fashion is like a topic that lights people up. So when I post is generally about the the tension between the creative side and the business side of fashion and how that basically like how brands deal with that or how the consumer experiences that. You know, I wish I had more of a plan, and my goal is to develop more of a plan, but it's like I have a general idea of kind of like the themes that I cover. And I subscribe to a lot of fashion newsletters and listen to some podcasts. So basically, like I'll go throughout my week and kind of like absorb all whatever's happening in the industry, just like kind of mentally make a note of things that are interesting or that might overlap with the topics I usually discuss. And then on Wednesdays or Thursdays, I'll sit down and actually try to write out my scripts. And I'll I'll usually shoot them on Fridays or Saturdays because that's when I wash and style my hair. So it's like you have to be the whole thing, the whole content production uh cycle is based around my hair schedule.

SPEAKER_01 31:24

Listen, I think if anything makes you sticky, that in itself, it's like it's my Saturday wash day. Here I am. Let's go. Yeah, that's awesome.

SPEAKER_00 31:35

So yeah, I'll shoot on Fridays for the upcoming week and then like edit it kind of on a rolling basis because the green screen videos honestly, from end to end, those probably take like three or four hours to make from like scripting to shooting to editing. That the editing piece of it is so tedious and it is so tedious.

SPEAKER_01 31:55

Yeah. So tedious. It is so hard to do. It really, how long do you think it took you to really feel like you had a had a hold on the process?

SPEAKER_00 32:05

I still don't feel like I have a hold on the process. Um, like this week, I I mentioned before we got on the call how I was solo parenting last week. Like I'm I'm not posting five times a week this week because I just could not, I didn't have the energy to like shoot five videos for this week. So my goal, I think, is to I'm recording this from my office. You can tell that it's pretty blank back here because I just moved in maybe like two months ago at this point. But my goal is to decorate it a bit more so that I can move away from 100% green screen videos.

unknown 32:45

Right.

SPEAKER_00 32:45

And it will become like less time intensive to edit. But in terms of content, I basically have a notes document on my phone. And whenever an idea pops into my head, I just put it down there religiously. And then when it's time to write scripts, I'll return to it and say, like, okay, I can go somewhere with this. Like, I'll I'll run with it.

SPEAKER_01 33:08

And you read them live to yourself, or do you have a do you memorize them kind of thing? I do a mix.

SPEAKER_00 33:15

If it's a topic that I've really been stewing over, I'll just create a few copy points and kind of improvise it. But for anything where there's like a lot of dates or figures, so the Cap Cut app has a teleprompter feature, and I'll just like write the script and read it off the teleprompter, but kind of inject my own. Like if I get to a line and it feels weird, I'll just

Brandy Melville And Category Rule Breaking

SPEAKER_00 33:40

kind of improvise on it.

SPEAKER_01 33:42

What were the last things that you've been talking about recently?

SPEAKER_00 33:45

I just did a video about Brandy Melville, which I knew was going to be controversial because they only sell clothing in one size. And historically it's been a very small size. Although apparently what I learned from people commenting was that they increased that one size. So now it's closer to like a six, eight than a zero, two, which like, yeah, which is is crazy. And now I want to actually go to the store and like validate that. And maybe I'll make that a whole like side quest video, but you'll have to you'll have to wait in line, which is even crazier.

SPEAKER_01 34:22

Okay, yeah, that's that's I don't want that alone. Let's time that in. Recently they had a an interview day because I heard from some people in the neighborhood, and it was like every teenage girl was either working there or waiting, and they had crops of people coming in for interviews. And yeah, it's hey, whatever they're doing is working, and for much as as much as people are hating on the brand, it's still giving them more airtime to talk about it. So bad publicity, good publicity, it's still very much in the not to use a very like overdone word, it's very much of the zeitgeist. It's not going anywhere today. This is so interesting. Is there any other nuggets that you want to share about where you see e-com going within the space that you can leave us with that people could think about?

SPEAKER_00 35:19

So I think kind of tying it back to the Brandy Melville thing, what they did and the the reason they're so successful is because they completely defied category conventions. Like if you spent your career in the apparel industry, the idea that you would only sell your brand in one size, that's like saying, well, it's like the same thing Red Bull did. Like, we're not going to compete on taste. We're going to make something that tastes bad, but we're going to market the functional aspect of it. They invented the whole energy drink category. So it's like you do something that the people who have been in the industry where it almost, it's it's like, let's make the sky purple. It's like it's just something that's so out of the realm of possibility. And they weren't afraid to kind of draw a line in a sand and say, this is who we're for as a brand. And it we know that it'll probably make people angry, but it's like you either kind of get it or you don't. One of the reasons that was so effective was because when you only sell one size, your inventory turnover is a lot higher and your return rates are a lot lower because it removes a lot of the variability from your sell-through. So it's like there was a huge financial lever in making that decision. And they don't do a lot of paid marketing. So it's like the e-commerce landscape, especially, is getting a lot more competitive because the barriers to entry have never been lower. So it's like the way I think about it is almost anyone who has a solid plan can make one or two million dollars a year selling online. You have to know the some things about the business side of it and the merchandising side of it, but like that pie, there's like a tiny little nibble of the pie that almost anyone can go out and get. But because for that exact reason, becoming a billion-dollar brand is like a lot harder than it was even 10 years ago. And if you want to become like a, you know, a $200 million brand or a billion-dollar brand, you have to do things that other people are either too afraid to do or just like too lazy to do.

SPEAKER_01 37:24

Yeah, look, I have been in this for a long, long time. And I'm not bitter or angry. And so many people who, as I'm sure you worked with, who've been in industries for a long time, get really bitter and frustrated and they're over it. And if you ask anybody to start a fashion business, a retail business, a handbag business, to go into anything, anyone you ask. Like if you ask an older doctor, I want to be a doctor, the first thing they'll say is, oh, don't do it. It's awful. And I think sometimes it takes fresh eyes and a fresh perspective to be that. I say if you're starting a business or a brand, you have to be the fastest, the first, or the best. And once you pick that lane, you have to kind of fight hard to stay in it. And back in the day, retail e-com was kind of like a sidekick to in-store. And now any designer who wants to get picked up hypothetically by Macy's has to subscribe to Dropship and they need to prove their sales on dot com before they're even remotely lucky enough to be in store. So it's totally upside down now in terms of like, okay, we need to see that your brand with fans that can guarantee and show up that will buy or buy the product before I'm gonna commit to you. So it's just an interesting tale. And I and I I appreciate you sharing those too, because they really speak to like, if you're gonna be an innovator and a disruptor, you better, you better be ready for the fight because the CAC, the customer acquisition cost is gonna be that much higher

Where To Follow Alex And Wrap-Up

SPEAKER_01 38:55

because you need to educate the people to show them that you're the pioneer and you're worth that trip. But Alex, how can people find you, follow you, and enjoy your very educated e-com growth marketing consultant, specifically specializing in fashion content?

SPEAKER_00 39:13

So my Instagram profile is Alex Greifeld. Will you be able to put it in the show notes? Yeah, yeah, yeah, of course. Because I otherwise I'd spell it out, but T. I always sell it though, it's important. Okay, so it's A-L-E-X-G-R-E-I-F-E-L-D. And then I have a newsletter called D T C Fashion Decoded. You can find it at dtcfash and decoded.com. I send it out uh twice a month, and it's it's a mix of like uh strategic case studies and then like really tactical advice for you know, if you're a brand who wants to sell online, how do you make Facebook ads work for you? Like what kind of numbers and unit economics do you have to have? Like basically like the the really hands-on technical things you need to know to grow a brand with e-comm. Okay, this has been awesome.

SPEAKER_01 40:08

Thank you, thank you, thank you, Alex. And I strongly recommend everyone to tune in, whether you are starting a brand or are very much interested in how brands work and grow, because Alex, Alex seems to have the pulse on all of that. Thank you so much for joining us. Thanks for listening. Don't forget to rate and review and follow us on every single platform at Campbike Designer. Thanks a lot. See you next time.